Laura tries but cannot reach around as the passage is too narrow, all she can do is to push up against the roof and crush the rat. She pushes as hard as she can, hearing bones crack until the rat is not moving any more. Her back hurts and blood is running down it, she shivers at the thought of the dead rat on her back, but continues on.
Shining the light in front of her she is surprised to find another wall, yet this one has two holes in it, just large enough for her to pass her arms through. Looking inside the holes, she notices that each one has a lever in it.
“Manco, I am at a dead end and there are two holes in the wall with levers in each one, what should I do?”
“Is there small holes in the walls next to you?”
Looking next to her and as best she can down her body Laura notices rows upon rows of one-inch holes at either side of her.
“Yes, there are a number of holes in the walls, what are they for, Manco?”
“It is a protected doorway, one lever will open a door somewhere, while the second lever will cause wooden spears to come out of the holes and kill you.”
“Which one shall I pull?” Laura is not so much afraid of dying anymore, but rather that she will die in vain.
“I do not know, Laura. I think it must be the left one.”
“Ok, I’ll try the left one,” replies Laura uncertainly. Slowly, she inches forward until she can get her left arm into the hole and grabs the lever. Closing her eyes she starts to pull. The lever is sticking from years of dust, but slowly it moves towards her. Laura can hear noise coming from the sides of the walls. She wonders if it is the door opening or the mechanism shooting the spears.
The lever gives another bit but then gets stuck. Laura puts her right hand against the wall and braces herself to give the lever a jolt to free it. Just then she hears her name being called. Laura freezes; can it be?
“Dad, is that you?” she says softly, shaking her head to try and wake herself from this illusion. It cannot be, her dad had died a year ago. Memories of him come flooding in, and then one sticks in her mind. Softly, Laura repeats her dad’s favorite words to her.
“The righteous always walk the right path, no matter the consequences.” Gently, Laura lets go of the lever and pulls her arm out of the hole. What should I do dad? Silence answers back. Uncertainly Laura puts her hand in the right hole, and grips the lever. Taking a deep breath she pulls on it, it does not move. Again, Laura uses her other hand to brace herself against the wall.
“It’s now or never,” she says to herself and pulls as hard as she can. The lever comes loose, and she pulls it all the way forward as far as she can. Suddenly the floor beneath her opens and she falls about three feet before coming to land hard on the floor. The flashlight rolls away from her until it stops against something that blocks the beam.
Laura can just make out where it is but cannot see anything around her. Carefully she crawls to the light and picks it up. Her jaw drops at the same time as she loses her grip on the light, from what she sees. She has to shake her head to get herself to pick up the light again.
Slowly she stands up and shines the light around her. Laura is standing close to the centre of the building, and all around her are golden cups, plates, armor, jewelry, coins, other ornaments, and a host of silver items as well. There is royal clothing in one corner, winter jackets made from bat skin and hair. In the distance she can see golden statues of Inca kings, and even chairs made of gold that the Incas used to carry their kings on. Laura notices stairs going down to a lower chamber a few feet away and decides to investigate it.
The stairs take her 20 feet down to where it opens into another chamber, ten times the size of the one above, with the same treasures. It must be worth billions. Going back up Laura looks around for a way out, for the passage she came in is too small for all this treasure to be brought in through it.
Walking all around along the wall, Laura notices the same paintings as the first door she came in, a topless young Peru woman standing with her back to the room and looking over her shoulder. The wall as before has a hole in for a spear to exit through and kill the person standing there, and also has the same places to push on the woman’s palms.
Again Laura takes the same stance as the woman and pushes the two raised bumps by the woman’s palms. This time she is a little less nervous than before. Suddenly a massive door next to her swings open and sunlight floods the room. Tears of joy flow down her cheeks as she steps through the door, back into the forest.
Laura calls Manco’s name, and then waits for him to answer. She can hear Manco calling back in the distance. Laura keeps calling, leading Manco and some of his men towards her. It does not take Manco long to cut a path through the bush and reach her. There are 10 of his men with him, and all of them gasp in surprise when they see the open door, the treasure beckoning from inside. Suddenly Manco drops to his knees and starts thanking Laura. His men immediately follow his actions. Laura steps forward and places her hand on Manco’s shoulder.
“Use the treasure well Manco, help your people. All I ask is that if any books or scrolls are found, that they be brought to me for safe keeping.” Manco agrees, then stands up and orders one of his men to bring the others to the door and start removing the treasure, breaking it into smaller collections for hiding. Manco does not want to chance any corrupt government claiming rights to the treasure.
“You finally have your hidden treasure, Manco,” Laura says proudly with a smile. Her smile however quickly fades when Manco replies.
“This is only the king’s personal treasure. He had the court’s treasure hidden in several different locations.”
“I think this is quite enough treasure hunting for one day, can you please take me to Victor now?”
“Victor?”
“The man who is injured, that your men took away.”
“Yes, your husband, follow me.”
Manco assigns two men to clear a path in front of Laura and himself, allowing them to take a shortcut through the jungle to where Victor is. Manco walks next to Laura, and also assigns two men to be rear guards for the party.
