Pierrot's Song

Chapter 3 - Desecration-1

Chapter 3 Desecration‘We can’t go back now,’ Luka said. ‘They’ll catch us.’

‘We can’t leave it!’ Sofia cried, then dropped her voice as her cry echoed up the stairwell. ‘I’ve spent my whole life trying to find out more about the muses. This is it, I know it is.’

A huge crash came from the main cavern, then some shouting.

Mina looked at the darkened stairs below. There was no guarantee of safety that way. They had no way of knowing if there was even a way out. There might just be another cave, a dead end with no escape.

The noise behind them grew: shouting voices, more crashing. They could go back and face whoever was there, perhaps reclaim the box and leave the way they had come. But her last experience of pursuers had ended with Dario’s golden thread being broken and his descent into madness.

‘We don’t know anything about them,’ she said. ‘Who they are, why they are here …’

‘By the sounds of things, they are not here to admire the statues,’ Sofia said wryly.

Luka shrugged and started quickly up the stairs.

‘No!’ Mina hissed.

He turned and smiled at her. ‘Haven’t you worked out Pierrot’s greatest gift yet?’ He raised a finger to his lips.

‘Silence,’ whispered Mina, and Luka gave a broad smile, then turned and was gone.

~

It was almost too easy. The golden box, open, the book still within, sat near the entrance to the hidden chamber. Slowly, careful not to make any sound, Luka reached across the lid and lowered it closed with great tenderness. He watched the intruders warily as he did so.

Three large, thick-necked men in ordinary clothes of tunics and pants prowled around the chamber. They looked more like thugs than artisans, their movements graceless with a hint of violence. Growing up on the streets, Luka had learned to read such things. Shouting to each other as they searched, the men checked all the alcoves for anyone hiding. Each carried a small torch, not the ones from the cavern. It was sheer luck none of the men were near Luka’s alcove. He slid the box up his body, keeping his movements slow and smooth so as not to catch their attention. Though the bowl in the centre of the cavern still burned, without the large torches around the room’s periphery there were plenty of shadows to hide him. Clutching the gold box to his chest, he backed into the hidden chamber. One of the thugs grunted. ‘There’s no one here.’

‘Doesn’t matter. Ellechino said they’d come, even if it took weeks or months.’

‘Months? We didn’t bring enough food for that!’

The one with the voice of authority spoke again. ‘Look, we’re working on his best guess here. The girl he’s after has disappeared and he needs to find her, but there’s also something he doesn’t want her to find out. He’s covering all his bases. Why he thinks she’d come here, he hasn’t said. That’s not our job. Our job is to stop them finding anything, no matter what, if they do.’

One of the others sat down, his back against a pillar, and complained. ‘I ain’t sitting here in the dark for months.’

‘We don’t have to, stupid. We don’t have to wait. There are other people looking for her. Our job is just to stop her finding anything if she makes it here.’

‘Oh. Right.’

Luka stepped into the darkness of the stairway to begin his descent. A loud thud and a cracking sound stopped him. He took a step back into the small chamber.

‘What are you doing?’ one of the men snapped.

‘Well, one way to stop her finding anything is to destroy it all.’

Another great cracking sound followed. On silent feet, Luka moved back to the door.

‘That’s not what he meant. I was thinking we can just mess up the entrance.’

‘How do you know what he meant? You said he always speaks in riddles. My way’s more fun.’

Another crack sounded. Luka peered around the alcove’s doorway, just enough to see into the large cavern. Directly opposite him, one of the intruders stood poised to swing, an axe in his hands. There was enough light for Luka to realise he stood in front of the cruder statue, that of Saveria, before the man hefted his weapon, hitting the back of the alcove and the stone figure with great force. Chips of stone flew across the floor. Apparently satisfied with his work, the thug took a break for a moment to talk to the others.

‘Besides, you said this place was booby trapped.’

The tallest man stepped up to the mouthy one and stared him down. ‘Yeah, for people who do Arcani. Ordinary people like you an’ me are safe. But the girl he thinks might come here does all that stuff. Which means she might not be able to get in. But he wants us to make sure.’

‘Don’t you fink it’d be more fun if she wore herself out with the booby traps, then got here and bam, nothing left! I do.’ He turned and hefted his axe again, a wild smirk pasted across his face.

Swiftly, Luka reached down and slid the gold box along the wall inside the secret alcove, pushing it as far as he could reach so it wouldn’t be visible to anyone standing outside. As the axe whistled through the air, he took a deep breath, stepped into the great chamber, and summoned his onstage voice.

‘Do not desecrate this chamber.’

His words echoed across the shadowed space. The axe stopped in mid-air, its bearer startled into freezing. It occurred to Luka then, too late, that he could have stood inside the alcove, projecting a disembodied voice. Inwardly cursing his mistake, he took a slow, careful step backward. He started to turn toward the alcove and found himself face to face with one of the thugs.

‘Silly us,’ the man said with a shrug, ‘thinking we had got here first.’

Luka was fast, but the man was built like a fighter and he was tall. In seconds he had an arm locked across Luka’s throat.

‘Hey, Sim,’ he called out. ‘Got something for you to play with.’

Near the damaged statue, the mouthy goon dropped his axe. He rubbed his hands together and strode toward them. ‘Oh, goody!’

~

‘It’s been too long,’ Mina said. ‘We have to go back.’

