Empire of Ruins

by Arthur Slade

  “I don’t mean to be impertinent, sir,” Octavia said as she stomped on one of the millions of ferns carpeting the forest floor, “but how can we be certain that the artifact is actually still in the temple?”

  “We can’t. The only way to be certain is to enter the temple ourselves. My guess, and I admit this is only a guess, is that Miss Hakkandottir is still here because she wanted to revel in my obliteration or she’s attempting to steal the relic. After all, we don’t know for certain what it was that drove Alexander King mad. Perhaps whatever it is, is proving to be a bulwark against her.”

  It was now clear to Octavia that it was the jungle that had driven the explorer mad. She followed Tharpa as he swung the machete, cutting a path through the hanging vines. We’ll have to hack our way back to London! Octavia thought as she struggled under the weight of her haversack—it was stuffed to the top with smoked meat, biscuits, ammunition, and any other useful supplies they had retrieved from the Prince Albert’s wreckage. Mr. Socrates held his elephant gun as if he were waiting for a charge, and Lizzie brought up the rear.

  After three bug-bitten hours they stopped for lunch, sitting on a fallen tree trunk and munching hard biscuits with marmalade. Tharpa sharpened the machete between bites and Mr. Socrates made notes in his journal.

  Lizzie sat staring into the forest. Octavia drank water from a tin cup and studied Lizzie’s tattoos. In the jungle light they made the woman look less civilized.

  “Lizzie, do you know this area very well?”

  “Been here once or twice,” she grunted.

  “Ah, and you lived to tell the tale, that’s a good sign.” But Lizzie didn’t smile. She was on par with Tharpa for humorlessness. “You’re of native blood—is your tribe from here?”

  “No. This is the land of the Rain People.”

  “And what are they like?”

  “They live. They hunt. What more do you need to know?”

  Octavia shrugged. It was like conversing with a python. “Well, where are your people?”

  “In my heart,” Lizzie said with a hint of bitterness.

  Octavia nodded and fell silent.

  A few minutes later they were back on their feet. Mr. Socrates marched ahead, but Octavia had lost all sense of direction. With all these leaves it was impossible to tell whether the sun was in the east or west! She’d never understood the use of a compass; it was streets, their curves or straight lines and landmarks, that made sense to her.

  According to Mr. Socrates, humanity had risen out of a jungle just like this one. As she slapped at a mosquito, she found it very hard to believe. Humans built cities and ships to get away from these uncivilized places. It was insanity for any English citizen to return willingly to the jungle.

  She trudged over the moist earth, catching her foot on a thick vine and biting back a curse. Lizzie was walking along as if it were Hyde Park, for pity’s sake. You should try to be half as graceful as her, Octavia told herself. A lock of hair slipped in front of her eyes; humidity made her hair unruly with curls. She shoved the lock back under her sun helmet and looked over at Lizzie, envious of her cropped hair. At least they both had trousers on. Octavia didn’t even want to imagine what it would be like trekking through this green hell wearing a dress.

  Her thoughts turned to Modo, as they had a thousand times already that day. He might be dead. She’d been trying to keep her spirits up by dreaming of more cheery scenarios in which he had hit his head and lay unconscious somewhere, or had landed on two feet and was right now doing jumping jacks to keep warm. All the scenarios ended with their emotional reunion.

  He might have lived. He was much stronger than any man she’d known, and he could, as her old gang would have said, “take a beatin’.” But the fall was from such a great height that his body would have been shattered. She pictured him lying on the forest floor, splayed out, his mask several feet from him. His face turned toward her. Of course, it was featureless. Even in her imagination she couldn’t put a face to him.

  What did he look like? In death he could still be a stranger to her; would always be a stranger to her.

  And now she would give anything to see him again, with or without a mask. Even if he was the ugliest man on earth, she wanted to look into his face again.

  A Swollen River

  Throughout the day, Modo watched and listened carefully, but the tribe no longer seemed to be following him. He felt relief and fear; if they weren’t watching over him, then he was very much on his own. With each step he wondered if his encounter with the natives had gone exactly as he remembered it. He’d lost blood and was still a little woozy from his fall. Could the whole thing have been a dream? His pocketful of berries told him otherwise.

