The Last Priest

by Amy Cross

  “So how are they burning now?” Charley asked, watching as flicking lights continued to dance on the wall ahead. “Who the hell lit them?”

  Without answering, Chris made his way along the corridor. Figuring that she needed to stick close to him, Charley made sure to stay quiet as she followed, and when they reached the end of the corridor they found that it turned right and then opened out onto a small ledge. The pair of them exchanged a concerned glance, before they edged forward and finally found that they'd somehow managed to make it back to the large spherical chamber they'd found earlier. This time, however, everything looked different.

  Several torched were burning on the walls, bringing just enough flickering light to illuminate the space. Down at the bottom of the steps, in the round pit at the base of the chamber, a tall, thin figure could be seen, working on something that had been laid out on the slab.

  “What is it?” Charley whispered, keeping her voice as low as possible as she watched the figure's back.

  Chris shook his head.

  Moments later, the dark figure stepped to the other end of the table and picked up a tool. The shape on the stone slab was more visible now, and Charley saw to her horror that it was Duncan, with his dead eyes wide open and a bloodied wound on the side of his head.

  “He's preparing him,” Chris whispered with a hint of awe in his voice.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean he's preparing him for...” His voice trailed off as he saw the long, hook-ended implement in the figure's hand. “He's mummifying him,” he continued. “That device he's holding, it's used for -”

  Before he could finish, the figure moved back toward Duncan's head and pressed the tool town, digging the hook deep into the dead man's nasal cavity and then twisting it slightly.

  Feeling as if she was about to throw up, Charley turned away, but a moment later she heard a sickening crunching sound, as if bone was being broken.

  “He's extracting the brain through the nose,” Chris whispered.

  “Don't tell me,” she replied, her voice trembling with shock. “Please, I just... We have to get out of here.”

  “He has the...” Chris paused for a moment, before leaning a little further forward. “My God, he has the tablets.”

  “What tablets?”

  “The ones from Ah-Shalla's sarcophagus,” he continued. “The priest must have removed them after Ah-Shalla's death.” He paused again, before turning to her. “Don't you get it? He stayed behind to wait for Ah-Shalla to rise, and when that didn't happen, he was supposed to just die. But he didn't. Instead, he must have unsealed the burial chamber and removed the tablets himself, and then...”

  “And then what?” Charley asked, wincing as she heard more crunching sounds from the stone slab.

  “It works,” Chris said, his voice filled with shock. “It actually works. The priest has been waiting all this time, hoping that Ah-Shalla would eventually rise.”

  “No,” Charley replied, “that's not possible.”

  “It's happening right in front of us.”

  She shook her head.

  “Charley, look for yourself!”

  “No.”

  “Charley -”

  “I don't want to see it!” she said firmly, her voice trembling with fear. “I can imagine what it looks like, okay?” Pausing, she realized she could hear a sickening crunching sound.

  “This is it,” Chris continued, “this is proof of everything we've been working for. The legend of Ah-Shalla's tablets was right, it's some kind of mechanism that allows the dead to return, or allows life to be prolonged, or... Whatever it is, whatever kind of recipe or revelation, it's the most valuable thing in the world.”

  “And that's why my father paid for this expedition?” Charley asked.

  “Your father's a smart man. When I proposed this expedition to him, he was already curious. He'd read up on Ah-Shalla, but I still had to persuade him that he should put money into what we were planning.”

  “So you pushed ahead,” she continued, “even when you knew it might be dangerous, even after Martha and Henrik were killed, you wouldn't let anything hold you back.”

  “I had no idea about this,” he replied. “Seeing this priest, it's like... Three people have died over the past day, Charley, but think how many more will live, and live longer, once we get this discovery back to the modern world. When your father's company manages to understand how the tablets work, the whole world will get to benefit from the knowledge Ah-Shalla uncovered all those years ago.”

  “For a price, of course,” Charley said bitterly. “My father never does anything unless there's a huge profit to be made, and he doesn't care who gets hurt in the process. He must be -”

  “Get down!” Chris hissed, grabbing her by the shoulder and pulling her out of view, just as the priest began to turn and look up toward them.

  “Did he see us?” she mouthed, too scared to actually speak.

  Chris shook his head, but he waited a moment before slowly peering back through into the chamber. “No,” he whispered finally, “he's...” He paused. “He's leaving. He's heading to the door that leads into the warriors' hall. I think he's going to the burial chamber. If he doesn't know that we opened the sarcophagus, he'll find out in a moment.”

  “What about Duncan?”

  “He's still on the slab, and so are...” He paused again, before turning to her. “So are the two stone tablets.”

  “We have to get out of here.”

  “With the tablets.”

  “Are you insane?”

  “We need to cut through the chamber anyway,” he continued. “There was another turning in the corridor, remember? If we go across the chamber and then along that corridor, I think we'll be able to get back to the entrance hall, bypassing the stones that fell. Then we're out of here and clear.”

  “Are you sure he's gone?”

  He peered around the wall again. “There's no sign of him, come on.” Grabbing her arm, he led her out onto the ledge and then down to the steps.

