A sparkle of light tore Goodwin’s attention back down to ground level, where an armoured figure holding a glowing sword jogged towards them.
Goodwin could have wept with joy at the sight of the Darklight commander’s approach. It seemed like months since Hilt had departed on his mission to bring back Susan and locate the USSB, and by the look of the small figure that dogged the man’s steps, he’d lived up to at least half of his promise.
‘Sorry I’m late, sir,’ Hilt said over the growing storm, before glancing back at Susan, whose eyes were no longer bloodshot. ‘We need to get you both out of here.’
Goodwin gestured towards the giant silver statue. ‘I think that might be a bit of problem.’
Either side of the golden throne, cloaked in mist, the indistinct lights of two Pharos had appeared to hover in silent sentry.
♦
Sarah’s pendant continued to pulse with heat against her chest. Her bloody palms tingled against the altar and tiny fingers of purple electricity licked at her skin. She looked up as the ceiling retracted and storm clouds gathered. Thunder rumbled and lightning flickered through the sky before a spike of pain shot through her hands. The first symbol on the altar’s circular pattern lit up with an electrical glow, while either side of her hands the metal surface turned liquid and drained away to reveal two large handles.
Removing her hands from the altar, its centre distorted and melted down into a pentagonal indent. The size and shape was unmistakable: it matched the newly transformed orb. She withdrew the discus-sized artefact from her coveralls and gazed at its strange surface. Should I be doing this? The thought came unbidden. Isn’t this too convenient? If the orb has brought us here for a purpose, why would that purpose be ours? Why would it be mine? I could just be a pawn in its plan.
‘Sarah,’ a voice said, ‘can you hear me?’
The communication system built into the bottom rim of her smashed helmet sparked and crackled beneath a layer of oil.
‘Jason,’ – Sarah peered through the flames – ‘is that you?’
‘Yes. Are you okay?’
‘I’m fine. The orb did bring us here. It all fits, the visions, everything.’
‘Then you’re doing what it wants.’ Jason sounded scared. ‘You have the pendant, come back to us.’
‘I know—’ An image of Riley flashed into Sarah’s mind and her reasoning faltered. I have to save him. She gauged the speed of the rotating pentagram; she couldn’t go back now even if she wanted to. She reached out and held the artefact over the altar before hesitating again. What is its real agenda? What do the Pharos want? An overwhelming compulsion to place the disc into the aperture forced her hands down and before she knew what was happening the disc snapped into position with a metallic clunk. A mechanism in the altar released and the handles rotated round and up to present themselves for Sarah to hold.
‘Sarah,’ Jason said, ‘can you hear me? Sarah?!’
What had Goodwin said? Sarah thought, as Jason’s calls fell on deaf ears. The oil was a test of faith. And I passed that. Now all I have to do is take the final leap …
Driven on by the heartache of grief, her doubts forgotten, she reached out to grasp the metal handles.
A sharp tingle swept up her arms and the altar twisted on its dais. More symbols on the altar flickered alight as the electricity continued to spread around its circumference. Sarah saw the alcove two along from Rebecca’s glow brighter as the altar turned towards it, the metal device forced on by an unseen mechanism. With a grunt of effort, she helped it round until Rebecca’s alcove lit up. The pendant around her neck grew hotter and she squinted through the wavering heat of the flames to see if the crystal was dissipating, but before she could tell if it was working, the altar resumed its leftward creep. She tried forcing it back, but her feet slipped and skidded on the slick surface and the altar continued its motion until Riley’s alcove glowed bright. She gripped the handles tight and managed to wedge her foot into a crack to halt its rotation.
Pinpricks of light glittered before her eyes before a flash from the void dragged her vision down. Strange shadows moved in the beyond, flashing in and out of reality in time with the spinning blur of the pentagram’s star. Sarah felt a sense of dread descend over her and two more symbols at the edge of the altar lit up – and then another … and another after that – each one adding to an arc of light that would become a circle. The altar jerked left and the light behind Riley’s alcove died. She tried twisting it into reverse, but an unseen force held it fast. She let out a scream of fury. The sinews on her neck stood out as she strained every muscle, and the altar inched back.
