by Madyson Rush
Her skin was clammy. She was sweaty but chills ran up her spine. Her vision was spotty. It was hard to concentrate. It hurt just to move her leg. Reality was catching up with her, taking its toll. She could only run for so long. Worse, where they were headed, there would be no hospitals or doctors.
Asor opened his eyes and returned her stare. His thin lips curled into a grin.
For a moment, she was certain he was still inside her head. She could hear him breathing. He crowded her thoughts as he searched through them, looking for something. Was she crazy? Could he really be in her mind? Claustrophobia overwhelmed her.
“Stop,” she said aloud.
For a moment, he released her.
All she felt was cold. She pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them.
Asor mimicked her movements.
“Stop it,” she insisted. She felt him reel away from her thoughts, leaving a trail of despair behind him that he wanted her to follow. He tempted her with doubt.
His eyes seemed to glow. “Aren’t you scared?” he asked.
Thatcher responded straight-faced. If he wasn’t inside her mind, she could mask her uncertainty. “I have nothing to fear.”
“Thy life shall hang in doubt before thee; and thou shalt fear day and night, and shalt have none assurance of thy life.’” Asor knew she was terrified. He fed on her fear with frenzy. He smiled, showing his rotted teeth. “Do you believe in God, Dr. Thatcher?”
She pulled Marek’s crucifix out from under her shirt. “Damn straight.”
“I wonder...”
“What?” She pulled her legs more tightly to her chest.
“Will you still believe after God fails you?”
They sat in silence as she absorbed his words. She didn’t know what he meant, but she was sure it was significant. Mostly, she knew Asor could not be trusted. She watched him fall asleep, unwilling to let herself dream again.
Chapter 74
Ian tried to roll onto his back, but he was wedged between two crates in the bed of a Unimog truck.
The jungle canopy arched over the edges of the roadway providing some shade, but the middle of the truck bed was awash with sunlight. He groaned, feeling every bruise as his sunburned body bounced against the metal lining of the truck.
Dust spewed up from the road, amassing in a thick cloud that blotted out the trucks following behind. The haze cleared momentarily as they drove through a streambed, and Ian saw Javan in the passenger seat of the Unimog behind them.
A person shuffled beside Ian’s head.
Ian recognized Dettorio’s boots.
Sitting near the cab on top of a crate, Javan’s henchman guarded Ian with a rifle propped between his legs.
Good grief.
Ian closed his eyes. If he pretended to be unconscious, that might spare the last few non-bruised portions of his head.
Chapter 75
SUNDAY 3:20 p.m.
Wadi Musa, Jordan
“Keep her up until she dies!” Asor was yelling over a sputtering engine.
Thatcher sat up and knocked her head on the roof of the cabin. It was a painful reorientation of her whereabouts. Despite her best effort to stay awake, she had drifted to sleep. At least it was a dreamless sleep—one where Asor did not penetrate her mind.
Thatcher stood behind the pilot chair. “Are we stopping for fuel?”
It was daylight. How long had she slept? The sky was clear blue, the sun on the horizon, but her mind was in a fog.
Daylight penetrated the small porthole windows. They dipped to the left. Beneath the wing, water spanned every direction. The plane suddenly banked south, and she caught a glimpse of Jordan’s rocky coastline.
“We made it all the way to the Dead Sea without refueling?” she asked, buckling herself into the seat behind David.
“Don’t ask me how.” David flicked the oil pressure gauge with his finger. The low voltage light blinked off and on. The needle stayed below zero. “Both engines aren’t generating enough electricity. They haven’t been for the last three hours.”
As if on cue, the turbines sputtered out. The propellers stopped spinning. The altimeter spun counterclockwise. They tipped toward the water.
“Hope y’all brought your swimsuits.” David gripped the wheel.
The old man bounced up and down in the navigator seat. “Catch the wind!”
“There’s no wind!” David snapped.
