Empire of Shadows (Raiders of the Arcana #1)

Thirty-Three

A few minutes earlier

As the clouds thickened overhead, Ellie watched the urgent buzz of the camp from her perch on a fallen column.

Her fingers itched where she clenched them uselessly in her lap. Mendez hovered at her back and shifted from foot to foot as he looked restlessly from the ruins to the sky. Ellie wasn’t sure whether he was dreaming of taking off to explore the mysterious structures for gold… or worrying that the ghosts of the place were going to jump out at them.

The imminent threat of the weather had also sobered the mood in the camp. Many of the men glanced nervously toward the encroaching clouds—though not Braxton Pickett. The fish-eyed Confederate stomped across the plaza, interrogating anyone he came across.

He grabbed Ram by the collar and gave him a shake.

“Which of you made off with my knife?” he shouted, pitching his voice out over the tired assortment of men.

“What do any of us want your knife for?” Ram retorted in his clear, Bhojpur-accented English. “We already have our own, thank you very much.”

“Well, somebody made off with it!” Pickett protested.

He released Ram and stalked away to continue his search.

Ram straightened his shirt, and then treated Pickett’s back to an emphatic gesture that Ellie was fairly certain meant sod off.

Someone had lit a campfire on the stones of the plaza. Ellie choked on her protest at the sight of it. Activities such as establishing campsites and building fires should have been happening well outside of the settlement area, ideally in a location that had been carefully reviewed to ensure there was no evidence of habitation which they might be disturbing.

Jacobs didn’t care about disturbing evidence of habitation.

Ellie had seen little of the true leader of their company since she had arrived. Dawson had dragged Adam up into the temple at the top of the pyramid, and Jacobs had moved off. Perhaps he was stalking the perimeter of the camp to ensure that greed didn’t get the better of his guards and send them off treasure-hunting in neglect of their other duties.

Another gust of wind stirred the hairs at the back of her neck. Aurelio’s mules shifted and brayed uncomfortably in their corral.

Ellie burned with the urge to explore the city. From her spot at the edge of the plaza, she could see clear indications of how organized urban planning had shaped the natural growth of the settlement by way of water and sewage systems, bath houses, road networks, and community spaces.

She could vividly picture what Tulan might have looked like when still inhabited, with the soaring temple free of growth and debris, and the bas relief murals painted in vivid colors. Cloth banners might decorate the buildings while flowers adorned the figures of the ancestors on the stelae.

The details of the vision were so rich and familiar, Ellie could almost imagine that she had really seen them.

She looked up at the temple where Adam and Dawson had disappeared. The building was clearly the major ritual center for the city. If it had remained as untouched as the rest of what they’d discovered, its contents could offer earth-shattering revelations about the people of Tulan… and Ellie had been left out of that exploration because Dawson found it impossible to comprehend that a woman might also be a competent scholar of the antiquities.

Ellie’s frustrated thoughts were interrupted by the arrival of a squat fellow with an enormous ginger beard.

“Hey weasel,” he said by way of announcing himself. He jerked his head at Mendez. “The boss wants to see you by the temple.”

The man spoke with a noticeably French Canadian accent.

Mendez glanced at the enormous structure across the plaza.

“Not that one, niaiseux. The small one.” The Canadian pointed to a white peak just visible through the dense trees beyond the city center.

“What does he want?” Mendez demanded crossly.

“He didn’t tell me,” the Canadian replied flatly. He loosed a stream of tobacco-stained spit through a missing tooth. “You want me to go back and ask him?”

The remark was casual enough, but even Ellie could hear the threat in it.

Mendez shuffled uncertainly, and then set off with a muttered curse.

“Stay with the woman!” he shouted back at Flowers, who remained comfortably positioned behind Ellie with his rifle resting on his shoulder.

Flowers acknowledged this with an easy wave.

A moment later, another of the workers sat down beside Ellie on the column—a lanky Creole fellow with well-muscled arms and a close-cropped beard that showed off his fine cheekbones.

“Weh gaan on, Charlie?” Flowers said amicably. “Lessard,” he added with a nod at the squat Canadian.

“Aarait, cousin,” Charlie replied easily.

He took out a cigarette, obviously preparing to light it.

