The ceiling to the huge circular chasm rose up to a magnificently tall dome.
Hunter commented on it, “The pointed ogive arch at the top is gothic. It doesn’t look Egyptian. Don’t ask me why they built it like this.”
“Or who built it like this.” Tiyana added ominously.
They all stood on land at the far side of the chasm. The area had no apparent exit or entry. On the far wall, a thirty foot tall glass-looking structure seemingly held frozen liquid. Inside the frozen display case, they saw a statue or model of a large, muscular, vicious looking three-headed beast. It looked disturbingly lifelike.
“Yana, this is amazing! Look at that big guy there! I think it’s a Fu Dog!” Said Hunter, using his wife’s nickname.
Tiyana added, “A Fu Dog? Fu Dog.” Tiyana shook her head, “what is a Fu Dog? Did someone worship this?”
“No, Fu means Lion. This is a Lion Dog. In Tibet they call them Snow Lions. They represent creatures that protect sacred places. It can’t be anything else with the white hair and the turquoise mane. It looks just like the one on the Emblem of Tibet except more... intimidating, ferocious. It looks a lot like the Chinese depictions. Amazing…”
“What?” Said Tiyana and Hongo simultaneously.
“It has three heads. Many mythical creatures in Asia have multiple heads or multiple arms, but you don’t see Snow Lions portrayed that way. In Greek mythology, however… you have Cerberus. He doesn’t normally look like that; he usually looks more like a dog and less like a lion. He doesn’t have the huge mane or the stocky build, but the snakes…”
Tiyana and Hongo looked closer and saw the beast’s back covered with slithering reptiles.
“Criminey…” Tiyana exclaimed.
“Kumbe…” Hongo exclaimed.
The image was breathtaking. From beneath the thick mane of turquoise hair, scaly serpents poked their heads out.
“They look a lot like the Nagas from the hallway back there don’t they.” Said Hunter.
Tiyana and Hongo said nothing; they just stared.
Hunter went on in a quiet and contemplative voice, “Cerberus guards the gates of Hades. It’s possible that he is guarding something here and that we are very close to it. In fact, this might be exactly what we’re looking for.” Hunter’s eyes filled with wild excitement.
“I don’t like the look in your eyes, dear; let’s get out of here before we worry about finding anything.” Tiyana said ominously.
“Yeah, yeah, we will.” Hunter said softly as if in a trance. Then he snapped out of it, “No, you’re right. Seriously, we will get out of here before we do any exploring.” Hunter had a wistful look in his eyes.
Copious amounts of writing in an unintelligible language absolutely covered every square inch of the walls surrounding the giant display. In the middle sat a pedestal with a Tibetan Dharmachakra wheel attached. In an elongated diamond shape around the wheel sat four more pedestals. Each pedestal was comprised of rich gold, ivory, gemstones, pearl, aluminum, and silver.
Hunter stepped up to the wheel on the pedestal in the center of the room. “Hongo, have everyone step back, I’m going to turn this baby and see what happens.”
Hongo barked orders and everyone stepped back and braced themselves. They knew that another trap might await them, but no one wanted to cross back over the acid lake.
“Here goes nothing!” Hunter said with gusto as he gave the wheel a Herculean turn. The wheel spun easily as if someone had greased it just yesterday. As the wheel spun, they heard the friction of gears turning. They saw two metal floor tiles in front of the pedestal separate. From below a new pedestal rose up. Four small, ornate statutes rested on it.
Hunter studied them and then spoke up, “These are the Guardians of the Directions. The fat one carrying the mace is Kubera, the Guardian of the North. He’s a deity of wealth. That’s why he’s made of gold, wearing jewelry, and carrying a money pot. The red guy riding the four-tusked ivory elephant must be Indra, the king of the gods and the Guardian of the East. For the West, riding the weird alligator-looking thing, is Varuna, the god of the ocean. Finally, we have Yama of the South. Yama, god of the underworld, representative of justice, carries a scepter in one hand and a rope in the other. He uses the rope to pull your soul out of your body!”