As they dropped, the Red Sea overtook the view of the entire windshield. There was nothing but water. Gravity played chicken with Thatcher’s stomach. A sudden updraft caught the wings. The plane was tossed back into the sky. For a moment, the sea disappeared, replaced by stratosphere. David adjusted the wing flaps, catching as much momentum as possible. They tipped downward and glided toward the coastline. The landing gear sliced through the waves, and the relic heap threatened to break apart.
They were so close to land.
There was a terrible crack as one of the wheels broke off against the crags. They were a few feet above sea level with half the landing gear stripped away. Half a mile and they would make it.
Asor pulled on the prickly twine around his wrist. He squinted in pain, and mumbled under his breath.
An unexpected burst of wind tossed the aircraft over the surf. The left wing collided with a boulder on the beach. With a gut-wrenching scream, the wing separated from the fuselage. The plane spun around backwards from the impact, tossing Asor into the windshield. The glass cracked.
They flipped left again and again over the sand. Landing upside-down, the Anson slid across the rocky seashore loam. The ceiling ripped apart like it was cardboard. The scream of metal grinding against rock was horrible. They finally came to a stop, the cockpit inches from another boulder. One fractional change in velocity, and they would have been breakfast for seagulls.
David unbuckled his seatbelt and fell onto what was left of the ceiling.
Thatcher rubbed her neck. Reaching above her head, she unfastened her seatbelt and caught herself in the sand.
Asor stirred, face down on the ground. His body was speckled with glass from the bone-breaking force that had thrown him into the windshield. He sat up, unbothered. “We don’t have much time!”
Chapter 76
The Unimogs rolled to a stop beneath a camouflaged shelter. Vehicle doors opened and shut. Dettorio jumped from the truck bed, and relieved himself in the nearby brush.
The bed gate came down. Its rusted hinges squeaked as the door collapsed into position. Ian was pulled out by his feet and dumped on the side of the road. He kept his eyes closed until he heard a flimsy door swing shut. The men rejoined the others to help set up camp. They’d placed him inside a cage of branches. Crooked sticks, half an inch in diameter, were lined side-by-side to form a square five-foot tall enclosure. The structure was probably intended for chickens or pigs. If he tried, he couldn’t stand or lay fully extended in any direction.
Through the trees near the road, Ian could see Javan barking orders. Ian sat up slowly and leaned his head against the wood. His brain was throbbing. Surely his head was one gigantic bruise. He could taste dried blood within the cracks of his lips. His skin felt sticky and hot. He could tell Javan’s toxic substance had mostly cleared from his body.
Nobody seemed to care that he was conscious.
He scooted to the back of the cage and attempted to pry apart the bars. The sticks were weather-beaten but strong. The cage didn’t budge.
Plan B.
He noticed a rock partially covered with soil. Scooping out handfuls of earth, he clawed at the ground, trying to find the end of the rock. It was too big. He could never conceal something that large. He leaned against the wood frame, discouraged. The jungle canopy was too thick to see any significant distance. If he did escape, where would he go?
He looked at the stone protruding outside the cage. It broke ground again a few inches away. Although covered with pale green moss, he could see dark markings etched into its s
urface. Symbols, squares and circles, formed the shape of a cross.
Ian forced his hands through the narrow separation between the bars and brushed moss off the stone. He cleared dirt from its center. The rock was ornately carved, the surface flat and the symbols bold. The blocky, swooping figures were ancient Mayan. The vertical portion of the rock had the form of a tall ceiba tree. Thick lines detailed the trunk. Its branches opened into the sky, reaching for the heavens and toward the Mayan symbol for the Milky Way. The horizontal portion of the cross depicted a double-headed serpent, a representation of the ecliptic pathway of the moon and the sun. The ceiba tree’s roots delved deep into the underworld, stretching into the bowels of hell.
He realized exactly where they were.
“The Wakah-Chan.” Javan startled him. “You found a Tzuk te’. Those rocks are scattered all over this area.”
Ian scowled.