♦
Goodwin could tell Sarah was struggling. He’d seen Rebecca’s alcove brighten momentarily, but the crystal remained intact. Everything told him the Englishwoman needed his help, but the burning oil and spinning pentagram at its centre blocked off any route through. He felt helpless, but found himself moving towards the fires to join Sarah’s two friends, who continued to watch in similar impotence.
A mighty hand closed on his arm and he looked up into the face of Darklight’s leader.
‘She’s beyond our help,’ Hilt said, before gesturing towards an alcove. ‘And so is he.’
Goodwin looked at the body of the man Sarah wanted to save. ‘His name’s Riley.’
‘Sir,’ – Hilt grasped his shoulder – ‘we need to find another way out.’
Goodwin snapped out of his reverie and shook his head. He pointed at the other alcove where Joseph and Rebecca remained imprisoned. ‘I’m not leaving without them, not again.’
Susan, seeing her carer immersed in crystal, approached the wall to touch it with tentative hands.
Hilt raised his thermal sword. ‘Have you tried heat?’
Goodwin’s hope rose and he shook his head.
‘Stay here,’ Hilt said, and Susan stood aside to give him room as he strode to the alcove and placed his glowing blade against the face of the crystal.
The Darklight commander pushed his sword into the surface and then drew the weapon down inch by agonising inch.
At such a rate Goodwin realised it would take hours to cut Rebecca and Joseph free. He glanced back at the two creatures that remained lurking a hundred feet away and knew that time was something they didn’t have.
Goodwin felt his frustration rise and he searched around for something, anything, he could do to save those he held dear. His eyes drifted beyond the crater to the distant frieze, its night sky filled with constellations. He frowned and gazed back at the spinning pentagram in the middle of the burning whirlpool of oil. The rotation increased and he glimpsed something in its interior that shimmered translucent.
‘It’s a void,’ he said, and a sense of déjà vu struck him. He racked his mind and looked back into the flickering oil as the storm built overhead. Something silver and gold reflected across its silken surface. He glanced right to the giant silver statue ensconced on its golden throne. He then looked back to see the beautiful face of the Anakim god reflected in the pentagram’s void of metal and light.
‘And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters,’ he murmured and the spark of remembrance grew. He looked back to the frieze and its depiction of the heavens and the earth.
‘Genesis,’ he whispered and looked up at the sky, ‘Genesis, of course!’
He tried to use the Deep Reach helmet Sarah had given him, but he couldn’t activate it. He dropped the headgear and waved to Sarah to gain her attention and pointed at the statue. He cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted, ‘GENESIS!’
Sarah’s friends looked in his direction.
‘It’s Genesis,’ he said to them, ‘tell her to face the Anakim God, the statue!’
They looked at him, uncomprehending.
Goodwin let out a growl of frustration and ran to the frost-laden wall and drew his fingers across the surface to create a note for Sarah to read. He thought he saw her glance in his direction beyond the flames and he ges
tured to his message and then pointed at the statue and mouthed: ‘The other way! Face the other way!’
The wind from the storm continued to increase and the flames died down before the oil in the crater dropped lower. A small figure moved to the edge of the rapidly disappearing lake as the fires extinguished. Goodwin saw Susan look back at him. She held a large, blue crystal in her hand and she gave him a look of sorrow before jumping down into the oil.
‘No!’ Goodwin leapt after her and moments later he was splashing knee deep in the hot, viscous fluid. Shocking images flashed through his mind as the black oil’s hallucinations attacked him, but he managed to grab Susan round the waist and drag her back. The glowing rock fell from her hand and vanished into the disappearing ooze.