Chapter 14
The party fights their way through the thick forest for half an hour before they come to a small jungle village, hidden away from civilization. The houses are made of simple mud bricks with thatched roofs. There are 20 houses in total, all arranged in a circle around a small communal gathering place that has low chairs around a campfire.
Laura reckons 30 people can sit in comfort around the fire, talking or discussing matters.
“These are the homes of some of the guards of the treasure, the men you saw earlier,” says Manco, indicating the homes. “Come, follow me,” Manco continues and starts walking through the centre of the village towards a building on the other side, outside of the circle of houses.
Laura notes that the houses have perfectly straight walls and are built in a rectangular shape. Each house has a doorway to both the outside of the circle and the inside, making it hard for attackers to trap occupants inside their houses. The building on the outside of the circle is far larger than any of the other houses, spanning 100 feet long and 60 feet wide.
When they reach the building, Manco opens the door for Laura and beckons for Laura to enter. As Laura enters she immediately knows that this building is used by an important person.
Fur lines the floor as carpets, and there are wooden ornaments of tigers, jaguars, condors and snakes all around the first room. Each wall is decorated with feathers and strings that have crystals and beads tied securely in different decorative patterns. There is one opening leading from the room into the rest of the building and it is covered with two animal skins, making a door. Smoke slowly pours from behind the animal skins and Laura can make out the smell of a variety of different incenses, myrrh, jasmine, sandalwood, rosemary, and frankincense. She herself loves to burn incense while soaking in the bath, reading a book.
Suddenly, an old hand pushes the animal skins slightly apart and beck
ons her to enter. She can see from the hand that it is a very old woman, with long fingernails and frail old bones. Manco indicates with his hand that she must enter. Slowly Laura steps forward and starts to part the animal skins, not sure of what to expect.
The room is thick with smoke, and little light penetrates past the animal skins to light up the room that is otherwise lit by a few freestanding candles.
Standing in the doorway, Laura lets her eyes adjust to the dim light. In front of her is a large room with a bed in the far right corner, covered in more animal skins. There are a number of small wooden tree trunks cut at knee height scattered around the place, serving as small tables and stools. In the middle of the room is a large tree trunk, cut through the centre and polished, forming a large flat table. There are six tree stumps pushed into holes cut into the tree trunk at the bottom, serving as legs, three a side.
It is on this table that Laura sees Victor lying, unconscious. Laura quickly moves to his side, grabbing his hand, it is cold. Slowly a figure moves from out of the darkness in the back, wearing animal skins as clothes. The face is covered by a mask of gold, showing the face with teeth and protruding tongue Westerners have become accustomed to seeing on Inca temples.
“Is he dead?” Laura asks, fearing it so.
“Not yet.”
“Can you save him?” Laura is almost pleading.
“No, not me, I cannot, he has too many demons in his past, needs too much forgiveness.” The shadow removes the mask showing her face. She is an old Peruvian woman, skin rumpled, missing most of her teeth.
“What can we do?” Laura holds Victor’s hand tightly as she speaks.
“He needs a reason to live, his journey is complete and he needs to be offered a new journey to live.” The old woman walks past Laura and out of the hut. Laura puts her head on Victor’s chest and cries while saying, “Please don’t leave me, not after all we’ve been through, I need you.” There is no movement from Victor. Laura pulls back and for the first time she sees the herbs and home made medicine the old woman has put on Victor’s wound, she must be a traditional healer.
She leans over and kisses Victor on the lips, then softly says, “I love you Victor, I want to spend my life with you, I forgive you for all you’ve done.” Still Victor does not move. Again Laura lays her head on his chest while sitting on a small stool that is next to the table. Softly she cries until she falls asleep, going into a deep trance. Outside she can hear the local people dancing and singing, chanting something, slowly the sounds fade away.
Laura dreams she is standing by a river. Victor is sitting in a boat on the other side, ready to cast off. She calls to him, but he does not hear her.
Slowly he pushes the boat away from the river bank with a paddle and starts to row down the river, away from her. She screams for him to come to her, but he seems to be in a trance, unable to hear her.
Slowly he drifts away from her, to be forever lost to her. Laura’s heart beats madly in her chest, adrenaline rushes through her body.
She wants to swim after him, so she steps into the river. Suddenly the river turns black, and dark figures come out of the water, extending their arms to pull her down. Fear grips Laura, but seeing Victor, her love, disappearing gives her strength. She dives into the black water, arms grabbing at every part of her body as she struggles towards Victor. She kicks and claws her way through the mass of arms pulling at her, trying to take her down.
Without warning something stronger grabs her right leg and pulls her body under the black waters. She cannot breathe, fear chokes her. She kicks and punches as hard as she can, but the thing keeps dragging her deeper. Laura decides she has come this far, she is not about to quit now, and renews her fighting with extra effort.
Suddenly she breaks free and makes her way to the surface, gasping for air as she comes up. Looking around she sees Victor only an arm’s length away. Fighting her way against the sea of arms and hands trying to drag her under, she reaches the boat and grabs Victor’s left arm.
