by Aiden James
“Yuh..yes.”
I rolled my eyes, despite the fact that no one could see me. “Jesus. Well, try to relax, will you? You’re not helping anything.”
I left Miss Da Vinci to figure out how she would live life without her iPhone and found Ishi in the dark. Not too hard to do since he was chuckling lightly.
“Your girlfriend is funny,” said Ishi.
“She’s not my girlfriend,” I said irritably.
He chuckled some more, then grew somber. After a moment, he asked, “So, how’d they travel through here in the old days?”
“Hey, you’re right,” I said, surprised I hadn’t asked myself this question yet. “There’s got to be a torch somewhere along the walls. Marie, check the cave wall to our left, and I’ll check the one to our right. If it follows what we’ve seen in other older caves in this part of the world, we shouldn’t have to search for long.”
“I’ll look for two rocks to create a spark,” said Ishi. “We can use our clothes and my pickaxe handle to make a torch.”
“Great thinking, as long as something’s dry...you won’t find a dry stitch on me,” I said. “Let’s see what we can come up with in here...just try not to get bit by anything.”
“By what?” asked Marie, worriedly.
“Spiders, bats, snakes, things like that,” said Ishi, his tone nonchalant.
I could almost hear her gingerly touching the walls....
“Maybe I should handle this on my own,” I suggested. “You can’t treat this like a country club luncheon, Marie. Just work your hands through the webs and whatever else is stuck to the walls, and—”
“Got it!” she cried out.
“So you know what I’m getting at?”
“No, I mean I am holding a torch!” she advised, and I could hear the triumph in her voice. “Give me your lighter.”
“My what...oh, shit. Here it is,” I said, after fishing it out. Yeah, I know. I should’ve thought of it right away. But I thought I’d left it with my smokes in the Jeep. “It might not work after taking a bath in the river.”
But it did work, and I saw that she was indeed holding a torch. Not an ancient one, which was probably a good thing, although it wasn’t exactly a recent torch either. “You’re father’s old torch?”
“Undoubtedly!” she said, triumphantly.
“Why would he leave his torch behind?” I wondered aloud
“Hard to say,” she said, immediately bringing the torch up closer to the wall closest to her, where several rows of pictograms had been carved into it. “There could have been a number of such torches. Perhaps they left this one behind for the way back.”
I nodded. Leaving a marker behind—a torch, in this case—was a good idea, actually.
Ishi’s primitive skills might’ve come in handy, but he was just as happy to deposit the two small flint-like pieces he had recovered from the cave floor into his pants pocket.
“I told you I thought this was the right place where we needed to be. The signs are right here!” Marie enthused, as she held up the torch to another wall covered with primitive writing that I didn’t recognize. Even relic hunters know their way around Mayan and pre-Mayan glyphs, but we can be stumped. “I realize that none of us can read what has been inscribed here, but the map has a key. I’ve memorized most of it, so let’s see if I can figure this out without having to dig it out of my...oh shit, where did I set my fanny pack?”
“Ishi, check her fanny,” I said, unable to resist one more zinger.
Ishi chuckled and said, “She took it off on the ledge when we were all being chased.”
“Great, just lovely,” she murmured, then grew silent as she studied the wall. Ishi and I watched as she silently mouthed her pronunciation of the symbols, reading from a line that ran across the middle of this particular wall. A moment later, she started to grin...and then her grin soon morphed into a look of childlike fascination. “It’s here...somewhere in this room!”
“What’s in the room?” I asked, while Ishi and I followed Marie as her frantic gaze moved from wall to wall.
“The doorway to the tunnel that leads directly to the treasures we seek is in one of these walls,” she said, moving quickly, stepping over scattered stones. “What the glyphs just now revealed is the corresponding symbol that won’t be as easy to...Ishi, would you mind holding the torch for a moment? This might be what we’re looking for.”
Ishi held the torch as high as he could and Marie dusted aside a spider’s web and its makers, now totally unconcerned about a potential bite. Funny what getting close to a treasure does to someone. She was standing before the flattest section of the wall, alternately wiping and blowing away dust.
