12. Venetia
Venetia
B ack at the library, Blake crouches over the ancient stone, his fingers tracing its edges with an intensity that borders on reverence. “We need to do this carefully,” he murmurs. “This stone must remain intact.” He gives Viper a hard stare.
Viper just shrugs and places the shovel at the edge of the stone. He gives the shovel a hard shove, wedging it under the stone’s edge. I hold my breath as he applies pressure, levering it up. The ancient stone groans in protest, centuries of stillness disturbed in an instant.
“Easy,” Blake warns, his hands hovering near the edge as if ready to catch a priceless artefact.
“It’s a fucking rock,” Viper mutters, but he eases up slightly on the pressure.
Rafferty positions his shovel on the opposite side, and they work together, gently raising the massive stone a fraction at a time. The stone lifts higher, revealing wet dirt.
With a final heave, they manage to slide the stone to one side. It settles with a dull thud, exposing a square opening roughly three feet across. Cold air wafts up from below, carrying the scent of damp stone earth.
“Well, well. Lord Cravenmoor’s secret,” Blake says.
“And whoever came before him,” I mutter. “This was placed here to cover up something for a long time.”
Blake shines his torch into the square opening. A set of narrow stone steps descends into darkness, the stone smooth and well-worn. “Look at this,” he murmurs, lying face down to get a better look.
“What is it?”
“A symbol etched into the top step.” He runs his fingers over it. “Very old.”
“How old?” Viper asks.
Blake looks up at him, his eyes shining with academic excitement. “Roman old.”
“Roman?” I repeat. “Are you sure?”
He nods. “Look at the way this has been carved. The straight lines, the precise angles. This isn’t mediaeval craftsmanship. This is much older. The symbol itself is a variation of a Signum Praesidii —a Roman protective ward.”
“So the Romans built this?” I ask, leaning closer to see the symbol, my stomach fluttering. This is a huge find.
“Not necessarily the passage, but they definitely knew it was here and marked it,” Blake explains, his eyes alight with fascination. “The old castle must’ve been built on the ruins of an old Roman fort. It has never been mentioned in any of the history texts of this building.”
“Because everyone took great pains to keep whatever is down there hidden.”
“Fascinating history lesson,” Viper interrupts, “but can we focus on what’s down there now?”
“Should we go down there?” Rafferty asks, frowning into the darkness. “This doesn’t sound like a great idea, right now.”
“Whatever your buddy Corven wanted is down there. His paymasters blew up the library to get to it,” Viper points out.
“Not my buddy,” Raff grits out.
I ignore their bickering and peer into the darkness below. The steps disappear into blackness that seems to swallow Blake’s torchlight. A shiver runs up my spine. Whatever is down there has been hidden for centuries, guarded by those who came before us.
“I’ll go first,” I say, already preparing to step down.
Viper’s hand clamps around my wrist. “Like hell you will.”
I turn to him, raising an eyebrow. “We’ve been through this.”
“And we’ll keep going through it until you learn,” he growls. “Blake goes first. You follow. No arguments.”
Blake snickers. “Thanks.”
Viper gives him a foul stare. “You are the academic here. All this cloak-and-dagger, dungeon stuff is your bag, not mine and not Venetia’s to be running into headfirst. You said that the symbol is a protective ward.
Whatever is down there isn’t just a bunch of rats and skeletons like the last hole we dropped into. ”
The command in his voice sends a flush of heat through me, but I push it aside. Now isn’t the time. I nod. “He’s right. You know about the symbols and shit. We could be walking into one giant trap.”
Blake looks pleased by the vote of confidence, but he says, “Since when are you the voice of reason?”
“Since about five seconds ago, when I realised we’re about to descend into a two-thousand-year-old Roman tunnel that someone desperately wants to access. I may be reckless, but I’m not stupid.”
He nods and goes into Blake-mode.
He lowers himself into the opening. He descends slowly, the beam of his phone torch cutting through the darkness below. When he’s about halfway down, he pauses.
“It seems stable,” he calls up. “The steps are worn but solid. Bring those shovels… just in case.”
I shoot Viper a fearful look. “In case of what?” I hiss.
