IN THE TIME WE HAVE, Chapter 7
The two young women peered into the darkness: one filled with excitement, the other with trepidation.
"Okaaayyy," said Elsie slowly, "Explain to me what just happened? How'd that honking huge rock just move by itself?"
"Welcome to my world, Elsie," said Lara, cupping a hand to the blonde's shoulder. "Sometimes you just have to accept the impossible..."
"That's fucking right out of a movie, Lara," swore the American. "This is some crazy-assed shit…"
Elsie continued to gaze into the darkened entryway, unmoving. She could hardly believe what she'd just seen: while she'd always considered herself an open-minded sort, witnessing the impossible had shaken her. Her sensible half demanded a reckoning; imagination and reason brawled for dominance.
"Hey," said Lara, concern evident in her voice as she squeezed the blonde's shoulder. "You okay? You look a bit pale...I mean more so than usual…"
The American nodded slowly. "Yeah," she finally breathed. "Just...trying to wrap my mind around all this..."
"Maybe you should wait here," suggested the brunette.
"Huh?" voiced the blonde. "You're not thinking of going in there, I hope?"
Lara unstrapped her backpack and dropped it to the ground. "Herding cats," she said with a smile.
Elsie's anxiety grew threefold. "Jeezus, Lara," she said worriedly. "What if...what if that thing collapses in on top of you?"
Lara drew her torch out of the pack and straightened up. "That's always a possibility, I suppose," she admitted, brushing a stray lock from her face. "But it seems to have held up for two millennia; so long as I don't disturb anything I should be fine."
The archaeologist flicked on her lamp and shone it down the dark passageway. Elsie watched with growing nervousness as the light revealed stone-lined walls supporting equally massive stone lintels above.
The passage faded into ominous obscurity in the distance.
"See?" said Lara, patting the near stone wall. "Perfectly sound construction."
She took a step into the entryway.
Elsie caught sight of movement in the nearby trees; a large stag had emerged from a thicket, observing her with disquieting interest. Normally the blonde would have been thrilled at such an encounter, but in her current circumstances and with the very air seeming to press inward, the animal's odd stare unnerved her.
"Ohhhhh, wait for me," said the blonde plaintively as she removed her pack and drew her own flashlight.
The brunette paused to look back. "You don't have to do this, Elsie," she said. "Don't worry about me, I'm a big girl."
"I'll be damned if I let you go in there by yourself," replied the blonde. "But if we get flattened by a rock I'm holding you personally responsible."
Lara smiled. "Fair enough."
Elsie joined her companion at the entrance. The ceiling was low, Lara being fractionally closer to it than the blonde; they could fit inside without crouching, but only just. The narrow construction also meant they had to go single file, Lara taking the lead.
The air within was stale. Elsie noted there wasn't so much as a single cobweb lining the nooks of the walls or ceiling. The place had evidently been exceedingly well-sealed.
There was a slight downward slope to the passageway; the sensation that they were gradually moving into the Earth only heightened the blonde's apprehension.
Lara stopped ahead of her.
"Did you hear that?" whispered the brunette.
Elsie froze. Heart racing, she strained her ears.
"What?" she squeaked.
A pause. "Maybe it was nothing."
Elsie swore under her breath.
Lara looked back over her shoulder, smiled and winked.
"Oh...fudge nuggets!" blurted the blonde, shoving her companion in the back. "Don't do that!"
They pressed on, Elsie trying to decide if she should be irritated or grateful for her friend's apparent fearlessness. But then, the brunette was in her element, while she most definitely wasn't.
She wondered just how far the passageway ran for: she estimated their current distance from the entrance at roughly two hundred feet. She'd never been claustrophobic, but the walls seemed to be closing in the further they went – whether it was an optical illusion or a manifestation of her anxiety, she couldn't be sure.
"This is massive," said Lara from in front, her voice filled with wonder. "This might be larger than West Kennet Long Barrow, Elsie..."
"Imagine that," said the blonde unenthusiastically.
"Hold on," said Lara. "Something up ahead..."
Elsie's heart jumped. "You better not be joking - "
"No, look."
The American drew close and peered cautiously over her friend's shoulder.
