Looking around, he saw that there were various medieval-looking weapons hanging from the walls, most likely intended for their use.
“Grab a weapon, my dears!” Lintz bellowed, his voice like a war cry.
The professor lunged for a hefty double-sided axe, tearing it from its fittings. He looked truly terrifying as he wielded the vast blade, preparing for the fight ahead. Ellabell followed straight after, pulling a trident down, alongside a net. It reminded Alex of the retiarius gladiators, who had fought in grand arenas with the same weapons she had chosen. Aamir sprinted toward a mace and shield, grappling with them, until he too looked the part of vicious warrior. Alex moved toward a curved saber, lifting it off its bracket. The solid silver handle was scarred with the wounds of past battles, and the blade glinted with a deadly sharpness. It felt heavy in his hands, but, after a few practice swings, he knew he could do some real damage with this thing—and he intended to.
As a unit, they circled the mechanical creatures, who had come to life, moving with surprising fluidity toward them. Proper combat wasn’t a natural state for any of them, and Alex was nervous about making the first strike, even as one of the lions snapped its jaws at him.
Within seconds, the creatures had snatched away any choice they might have had in the matter. One of the lions pounced, coming within inches of Alex’s shoulder. He ducked out of the way, rallying against the automaton as he sliced his blade down onto its back. It made a dent, but the lion was unperturbed, wheeling back around to have another go. Again, Alex brought his sword down onto the creature’s back, wanting to crack the metal, but the beast swung out of the way at the last minute, unscathed.
At the far end of the room, Aamir smashed his mace down onto the Minotaur’s chest plate, not seeing the second lion as it approached. Aamir raised his arm to swing the mace again, and the lion pounced, clamping its metal jaws down on his hand. Aamir cried out and dropped the mace, trickles of blood meandering down his forearm. Ellabell ran to him while Lintz distracted the Minotaur. She was fending it off, jabbing at its golden eyes trying to get it to let go, when Alex raced up to assist. With a great leap, Alex drove the sword down into the spot between the lion’s shoulder blades, using all his forward momentum to shatter the mechanism within. The creature let out a robotic roar, opening its jaws. Aamir snatched his hand away just as Ellabell forced her spear down into the open mouth of the golden beast. With a heavy clunk, the lion slumped to the floor, the clockwork broken.
“You okay?” asked Alex, looking at the blood trickling down Aamir’s arm.
Aamir clutched his wound, breathing hard. “Nothing I can’t handle.”
Ellabell turned to Alex. “I had it covered,” she said, her eyes glinting with irritation.
“I was just trying to help,” Alex replied, brow furrowed. “Two weapons are better than one, right?”
Ellabell whirled around in time to smack the remaining lion hard in the face, forcing it to run toward the far wall. “Aamir, are you going to be okay?” she asked, and Alex noticed that she had ignored his question.
He nodded. “As long as you cover me.”
There wasn’t time to patch him up now, but the older boy didn’t seem too bothered by the injury, dropping the shield to the ground and picking up his mace again. With only one usable hand, he returned to the fray. Alex and Ellabell joined him, though Alex had to take a moment to pause at the sight before him. Lintz, in a feat of athleticism, had jumped off the back of the remaining lion and was soaring through the air toward the Minotaur, crashing his double-sided axe down on the monster’s neck, beheading it in one fell swoop. The head arced through the air, sparking from the point of its beheading. Its body crumpled. Alex dove out of the way as the head came rushing in his direction and hit the wall behind him.
“Nice, Professor!” he whooped.
Lintz grinned. “It’s good to stretch your legs once in a while!”
The others looked at the professor in awe, before remembering they still had another beast to dispense with. They approached the final lion, backing it into a corner. Bombarding it with blows from their various weapons, they had it lying defunct on the ground within a matter of minutes. Looking closely at the unmoving metal body, Alex saw that it had the word “Strength” written down its spine. The fifth virtue of Orpheus, no doubt.
“Well, that was refreshing,” boomed the professor, propping his axe against the wall.
“Where did you learn to do that?” Ellabell asked.
Lintz wiped sweat from his forehead. “I was young once, remember?”
Aamir was still bleeding, and the flesh of his hand was torn up pretty badly. Walking up to him, Alex ripped a strip of fabric from the edge of his shirt, and helped to bind the wound with the rudimentary bandage in an attempt to staunch the bleeding. Aamir winced as Alex tied it into place, but said nothing of the pain.
The door to the next room lay just beyond the crumpled form of the headless Minotaur, but Alex paused for a moment, realizing this might be the only opportunity they’d have to take a breather. Looking at the others, he could see that they were beginning to tire, though their optimism had yet to wane. Alex felt it too, tugging at his muscles.
After a brief respite, they moved on through to task number six.
Almost halfway, thought Alex, with a sigh of tentative relief.
A set of stairs took the group down, deeper into the earth. Alex thought of the pagoda and pictured the vault like a reverse version, with the floors going down instead of up, though it served to make him anxious about what might lie at the very end.
