Chapter 30
Amazonite
Lillian
I’VE BOUGHT THE others as much time as I can muster. I only hope that it’s enough.
Ivo has collected his group of brutes. I assume they’re to be used as cannon fodder if the mountain has tricks up its sleeve.
There’s no other reason for them to tag along, being as daft as they are.
Though Ivo's bringing a select few, many will stay behind at camp. I try not to think about the fact that it will make for a tougher escape with men waiting behind. There’s no use in thinking of such things until they come to pass.
So many things must go correctly in order for me to even have a chance at escaping.
As my father falls in step beside me, I tear my eyes from where they rested upon the peak high above.
I’ve spent days staring up at that mountain, and now, now, I will finally touch its walls and feel its mist against my skin.
It pains me to know that I will be the only one within this party to appreciate stepping into an impossible piece of history.
I feel a prick of pain in my heart thinking of the only two people I’ve known who would feel the awe in the same way as me.
I wish they were here with me now, but M?e and Ademir are both gone.
They will never see this place even though they dreamed of it.
Just when the weight of my losses hangs so heavy that I think I might fall victim to the emotion, Margaret joins my father and me.
She must suspect that not all of my teammates have gone quietly, because the first thing she does is prod me about them. “It’s been awfully trouble-free,” she says, jabbing an elbow into my side. “I’m surprised Benny boy and the others haven’t come to your rescue, Rapunzel.”
I banish the bubbling emotions of pride before setting my face to stone. I don't know who's dead and who’s alive, but I know I have to act like I’ve lost them all. “You let him kill Ben, Margaret. You let him kill all of them.”
She sees straight through my lie, clearly a better spy than I ever was.
Lowering her voice to a murmur and bowing her head, she speaks for only me to hear.
“Of course, your highness.” She narrows her eyes at me, but I don’t give her the satisfaction of a single second of my attention.
“Of course,” she says again before skipping off.
Her slim frame joins Ivo, and she practically hangs off him as she wraps an arm around his.
My heart breaks for James again. Even though I never saw them break protocol, it was clear to me that he was quite smitten by her.
She never once behaved in front of him as she behaves with Ivo.
In a different world, where either of us women had made different decisions, perhaps we would have found ourselves on the same team in the end. The thought gives me both hope for future decisions but also terrifies me to think that there’s a timeline where I worked for Ivo and the rest of them.
I see that timeline in the man next to me.
The man I had idolized until realizing his true nature.
I wonder if he knows that the girl beside him still has a smidge of love for him.
Not respect, not care, but a daughter’s love that will never be voiced.
I wonder if he knows that he is leading his own daughter to a certain death.
“Your mother would have been so proud to see you come this far,” my father says beside me. “To see how you’ve embraced the power bestowed upon you.”
I don’t answer him. I’m too caught up in the fact that my mother would have led me here too. The difference in her own selflessness is the one thing I can hold onto. She would have sacrificed herself first. That’s exactly what she did. She gave everything before passing the burden to me.
Feeling power rise out of rage is the last thing I need to be feeling, so when my untied hands involuntarily clench, I pull myself out of the darkness.
Placing a palm gently against my father’s forearm, I let him think it’s a kind gesture of remembrance before letting it slide away.
“M?e would be here if you had made different choices.” I let the comment sink before taking two long strides to pass him.
The two brutes assigned to me follow tightly behind, but I couldn’t care, not when I’ve got more important things to be preparing for.
The hike through the courtyard features more deadened earth; what I imagine was once a place of commune and celebration is barren and devoid of any color at all.
The front door on the other side is made of thick wood and stands well over a story tall.
Whatever tree that was felled to make such a thing must have been growing for hundreds of years.
The finish has stood the test of time; not a centimeter of it is compromised.
There are carved details of the river and mountains that are still visible to the naked eye.
To my relief, the evil doers manage to open it, no explosives required.
The door creaks wide open, revealing a grand reception hall. It’s all over before I know it. I’m out of time to pray, out of time to plan, and certainly out of time to think.
The room feels like something out of an ancient and cold castle in Europe.
It could be a prison if not for the palette of the rainforest that adorns the walls in the form of murals.
The dusty mosaics of greens, blues, and browns bring the room out of solitude and into the cultures of the region.
Amazonite, blue and black, are inlayed into many of the pictures, instantly catching the light we’ve brought in with the opening of the door.
Items of furniture and decoration scream warmth with yellows, reds, and greens.
It’s a wonder to me that they were able to build something so quickly and then have to abandon it shortly after.
The scale is grand, and unfathomable; nothing like this could be built today.
Glassless windows line the front wall much like the homes in the settlement.
Each one is placed perfectly to allow in as much sunlight as needed at each hour of the day.
As the sun’s rays move fully central in the most central frame, I’m bathed in the warm light.
I close my eyes to forget the evil men around me and imagine for a moment what it might have been like to dwell here when all was peace.
The women-led tribe that the colony stemmed from would have been so hesitant of living in this prison in the sky.
I imagine their world changed the moment the Portuguese arrived.
Men they thought they could build a new life with, a trustworthy life full of new ideas and forward thinking they thought would provide a better life for them.
I’ve experienced the complexities of a modern world, and it is nothing but darkness and cutthroat business.
I’ve also experienced, if only for an afternoon long ago, an ancient way of life.
