“Hey, that kinda looks like the school’s shield, I remember seeing it on the letterhead that was on our acceptance letters,” Zane said, never forgetting what he saw.
“You’re right,” Theo agreed now remembering it as well.
“So, what happened, what did you see?” Zane pushed again.
“I think it was memories of how the dagger began,” Theo said looking down at it and bending to pick it back up.
“Uh, do you think you should do that?” Zane warned but Theo knew that the danger had passed.
“I can’t explain it, but it’s almost as if it’s telling me to take it, like I will need it or something,” Theo said after picking it up and looking down at the now empty glass dagger. It looked like a giant shard of clear crystal that had once been blood red, as though it had been chipped off a glass boulder. In fact, the only thing that looked manmade was its handle.
It had six hooked claws made of gold, holding it secure to the metal it appeared forged to. Then its T bar held a fan of claws reaching outwards on either side, which looked like deadly spikes ready to injure anyone who didn’t wield it right.
The handle itself was decorated with embossed gold lattice work and its pommel end piece looked like an Aztec sun, arching round like some Sun God’s headpiece. It was stunning and deadly looking all at the same time.
“And that liquid?” Zane asked making Theo look at him when he said,
“It was blood,” Theo answered feeling as though he was back there, seeing it seeping into himself all over again. But it wasn’t just this that was playing on his mind. It was all the images it had shown him, like a storyboard when all put together. He didn’t know who the monster had been or the girl who had defeated it but he knew one thing, that fallen King, well that King had been…
Dominic Draven.
One from a different time.
“Well that’s comforting to know,” Zane said sarcastically in response to Theo telling him it was blood.
“We’d better go,” Theo said gripping the handle once more before hooking it through the belt on his jeans being careful of the gold spikes that were likely to do damage.
“Yeah, let’s just hope the rooms beyond this point don’t get any weirder,” Zane said but down there, well they were asking for a lot. They pushed the next door open and found themselves faced with a huge hallway, one that cars could have driven down with room to spare on either side.
“Wow, it makes you wonder who their architect was and if they have like a demon company they go with?” Theo had to laugh, as it was true the place was incredible, but in a gothic, creepy way.
“For starters, I don’t think you could walk into Macy’s department store and pick out your favourite Gargoyle,” Zane said looking up at them all as they walked past.
Well if Theo thought that the upstairs looked like part of a castle then down there it looked as if it was straight out of a Greek temple.
There were carved stone pillars that looked like sandstone warriors running down the length of the space. Each was holding up the ceiling above with muscles bulging with an eternal strength. Theo looked up and saw massive arches covered in gilded flowers. It now seemed as though those stone hands were holding up precious artwork on the ceiling, along with the stone arches.
But like Zane had said, it was not only beauty to be found because in between these pillars were the twisted faces of grotesque looking gargoyles. However, they weren’t the weathered ones Theo had been used to seeing on buildings like Westminster Abbey or London’s Natural History Museum. No, these looked as though they could have been carved yesterday.
“I swear those eyes are following us,” Zane said as they walked down the massive space, feeling like a couple of small intruders in comparison.
“I think that’s because they are,” Theo said side on to his friend as he noticed the first one turning its head as they passed.
“Great…just great, even the freakin CCTV here is demonic,” Zane said looking cautiously up over his shoulder at them.
“Ignore them,” Theo muttered between gritted teeth.
“Easier said than done my friend, seeing as they keep looking at us like the human take-out just arrived,” Zane murmured in reply, turning on his heel to make sure no one was following them.
“Then let’s make it fast food and get a move on,” Theo recommended and they both started making a run for it, as being watched by those stone demons had become too much. The door at the other end started to get closer and closer just as they could hear the frantic movements of stone grinding against stone, as the monstrous gargoyles tried to keep up with their fast pace.
They both landed hard against the door, falling through it but saving themselves before they hit the ground. They both turned and slammed the door, shutting out whatever those things were.
“Oh good, out of danger,” Zane said leaning against the wood, trying to catch his breath. Theo on the other hand turned around to take in the room and gasped before informing him,
“I think you spoke too soon.” Then he grabbed Zane’s shoulder and pulled him, so that he was facing the right way and could see what Theo was now seeing.
“O…h, you have got to be shitting me!” Zane said after first stuttering to find the right words to express…well, the unbelievable they were seeing right now.
“Seriously it can’t be, it just…”
“Calm down,” Theo said, trying to keep Zane cool along with dealing with his own. But then Zane lost it and screamed what they were now both stood inside,
“Calm down, calm down…are you insane? How the hell can I calm down when we are in…!” He took a breath, looked around the vast space and screamed,
“…A GODDAMN CRYPT!”
32
Blood is the Key
Theo had no choice other than to slap a hand over Zane’s mouth in hopes of calming him down.
