Chapter 95: A Graverobber’s Luck
"Right, this is stupid."
James pushed away from the doorframe and squeezed through the gap first, his shoulder scraping against stone packed tighter than a purser clutching the ship’s shares.
"We’re standin’ here like a pair of fools waitin’ for the other to blink."
"You were the one who said ladies first, Captain."
"Right, so we’re both idiots. Good start to a grand expedition."
He thrust his torch through and twisted sideways past the heavy stone door.
"Come on, then, before this door decides to close on its own and save us the trouble."
Mary slipped in after him, holding her torch low and nearly flat so it would pass through the frame.
They stepped into a chamber so vast that both flames disappeared into the darkness long before either found the far wall.
"Christ."
James turned in a slow circle, following the reach of the torchlight. "This isn’t a room, but some bloody city."
Dark doorways appeared on every side, each one a black mouth leading into places neither of them could see.
One had collapsed beneath a heap of fallen stone, the blocks piled together like ballast dumped overboard in a hurry. Another vanished beneath black water, perfectly still and impossible to judge. There was no telling how deep it went without sacrificing someone to find out.
Off to one side, a broken staircase climbed toward whatever waited above, though its lower steps had long since snapped away, leaving the upper flight uselessly in the air.
"Guess I’ll fancy some archeologist renown now."
Mary nodded toward the flooded passage. "Although I wouldn’t care to learn what’s livin’ in that water after meetin’ today’s local wildlife."
"Aye, and I’m not trustin’ a staircase either."
James gave the broken steps one last look, then shrugged. "Shame, though. There’s probably whole floors of plunder up there we’ll never see."
"That can be somebody else’s problem three hundred years from now."
Only one path remained.
The central archway stood directly ahead. Before either of them had crossed the distance, their torchlight caught the unmistakable gleam of gold.
James stepped through the arch first.
He stopped dead.
The chamber stretched beneath a ceiling swallowed by darkness and murals covered every wall, faded blues with pictures of men and beasts marching together in a procession neither of them could understand.
Jade figures, each no larger than a man’s fist, stood carved into neat rows. Obsidian rested inside shallow alcoves, black as a barber’s finest razor. Gold lay everywhere, scattered across the floor in plain, heavy pieces, as though a wrecked galleon had finally spilled its cargo and left it there.
At the center rose a stone dais. Resting upon it was a golden mask, fashioned from crown to chin with a coiled serpent rising from its brow, just like the carving on the great door behind them. Beneath the mask sat a smooth black stone disc, polished until the torchlight glided across its surface.
"Would ye look at that."
James drifted toward it, his grin widening with every step. "Thatch himself would cry into that ridiculous beard over a haul like this."
"Aye, and half of it’s worth less to folk like us than a decent cutlass."
Mary crouched beside one of the jade carvings without touching it, lowering her torch for a better look. "Still, they stacked the gold up like ballast. Whoever built this place had more riches than sense."
"Sense has never bought a man a comfortable retirement."
"There’s an old sayin’ about robbin’ the dead."
She looked back toward the chamber behind them, where the little skeleton still rested beside its untouched gold cuff. "The old hands always claimed there’s a toll to pay. We left that poor soul’s trinket alone for good reason."
"That poor soul died because it was alone and trapped in a place like this. Not because of any curse."
James scooped up a loose gold bead and rolled it across his palm. "I’ve stared down a French frigate, a naked admiral, and a crocodile the size of a longboat. I’ll take my chances with a dead man’s temple."
"I still can’t decide whether ye’re fearless or simply stupid."
"Why not both? Saves arguin’ about it later."
Mary snorted.
James reached the dais and ran a hand along the cold edge of the golden mask. The grin never left his face.
"This one’s mine. Captain’s share."
"You’re the one who nearly drowned us both findin’ it. I’d say ye’ve earned first pick."
He lifted the mask from its pedestal.
The black disc dropped the instant the weight left it.
Stone grated against stone with the deep growl of an ancient mill. Somewhere beneath the floor, a chain of hidden mechanisms answered, dust drifted down from the ceiling like ash falling from a burned sail.
Behind them, the great stone door swung shut on its failing hinge. It slammed into the serpent-carved frame with a crack that rolled through the chamber.
"That’s not good." James turned, the mask still in his hands.
"No."
Mary was already at the door, both palms braced against stone that refused to move.
"It fucking’ isn’t innit?"
A faint hiss rose from somewhere inside the walls.
It started quietly, then it grew steadier.
A foul scent followed, so sharp that James recoiled before he even recognized it.
"Worse than rotten eggs."
He covered his mouth with his sleeve. "Mixed with bilge water that’s been left to rot."
Mary ran her free hand along the wall. "And it’s comin’ from everywhere, this whole place is fillin’ up."
"Well."
James set the mask back on the dais without ceremony. "Bloody typical. We finally find the one treasure worth stealin’, and the whole temple decides it’d rather kill us than let us keep it."
"Seems a fittin’ end for grave robbers."
She was already moving along the wall with her torch held low, studying every seam in the stone.
"Watch that flame, Captain. That smell isn’t only foul. It’ll burn."
"Aye. I know."
Keeping his own torch well away from the wall, James swept the light across the floor instead, searching for any crack or hidden breach like he searched for a leaking hull.
"One spark in the wrong place and the air will finish us before the gas ever does."
Neither of them wasted another word.
They worked their way from wall to wall, treating their torches like dangerous cargo that might betray them at any moment.
Every seam, every crack, every carved stone earned another look as they searched for some escape the sealed door and flooded passage hadn’t already denied them, while the hiss continued to grow and each breath became a little harder to take.