Thieves Like Us 01 - Thieves Like Us

by Stephen Cole

  ‘Enter,’ Coldhardt called back, from somewhere far ahead. ‘But be careful where you stand.’

  ‘Traps?’ Patch asked nervously.

  ‘No. I think it’s snake-root.’

  Tye exchanged some apprehensive looks with the others and crossed through to the tunnel beyond. The floor sloped down steeply at first, then levelled out. The air was stale and fetid, the heat oppressive. Her lungs seemed to crackle with each breath.

  Then she realised the darkness was lifting, it was getting lighter. Coldhardt and his torch up ahead –?

  No. The lower halves of the walls weren’t just dark, clammy rock any longer. Stuff was growing there – misshapen, fibrous balloons shot through with little luminous veins and patches. They clustered over the dank surface like pustules on skin, their sickly glow lighting the tunnel like weak moonlight.

  ‘So it’s real,’ breathed Jonah behind her. ‘Flesh of the gods.’

  ‘Never thought of gods as having bad skin days,’ said Patch nervously.

  ‘Round here,’ said Motti, ‘I got the feeling the gods might do things different.’

  Even as he spoke, a menacing shadow loomed up from around the corner. Tye shrank back.

  But it was just Coldhardt. He wasn’t even using his torch any more. ‘It grows thicker the further in we go,’ he said. ‘Even the floor’s covered with it. It can’t have been harvested for a long, long time.’

  ‘Thank God,’ said Jonah with feeling.

  ‘How can this stuff grow out of rock,’ Patch wondered, ‘with no water or sunlight?’

  ‘Fungi don’t need sunlight to grow,’ Coldhardt explained. ‘They don’t have chlorophyll like plants do. They feed on dead or dying things.’ He dug out some dark grains from a bare patch in the wall with his fingers, and nodded. ‘This isn’t rock, it’s a thick coating of volcanic loam, full of ancient organic compounds pushed up from the depths of the earth’s crust. And this stuff seems to thrive on it.’

  ‘Plus there is water,’ Jonah pointed out. ‘This whole place is damp.’

  ‘An underground spring maybe?’ Coldhardt looked around him. ‘Or rainfall through vent shafts in the rock? Air must be getting in from somewhere.’

  ‘Who cares how come the stuff’s here,’ said Con. ‘It just is.’ Her eyes gleamed greedily in the half-light. ‘We should think about what else is here, no?’

  ‘Yes,’ grinned Coldhardt. ‘Follow me.’

  The hot, claustrophobic tunnel wound onwards like some alien artery in the rock. The fungus got thicker around them, squashing wetly underfoot with a creaking noise. The air grew rank to breathe as they trekked on, and Tye clamped a hand over her mouth and nose. They passed smaller passages branching off like veins, so thick with snake-root as to be impassable. Pressure built in her ears as they went ever deeper. How far underground were they now?

  Then the walls started to widen again. Strange designs had been daubed on the walls here in pale oils: a man clutching a serpent; a serpent coiled about a man, while strange, misshapen figures watched on. The pictures were like little seams of gold, glinting in the snake-root’s slimy light.

  Coldhardt stopped.

  Ahead of them was a pair of huge doors set in the rock. They seemed beaten from solid bronze.

  And they stood open.

  ‘The markings on the walls suggest we are nearing some kind of inner sanctum,’ Coldhardt whispered, smoothing back damp hair from his forehead. ‘The shrine of Ophiuchus. The dark heart of these catacombs.’

  Tye didn’t trust this at all. ‘And it’s just left open? Unguarded?’

  ‘Maybe they didn’t expect the average tomb robber to get this far,’ said Jonah. ‘Or else someone got here before us and cleared the place out before they left.’

  Motti shook his head. ‘Those traps were set from the inside. Someone stayed behind.’

  ‘Let’s take a look,’ Con suggested.

  ‘We cannot be complacent,’ Coldhardt told them. ‘Motti, check those doors for any surprises.’

  Motti nodded and started forward cautiously.

  Tye watched him in uneasy silence. Her head was starting to pound. ‘Anyone else got a headache?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Jonah led a general chorus.

  ‘We’re probably dehydrating,’ said Con.

  ‘It’s so hot, even the air’s getting smoky,’ Patch moaned.

  Coldhardt looked around, as if staring into space. ‘Does anyone have a sore throat? Itchy skin?’