“Okay so yes, it looks like a crypt but at the moment it looks like a very quiet goddamn crypt and we really…really want to keep it that way. So, I suggest we get to the other side as quickly and as quietly as possible before we find out who rests in those holes,” Theo said, emphasising the word ‘really’ again and then looked towards the man-sized holes that covered the walls of the room, just to make his point. Zane didn’t try and say anything but just nodded behind his hand letting Theo know that he understood.
“Are we cool?”
“Yeah for now, but just so you know, if anything crawls out of those holes, then I’m not ashamed to say I will probably shit myself before screaming out of that door like a little girl, ‘cos at this point, give me creepy ass gargoyles any day, at least those bitches can’t reach me!” Zane said making his own point very clear.
“Gotya,” Theo told him as he didn’t want to admit it, but if something did come out of those holes, then in all likelihood he would be right there running alongside him…minus the crap filled pants and screaming like a girl of course.
The room they were now stood in, if it could be called that, was the size of an enclosed football field. The floor was a series of broken tiles that created a picture which neither Theo or Zane could make any sense of. It almost looked as though the sky itself was engaging in a battle of light and dark, creating clouds of grey in between.
The huge walls looked tall enough to keep an army out, but for all they knew a dead army was what lay inside them. For there were floor to ceiling holes cut out of the bare rock that were the perfect size for hundreds of coffins to fit inside, widthways. But even this wasn’t their biggest concern right then, as it was what the room held at its core that was their main focus.
“Okay I was wrong, this place officially just got weirder.”
“Amen to that. What the hell is that thing?” Theo agreed with Zane as what they were seeing now made even less sense than the dagger, gargoyles and coffins combined. At the centre of the room stood a gigantic pillar, reaching up to the roof, as though it could have held an entire city… or what they at
least thought was a pillar.
The closer they got to it they soon realised it wasn’t a manmade structure at all, but instead a Jurassic looking tree that seemed as if it was still trapped in the stone age. Theo had never seen giant redwoods before but looking at the size of this thing, then this was what he would have expected. Something big enough you could have fit three cars through if someone had cut a tunnel through its centre.
“I think it’s a tree…or at least it was at one time,” Zane said looking it up and down just as Theo did the closer they got to it.
“It looks…”
“Fossilised?” Zane finished for him and he was right for it no longer held any life inside it that it once had. The colossal trunk was grey, void of energy as though it had been locked down there that long. And without any sunlight, it had simply started to fade from the earth, becoming stone like the rest of the room. Even its vast network of branches that travelled along the ceiling above were dead, as though they too were still searching for that important lifeforce…the sun.
“I think it’s wise if we just leave it alone,” Theo suggested.
“Good plan, although I don’t know about you, but I don’t see any doors around here…do you?” Zane agreed and like Theo, was looking around the place for a way out, other than the way they had come in.
“Maybe we made a wrong turn or missed something?”
“No, this is the way she said to go but wait, I didn’t check the note,” Theo said, only just remembering what Fae had written down for him.
“So, the hot geek did tell you something?” Zane remarked but Theo just shot him a look as if to say not to go there as he fished the piece of paper out of his jeans’ pocket.
“Well that’s interesting,” Theo remarked sarcastically, something Zane didn’t quite pick up on the first-time round.
“Yeah?” Theo looked up and said,
“No, not really. It just sounds like it’s really gonna hurt…again!” he answered, walking over to where she had directed in her note, a place that simply looked like a wall of stone vines.
“I don’t see a door,” Zane said but he didn’t know what Theo knew thanks to that note and the horrors that awaited them. So, instead of telling him what was written, he just handed it over for him to read for himself. Zane’s eyes widened and he looked back up at the thorn covered vines all entwined there. It looked like a curtain of razor backed snakes had been draped down to hide what lay beneath.
“Okay, so hey, look it was nice knowing you and all but…”
“Gee thanks, your concern is overwhelming but you’d better stop now before I cry,” Theo said lacing his words with sarcasm.
“No, you crying will be when you stuff your hand in there and let it feed from your blood like the note said. I mean how do we even know it’s not going to get a taste for you and think…um, I like this vintage, I think instead of a sip, I shall just take the whole bottle?”
“Well, there is only one way to find out now, isn’t there?” And before Zane could talk him out of it, he suddenly plunged his hand in and prayed he tasted foul. He touched the cold stone and for a second he wondered why he’d bothered as the things were obviously dead but then what was it that Pip had said, about presumption being the mother from where all mistakes are born.
Well this turned out to be true when Theo started to feel movement on his fingertips.
“What’s happening…is something happening?” Zane asked repeating himself. Theo turned to look at him with one hand still feeling for something more, but just as he was about to answer his eyes went wide, telling Zane all he needed to know. The vines slithered along his palm and up around his wrist, entwining itself as if trying to find a pulse on a sleeping corpse. The second it found what it was looking for Theo started to feel it pulsate and vibrate along his flesh just as it produced its wicked thorns.