  The deep rumble of a steam-powered engine could be heard in the sky. He scrambled to the topmost branch of a pine tree—so high that the tree began to wave back and forth—hoping to see the Prince Albert. To his dismay, he spotted the Prometheus. The airship had been repaired and was traveling northwest. Perhaps they were searching for him. He ducked behind the branches. Well, if they were going back to their base, he’d been heading in the right direction.

  He climbed back down to the forest floor and followed his compass. After another hour of trudging he came to the river that he was sure had been on the map. The map had led Modo to believe it would be a relatively minor river, but instead it was a deep body of green water that cut through the bottom of a gorge. Using vines as handholds, he carefully climbed down the gorge wall and stood on a large flat rock, staring at the surface of the river. What demonic jungle creatures lurked below? A school of piranha, which would consume a man one razor-sharp bite at a time? Water snakes that swallowed their prey whole? Several gigantic smooth rocks jutted across the river, looking as though they’d been tossed there by some capricious god. They were so far apart, it would be impossible to hop from one to the other, and he wasn’t going to risk swimming across. But it was heartening to find the river, for it meant he was closing in on his destination.

  He hopped from stone to stone along the bank, searching for a way to cross and keeping his eyes open for predators. The gorge provided a break from the overhanging forest, so there was a lot more sunlight, so much that he had to squint at times.

  He began to give up hope of finding an easy way to cross and once again contemplated swimming the river. He eyed a few of the fish he could see in the clear water, small, with backs speckled black and white. Piranha? Or perch? Once again he admonished himself for not memorizing some of the naturalist illustrations he’d seen as a child. His education was lacking!

  He finally found one lone tree at a bend in the river that had grown in an arc toward a tree on the opposite shore. Something moved in the nearer tree’s foliage and, as he approached, an animal that looked half kangaroo and half monkey hopped and climbed through the branches, using its long tail to steady itself. It swung from the tree to the one on the opposite side, making the feat look relatively easy. Moments later it had jumped to another tree and vanished in the forest.

  Modo inspected the unusual tree. Its bark was gray, its narrow roots well exposed above ground, buttressing the tree. He shinned up the trunk to the closest leafy branch, beginning to feel the exhilaration he’d always felt when climbing, but kept a wary eye out for snakes. When he was near the top, the tree started to bend and he began to feel fear. In his excitement about finally crossing the river he’d forgotten he was a lot heavier than the monkey creature. He inched farther along the branch. The tree on the opposite bank didn’t look so close now, but he was pretty certain he could still make the leap.

  And so he grabbed a branch above him and swung back and forth, building momentum. Just as he was about to let go, it broke! By pure luck he hit the branch below with both feet and pushed off it, launching himself over the water and catching a branch on the opposite tree. It snapped and he fell, crashing through several branches, then latching on to one only a few feet above the water.

  It promptly snapped
and he dropped into the water with a great splash, falling so hard and deep that his buttocks hit the rocks on the bottom. Piranha! Snakes! He shot up in a wild panic, to find he was standing in waist-deep water. He charged the short distance to the riverbank, gasping and panting in relief that nothing had bitten him.

  Laughter could be heard in the trees on the other side of the river, and Modo wondered whether it was a human or a kookaburra bird, known for its cry that sounded like human laughter.

  Modo straightened himself, squeezed the excess water from his cloak, and climbed up the gorge and back into the rain forest. According to the map, the temple wasn’t far from the river, but it wouldn’t be easy to spot; after a thousand years or more of growth, the forest would have reclaimed it. That said, if Miss Hakkandottir was already there, he would hear the camp noises before he saw them.

  As if on cue, there was a metallic clanging in the distance. Modo shook his head. Such a coincidence had to be his imagination getting the better of him. He listened intently. Nothing. He pushed his way through the vines until—Clang! Clang! There it was again. It wasn’t a noise animals would make, and so far as he’d seen, the natives didn’t have metal. He moved toward the sound, working his way up an incline. The map had indicated that the temple was on the slope of a small mountain, looking down on the surrounding forest.

