Encala (41 page)

“
First you have to be
Emily,” Damon said, and hushed when everyone glared at
him.

Allen crawled out of Chevalier’s lap, “You
go like this.”

Allen put his ear up against the wall, and
then made the motion of falling forward, “Like that.”

Chevalier picked him up again, “I see, and
where is this amazing wall?”

“
In the game room,” Allen
said, and pulled a handful of smashed popcorn from his pocket. The
heku in the room all wrinkled their noses and turned away from
him.

“
Time to go save the
mortal,” Damon said, following them all out of the conference
room.

“
You don’t have to come,”
Kyle snapped at him, as they walked toward the game
room.

“
Oh, I wouldn’t miss this
for the world,” Damon grinned.

Chevalier glared at him, and he became
serious again.

“
That smell is awful,”
Damon said, as they entered the room. He put his arm over his
nose.

“
It’s just popcorn,”
Chevalier said, trying not to grimace.

“
This wall,” Allen said
when Chevalier let him down. He ran to the wall with the
dartboards.

“
She fell into this wall?”
Kyle asked, running his hands along the solid wall.

“
Yup”

Damon leaned up against the wall between
dartboards, “I say we leave her.”

“
Damon,” Kyle
growled.

Damon just shrugged, “I was kidding. You
can’t fall through a solid wall. The kid’s imagining things.”

“
When did Mommy fall
through the wall?” Chevalier asked, amused.

“
When the movie started.”
Allen pointed as the credits ran along the TV screen.

“
Come on,” Chevalier said,
picking Allen up. “Let’s go find her. I need to get back to my
meeting.”

“
No!” Allen frowned. “She’s
in the wall.”

“
Drinking younger and
younger these days,” Damon said, walking forward a few
steps.

“
Enough, Allen. She’s not
in the wall,” Chevalier said, a little more sternly.

“
Yes she is,” Allen yelled,
crossing his arms. Chevalier had to grin, when he did that, he
looked just like Emily.

Chevalier put him down, “Mark, stay here
with Allen while we look for Emily, that’ll be easier.”

Allen ran to the wall and pushed against it.
There was a sound similar to electricity, and with a lot of force,
he was able to stick his hand through the wall. The heku all gasped
and went to the wall.

“
See,” Allen said, and
tried to get to the wall, but Kyle held him back.

Mark walked up to the wall and touched it
right where Allen had gone through, “It’s solid.”

“
It can’t be solid,” Damon
said, and tried it himself, but his hand hit solid wall.

Kyle moved Allen closer to the wall and took
his hand. They both reached out for it. Kyle’s hand stopped when it
hit solid rock, but Allen’s hand disappeared.

“
She’s really in there?”
Chevalier asked Allen.

“
She fell in,” Allen said,
smiling. He was glad the others believed him now.

“
Sam?” Chevalier called
out, and turned when the familiar appeared.

“
Yes?”

“
Walk through that wall,”
Chevalier said, pointing to the dartboards.

“
Erm… ok,” he said. Sam
walked toward the wall, put his hands up, and stopped when they
touched the wall.

“
Can’t go through it?” Kyle
frowned.

“
No… it’s a solid wall.”
Sam said, confused.

Allen stuck his hand through again, when he
pulled it out, he shivered, “Cold in there.”

Sam watched him with wide eyes.

“
Well, well, a Mortal
Trap,” Damon said, grinning.

***

Emily quit running and bent over with her
hands on her knees. She was breathing hard from running and her
hands hurt. She’d been running through the corridor in the dark,
feeling ahead of her. Numerous times her hands would feel bones or
sharp rocks, and she would move away in a panic. She finally
regained control of the terror and stopped to rest. It was colder
here than in the first room with the shackles, and she felt like
she had been moving downhill.

“
Think... think… skeletons
cannot move,” she said to herself, and the corridor lit up. She
looked up at the torches and grabbed one off of the wall. She was
in a narrow stone corridor that extended as far as she could see in
both directions. She decided to head back the way she had
come.

***

“
Those were rumors,” Leonid
told Maleth. He looked again at the wall, hoping for some clue as
to how to get through.

“
Rumors yes, passed down
through the ancients… but what if they weren’t rumors, that would
explain all of this,” Maleth said.

“
Why have I not heard of
these?” Chevalier asked, irritated.

“
You hated the ancients
from the moment one of them made you. They weren’t about to tell
you about their games,” Leonid said.

“
So... enlighten me on
these rumors,” Chevalier said. He looked down at Allen, who was
asleep in his arms.

“
They were called Mortal
Traps. They were enchanted so only mortals could enter. This kept
any heku from going in and saving them,” Leonid said, still
watching the wall. “Once the mortal was inside, the ancients would
gather and watch what was going on inside the trap. The
entertainment came from the ability of the trap to read fears and
emotions of the mortals. Ancients enjoyed watching as mortals were
faced with their greatest fears, and eventually either starved to
death or went insane.”

“
They were all sealed when
the ancients were banished,” Maleth said.

“
Apparently not all of
them,” Damon said, hiding his amusement.

“
What do you mean the
ancients could view them? How?” Kyle asked.

“
They were just rumors,”
Leonid said again.

“
How?” Chevalier asked,
watching Allen.

“
There were portals by the
trap entrance that would let them see what was going on inside. The
torches were the source of the enchantment. They become active
whenever they hear a mortal’s voice,” Leonid said, sitting
down.

“
What are other options?”
Chevalier asked.

“
It’s a Mortal Trap,
everything fits,” Damon said.

“
Just for the sake of
argument, what was rumored to happen when a mortal got out of the
trap?” Kyle asked.

Leonid shook his head, “None got out.”

“
We can solve this… let’s
summon the portal and see if it’s here,” Mark suggested.