Ellie frowned.

“You do realize that’s a dreadful habit,” she noted.

“Laura tells him that all the time,” Flowers cheerfully added.

Charlie looked at the cigarette a little mournfully, and then put it away with a sigh.

“Your boy Bates asked me to acquire something for him,” Charlie said. His Kriol accent warmed the words. “I acquired it into the coffee.”

“Don’t dig too far,” Lessard added with a terrifying grin. “It bites.”

“And maybe don’t find it until you are well and ready to disappear,” Charlie added pointedly as he locked his sharp brown gaze on her.

Ellie glared at them. “How am I supposed to dig through anything if I am constantly being watched?” she demanded. “Unless I am meant to go right now?”

The three men exchanged a look.

“She goes now, it will fall on this one here,” Lessard pointed out as he jerked his thumb at Flowers.

“She needs a distraction,” Charlie concluded.

He looked up at the temple. Ellie suspected he must be thinking the same thing that she was—that Adam was still under guard up there, and any distraction down below might not be enough to get him loose as well.

“I might have an idea,” Ellie blurted.

Charlie cocked an eyebrow. Behind her, Flowers chuckled, though he still maintained every appearance of guarding her.

“Oh?” Charlie prompted carefully.

Ellie felt a little burst of excitement at his invitation to elaborate.

“There is a box of ammunition in that pile of equipment over there, which they haven’t yet moved into one of the structures,” she explained. “I happen to have a bit of strong liquor in my pocket as well as a magnifying lens—which as a convex lens is quite useful for focusing light. Were we to douse the dry debris under the crate with the alcohol, and then focus the remaining light there with the lens, generating sufficient heat to spark a blaze—”

“You want to blow up the bullets?” Charlie cut in with a look that managed to be both horrified and vaguely impressed.

“I like this woman,” Lessard announced happily.

Ellie’s shoulders slumped as she thought of the flaw in her plan.

“Of course, I cannot know what sort of danger any shrapnel from the rounds might cause,” she admitted, “and Mr. Bates was quite insistent that I not make any explosions without clearing the matter with him first.”

“Did you want to make more of them?” Charlie prompted.

Ellie brightened and leaned in as she whispered a little wickedly. “I had the most wonderful idea for overheating the boiler on one of the steamers back at camp…”

Flowers snorted behind her.

Charlie pinched the bridge of his nose in a gesture that struck Ellie as rather Adam-like.

“Baas gat di regyula papshat ya,” he muttered in Kriol.

“What’s a papshat?” Ellie demanded, looking to Lessard and Flowers.

“Like a firework,” Lessard replied and illustrated with a gesture. “Hssss—pow!”

Charlie raised his head, looking a bit tired.

“Lessard, bali—You still good for throwing your fists around some?” he asked.

Lessard shifted his tobacco to the other side of his mouth. “So long as I get seventy percent,” he replied easily.

“Seventy percent of what?” Ellie cut in, confused and mildly alarmed.

“The bets, Pepa,” Flowers replied cheerfully. “Who you gonna pick a fight with then, Frenchman?”

“Maybe that bakra Pickett,” Lessard offered with obvious relish.

“Pretty sure that one is fool enough to try stabbing you,” Flowers noted.

“Good thing somebody took his knife, then,” Lessard said with a laugh.

A sharp cry rose up from across the camp. It sounded of both alarm and interest.

The noise was followed by a distinct wave of chatter, which emanated from somewhere behind the ruins of the palace.

“C’est quoi ?a sacrament?” Lessard demanded with a pointed look at Charlie, providing Ellie with a lovely example of the Quebecois habit of using sacred terms as profanity.

Charlie sighed.

“Suppose we better go find out,” he concluded and set off across the plaza.

Ellie leapt up as well and fell into step behind them. With a shake of his head, Flowers followed, slinging his rifle over his shoulder.

Mendez jogged up to meet them, flustered and out of breath.

“The boss wasn’t at any temple. I don’t know where he’s gone,” he said with a note of panic.

“He wants you, he’ll come and find you,” Flowers assured him, waving it off.

“What’s all this?” Mendez demanded.

“I think maybe somebody found something,” Flowers replied and nodded to the thick cluster of men ahead of them.