One full of care and celebration of life.
I wonder if these women saw the dangers of a man’s world or if the day they died was the day they realized how cruel the creatures can be.
But of course, my visions tell me they did. There had been a union and a child birthed from that union, and the other elders had warned and fretted over the implications. The dagger and necklace had come into that union, and when the man recognized the power, it was all over.
I wait for the whispers to correct me, to desperately tell me that I’m wrong, but they are silent. Perhaps, even in death, this palace does not serve them as it had been intended to and is instead a symbol of what went wrong.
A sharp shove in the back with the barrel of a gun gets me moving again. Leaving the warmth of the sun for the sphere of Ivo’s iciness is enough to make me shiver. “Show me the way through,” he says. As if I have been here before.
When I hesitate, another gun meets my back. They wouldn’t dare shoot me, but I know the consequences of disobeying—another bout with ropes. It’s not time to make a run for it yet, so I nod and slowly trudge my way forward.
In my visions, the sanctuary had been shown to me to have windows, but not like the ones above.
They had been larger, the size of a full grown man.
They’d led out to a small balcony of stone.
The walls had been the smooth rock of the mountain itself.
I would expect to find the room tucked away somewhere.
A place where only the family living here would have easy access to it.
Another room untouched by the darkness. These halls meant something to the wielder; I expect the sanctuary did as well.
All these clues paint an easy enough picture for me, but I don’t dare let those around me know a single detail.
Deeper and deeper, our party wanders into the reception room without a hint of a single change. Deeper and deeper, we walk without me giving anything away. I hold onto everything until the next step becomes clear in an instant.
A pile of shattered stone and black amazonite blocks our path. From the entrance, it had looked like one of the wonderful murals reflecting stunningly in the sunlight, but now I see it for what it is. Something beautiful, shattered by a rageful hand.
One portion of the wall remains, part of an arch. It stretches up from the right and runs just over the halfway mark. Behind it is nothing but a sharp entanglement blocking the path.
“It’s missing a piece,” Margaret says, angling her head from side to side to get different looks at it.
One of the men laughs. “You think so, Fr?ulein?”
She turns wildly and gives the man a look that could kill.
“At the top of the arch. It’s different from the rest of it.
” She points again, and I hate that she’s right.
When you catch the light right, you can see that the edges move from an inky black to a brazen blue.
The same blue as my necklace and…and the boxes.
The box we could never open was never a box at all.
The answer hits me like a brick wall, and I nearly make the discovery audible.
Unfortunately, Margaret’s attention falls to me at the wrong moment and she recognizes the change in my face. Her face contorts into a twisted smile I didn’t think she was capable of giving and a finger rises toward me. “She knows the answer. This is her next test.”
Ivo wastes no time. He waves me forward, and when I don’t budge, he hands Margaret my old bag and comes to retrieve me himself. His grip is not kind, and even though I attempt to refuse, his strength is too great. I’m marched over and put right in front of the ruins.
Margaret has already pulled the black amazonite needle and the lump of blue amazonite from the bag. One in each hand. I make no play for either of them, only study the object on the right. The more I look at it, the more the center of it takes on the anatomically correct shape of a heart.
The room is eerily quiet for how many of us linger. They wait for me to make a move, but little do they know that I won’t be dropping a finger.
“Which one!” Ivo roars. He places both hands on the back of my head and compels me to bow over Margaret’s hand. “Which one,” he says again, forcing my eye from the needle to the heart. When I don’t so much as squirm, he releases me and takes both objects into his hand. “I’ll do it myself then!”
He whistles, and immediately, hands are restraining me. Margaret coos into his ear and coaxes him forward with the knowledge to place the bigger piece where it belongs in the arch.
Everyone watches wide-eyed as he reaches up and attempts to place the stone in the socket. Though it stays in place as he steps back, nothing happens.
“It knows,” my father says under his breath. Unfortunately, the echo in the chamber makes it so all of us hear his comment.
“What?” Ivo brazenly asks. As he whirls on my father, his hair falls from its slicked back position turning him from Nazi officer to madman.
Father steps forward, bolder than before. “It knows your intent.”
Where my heart was once in my stomach, it has now dropped to the floor. He has known the intent from the start. He knows the horrendous nature of Ivo’s plans for the dagger, and yet he is still pushing for him to win the day.
Before Ivo can lunge at my father for calling him out, Margaret soothes him by digging grounding fingers into the sleeve of his jacket. How he’s still wearing a jacket in the heat of this place I will never know. Though, I suppose, the devil does like it hot.
“It needs the necklace,” Margaret whispers after finally calming the hulking man beside her.
All attention turns to me. The hands that bind retreat, and I’m left with a single option as Ivo approaches with the amazonite ripped back from its rightful place.
He forces it into my hand, and finally the tears come.
I held out as long as I could for Ben and the others, but with no sign of them, I should assume I will be facing the final two tests alone.
Not alone. A whisper cuts through the noise, faint but there.
As the necklace swells with light, I remember just how much power I hold within me. How could I ever forget that those that came before me have stood beside me and will continue to?
Stepping forward by my own power, I finally know how I will accomplish the goal I set out to achieve. When this task is complete and Ivo asks me to cease, asks for me to be restrained, there will be no such thing.
With or without allies, now is the time to make a move.