F. Wilson - Secret Circles

Jack dropped to his knees and saw a thick semicircle of braided steel protruding from the concrete.

“What is it?”

“I noticed it when I was waiting for you. It looks like a handle.”

He looked up at her. “A handle? What—?”

“Help me move the table.”

He rose and together they moved it off the spot and down the aisle. Once the area was clear, Jack saw a rectangular groove in the floor. He brushed and blew the dust out of the seam on the far side from the handle and found sunken hinges. Pretty clear what they had here.

“A trapdoor.”

Weezy nodded. “Just what I thought. Especially when I tapped on it.”

Jack rapped his knuckles on the surface and heard a deep, hollow, gonging sound.

“Steel.”

“Yes,” Weezy said, her voice vibrating with excitement. “Made to look like concrete.”

Jack bent for a closer look. Based on the amount of dust and dirty sand in the grooves, the trapdoor or what ever it was hadn‟t been opened for a long time.

He grabbed the ring and tugged. The door wouldn‟t budge. He put his back into it with the same result.

“Give me a hand.”

Weezy added her strength to the pull but to no avail.

“I think it‟s locked,” she said.

Jack inspected the dirty surface. “If so, it must be from the other side, because there‟s no keyhole.”

“We‟ve got to get it open, Jack. It‟s obviously a secret compartment that‟s been locked for who knows how long. Just think what could be hidden inside. Ancient books, infernal devices,

secrets !”

Jack stared at her shining eyes, her intent expression. “Okay … how?”

“I don‟t know, but—hey, here‟s something.”

She began brushing the dirt from a shallow depression in the trapdoor surface. Only it wasn‟t so shallow. The dirt kept coming. And as she brushed it free, the edges of the depression became visible.

“Jack, it‟s got six sides! And it tapers down to a point, I think!”

Her hands began to shake, so Jack lent his to the task and …

“You‟re right … the same size and shape as … you think … ?”

Weezy was already under the other table, grabbing the pyramid.

“Yes! It‟ll fit! It has to!”

Jack brushed-blew out the remaining debris from the hexagonal depression and took the pyramid from her. He placed it point-down into the cavity and leaned back.

“Near perfect fit.”

“Jack …” He could barely hear her. “I think it‟s the key.”

The top three-quarters of the pyramid were settled into the opening, leaving the hexagonal base protruding. Jack leaned closer and noticed a circular groove running around the cavity, like it was set in the end of a cylinder.

“I think you‟re right.”

He gripped the base and tried to rotate it, but it wouldn‟t budge—clockwise or

counterclockwise, no luck, not even with Weezy‟s help.

“It‟s jammed.” He looked around. “Maybe we‟d better go. We‟re stretching our luck by staying here and—”

“Are you kidding?” she said, her voice jumping an octave. “They‟re gone, right?”

“Well, yeah.”

“Then we‟re not going anywhere until we get that door open.”

He realized argument was futile.

“Okay, but—”

“Wait a minute,” she said, grabbing a flashlight. “I thought I saw something inside when I was cleaning it out.” She removed the pyramid and trained the beam on the cavity. The light wavered in her trembling hand as it revealed little rough spots on each of its six facets. “Don‟t those look familiar?”

Jack leaned closer and immediately recognized them.

“The symbols on the pyramid. So it does belong in there.”

“Right, but maybe it‟s got to be in there a certain way—with the glyphs matched up.”

So that was what they did: Matched up the glyphs on the six sides of the pyramid with those on the facets of the cavity.

But when Jack tried it again it still wouldn‟t turn.

“It‟s got to!” Weezy cried, her tone frantic. “It‟s jammed!”

She rose and stomped on the base of the pyramid with a sneakered foot.

“Hey!” Jack said as she kept kicking it. “What are you doing?”

“This is what my dad does when something is jammed. He whacks it. So …”

Another kick or two and then she knelt beside him and they both tried rotating the pyramid.

It budged counterclockwise.

“Did you feel it?” Weezy cried.

Jack nodded and increased his efforts. He felt another budge. And then another. He and Weezy were grunting, their breath rasping though their teeth.

With a crunch , something broke free within the mechanism and the pyramid made a quick quarter turn. And then another quarter. And after that it made steady progress until it completed a full turn.

“I think that does it,” Jack said. “What now? Open it?”

Weezy nodded, eyes shining. “Are you kidding?”

Jack thought about the mound, and all the trouble digging into that had caused. And now this.

What secrets had the Order hidden behind the trapdoor that only it, as possessor of the pyramid, could open?

Jack wasn‟t sure he wanted to know. He was also sure that no way could he walk away from this door without seeing what lay behind it.

“Okay. On my count of three.” Together they grabbed the ring handle. “One … two … three !”

11

“I can‟t believe it.” Jack didn‟t know how long they‟d stood in silence and stared at the dark hole before Weezy spoke.

He sighed. “Yeah. All that crazy lock business for a hole in the ground.” He squatted for a closer look at the rectangle of empty blackness. “Or maybe not.”

He grabbed one of the flashlights and aimed its beam into the opening. About ten feet down he saw a flat expanse of what looked like wet stone and mud. Weezy was at his side, craning her neck for a look.

“Looks like a subcellar,” she said. “But no stairs.”

Still beaming his flashlight into the opening, Jack moved around to the other side and found something.

“Hey. Steps. Sort of.”

A stone wall sat under Weezy‟s side. Deep horizontal grooves had been cut into the surface, allowing it to function as a ladder of sorts.

“I‟m going down for a look,” Jack said.

“You think it‟s safe?”

He looked at her. “You mean, is there anyone or anything down there? You saw that door. It hasn‟t been opened for ages.”

She shrugged. “I guess you‟re right. It‟s just that it‟s so … dark.”

He smiled and held up the flashlight. “That‟s why we have these.”

He wasn‟t sure why he wanted to descend into the space. Maybe simply because it was there.

Or maybe because he didn‟t think he‟d ever get another chance like this.

What ever the reason, he felt a tug from the darkness.

He stuck the flashlight in his back pocket and eased himself over the edge until his sneaker found one of the grooves. Then it was almost like climbing a ladder.

When he reached the bottom his sneakers splashed a little. More water down here than he‟d originally thought. He was glad he‟d worn his old Converses.

“See anything?”

Weezy knelt at the edge of the opening, staring down at him. He glanced around: stone wall in front of him, stone wall behind, and blackness left and right.

“Looks like I‟m in a passage of some sort.”

Pulling out the flashlight, he turned it on and moved to his right. He didn‟t go far before he ran into a third stone wall. This was cracked and flaky, with water seeping around its edges and through the cracks.

He closed his eyes and oriented himself within the Lodge and realized he was below and beyond its west wall. Which put this wall right near the bank of the lake. He gauged that it would normally sit just above surface level. But now, with the lake so high, it had to be underwater.