  ‘No,’ said Tye, glancing round to be sure she wasn’t alone. ‘Why?’

  He produced a white handkerchief from his pocket and shook it out. ‘That’s not smoke in the air, it’s spores.’

  She felt suddenly sick. ‘From the fungus?’

  ‘Yes, released as we’ve trodden through the stuff. Unavoidable, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Gross!’ Patch pulled his top up over his nose and mouth – he looked like a kid hiding under the sheets. ‘Can this stuff hurt us?’

  Coldhardt placed the handkerchief over his nose and mouth. ‘I can’t imagine it’s toxic – the fungus itself is supposed to be edible. Besides, we shouldn’t be here long enough to experience any ill effects.’

  ‘You hope,’ said Jonah, speaking through his sleeve.

  ‘Our work isn’t without risks, Jonah,’ Coldhardt snapped. Then a sly smile played about his lips. ‘Nor is it without reward.’

  ‘You hope,’ Tye echoed, under her breath.

  ‘It’s safe to go in,’ Motti called back to them. ‘Totally safe.’

  Coldhardt’s eyes sparkled like diamonds. ‘Shall we see what we can find?’

  As they approached, Tye saw that the doors led on to a weird circular cavern hollowed painstakingly from the slates and silts of the foothills. It was palatial in size and might once have been in decoration too. The flesh of the gods grew thickly here, encroaching on intricate mosaics, blighting strange, stylised wall paintings.

  Tye switched on her torch to probe the chamber’s deepest darknesses as she and the others fanned out, still covering their mouths. Crystal tapestries hung from the high vaulted ceiling, catching the light and playing with it in a hypnotic display. Huge stone statues loomed out at them from the thick shadows, their abstract shapes twisted and unearthly. With a chill, she realised they reminded her of the figures on Coldhardt’s frieze in the hangout back in Geneva.

  Pressing on deeper into the gloom of the room she saw a small wooden writing desk piled high with parchment scrolls, and all sorts of bric-a-brac scattered about the floor: coins and jewels … amphorae … another lekythos, discarded on its side but intact …

  She heard Jonah breathe in sharply. ‘Oh, Jesus holy Christ.’

  ‘What is it?’ hissed Coldhardt.

  But the torch beams were already lancing out in the direction of his voice through the mist of dust and spores. He was standing before a great stone altar, ornately carved. Horrible, contorted shapes that might have been faces laughed and screamed out of the sides in bas-relief.

  And on the altar was a body. It was emaciated, swamped in a long, decorated tunic and a cloak. The rich red folds hung down over the sides of the stone, as though the body was dripping blood.

  ‘It’s a man,’ Jonah whispered. ‘He looks …he looks about a million years old.’

  Tye felt the coldest shiver creep through her, pushing up gooseflesh. ‘Ophiuchus?’

  When Coldhardt finally spoke it was in a sepulchral whisper: ‘The body’s intact?’

  ‘You could say that,’ said Jonah.

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Con complained.

  ‘I – I think he’s still breathing.’

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Jonah stared down at the ancient figure, both revolted and fascinated. The broad face was more like a mask it was so leathery and lined. The eyelids were almost transparent, shot through with veins like threadworms preserved in the crispy skin. The nose was a haughty hook, the mouth tugged down in a disapproving sneer. There was
no peace in the old, old face, as though it had seen such things, such horrors, that it could never rest easy again.

  Again, the chest shifted slightly under the rich vermilion robes. Patch must have caught the movement too. ‘Trick of the light,’ he said uneasily. ‘Gotta be.’

  ‘Let me see.’ Coldhardt went up to the altar, pushed Jonah aside, studied the body himself, tentatively pressed a finger to its wrist. The figure didn’t stir.

  Jonah waited expectantly. There was a long, deathly pause.

  ‘A pulse,’ Coldhardt said softly. ‘Slow …barely anything at all. But this man is alive.’

  ‘Probably the caretaker,’ said Patch nervously. ‘There – there must be a safe way in he uses.’

  ‘These robes, the jewellery on his fingers …’ Coldhardt stared round at his apprentices. ‘They’re all ancient. All genuine.’

  Gingerly, Con stepped forward. ‘So let’s take them and get out of here.’

  ‘Better make it quick, too.’ Jonah looked at her. ‘Before he wakes up.’

