by Martha Carr
Shay crossed her arms. Somewhere along the way, she’d stopped merely existing and started living. And damn it, she liked the feeling.
Alison laughed. “So when Izzie came and asked me, I said, ‘Why are you asking me? I’m blind, remember?”
Lily laughed. “Even after all these years, Harry thinks it’s funny to come to me after something happens, or he wins in a game and say, ‘What? Didn’t you see that coming?’”
The teens giggled.
Fifteen minutes into their drive from Warehouse One to Warehouse Two, Shay was struck by two things.
First, the girls got along great. It was like they were long-lost sisters. Even if Alison had been spoiled by James, that didn’t change the fact that she’d had a hard life and had lost her mother in a depraved act of betrayal. Both girls had experienced the darker sides of life too young. Even though neither was talking about those depressing topics, it was almost as if they could sense that pain in the other lurking just below the surface and it formed a natural bond.
The other striking thing about the conversation was that Shay was sure she’d never heard Lily talk so much on so many topics. This wasn’t a quick quip and then an escape, but a detailed far-ranging discussion. Even when they’d spent hours alone together on tomb raids, the girl hadn’t talked this much.
Does she talk like this with the tunnel kids? At the end of the day, I’m her scary mentor, not another one of the girls.
Shay smiled. Yes, she’d exposed Lily to violence and death, but the girl’s whole life had been that. The tomb raider was just giving her the tools to thrive in a world that wasn’t always nice.
Unfortunately, any adult who has been subjected to a constant barrage of teenagers chatting away soon reaches their limit, and Shay was no exception.
She rolled down her window, enjoying the breeze and the natural white noise provided by the air rushing into the car.
Another few minutes passed when her phone announced a call from Peyton. She grabbed her earpiece and stuck it in her ear before turning it on and answering.
“What’s up?”
“I’ve got a job. It pays a little less than you normally ask, but it’s also so easy that I figured, why the hell not?”
Shay chuckles. “Let me hear it first.”
“Know the Paisley Caves in Oregon?”
She furrowed her brow in thought. “Nope, but I already like that this job is stateside.”
“Exactly.” Excitement colored Peyton’s voice. “Four caves in an arid, desolate part of Oregon north of the city of Paisley. About 4,500 feet up, geologically lots of it volcanic rock. Caves were carved by waves from the nearby Summer Lake during the last Ice Age.”
Some of her interest faded. “Okay, the geology lesson’s nice, but why do I give a shit about some caves in Oregon?”
“One of the caves may contain evidence of the oldest human presence in North America. But, in terms of the job, there are supposed to be three gold figurines hidden in the cave that might provide evidence of contact between the humans of that area and Oricerans.”
“Interesting.” Shay changed lanes. It wouldn’t be that much longer until they arrived at Warehouse Two. “Magical figurines?”
The two girls in the back continued chatting, not even realizing Shay had taken a call.
“As far as I can tell, no,” Peyton responded. “This is more about someone being really interested in history. They want the figurines for a private collection and are willing to pay a hundred thousand for their retrieval. The figurines are pretty small, so it’s not like they would be worth that much even if they were melted down, and they couldn’t identify them other than to mention they represent Oriceran races.”
Shay nibbled her lip. Even without taking a supersonic flight, she could set off in the morning, easily get to Oregon, do the job, and get back before dinner time.
Peyton was right. A mere six-figure payday generally wasn’t usually worth it anymore, but sometimes you just picked up the quarter on the sidewalk in front of you.
“Any legends associated with the caves? Hostile frog guys? Giant spiders that eat people? Ghosts? Cave-protecting death cults?
Peyton laughed. “Nope, nothing credible. The main thing is getting to the location. Requires some cave diving, and you have to know exactly where you’re going.”
“And the client happens to know exactly where I need to go?”
“Yeah, because they sent someone in before. They drowned, but they managed to get off a little emergency drone transponder.”
Shay snickered. “At least they’re honest about the danger. Okay, tell the client I’ll take the job. Just have to drop off Lily and Alison at Warehouse Two, then I’ll go gear up at Warehouse Three.”
“Lily and Alison together?” Peyton groaned.
“What? Do you suddenly have a problem with them?”
“No, it’s just that I don’t know if I can survive two teenage girls.”
17
The good news was Shay hadn’t run into any frogmen, death cultists, or giant spiders. The bad news was the earthy and humid stench that clung to everything inside the cave filled her nostrils and made her want to gag.
The tomb raider continued wading through stagnant water filled with algae, insects, and who knew what disgusting parasites. She’d been in many caves in her short career as a tomb raider, and they never got any less annoying.
She slapped at the water. “Why can’t I go after pirate treasure buried on a tropical island?”
The glamorous life of a tomb raider. Look at me, I’m wading through nature’s sewage pipe. The area’s arid, but this cave isn’t. Nice how that shit works out. It’s like a big joke at my expense.
