Draiks and Angels: Rescued

11 - Underground

Three days later, Daniel called and informed her she was good to go. She waited until it was nighttime before getting ready to leave. She packed a flashlight, some glowsticks, some rope and a small shovel. She looked up the address Daniel had given her on a map of Volatum and headed out. It was maybe only ten at night, which was prime time for her with the inverted schedule she kept. She flew directly to the dig site and landed on the roof of a building nearby to assess the location.

It looked like an abandoned lot. There were metal poles all the way around the lot to keep cars from driving in. Grass and weeds grew sparsely in the rocky dirt. Hoping no one was watching, Cona landed at one end, folded her wings tightly to her back and started walking the area.

One step felt different, and she stopped. She looked at her feet and could see a large area where there were no large weeds. She pulled out her shovel and started jamming it into the dirt. She kept hitting something hard and metal about an inch under the surface. She finally found its edge and started shoveling the soil off the very edge of the large metal plate.

She chose a side and also dug next to the edge there, creating a small ramp. On the opposite side, she dug a little hole for her hands to reach underneath the edge. She put away the shovel, braced herself, and heaved on the plate. It wasn't as heavy as she was expecting, but she still had a hard time shoving it to the side, especially because she had to avoid the large hole it was covering.

The hole was not perpendicular, but it was still steep enough to need the metal ladder that was kept in place with stakes. Cona pulled out her flashlight and shone it down the hole. The roof of the ladder-tunnel got in the way of seeing anything more interesting. She pulled on the tip of the flashlight and it converted into a lantern. She clipped it to her bag's strap, and started backward down the ladder.

At the bottom, she could see a wider area had been dug out. To the far left, a stone doorway showed. She walked over and peered in. Immediately there was a wall with options to turn right or left. It must be the maze. Cona pulled some papers out of her bag and shuffled through them until she found the drawing with the maze on it. Daniel had traced their copy of the maze diagram, showing only the correct route. She put the other papers back and headed into the maze.

She was nearing the end of the labyrinth when she thought she heard something. She stopped short and heard it again. It sounded like a footstep in bare feet. She waited a moment, but all was silent. She walked a little further, straining her ears. Again! This time she didn't stop.

She was sure someone was following her. Since she couldn't see any light, they must be using her light. She rifled through her bag until she found a glow stick. She cracked it, shook it up, and turned off her flashlight. She took a good look at her map until she was sure where she wanted to go and tucked it in her bag. She walked down the left path for a ways, stopped, laid the glowstick on the floor, took off her sandals, and snuck back the way she came, using her hand on the wall to find where she was going. She went quietly down the right path until she was sure she was out of sight and waited.

She heard the quiet footsteps continue and then stop, probably waiting for her light to keep going. There was nowhere else to go down the path she was on but the final chamber, so Cona kept her hand to the wall and her shoes in her hand and snuck forward. If her follower ever found out the light wasn't her, they probably wouldn't have a hard time getting there either.

After waiting a minute and not hearing any more footsteps, Cona turned her lantern back on and put on her sandals. She looked around the room. It was not very large. The walls were covered in carvings. There was writing she didn't understand, but also a lot of pictures. There were Draiks in the air, on the ground, on buildings, and in forests. There was one drawing of a Draik larger than the others. It was holding something that glowed in both hands.

Cona read the first line of the directions: "First is near, even in this very Temple. The way shall open for the Draik who puts their hand to the works here."

She was in the temple. She was a Draik, she guessed. What were the "works?" The carvings? Impulsively, Cona laid her hand flat on the glowy object of the large picture. White light shot from underneath her hand through the lines of the carvings on the wall. The light flowed until it lit the entire drawing of the large Draik. Then Cona's hand fell through the space where the wall used to be and there was a doorway.

Cona stared at the blank space. She couldn't deny that she felt a wall before and now it was gone. Much as she wanted to naysay it, it looked like... magic. She felt the gap just in case. Still nothing. Resigned, she walked through the hallway that had appeared and into another small room. There were more carvings and she wished she had thought to bring her camera again.

On the far wall was a stone door with a metal ring for a pull. She walked over and pulled on it, but the door didn't move. Holding with both hands, she heaved on the ring, and the door scraped loudly open a foot or so. Repositioning herself, she pushed on the far side of the door and scraped it deafeningly the rest of the way.

Light came from inside. Cona knew that it was still nighttime, so it couldn't be sunlight. The temple was underground, too. She looked through the door to see a small landing about five feet square that dropped off on the three sides not attached to the door. The room was larger than the one she was in and seemed to hang to the right of the landing, if the closeness of the left wall was any indication.

She walked onto the platform and looked down into the room. There were beams of light streaming from slits near the ceiling on the far wall illuminating a pedestal much like the ones she had taken the caller pieces from. There was something on the pedestal, but she couldn't see it well. It looked silver and was small. The rest of the room was uncarved and empty.

She noticed there was a set of stone stairs coming off the end of the landing and thought she might as well walk down them since someone went to the trouble of putting them there. She got halfway down when the ground beneath her began to tremble. Not the ground, the stairs! Cracks shot through the stone steps from where she stood and with a tremendous rumbling, they collapsed!

After the noise and falling stone stopped, Cona painfully gathered herself. She pushed a large piece of stone off her right wing and bit back a cry. That was going to make flying difficult. She tested her other limbs, and found that while they all hurt, nothing else seemed as serious. She carefully eased herself off the pile of rubble and got to her feet. She painfully folded her bruised wing and then the other.

Finally, she looked at the pedestal. The ring piece was not what she was expecting. It looked like a flat diamond around three-quarters of an inch wide and one inch tall, with little tabs coming out of the side. A flat, clear, faceted jewel was inlaid in the face. Cona took the piece from the stand and looked at it in her hand for a moment, before putting it in her bag.

Suddenly, she felt very cold. She rubbed her arms and looked around wondering where the draft was coming from. Then she felt the fear. She remembered this! She looked around frantically as the shadows on the ground got blacker. She backed up toward the broken stairs as Shadow blobs rose from the floor. She didn't bring her knife!

These blobs seemed slower than the ones the other night, maybe she could still get away. She spread her wings and cried out as her bruised wing protested. She tried to ignore it and beat them anyway. Pain shot through her wing, and she collapsed to her hands and knees, tears in her eyes and panting. Maybe she did more than just bruise it!

She heard a thump behind her and felt hands around her waist. Before she could protest, whoever it was hiked her under their arm and they shot into the air. She could see their legs, that they were wearing jeans and no shoes. They landed on the platform, he (Cona assumed it was a he) helped her to her feet and immediately shoved her out the door. Still able to feel the cold from the Shadows, Cona didn't argue. They made it through the next room when something caught her flashlight and it tore from its strap, making it crash to the floor and go out. There was still a small amount of green light coming from the person behind her, so she was able to make it to the maze entrance.

The cold was still strong and Cona was beginning to panic. She rifled through her bag for the stack of papers, but she couldn't see well enough to tell which was the map. There was a tap on her shoulder and her rescuer handed her the glowstick she had left in the maze earlier. She took it and located the maze map. Running again, she led the way back through the labyrinth.