The crowd had gathered in a circle. Ellie scurried around the edge of it, with Mendez complaining at her heels. She picked out a less thickly packed spot and nudged her way in.

The men were clustered around an open hole in the ground. It dropped perhaps ten feet down. Ellie recognized the general form of it as a sinkhole.

There must be more caves under the city, which meant that Tulan likely sat at the edge of the place where the limestone karst met the harder stone of the mountains.

Between the clouds and the encroaching sunset, it was getting darker. A pair of lanterns flared to life at opposite sides of the gap. The light spilled across the pit and revealed what had sparked that shout of surprise.

The sinkhole was full of bones.

They were browned with age, jumbled into a pile, and twisted through with vines. Moss grew from them in places. Ellie could pick out faded remnants of tattered cloth and old leather.

Scattered throughout the debris were distinct hints of gold, which glinted in the light of the lanterns.

It was a grave—a mass grave where the bodies of the people of Tulan had been tossed as though there had been no time to do anything better for them.

With a cold shock, Ellie realized that she had seen it before… that she had seen all of it before.

The white road that led to the city. The plaza with its palaces and temples—and this, the grave that lay before her.

She had dreamed it as a scarred woman spoke of the voices of gods and ash rained down from the sky.

Ellie staggered back a step as the impossibility of it washed over her.

Thunder rumbled in the distance. The sound brought the men clustered around the sinkhole to a hush. Wind gusted through the trees again, ripe with the promise of rain.

Bones arrived and pushed his way through the crowd.

“Back to work!” he ordered. He clapped his hands for emphasis as he herded the men away from the sinkhole.

They went slowly, glancing back with either fear of the dead or greed for those hints of gold. Ellie didn’t doubt that some of them would slip back here tonight, seeking to climb down and rifle through the bones.

She wondered if anyone would bother to stop them.

A flash of light caught her eye. It winked from the temple at the top of the pyramid… from where Adam and Dawson had gone. The glare was unnaturally bright—a star-like illumination that blazed out from between the columns.

Then it was gone.

An instinctive panic tightened at Ellie’s chest. She looked to the far side of the sinkhole, seeking out the place where Charlie stood.

He was also staring up at the pyramid. He lowered his gaze and met her eyes from across the pit. Ellie could read the question in them.

She nodded.

Charlie nudged Lessard with his elbow.

“Eh! Slaver pig!” Lessard shouted.

The harsh call of it shattered the hushed quiet of the scene.

Braxton Pickett whirled toward the sound, and Lessard threw a meat-handed punch into his jaw.

Pickett’s head snapped back as the blow sent him reeling—and the crowd burst into a roar.

“Is he crazy?” Mendez demanded behind Ellie. He took a few steps closer to the edge of the sinkhole as he angled for a better view.

Flowers shrugged—and then easily knocked Mendez over the side.

Mendez landed on a pile of bones and barked out a ferocious curse.

“You aarait there, bali?” Flowers called out.

He turned and gave Ellie a pointed wink.

A cheer rose up from the crowd gathered around Lessard and Pickett as Charlie called out stakes. Ellie cast them only a glance before looking back to Flowers.

Thank you, she mouthed and darted off into the bush.

She bolted through the ruins. A shout echoed through the trees a moment later—Mendez’s cry of alarm as Flowers pulled him out of the pit and he realized that Ellie wasn’t there. His protest was largely drowned out by the roar of the men gathered around Lessard’s brawl.

Ellie dodged through the deepening shadows around the ruined buildings, stumbling over roots and tumbled stones. She paused for a breath to orient herself. Her lungs burned from the sprint.

The central plaza must lie somewhere to the right ahead of her. Through the distant leaves, Ellie could just make out a faint glimmer of light from the campfire there.

Crashing footsteps and voices sounded from behind her, far closer than she would have liked. Ellie stumbled forward through the thickening gloom as quickly as she dared without raising a racket or twisting an ankle.

Her boot came down—then slid on a hard, round surface. As she fell forward, something under her foot let out a sharp crack.

She found herself kneeling on the shattered remnants of an excellent example of Mayan urn manufacturing. Her hands itched to gather up the pieces even as she winced against the echoing racket of her misstep.