Her diving equipment hung heavy on her back. From what the client had told Peyton, it’d be a good thirty minutes of walking before she hit the actual point of diving. She’d been walking almost that long. She couldn’t verify anything with her assistant, though, since her communications had died once she was five minutes into the cave.
Something brushed against her leg.
Shay frowned. She had a needle gun hanging from her belt in case she needed to deliver a little underwater death, but taking on some monster in dark cave water struck her as high on the list of bad ideas. She just needed to find the damned figurines and get the hell out of there before some mud octopus ate her.
Gold. Everyone likes gold. Even early humans liked the shiny metal. What the hell is it about gold?
The splashes of water echoed as she made her way deeper into the tightening cave system.
Her headlamp and wrist light illuminated the rippling water and moist cave walls covered with fungus, moss, and algae. Life always found a way. A disgusting way, but still a way.
The flow of the water picked up as she approached a deep opening. She could hear the sound of rushing water below.
Almost there. Time to gear up, I guess.
Shay lowered her mask and connected her tanks and oxygen lines. She took a moment to equalize the pressure in her system before grabbing a coiled nylon line off her belt. The tomb raider found an outcropping to tie the line off to before using it to slowly climb into the dark rushing water below.
She hissed as the current caught her leg. Her heart sped up, but she took a few deep breaths and kept moving down. She wouldn’t be swept away as long as she held onto the line, and even if she were, she had oxygen.
I can swim against the current. It wouldn’t be fun, but I could do it.
Shay took a few deep breaths.
Good thing I’m not afraid of dark spaces or water.
An image invaded her mind, tumbling logs in a deadly maze. She winced.
Sure, she’d almost been buried alive on her first real tomb raid, but she’d gotten her revenge on the lake later with the help of Daniel Goldstein sponsoring a return to the lake.
Is that what I need? A bunch of CIA money and a full team? Screw that. I’ve done tons of underwater raids since then. This isn’t such a bad
deal, and the past doesn’t predict the future. I can do this.
Shay continued her descent, the current weakening as she moved deeper into the dark, watery abyss. She had plenty of air left, and not a single hostile monster, animal, or human had come anywhere near her, unless she was counting the giardia in the water.
She was feeling pretty relaxed, even bored, when she saw a hand.
Shay kept hold of her nylon line with her left hand and raised her needle gun with her right, her heart pounding.
Well, at least I’m not gonna die in my kitchen.
The tomb raider aimed the weapon but didn’t fire. The gloved hand was waving. No. Not waving—it was moving with the slow underwater current.
She shifted her head to illuminate the rest of her new friend. A half-rotted corpse stared back at her.
Shay took a deep breath, trying to keep the bile down. She hooked the needle gun back onto her belt and took in the disturbing sight.
Fuck. Guess I found the poor bastard who tried to find the figurines before me.
The man’s legs had been pinned by rock and mud against the cave wall, and the rips in his gloves suggested he’d spent his last few moments desperately clawing at the rocks to try to free himself.
Good news is, I know I’m in the right spot.
Shay did her best to ignore the half-decayed waterlogged corpse just yards away from her as she carefully searched the area for any hint of the figurines. With only her two lights available, she decided on a systematic approach. She started a few yards above the body, and inch by inch moved her head and hand to illuminate a new stretch of wall.
The seconds ticked along until they were minutes. Plenty of rocks, but nothing shiny.
Wonder how the client knew it was here? Did they do an aquatic drone survey first?
Shay snickered, thinking that might have been a good idea. Going to Lake Toplitz the second time with a team and being more deliberate with her exploration hadn’t been the worst thing in the world. Not every tomb raid might lend itself to that sort of strategy, but she’d fallen into a pattern of trying to get in and out at maximum speed.
It did help reduce her run-ins with assholes like Yulia, but whether she was killed by an ice spear or crushed by logs, she would be just as dead in the end.
Something shone in the beam of her wrist light.
What do we have here?
Shay glanced between the shining material and the body. A few yards. He’d almost found the treasure but then ended up dead in some cave in Oregon.
Was it a good or a bad way to die? She didn’t know, but she’d prefer not to die either in her kitchen from a gunshot wound or from running out of oxygen in a cave anytime soon.
Dying’s easy. Living’s the hard part.
She let go of the line and swam toward the source of the shine. Closer to it now, she could identify the mud-encrusted arm of a small figurine.
Okay, that’s one. Good start.
The tomb raider carefully dug a small golden figurine out of the mud and rock. She did her best to wipe off some of the grime, but her thick gloves and the conditions made it difficult.
The small golden figurine was crude in design, but identifiably humanoid with pointed ears. Any doubts Shay’d had about it being merely stylized were erased by the crude etchings on the body. She couldn’t read the words, but she recognized some of the shapes. It wasn’t elf script, but rather Gnomic from what she could tell. She deposited the figurine in a mesh bag clipped to her belt.
Gnomes sure get around. Or maybe this is just the Oriceran equivalent of a copyright notice.
The next agonizing ten minutes passed as she carefully scraped and pulled around the area. She was just about to give up when she found the corner of another figurine. It was larger, and maybe it was just her recent trip to the Great Treaty, but she thought it looked a lot like a Kilomea. Again, something resembling Gnomic script was written on it.