Again something strong grabs her legs and pulls her down. She holds on to Victor, causing the boat to tip over and Victor to fall into the water with her.
The sea of hands is immediately on him, pulling him down quickly. Laura and Victor are both pulled together into the depths of blackness.
“Spare him and take my life!” Laura pleads to the darkness. Suddenly her heart starts glowing a brilliant white, getting stronger and stronger. Then a spark from her heart jumps to Victor’s heart, and it also starts to glow a brilliant white.
The two balls of light grow bigger and bigger, until they merge and make one big brilliant ball of light, covering them both, pushing the hungry dark arms away. Then the ball of light explodes, and everything goes white, blinding Laura. Seconds later the light fades and Laura finds herself lying on the river bank with Victor, the river is clear and birds are chirping. Victor opens his eyes and says, “Your love for me saved me.”
Laura leans forward to kiss him, their lips almost touching. Just before she can kiss him, she feels herself being pulled away, as if she is falling.
“Victor!” she yells as she is ripped from him.
Laura wakes the moment she hits the floor. Lying still for a second to take in the surroundings, she realizes she is still inside the room next to Victor, but has somehow slipped off her home made chair and is now lying on the floor next to him.
Slowly she stands up and looks at Victor. He is still asleep. Hope fades from her and she turns around to right the chair so that she can sit down again.
“Water,” comes a faint voice from behind her. Laura spins around so fast that she slips and comes to land on her bum. She is up in an instant and next to Victor who is now awake. A smile breaks on his face when he sees her and she takes his hand.
“Glad to see you stuck around, can I get some water please?” he says, his voice soft and weak. Laura eagerly nods yes and jumps up to run and get water for him. As she reaches the door she quickly turns around and runs back to Victor. She gives him a big kiss and then goes to get water for him.
Chapter 15
Victor is up in two days, and although still weak and recovering he starts to train Laura the basics of cleaning and handling a pistol. There is a lot of work still to be done. They stay in the village, the old lady caring for them while Laura helps her clean the house and cook. The old woman is so grateful for the company, she starts teaching Laura how to use plants to heal from an upset stomach to infected wounds.
The news about Laura finding the treasure spreads fast and people come from afar to say thank you, bringing food and gifts for her and Victor. After a month, when Victor feels he can make the trip to Cusco he asks Manco to help him with transport.
Manco arranges for a truck to pick them up, and while Victor and Laura are sitting in the back of the Bedford truck, Victor opens the four scrolls that had been found with the treasure. The scrolls are made from a material Victor has never seen, almost like leather, yet after all the years it is not rotten or damaged by any bugs. The ends of the scrolls have a bar of solid gold that is used to roll the scroll material onto. The scrolls contain strange writing, some of which Victor has seen before, in addition to drawings for a device.
There are a lot of footnotes and arrows pointing to various parts of the drawings, all in unreadable hieroglyphs. Laura stares in amazement at the scrolls. They had studied the scrolls a few times while Victor healed, but she just cannot get used to them and their significance.
The journey takes two days to complete and when they finally reach Cusco, Victor books a hotel room for the two of them. After a quick shower and a meal Victor goes into town and buys a prepaid cell phone card. On returning to the room he places a call.
“Dean’s Carpet Service, how may I help?” Victor has the phone on loudspeaker.
“Put me through to Manuel.”
“Sorry sir, there is no one here by that name, can I be of service?” The voice is friendly, but Victor knows they are already runn
ing a voice recognition pattern on the other end, just a matter of time before the operator makes a positive identification. Victor knows he can simply give his id number, but this is so much more fun.
“Oh shit,” comes the reply from the other end and Victor knows a message in red is flashing on the operator’s screen, saying “High priority alert, Follow protocol red immediately”.
There is a click on the line, then silence and then Manuel answers. Victor knows they have started a trace on his location already. He has an encryption program on his phone that will block them from finding his location for 45 seconds.
“I was hoping you would call, how are things Victor?” Manuel is stalling for time and Victor knows it.
“Eliminated complication, data secured, located high priority information, trade for courier’s life.” Victor looks at his watch as he speaks. 38 seconds left.
“No deal, kill courier and bring data in,” the voice is firmer now. 32 seconds.
“Manuel, I am out, you can keep all, just leave us alone.” Victor changes form protocol to normal language. 25 seconds left.
“Victor, Victor, Victor, you know no one get’s out of this business, and the girl knows too much. Do your job, or have you gone soft?” 15 seconds.
“Go to hell.” Victor replies and prepares to end the call. 10 seconds.
“We will find you and her and..” Victor cuts the call. 4 seconds left.
Looking at Laura he says, “We need to go.”
“Are they coming for us?” Laura asks as she stands up, taking Victor’s hand.
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“All they have.”
Laura turns to face him, blocking his path. “What are we going to do?”
“Find out where all of this started and who is behind all of this, and then end it all.” Laura nods then smiles as she takes her place next to Victor again, hand in hand they walk out of the room, into a new life for both of them.
Laura 01 The Jaguar Prophecy Page 21
