Touching Midnight

by Fiona Hood-Stewart

  All the hairs at the back of her neck lifted as he indicated the difference in the size of the blocks, then ran the beam of his flashlight over the visible join that went the length of one wall, across the ceiling and down the other wall. “Whoever built the entrance tunnel didn’t build this part. The construction material is the same, but the way the stone is dressed and fitted is different.” He aimed the beam over her head. “Even the ceiling height has changed. Whatever this part of the temple is, it’s on a much bigger scale than the rest.”

  A few meters later, the broad walkway ended in a wall.

  “There’s got to be a door.” Jay ran his fingers along the join, then pushed at the smooth sheet of granite, but it was solid.

  Quin stripped off her gloves, stuffed them into her jacket pocket, then studied the door and the glyphs that were carved into the adjacent walls. Knowledge tantalized but failed to coalesce into anything helpful. “The builders might be different, but the glyphs are the same.”

  “Let me try something.”

  He began systematically pressing the snugly fitted stones around the glyph, moving in the direction of the suspected door. When nothing happened, he studied the glyph, then pressed the center. The stone moved smoothly inward and another, lower down, slid out with a grating sound to protrude several inches from the wall. “That’s it, the door’s unlocked.”

  “How did you know to do that?”

  “Common sense. The door had to have a mechanism somewhere close.” Jay pushed against the door. This time it swung inward with ease, rotating on a rod that was fitted slightly off center.

  Covering her nose and mouth against the dust that rose in a cloud as the door scraped over the remains of the plaster that had once covered the walls, Quin followed Jay into the chamber.

  Her first impression, after the long tunnel, was one of space. Dust motes as fine as talcum powder spiraled upward, glowing incandescent in the beams of their flashlights as air that had lain still for century upon century stirred.

  The chamber was empty except for a short stone pillar in the center, which culminated in a four-sided point—an obelisk. Quin swung her light upward, tracing the sloping line of the ceiling. The breath stopped in her throat when the beam, almost swallowed by darkness, picked out the unmistakable apex of a pyramid.

  “Bingo,” Jay said quietly.

  Quin swung the beam down and around, critically examining the proportions of the pyramid. Something wasn’t quite right. “It’s smaller than I thought it would be.”

  Jay lifted a brow. “I’m not even going to ask the question.” He flipped his compass open. “Magnetic north doesn’t work—the needle’s going crazy.”

  His gaze moved about the room. Lines carved into the floor radiated out at odd intervals from the central marker, continuing up the walls and ending in symbols that looked remarkably like astronomical markings of some kind. The entire chamber looked like some kind of map of the solar system—a three-dimensional interstellar survey. The walls were covered in a code that looked remarkably like binary computer language—and the degree of detail of the star map that covered the ceiling was astounding, even including the Earth’s position in the solar system, with its elliptical orbit around the sun factored in.

  In another series of diagrams, Jay recognized what looked like, incredibly, configurations for other solar systems. “That’s Alpha Centauri.” He shook his head. “The entire room seems to be some kind of astronomical resource.”

  Quin studied the pillar in the center of the room; it was made of some plain, impervious material and was smooth to the touch. At first glance it looked like high-quality white marble or alabaster, but the surface wasn’t cold. On the contrary, it warmed to her touch, more like plastic than stone, although that was hardly possible.

  Focusing her beam on the pillar, Quin examined it for glyphs and lines that might indicate a secret compartment. If there was something she’d left behind in that previous life, then the only place it could be—assuming there wasn’t a secret compartment in one of the walls—was the pillar.

  Another tremor shook the structure, this one sharp enough to disturb her concentration.

  Jake’s hand curled around her arm. “As fascinating as this place is, it’s time to go.”

  A dull explosion rocked the cavern, throwing her forward. Reflexively, she grasped at the slick surface of the obelisk but, like the floor beneath her feet, nothing about the pillar was stable. It shifted beneath her grasp, sending her tumbling.

  Seconds later, Jay helped her to her feet.