She pointed excitedly. “Oh, my God...it sure looks like what Dad described to me six years ago, and it fits what was described in the map.” She indicated more glyphs that I didn’t recognize. At least not at first. These glyphs were identical to the ones on the other wall. Corresponding glyphs, perhaps.
Most importantly, just below the glyphs, which I understood now were markers, she pointed to something small and protruding from the wall. A stone lever. It made me a tad uneasy as she reached for it. “I hope this is what I believe it is.”
“Me, too, sister,” I said, as she pulled on the lever.
Immediately, the ground began to shake. Ishi grabbed onto Marie, who grabbed onto me. Not quite the threesome I had in mind. A moment later the wall opened up. From beyond the wall, a golden haze greeted us.
“What in the hell?”
Chapter Thirteen
“I thought you said this was where the treasure was,” I said.
“No,” said Marie, stepping forward and shielding her eyes, “I said this was the tunnel that led to the treasure.”
“And where would the treasure be?” I asked.
“That,” she said, turning to me and smiling as golden sunlight washed over her alabaster skin, “is the million dollar question.”
“How about a ten million dollar question, instead?” I said.
Beyond, birds twittered. A howler monkey shrieked. Something heavy moved through the thick underbrush near the tunnel’s exit, then abruptly dashed off. Marie glanced briefly through the doorway, then back at me. “If the legends are even a fraction true, we might be looking at billions.”
“You never said anything about billions,” I said. Ishi had stepped up behind me...and promptly dashed out the torch, its flame now unnecessary.
“Perhaps many billions, Mr. Caine.”
“That’s if Ciudad Blanca exists,” I said.
“For a treasure hunter, Mr. Caine, you’re surprisingly cynical.”
“Yeah, well, I’ve been burned one too many times. And I smell smoke all over this.”
She reached back and gently patted my face, a simple gesture that sent a thrill through me. Dammit. “Well, my doubting Thomas, there’s only one way to find out.”
And I really shouldn’t have been very surprised when she pushed aside a tangle of spider webs and marched through the narrow tunnel, her shapely figure now silhouetted against the bright light.
“The girl has guts,” said Ishi.
“I know,” I said, stepping forward, “It’s beginning to annoy me.”
* * *
The tunnel opened up into what appeared to be a deep valley. To either side rose steep cliffs covered in dense foliage. Before us was a rock-strewn path through even denser undergrowth. What lay beyond was anyone’s guess.
We caught up to Marie. Or, more accurately, she waited for us. Impatiently. Literally tapping her foot and folding her arms. Yeah, she was all types of bugging me.
We continued along with Ishi now in the lead. The Tawankan was unusually skilled at wielding his machete, which he did now, hacking a path for us through the vine-covered trail.
The jungle seemed particularly alive. Trees shook with the passage of various monkey species: howler, spider, squirrel monkeys, capuchins, tamarins...and a species I didn’t readily recognize. A
larger species with long, shaggy hair. It swung easily in the branches above, moving with cat-like grace and agility, and watching us closely.
Ishi saw it, too, and paused briefly, machete raised high. I could be wrong, but I might have seen the Tawankan shiver slightly. Never a good sign. After a moment, he continued hacking and we continued following.
We did this for some time, following a hint of a game trail that meandered deeper into the valley. What valley? I hadn’t a clue. I thought I knew Honduras. In fact, I thought I knew it like the proverbial back of my hand. The same hand that sported a half dozens circular scars that were, unsurprisingly, the exact circumference of a piranha’s mouth. Long story.
We paused for some water a few hours in, finding a moss-covered log that could seat three and was critter free. It was coming on early evening and the sun had slipped behind the western valley wall. Soon, we were going to be in complete darkness. Not anything I hadn’t experienced hundreds of times before. Hell, half my life had been spent camping in the wilds. But, something about this valley was... unnerving.
“Where are we?” asked Marie.