“Ok Hunter thanks for the brilliant identification, but we can do without the theatrics.” Tiyana chided mildly.
“Etymological studies indicate a possible link of Cerberus to one of Yama’s dogs. This room might contain some sort of homage to Yama.” Hunter was practically lecturing.
“This is all quite fascinating dear, now what about these pedestals? The statues are just big enough to fit on top, but what order do they go in?” Tiyana asked.
“They do look conspicuously similar. Anyone got a compass?”
“We are in luck.” Said Hongo. “My father gave me this. I carry it everywhere.” Hongo said as he pulled an old, gilded copper compass from his breast pocket.
They arranged the statutes in the proper corners and waited. Nothing happened for awhile. Then they heard a high-pitched whine. It grew louder and louder. The statues began shaking. Another set of tiles separated, this time on the ground just in front of the huge display. Another statue arose from the gap. First a large stone head appeared covered in majestic, curly hair. A medieval-looking helmet with wings adorned the head. Through a hole in the forehead of the helmet, they could see a third eye, like the eye of a Cyclops. The statute kept rising and they saw an austere face with a deep and well-defined jaw. Two horns protruded from the sides of the helmet. A long, thick, curled beard covered the neck and lay draped across the chest. The figure had broad shoulders, wore a robe over a coat of intricate armor and carried a two-pronged staff.
“That… is Hades.” Hunter exclaimed. “Or Yama, I’m starting to think they are the same. The two pronged staff and the Greek features are Hades, but the three eyes are Yama. This is his dog.”
The statute’s arm lay outstretched and his wide palm sat empty.
Hunter went on, “He wants something.”
“Hunter, the statue.” Whispered Tiyana.
The statutette of Yama shook violently in its pedestal. It actually seemed to glow. The others had stopped moving and lay still.
“Well, Hongo my man, Geb, Andwele, Haji, everyone, what do you all think?” They knew Hunter planned on placing the statue in Hades’s outstretched palm. The group nervously glanced back over the acid lake.
“Give me one minute.” Said Hongo. He conferred with the group briefly. “Ok, no one wants to cross back over and wait. Let us do this now.”
“Hold onto your hats!” Hunter nearly yelled as he grabbed the Yama statuette and placed it into the outstretched palm of Hades. In the palm, the statuette shook harder, glowed brighter and began to melt. The gooey molten liquid melted through Hades’s palm and passed into his body. Suddenly, they heard gears turning again and Hades’s other arm began to move. As if the statue’s builder had spring-loaded it, the arm shot upwards driving the two-pronged scepter into the glassy cover of the Cerebrus display. The glass or crystal containing the beast shattered and the prongs passed through the frozen liquid as if it were jello. Then the molten brimstone liquid of the Yama statuttette shot out from the prongs of the staff. As the yellow seeped into the frozen block, the substance began to melt. Soon the display oozed liquid on all sides. The massive amount of liquid drifted away into iron grates built into the cavern’s floor.
Hunter’s heart began racing. He had never been so excited in his life. Tiyana’s heart raced along with his. Despite all her carefulness and prudence, she dreamed about adventure as often as Hunter. In her own way, she wanted this as much as Hunter, if not more.
Hongo, on the other hand, had had plenty of adventure in his life. He wanted to keep everyone safe and avoid problems. He had a wild side back in his youth, but he put those days behind him when he left the military, or so he thought.
Tiyana looked around her and called out to Hunter and Hongo, “Boys, look behind us! The rocks are breaking up! There goes our path!” They turned and saw that the stepping stones that they had crossed had broken into smaller stones and begun to drift. As the men pondered the rocks, Tiyana shouted again, “Wow, eyes up front again, pronto!” They turned around just in time to get doused with viscous liquid as they saw Cerberus come to life and begin shaking himself dry.
