Part 39 (1/2)
A snarling noise made them turn.
Four warriormonks emerged from a cage dug into the wall nearby, holding four large spotted hyenas on leashes.
The doglike animals heaved and strained-they seemed starved, just for occasions like this-and they barked and snapped, saliva spraying from their jaws.
”Tell me again why you brought me along,” Alby whispered.
”Because you can read maps better than I can.”
”Because I can what?”
”And because you have my digital camera around your neck,” Zoe said, looking at him meaningfully, ”and my camera holds the secret to this maze.”
”How?”
Before Zoe could answer, they were brought to the northern extremity of the maze and the entrance there: a wide arch set into the outermost stone ring.
The stonework of the wall itself was remarkable-a marblecolored rock without any visible joins or seams. Somehow the superhard igneous stone had been cut and smoothed into this incredible configuration, work that was far too advanced for a primitive African tribe.
The warlock addressed the crowd across the lake, calling loudly: ”Oh mighty Nepthys, dark lord of the sky, bringer of death and destruction, your humble servants commend this taker of royal blood and her companion to your maze. Do with them as you will!”
With that, Zoe and Alby were thrust through the archway and into the maze, the ancient labyrinth from which no accused had ever emerged alive.
THE MAZE OF THE NEETHA.
THE MAZE OF THE NEETHA.
A HEAVY DOOR boomed shut behind them and Zoe and Alby found themselves standing in a superlong opentopped whitewalled corridor that curved away in both directions.
Looming above the maze's tenfoothigh walls, rising out of its very center, was the spectacular stone staircase that led up into the volcano, into the priests' inner sepulcher.
Right now ten warriormonks stood on the staircase, guarding the inner sanctum in the unlikely event Zoe and Alby got to the center.
They had three choices.
Left, right or-through a yawning gap in the next circular wall-straight ahead.
On the muddy floor in that gap, however, blocking the way, was the foul decaying skeleton of a very large crocodile that hadn't quite made it out of the maze. Halfeaten, the skeleton still had rotting flesh on it.
What on earth ate a crocodile?Alby thought.
Then it hit him.
Other crocodiles. There are other crocodiles in here...
”Quickly, this way,” Zoe said, dragging Alby left. ”Give me the camera.”
Alby extracted the camera and gave it to her. As they ran, Zoe clicked through its stored photos, clicking back through their African adventure-shots of the Neetha's carved tree forest, of Rwanda, then of Lake Na.s.ser and Abu Simbel and...
...the shots Zoe had taken at the First Vertex.
Images of the immense suspended bronze pyramid leaped off the camera's little screen, and then shots of thewalls in the Vertex's ma.s.sive pillared hall, including the picture of the golden plaque.
”That one,” Zoe said, showing it to Alby. ”That's the one.”
He looked at the photo as they hurried down the long, curved pa.s.sageway: The photo showed two curious circular images intricately cut into a rockwall. Images of a maze.This maze. One image showed the maze empty, while the other showed two routes through it, one from the north, the other from the south, both ending at the center.
Alby shook his head. With its ten concentric rings and the straight narrow staircase branching from its center out to the right, it certainlylooked like their maze...
”That warlock and his priests probably have this exact carving somewhere,” Zoe said.
”That's how they alone know how to successfully navigate the maze.”
”Zoe! Wait! Stop!” Alby shouted, halting suddenly.
”What?”
”According to this, we've gone the wrong way!”
”Already?”
Peering at the camera's tiny screen, they checked the carving showing the route through the maze. They had gone immediately left, racing around the outermost circle of the maze- ”We should have jumped over that crocodile carca.s.s and taken the next circle,” Alby said.
”Look. This route only leads to a bunch of dead ends. Quickly! We have to go back before they release the hyenas!”
”Glad I brought you along.” Zoe smiled.
Back they ran, arriving at the huge entry gate and again they saw the halfeaten crocodile carca.s.s. They hurdled it.
”Now we go left,” Alby directed.
Left they went, running desperately around the curving alleyway.
They saw the high staircase looming above them, coming nearer, saw a semicircular archway in its base, allowing them to run under it if they wished.
”No!” Alby called. ”Go right, into the next circle!”
Bam!
A banging noise echoed throughout the maze.
It was closely followed by the barking of the hyenas and the rapid splas.h.i.+ng of paws on mud.
”They just let the dogs in,” Zoe said.
Through the maze they ran.
Das.h.i.+ng down its long curving alleyways, often hearing the hyenas over the walls.
Occasionally, they came to a pit filled with dank, stinking water and inhabited by a crocodile or two. Human remains were often nearby crocodile skeletons, too, of those reptiles that hadn't made it out before they'd starved.