by Alex Archer
Annja started walking back to the grand staircase. Surely there would be attendants awake in the temple corridors. Perhaps she could ask them a few questions and try to put her mind at rest.
But as Annja ascended the stairs, she heard nothing.
Back at the top, as she traveled down corridor after corridor and checked out room after room, she found nothing. There were no people anywhere. And worse, there were no personal belongings to speak of.
It was as if she was on some sort of weird soundstage in a movie production lot. But the land was real and surely the peach she’d eaten was real.
So where the hell was everyone else?
She ducked back upstairs to her room and tried again to sleep. Perhaps, she thought, if I go to sleep, tomorrow will sort things through.
But her mind raced as soon as she lay down.
Annja sat up and frowned.
Shangri-La was turning out to be anything but paradise.
She yawned and realized how utterly fatigued she was. Even if she couldn’t sleep, maybe just closing her eyes would make everything feel better. She leaned back and felt her head sink into one of the pillows.
A delicate scent of honeysuckle tickled her nostrils and Annja smiled. She loved that scent. Always had.
She thought about the golden sunshine and how warm it had been earlier today. It reminded her of sitting on a tropical beach somewhere watching the blue-green waves crash in against the sandy shore, frothing white before retreating once more to the water.
Annja stretched her limbs and tried to release all of her nervous energy. Wherever she was, she decided, it was better than being back in that cold, snowy cave.
In the next instant, driven purely by instinct, she leaped from the bed into a standing position. In her hands, the sword had already materialized.
Several images registered at once as she came fully awake.
A dark shadow behind her bed.
Hands extended over the pillow where she’d been lying. Claws.
Annja flicked the sword up in front of her and, from behind her bed, tracked the shadow. It was bathed in black cloth, invisible in the dim twilight of the room. There was no moon, making the landscape even darker.
But the shadow that stalked Annja seemed to simply bleed across the floor toward her, its hands upraised in a fighting stance vaguely reminiscent to Annja. She’d seen it somewhere before, but where?
The figure in black didn’t scream or jerk its body in any fashion. One second it was coolly regarding Annja as a cat might look at a mouse.
The next instant, it attacked.
Annja was almost stunned by the sudden ferocity of the attack. The figure slashed at Annja’s face with its claws.
Annja deftly flicked her sword up, intending to cut the attacker’s hands, but she heard something she didn’t expect. It was the clang of metal against metal.
Annja moved back for more room. Swinging a sword in a confined space wasn’t the best use of it as a weapon. The shadow had the advantage of a smaller tool used in a close environment.
But Annja didn’t intend to go down without a fight.
As the shadow advanced again, Annja could see that the skin around the eyes had been darkened, as well, rendering the figure nearly invisible save for the whites of the eyeballs themselves.
Again and again it came at Annja. Annja used the sword to ward off the attacks, but her own offensive struggled to get off the ground. Annja stabbed and took short cuts at the shadow, but the figure merely moved out of the way and out of range.
Annja shook her head. She needed open space to use her sword to its fullest advantage. But how would she convince the shadow to pursue her? She had to assume the shadow knew how to fight and do so extremely well. There was no way it would simply follow Annja if it meant giving up its advantage in the room.
Annja attacked savagely and thought she felt her blade slide into a piece of flesh. But the shadow never once uttered a sound.
Instead, it came back at Annja, swinging its claws with full force. Annja was driven back to the doorway and then beyond into the corridor.
Instead of continuing the fight, though, Annja ran.
She dashed down the steps back into the open pavilion. She had no idea if the shadow had followed her or not. She couldn’t hear anything. Even her own footsteps had been virtually silent thanks to the thick stone steps.
Annja whirled in time to see the shadow floating down from the second floor bedroom window of Annja’s quarters.
It flies, Annja thought. How is that possible?
But she had no time to think it through. The shadow attacked again, this time kicking Annja in the stomach.
Annja flew back, feeling her wind rush out of her body.
The shadow followed up with a resounding punch to Annja’s chin. Annja saw stars and tried to blink away the tears that welled up in her eyes.
Annja crouched, pivoting on her knee, trying to cut the shadow open at the midsection.
But the shadow backflipped away, tumbling across the pavilion and disappearing into the corridors beyond.
Annja stood there with her sword gleaming in the night.
Stay or follow?
She’d tricked the shadow into coming down here where she could better use the blade. Now the shadow probably wanted to return the favor.
Annja shook her head. No way was she following.
From the darkness across the courtyard, Annja heard a soft whisper cut through the night air. She jerked her sword up and cut it across her face, severing the arrow that had been fired at her from somewhere beyond the range of her sight.
The two pieces fell and skittered across the stone floor.
Annja heard another series of whispers and twisted to avoid the bolts that flew at her.
Again and again, arrows flew at her body and Annja found her lungs heaving as she struggled to avoid them. I’m silhouetted out here in the dim light, she thought. I need to be invisible, too.
Annja ran toward the darkness where the shadow had fled. Rushing through the doorway, she cut right and left and above and below, trying to score a direct hit with her offense.