  He came to a clearing and there it was, at the far end of a great plateau, jutting out of a small mountainside.

  The temple.

  The Temple

  Octavia was awakened by a tickling sensation on her leg. Still in a dreamy fog, she wondered if it was Modo, then thought: he’d never tickle her leg. He wasn’t brave enough.

  She opened her eyes, lifted her head from her rolled-up blanket, and caught her breath. A spider the size of her fist was crawling up her leg, the hairs on its dark body white in the moonlight. She held still, out of wisdom, not fear. You’ve seen worse things in London sewers! she told herself. The problem was, she didn’t quite know what to do; she wanted to swat it away but couldn’t remember what Mr. Socrates had said about spiders. Would hitting it make it sting her? They bit, that much she remembered. Best to just lie still and hope it would go away. It reached her thigh and rambled, almost drunkenly, toward her midsection. Would the thing leap at her face? She held her breath.

  Then a hand appeared out of the darkness and lay, palm up, on her stomach. “Don’t move,” Lizzie whispered. The spider crawled onto her fingers and up her arm. “This one ain’t poisonous,” she said, guiding it onto a palm-tree frond. The spider crawled away.

  “Thank you,” Octavia said. “I wasn’t frightened.”

  Lizzie smiled. “No, you weren’t. For a London Town girl, you’re doing well enough.” She extended her hand and helped Octavia to her feet. “Pack up. Mr. Socrates has already given orders to move out.”

  And before she was really awake, Octavia found herself marching along in line. She wolfed down a few biscuits on the go.

  “No speaking above a whisper,” Mr. Socrates instructed. “We’re likely in the area of the temple now, and we’ll no doubt be running into patrols.”

  Since it would be too loud to hack a comfortable path, they were forced to follow the natural trails of the jungle, sometimes crouching and crawling through the vines and leaves. Octavia promised herself that when they got back to Sydney she’d give Mrs. Finchley a big hug for making the trousers. And she’d buy her a glass of wine, too. No! A whole bottle.

  As they crossed a narrow, rocky stream, Octavia slipped on one of the stones and caught herself before she could go headfirst into the water. She was getting exhausted and Mr. Socrates showed no sign of wanting a break. The old man was a slave driver! But she had to admit he was a lot tougher than she’d ever imagined.

  On the other side of the stream she spotted a human footprint in the mud. “Psst!” she said to the others, and pointed.

  “The Rain People,” Lizzie whispered. “Three days old.”

  “You can tell just by looking?”

  Lizzie smiled for the first time that day. “No. But if I say it with enough confidence, you sterling believe it.”

  Octavia had to stop herself from laughing. “What do you mean by sterling?”

  “In Australia we call ourselves by currency, so you English are sterling. Understand?”

  “But I’m only a few farthings,” Octavia quipped.

  Mr. Socrates shot them both a perturbed glance, so they climbed on quietly.

  The path gradually became steeper. Here and there stones jutted out of the earth. Octavia had never sweated so much or been bitten by so many insects. She itched. She was tired. And she wished she hadn’t thrown the teapot out of the Prince Albert. She couldn’t even take comfort in a cup of tea.

  Tharpa had scouted ahead and now returned, quiet as a cat. His eyes were bright with excitement. He led them up to a rocky ledge and pushed aside the vines and fronds. Octavia was surprised to discover that they’d actually climbed quite high. They were looking down at a plateau where there was still evidence of the foundations of an ancient city! Overgrown obelisks and pillars stood up here and there, but the rest of the city had been pulled down by time and the jungle vines. Beyond these ruins the sun shone bright on the face of a small mountain. Gray-clad soldiers were working in the distance, busy as ants, carrying supplies up a set of stone stairs that led past something that looked like a great stone lion.

  “So the temple exists!” Mr. Socrates whispered. “Marvelous! And judging by the color on the sphinx, the Egyptians actually carried limestone all the way here. I presume it’s from the coast. They were amazingly industrious!”

