by Sadie Swift
“Please don’t do anything foolish, Sir Percival.”
But he was still too excited at the find to take notice of my words, looking all around the orangey-red tunnel. It appeared that I needed to take a different tack.
“What of your apparatus, Sir Percival?”
That caught his attention, and the gravity of our situation lowered itself onto his shoulders. Seeing him calm down I let his arm go and let him lead the way further into the temple.
Fifteen
The tunnel branched off into dark rooms and dimly-lit passageways. It seemed like we’d wandered into a maze. The air was surprisingly warm and the tangy smell was much stronger. It smelt for all the world like rotten eggs. With the increased heat I felt the need to undo the top button of my dress. I decided it best not to advise Sir Percival of this fact.
Around us statues of naked males and females stood in alcoves. Various beasts such as wolves, lions, tigers, and bears, with the odd snake, were depicted in the mosaics upon the floor. All of them looked very fierce.
Sir Percival led us in a seemingly dizzy array of directions, so much so that I felt the need to tap him on the shoulder.
He stopped and turned to me, “Yes?”
“Do you know which way to go or are you guessing?”
He gave me an affronted look. “I am following the most obvious path, Miss Lovelady.” He indicated the mosaic animal images upon the floor. “The Romans wouldn’t bother with putting highly work-intensive mosaics on the floors of unimportant passageways or rooms, so I am following the most important path. It seems most logical, yes?”
Not being the recipient of the same level of his education I could only acknowledge that it certainly seemed a reasonable theory. I waved a hand indicating he should continue to lead. “Thank you. Please go on.”
He pointed to some carvings in the stone above us that I’d thought were just for decoration. “There’s also the fact that the writing indicates this is the way to go.”
I could feel his intense smugness seeping through his back when he turned to lead the way again.
As we ventured further the light began to markedly increase until Sir Percival stopped. Looking past him I saw why. In an alcove next to another topless lady (this time apparently wearing a bunch of grapes in her hair) stood a shiny metal lantern.
With his free hand he indicated that I should look up. What I now recognised as words were deeply carved into the marble. I had no idea what they said, but Sir Percival, a sheen of sweat on his face, turned to me and said, “I believe this is it, Miss Lovelady.”
In a way I rather hoped it was as my dress wasn’t designed to keep me cool. In fact I had a strong urge to re-experience the cold snow above us.
“Ready?”
But before I could answer I felt a vibration through my boots. And a low rumbling sound impinged upon my hearing. “What’s that?”
“I believe it’s the reason for the heat.”
I waited for a more useful answer. But, as nothing more was forthcoming, had to resort to a raised eyebrow.
“Heat from the ground,” he explained.
Carefully I examined his face to check if he was pulling my leg. “Really?”
“The Romans made use of it in their hot spring baths.”
Oh. But here? In deepest North Wales? One up for the Romans then. It seemed that they also went for long flowing dresses, if their statues were to be believed. Most civilised, rather like Egypt. I could do with wearing one of those in the in the current environment.
My nose decided to bring to my attention the strong strange scent. “What’s that smell?”
“I believe it is magma.”
“Magma?”
“More specifically the sulphurous gas that the molten rock is releasing into the air.”
Again I examined his face for possible foolishness. “Really?”
“Yes. In my younger days I was quite fascinated by volcanism. Ready now?”
I decided that time was of the essence and to perhaps question him upon the matter later. “Ready.”
We placed our protective goggles over our eyes and peered round the corner to see a large rectangular room with long stone benches along all the sides. It appeared to be wholly made from white marble. Or at least I assumed it was as everything was bright yellowy-orange.
A rectangular pit in the centre of the stone floor was the source of all the light and fierce heat that flooded the tunnel we’d traversed. It also appeared to be the source of the vibration and the low rumbling noise.
The white ceiling curved above the rectangular pit and I had the strong suspicion that this room was also what caused the anomalous warming in the garden above.
At the other end of the room was another entrance, similar to the one we stood in. Carved along one wall were more of what I now recognised as words.
More alcoves housed statues, some of which appeared to have more than the usual quota of arms. Or legs. Or none.
On the long side of the rectangle to our left sat a plump figure. I realised it was Mr Lloyd and, with a shudder of horror, saw that he was naked. Suddenly my strange internal danger system began shouting at me.
Sixteen
With our guns aimed at the naked Mr Lloyd we slowly moved further into the fiercely-hot room, carefully avoiding the rectangular pit in the floor. Even without my warning system shouting at me I knew something was definitely off about the situation.
I peered down into the hellishly hot pit, thankfully my goggles protected my eyes against the intense heat coming up out of it. The sides near the top were rough stone, but lower down looked as if they’d been melted somehow. Even lower down was a bright yellow-orange liquid that flowed like a river from Hell. I guessed that this was the magma Sir Percival mentioned earlier, and also that neither of us would survive falling into its depths.
Mr Lloyd hadn’t moved even though we were in plain sight. I saw his eyes were closed. The low rumbling noise probably helped mask our entrance.
We carefully stepped along the long right-hand side of the rectangular room until we stood opposite the non-moving Mr Lloyd (I felt it necessary to move slightly further along so as to avoid the direct sight of between his legs).