But she cut nothing.
She heard a soft peal of laughter ring out, carried to her ears on the breeze that brushed past her face.
Annja pivoted and sliced nothing but air.
But she’d sensed movement.
Something had rushed past her back into the open courtyard of the pavilion.
Annja raced back out, still keeping the sword in front of her to protect her if need be.
Perched atop one of the stone walls leading up toward Annja’s quarters, the shadow was hunched. Against the night sky, it looked like a feral cat.
And it cast one final look at Annja before leaping off into the night.
24
The ringing of the phone echoed in Tuk’s ears as he pitched and fell headlong through the doorway into the blackness beyond. His hands instinctively shot out, reaching, grabbing for anything to help break his fall. He felt a weird fabric brush against his hands and he clutched at the material before it gave way under his body weight. It enshrouded him as he continued to fall forward until he hit his face against something hard.
For a moment, he lay there unsure of what had just happened. His phone had rung and then he’d been shoved from behind. But had his own father pushed him through the doorway? That didn’t make any sense.
Tuk heard a heavy rumbling sound and yanked off the black material in time to see a giant slab of stone slam shut, enclosing him in a small ten-by-ten-foot room.
“Hey!”
Tuk’s voice echoed back at him. He could tell the walls must have been exceedingly thick. He didn’t think any bit of sound would escape this room no matter how hard he tried to shout.
He looked around at the sparse room. It resembled a prison cell. Overhead, a single light illuminated the room behind what looked to be a Plexiglas housing. This suddenly didn’t look very much like Shangri-La.
<
br /> Had he come across some kind of gap in time and space and he was back on the other side in some strange location? This certainly wasn’t the mountain cave they’d come through.
So where was he?
He paced off the room, confirming in his own mind the measurements. Other than the light fixture, there was nothing else in the room with him. Tuk was, for all intents and purposes, in a perfectly square stone box.
His mind raced. Surely his own father hadn’t done this to him, had he? He felt like a prisoner and he was rapidly suspecting that he’d somehow been betrayed. Was everything a hoax here? Was this place just a fraud? And if it was, then that meant that Annja and Mike were in serious trouble.
He pounded on one of the walls but found it as solid as he thought it might be. His hand came away badly scraped. Tuk sucked it for a moment and then sat down on the floor, trying to make sense of things.
Garin was obviously attempting to get in touch with him again. But why? Had he learned something that would help? Or was he calling to see if Tuk had managed to find a way for Garin to cross over?
Either way, things didn’t look good.
Tuk leaned against the wall and folded his arms. Nothing made sense except for the fact that he’d passed through a doorway and into some type of prison cell, cut off from his friends, and seemingly at the mercy of his so-called father.
Perhaps his father didn’t really want him back, after all. Maybe Tuk was a threat to his rule.
No.
Tuk shook his head. His father was old. Guge himself had said how happy they were about his return.
But why?
If that was how they showed their happiness, then things were truly askew.
Tuk examined his hand again and made sure that the bleeding was minimal. It wouldn’t need any medical attention, but it hurt for the time being.
“You shouldn’t have punched the wall like that.”
Tuk looked up and saw that a section of the stone wall had slid back, revealing a piece of Plexiglas. It looked to be some type of observation window. And Tuk couldn’t see beyond the one-way glass into the other room.
“Father?”
He heard laughter. “He still thinks you’re his father.”
“Who is that?” Tuk got to his feet, feeling his heart thunder in his chest. Now they were mocking him. He felt his face redden at the thought of it.
“Sit down, little man. Sit down and listen.”
Tuk sat, still feeling furious.
“It’s a shame you had to be so curious about things. We were hoping you would hold out long enough for us to complete what we’re working on here.”
“I only asked a question,” Tuk said.
“Yes, but you asked the question we didn’t want you to ask. Don’t you see? And now you’re paying the price for that curiosity.”
“Where is my father?”
More laughter sounded. Tuk got back to his feet. “Stop laughing at me!”
He heard a voice that sounded vaguely familiar. Guge. “I’m here, Tuk. What can I do for you?”
“You can explain yourself. All of this. Tell me what is going on here. I want to know.”
“Yes, I know you want to know. The thing is, I can’t tell you just yet. I’m afraid you’re going to have to be a little more patient. When everything is done, you will be allowed to see it.”
Tuk stopped. “I will?”
“Certainly.”
Tuk didn’t like the tone of his voice. “What’s the catch?”
“There’s no catch…son.”
Tuk frowned. “You’re not my father.”
“Oh, now don’t take it so personally. It was important for us to make you feel welcome when you first arrived. After all, it wouldn’t do to have you come here and not roll out the welcome mat.”
“Why, though? You could have just left us alone in the cave on the mountain.”
“No. Unfortunately, as much as we would have liked doing just that, we couldn’t leave you there.”
“Why?”
“Because the woman you are with is far more adept at ferreting out things than we would like. And inevitably you would have located the passageway that bridges us with the mountain entrance.”