  Tye turned away from the scene at the altar. It was one thing looting from the long-dead, but if this man was somehow alive …

  She felt suddenly afraid.

  ‘After so many traps …’ Tye walked back over to Motti, who was still waiting beside the huge, bronze doors. ‘If that is Ophiuchus, why would these have been left standing open?’

  ‘It’s safe to go in,’ Motti insisted.

  ‘You see what this might mean, don’t you?’ She turned at the note of awe in Coldhardt’s voice and found him staring round at the others. ‘It could mean that the legends are true, that the cultists’ faith is based on reality. Which means the Amrita is not myth but biological fact.’

  ‘So Samraj really could synthesise it?’ asked Jonah.

  ‘There’s no shortage of the fungus here.’

  ‘Then we should burn it,’ said Con. ‘Or maybe save just a handful and make her grovel on her knees to buy it from us.’

  ‘It’s safe to go in,’ Motti said again. ‘Totally safe.’

  ‘Motti?’ Tye waved her fingers in front of his face. No reaction. ‘Jesus, Motti, come on, this isn’t funny any more.’ She snatched off his glasses, looked into his eyes. His pupils had dilated to pinpricks.

  ‘Totally safe,’ he smiled.

  ‘Coldhardt,’ Tye turned and shouted, ‘something’s wrong. I think something very bad is going down here –’

  She broke off as something cool and hard pressed into the side of her neck.

  The barrel of a gun.

  ‘Oh, my dear child,’ said Samraj, her finger tightening on the trigger. ‘How right you are.’

  Suddenly the sweat ran a lot colder down the back of Tye’s neck. Six veiled acolytes stood ranged just behind Samraj, almost as one with the shadows in their dark robes. At the front of the line was her would-be killer from Cairo again, the woman with the hooded eyes – Hela. She pointed and the man behind her held a knife to Motti’s neck.

  Then Yianna shuffled in, supported by two more acolytes. Her skin looked waxy and pale in the weird light from the snake-root and torches, and her wide eyes burned with spite.

  ‘None of you move. None of you try anything,’ said Samraj, her tone as cold and clinical as a surgeon’s knife, ‘or this girl dies.’

  Jonah raised his arms. Con glowered, fuming and helpless, while Patch settled for sighing noisily: ‘We’re screwed.’

  Everyone had frozen, save for Motti – who already seemed oblivious to everything – and Coldhardt. Now he slowly stepped down from the altar and smiled in casual greeting. ‘You were quick to find your way here.’

  ‘The drink that Hela gave poor little Con contained tiny transmitting filaments,’ said Samraj triumphantly, her thick make-up starting to come loose in the stifling heat. ‘I have been using them to track her movements ever since.’

  Con started forward. ‘You poisoned me, you bitch!’

  ‘The filaments will have left your body entirely within a week. But knowing Jonah’s reputation, I suspected that would be more than enough time.’ She smiled. ‘And that once he had cracked the cipher, you would all head straight here – so I might follow.’

  Tye closed her eyes. ‘You let us escape from your villa.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘You’ve allowed your patients out for a field trip, I see,’ Coldhardt went on.

  Samraj played it humble. ‘This moment of glory is theirs as much as it is mine.’

  ‘And since we left the way in so obligingly clear for you, you have arrived with minimum casualties I trust? I don’t see your bodyguards.’

  ‘The acolytes afford me ample protection, I assure you. I would not insult Hela and her brethren by seeking to bring non-believers to this holy place.’

  ‘You mean Hela refused to allow them inside.’ He grinned suddenly. ‘Goodness knows there are enough heathens here already. Ah, and here’s poor Yianna. You must have found the trek particularly draining, my dear.’

  ‘I would not miss this moment,’ she hissed.

  Samraj left a blue smear across her temple as she wiped at her eye with the back of her hand. ‘Your arrogance was always your Achilles heel, Nathaniel. Now it has led to your final humiliation. Your time is over.’

  ‘Time is a concept that has little meaning in these catacombs,’ said Coldhardt airily. ‘Just ask Ophiuchus here.’

  Now Samraj tore her eyes away from Coldhardt and took in properly the altar behind him. Tye felt the gun barrel waver as she reacted. ‘It is him?’

  ‘Who else would lie at the heart of this place, surrounded by such grandeur?’

  ‘Is he dead?’ Yianna whispered, afraid.