  The beam of his light flashed in her eyes as his thumb swept over a tender spot just above her temple, where she must have knocked herself when she’d fallen.

  “Ouch!” Quin winced away, both from Jay’s thumb and the glare of the light; then, as her gaze caught on the glowing, reflective shape of the obelisk, she wondered if the blow had somehow affected her perceptions.

  The entire top section had moved—rotating a fraction of an inch, so that the pyramid’s base was no long square with the pillar.

  As a place of concealment it was ingenious, because the join was so finely executed that it was invisible when the top was in place.

  Jay rotated the top of the obelisk until it came free, then carefully set it down on the floor. Light coruscated off what appeared to be a diamond the size of her fist, formed into a perfect many-faceted globe. “Is this what you’re looking for?”

  Quin touched a fingertip to the jewel and waited to feel…something.

  Aside from experiencing a surface coolness and an aesthetic appreciation for what was a surpassingly beautiful gem, she felt nothing. Like this chamber, the jewel wasn’t what she’d expected. The temple seemed to be a repository for scientific knowledge, rather than the spiritual heart of a monotheistic civilization that had clung stubbornly to its beliefs when most of the world had fallen into paganism.

  The distinct sound of footsteps jerked her head up. The low rumble of a male voice registered.

  Jay put a finger to his mouth. He slipped the jewel in his pocket and fitted the top of the pillar back in place. A split second later, another explosion rocked the chamber. This time the shock wave knocked them both off their feet, the concussion deafening as the sealed door dissolved.

  The tremors they’d taken for earthquakes were C4 induced. Hathaway was blasting his way through the maze.

  Twenty-Four

  Hathaway stepped through the opening, pushing Olivia ahead of him, one of the Skorpions his security team had used held carelessly in one hand, the stock folded back over the weapon so he could use it like a handgun. “Lomax. And what do you know—Mallory. Don’t you have some other place to be?”

  Quin met Olivia’s gaze. “Not lately.”

  Jay chambered a round in the Glock as Ramirez and another man he recognized as Cortez, one of Cain’s security guards, stepped into the room. Reaching down, he helped Quin to her feet and moved back a step, not taking his gaze off the trio of men and keeping the pillar between them. The cover was minimal, but it was better than nothing.

  Hathaway’s gaze rested hungrily on the pillar, and slowly—so as not to alarm Ramirez, in particular, who looked like he’d developed a taste for the drugs he’d been hawking all down the Peruvian coast—Jay reached into his pocket and extracted the jewel. “Is this what you’re looking for? Let Olivia go and you can have it.”

  Hathaway’s gaze fixed on the jewel. “No deals.”

  Ramirez grinned, his expression definitely off center. Cortez simply held the Skorpion in a two-handed grip, aimed squarely at Jay’s chest.

  If Jay had been in their position, he wouldn’t have let Olivia go, either. It was a simple equation: you didn’t give anything up unless there was something to gain, and the fact was, Hathaway controlled the odds. He had more men, more firepower and no conscience. If he wanted the jewel, all he had to do was start shooting.

  Memories of bargaining for another hostage, in another time and place, surfaced, along
with other more insubstantial memories that slid away before Jay could grasp them, but the certainty remained that he had done hostage-rescue work before.

  A fine tremor shook through the chamber, this one not C4 induced. Stone dust shimmered down, and Jay threw the jewel in Hathaway’s direction, further distracting him and his men, giving him the split second he needed to grab Quin and dive for the cover of the door they’d used to enter the chamber.

  In the scheme of things, the jewel meant nothing to Jay—it was life that counted, Quin’s and Olivia’s lives in particular.

  As much as he wanted to save Olivia, there was no way he could reach her right now—Hathaway had too much firepower at his disposal—but he had a strategy.

  Rounds thudded into the heavy stone door as Jay pushed it to and hit the mechanism, sealing it closed, Hathaway and his men on the other side—with Olivia.

