John Hawks - The Dark River

“You go first,” Lumbroso said. “I’ll hand you the equipment; then I’ll come down with the lantern.”

Maya placed the two sacks of equipment on a plywood board and removed her jacket, shoes, and socks. Then she climbed down the ladder to the sundial. The water was cold and about three feet deep. Lumbroso handed Maya the equipment sacks, and she looped the drawstrings around the steps of the ladder so that they hung from opposite sides.

While Simon took off his fedora, suit coat, and shoes, Maya inspected the cellar. As she moved around the room, little waves sloshed back and forth, breaking against the walls. Over the years, the minerals in the water had transformed the white travertine sundial into slabs of grayish stone; in various places it was pitted, cracked, and stained. The bronze lines and Greek symbols that had been embedded in the limestone had once been a bright gold color that glittered brightly in the Roman sun. The metal had oxidized completely and now the letters were dark green.

“I don’t like ladders,” Lumbroso said. He put one foot on the top rung as if to test the ladder’s strength, and then climbed down slowly with the lantern. Maya walked over to the corner and found a drainage hole in the gray stone wall. The hole was about two feet square and completely underwater. Its bottom edge was flush with the surface of the sundial.

“The water flows out here?”

“Correct. That’s where you have to go.” Still wearing his long-sleeved white shirt, necktie, and black pants, Lumbroso stood with an odd sort of formality in the water. “Turn back immediately if it gets too difficult to move.”

Maya returned to the ladder and took the scuba equipment out of the canvas bags. There was a belt with lead weights, a two-stage air regulator, a diving mask, and an air tank that was a foot long and four inches in diameter. She had also purchased an underwater flashlight and a digital underwater camera-the sort of thing a tourist would use when snorkeling in the Bahamas.

“That air tank looks very small,” Lumbroso said.

“It’s called a pony tank. You told me that there wasn’t a lot of room in the tunnel.”

Maya put on the weight belt first, attached one end of the regulator to the pony tank, and slung the camera’s plastic lanyard around her neck. The tunnel was so narrow that she would have to hold the tank with one of her arms, pressing it tightly against her body.

“So what am I looking for?”

“You need to take photographs of any Latin or Greek phrases on the outside of the sundial. Some of these phrases will describe cities in the ancient world, while others will describe a spiritual location-an access point.”

“And what if the words are covered with rubble?”

“You can brush it away, but don’t touch the walls.”

Maya pulled on the diving mask and sealed it against her face, then turned on the air and started to breathe with the mouthpiece.

“Good luck,” Lumbroso said. “And, please-be careful.”

She knelt on the floor and lowered her head beneath the water. Lying flat, she moved toward the opening in the wall. Maya could hear her own breath, the bubbles coming out of the regulator, and a scraping sound from the edge of the pony tank as she dragged it across the limestone floor.

When she reached the opening, she extended her arm and pointed the flashlight into the darkness. Over the years, the flowing water had cut an underground tunnel through the rubble of the past. The walls of the tunnel were an aggregate of stones, Roman brick, and chunks of white marble. It looked fragile, as if everything would crumble, but the real danger was created by the present era. In order to support the collapsing foundation of the building, someone had driven steel rods deep into the ground. The tips of the rods jutted out into the tunnel like the tips of rusty sword blades.

Pushing with her toes, Maya glided down the tunnel. When she looked up at the rubble and the steel rods, she felt as if the weight of Rome were directly over her head. Her body was pressed against the travertine floor of the sundial, but she couldn’t find any words set in bronze.

The scuba regulator rasped. Bubbles rose past her face. Inch by inch, she crawled forward until her entire body was in the tunnel. The tunnel was so low and narrow that it was impossible to turn around. In order to return to the cellar room, she would have to push backward with her hands.

Forget about your fear , Thorn told her. Concentrate on your sword . Her father never seemed to hesitate about anything. And yet he had spent two years in Rome avoiding his destiny. Maya pushed everything but the tunnel out of her mind and kept moving forward.

She had traveled twelve or fifteen feet when the tunnel took a turn to the right. Passing beneath one of the steel rods, she entered a wider area that looked like an underground cave. The surface of the sundial looked dark in this area, but when she crawled closer she saw that the floor was embedded with bronze words written in both Greek and Latin.

Holding the flashlight with her left hand, Maya grabbed the underwater camera with her right and began taking pictures. Whenever she moved her body, shadows formed or disappeared.

As she crawled forward, the air tank got away from her and touched the side of the tunnel. Some debris was shifted loose from the wall and rolled across the sundial floor. It was nothing, really-just a few black pebbles-but she felt a stab of fear.

More sand and stones fell from the wall. A good-sized rock hit the floor and rolled toward her. She took a few more quick photographs and tried to ease backward, but suddenly a chunk of ceiling collapsed and fell in front of her.

The water was dark with sand. Maya tried to escape, but something was holding her. Fighting panic, she forced her palms flat onto the marble floor and pushed hard. There was an explosion of air bubbles and water rushed into her mouth.

She had cut the regulator tube on one of the metal rods. There was no air to breathe and no way to get out. Her flashlight was lost and she was struggling in total darkness. Maya gripped the mouthpiece with her teeth, reached over her shoulder, and felt for both sections of the severed air hose. The section connected to her mouth was filled with water, but air bubbled through the hose connected to the pony tank. She forced the two sections together and held them in her fist. Air mixed with water started to flow out of the mouthpiece. Maya swallowed the water and sucked the oxygen into her lungs.

With both sections of hose held tightly in her right hand, she pushed back with her left, feeling the gritty sand with her feet. Like a bystander staring at a car accident, her mind disengaged from the situation except to observe calmly and draw conclusions. She was completely blind, and within a minute or so the air tank would be empty. Her only chance was to find the tunnel that led back to the cellar room.

When her feet touched the side of the tunnel, she stopped immediately and slid her body sideways. Maya concentrated on the gritty texture of the fallen rubble. Her life had collapsed into a particle of bone and blood and tissue.

Trying not to cause another cave-in, she crawled backward inch by inch. The regulator made a faint gurgling sound and then her tongue tasted something that reminded her of ashes. She tried to inhale, but nothing filled her lungs. The ruptured hose had bled the tank dry.

Maya extended her arms, pushed backward, and her toes felt the bend in the tunnel. She kept moving and prayed that she wouldn’t get caught on the barbs. It felt like her brain was reacting slowly and she wondered if she was about to pass out.

A few seconds later, she felt hands on her ankles. With a swift tug, Lumbroso pulled her out.