Ahead lay what appeared to be a large chamber, the glow from their flashlights casting confusing shadows within. At least nothing seemed to be moving inside, noted Elsie with relief.
"Almost there, Elsie," said the archaeologist as she moved forward.
"Here be dragons," whispered the blonde.
They emerged into a large circular chamber capped with a towering corbeled-vaulted ceiling that rose a good twenty feet above the floor. The room was possibly sixty feet in diameter or more, large enough that the far side remained predominantly in shadow.
But what drew their immediate attention was an impossibly ornate tapered stone approximately seven feet in height and perfectly dressed, dominating the centre of the structure. Elsie's eye fell on the innumerable elaborate designs on its surface which she recognized as incredibly complex and intricate examples of Celtic knot work, flawlessly chiseled in stone. The beauty and workmanship of the carvings astonished her.
"What is this?" she asked softly as she approached the monolith, her curiosity temporarily overriding her apprehension.
"Incredible isn't it?" answered the brunette. "Just look at this place…I've never heard of a corbelled ceiling covering a structure this large. Just the architecture alone would be worthy of - Elsie, look at the walls."
The blonde directed her flashlight to where Lara was focusing hers: glittering metal reflected their lights back at them. The two women slowly approached, the gleaming metal slowly coalescing into a large circular object: a highly polished and decorated bronze shield, with two spears crossed behind and pointing upwards at an angle approximately fourty-five degrees apart.
"Wowzers," breathed the American.
Lara traced her fingers around the shield's embossed rim. "Tell me your secrets," she whispered in awe.
Many other shields lined the walls, all backed by a pair of crossed weapons. Each shield was of a different colour and design, fading off into the darkness at the rear of the chamber. "Well, it's definitely Iron Age, at least," concluded the archaeologist. "This couldn't possibly be Neolithic…"
The blonde looked to her friend. "I hate to admit it, but…I'm starting to understand what you see in this stuff."
The brunette smiled back. "Hard not to get excited, isn't it?"
"Okay, fine," admitted Elsie. "It's just…to think no one has seen these things in two thousand years…"
"That's my girl."
"I'm wondering though, why do all these shields look so different?"
Lara examined the circular one they'd first observed; its polished surface was embossed with elaborate Celtic knot work around its rim, the centre dominated by a stylized dragon. Another shield to its left was oval-shaped, with two poleaxes crossed behind; it brandished a boar as its central motif. Another further down was lozenge-shaped, with dual swords hung on the wall behind; its central design a representation of a bear.
"These are clan symbols," explained Lara, lightly tracing her fingers across the shield's embossed features. Its condition was exquisite, almost as though it had been placed there only days before. "I recognize some of these…Munster…Connaught…these are Irish, Elsie."
"Irish? I thought the clans were Scottish?"
Lara nodded. "They were, but Iron Age Ireland was very similar, for centuries it was a conglomerate of small kingdoms," she explained. "These must be their crests, I'm almost certain of it…"
"Why here though?" asked the blonde. "Shouldn't this be in Ireland?"
"That's the question, isn't it?" agreed Lara.
They continued along the circular wall, taking note of the various displayed shields and accompanying weapons.
Elsie stepped on something hard, the crunch echoing loudly in the tomblike silence.
"The hell…?"
She took a quick step back and shone her light on the ground.
"Oh, FUCK!"
Hidden behind the stone menhir, and splayed out on the ground before them, was a long dried-out corpse.
"Shitshitshit!" wailed Elsie. Lara quickly pulled the blonde back and interposed herself between the American and the object of her horror.
"Look at me," said the brunette, staring directly into the American's terrified eyes. "Elsie, you're hyperventilating, focus on me, focus on my voice - "
She wrapped herself around Elsie protectively, cradling the blonde's head against her shoulder.
"You're okay," cooed the brunette soothingly as she gently stroked her companion's hair. "You're okay, Elsie...it's all right...you're safe..."
"Lara," gasped Elsie in between ragged breaths, "What...is that?"
"I don't know," said the archaeologist softly. "I'll figure it out later...let's get you outside, okay?"
The blonde pulled out of Lara's embrace. "No," she said hoarsely. "I need to…man up about this..."
Lara looked at her with concern. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah," swallowed the blonde, putting on an unconvincing smile for her friend's sake. "Just…not used to this shit, you know?"