She had already capped her water bottle, and I could tell she was picturing the contours of the map she had lost. Even so, she still held her iPad. Holding it like she was hoping against hope that the GPS finder would suddenly spring to life. Ishi glanced at the iPad briefly, wrinkled his nose and turned away while stifling a snicker. He studied the trees above us, which was never a bad idea when one was in the deep, dark jungle.
Despite the fact I was now seriously concerned that we would soon be lost without a clue as to where to go next, I followed Marie’s muttered words and her pointing finger as she backtracked our progress along the dirt road we had followed in the jeep, and the path we had hiked along to reach the tunnel. She then pointed to the tunnel’s exit we had recently emerged from. She frowned.
We had ended up deep within the mountains, and then had made a mad dash for our lives when the lizard man had appeared. Where we had now ultimately ended up was beyond even my own inner compass.
I told her as much, in which she responded, “You just might be the first man to admit he doesn’t know where he is.”
Thus far, Marie tended to lash out when she didn’t get what she wanted, or heard what she wanted. But, for the moment she remained calm...at least externally. I was almost content to let sleeping dogs lie.
“Ishi, do you know where we are?”
“No clue, Nick,” he said, still scanning the trees. Something was triggering his inner alarm system. Ishi was like my watchdog. The Tawankan seemed to have a sixth sense for spotting trouble.
“There you go,” I said to Marie. “Two men who admit to not knowing where they are.”
And then I saw it. Fifty feet away something was slowly, carefully parting the branches of a wax palm. Ishi, I was certain, had seen it, too, but he made a point to look away. Good idea. I looked away, as well, although I kept the slightly moving branches in my periphery.
Marie snickered tiredly and turned away.
“I can tell you this: we’re in a valley of sorts,” I said. “It doesn’t look like one of the hotter tourist stops Honduras has to offer, does it?”
“Thank you, Magellan.”
I chuckled, all the while keeping my main focus on the shadow that was still present behind the parted branches of the dense wax palm.
“Well, there’s one thing I find interesting,” I continued. “It’s a misleading valley, you see. It’s far wider at the base than at the apex.”
“What do you mean?”
“We’re given the false impression that we’re in some forest, or a part of the forest.”
“We’re not in a forest?” She sounded alarmed, as if she suddenly didn’t know where she was.
“No,” I said, reaching inside my still-wet jacket and withdrawing the Bowie knife, a knife that had, amazingly, found its way back into its sheath. My Bowie and me...it’s a beautiful thing.
“Then what do you call this?” she asked, standing and motioning at the dense foliage around us.
“A lost valley,” I said. “Now get down.”
“What?”
“Get down!”
Chapter Fourteen
No sooner had we fallen prostrate upon the ground than something enormous flew past our heads. It was an animal with black fur, and as it tumbled into a banana palm behind us, it let out an angry growl.
Oh sweet Jesus, what in the hell was that?!
“What in the hell was that?” whimpered Marie, echoing my alarmed silent thought.
“I don’t know exactly,” I told her, squinting my eyes in the ever-growing dimness.
“Exactly? So that should mean you know something of what it is...right?”
Even in times of duress, she still had to be an academic smart ass. Something in common between us, which made her even more attractive. At the same time, it also upped the ante on how irritating she could be.
“Well, no. Exactly could mean nothing more than ‘it ain’t exactly Smokey the Bear’,” I said, glancing back at the beast that regarded us warily as it regained its footing. It would be back for round two at any moment. “In fact, I don’t think it’s a bear at all.”
“It looks like a big dog or a cat,” said Ishi, nervously. “It’s too big to be a jaguarundi”
“A what?” said Marie, inching closer to me, to where her light perfume filled my nostrils. “All I know is that thing’s huge!”
True. It certainly wasn’t the cougar-sized jaguarundi. The monster was far too big. But once it focused its luminescent yellow eyes upon us, I could tell it was the bigger cousin of the aforementioned jaguarundi. A panther. Black as midnight with a blue sheen running through its fur. And, bigger than any other panther I’d ever come across.
“Well…what in the hell is it?”
The shrillness was back in Marie’s voice.