That echo was abruptly answered with the thunder of a rifle shot. A bullet smacked into a tree beside her.

Her pursuers were on to her—and Ellie could think of only one way to elude them.

Wincing against her archaeological sensibilities, Ellie grasped the neck of the broken urn and chucked it out into the forest.

The artifact burst with another crack. The men behind her murmured before setting off in pursuit.

Ellie picked her way more carefully forward, ducking to keep to the growing shadows that cloaked the overgrown, moss-covered ruins. Voices continued to sound from various points around her, but the deepening dusk and the towering rubble of the once-palatial residences made for ample cover.

Silently, she crept toward a jumble of fallen stones that sat right at the edge of the great plaza.

A handful of men still lingered around the campfire there, uninterested in the brawl. The light of the flames looked small amid the ghostly grandeur of the city.

None of Jacobs’ guards were with them, but Ellie knew they could still be nearby.

She risked inching out of her hiding place for a better look at the roofed structure where Bones had chosen to store the company’s supplies.

The front wall of the building was missing, leaving it open to the broad plateau—probably because it was some sort of ceremonial structure for public rituals. The men had built their campfire just in front of it. Ellie couldn’t hope to get inside that way without them seeing her.

She glanced up at the pyramid. The strange light was gone, but she could just make out the silhouettes of three men lingering on the platform at the top of the steps. She couldn’t be sure through the gloom and distance, but she felt certain none of them were Adam.

What was going on up there?

Worry tore at her, but she couldn’t give in to the impulse to rush up there—not until she’d done what she had come here for.

Ellie slipped back onto the overgrown path behind the buildings that lined the plaza, listening carefully for more patrols. She reached the back of the structure that housed the supplies, hoping her hypothesis would prove correct.

Ceremonial architecture had to include a way for the figures in ritual pageants to get inside and await the moment for their appearances—like a back door

The rear entrance to the storehouse was half crumbled to rubble, but as Ellie had hoped, it led not to the main chamber but to a smaller annex within the building.

She climbed carefully over the loose stones into the shadowy passage. Soft light glimmered from around the corner. Ellie followed it and found herself looking through an opening cut into the wall.

Through it, she could see the piled crates of the expedition’s dry goods, stacked beside sacks of maize, rice, and beans. The case of ammunition had been moved inside as well.

Ellie looked at it longingly, thinking of the magnifying lens in her pocket… but the sun was gone, and an explosion would do her little good in her current circumstances, even if she hadn’t made that dashed promise to Adam.

At last, she spotted the coffee. The burlap sack of beans leaned against a pile of crated excavation equipment.

She risked peeking a little farther through the opening. Just beyond the open threshold of the chamber, the men still sat at their fire. Ellie recognized Ram and his friends there, along with Nigel and Aurelio.

None of them struck Ellie as a threat—but even an alarmed cry of surprise when they spotted her would draw the interest of any of Jacobs’ patrols that happened to be nearby.

It didn’t matter. She would have to chance it.

Thunder rumbled, and a flash of lightning brightened the clouds overhead. In the quick glow, Ellie spotted two more figures standing just beyond the range of the firelight.

It was Jacobs and Bones, holding a quiet consultation.

She tucked herself neatly back into the shadows. How could she even think of trying this with Jacobs standing right there?

Ellie took a breath and forced herself to calm. He was just one man. He had no idea she was there. She didn’t know what was happening with Adam up in the temple, but every instinct told her time was running out.

With her eyes locked on the coffee bag, Ellie dashed for it.

She slid into place behind the crates and made herself small. The murmur of conversation around the campfire was unchanged. Nothing had alarmed Ram and the other men.

The top of the burlap bag was open. Ellie couldn’t reach into it without making herself visible to those outside—as well as to Jacobs, if he happened to glance her way.

She peeked around the crate. Nigel stood by the fire, stirring his big pot with a spoon. She tried to look past him to see if Jacobs still lurked there in the darkness, but her eyes refused to penetrate the deeper gloom beyond the glow of the blaze.

Blast it anyway, she determined fiercely. Ellie rose and plunged her hand into the smooth, dark beans—then bit back a curse at a quick sting on her finger.

Lessard’s warning came back to her. It might bite.