  “Uh, sir,” Octavia said, “you do see all the soldiers over there, don’t you?”

  Mr. Socrates shrugged. “A minor nuisance.”

  Had he gone mad or was he just playing with her?

  Even from this distance Octavia could see that the sides of the doorway into the temple were ragged, as if it had been blown apart. Many of the trees around the temple had been chopped down, and there were a few dozen Guild soldiers right below them, their white tents bright against the dark green. All were armed. The Prometheus was docked on a large flat rock, tied down with ropes.

  Several soldiers patrolled the perimeter of the grounds, large hounds at their sides. Octavia had encountered the four-legged monsters before—part metal, part flesh. She didn’t want to get near them again.

  “Looks like they’ve been camped here for weeks,” Mr. Socrates said. “Enough time to get well set up.”

  “And to die.” Tharpa was pointing at a small graveyard located on the near side of the settlement. No crosses, but each mound was marked with large black stones.

  Mr. Socrates pondered. “Sickness, perhaps. Or conflict with the natives.”

  “The Rain People are peaceful,” Lizzie said.

  “Yes, perhaps, but the Guild are not. And sometimes these conflicts occur despite our better natures.”

  Octavia spotted red hair: Miss Hakkandottir was walking alongside a row of crumbled stone buildings overgrown with vines and small trees.

  Octavia pointed her out. “With one shot from the elephant gun we could end this now.”

  “Yes, and then we would be swarmed and killed,” Mr. Socrates said. “Besides, the gun is only effective at close range.”

  Octavia watched Miss Hakkandottir helplessly as she strode through the camp. She signaled to one soldier; she spoke, he saluted and ran off to do her bidding. That’s what power is, Octavia thought. Powerful people attract followers; they’re decisive.

  “We’ll have to travel farther around the site,” Mr. Socrates said. “We don’t want to take them head-on.”

  “When will we enter the temple?” Lizzie asked.

  “Tonight,” he answered. “When it’s dark we’ll sneak in.”

  “You’ll have to be a lot quieter,” a voice said from above.

  Octavia whipped out her stiletto. Mr. Socrates aimed his elephant gun toward the voice
and cocked the hammers on both barrels.

  “I have you in my sights,” he said. “Now, who said that?”

  The leaves rustled and a figure lowered itself, then swung from the tree to the ground in front of them. The familiar stocky shape, the crooked back, the wild African mask.

  “Modo!” Octavia sheathed her knife and ran to throw her arms around him.

  But she was stopped in her tracks when three muscular men dropped out of the trees behind Modo, spears pointing at her.

  Scope of Duties

  Pure joy filled Modo’s heart as he lowered himself down and swung to the ground in front of the group. Yes, Mr. Socrates still had his gun pointed at him, Lizzie had raised her machete, and Octavia was holding her stiletto, but it was the look on Tharpa’s face that Modo loved the most. He’d surprised his teacher! He’d sneaked through the trees above them without even the slightest creak of a branch or rustle of a leaf. Tharpa’s smile grew ear to ear, and Modo believed he even looked proud. Mr. Socrates shook his head; was it pride on his master’s face too?

  It was all so perfect!

  Octavia ran toward him and he prepared to catch her in his arms, but just before she reached him he heard a rustling above him, and behind him, the soft thud of feet. He turned to see three of the Rain People, their spears out and aimed at his companions. The warriors had followed him the whole way!

  Tharpa lifted his machete as Mr. Socrates raised his elephant gun. The warriors prepared to launch their spears.

  “No!” Modo shouted, standing between the two parties. Then he remembered their situation and whispered, “No! They’re with me.” He pointed at the spears, gesturing to the warriors to throw them down, but no one understood, or they weren’t willing. Modo claimed a spear from one warrior and tossed it to the ground. The other two followed his example.

  “They’re friends,” he said, pointing toward Mr. Socrates. He clasped both hands together as though shaking hands with himself, trying to get the message across. “Good friends.”