  Tye looked at her. ‘Your father said Ophiuchus couldn’t die, remember?’

  ‘He also said that Amrita means “deathlessness”,’ said Coldhardt. ‘And I’m beginning to suspect that’s no accidental mistranslation.’

  ‘Ophiuchus still lives, Samraj!’ Yianna clutched at the arm of the acolyte supporting her. ‘I saw breathing! I know I did.’

  ‘Yes, he still breathes,’ Coldhardt agreed. ‘His old heart bumps feebly in his breast. His thin blood still drips through his veins.’

  And something has gone to work on Motti, thought Tye grimly.

  ‘Then the snake-root does sustain the body,’ Samraj breathed, staring round at the black fungus as though it was the true treasure here. ‘How potent it must be … to let him keep a hold on life for all these thousands of years …’

  ‘You call that living?’ Jonah looked revolted. ‘Dried out on a slab for all time?’

  Samraj licked her lips. ‘I must see this.’ She spoke to Hela in a strange tongue, and Tye found a stiletto pressed up against her jugular. The dark spark in the woman’s hooded eyes left Tye in no doubt – when Samraj’s game was over and it was time to kill, Hela would enjoy every slow second of the knife’s insertion.

  As Samraj slinked slowly towards the altar, savouring the moment, she trained her gun on Coldhardt. ‘You are such a fool, my dear Nathaniel. To turn your back on eternal life. To turn your back on me.’

  ‘The snake-root doesn’t offer eternal life,’ he retorted, looking down at the body on the altar. ‘Jonah is right – there’s no life in this bag of scrag and bones. Only an absence of death.’

  ‘Better a slow decline over five thousand years than this handful of heartbeats the rest of us are given,’ she said. ‘And now the truth of Ophiuchus’s discoveries is within my grasp, I shall go on to taste true power – and wealth beyond imagining.’

  ‘We’ll share it for ever,’ Yianna called, ‘won’t we?’

  ‘You thought I wanted eternal life for its own sake, didn’t you, Nathaniel?’ Samraj shook her head. ‘You underestimated me. As the years stretch to decades, as the decades stretch to centuries … I shall probe every last secret of the human genome, unlock every last cell of the human mind.’

  ‘She’ll learn how to make me well again!’ Yianna bragged to Tye and th
e zombie-like Motti, as though she was desperate to be a part of the moment.

  But Samraj was on a roll. ‘No longer shall death be the price we pay for progress. All secrets shall be mine – and I shall use them for the betterment of humankind.’

  ‘Totally safe,’ Motti said happily.

  ‘When I can cure cancer with a routine operation,’ said Samraj, ‘when I can banish disability from the human race … When I can extend the lifespan indefinitely of anyone I choose … What will people not give me in return?’

  She paused, surveying her audience. They all were standing still and silent as statues in the stinking, smothering gloom. Tye realised that even Yianna was waiting to hear.

  And finally, Samraj answered her own question.

  ‘They will regard me as their saviour.’

  Jonah would have shaken his head in bewildered disgust if he hadn’t been afraid Samraj would blow it off at the slightest provocation. Standing there, sweaty and dishevelled, her make-up smeared over half her face, she was at once both frightening and pathetic. And she had clearly lost the plot big time.

  ‘So there you’ll be, saviour of a world full of perfect people, all living for ever.’ Coldhardt didn’t bother to hide the sneer in his voice. ‘Driving out the impure. Driving out the different.’

  She stared at him like he just didn’t get it. ‘Improvements must be made.’

  ‘And when you have grasped every last genetic root of humanity’s design, what then? What will sustain you, stop you from decaying like …’ He gestured down at the body on the slab. ‘… this.’

  ‘There is much I must learn from this man,’ said Samraj. ‘If the snake-root reveals doors to higher realities then I shall kick them down, map out every perception of which the mind is capable – every higher sense.’ She smiled, looking at him almost hopefully. A thick dribble of mascara stained her cheek like a black tear. ‘Don’t you see, Nathaniel? In time, anything can be mine. Everything.’

  She’d still share it all with him, Jonah realised, no matter what he’s done.

  ‘It would never have worked between us, Samraj,’ said Coldhardt bluntly, taking a step towards her. ‘You see, we’re both takers in life. I take precious treasures, chances, risks – pleasures, where I can.’ He looked down the barrel of her gun, perfectly calm. ‘You simply take things too far.’