‘Susan,’ Goodwin said, as she fought him, ‘stop!’ He stared into her eyes expecting them to be bloodshot, but her whites were clear. In his moment of hesitation she plunged her teeth into his hand.
He cried out and let go.
The crater’s last drops of oil drained away to reveal the crystal, now glowing beneath a covering of black fluid. Susan dived for it and Goodwin leapt after her.
♦
Sarah gritted her teeth as she struggled with the altar’s handles to keep Riley’s alcove lit, but as she fought to bring him back from death she felt something enter her mind, something that controlled her thoughts, her actions, her life. Her hands shook as she sought to wrest back control and the light from Riley’s alcove died again as the altar moved left. The pendant burned hotter and another light lit up on the altar. A voice spoke in her mind. Let go … give in … it will feel so gooood … let go. Sarah felt her resolve weakening, the feeling of surrendering so wonderful, so easy … so right … so pleasurable. Another part of her mind screamed ‘NO!’ and her eyes inched from the pentagram’s spinning void and back to Riley. ‘I can save him!’
The flames had died out and the metal pentagram sank down and turned into a blur. The ground at Sarah’s feet shifted and a large ring of glittering metal twisted up from the floor around her. A curved section rose up a couple of feet on crystalline rods from the bottom of the ring’s interior surround, creating a platform which contained two circular indents positioned side by side. The altar split down the middle and shifted forward to connect to the bottom of the ring.
The speakers in her broken helmet crackled again. ‘Sarah,’ Trish said, ‘don’t get on it, you don’t know what it’ll do!’
‘I can’t …’ – Sarah clenched her teeth as she felt compelled to step forward onto the device – ‘stop myself … it’s controlling me!’
Her left leg moved against her will and she found herself mounting the platform. The altar’s handles shifted onto the interior of the ring, spreading her arms wide. She wanted to release her hold, but the entity inside her mind had other ideas. Her palms remained clenched against cold metal and clamps closed around her wrists, before two more encircled her ankles. The metal circle rose up and she felt herself lifted from the floor to hang suspended inside the vertical ring, her limbs forced out into the shape of a star like the Vitruvian Man.
She tried to fight back against the thing that controlled her, summoning every ounce of willpower to save Riley. The handles twisted and the metal ring turned towards his alcove before a surge of energy sent a rush of pleasure flooding through her body. She gasped in rapture. More voices whispered to her, telling her to relax, to enjoy – to be. Her eyes filled with the spinning pentagram and she felt an ache in her chest spreading through her skin. The ecstasy grew, but so did the pain. Her head felt too heavy to hold up and her chin dropped to her chest.
Another symbol on the altar lit up.
She could feel the energy draining from her body, her soul torn from its home.
She was the sacrifice for the thing unknown.
The void flared with light and Sarah felt the darkness taking her.
♦
‘Let me go!’ Trish dug her fingernails into Jason’s arm. ‘It’s killing her!’
Jason clung to Trish as he watched Sarah die; there was nothing they could do.
♦
Sarah’s vision drifted lost and images from her life flared real.
She was a child chasing a butterfly across a field … sharing her first kiss with the boy next door … accepting her diploma at graduation …
The pendant throbbed against her chest with excruciating pain and the altar’s circle of symbols neared completion.
‘This is SED Command. We are a go for shuttle launch in T minus thirty seconds.’
‘Sit down, Miss Morgan,’ a man said, folding his arms, ‘my name is Dresden Locke.’
Pain exploded in her face. ‘I told you,’ Mark said, standing over her with madness in his eyes, ‘you’re not going anywhere.’
Sarah’s eyes flickered closed and the spinning pentagram whirred faster, its pitch increasing.
‘This is SED Command. We are a go for shuttle launch in T minus ten seconds.’
‘The blinds,’ – her eyes widened as Riley pleasured her – ‘people … are watching.’
Sarah held the ancient skull in her hands; it was proof positive of the existence of Homo gigantis!