He shrugs. “Rats,” he growls.
“Right,” I mutter.
Viper nudges me forward. “Your turn, wildcat.”
I take a deep breath and follow Blake down the steps, feeling the cool, damp air envelop me as I descend. The stone is smooth beneath my fingers as I trail them along the wall for balance. It feels almost polished, as if countless hands before mine have traced the same path over centuries.
“Watch your step here,” Blake warns from the next step. “There’s a crack in the stone.”
I step carefully over it, feeling Viper right behind me. The stairway is narrow, forcing us to descend single file. The air grows colder with each step, carrying a strange, metallic scent that makes my nose wrinkle.
Blake reaches the bottom step and sweeps his torch around a small antechamber, from what I can see in the dim glow. “Definitely Roman,” he declares.
“How can you tell?” Rafferty asks from behind me before I can.
“Catacombs.”
“Oh?” I croak and freeze.
Viper crashes into me, his reflexes lightning fast as his hand shoots out to grab my arm before I topple forward.
“The Romans built extensive burial chambers under their fortifications. This makes sense.”
“Creepy sense,” I mutter, fighting the urge to turn and climb back up. Rats are fine. Skeletons, and not the kind you keep in a proverbial closet, are not my friend. I squeeze my eyes shut and shake my head.
Viper’s hand remains on my arm, steady and reassuring. “You okay?” he whispers in my ear.
“Mm-hm,” I mutter and open my eyes again. Too many nights I’ve had nightmares about what my mother must look like now, lying in her coffin, six feet under, in her pretty red dress that Dad bought her and she loved with a passion not usually reserved for clothes.
Viper’s hand lands on the back of my neck, and it works like a soothing hot stone. The unintended pun makes me stifle an inappropriate snort, but it does the job. It refocuses me. “I’m fine.”
As I step down onto the floor of the antechamber, I can finally see what Blake’s torch has illuminated.
The walls are lined with small rectangular niches, most empty but some still containing fragments of bone and pottery.
Rafferty adds his torchlight, sweeping it up above our heads, lest anything drop down on us…
When nothing crashes down on our heads, I resume looking at the walls.
Ancient Latin inscriptions are carved into the stone above each niche, the letters worn but miraculously still legible.
“This isn’t what they’re after,” Viper says, his voice close to my ear. “Keep moving.”
Blake is already examining an archway on the far side of the chamber. “Three doorways. Classical Roman design. The central path would typically lead to the main chamber.”
“Or it’s a trap,” Rafferty says. “The obvious path is usually the most dangerous.”
“We need to find whatever this ‘asset’ is before they send another team,” I remind them. “Central path it is.”
Blake leads the way through the middle doorway, his torch beam cutting through the darkness ahead.
The passage is narrow but tall enough that the guys don’t need to duck.
Smooshed between them, I feel like a child, surrounded by adults.
I take after my mother, never growing over five two.
Blake is the shortest of the three men, and he must stand at six feet easily.
With my mother’s memory so close to the surface, I automatically reach out to my left breast and absently press my fingers down over my top.
Viper’s declaration earlier took me completely by surprise.
It was sweet and thoughtful, but he can’t carry this burden for me.
This dread that one day I will end up ravaged by disease and die too young.
Biting the inside of my lip so I don’t cry. I focus on the dark tunnel. Which symbolically doesn’t help. Did Mum see a tunnel? Did she see a light at the end of it?
Blake stops, and I halt behind him. “What is it?”
“Maybe you should go back upstairs?” he says, turning around and blocking my view of whatever is now behind him.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I snap. “What is it?”
He exchanges a wary stare with Viper over the top of my head, which just pisses me off.
“Move.”
“No.”
“Move forward or get kicked in the balls,” I snap.
“Well, when you put it like that… but trigger warning for the skeleton, okay?”
I grimace but shoot him a death stare. It seems my irrational fear is becoming a liability that these men are trying to cushion me from, without me even having told them anything about it.
There should be a thought-provoking response to that, but right now, I’m more annoyed than pensive. Blake turns around and moves carefully forward and to the side to reveal something that will probably stick with me for a very, very long time.