“It’s alive!” Screamed Hunter, “Run for it! Back to the other side everyone, now!”
Snakes sprung from Cerebrus’s mane. Some attacked the crewmembers. People started screaming. Hongo began barking orders, but it did no good. Everyone panicked and ran. Luckily, even though the rocks separated and got smaller, the crew still found footing on them. Hunter found Tiyana’s hand and ran, practically dragging her along. He jumped to a nearby rock and helped her across. As they fled, he helped her stabilize herself as she watched the rocks drift and directed him where to step.
At one point, they found themselves on a particularly large stone and stopped briefly to look back. They saw Geb in one of Cerberus’s mouths. They saw men half-swallowed by snakes. They saw people slipping and falling into the acid. The horrific scene unfolded before their eyes. Hunter could hardly pull his eyes away from Cerberus. He had incredibly muscular legs and an almost reptilian body. Hunter could see why Dante Alighieri had once called him “the great worm.” His scaly tail whipped wildly around smashing into the statue of Hades and breaking off its arm. The beast devoured people before Hunter’s eyes. Hunter tried to spot Hongo, but could not find him.
“C’mon Hunter, we have to move!” Tiyana shouted and tugged at his arm. He moved. They raced from rock to rock in leaps and bounds. They reached the other shore quickly, where Andwele crouched gasping for breath.
“Mr. Price look!” He said between gasps. The Prices turned in time to see Hongo on the other shore. A coiled snake rose to eye level with Hongo and sprung. Hongo ducked and swung with his machete. The snake’s head separated from its body. Free from immediate threat, Hongo ran for the lake and began jumping from stone to stone. Just then, Cerberus’s middle head swallowed and looked around for fresh prey. Spotting Hongo, the beast took a few steps forward. The head strained to get at Hongo and chomped its big canine teeth in the air a few feet behind him.
Hongo turned and threw the machete into the beast’s eye. The head reared back and let out an earsplitting roar. Enraged, it whipped its neck back and forth hitting the left head and biting at the neck of the right one. With the attention of the other heads, the middle head dove forward causing the whole beast to leap into the lake. The big paws searched for stable footing. Clusters of small broken rocks supported two or three of the great worm’s feet. The other feet slipped. With another earsplitting howl, the creature clumsily stumbled into the acid. The elephantine body took time to fully submerge. The beast’s screams were terrible and hauntingly ferocious. Hongo continued jumping the rocks and eventually made it safely to the shore.
Tiyana watched the acid start to boil and saw misty vapor drift up out of the lake where the beast had fallen. The steam rose up to the roof and she noticed activity up above.
“Hunter, there are arrows flying by overhead.”
Hunter looked up and sure enough, holes had opened up in the walls of the high domed ceiling and arrows shot out blindly across the cavern. They rained down into the acid, but none shot across the cavern at a height of less than seven feet.
“Another booby trap for giants. How peculiar?” Remarked Tiyana.
“Peculiar!” Hongo’s accent was thick and he struggled to pronounce the word as he blurted it out. “This is more than peculiar!” He went on, “Nini katika Jahannamu ni kwamba!” His voice was uncharacteristically agitated.
Hunter put his hands on Hongo’s shoulders and looked him in the eyes. “Hongo, are you alright?”
“Kumbe, kumbe, kumbe… yes, Mr. Price I am fine.” Hongo looked around as if in a daze. His eyes slowly focused and he recovered, “Andwele, you are okay? How many have we lost?”
Hongo and Andwele gathered and regrouped what they had left of their crew. Hunter and Tiyana talked.
“I’ve got a big imagination, and this goes beyond it.” Hunter said.
“Oh Hunter, if anyone was going to find this thing it would be you.” Tiyana felt and inclination to analyze what had just happened, but she could not muster the strength. Her heart still raced. The adrenaline still pumped through her system. She had never felt so alive. She kissed Hunter.
----------
Please vote for this chapter if you like it!