Her gaze focused above and behind her friend's shoulder, her grey eyes swelling in alarm.
"LARA!"
The archaeologist whirled around, axe held high.
On a raised dais along the chamber's back wall sat an ancient helmeted skeletal figure: clad in remnant rags of once rich clothing, it was festooned with the brilliant gold torque, sword and enameled jewelry of a Celtic king.
"It's okay!" asserted Lara quickly. "He's…quite dead too…"
"What the fuck, Lara? What the hell is this place?" lamented the blonde, taking a step back and glancing anxiously about her.
"I don't have an answer for you, Elsie," said the brunette, gazing at the seated figure. "Not yet, anyway…"
Lara turned her attention to the sprawled figure on the floor, it being their more pressing concern; the man had clearly been dead for years, perhaps even decades, but from his clothing and accoutrements he was obviously not contemporary with the rest of the structure. In one skeletal hand the corpse clutched an old style torch, laying on the floor inches from the other bony fingers was an old canteen.
The brunette knelt down and gingerly went through the man's clothing, Elsie looking on nervously. Reaching inside the man's coat, the archaeologist pulled out a crackling leather wallet.
"James Forrestal," said Lara softly, going through the aged papers within. "Yank…born eighteen eighty-nine in Baltimore…money has issue dates in the twenties and thirties…he must've died roughly seventy or so years ago…"
"Lara…" said Elsie nervously, "What killed him? Why'd he die in here?"
The Englishwoman looked up to her friend, her expression doing nothing to soothe the blonde. "That's a very good question," said the brunette. "There are no obvious signs of trauma..."
"If he can die in here so can we," warned the blonde. "Can we just get out of here, please?"
To her surprise, the brunette nodded with a sigh. "All right," she said, getting up from the long deceased Forrestal. "There's not much else we can do here for the moment, anyway…you brought your phone, yes?"
The American reached into her trouser pocket. "But there's no service – "
"I just need the camera," said the Englishwoman. "Let me just take some snaps of this place; that way we'll have irrefutable proof, they'll have no choice now but to take it seriously. Then we'll go, all right?"
Elsie unlocked her phone and handed it to her companion, intensely relieved at her companion's decision. "Okay…thanks, Lara…"
Lara smiled at her reassuringly and began taking snapshots of the chamber, the flash being particularly harsh in the confined blackness. Elsie moved to the central stone monolith. She trailed her fingers along the exquisite knot work, the impossibly complex patterns beguiling her.
"Lara…could this be something like that 'Stone of Destiny' you were talking about?"
"The thought had occurred to me," said the brunette as she continued to move about the structure. "Or…and I have no evidence for this…it might be the real Stone – the one in Ireland might simply have been a convenient substitute to throw off those who might seek to steal or destroy it."
"But why bring it here - ?"
"Think of the timeline, Elsie," continued the archaeologist, moving to take a photograph of the seated skeletal figure. "This structure is roughly contemporary with the Roman invasion of Britain…it wouldn't be much for the builders to fear Ireland might be next…"
Elsie turned her attention back to the monolith, her hand sliding across its carved surface. If Lara's theory was right, they'd just stumbled across a major archaeological find of historic significance.
"Guess I'm not King material either…" she whispered.
A barely audible rumbling permeated the chamber, the vibrations carrying through to the ground beneath their feet. Elsie snapped her hand back, the deep rumbling continuing unabated.
"That wasn't me!" she blurted. "Shit, maybe it was…oh, please tell me I had nothing to do with that…"
Lara dashed to her side. "What'd you do?"
"I barely touched it," said the blonde, indicating the carved menhir. "That couldn't be me, could it? It's not like I pushed a button or tripped a lever or anything…oh God…"
A moment later the rumbling abruptly ceased.
The two young women stood absolutely still and waited anxiously.
"Well…so far so good," ventured Elsie with relief after several moments of silence. "Maybe it was just a small quake - "
She was pulled back violently by her companion, nearly losing her balance as she plowed awkwardly into the brunette. "Lara, what the hell – "
Then she saw it.
The supposedly 'dead' Celtic king was standing upright on its dais, its empty eye sockets trained directly on them.