“It’s an incantation,” Sir Percival whispered.
“Sorry, what?”
He indicated the carved words in the wall with his gun. “It’s an incantation.”
I didn’t like the sound of that. “To do what?”
Still keeping my gun aimed at the naked Mr Lloyd I noticed Sir Percival’s lips moving as he silently translated the words.
“To change… form.”
“Change form?”
“From human into animal.”
My mind flicked to the images of the fierce beasts depicted in the mosaics on the floor. Oh dear.
“Excuse me!” called out Sir Percival, startling me.
Mr Lloyd didn’t move.
He tried again, “Feels a tad warm, don’t you think?”
Mr Lloyd’s eyes flicked open. And I sort of wished they hadn’t as in the light they looked to be bright red.
“Oh dear,” Sir Percival said.
I concurred with his assessment. As did my internal warning system which began to scream ‘get out!’ at me.
All of a sudden Mr Lloyd appeared to crumple against the bench. Orange liquid ran across the stone he sat upon and dripped to the floor, and strangely enough up the wall behind him. Then I realised that it wasn’t liquid, it was lizards.
We stood in shock at the sight. Very quickly Mr Lloyd’s body had gone, metamorphosed into hundreds of orange lizards all heading along the walls and around the pit towards us. How they managed to move across the walls was the least of my concerns at that point.
“Sir Percival? Was anything like this mentioned in your schoolbooks?”
“No.”
Why was I not surprised?
Quick as a flash I wondered which of my clockwork weapons would be of best use. Unfortunately t
he answer appeared to be none of them as the lizards were small, highly mobile, and would easily avoid anything I, or my weapons, threw at them. We were also in an enclosed space, so Sir Percival and I could be injured by their use. The gun it was. Then perhaps the stilettos. With the sword at my back as a last resort.
“Now?” I said, raising my gun to aim at the nearest lizards to me. Suddenly the leading one opened its mouth, showing small, sharp teeth. I thought this was just some scare routine to show us what a big brave fellow it was, but then, quite to my disgust, it spat in my direction. Luckily the spittle fell to the floor without touching me. Without further debate I fired. The bolt of lightning caught the spitter square-on and flickered out to its nearest comrades. A strange high-pitched noise momentarily over-rode the low rumbling noise from the pit as the lizards vibrated and screamed under the electric onslaught. Then, with smoke rising from their charred bodies, they fell dead to the floor.
Sir Percival fired. A bright green light erupted from his gun with its unusual flump! sound. But the lizards on the wall he’d he’d aimed at just scurried out of the way, leaving a charred hole in the marble.
His green beam fired out again, sweeping across the stone floor and slicing some unfortunate lizards in half. Of those that managed to jump out of the way several fell to their deaths in the pit.
Suddenly what sounded suspiciously like a roar came from the tunnel behind us. What was happening now?
More lizards were now close enough to spit at me. This time their spittle landed on my dress and what looked like smoke rose up where it slowly ate through the material. What nasty foul beasts they were! Yet again I was glad to be wearing my protective goggles. While firing at this group I asked, “Did you hear that, Sir Percival?”
“Indeed,” he replied, between flumps!
I glanced back through the smoky, scream-laden, burnt-lizard scented air towards the entrance and saw a large white bear’s head appear at roughly shoulder-height. It opened its mouth, showing off sharp white fangs and roared. The sound vibrated through the stone and air and into my body. I recognised the beast from one of the mosaic images on the floor we’d walked over. This was a most unexpected surprise. But was it good news, or bad news?
From the corner of my eye I saw Sir Percival quickly glance towards the entrance where the bear stood, looking around. “Move away towards the other doorway, Miss Lovelady!”
“Do you feel it’s dangerous to us?” I called back, selecting the next batch of lizards to fry.
“I don’t know! My gun was never designed for prolonged use! It’s out of power!”
The dial on my own rifle was hovering uncomfortably near to the spent level. A quick glance around me indicated that I’d never be able to kill the remaining lizards heading towards us. Plus whether the great white bear was a friend or foe was still as yet unknown as it shouldered its way into the room.
As Sir Percival fiddled with his gun I began to clear the way to the other doorway with the remaining power in my rifle. My dress was unfortunately slowly resembling a Swiss cheese as the surrounding lizard’s corrosive spittle attacked it.
The bear roared again, the sound incredibly loud in the enclosed room.
“Run!” Sir Percival cried as he threw his power-less gun down into the pit.
I did so and used my spent rifle like a cricket bat to sweep lizards out of our way as I had no wish to be in the room when his strange gun met the red-hot magma at the bottom.
Seventeen
We sped around the corner out of the room just as a deep BOOM! sounded. A bright flash of orange light momentarily blinded me, which was almost immediately followed by a searing blast of hot air. Then a screaming roar sounded as the white bear felt the brunt of the magma thrown up by the explosion of Sir Percival’s gun.
Once the immediate danger passed I slowed to a stop and lowered my goggles around my neck. Sir Percival followed suit. There was little chance that anything survived being showered with red hot magma. Also my dress was in severe danger of falling off what with all of the holes the lizard’s nasty corrosive spittle had dissolved in it.
