Chapter 22 #2
She cocked her head to the side and closed her eyes to concentrate. There, with the barest of sounds she heard the whisper of trees on the wind. She couldn’t discern what they said because she was too far away, but she heard them. That in itself was enough to bring a smile to her lips.
Sonya must have walked another half hour when the ground suddenly dropped at a steep angle off to her side. She followed it down, surprised to find there were steps.
“The burial mound,” she whispered as she stopped in front of a stone door.
She leaned close to see if something might be etched into the stone, but she didn’t glimpse anything. Time could have eroded the markings, however. She tried to push against the door to open it, but the heavy stone didn’t budge.
Sonya sank onto the steps and waited for Broc. She bounced her leg and drummed her fingers on her knee. She’d never been good at waiting. Patience wasn’t a virtue that came naturally to her, and she hadn’t tried to cultivate it.
She didn’t know how long she sat before she heard the sound of Broc’s wings above her. An instant later he was standing before her.
“I’m not hurt,” she said as she stood.
He walked down the steps with barely a glance at the door of the tomb. His gaze raked her up and down. “Nay, you are no’.”
“I found the tomb.”
“A good thing too.” Broc’s Warrior eyes looked over her head. Gone were his dark, sultry eyes. In their place were ones of the darkest blue covering every inch of his eye, even the whites. Warrior eyes. “Deirdre isna far."
“I tried to open the door.”
Broc nodded and turned to it. He looked around the door and shook his head. “This is a burial mound, but I doona believe it’s the one we’re looking for.”
“Are you sure?” Sonya wasn’t ready to give up. With Deirdre arriving soon, their time was running out.
“I’m certain. Deirdre told me about the markings.”
Sonya took a deep breath and walked up the steps, “Then we need to keep looking.”
Broc couldn’t stop the smile as he followed Sonya. Her disappointment was great, but she wasn’t giving up. It was her tenacity which would work to their benefit.
He knew she was tired, but she was ready to continue. For as long as it took. He followed her as they searched. She had set up a system that seemed to work.
Thrice more they found burial mounds—mounds he hadn’t seen from the sky, they were so well hidden— but each time they turned out not to be the one they hunted.
The sun was setting, creating more shadows in the mist and making it even more difficult to see. Broc was half a step behind Sonya when he heard her gasp. He grabbed hold of her arm as he saw her pitch forward, his heart in his throat.
He pulled her up beside him and just held her. He fought against the instinct to take her far away from him, but then he remembered her argument. If he left now, Deirdre might find the tomb before he returned. He had no choice. For the moment. But he would keep her safe.
With his speed and enhanced senses, he was better equipped to keep Sonya safe than any before her, save Anice. He’d learned his lesson there, however. He would make sure it was a different outcome with Sonya.
Broc forced his hands to drop from Sonya. He knelt and peered through the mist inside the hole. "It's another tomb.”
“Where are the stairs?” Sonya asked.
“I doona see any.” He jumped into the indentation and reached up to swing her down beside him.
Sonya groaned. “I can barely see anything.”
Fortunately for Broc, he could see as well in the dark as he could in the light. The stairs down to the entrance of the tomb had been taken over by the earth. “This is a verra old burial mound.”
“Broc.”
He heard a thread of excitement and apprehension in her voice. “What is it?”
“Feel,” she said.
He didn’t need to. He could see what her fingers traced. “Celtic markings.”
“This is it, isn’t it? We’ve found the tomb.”
Her face was turned toward him, a huge smile on her lips. Her eyes danced with anticipation as her fingers moved from one marking to the next.
“I want to have a look inside first,” he said,
“We have no idea what the artifact is. How can you look inside and know if this is the correct tomb or not?"
Broc shrugged. When he realized she couldn’t see, he said, “I doona know. This is an old burial mound but…”
“But what?”
“I expected more.”
“You mean you expected it to be more difficult to get inside?”
“Aye.”
She sighed. “But you haven’t tried the door yet.”
Broc eyed the square stones that formed the entry before disappearing into the earth on either side and on top. The door itself was made of a solid piece of boulder with a huge spiral carved at its center and smaller ones around it.
He gripped the rock and pulled. It groaned and creaked as it began to gradually slide open. Broc halted Sonya when she began to step around him to enter first
“Let me,” he said and ducked into the mound.
The chamber was made up of the same square stones to construct a perfect circle. The ground continued its descent another foot, and above him the roof rose and narrowed to resemble a beehive.
“Broc,” Sonya whispered.
He looked around at the broken remains of pottery and the scattered bones. “Come see.”
She stepped through and covered her mouth with her hand as she coughed.
“You’ll get used to the smell. It has been closed up for a long time,” he said.
“Someone moved the body.”
He nodded and walked around the small chamber. “Most likely someone came to see if there was anything of value.”
“Which there isn’t.”
“Or if there was, it was taken.”
She knelt beside the skull. “This was our fifth burial mound. There has to be more.”
“I'm sure there are. We’ll find the one we’re looking for, Sonya.”
“I have no doubt," she said as she stood and walked from the tomb.
Broc gave the tomb one more look before he followed her.