She pushed her hand deeper more slowly—and brushed against something that was most certainly not coffee beans.

Ellie grasped it carefully, and then drew it out of the bag as the beans rustled softly around it.

She found herself eyeing the familiar, gleaming shape of Adam’s machete.

There was a new clamor of voices from outside the storehouse. Ellie dropped back and pressed herself against the crates as Jacobs’ voice cut to her from just outside the building.

“What is this?” he snapped.

“We found this old goat lurking outside the camp,” another voice replied. It belonged to one of Jacobs’ armed men. Ellie worked to place it and pictured a shorter man with an unpleasant smile—Price, perhaps? He usually patrolled with Buller, who was larger and had a noticeably big nose.

“But is he… from this place?” she heard Buller ask, sounding uncomfortable.

“Nobody is from this place,” Price scoffed.

“Why are you here?” Jacobs demanded coldly.

Ellie shivered at how close he sounded as she clutched Adam’s machete to her chest.

“I came to deliver a warning,” a familiar voice replied.

Ellie risked a peek around the corner of the crates… where she saw Padre Kuyoc looking up at the taller figure of Jacobs with an expression of cool defiance.

But what on earth was the priest from Santa Dolores doing here?

Kuyoc was dressed like a diminutive Mayan Don Quixote. Over his plain shirt and trousers, he wore a bizarre homemade breastplate made of clattering rows of hollow reeds woven together with wiry cords.

“A warning from whom?” Jacobs dryly pressed.

“From the dead,” Kuyoc replied and flashed him a knife-sharp grin.

A few of the men by the fire exchanged looks at his reply, shifting uncomfortably.

“They know why you are here,” the priest continued relentlessly with his gaze locked onto Jacobs. “They know what you seek. And they have charged me with telling you that if you try to take it from this place, all the beasts of Hell will be unleashed upon you.”

Kuyoc raised his voice, pitching it out over the scattered men.

“I have seen Death sweeping down from the sky to claim the blood of the damned,” he called out boldly. “And none shall escape its wrath if the secrets of this place are profaned!”

Ellie blinked with surprise. Adam had warned her that Kuyoc had expressed some fantastical beliefs about the region of the wilderness in which Tulan was concealed, but the priest had also struck her as decidedly rational and clear-thinking.

Had she been mistaken in her impression… or was something else going on here?

“Tie him up and leave him with the mules,” Jacobs ordered flatly, and then walked away.

Price bound the priest’s hands behind him with a length of rope. The man’s bizarre breastplate clunked as the guard jerked him into position. The tenor of the sound was odd. Dry, hollow reeds should have given off a noise more like a clatter than a dull thunk.

Ellie set the thought aside. There were more immediate things to worry about.

With another peek to ensure that the attention of the men was still focused on Kuyoc, she darted back into the ruined hallway and crept through it until she hopped out into the overgrown alley. Ellie picked her way behind the looming structures, rounding the courtyard until she reached the place where they had deposited the priest.

The mules shifted uneasily in their nearby corral as she slipped back up to the plaza, which was bordered on this side by a low stone wall. One of the animals brayed, and Ellie ducked back behind the barrier, keeping her head below the stones until the beasts had settled.

Slowly, she peered over the wall. The men by the fire had gone back to quietly talking among themselves. A few of them glanced up nervously at the occasional gusts of damp wind that unsettled the leaves of the nearby trees. Behind them, Jacobs gave low, authoritative orders to Buller and Price as more of the men filtered back from the now-concluded fight by the pit of bones.

Kuyoc sat on a sack of feed in front of Ellie, whistling tunelessly to himself.

“Padre!” she hissed.

“Ah,” he replied with quiet ease. “I was wondering when you would turn up.”

“But why are you here?” Ellie demanded.

Kuyoc’s eyes narrowed as his gaze locked on the pale, looming shape of the temple.

“To do something I should have done a long time ago,” he replied grimly.

With a glance to make sure the men on the far side of the courtyard were otherwise occupied, Ellie scrambled over the wall and slipped to Kuyoc’s side.

“Never mind. We need to get you out of here,” she asserted, hefting the awkward weight of Adam’s machete. “Hold still while I cut these ropes.”

“I think not,” the priest returned quickly as he shuffled his hands out of her reach. “I need those.”

