The Dark at the End

5

Jack hacked away at the last layer of dirt packed around the gleaming black sigil where it leaned against the wall. Neither time, the flood, nor the encasing dirt had dulled its onyx finish.

Since the sigil measured a half dozen feet across, they’d decided to excavate a narrow passage in front of it, free it from the dirt, and drag it out. The passage allowed room for only one, so the three of them rotated between digging and hauling away the loosened earth.

Behind him, Eddie said, “Careful. Don’t break it.”

Jack bit back a retort that might have come out sharper than intended. Eddie had morphed into a pest. Yes, Jack understood that the Lodge creeped him out and he wanted the place in his rearview mirror ASAP, but he was beginning to micromanage. Maybe that expanded his comfort zone, but it set Jack’s teeth on edge. Having dirt in his hair, his eyes, and down the back of his shirt didn’t help.

So he said, “Not to worry, Fredo.”

“Frodo?” he heard Eddie say to Weezy. “Why’s he calling me Frodo?”

“I said ‘Fredo,’” Jack called back. “And I’m getting in the mood to take you out on the lake for a little fishing.”

“Fishing? What’s he talking about?”

Jack heard Weezy laughing farther behind. “Never mind. And as for the stuff that sigil is made of, you can’t even scratch it.”

“Nice sentence structure,” Jack said.

She laughed again. “Oh, now you’re getting on me?”

“No,” he said as the last bit of dirt fell away from the top point of the sigil. “Now I’m getting this thing out of here. Eddie, give me a hand and we’ll see if we can shake it free.”

Eddie slipped in beside him. Together they both got two-handed grips on the spokes of the sigil and began rocking it back and forth. Dirt rained on them as it became looser and looser.

“What is this thing made of?” Eddie said as they increased their efforts.

“Don’t know… but it looks like the same stuff as our little pyramid back in the day, and that was virtually indestructible.”

“It’s called tenathic,” Weezy said.

“Since when?”

“Since I read about it in the Compendium.”

He remembered Professor Nakamura telling him and Weezy that the folks at U of P hadn’t been able to identify the pyramid’s shiny black compound, mainly because they hadn’t been able to chip off a sample. Now he had a name for it: tenathic.

Finally it came free.

“Yeah!” Eddie shouted. “Yeah!”

“Okay. Let’s try to roll it out of here.”

They put their shoulders against the spokes, and Weezy pitched in by pulling on the free side, but the remaining section of the perimeter was jammed. Jack stepped up on one of the crosspieces and grabbed the perimeter. He could only vaguely make out the glyphs carved into the surface, but he could feel them against his palms. Something strange about them… something not right, but he couldn’t say just what.

Well, right or not right, it needed freeing up, so he tightened his grip and threw his weight backward-once… twice…

It loosened up on the third try. He dropped back to the floor and put his shoulder against the sigil. The three of them resumed their effort to roll it.

“Watch out for that point,” Jack told Weezy. “If this thing starts to move, it could-”

It moved and a point angled toward Weezy but she danced out of the way. Another couple of turns and it sat free in the passage. Dusting the dirt out of his hair, Jack stepped back with the others and stared at it.

Weezy said, “That has to be his Other name. Don’t you think? Can it be anything else?”

Jack looked at her eager face. “It had better be. It’s all we have.”

After they’d discovered the sigil this morning, Weezy had brought her backpack down. As she stepped over to where she’d tied it to the ladder, Jack leaned in for a closer look. He couldn’t say why it had felt so strange. But he recognized the glyphs.

“No doubt, Weez. Those are the same seven characters from the pyramids-the big and the little.”

“Makes sense, doesn’t it?” she said, pulling out her camera. “Each of the seven sides of the pyramid had one of these glyphs. Each of the Other Names is composed of the same seven glyphs, so, in a way, each member of the Seven had his name chiseled on the pyramid.”

She fiddled with the lens as she returned, then leaned in next to Jack and flashed a photo. When she checked the display, she frowned.

“What’s wrong?” Jack said as he and Eddie angled in on either side for a look.

“Blurred,” Eddie said, then grunted. “Huh. Master of the Obvious.”

“Maybe you’ve got some schmutz on the lens,” Jack said.

Weezy gave him a cockeyed look. “Schmutz?”

“Abespeak for dirt. Enough of it down here.”

Weezy checked the lens. “No. Clean. I always keep the lens cover on and-oh, crap.”

“What?”

“Just remembered something.”

She snapped another photo with the same result.

“Damn!” she said. “The pyramid wouldn’t photograph either, remember?”

Now that she mentioned it…

“Right-right-right. Neither would the box it came in. And since this is the same material…”

Weezy returned to her backpack and traded her camera for a yellow pad and one of her Sharpies.

“That never stopped me from drawing them before.”

Less than a minute later she displayed her work.

“I now present the One’s Other Name.”

Jack made a quick comparison with the sigil: a damn near exact copy.

“We hope.”

Her smile faltered. “Yeah… we hope.”

“Whether it is or not,” he said, “it’s a beautiful name… so euphonious.”

“Okay!” Eddie said, clapping his hands. “Our work here is done, so let’s get the hell out.”

Jack couldn’t argue with that.

Eddie led the way up. Jack followed with Weezy’s backpack, then helped her up to the basement level. He was about to unplug the spotlight they’d used below-he’d leave that and the shovels as a gift to the Lodge-when he heard footsteps on the basement stairs. He turned to see two men in suits step into the room from the stairwell.

“Who are you and what are you doing here?” said the one in the lead.

Jack had left his Glock in the backpack while he was digging. Neither of these two seemed to pose much of a threat but that didn’t keep him from slipping his hand inside to find its comforting polymer composite.

“We were hired to excavate the subbasement.”

“I know who was hired,” the guy said, “and you aren’t he.”

Ooh… you aren’t he… a grammarian.

Without missing a beat Jack changed the story: “The One told us to check out the work.”

Both men frowned.

“The one what?” said the second.

Either they weren’t high-ups or were pretending not to know. He bet on the former and figured it wouldn’t hurt to keep them off balance by changing the subject.

He jerked his thumb at the opening in the floor. “We found an interesting variation on the Order’s sigil down below.”

Weezy was nodding. “Really interesting. Like nothing you’ve ever seen before.”

The Order guys glanced at each other. Both looked dubious but finally the first said, “I’ll go see.” He pointed at Jack. “No games, all right?”

Jack put on a wounded look. “I assure you, this is not a joking matter.”

He turned to the second. “Watch them.”

He headed for the opening, descended the ladder, and was down maybe half a minute when his excited voice echoed up.

“Hey, Lee! Get down here. You’ve got to see this!”

Lee gave them a look as he approached the opening. “Don’t go anywhere.”

“As if,” Jack said. “That’s our find and don’t you guys even think about stealing credit.”

He waited for Lee to descend then stepped over to the opening. Both of them were out of sight, so he grabbed the ladder and quickly hauled it up.

Ignoring the cries of “Hey!” and “What the fuck?” from below, he signaled Weezy and Eddie to follow him up the stairs.

“Yeah,” Eddie said. “Let’s roll.”

Jack glanced at him. Let’s roll? Really?

Well, at least they had a name-whether the right name or not, no one could say, but the only name available. It would have to do.

But something about the glyphs and the feel of that sigil continued to gnaw at him.