“Dude,” Diesel said to Hatchet. “You have to go last. I don’t want to be stepping on your rats.”
Hatchet retreated, and Diesel led the way into the tunnel. We turned a corner, the light disappeared, and we were plunged into darkness. I put my hand to Diesel’s back and stayed close. I could hear Hatchet stumbling behind me, the rats squealing behind him.
Diesel stopped abruptly. I bumped into him, and Hatchet bumped into me, and I could feel the rats scurrying over my feet.
“Jeez Louise,” I said, chills running down my spine, a scream lodged halfway in my throat.
Hatchet stepped back, and the rats went with him.
“A little advance notice next time you stop,” I said to Diesel.
“Sorry. I forgot you can’t see. There are two tunnel choices here. If we follow the letters on the plaque, we take SW, so here goes.”
It’s easy to lose track of time in the dark. Without a watch ticking off minutes, time either stretches on into infinity or flies, depending on your level of enjoyment. In this case, we seemed to be walking forever. Stopping while Diesel read the paper, and continuing on. We came to a small chamber where there was another crack in the high domed ceiling and weak light filtered down. I could see that there were two tunnel choices, and Diesel wasn’t moving.
“Which way do we go?” I asked him.
“I don’t know,” Diesel said. “The ink is blurry on this one from the soaking. I wouldn’t want to send us into a booby-trapped tunnel.”
Some of the rats were abandoning Hatchet and wandering off into one of the tunnels.
“Follow the rats,” I said. “Hopefully, they’re heading for food.”
In a couple beats, we were again without light. I was close behind Diesel, both hands clutching his shirt. Twice I felt something brush against my leg and I thought rat! And by this time, I was hoping it was a rat, because I didn’t want to speculate what else it could be.
“I’m stopping,” Diesel said. “We’re at a ladder. And I can see a hatch above it. Everyone stay here until I open the hatch.”
I waited in the dark, listening to Diesel climb the ladder. There was a scraping sound, and Diesel told me to follow him. I climbed the ladder and Diesel lifted me out into a small dark chamber.
“I think we’re behind a false wall,” he said.
I felt him moving around, more scraping sounds, and the wall rotated to reveal a real room with a cement floor. Light was pouring through a couple half windows high on a cinder-block wall. Boxes and paint cans were stacked on one side of the room. Beyond the boxes, I saw what looked like a water heater.
“We’re in a storeroom,” Diesel said. “Either a classroom building or a dorm.”
Diesel yelled to Hatchet to come up, and Hatchet climbed out and scrambled to his feet. One of the rats came with him. The rat looked around, and went back down the ladder. We closed the trapdoor and the rotating wall, and I punched Hatchet in the face.
“That’s for Glo,” I said.
Hatchet’s nose was bleeding, and Diesel was smiling.
“Feel better?” Diesel asked me.
“No,” I said.
I was no longer dripping, but my clothes were wet and smudged with mud from brushing against the dirt walls. Now that I wasn’t quite so terrified, I was freezing.
“We need dry clothes,” Diesel said. “Good thing credit cards are waterproof.”
We left from a basement door. It was late afternoon and there was a definite chill in the air. We had emerged from the dorm behind the Sphinx.
“I will take my leave of thee now,” Hatchet said. “I must search for my master.”
“You can take your leave as soon as you give me the stone,” Diesel said.
Hatchet feigned surprise. “Stone? What stone?”
“The Luxuria Stone,” Diesel said. “You would never have given it to Anarchy. She had no way of knowing if it was enchanted.”
“I never thought of that,” Hatchet said. “I swear, I don’t have the stone.”
Diesel grabbed Hatchet, turned him upside down, shook him, and the stone dropped onto the ground. It was a plain little brown rock, very similar to the first stone Diesel and I found.
“Make sure it’s enchanted,” Diesel said to me.
“I’d rather not touch it,” I said. “I’m not sure where he was storing it.”
“Give me a break,” Diesel said. “You’ve probably spent the last half hour walking on rat turds. Just pick the damn thing up.”
“It was in my tunic,” Hatchet said. “It wouldn’t easily fit elsewhere.”
I picked the stone up, and it hummed and vibrated in my hand and gave off heat. It wasn’t just enchanted. It was very enchanted. I’d only felt stored energy this strong in one other instance, and that was when I’d held the other SALIGIA Stone.
“It’s a SALIGIA Stone,” I said to Diesel. “I can’t tell if it’s Luxuria.”
Diesel set Hatchet on his feet. “Good luck finding Wulf. We’ll be in the Gap if you need us.”