“You should know, since it’s the creature depicted on your papa’s treasured disk,” I said, finding it impossible to not snicker. It’s a nervous tic of mine. “And before you try to tell me this ain’t a jaguar, think again—”
“Yeah, I know, Nick—they’re part of the panthera family of big cats,” she said, interrupting me. Her tone sounded even more worried. “But I never expected to encounter anything quite that big. Papa said to watch out for the jaguars that guard the entrance to the ‘treasure cave’.”
“What?! So, you knew about this damned thing and never said a word about it? And, there’s more than this one??”
“Yes. But, if we move quickly, we should be able to get inside before anything bad happens.”
“Bad? What do you mean by ‘bad’??”
Ishi’s voice cracked as he said this. Meanwhile, the enormous panther began to creep toward us. Its yellow eyes were tinged with orange halos around the edges, as if the very fires of hell had ignited them. No, I didn’t think that thought right away...it was what popped in my head for a brief moment as I turned to follow Marie as she sprinted toward a group of gnarled trees near where our jaguar friend had originally been peering at us.
“Where in the hell are you running to?” I called after her, after urging Ishi to quit staring stupidly at the big cat and hightail his ass to join mine in pursuit of our more athletic female companion. “Shit!...Ishi, damn it let’s go!!”
“I’m coming, Nick! I’m—ah, shit, it’s coming after us!!”
As if the jaguar’s menacing growl hadn’t already announced that fact. As much as I worried that we were chasing a mad woman into our death trap, the reality that an animal large enough to devour my diminutive companion in a couple of bites and me in under five provided all the incentive needed to for us to sprint into the shadowed foliage ahead of us.
“Nick—get ready to dive!”
“Huh?! Are you frigging serious? Dive where??”
“Both of you need to dive headfirst when I tell you to do it!” Marie shouted back toward me. I couldn’t see her, and I started t
o slow down so I could get my bearings. It seemed like the smartest thing to do.
“No! Nick, keep running! You’re almost there! I remember it...everything’s coming back to me. Get ready to—oh shit!”
“Marie?! What in the.... Are you all right—”
“Dive, damn it—do it now!”
But there was no response. Nothing. Well, check that...I heard several low growls in the deep shadows within the shade from the native palms, shrubs, and other broad-leaved plants. It sounded like there were a dozen big cats, although I only caught a glimpse of another pair of luminous eyes—this time orange. It seemed odd that the jaguar had companions, since they are solitary critters. But, when the eyes disappeared from view, none of that mattered. I knew instinctively that this particular cat was circling around us and that an attack might well ensue at any moment.
We were in a terrible spot. Yeah, no kidding...I wanted to warn Ishi, but as I turned to look back at him, my feet gave out from under me and I landed hard on my ass once more. This time it felt like a stone slide.
Oh, shit!!
I would like to tell you that it was a heavy-masculine thing that came out of my mouth in this latest moment of surprise. However, I must confess that a shrill scream that would rival any little girl’s frightened shriek escaped my throat instead. It didn’t matter that Marie had tried to warn me about what lay ahead. Not that plunging another few hundred feet or so down a cold, grime-covered chute surrounded by pitch-blackness wouldn’t prompt most males to utter a terrified response of some sort. That would have been my second excuse. The initial one? My rationale that I was actually frightened for Ishi. Hell, he might not have heard Marie’s warning either, and would soon become what amounted to a Happy Meal for the apparent protectors of this chasm.
I heard a surprised yelp from Marie up ahead, which told me that I deserved partial credit for descending down the correct rabbit hole. A small pinpoint of light soon greeted my eyes up ahead, as my body picked up speed. I would reach this mysterious glow that rapidly grew bigger in the next ten to fifteen seconds. Meanwhile, Ishi’s piercing shriek resounded behind me, which made me feel a little better about my reaction. Although, I initially feared he had failed to elude the enormous panther, or one of its companions. I would never want him to see me shed a tear—either in this life or the next—but I felt choked up, thinking of his unpleasant fate and ignoring the fact that Marie’s and mine might well be worse.