  Quin got to her feet, brushing dust from her eyes and hair. As Jay closed the door, she had seen something that made her blink with disbelief. The force of the explosion had swept the coating of dust from the floor, and with all the light, she had been able to see that the floor was an intricate mosaic, remarkably like a map of the maze—and something more. She frowned as the overall shape of the mosaic niggled in her brain. It had looked like a glyph—and a familiar one. That in itself had to mean something.

  Jay pressed the center of the glyph on the adjacent wall and, with a grating sound, pushed a much smaller door open—this one leading to yet another corridor.

  Jay’s hand gripped hers as he pulled her down the corridor. Quin’s throat locked up. As dangerous as it was to stay, she didn’t want to go. “They’ve still got Olivia.”

  “And we can’t risk going back that way. I guarantee you that Hathaway’s just booby-trapped that door, and he’ll be setting explosive charges in all the tunnels surrounding the chamber.”

  Quin’s expression was fierce. “We can’t leave her.”

  “This time we have to. Hathaway’s gotten what he’s come for, now he’ll simply be trying to get out. Olivia will be safe until they’re clear of the ruin. And when Hathaway comes out the other side, he’ll run into Ramon.”

  But Jay wanted to catch Hathaway before then. As good as Ramon and Jorge were, they were no match for the explosives Hathaway and Ramirez were carrying, and Olivia had been limping. Years ago she had broken the ankle on a dig. If she used it too much, it swelled and became painful. If Hathaway decided she was slowing him down, he could dispose of her before he left the temple.

  “There was a map of the maze on the floor of that room.”

  Jay squeezed her hand. “Have you got a photographic memory?”

  “Nope.” Just a strange one.

  “Then forget it. With all the holes Hathaway’s blasted in the place, we won’t have a problem getting out.”

  If the structure remains intact.

  Quin had no idea how old the temple actually was. It had weathered centuries of earthquakes, but it hadn’t been designed to withstand the shock waves from blasting. With Hathaway playing fast and loose with C4, it wasn’t a matter of whether the structure would collapse, only a matter of when.

  Their biggest enemy now wasn’t Hathaway or Ramirez but time.

  As they walked, Quin began to feel warmth and a heady lightness—a fine tingling flow, as if she were walking into a shimmering current, and abruptly she recognized what the sensation was. They were close to the source of the mysterious energy that filtered up through the ground into the secret grove. If she didn’t miss her guess, they were directly beneath the grove.

  The corridor met several others and broadened into something approaching an anteroom, with a central set of doors on the opposite wall. The doors were massive, with a carved golden sun adorning the center. “This is it.”

  Stepping forward, she placed her hand on the center of the sun. Taking a deep breath, she pressed on the doors and pushed them wide.

  As the doors opened, Quin was engulfed by a smooth flood of power, her senses overwhelmed by the sheer dissolving beauty of it. Ancient mechanisms ground one against the other, and light from a complex set of polished gold mirrors set high on the pyramidal ceiling flooded the inner chamber with sunlight that was momentarily blinding after hours of walking in near-darkness.

  A golden dais, the only physical feature in a room devoid of everything but light and the beauty of its walls, sat directly beneath the apex of the pyramid. Apart from that, the room was bare of everything but a fine coating of dust.

  As she stepped further into the room, Quin’s gaze moved over decorated walls that soared cleanly. The gold paintings were elaborate, each stemming from a central figure radiating light, his/her hands showering golden seeds. On the first wall, the shimmering motes of gold turned into the moon and the stars, on the second, rolling hills, which were lapped by rivers and seas. The third wall contained an ornate filigree of flowers and trees, birds, animals and sea creatures, and the final wall was filled with rank upon rank of people: men, women, children and babies, each face individual, each figure perfectly executed, the detail of their clothing exquisite.

  Quin stared at first one wall, then another, her throat tight at the sheer beauty that had survived not just centuries, but millennia, because there was no doubt in her mind that this part of the temple went further back than any of them could guess. In no way was any part of this Incan, Nazca or Moche—or any of the other tribes. The work was too elegant, too fine—more Grecian than Egyptian, although there were elements common to each. In short, she was stumped. The pyramids shouted a link with Egypt, but the sophistication of the glyphs, the technical brilliance of the engineering and the sheer flowing beauty of the paintings were millennia ahead of anything produced along the Nile.