“So you took us over with the intention of doing what?”
“Sending your friends back on their way when the one called Mike was healed. And keeping you here.”
“Why keep me?”
“We have our reasons.”
Tuk sighed. “Well, now you’ve got me. Are you going to let Annja and Mike go?”
“I’m afraid things have progressed beyond us being able to do that now.”
“Why?”
“Your cell phone for one. Who is the man you are speaking with on the other end of the line?”
“None of your business.”
“Tsk, tsk, Tuk, that’s no way to treat your friends.”
Tuk sniffed. “Friends…right.”
“We need to know. We must ensure the secret is still safe. Does he know where you are?”
Tuk frowned. “I don’t even know where I am. How would I be able to communicate anything to him?”
“All right.”
Tuk rubbed his hand. “So how long are you going to keep me here?”
“Just a little while more.”
“My friends aren’t going to stand for this. Once they see that I’ve gone, they’re going to start asking questions.”
“Yes, Annja is already being somewhat troublesome.”
Tuk smiled. You have no idea what she’s capable of, he thought. “Oh, really?”
“Indeed. And we have another problem.”
“Good.”
“Don’t be like that, Tuk. This can all go so much smoother if you simply cooperate and answer our questions. If you do that for us, we’ll make sure your time with us is relatively comfortable. And painless.”
“You’re going to torture me if I don’t talk? How refreshingly original.”
“Torture tends not to work that well. The results are usually mixed. Unpredictable, even. But there are other alternatives.”
Tuk frowned. “I’m not answering any more of your questions.”
“Where is Mike?”
Tuk looked back at the one-way Plexiglas. “You lost him?” He couldn’t help it and a smile broke out across his face. “That’s fantastic. You guys must be so proud of yourselves.”
“Tuk, this isn’t helping us.”
“You are absolutely correct. It’s not helping you. And you can bet there’s more where that came from.”
Another voice spoke now but it wasn’t directed at Tuk. “This is getting us nowhere. I told you he wouldn’t cooperate.”
Guge’s voice broke into a different language. Tuk frowned. Mandarin Chinese. He heard the tones and had spent enough time around some of the Chinese transplants in Katmandu that he knew how the language sounded even if he didn’t understand a word.
The conversation continued for several minutes and sounded quite heated. Tuk leaned back against the wall with a smug look on his face. Good, he thought, let them get annoyed with me.
“Tuk.”
“What?”
“My comrade here thinks we would be better served if we simply started making you as uncomfortable as possible right now. He thinks I am wasting my time trying to talk to you like a civilized human being.”
“Maybe you are.”
“Don’t say that, Tuk. Things can grow truly unpleasant here. You have no idea how enterprising some of my colleagues can be. And I mean that in the worst possible way.”
Tuk sighed. “I’m done helping you. Until I get some answers, I’m not saying a thing.”
“Where is Mike, Tuk?”
“I don’t know. And that’s an honest answer. Seriously. I will give that one to you for no charge.”
“Where is he?”
Tuk patted the stone walls of his cell. “You guys are about as thick as this wall, aren’t you? I just told you the truth
. I don’t know where he is. The last I saw of him was right after Annja spoke to him and he went off in a huff about something. I don’t know anything else.”
Guge and his colleague exchanged another battery of Chinese conversation. Back and forth for a minute this time and then, finally, Guge’s voice came back on.
“All right, Tuk. That’s fine for now. We will see if your story checks out. If I were you, I’d spend my time praying that it does.”
“Really?”
“Oh, most definitely. Because if we find out you’ve been lying to us, there’s going to be little I can do to stop my colleagues from exerting themselves upon you in a most terrible fashion.”
Tuk bunched his knees up and leaned his head back against the wall. “I have nothing to hide. I’ve told you the truth.”
“Let us hope so.”
“How soon can I get out of here?”
“I told you. When we are finished. Not a moment before that time.”
“And then you’ll let me go?”
There was a pause. “We never said anything about letting you go, Tuk.”
“I’m no use to you here. Let me go back to Katmandu. Or better yet, let me leave the country. I’ve got a little money. I can go anywhere. Trust me, I’m no bother to you here.”
“You won’t be a bother.”
“Absolutely not.”
“Well, there’s one thing we agree on, Tuk.”
Tuk nodded. “Good.”
“Unfortunately, we don’t agree on how to make sure that you do disappear.”
“I just told you that I can vanish.”
“It’s too risky, my little friend.”
Tuk swallowed. “I don’t think I like where this is going.”
“Then perhaps you should stop talking. Before your worst fears are confirmed. Good night, Tuk.”
And the room plunged into darkness again, leaving Tuk very much alone in the cold stone cell.
25
Annja ran through the deserted corridors of the temple searching for her adversary everywhere, but to no avail. She paused, the sword still gleaming in the night air. There was no way she was going to release her blade until she knew exactly what the hell was going on around here.
But after a full minute with no action, Annja calmed her heartbeat down and retraced her steps to the courtyard. The night seemed even more still than it had before.
