by Melissa Frey
Then something sparked inside of her, something instinctive, and she abruptly felt an overwhelming need to know how the wall was glowing. Without another thought, her scientific side took over and she turned back to the wall.
At first glance, the wall seemed unexceptional. But as Kayla looked closer, she began to see some . . . irregularities.
Grady leaned in, examining the wall with her. He hesitantly reached out and touched the wall lightly. “Look . . . this wall has a translucent top layer. The light must be coming from behind it.” He carefully pressed a little harder, testing the strength of the rock. What appeared to be simply a thin layer of rock didn’t move.
Kayla squinted, trying to examine the wall without looking directly into the middle of it. By now, the light was shining almost as brightly as the sun.
As she scrutinized the top layer of rock, she noticed small etchings on the surface. A strange pattern, nothing that made any sense . . . hmmm. Well, the symbols did make sense, kind of. The writings were of Mayan origin, she was almost certain of that, but they were . . . different. Almost . . . then it hit her. They were backward.
She stared more intently at the symbols. Something about the way the light was shining out from behind the wall . . . She slowly turned around. Her eyes widened. Again.
“Grady . . . look.” Kayla pointed toward the middle of the room.
Grady’s mouth fell open.
CHAPTER 3
Cavern
Grady was trying to will his body to move, but to no avail. What on earth was he seeing? His mind kept telling him to sprint toward the middle of the room so he could make sense of what he was seeing, but his legs wouldn’t move.
Then, excruciatingly slowly, his muscles began responding. And, finally, his body began listening to him again.
Once he was confident his legs would cooperate, Grady walked, ran, sprinted toward the middle of the room.
Directly in the center of the cavern, an enormous boulder—a monument, really—stood erect, blocking their view to the other side. Grady reached the boulder quickly then stopped to take it all in. There, on the side of the large rock, was writing—not etched in the rock, not written in ancient faded ink, but reflected on the rock from the brilliantly glowing wall behind him.
Kayla was coming up behind him, sprinting toward the center of the room—he could hear her frantic footsteps in the sand—but before she reached him, Grady heard her abruptly stop. He spun around. “What is it?”
She jabbed a finger at another part of the room, another wall. “Look! Those walls are shining, too.” She moved to the right, taking a look at another side of the boulder. “Grady . . .” Her voice trailed off; Grady instinctively held his breath.
Kayla’s next words were whispered. “These walls all have writing on them, too.”
Grady looked past her to another part of the wall. It too was glowing, transposing symbols on another side of the boulder. Grady backed up a little, trying to see a little better.
Now he could see what Kayla was talking about. This was an amazing find. Soon his head was spinning with the possibilities.
Kayla had started circling the boulder. Grady followed close behind, always keeping her in sight, but making sure he didn’t step in the way of the light’s reflected words. She didn’t seem to notice him in her exuberance. Grady just smiled as she gazed almost reverently at the symbols shining on the huge rock.
“Do you know what it says?” Grady was trying to make sense of the hieroglyphs with little success. He didn’t know the language nearly as well as Kayla did; not many people did, after all. He found himself wishing he hadn’t relied on his translators quite so much.
“Yes,” Kayla mumbled, “but I’m not sure . . . I think these are stories, written histories of some kind.” She paused as she read the ancient Mayan symbols. Her brow furrowed.
Grady watched the frown on her face deepen as she read. “It appears as though they’re detailing random events in their history, stories of . . . hmmm. Something’s not adding up.”
Grady frowned. “What?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered. Then her expression abruptly changed.
“What is it?”
Kayla was grinning widely, all but jumping up and down. Grady smiled. She’d definitely found something.
“Yes! That’s it!” Kayla’s words came faster now, becoming jumbled in her excitement. “Here they’re talking about a group of four men—they were referred to as the ‘Old Ones’ here . . .” she pointed at a small symbol, her hand briefly passing through the light, distorting the image, before she continued her explanation. “They ruled the Mayans for . . .” her voice cut off suddenly.
Grady inched closer. “For what?”
Kayla shook her head, blinking. “This says they ruled the Mayans for . . . centuries.” She took a deep breath. “How is that possible? How have we never heard of them?”
Grady stared at the symbols shining on the boulder. “No one knows how to read K’iche as well as you, Kayla.” Grady smiled, referencing the ancient Mayan language of this region. “Also, the ancient Mayan texts were always careful not to mention their royalty. They didn’t even mention they had any royalty. Not for any significant period of time, anyway. Their gods were the only things they worshipped. At least, that’s all we’ve ever uncovered.” He shook his head. “This changes everything we know about the ancient Mayans.”
Kayla was frowning again. “Grady . . . I think you need to hear this.”
He leaned over her shoulder. “What?”
Kayla pointed at the rocky surface. “This says they ruled for centuries.” She emphasized the word again.
Grady didn’t get it. “So? Royal families have ruled for centuries throughout history.”
“No.” Kayla shook her head. “Not a family. The same four men.”
Grady froze. He just stood staring at the side of her face, trying to figure out if she was joking, trying to let what she’d just said sink in. After a few moments, he finally found his voice. “How can—” his voice cut off as he choked on the words. He cleared his throat and tried again. “How can that be?”