  “This is insane,” she whispered, looking around for any hint that the priest had returned. By the time they reached the bottom of the pit, however, her attention had been drawn instead to the dead body on the slab. Duncan had been partially wrapped in bandages, but his head had been left exposed and there was a bloody hole where his nose had once been. Turning to look away, she spotted several golden bowls nearby, containing fragments of bone and brain matter as well as what appeared to be glistening intestines and internal organs.

  “We've got them,” Chris said, holding the stone tablets in his hands and staring at the faded inscriptions. “Damn it, if Duncan was alive, he could translate the text for us here and now. We'll have to get them back to London before we can get another expert to look, but from the description I'm sure this is them. Charley, come on, it's time to get out of here.”

  Frozen in place, Charley stared at Duncan's heart, which had been deposited in a bowl of its own.

  “Charley,” Chris hissed, grabbing her arm. “This isn't a good time to flake out on me. Don't make me leave you behind!”

  She turned to him.

  “Of course I wouldn't do that,” he continued, “but -” Suddenly his attention seemed drawn to something behind her.

  Turning, she saw to her horror that a shuffling figure had emerged from the door at the far end of the chamber and had now stopped. Although the light in that part of the room was low, she could just about make out a dark, painfully thin figure wearing tattered robes. After a moment, she saw that its dried, withered face was staring straight at her, and that most of its skin had worn away to reveal the dark, stained skull beneath.

  “Move!” Chris said firmly, pulling her away from the stone slab. “For God's sake, run!”

  “We're dead,” she replied, hurrying after him. “It saw us!”

  “I'm pretty sure we can run faster,” he muttered as they made their way up the steps and into the corridor. He grabbed his torch f
rom his belt and switched it back on. “We're almost out! Just stay with me!”

  Glancing over her shoulder, she saw that the figure had already made its way down to the bottom of the pit and was calmly picking up another of its tools. Although she hated to turn her back on it even for a moment, she forced herself to follow Chris along the corridor. Her mind was alternating between stunned blank shock and moments of blinding clarity, interspersed with flashes of Duncan's body being torn open by the priest and the sight of that glistening heart -

  “Stop!” Chris said suddenly, putting a hand out to keep her from going any further.

  “What's wrong?” she asked, although she immediately saw that the route up ahead had been blocked by fallen stones. For a moment she froze, terrified at the thought of having to go back toward the chamber, but after a few seconds she was that there was another opening in the wall. As Chris shone his torch through, they both realized they'd found another corridor.

  “It's our only choice,” he said, starting to climb through.

  “Are you insane?” she hissed. “You don't have any idea where this leads!”

  “It definitely leads away from that thing we just saw in the chamber,” he replied, “and it probably leads to some kind of exit. Come on, there's no time to stand around debating every move.”

  Reaching out to start climbing into the next corridor, she saw a couple of spiders crawling across the wall and brushed them away, before finally managing to scramble through. Taking a moment to find her footing, she saw that Chris had already begun to run, so she switched her torch back on and then raced after him.

  “Wait!” she shouted.

  “Damn it,” he muttered as they reached the end of the corridor, only to find that there were two possible routes. He shone his torch around frantically, causing the beam to zigzag erratically across the stone walls.

  “It's like a maze,” she said.

  “Are you still keeping that map going?”

  Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out the pencil and piece of paper.

  “I told you to make a note of every turn!” he hissed.

  “I'm doing it,” she replied, quickly jotting down the corridors and turns they'd taken since leaving the chamber. “We should be...” She paused, trying to remember the layout of all the rooms they'd found so far. “I think we should be somewhere near the exit, but that doesn't mean there's going to be a door that'll let us through.”

  “Which way?” he asked.

  She looked left and then right. “I -”

  “This one,” he said firmly, pushing past her and making his way to the right.

  “I'm not sure!” she called after him. “Chris! Wait!” Realizing that he was starting to panic, she figured she had no choice but to keep close to him so she followed, while trying to work out where they'd end up if they followed the corridor. Up ahead, Chris stopped again and when she reached him she saw that they'd reached yet another intersection, with tunnels running left and right.

  “Now what?” he asked, turning to her. “You're the one with the map! Which way?”

  “I think...” She looked down at the piece of paper for a moment. “Right,” she said finally, turning to head that way. “I think we -”

  “No, this way,” he said, already heading in the other direction.

  “I don't think that leads out,” she replied, stopping and turning to him. “Chris, will you just listen to me? That way leads right back into the heart of the pyramid!”

  Stopping up ahead, he turned to her. “Are you sure?”

  “I think so.”

  “No, I don't care whether you think so,” he continued, “I need to know if you're absolutely sure.”

  “I...”

  Before she could finish, she saw something moving in the darkness behind him. She froze for a moment, telling herself that it was just her mind playing tricks on her, before she spotted the withered, dead face of the priest looming out of the shadows.

  “Behind you!” she screamed.