What worried her was the crashing sounds had stopped. Something had changed in the chamber above.

Sofia peered into the darkness ahead. ‘Maybe one of us should wait here. Stay hidden. It gives us the chance to surprise them.’

Mina thought for a moment. ‘Let’s just get this done. It’s too quiet.’

Panic driving them, they ascended swiftly and within moments stood just inside the alcove, peering into the cavern. All the light centred around the burning bowl, casting the four men who stood near it as silhouettes. Three were huge and beefy, while the fourth was slim and diminutive. One of the thugs held a small torch in each hand. His face was lit from beneath, the flickering giving his broad grin a sepulchral overlay.

Another of the men waved an arm, and the third took Luka’s hand and forcibly spread it out across the edge of the flame bowl. He too was grinning.

‘What do you want?’ Luka asked, his voice thin.

‘Fun!’ said the man with the torches.

‘Shut up, Sim,’ countered the man who was obviously in charge. ‘Ellechino sent us here to make sure no one found this place or, if they did find it, to make sure they didn’t tell anyone about it. Unfortunately for you, the fact you’re here means we have to go straight to the second part of our instructions.’

Sim let out an excited whoop. ‘Does that mean we kill him?’ he asked. The other man shook his head. ‘We just need to make sure he doesn’t leave.’

He nodded to the man who had Luka’s hand pinned, who pulled a cosh off his belt. It looked like nothing so much as an over-stuffed sausage, and Mina could tell from the way it swung that it had a lot of weight to it. With a swift, unexpected movement, the goon brought it smashing down on Luka’s hand. Luka jerked like a puppet whose strings had been yanked, but he stayed silent.

‘What, no scream?’ the boss man asked. ‘Sim likes it when people scream.’

Luka looked up at the men towering over him. ‘Why not just get on with it?’ he asked, his voice tight. ‘You want to make sure I don’t leave, so just do it. There’s no need for anything else.’

The man in charge shook his head. ‘You’re wrong about that. Ellechino said we might also find a girl here. Now, you nearly qualify, but not quite. We’re supposed to take her back to him if she turns up. So we actually need to know where she is.’

He nodded and the man with the cosh brought it down on Luka’s hand again with swift violence. From her hiding place in the alcove, Mina saw Luka’s body fold and she looked to Sofia, mouthing the words, ‘We have to stop this.’

It must have cost Luka to keep his voice strong and unwavering as he said, ‘Mina sent me here alone. She had other things to do.’ He did not meet his tormentor’s eyes.

The boss turned and scanned the room. ‘Ellechino will be upset to think he misjudged her so badly. He seemed to think she’s the sort of person who gets in there and does her own jobs. Doesn’t shy away from anything. Although he didn’t think she’d be smart enough to work out this place was here,’ he said with a sneer. ‘He only sent us in case she turned up.’

Even from a distance Mina could see Luka was trembling, although from pain or fear, she could not guess.

‘Why is this place important?’ Luka asked. ‘What does Ellechino want to protect?’

Mina saw his eyes flicker toward the alcove she and Sofia hid in.

The man in charge shrugged. ‘Don’t know, don’t care. Ellechino likes his secrets, and it’s our job to help him keep them.’

‘He’s got a lot of secrets,’ the man with the cosh added.

‘Shut up, Bray,’ the boss snapped.

Bray glared at him, then brought his cosh down full force on Luka’s hand again. Luka’s knees collapsed and he only stayed upright because Bray grabbed him by the neck of his tunic and hoisted him up.

‘Did I tell you to do that?’ the boss barked.

Bray looked down and didn’t respond.

‘Can I have a turn?’ Sim interrupted, bouncing on his toes. ‘I wanna try something.’ He tilted his head toward the flaming bowl. The others chuckled.

‘That just might work.’

Sim lunged and seized Luka’s hand. From the jerk of his body, Mina could tell the pain in his fingers must be unbearable. After a moment, Sim adjusted his grip so he had Luka by the forearm, then pulled him toward the flame.

‘I have to do something,’ Mina whispered.

Sofia laid a warning hand on her arm. ‘Ellechino wants you. Let me do this.’

‘No! I don’t know how he knows about me, but he’s right. I do my own jobs.’

Sofia shook her head. ‘Not this time. We need you to do the healings.’

She kneeled, her cloak hiding her figure briefly, then stood, the golden box in her arms. Nodding to Mina, she walked slowly and with grave dignity into the chamber. Her voice filled the space.

‘Don’t hurt him anymore. I’m the girl you’re looking for. I came to find this.’ She held the golden box out before her.

The three thugs stared, then Sim’s face crumpled in a strange look, perhaps disappointed, before splitting into a wide grin. Swiftly he grabbed Luka’s damaged hand and thrust it forward into the vivid flames.

Luka’s scream filled the cavern, a cry of agony that sliced through Mina’s core.

At a nod from his boss, Bray strode forward. ‘Well, look at this.’ He seized the box and held it up for the others to see. ‘Gold!’

Behind him Sofia took a deep breath and used her most commanding voice. ‘This place is sacred. Leave here now or you will pay a dreadful price.’

Mina had already seen Bray’s taste for swift violence, so part of her was unsurprised when he swung round and hit Sofia hard across the face with the gold box. The storyteller collapsed to the floor.

The boss strode over and stood astride her. ‘You are no girl,’ he sneered.

Nothing would get through to these men, Mina saw. Not reason, not trickery.