“The Mayans believed the world was flat and had four corners.” Javan crouched beside the rock. “They had four gods, or four bacab, and each ruled a corner of the earth: the north, the south, the east, and the west.” He pointed beyond the ceiba tree. There was another rock beside the petroglyph, inside Ian’s cage. Ian hadn’t seen it until Javan pointed it out. Smaller and roughly the size of a baseball, it was flat on top and composed of obsidian.
“Each bacab was assigned a color. The North is white, the East is red, the West is black, and South is, of course, yellow.” He smiled. “A startling choice of colors, don’t you think? Exact to the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.” Javan unlocked the cage. The door swung open. “Do you know where we are?”
Ian’s voice was low. “Chichén Itzà.”
“You’ve been here before?”
“No.”
“But you’ve heard the legends?”
“My father taught them to me when I was a kid.”
“Did he tell you about the Platform of the Skulls?”
Ian cleared his throat. “The Mayans threw human sacrifices off the platform into a pit as an offering to the gods.”
“According to tradition, the few who survived and escaped the pit were considered chosen by the gods.”
Ian was tired of the cat and mouse. He came straight to the point. “Why are we here? We should be in Wadi Musa.”
Javan smiled. “Why would I get caught up in one battle, when I can win the war?”
“I don’t understand.”
“There’s more at stake than one seal. There are four of them, remember? We’re here to make an offering and receive knowledge.”
Ian’s stomach churned with nausea. “You’re throwing me into the pit to see if I can escape—to test whether I am the Chosen?”
“Do you think the gods will spare you?” Javan’s face was serious. It was the same look he had given Ian at the Lothian post office. “Death is the doorway to life, son.” He shook his head. “I don’t believe you’re the Firstborn Chosen, Ian. I know it.”
Chapter 77
SUNDAY, 4:51 p.m.
Wadi Musa, Jordan
“Three flares, two light sticks, a climbing rope, and 24 hours-worth of food and water—for one person.” Sweat dripped down David’s forehead. His tongue was swollen, but he refused the luxury of a drink.
“We’d better be quick about it, then,” Thatcher said, hiking ahead of him.
They’d found a backpack filled with emergency supplies under a seat in the cockpit. They were crudely under-equipped. The chance that all three would survive more than 24 hours seemed remote at best. Even if they managed to find the seal, they were miles from civilization.
Regardless, Asor led the way, increasing his anxious pace.
Thatcher struggled to keep up, hobbling between the two of them. David could see disease fester in her wounded leg. He could only imagine the pain of her swollen calf as it burned under the crushing sun. Spidery, vein-like lines of opportunistic infection zigzagged across her leg. The woman desperately needed medical attention.
Dread stirred in his gut. It was unbearably hot, and only midday. They were surrounded by dryness, miles and miles of nothing. Desolate sands, desiccating wind. His skin leather, taut over his bones, cracked in the heat. Beyond the blurry heat waves, he could see dark thunderheads gathering over the mountains of Wadi Musa. A rare desert storm was creeping towards them. He tried to shake the mirage from his head. It didn’t rain in the desert.
“Let’s rest a minute,” he suggested, knowing Thatcher would never ask. He handed her the water bottle. “Sorry that it’s warm.”
“It’s wet.” Gratefully, she took a drink.
Asor found a spot of shade beside a boulder. He leaned against the rock and searched the horizon.
Thatcher took a seat in front of him, staking her own small claim of shade.
David removed glow-sticks from the backpack to lessen the weight of the load. He put them in the pockets of his cargo pants.
“I must be going mad.” Thatcher pointed at the distant storm. “Do you see that?”
David blocked the sun with his hands and squinted for a better view. “Unless we’re both going crazy, it might actually be raining in a few hours.”
Thatcher took a larger sip from the bottle. “I guess that means there’ll be more of this.”
David smiled. It was an optimistic point of view considering the last place they’d want to be during a thunderstorm is the bottom of a slot canyon. Runoff from the lightest rainfall could build in the elevated portions of the canyon and wash through the narrows at breakneck speeds. He pulled the pack over one shoulder and looked at the mouth of the Wadi Musa. The canyon was a few miles away.