I slung my now useless gun over my shoulder to join the sword against my back.
“How are you, Sir Percival?”
“Slightly burnt.”
“By the magma?”
“No, those offensive little lizards.”
Was this the time and place to inform him that my dress was deteriorating around me as we spoke? How would he cope knowing he was in a virtually light-less environment with a female soon to be only dressed in her underthings? I felt it best to accentuate the positives in our situation. “At least we are still alive, Sir Percival.”
“Indeed.”
“And the lizards wouldn’t have survived the magma.”
“Most unlikely. Unfortunately it means that we shall have to inform the Department that one of its staff members has died. In most unusual circumstances.”
I was unsure whether it was right to judge a man’s character by the nasty disgusting creatures he metamorphosed into. What creature would Sir Percival be? Or I? And what of Mrs Lloyd? My heart sank as I suddenly realised that a white bear would be almost invisible in a snow-storm.
“Was she?” I whispered, horrified at the thought.
Was that why she was so upset with me wanting to look for the strange warm area in the grounds? Did she know that she’d have to hunt me down to protect their secret? Or was it a change that she had no conscious control over?
Sir Percival appeared to be reading my mind as he replied, “Responsible for Dewi’s death?”
“And the others Glenys mentioned?”
“Without knowing how they died, I can’t be sure. Perhaps a combination of both of them? Her claws could certainly be a match for Dewi’s wounds.”
And now she was dead. Burnt to a cinder. My heart sank with the knowledge that we’d killed her. Albeit by accident.
Deciding to change the topic I asked, “How long should we give the magma to cool so we can return?”
I turned and saw him through my strange purple aetheric night sight cogitating upon the question.
“I’d say a good few hours. Shame there’s no lantern this side so we can explore this undiscovered treasure trove.”
It was then that I realised there were no torch sconces in the walls. Perhaps as part of the religious theme the Romans relied on light from the magma room?
“We could use the magma to light some sort of material to create crude torches?”
“Regrettably the only material available would be our clothing.”
He gave a shudder at the thought of losing his clothing in close proximity to a female, or vice versa. But by the way my dress felt it wouldn’t be too long before his fear became reality.
Just then an eerie wailing scream sent shivers up and down my spine. “She’s still alive?” I whispered in shocked surprise.
“And perhaps upset we’ve killed her husband?”
Another, slightly closer-sounding scream didn’t bode well for us.
Eighteen
I carefully took hold of Sir Percival’s wrist and laid his hand upon my shoulder so he could follow me in the darkness. For some reason the light on this side of the room didn’t seem to travel as far as when we approached the room. Perhaps our eyes had grown accustomed to the greater light in the magma room? Or was it something to do with the magma explosion? Maybe some rock had fallen from the pit’s sides to into the magma and therefore reduced the amount of light emitted by it?
Using Sir Percival’s theory concerning the mosaic quality underfoot, I began quietly putting distance between ourselves and Mrs Lloyd’s murderous white bear.
“Do you have any idea where we are, Sir Percival?” I whispered.
“It may head towards the village, or towards the mountains. I am unable to make a determination without further information.”
I sighed, quietly. Fat lot of good that answer was.
As we walked I slowly became awa
re of more air around my legs. Puzzled I glanced own and saw that my dress was slowly rotting away and falling onto the mosaic path. With a sinking feeling I glanced behind me towards Sir Percival, and saw the same thing happening to his trousers. Oh dear. I knew I was wearing underwear, but Sir Percival? Had he perhaps picked up some bohemian-style thoughts concerning undergarment usage from his time with a male descendant of Casanova? I gave a shiver of horror at the thought.
I nearly jumped out of my skin as another rough scream came from behind us. Even if the bear’s nose were badly burned which meant it couldn’t follow our scent we, or at least our disintegrating clothes, were leaving a trail.
The mosaic path petered out and became hard-packed mud. We had apparently left the Roman temple. But where did this passageway lead?
Slowly I became aware that the path was sloping slightly downwards. Wherever it went we had to follow. Even though the passageway was narrow I still didn’t rate my chances using the sword against the white bear, however injured it was. Even if I stabbed at it I doubt that I’d hit anything vital, and it would still have those nasty-looking claws to use against me.
The sulphurous smell decreased and the air around us got cooler. Which was a nice change from the blistering heat of the magma room, but not very useful when your clothing was falling in pieces to the ground.
I tried a tactful way to broach the topic. “My clothing has certainly seen better days, Sir Percival.”
“Oh good heavens! Yours too?”
I decided it best not to look back to see how much of his trousers he still had left.
“Death behind us and horror in front,” he muttered darkly to himself.
Well, if he continued in that vein he could jolly well fend for himself!
Suddenly around a sharp corner the passage opened out into… space. A vast empty cavern appeared before me, lit by a glowing yellow-orange river that wound its way through it. I didn’t believe that such a place could exist with the town atop it so we must have walked far enough to be under one of the mountains that surrounded the village. The sudden sulphurous smell was even stronger here bringing tears to my eyes. Quickly I replaced my goggles over my eyes.