Kayla continued reading. “This part says—and I can’t believe that I’m reading this—that they never aged.”
Grady smiled crookedly. “There’s no way. That’s impossible. Are you sure you didn’t translate it incorrectly?”
Kayla shrugged. “I suppose I could have.” She rechecked, frowning again. “But I don’t think so. By these accounts, it sounds like these four ‘Old Ones’ ruled the Mayans absolutely, for centuries, and were never challenged. No one ever went up against them.” She abruptly shuddered. Without thinking, Grady lightly rested a hand on her shoulder; something she’d read bothered her—he was certain of that. Grady watched her swallow hard before she continued. “Well, it’s clear why they were never questioned. At least, they were never questioned twice.” She chuckled darkly. “The repercussions of insubordination came at a very high cost. Sounds like no one ever survived.”
Grady cringed at the thought until he had another one. He cocked his head to one side. “How?”
Kayla turned to stare at him. “How what?”
Grady frowned. “I mean, how did no one survive their attacks? What made them so powerful?”
Kayla turned back to the hieroglyphs without a word, clearly searching for the answer.
After what seemed like an eternity, it seemed as though she’d found it. Kayla slowly stood, inching away from the wall almost imperceptibly. “Grady . . .” Her voice sounded strangled.
“What did you find?”
Kayla just squinted at the symbols in front of her. Grady felt his heart start to beat a little faster, though he didn’t yet know why. He sensed he was about to find out.
“I think I know the how,” Kayla whispered.
Grady just leaned in, so she continued. “These ‘Old Ones’ somehow found something that gave them absolute power. I think the story of what they discovered is here,
I just haven’t deciphered it yet.”
“What have you deciphered?”
Kayla felt a pit forming in her stomach, getting larger by the second. “These men—they didn’t just have power—they had powers, plural.”
Grady’s eyes widened as Kayla felt him freeze beside her. It took him several seconds to find his voice. “Powers? You mean like superpowers? X-ray vision, invisibility, comic book stuff?”
Kayla nodded gravely. “Basically, yes.”
Grady smirked, just a little, and crossed his arms. “You can’t be serious.”
Kayla shrugged. “Normally, no. But maybe . . . It does explain everything. How they ruled absolutely, why no one who stood against them survived, why they never aged . . .”
Grady uncrossed his arms and held them out in front of her; Kayla thought he looked almost like he was begging. “But it can’t . . . Kayla, superpowers don’t exist. As a scientist, surely you have to know that.”
Kayla bit her lip, unsure of how to respond. At any other time, on any other day—even just an hour ago—she would’ve had the same reaction. But she was here, this was now, and somehow she just knew.
Kayla drew a deep breath, releasing it before she spoke. “I don’t know how I know, Grady, I just do. I’m sorry.”
A long silence stretched between them before Kayla tried to clear the air. “Look, we don’t have to figure this out tonight. I’m sure it’s getting late, and we need to take these symbols down. Did you happen to bring a camera?”
Grady shrugged. “Left my phone in my bag—not much sense in keeping it charged around here. And the dig’s cameras are so bulky I left them above ground. Sorry.”
“Yeah, me too.” Kayla sighed, not sure what to do. Everything still felt a little awkward with Grady, and she couldn’t figure out how to fix it.
Then Grady spoke. “Kayla . . . I’m sorry. I had no right . . . If you believe these Old Ones had powers, who am I to say they didn’t? You are pretty much the best K’iche translator in the entire world.”
Kayla couldn’t help but smile when Grady grinned at her. She almost even giggled. “Pretty much?”
Grady’s grin widened as he turned back toward the boulder in front of them. “So we don’t have any cameras down here, but we need to take these symbols down. Thoughts?”
Kayla nodded and grabbed a notepad from her shirt pocket. “Yup. We’ll go old school.” She winked at him before turning back toward the wall.
Grady grinned. Smarts and a sense of humor.
He knew he should follow her, help her, but instead he just stood there for a few seconds, watching as Kayla started circling the boulder. Something about the light in this room had gotten him thinking . . . where was it coming from? He knew there was some light coming from behind the walls, but it had brightened—seemingly in response to their presence—as one unit. Plus, now that he thought about it, the light had seemed to ebb once they walked away from the wall. There had to be a single source, a sort of catalyst that was sustaining it, right? It seemed to make sense. But what would such a thing even look like? And where on earth would it be?
Grady took a few steps back, scanning the formation in front of him as he went, barely noticing Kayla moving on to the next boulder face, off to his right. Where could . . .
Then he looked up.
Kayla was making good time. At this rate, she would have all four sides of the boulder transcribed in just another ten minutes or so. She wasn’t translating everything as she went—this massive underground cavern was oddly getting more claustrophobic by the minute—but she was catching enough to start getting excited. This was an amazing find! She couldn’t wait to get back to the work trailer, lay all these symbols out, maybe even get them scanned into the computer . . .
Then she felt it. Something was not right. Maybe it was just being in this room, but something was definitely off.
For the first time in who-knew-how-many minutes, she looked up from her work. Where was Grady? She’d all but forgotten about him.