“Why?” Ellie replied with surprise.

“Well, I can hardly get where I’m trying to go without them, can I?” Kuyoc retorted.

“But where are you trying to go?”

“There,” Kuyoc replied with a determined nod toward the temple.

“You wanted them to catch you,” Ellie burst out, barely remembering to keep her voice down.

Kuyoc shot a disgruntled look at her over his shoulder.

“What—you think this bunch of lead-footed noisy fools could’ve found me if I didn’t want them to? I am Maya,” he asserted fiercely.

“I don’t understand,” Ellie protested.

The priest cast her a look edged with disdain.

“I should hardly expect you to,” he replied.

“Then tell me how I can help you,” she pressed back.

“What you should do is collect Mr. Bates and leave this place. Get out of here before it’s too late.”

Outrage hummed through her.

“Before Death sweeps from the sky?” she retorted skeptically.

The priest let out a dark, slightly unsettling chuckle.

“You’re trying to scare them off,” Ellie accused. “Just like you tried to scare me and Adam. But we were never coming here to steal. We just wanted to learn about this place. If you’re here to protect it, then we’re all fighting on the same side!”

Kuyoc slowly shook his head.

“I know you do not mean to harm, mija,” he said tiredly. “But I have told you what you need to do. Now get behind that rock.”

“Why?” Ellie pushed back as her temper flared.

The priest’s mouth quirked into a dangerous smile. “Because I am about to call that murderer over,” he neatly replied. “?Oye! ?Patrón! How is your search for the glass going?”

A jolt of surprise nearly exposed her. Ellie scrambled to the right and skidded into the makeshift corral for the mules. A few of the animals snorted with irritation as she tucked herself in behind the forest of their legs.

She hoped none of them were in a kicking sort of mood.

In the flickering light of the campfire, Jacobs’ eyes narrowed thoughtfully.

Ellie’s mind spun. What glass had Kuyoc been talking about?

Abruptly, she knew the answer. It was the Smoking Mirror.

The iconography of the mirror had been haunting her ever since she had first picked up the medallion back in London. Ellie knew the mythological glass was associated with the legends of Tulan in both Mayan and Aztec cultures. Apparently, Jacobs and Dawson were aware of that as well.

And so was Kuyoc.

Jacobs strode across the plaza to loom over the smaller man.

“Which glass would that be?” he said evenly.

The sound of his voice from so close by sent another shiver over Ellie’s skin.

“The one your men are up in that temple hunting for,” Kuyoc returned just as calmly, meeting Jacobs’ icy gaze. “The one that is worth more than all the rest of the riches of this city combined.”

Jacobs titled his head thoughtfully. “And how do you know about it?” he quietly demanded.

“Because I have been here before, obviously,” Kuyoc retorted blithely.

Ellie clenched her teeth against a gasp, even as the pieces began to shuffle into place. Kuyoc’s warnings and threats back in Santa Dolores hadn’t been bizarre superstition. He’d been trying to scare them away from Tulan… because he had known exactly where it was and why it mattered.

But why had he followed them here? Was he trying to save the ruins from looting? But then, why insist on getting himself captured?

None of it made any sense.

“Why don’t you send me up to the temple?” Kuyoc suggested. “I might know a thing or two that could help you find what you’re looking for.”

“Is that right?” Jacobs returned smoothly.

Ellie felt an instinctive sense of danger flare, as it did anytime Jacobs asked a direct question in that same easy, dangerous tone.

The small, weathered priest met Jacobs’ gaze unflinchingly as his eyes glittered with dark intelligence.

“It is,” he replied. His words resonated with certainty.

Something in Jacobs’ eyes shifted, moving from challenge to an unsettling interest.

“Well,” he mused quietly. “That does change things.”

A new voice cut through the wind-tossed gloom, echoing clearly from across the plaza.

“Boss!”

Ellie risked a better peek through her fence of mules and saw Braxton Pickett striding toward them. His lip was split, and an angry bruise marred his cheek.

He was dragging Mendez by the collar. As he neared, Pickett shoved the smaller man toward Jacobs’ feet. His words rang out clear and bold across the shadowed stillness of the city.

“This idiot has lost the woman!”