Thatcher didn’t move. Hot, biting wind blew over the sand.
Something glittered near Asor’s feet. The old man picked it up and brushed off the sand. “Luck for me, eh?” he said, showing them the small Bedouin coin. He juggled the coin around his knobby fingers and made it disappear. To Thatcher’s annoyance, he reached behind her ear and pulled out the coin with a gasp.
Unimpressed, she looked away.
“I’m boring her, David,” Asor said. “She doesn’t like my tricks.”
He snatched her wrist. She tried to pull away, but his grip was too strong.
David stepped in to help her, but Asor stopped him with a wave of his hand.
“I know what she’s thinking.” He looked up at David. “‘How do I do it? Where do I get this miraculous power?’”
“‘Miraculous?’” Thatcher scoffed. “Whatever you’re capable of, it’s perversion.”
Asor was delighted by her response. “This power exists in everyone. It’s mind over matter, if you will.”
Thatcher tried to pull away.
Asor wouldn’t release her wrist. “What frightens you more, Dr. Thatcher, witnessing my power or considering the possibility that you possess the same ‘perversion?’” He tightened his grasp and placed the coin on the inside of her palm. “Tell me what you see there on your hand?”
Thatcher scowled.
“Look down at your hand and tell me what you see,” Asor insisted.
Thatcher gave him a willful glare. “A coin in my palm,” she said through clenched teeth.
“‘A coin in my palm,’” he mimicked her voice. “Where’s your imagination?” He waved his hand over the coin and it disappeared. “Now what do you see?”
She looked up at David. “Nothing.”
“Are you sure?” Asor asked. “Close your eyes and tell me what you feel.”
Thatcher looked down and then at David again.
David nodded, curious to see the trick. She hesitantly obeyed. After a moment, her nose drew up in a mix of wonder and disgust.
“You can feel it,” Asor whispered. “It’s still there, resting on your skin. You can feel the weight of metal in your hand even though your eyes betray you. Describe how it feels.”
“Warm from the sun.”
“Do me a favor, Dr. Thatcher. Empty your mind of all other thoughts. Feel nothing but the coin. Envi
sion the physical forces that keep the coin on your skin. Gravity holds it down, keeps it in place. Energy spins around it. Faster and faster, the energy turns. It heats the coin. It changes the metal from warm to hot. Burning hot.”
Thatcher gasped and tore herself away from him. The coin fell into the sand, the metal a molten crimson color. A blister formed on her hand.
Asor grabbed her arm again and held it up for David to see. She started to pull away but froze. She looked up at David, wide-eyed. He knew whatever it was, she couldn’t tell him—not in front of Asor.
“When you learn to transcend pain, your body can transcend reality,” Asor said. “The human mind is enslaved by disbelief. ‘Ask, and it shall be given you, seek, and ye shall find.’”
Thatcher stared at him defiantly. “‘I stood upon the sand of the sea and saw a beast. Upon his head was the name of blasphemy. And power was given unto him to overcome all kindreds, tongues, and nations.’”
“Impressive,” he hissed.
“I’m not finished yet,” Thatcher said. “‘Let no man deceive you, for the wicked shall be revealed, even him who is after the work of Satan…with all power, signs, and lying wonders.’”
David folded his arms and looked at Asor. “You’re not the only one who can quote scripture.”
“A woman of hidden talent.” Asor gestured to her hand.
“I didn’t do this,” she said.
“It only works if you believe.”
David took her wrist and examined the wound. “It’s an illusion, nothing more.”
Asor raised an eyebrow. “Is it?”
“A good magician makes his audience think it’s real.” David set the backpack on the ground. “The mind is powerful, I’ll give you that.” He took her wrist and cupped his hand over the burn. “But it’s merely the power of suggestion. There’s no blister, no burn.” He removed his hand from Thatcher’s wrist. The wound was gone. He offered her a hand up.