Then she spotted him, several feet away from the base of the boulder, to her left. And staring toward the ceiling.
Could he even see the ceiling from here? She glanced upward, tried to see what he was gazing at so intently. Nothing out of the ordinary. Not even the ceiling, which was shrouded in shadow.
Kayla took a few steps toward him. She wanted to call out to him, ask him what was wrong, but she couldn’t find her voice. She was worried that any sudden sound or movement could . . . well, she didn’t know what. Maybe send him further into his trance?
She reached his side and faced the boulder, mimicking his stance. Then she looked up.
Sitting atop the largest boulder, barely visible from this vantage point, something was glowing. Kayla backed up to try to get a better view. From this angle, she could see the top of what appeared to be a golden sphere illuminated by the light in the room—or was it illuminating the room? The space around it was filled with an eerie glow.
“Kayla . . .” Grady’s voice cracked.
“It’s . . . amazing.”
Kayla felt Grady come up beside her. “I can’t even begin to explain how it . . .” his voice trailed off.
Kayla nodded slowly. “What is it?” She didn’t really expect an answer.
Grady gave her one anyway. “I think this is the catalyst for the light in this room. Somehow it’s giving off so much light that the entire room is illuminated.”
Kayla’s eyes widened. “Amazing,” she repeated. After a few more seconds of awestruck silence, she shook her head and forced herself to look away. “We’ll have to examine it tomorrow, when we can get a ladder down here.” She smiled, then switched gears. “I haven’t taken everything down yet. Wanna help? I’d like to get back topside as soon as possible.” She nodded toward the ceiling then offered a half-smile.
Grady smiled back, nodding. “Of course.”
Grady fell into step behind Kayla, pulling out his own notepad and circling the boulder to take down the symbols she hadn’t gotten to yet. He couldn’t read them this quickly, not all of them, but he could copy them down. At least he could do that.
Kayla hurriedly followed Grady to the surface. Once their feet hit the ground, she stood very still for a brief moment, closing her eyes. She drew the cool night air into her lungs and felt it clear her head. Until now, most of her fieldwork at Lamanai had been above ground—and after tonight, she’d prefer to keep it that way.
But she had a job to do. Kayla deliberately focused her attention on what they’d found and went directly to the dig’s primary work trailer, a portable, aluminum-sided refuge where they stored some of their more sensitive work equipment, those most susceptible to the weather. The one-room trailer housed a small library, a couple of microscopes, a handful of computers, and plentiful desk space. Aside from being on her stomach in the dirt unearthing her next treasure, this trailer was Kayla’s favorite place to be—especially due to its comfortable, climate-controlled interior.
Kayla rolled a desk chair up to one of the tables and set to work. Opening her notepad, she tore out the pages she needed and began to organize the stories in chronological order as best as she could.
She barely heard the door open as Grady followed her in a few minutes later. Never taking her eyes off her work, she motioned to him with one hand. “Can I have your notepad?”
His notepad landed beside her on the table and she muttered a quiet “thanks” without looking up. She was barely registering anything beyond her work at the moment. That’s how it always was.
She heard a scratching behind her then felt Grady come up beside her. Out of her peripheral vision, she saw him leaning over the table, peering at the papers she’d carefully assembled.
Kayla ignored him without really meaning to. She hoped he wouldn’t take it personally.
Grady grabbed one of the two sandwiches he’d brought in—dropping the other on the desk next to Kayla—and started gnawing on it as he leaned back in his chair. He was
only slightly hungry. He mostly just needed something to do.
After a few minutes—and only a small dent in the sandwich—Grady tossed the sandwich back on the table beside him. With a loud sigh, he rose and pulled his chair over to the dig’s solitary desktop computer. After waiting for what seemed like an eternity for the dinosaur to wake up, Grady started searching the internet for information about the geographical area, blindly searching for anything that might give them a clue about who might’ve written the symbols in the cave—or maybe he’d get really lucky and find some info on the “Old Ones.” He half-smiled. There was no chance of that.
He gave up only a few minutes later; the computer was just too slow, and it wasn’t like he’d really find anything useful, anyway. He pushed away from the desk and moved to the dig’s small library. Thorough research had been done on this site for more than a year before they’d decided the area warranted an archeological inquiry. He searched for those researchers’ notes to see if they’d had any indication of what might have happened here or who may have written on the walls of the cavern below ground. A brief perusal of their lengthy notes turned up exactly what he expected. Nothing.
He glanced over at Kayla. She was still poring over the papers in front of her, but Grady was relieved to see a half-eaten sandwich in her hand. He watched as she blindly grabbed one-handed for a larger, well-worn, leather-bound notebook. It almost looked like a diary of sorts.
“What’s that?” Grady asked, unable to remain quiet a second longer.
Kayla squinted at the notes in front of her, setting her sandwich down and reaching for a pencil without her eyes ever leaving the page. As she began scrawling frantically in the notebook, Grady wondered if she’d even heard him.
But she eventually answered. “My journal.” She kept up her furious scratching as she continued. “I’ve been keeping a record of everything that happens here, everything we find. For my personal use.”