I need to wrap this up sooner than later. Don’t want to be hanging out down here and worried about reserve oxygen.
Shay continued her excavation near the previous finds. It took fifteen minutes of careful work before she found the edge of the last figurine. She lost a few more minutes of oxygen freeing it: a thin humanoid with four arms.
Jackpot.
A satisfying smugness settled over the tomb raider as she slipped the figurine into her bag. When she looked up, her heart nearly stopped. Huge cracks had spread from her digging site.
Shit. Need to get out of here.
The wall collapsed, sending a wave of mud and rock straight toward Shay. She kicked her legs to send herself back toward her safety line, but debris pinned her against the cave wall, much like the poor corpse of the other tomb raider. The latest cave shift sent his body tumbling into the darkness below.
Shay stretched reaching toward the white line in the dark water.
Just a few more inches, damn it.
Even though most of the rock and dirt had continued into the depths, if she couldn’t get to the line she didn’t think she’d be able to pull herself out of the rock and mud holding her in place. The cave would gain a new body for the next tomb raider to gawk at.
Come on, come on. I can do this.
Shay’s fingers reached the line, and then she got her hand around it. She tugged and managed a firm grasp with both hands.
Three…two…one.
With a push and a yank at the same time, her foot wrenched free, and she immediately started swimming back up. She didn’t look down until she was only waist deep in the stagnant water of the upper cave.
Shay pulled her mask off and bent over, taking deep breaths. She’d been deep underground by herself with not even Peyton on comm. If she hadn’t been able to free herself, she would have been dead in less than an hour, once her air ran out.
Shit, that was too damned close.
She straightened up and shook her head. It was always too damned close, whether it an army of cursed invisible swordsmen, frogmen, French retrieval specialists, or possessed elves with alien stones.
The tomb raider burst out laughing. Her life was insane, and the only thing she could do was enjoy every minute of it.
18
Shay settled into a loveseat in her living room, stifling a slight yawn. It was just as she’d predicted. She’d been able to do the entire job including the delivery in a single day. It wasn’t huge money by her standards, but the job, other than running into the corpse, had been almost an errand more than a tomb raid.
Yeah, I can say that because I didn’t drown. Then again, if I had, I would have been dead.
With James in Las Vegas checking on some Brownstone Agency business with the local police, it left her with an open evening.
Alison was at her house, spending the night chatting with some of her friends from school. Shay half-suspected she was talking to a boy, but she figured if she didn’t ask then she wouldn’t have to lie to the paranoid James about it.
His daughter is growing more beautiful by the day. He’s just gonna have to learn to deal with that. Plus, Alison knows magic. She can handle herself.
That left Shay alone in her home with no pressing tomb raid or research she needed to worry about. She was still curious about why the Demon Generals’ temporary leader might have been interested in the Anzick site, but the department head was still spooked by the whole experience. During their last phone call on the matter, he had been content to leave his old research alone for at least a few weeks.
Huh. It’s been a while since I’ve had the chance to just sit and relax, unwind, and read. I should have brought some Anzick book to read. Maybe I would have stumbled onto something useful.
Shay smiled to herself as she lifted the book she’d brought instead from Warehouse Four. The New Odyssey: A Modern Revised History Look at the Classic Myths.
When was a god not a god? When they might have been an Oriceran. Sometimes Shay wondered how long it’d take for humanity to truly process what their false history
had meant and how almost every major myth and legend at the heart of civilization had been influenced by Oricerans who had known exactly what they were doing.
Considering that the ancient beliefs were even baked into things like the days of the week, it was surprising how little resentment the average human felt toward Oricerans. Most people seemed more concerned about Oricerans coming to Earth and taking their jobs than what they might have done in the past.
We’re a petty species. I’m still sure that shit will cause some major trouble in the future, but for now, everyone’s too busy worrying about surviving.
Shay found herself detached from the whole idea. On a certain level, she could understand why it was annoying that the Oricerans had manipulated human history, but on the other hand, humans had also participated in the deception. If anything, it felt like she should be angrier at the humans in the know than the Oricerans.
In addition, she’d lived her life in solitude, with only a recent expansion into having people near and dear to her. It was hard to get too worked up about what someone might have done to her ancestors thousands of years ago. No one could change the past, not even the most powerful wizard.
I can’t change the world or the past. All I can do is find out the truth for myself and protect the people I care about. For now, that’s the new life plan, and that’s all I care about. I’m sure we’ll find out in a thousand years that all Oriceran history is a lie made up by some other strange planet. Maybe James’.
Shay snickered at the thought. After a moment, she opened her book and read the first passage aloud.
“Long, torturous thought and deliberation have gone into decoding the myths and legends that formed the basis of the Ancient Greek world. Long thought to be fanciful exaggerations or mere just-so stories, the existence of Oriceran has forced many classical scholars to go back and ask themselves, ‘What if everything the ancients said were true?’”