  Chris began to turn, but it was too late. The priest grabbed him by the shoulder and slammed him into the wall, breaking one of Chris's arms and causing him to cry out in pain. In the process, he dropped the two stone tablets he'd been carrying and they smashed against the floor, shattering instantly.

  “Wait!” Charley shouted, hurrying toward him but stopping when she saw that the priest was holding the long, hook-ended instrument he'd used on Duncan in the chamber.

  “No!” Chris shouted, trying to get free. “Charley, help me, get the -”

  Before he could say another word, the priest pushed the hooked spike into his nose, driving it deeper and deeper and then twisting it around with one firm, quick movement. Charley watched in horror as Chris's eyes rolled up, and he let out a faint, gurgled cry before the priest began to pull the spike out again. When the hook emerged, it brought a scooped section of bone and brain, followed by a torrent of blood.

  “No,” Charley whispered, with tears in her eyes as she watched Chris dropping to his knees. Blood was pouring from his face, as the priest pushed the spike in again, pushing it so far this time that the hook began to scrape against the inside of the skull. After a moment, the priest pulled the spike out again, this time bringing out not only chunks of brain matter but also long strings of membrane. More blood began to dribble down Chris's face, and he slumped down until the priest took hold of his collar and held him up.

  Frozen with fear, Charley stared for a moment.

  Suddenly the priest turned and looked straight at her. With her torch shining straight ahead, she could see the priest's face properly now: its skin had become weathered and thin, as if dehydration had caused it to shrink and wrinkle as it clung to the skull beneath, and several large patches had worn away to reveal the angles of the skull beneath. Where once there had been eyes, there were now two gaping holes, while the skin around the creature's mouth had begun to come away, revealing its yellowing teeth. There was something strangely calm about the priest's gaze, as if after one thousand years of patience, it knew that its latest victims were trapped.

  Dropping Chris's body, the priest took a step toward her.

  “No!” she shouted, turning and running. She had no idea which way to go, so she simply raced along the corridor, and the next, and then the next, determined to get as far away from the creature as possible. Whenever she reached an intersection, she simply took the left turn, hoping against hope that somehow she'd miraculously find her way out, but each corridor seemed to be followed by another and when she finally had to stop to catch her breath, she felt as if she'd been going around and around in circles.

  Hearing a noise in the distance, she started running again, but still she found nothing but a series of corridors, all of which looked exactly the same as one another. Finally, just as she began to feel that she'd never find a way out, she emerged on the platform again, overlooking the large round chamber. She tried to stop, but it was too late and she toppled forward, tumbling down the steps until she slammed into the stone slab at the bottom and cracked her head.

  Chapter Eleven

  “And you really don't remember how you got out?” her grandmother asked, placing a bowl of marshmallows on the table.

  “Bits of it,” Charley replied, looking out at the lawn beyond the porch and watching as her dog Walter sniffed one of the rose bushes. “I think I was pretty badly hurt, so I just have these... flashes. Like, fragments of memory but without much linking material between them. The doctor said more might come back eventually, or it might not. We just have to wait and see.”

  “Your father's spitting feathers,” the old woman continued, turning and making her way slowly toward the back door. “He wants to pay for you to go to Switzerland and see some new specialists. He's convinced that's the only way you'll be able to remember the location of that temple. He thinks the information is in your head somehow, and he won't rest until he's found a way to pull it out.”

  “I'm not going,” she said firmly,
turning to her. “No way. I'm glad I don't remember how we got there.”

  “So what is the last thing you remember?”

  Charley paused for a moment, watching as Walter peed on the rose bush and then sauntered across the lawn to find something else to examine.

  “I remember...” In her mind's eye, she saw the priest, but that was a part of the story she hadn't told anyone yet. After all, it was too impossible, it couldn't be true. She was worried that if she started talking about the priest, she'd end up being locked in a psychiatric hospital. “I remember hitting my head when I fell,” she continued, “and then I remember stumbling around in the dark. My torch was broken. I thought I had no chance of getting out, not after we'd been searching for so long, but then suddenly, like a miracle...”

  Another pause, as she watched Walter pawing at the flowerbed.

  “Suddenly I was back at the archway,” she added, “and the rain had stopped, and I made my way across the plateau. I thought about going back inside to look for the others, but I knew... There was no hope, they were dead. So I went to the tents and found they'd been destroyed by the storm. Fortunately, rainwater hadn't actually got inside, so most of the supplies were dry, including the satellite phone. I tried to get through to someone, but I guess the weather was interfering or something, so I just took what I needed and started walking through the jungle.”

  “But however did you find your way back to the town?”

  Taking a marshmallow, Charley chewed for a moment before swallowing.

  “Pure luck, I guess,” she said finally, with a faint smile. “I guess it has to happen sometimes, right? I got there, and the locals could immediately tell I was in trouble. They looked after me really well and got me back to the city, and from there we were able to get in touch with the university. Dad arranged for me to get a plane home, and then...” She paused again to eat another marshmallow, while watching the dog as it took another pee. “Dad wanted me to stay at his place,” she continued, “but I wanted to come here.”