  She felt Jay’s warmth all down her back.

  “What is this?”

  Quin’s heart swelled tight in her chest. “Genesis.”

  No wonder the temple had fallen.

  Carefully preserved and protected as it had been, it had been too beautiful and too direct, its ideology displayed for all to see in the simplest of forms: pictures. It had been a threat in a world turned primitive and brutal, where there was a convenience-store god for everything, including death and destruction.

  Jay walked toward the center of the room, drawn by an odd effect in the air, like water rippling. He stepped up onto the dais and unaccountably lost his balance. He stumbled and corrected. The dizziness increased, and, abruptly, he lost awareness of the room and of Quin, but not of himself. He could feel his heartbeat, his breath, every nerve ending in his body. The surface of his skin had become ultrasensitive. He could feel the flow of the energy he’d unaccountably seen.

  Heat flooded him, starting at his head and moving into his chest, burning at the points of all his old wounds. His head prickled with a fire that was both hot and cold. Pain shafted briefly in his skull, followed by a faint popping sensation, and he was aware that the vision in his left eye had just been corrected.

  Dimly Jay was aware of Quin calling his name, felt her fingers on his forearm.

  Quin steadied Jay, and then the room dissolved. Heat poured into her, the radiation in her chest, both hot and cold, as if her heart was on fire. Her head spun, and she could no longer see walls and exquisite gold paintings, but beings radiating light. One of them bent, touched the side of the dais and beckoned.

  Quin investigated the area, a wisp of memory from the dream surfacing as she pressed on a glyph. A drawer slid out, revealing a simple blue box made of lapis lazuli, a ring nestled in the center. The being bent close, placing his hand over the ring, and instantly the shimmer in the air diminished. When he was finished, he looked directly at Quin, pointed to the box and jerked his thumb at the door. The message was clear: take the box and get out—fast.

  A distant explosion broke the peace and beauty. Jay’s hand wrapped around her arm as she closed the lid of the box, pulling her clear of the dais. His dark gaze connected with hers. “Are you al
l right?”

  “Never better.” And that was the truth. She felt warm, energized, as if she hadn’t missed almost two nights’ sleep.

  As Jay pulled her toward the doors, Quin stopped him in his tracks. “Wait. This goes in your pack.”

  Impatience radiated from him as he turned his back and allowed her to stow the box.

  As she fastened the flap, Jay shook his head. “It can’t be.”

  “What?”

  “This place. The floor. It looks like DNA coding.”

  Quin glanced at the intricate mosaic then, as they passed through the doors, she couldn’t resist a last lingering glance around the room, but the shining being had already left. “Where have you seen DNA coding?”

  Jay pulled one of the massive doors shut. “In a crime lab.”

  Quin flicked on her flashlight as Jay closed the second door. “Why am I not surprised? You’re getting your memory back.”

  “In bits and pieces.”

  She surveyed the passages that converged at the main chamber. Since she still hadn’t cracked the language of the glyphs, they would have to make an educated choice about which one to take.

  Jay pointed. “I don’t believe it. I can see a light.”

  Quin grinned, she could see the light, too, and it didn’t emanate from them or from a mirror. “Don’t ask, just follow.”

  Minutes later they walked into a section of the maze that had sustained massive damage.

  Jay swept his light over the rocks. “It’s a blast pattern. I can still smell the chemical. This is Hathaway’s path.”

  Which meant they were now following him.

  For several minutes they simply walked in a straight line, following the highway of destruction until they reached a three way convergence, with rubble flowing in all directions.

  “Looks like our boy got confused here.” Jay’s hand closed around her arm as she took a step forward. “Keep to the sides. The walls give the structure stability, but Hathaway’s removed so many, it’s a miracle the whole lot hasn’t collapsed.”