Page 53 of Hunting the Warlord's Daughter

The Mission: Origins away team roared enthusiastically.

Anticipation spiked along with dread. Like the old days, Bolivarr was heading out on an operation with Finn Rorkken in command. Except this time, the stakes weren’t only high—they were personal. Who was he—whatwas he? Man or monster? The answer awaited him on Ara Ana.

CHAPTERTWENTY-NINE

“Attempt comm contact again,”Rorkken said from inside the shuttle. They had touched down close to the AG-250. “No life signs, but I’m not taking any chances.”

One of the Space Marines operated a portable comm. “Unidentified cruiser, this is Origins One. Do you read?”

Rorkken swore. “Give me that.” He grabbed the comm from the Marine. “This is Captain Rorkken of theTASUnity. Request to come aboard your ship. Resistance will be met with full and overwhelming force.”

Nothing but static. Rorkken nodded at the Marine commander. “Ops-sergeant?”

The Marine then turned to the trio in his command. “Okay, everybody, on me. Weapons check. Kellen, you’re on point. We don’t know if we’ll find live ones on that ship. Everyone stay frosty.” The Marines swarmed the cruiser.

A few minutes later, the commander sent back word that the cruiser was empty and had been secured.

As the Marines searched the cruiser for evidence, Bolivarr followed trails of trampled grass around the ship. It had been a hard landing. The heat shields were charred. The hull was splattered with mud. But the ship was intact. Where had the crew disappeared to?

Bolivarr circled around to the other side of the ship—and stopped short. A trail so sharp and fresh that it still smelled of torn grass cut across the meadow, paralleling two older sets of tracks, and disappeared into the trees.

Three people had fled, and the last one only a short time ago. Probably when they heard the incoming shuttlecraft.

“I’m going to investigate these tracks,” Bolivarr told the team. He pulled out his triple and took off in pursuit.

* * *

The entrance to the sanctum was no more than a squared-off mouth to an underground chamber, basically a cave and open to the elements. The floor was littered with dried scat and bits of bones of small creatures. Wren wrinkled her nose. “It smells gamey and a little like urine.” Wildlife had long since claimed the place as their own.

Aral shined his flashlight around, his dozer in his hand. His wary scrutiny was everywhere, as if he expected the situation to deteriorate at any moment. The place looked undisturbed but for the evidence of critters, but he’d take none of it for granted, she knew.

A rocky ceiling was about twice his height, but the far wall was too far away to see in the darkness. He aimed a flashlight all around them, revealing nothing but a fairly featureless cave. “Well,” he said.

Doubt silenced them for a few moments.

“I hope this is the right place,” she said. “The pendant said so. Maybe it’s not the right entrance.”

“Or perhaps tomb raiders or thieves have already gotten to it. It was pretty damaged outside.”

“But would the goddesses have made the treasure this easy to obtain?” She gazed around. “If it even exists. We know if it only from legend.” Maybe that was all it was. All the risks they had taken to find this place would be for nothing. Bolivarr dying for nothing. Sabra too. Did they give their lives in vain?

“And from scripture,” Aral said. “Don’t forget, they make mention of Ara Ana. This place. Sacred Keys.”

“What Bolivarr was studying about…”

Aral answered with a nod. “Of course I am not conversant in scripture, and I sometimes wondered if my brother he meant to send me a map...”

Before he was killed on the mission I asked him to complete.Wren knew that was what Aral was thinking. It was still so painful for him to ponder, even after four years. She touched his arm and stood straighter. “But we’re here for him and we’re here for Sabra. If the fates are with us today, we’ll find something of value to sell and the money will go to those who need the help. If not, at least we were able to make this quest in their memory.”

They continued on, their flashlights illuminating the way. “Well, this is promising,” Aral said as the antechamber-animal-den narrowed into a passageway. In the stone walls, lines of runes were etched here and there, timeworn and of no meaning to Wren. “Definitely carved by human hands,” he said. “Or machinery.”

The passage took them deeper into the cave. After a while, the hallway took a sharp turn to the right. Then another, similar turn. When they had repeated it four times, they came upon an opening in the wall, leading them into another, identical passage with the same angles. “It’s like a maze,” she said. “But in the shape of concentric pentagons.” Same shape of the stars on the pendant and the five marks.

At last, they entered an open area even larger than the antechamber at the mouth of the cave. Shaped like an elongated pentagon, the chamber had a hollowed-out depression at each corner, reminding her of the offerings tables from the outpost.

“It smells old in here,” Wren said. Old but not stale. She sensed the unwinding of time. History. A legacy she couldn’t name. She turned in a circle, soaking up the wonder of it all. The beam from her flashlight speared the still air, turning ordinary dust motes into glitter. “They’re so beautiful, Aral. They remind me of what came out of the pendant.”

“What does?” He peered into the chamber. “I don’t see anything.”

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