Chapter 22
As I glanced around the only thing I could say to describe this place was awe inspiring. The archives looked as old as time and it was obvious that it held documentation of every culture, human or otherwise, to ever exist on earth.
"This is the largest collection of knowledge on earth, at one time it was named the library of Alexandria which is stupid because it has never existed there, it was just a blip that an Alexandrian ended up in here." Donalbain shrugged and continued to dictate to me the history upon the shelves like so overzealous tour guide. I guess he was really passionate about this stuff, but then again history to me was probably his actual past. The hands grasping me dropped away and in an instant the men were fanning out through the shelves that divided the archives. Lucius grasped my hand and gave it a squeeze before pulling me along behind him towards the dullest looking section of the place. The whole area looked decrepit, as if it had been forgotten by everyone and everything, the whole section of the archives in disrepair. Lucius caught my disparaging look and grinned.
"What better place to hide something as valuable as the Book of Eve than a place where no one would think to look." He gestured to the area of the archives that looked as if it would collapse at any moment and I agreed. I certainly wouldn't have looked there, the place looked more dangerous than a construction site and I was more than a little wary of walking through there without a hard hat and a bunch of protective gear.
Donalbain who was leading our group, expertly manoeuvred through the debris. It was like the steps were practiced and the path he had taken had been done a million times before. I could only guess that he had some part in its protection. Either way, I tried to follow after him but my foot caught on an outcropping piece of wood so that I tumbled forwards. In that moment everything froze before I went hurtling forward, a particularly ugly piece of wood that seemed to be targeted right at me and was getting closer and closer by the second. My heart was pounding and a sharp gasp escaped my lips as I stared cross eyed at the plank of wood that I was two centimetres away from being impaled on. Jarring to a halt I was relieved at the arm that was firmly wrapped around my waist as I stared unblinking at the wood, my chest heaving up and down as the blood pumped furiously through my veins. The arms at my waist pulled me back upright so that I was chest to chest with my saviour. Grinning breathlessly at Lucius as adrenaline pumped through my veins I felt a tinge of excitement pass through me. I knew if Donalbain hadn't cleared his throat and guiltily spoken his apologies then I would have done something incredibly stupid.
Instead I gave him a nod and pushed away from him taking extra care to put a comfortable distance between us before plastering an easy smile on my face as I turned and walked toward Donalbain. I made sure to pay extra attention to where I was stepping and when I was finally by the flaming haired man's side I let out a breath at the sight of the door before me. It was even more disheartening to look at and the very vibes that it was giving off made me want to do nothing else but turn and walk away. Donalbain grasped my hand to stop me from stepping backwards, a chuckle escaping his lips as he turned me around to face the door once more.
"Don't worry, it's just one of the many layers of protection, it repels humans." He told me before taking my hand and using it to push against the door but let out a gasp when I felt nothing beneath my touch. "It's a physical and mental mirage. It repels you with both sight and emotion."
I nodded my head as we continued through the mirage into a warmly lit corridor that glowed in the soft flames of the torches on either side of me. It was as if I had broken the surface of water and the world was finally coming back into focus after being drowned out of awareness.
My chest rose and fell as I took in a deep lungful of air, my entire being relaxing as the strange tension and need to run away ebbed away. I was too preoccupied with this to note myself being ushered along the corridor until we finally ended up in a large cubed room that had three floors. Each floor had a walk way that ran around the perimeter and it was on each of these floors that there were at least twenty doors going off to some unknown room.
"How many?" I asked with wide eyes, my eyes not daring to look past the first level as a sudden wave of vertigo swept over me. There was no way that I was ever going up to the third level. They could kiss my behind or go jump off a cliff before that ever happened.
"Twenty five on each floor and there are three floors so that's seventy seven in total." Donalbain grinned wickedly at us as he said that, his face lighting up when he noted the looks of confusion on our faces. Is he just stupid? There should be seventy five rooms not seventy seven. Something makes me think that there is more than meets the eye with this room. "Come on, all the way to the top."
His excitable tone did nothing to lift my spirits as I gulped and reluctantly lifted my head to gaze up at the third floor. The fact that the walkway was made of fragile looking wood made the blood drain from my face as I backed up a step into the hardened muscle of one of Donalbain's warriors. They all laughed at my apprehension but when they saw that there was no way that I would willingly follow them up that rickety old staircase, they paused and exchanged glances before Donalbain nodded and gave me a smug smile. I opened my mouth to say something but it only came out in a choked squeak when my legs were pulled from underneath me a moment before I was thrown over someone's shoulder.
I probably would have paused to admire the view before me but as it was, I screeched as I eyeballed the rickety staircase around the gorgeously toned buttocks, struggling harder and harder the closer we got to the steps. I knew that I had hit the money maker when the arms around me loosened a bit and I slipped further down their back so that my head was peeking from between their legs while their footsteps faltered. The profanities made me want to smile but even with the new injuries the man didn't even falter in his steps and continued towards the stairs. This man obviously had balls of steel.
On the first step I squeezed my eyes shut tightly and was rewarded with a sudden jolting motion that turned my stomach. Opening my eyes I noticed that my face was one again pressed up against the jean covered buttocks but the steps were luckily still solid beneath the man's feet. I couldn't decide whether to be happy or not that the stairs didn't break on the first step. Wouldn't it be better to have a short fall and get a bruise then do a three story fall and break many bones?
With a sigh I relaxed against the body in defeat, I wasn't going to get out of this no matter how much I wanted to. The only thing that came to mind was that I wasn't painting myself as a very good leader or a very good saviour of the world. These guys must be wondering what the hell they got themselves in for when they signed up to help me. I can't even walk up three flights of stairs because of vertigo, how the hell am I going to survive a bloody battle?