He kissed her deeply. ‘Let them watch.’
Dresden Locke held her gaze. ‘I employ the best, so I expect the best.’
Riley smiled. ‘Did you miss me?’
‘Where you … go,’ she murmured. Fire blossomed into being and smoke choked her lungs.
‘Why do you fear me?’ a sibilant voice whispered.
Sarah gazed into the mirror. ‘Am I not what you desire?’
‘One thing is for certain,’ Jason said, ‘you don’t deserve to die.’
‘Let go … give in … it will feel so gooood.’
Riley gazed into her eyes. ‘You’re a hard woman to find, Sarah Morgan.’
‘It’s all my fault,’ Sarah clung to Jason and cried. ‘I killed her. I killed Trish and I’ve killed you too!’
‘Sarah, are you okay?’ Trish’s face loomed before her.
‘I killed my mother. I deserve to die, I have to die. I want to die!’
‘Only you’re crying.’
A tear rolled down her cheek.
Jason placed his hand against her heart. ‘You decide who you are and if you don’t like what you are, you damn well fight back!’
‘Let go … give in … surrender.’
‘Never give in, as at the end of the day, when there’s nothing else left—’
‘Let go … give in.’
‘That’s all we have—’
‘Let go …’
‘—that’s who we are.’
Sarah’s heartbeat stuttered slow.
‘This is SED Command. We are a go for shuttle launch.’
‘Why do you fear me?’
‘In T minus three—’
‘One thing is for certain.’
‘—two—’
‘Give in.’
‘You don’t deserve to die.’
‘Let go.’
‘—one—’
‘Am I not what you desire?’
A strobe of images flickered through her mind.
‘—launch!’
Sarah’s heart pulsed its final beat and a white brilliance emerged from the void.
‘I’ll always … be with you … Sarah.’ Riley’s voice echoed through time.
The altar’s final symbol lit up.
‘—have faith … there’s always light … in the dark.’
Through a sea of black, a blue glimmer blazed bright. Susan shrugged Goodwin aside and slammed down the glowing crystal, shattering it over the spinning pentagram. Electricity enveloped the altar and Sarah’s eyes flew open as power surged through her. The pendant blazed beneath her coveralls, the void opened into a swirling portal and winds shrieked as the storm funnelled down. Riley’s alcove crystallised and a star of light formed around her. A black patch appeared on her chest as cloth smouldered and peeled back, aflame
. Her cross glowed orange and beneath it the Anakim pendant shone white hot.
Sarah cried out in agony as metal seared into flesh.
The power kept increasing, growing stronger, bigger, faster, filling her body with agonising pain. Darkness streamed out of the portal and Sarah’s eyes drifted to Goodwin’s sign.
Sarah gritted her teeth against the onslaught of power, her body shaking. The gold cross melted through its chain and merged with the Anakim pendant.
Electricity coalesced on the pentagram and crackled round in a massive spiral of energy towards the altar.
Sarah knew she was going to die and the force that held her vanished.
Blood seeped from her palms, metal fused to bone and tears streamed down her face. She looked at Riley’s frozen form with bloodshot eyes. ‘Where you … go,’ – she wrenched the device round toward the statue – ‘I … GO!’
The portal vanished in a whoosh of air and a vacuum of sound. The Anakim pendant sank into her chest. Sarah screamed and a blast of energy shot into the silver statue and on into the sphinx’s head. The ground shook, Sarah’s scream stretched on, and a massive beam of light powered into the Anakim city.
Chapter Fifty-Six
Blinding, white light roared from the sphinx’s eyes, blazing through the underground chamber like a galactic gamma ray. Miles distant, Anakim towers flared bright as the energy slammed into their translucent structures like a supernova.
The earth shook. Goodwin covered his ears and closed his eyes. Wind tore at his clothing. Thunder rumbled and lightning flashed.
Ancient Origins: Books 4 - 6 (Ancient Origins Boxset Book 2) Page 24