He was the last to descend the steps and enter the next room, which was lit by a central spotlight that illuminated only a small section of the space, the rest shrouded in darkness. He froze, as he saw the others standing stock still, clearly perturbed. As he reached them, the whole room flooded with bright light. They were standing in the middle of a large chamber, crowded with figures wearing Japanese Noh masks, some in basic white with red lips, some smiling, some sad, but others wearing more demonic versions, adorned with horns and sharp teeth. Alex’s pulse quickened in fear as all the blank eyes lifted at once, focusing on the new arrivals.
They shifted toward the quartet, swaying to an unheard rhythm, closing in. The room was silent except for the faint padding of footsteps as the figures glided closer.
The group huddled together in a square, lifting their hands as if to conjure, not knowing if it would work in this particular part of the vault. To Alex’s delight, he found that he could weave his anti-magic around his fingers, and saw the familiar golden glisten of the others’ magic, though Aamir seemed to be having a bit of difficulty, with his hand the way it was.
However, as they fed their energies into their hands, the masked people began to move more quickly toward them. The more fear and retaliation they showed, the swifter the masked beings stepped. Alex suspected that if he released his anti-magic upon them, they would swarm the group.
“There are some masks over there,” said Ellabell, gesturing toward several Noh figures at the back of the crowd holding spare masks aloft. “Maybe if we take those masks and wear them, we might be safe,” she suggested, but Alex had already darted away from the group.
“Alex!” Ellabell shouted, which only served to bring the masked crowd closer.
Snaking through the heaving throng, Alex could feel that something had changed. Turning ever-so slightly, he saw that the Noh-faced people had turned to watch him, following his movements. The room began to split into two, with half of the masked individuals creeping toward Ellabell, Aamir, and Lintz, and the other half slinking toward Alex, who was watching them out of the corner of his eye.
Alex bowed in front of the masked people at the back of the room, then reached up to pluck the spares from their outstretched hands. He lifted one to his own face before moving a short way back into the crowd. Once he was sure he was close enough, he threw the remaining masks one after the other in the direction of the other three. Thou
gh they reached up to catch them, one fell to the ground with a sickening crack, the clay face splitting almost in half. Lintz picked up the broken mask, holding the sides together across his face, as Ellabell and Aamir grasped the other two.
“Sorry about that,” said Alex, running back.
Ellabell shook her head. “Why did you do that?”
“Do what?”
“I could have sent them back using my magic—one broke, Alex.” She sighed. “You just ran off before I could finish what I was saying. You keep doing that!”
“Doing what?” Alex repeated, bewildered.
“Whenever I try to do something, you keep—never mind, we need to get moving.” She strapped on her mask, hiding her face from sight and leaving Alex unable to read her expression.
Alex frowned. “Okay… I didn’t mean to…” He trailed off, not knowing what had caused Ellabell’s sudden outburst. He was going to have to ask her later, once they were away from this claustrophobic vault. Maybe the strain of the tasks was getting to her.
Aamir donned his mask quickly and joined the others. They moved through the crowd of masked faces, pretending to be unafraid, though Alex’s heartrate was through the roof. He looked at Aamir and Lintz between the restricted eyeholes, and saw that their masks were smiling. He hoped his was too.
Immediately, the figures came to a standstill.
Half certain they weren’t going to start approaching again, Alex and the others moved to pass through the crowd, toward the doorway that was just visible, near where Ellabell was standing. The masked individuals stepped aside, granting passage. Even as they moved through the crowd, however, Alex felt a shiver of trepidation. As if sensing it, a few of the Noh-faced people moved toward him again, but he couldn’t suppress the fear he felt. He just had to hope he could reach the door before they got to him.
He did, but despite the threat, he paused and turned back around. The creepy hands froze in mid-stretch, like a terrifying game of “red light, green light.” Something was drawing him back into the room, but he couldn’t put his finger on what it was. It was a need, a feeling like they had forgotten something.
It all seemed too easy, as if they were missing a piece of the puzzle. Looking around for inspiration, Alex’s eyes settled on two words, written above the heads of the people he had taken the masks from. The words were barely visible on the wall, only showing when the light danced upon it in a certain way. One said “Adapt” and the other said “Kindness.” It made sense now; they had only completed one of the tests in this room, and this was a two-task stage.
“Stop!” he called to the others, who had already gone through the door. They turned to him. “We’ve missed something.”
“What?” Ellabell asked.
“There are two tasks in here. See?” he said, pointing to the two words on the wall.
Lintz frowned. “Well, what the blazes is the other one? ‘Kindness?’”
Alex nodded. “It’s in here somewhere, whatever it is.”
In the silence, the sound of sobbing found its way to Alex’s ears. With the shuffle of feet from the marching Noh-faced crowd, he hadn’t been able to hear it before, but now it was clear as day. It filled him with anxiety, but there was something compelling about it too, something that made him think it was linked to the second test. It was too out of place not to be.
All the blank eyes were staring at him, the hands still frozen in a mid-air grasp, and the sound of crying was growing louder.
“We need to go,” said Lintz.
“I can’t ignore it, Professor,” Alex insisted. Though he was still fearful, he knew he had to find the source of the crying. The tone of it was heartbreaking, driven from the depths of a tormented sadness. Taking a deep breath, he moved back through the crowd, following the sound of sorrow.