“AHHH!” Theo cried out just as Zane predicted he would as it started to pierce Theo’s palm over and over again, extracting his blood with each thrust. Theo tried to yank his hand free and when Zane saw what Theo was doing he tried to help; both of them putting a foot on the wall, trying to get leverage. But there must have been a certain amount of blood needed because as soon as it had taken its fill, it released him, making them both fall backwards.
They landed with a painful thud but Theo cared more for the throbbing in his hand, not his behind. He cradled his hand and looked down at the injured palm, seeing now that the strange symbol the dagger had left was back, only this time it was bloody.
“Look!” Zane shouted to Theo. He looked, not knowing what to expect, just as the vines started to thrive once more. It was as if they had found just a drop of sunlight, enough to breathe lush green life back into their roots. The grey vines started to bloom into a wave of forest greens before each one looked like the tree it once belonged to. They slithered up to the ceiling and back to the fossilised tree only managing to make it to the very tips of the branches. Theo couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if it had made it all the way down the mighty trunk, but this fleeting thought was quickly consumed by the sight of the massive doors emerging from behind its veil.
“Alright, now that is a freakin huge door!” Zane said, getting off the ground as Theo did but being just as transfixed as he, unable to take his eyes from it. It was huge and looked as though it would have needed thirty men to move it! But in the end, as if by his thoughts alone, the door started to open and Theo half expected to find some giant standing there behind it, being let out of its prison. Thankfully though, all that faced them was a bright light that was as blinding as if they had been walking out from the darkness.
“Do we dare?” Zane asked and Theo nodded and replied,
“Why the Hell not.” Then he walked forward into the void with Zane following him saying,
“That isn’t funny, for all we know this could be the gates of Hell.” Theo didn’t answer him as he obviously made it through to the other side first, ready to inform Zane of what faced them the second he made it through the blinding tunnel of light.
“Oh, we’re in Hell alright, just one that’s controlled by the Dravens,” Theo said and Zane rubbed his eyes to see that Theo was right. They had just stepped in to none other than a Demonic prison!
“You got that right,” he agreed as the place they were now stood was no doubt many people’s idea of Hell considering they were now staring down the centre of a room which held demonic prisoners either side. They were literally surrounded by the world’s most dangerous demons and supernatural beings on earth!
“Well, we ain’t in Kansas anymore,” Zane said looking from side to side, making sure no one was going to fly out at them and attack at any second.
“Mmm, I smell young flesh, fresh for the picking.” A demonic voice said, making them jump further away from one of the heavy metal doors that was the only barrier between them and IT.
“Then where are we?” Theo asked after they both gasped when the door rattled frantically.
“It’s freakin’ 666, House of the Dead, on Elm street, in Amityville, on Friday the 13th in Hell…that’s what this is!” Zane said and he had to agree with him, because even though it took a lot to scare Theo, this was right up there on the top of his list!
The crude doors looked like hammered metal with bolted rivets used to reinforce the strength in each. They all held small openings with bars fixed inside the arched windows. But it was the locks that puzzled Theo the most, as some held small flat dishes which looked ready for something to be placed there for the door to be opened.
“Come here little boys, I won’t hurt you, just a little kiss for granny.” One withered old voice said and Zane reached up on tip toes from a distance to see a hideous old woman, bleeding in between hundreds of wrinkles with pointed razor-sharp teeth, grinning sadistically at him. But it soon got more sickening when she gave him a little wave and he found that all the flesh on her fingers had been eaten and all that was left were the bones that had been gnawed, filin
g them down into sharp points.
“Nope, I don’t think so,” Zane said giving Theo a little shake of his head, telling him not to look.
“What was it?”
“Well, let’s just say that if Wolverine had a crazed, demented grandmother, with a major skin problem, then I think we just found her,” Zane replied swallowing down the bile that also threatened to bring up his food.
“Let’s carry on, Janie must be down here somewhere…oh and stay away from those dish things, the note said that they are the locks and blood is what can open them,” Theo said after double checking the note again and knowing now that the P stood for Prison. No wonder she had been shocked to find him going down there by choice.
“Well, not only do I not intend to go anywhere near those doors, but I also think that unless I am haemorrhaging and bleeding to death by some freak accident involving my batman belt buckle, that just happens to spray my blood up there, then I think we’re good.” Theo didn’t answer as he agreed, it was pretty obvious neither of them were going anywhere near those doors, that was unless…
“Is that Janie?” Zane asked as they walked around a corner to see that the door at the end was different in several ways. To begin with, it was much bigger. But apart from being more heavily fortified, it was also covered in several symbols that looked to be branded into a series of metal bars, ones that had been added to the original door.
Almost as though when they caught this prisoner, they knew they would get out of any other door they had. So, they had no choice but to reinforce this one, not only by bolting twenty metal strips the size of 2x4s across it, but also by using magic.
The Glass Dagger (Afterlife Chronicles Book 1) Page 25