“
How was it done?”
Chevalier asked, looking at Leonid.

“
It takes an ancient,” he
told them.

Everyone grew quiet as they considered other
options.

“
Think a quarter ancient
could open it?” Kyle asked, turning to Allen.

Chevalier frowned, “What would he have to
do?”

“
It won’t hurt to try,
right?” Kyle asked.

“
No, it won’t hurt,” Leonid
said, and blurred out of the room. He came back less than a minute
later with a book.

“
Allen?” Chevalier said
shaking him gently. “Wake up.”

Allen rubbed his eyes and sat up, “Is Mommy
back?”

“
Not yet, I need you to do
me a favor.”

“
What?” he asked, and then
yawned.

Chevalier looked at Leonid, who was skimming
through a book.

“
Aha, here it is,” he said.
“Ok Allen, put your hands up and say
Ostendo mihi
.”

Allen frowned, “What?”

Chevalier whispered into Allen’s ear. He
lifted his hands and said “Ostendo mihi.”

The fireplace roared to life, and an image
slowly appeared in the flames. As the image cleared, the heku saw
Emily standing in a dark hallway with a torch in her hand. She was
looking around and breathing rapidly.

“
Answers that,” Damon said,
sitting down in front of the fireplace.

“
Get out,” Chevalier said
to him. Damon nodded and blurred from the room.

“
Would you like us to
leave?” Maleth asked, and put his hand on Chevalier’s
shoulder.

“
Sam take Allen. The rest
of you can stay,” he said, moving his chair closer to the flames.
“We need to find her a way out of there.”

The other heku joined him and watched
intently.

“
I’m sorry Chevalier. I had
no idea there was a Mortal Trap in this palace,” Maleth said,
sadly.

Chevalier just watched.

Emily stood up and looked
down the corridor a little further. She walked forward, and then
paused to read something written on the wall. She held the torch up
and read the red words ‘
Never trust a
heku. You will die down here.’

She ignored the writing and looked back down
the hallway, where she saw a dark opening. Emily held the torch up
and walked forward slowly. The image in the flames followed her as
she rounded the corner, and raised the torch to see into the
room.

She walked in, carefully avoiding the
skeleton crumpled in the corner. She ran her fingers along words
etched into the far wall. Emily spun quickly and held the torch up
when she thought she heard movement from the corner. She watched
the skeleton for a few moments, and then noticed the shoes lying by
his decayed feet. Her breath vapors came more rapidly as she
crawled slowly toward the skeleton with her hand reached out.

As she touched the shoelace, she wrapped a
finger around it and watched the skeleton carefully as she brought
one shoe towards her. In a flash, the skeleton reached out and
grabbed her wrist. Emily screamed and jerked her body backwards,
pulling against the skeleton’s grasp. She kicked a bare foot up and
caught the skeleton in the face. The skull fell off of the body and
rolled against the wall. She yelled as she pried the bone fingers
from her wrist, dropping the torch in the process. Once she felt
the fingers release, she ran into the corridor, tripping over
something, she fell to the ground.

“
Light,” she yelled, and
looked up and down the corridor quickly when the torches
lit.

Emily leaned against the wall and pulled her
knees up to her chest. She ran her hands along her arms trying to
warm them. Her feet were freezing because of the cold ground, and
her t-shirt wasn’t helping at all to keep her warm.

“
Emi?” she heard someone
call to her.

She looked toward the sound, and scrambled
to her feet, “Dad?”

Emily walked down the corridor, following
the voice.

“
Come to me Emi. You need
to hurry,” the voice said.

Emily began to run. The torches lit a few
steps in front of her. She stopped suddenly when she saw Allen
standing ahead of her, smiling.

“
You look good, Emi,” he
said, putting his arms out to her.

“
Dad?” she asked again, and
took one step closer.

Chevalier growled and his anger filled the
room.

Allen put his arms down and smiled, “It’s
good not to trust.”

“
Why are you here?” she
asked, stopping a few feet in front of him.

“
It’s important that you
listen to me, very important. Do you understand?” he told her,
sternly.

Emily nodded.

“
The heku Emi,” His eyes
were sad. “Do you remember what I told you when you were a little
girl? What I told you about the strangers that bit you?”

“
You said to stay away from
them,” she said.

“
I know you think he loves
you, Emi, but he doesn’t… he’s a heku, all he wants is the blood
you have, and the ability,” he said to her, his eyes were warm and
caring.

“
He loves me, Dad,” she
said to him.

Allen shook his head, “No, he doesn’t. You
need to trust me on this. Is he controlling?”

Emily frowned and nodded.

“
Is he short-tempered and
easily angered?”

She nodded again.

“
Get away from him while
you can, Emily. The heku do not love mortals. They use them,” Allen
said, concerned.

“
You don’t know these ones.
They aren’t using me.” She tried to make him understand.

“
Emi, you have to trust me.
These are no better than the ones that fed off of you as a child.
They want children from you. They want your bloodline, that’s all.
I warned your mother, too, and look what happened,” he said, and
took a step backwards.

“
Dad, wait, don’t go,” she
walked after him.

“
I can’t stay. I just had
to warn you,” he said, and disappeared into the dark
shadows.

“
Dad!” Emily said, running
forward. She stopped when the empty corridor lit up in front of
her.

Emily fell to her knees and watched where
her Dad disappeared.

Chevalier leaned forward, putting his elbows
on his knees, “How did they find this amusing?”

Leonid shook his head, “I don’t know.”

Emily stood up and looked up at the torches.
She grabbed one and jammed it hard into the dirt floor so it stood
up. She sat down by it and pushed her hands toward the flames. She
frowned and sat her hand directly into the fire.