The others hovered in the doorway, evidently believing him to be out of his mind for wanting to weave back through the crowd of Noh masks. Alex didn’t blame them; he felt as if he must be mad too.
“Alex, come back!” Ellabell hissed. “It could be a trap!”
“I’ll be careful!” Alex replied, scanning the crowd of figures for anything unusual.
The sobs grew louder as he reached a particular individual, whose mask was unlike any of the others. This mask was painted in a bright red lacquer that shone like blood in the torchlight, with pointed demon horns that curved upward and sharp teeth painted around the twisted mouth. Head on, it looked terrifying, but as the wearer dipped their head upon Alex’s arrival, he saw that the mask took on a sorrowful expression instead. It was a trick of the eye, and one that made Alex feel slightly calmer.
He had found the person who was in such pain.
Chapter 10
“Are you okay?” Alex asked the red-masked individual.
The wearer dipped their head again, showing the sad expression. Not knowing what else to do, Alex removed his own mask, in the hopes it might encourage the crying person to remove theirs. He asked again if they were all right, and again the wearer dipped their head.
Does that mean they’re not okay? he wondered. It didn’t sound as if they were.
Hoping it wouldn’t result in terrible repercussions, Alex reached forward and removed the mask from the person’s face, lifting it gently off.
Beneath the mask was a ghostly woman, her eyes red with tears. She might once have been beautiful, but time had not been kind. There was a translucence to her body that made Alex think she was an actual ghost, and her sorrowful expression had him transfixed.
“I’m sorry,” he said, handing the mask back. In some defiance of physics, she took it from him, keeping hold of it in her faded hands. “Are you okay?” he asked again.
For a second, it seemed as if she wouldn’t speak, her voice lost after death. And then she did, in a tone so haunting it made tears spring to Alex’s eyes.
“Have you come to help me?” she breathed.
“I’ll try,” Alex replied solemnly.
“Kind boy, I am lost, and my child is starving,” she whispered. “Could you spare a coin so I might return to him? He is so hungry, and I have left him all alone. I need only a gift from the world beyond this place, and we shall be reunited. A simple coin. A token of value.”
Alex turned to see that the others had followed him and were standing nearby. Their faces reflected his own, after listening to the hauntingly sad voice of the phantom woman.
“Do you have a coin, or something valuable?” he asked the group. They checked their pockets, patting them down for stray treasures, but because the clothes were not their own, they didn’t carry any currency. They had nothing they could give. “I’m sorry,” said Alex, turning back to the woman.
She began to weep again, the sound undulating with an extra layer of hopelessness.
“All is not lost. You’ll see,” Alex said comfortingly as he checked his own pockets. All he had were the clockwork objects he had obtained on his travels. A thought occurred to him, and he removed the mouse, wondering if the gold-and-silver inlay might be a valuable enough token to buy food for her child, and to reunite them. He held it out to her, and her sad eyes went wide in surprise. Her spectral hands closed over it. With a whoosh of cold air, she disappeared, the red mask clattering to the ground.
On the air, Alex could swear he heard the whispered sound of “Thank you.”
Stooping low, he scooped the red mask from the ground and turned it over in his hands. Written on the inside was the word “Kindness.”
Lintz smiled. “The seventh virtue of Orpheus. That was a generous thing you did there, dear boy.”
“It was the least I could do,” replied Alex, knowing her face would haunt him for a long time to come.
As he turned, with his mask and the ghost’s mask in his hands, the rest of the Noh-masked people swept aside, bowing in a sort of reverence as the group passed on their way to the doorway.
Entering a passageway with a cavernous roof, dripping with stalactites, they saw two entrances ah
ead of them, though only one was open. The other had a heavy stone door blocking the way, with no obvious means of opening it. There was no lock, no keyhole, nothing, only the half-eroded face of an ancient bust, most of the features worn away.
“I guess we have to go this way, then?” said Alex, gesturing to the open passageway.
“Why don’t we scope it out first, you and I?” suggested Aamir.
Alex nodded. “We’ll be back in a second,” he promised Ellabell and Lintz. “Once we know the coast is clear.”
They headed through the open entrance, and as they paused at the lip where the tunnel stopped, Alex could sense something was wrong. The cavern beyond was filled with water, but it was not the kind of pool anyone would have wanted to swim in. Dark shapes weaved along the surface, pointed fins emerging and disappearing beneath the water. With a splash, a school of flying fish covered in barbs soared through the air, gnashing rows upon rows of vicious teeth. Alex could bet there was a moat creature in there somewhere, ready to lunge.
An enormous bird-like monster with vast, leathery wings swooped close to the cave’s entrance, sending the two young men staggering back from the edge. It was a hybrid of sorts, somewhere between a dragon and a bird, with a face that looked more like a skull than a living head. There was no way they could go in that direction, not if they wanted to live.
With shocked looks on their faces, the duo hurried back to where Ellabell and Lintz were patiently waiting.
“Yeah, we can’t go that way,” Alex said, catching his breath.
“So how do we get this one open?” Ellabell asked, tapping the stone doorway.