I was so lost in my musing that I hadn't even noticed the man walking up the first flight of stairs and was rewarded with a view on the lovely drop off the side of the staircase. No bloody way was I going to try that one again. I turned my head away from the drop so that my cheek was pressed against my captor's cheek.
The bobbing motion of his walk left me feeling a little motion sick but it let me count our progression up the stairs. I was more than a little confused when we got to twenty five but we were still climbing higher. Opening my eyes once more I saw that we were on the third landing but all of them were laughing as the man stood on the spot and stomped him foot. All of their eyes were on me and were streaming with tears of amusements. It took me a moment to realise why. My hands in their desperation had wrapped around his legs dangerously close to his man junk and while he stomped my face rubbed up and down on his backside. It was actually starting to give me friction burn.
With a grunt I kicked the man making sure to move my arms at the right time and was rewarded with a groan before the man released me so that he could clutch onto his crown jewels that were probably more like crushed glass right now. I tried not to smile smugly as I slid down his back towards the floor but I couldn't restrain the giggle from leaving my mouth. That would teach him for manhandling me. At least he saved me from having to walk up the stairs.
Somehow I managed not to smash my face on the floor. Thankfully a pair of arms wrapped around me and pulled me up before that could happen. I was a little wide eyed to be this close to Lucius within such a short space of time. How was is every time something happened it was always his arms that I ended up in, my body pressed tightly against his while he grins wickedly at me, a smug smile playing on his lips a moment before his tongue darts out to moisten his lips. I know that move. It brought my attention unwillingly to his lips and it was only with the utmost control that I managed to push myself away again and give him a smile that didn't show just how much he was getting to me today. Maybe it was the whole I might die thing that was making Lucius suddenly so appealing to me, either that or Calantha put something in my drink.
"Enough playing around children, I know you like to have fun but this is time for business." Donalbain's voice cut through the haze and in an instant all of the men were standing to attention, no sign of their amusement evident at all on their faces. It even made me suck in my gut and stand as tall as I could which wasn't very big compared to all of these giants. "Good, now remember, step only where I do, do not deviate from the path, if you fail to adhere to this then there are no guarantees on you surviving the next five minutes. Move out." He clapped his hands as he finished speaking and I was pulled into the line of people, wedged between muscles and his little sister mini muscles, who still happened to be taller than me might I add.
With each step that our procession took, I made sure to step exactly where the man before me had, wishing that there was snow or something to mark out the footprints instead of the rickety wood that groaned and creaked with each step. Because of the mass of muscled man before me I couldn't see where we were going so when the person before me disappeared before my very eyes I was more than a little startled. I halted causing everyone behind me to bump into back, several cursing and grunting at the jarring motion. I let out a yelp as they pushed me forwards towards the walkway that stretched before me only for a wave of coldness to sweep through every cell of my body that for a moment I felt as if I was frozen solid, my muscles tensing so that I hunched up against the frigid temperatures but as soon as it began it ended.
Panting, my eyes tried to peer through the gloom but I saw nothing but the slight outline of a body before me. How the hell was I supposed to follow where they stepped when I could barely see what was in front of me. That was answered for me when I glanced down and noticed that there were strange glowing spots on the floor, like when they do the blood test with the black light and it lights up like the fourth of July.
"What the-?" I was cut off by urgent shushing sounds so I immediately kept my lips shut tight, throwing away the imaginary key to the padlock.
Our steps continued on for a while, my eyes following the glowing trail as my mind wandered with nothing but the slap of our shoes on the stone floors as company. I only knew we had left the narrow passage that was barely taller than my head was when I finally saw Donalbain whose hair was once again a flaming mass like the time when I had first seen him. It lit the area around him in a soft orange glow that was a little painful to look at but it was kind of amusing when he used his flaming mass of hair to light one of the unlit torches so that within a minute every other person had a flaming torch in hand. I was glad that I was one without a torch, with the clumsiness that had been hanging around me lately like a cloud there was a chance that I, with a torch, could be disastrous.
As my eyes took in my surrounding I was in a mixture of shock and awe. All four walls were mosaicked with images of some event of great importance, like dinosaurs and man, co habituating on the earth or the discovery of fire which according to these paintings, was not done by man or any of man's descendants.
While my attention was focused on these, everyone else's was focused on the image of a woman whose hands were cupped as if they should be holding something yet the hands were empty.
"It's confirmed, the book is gone." Donalbain sighed wearily. "I had hoped - I don't know what I hoped. Men fan out and look for some clues."
I obeyed, taking time to pace around the strange shrine like room but to the unobservant, or one who had no clue what to look for like myself, the whole place seemed fine. A little dusty but apart from the noticeable absence, there was nothing really remarkable about the room.
A pained gasp behind me had me turning on my heel to see Lucius crouched in the far corner. Like a swarm, we all descended upon him, apprehension and eagerness leaking from our very pores as we glanced over his shoulder. Clasped within his palm was a pocket watch like those from the days of the gentleman and it was something I had seen before though I had trouble remembering where but I knew that it must hold some kind of significance.
"What is it Luce?" I asked as I crouched beside him and gently took the pale gold object from the claw like grasp he had upon the watch.
He lifted his gaze to mine and the pain I saw there was enough to break my heart. His lip wobbled slightly and I was surprised that his tears weren't welling with the intense emotions running through his eyes. "How could he betray me?" He questioned though it seemed as if he was honestly begging for enlightenment.
Frowning I stroked the hair on his head. "How could who betray you?" I asked as I fiddled with the watch.
His next work changed everything I knew and everything I thought I knew because it was something I never saw coming. Yet his next word that was barely more than a whisper hit me like he had shouted it right in my ear. "Phil."