Hidden Treasures

The map directed the duo out of the tunnels; yet as the end of the tunnel loomed ahead, Lara could see nothing. It was precisely that which made her doubt her interpretation of the map. There was nothing. Nowhere to go; a dead end.

And yet, a quick glance at Kurtis exposed a hauntingly cool and unconcerned face. Determined not to admit that the tomb raider didn't know how to proceed, she subtly slowed her steps and waited for the demon hunter to react.

He didn't, at least not until they had reached the wall itself. He walked towards the end of the hall before lifting a hand, placing it against the wall, and bracing himself. Half expecting him to use some special power or heritage to shatter the wall or cause it to disappear, she laughed when she realized he was pushing the wall. Her eyes instantly found the crack that was their door, and helped him to push the wall herself. Soon, the wall moved, revealing a long, perhaps naturally carved, vertical shaft that was lit by some unknown source. The shaft was rough and uneven, vaguely reminiscent of the Tomb of Ancients underneath the Louvre, although all Lara could make out from her vantage point was the chalky, dusty, and dirty walls that would not lend themselves to climbing. The door opened onto a ledge which peeked precariously down into the shaft, but no sooner had they stepped through then the door retreated, disguising itself into the wall once more.

"Well, looks like the only way to go is down." Kurtis observed.

"Or across." Lara said. Kurtis turned to her, confused, but only saw the blurry movement of a figure running into the air before grabbing a ledge slightly lower, but across the rather massive shaft.

Kurtis smirked as he too sailed across, grunting as he rolled to a stop next to Lara, picking himself up and dusting himself off as he stood up.

Now the two of them were standing in a small alcove, giving a spectacular perspective of the shaft. Lara's initial examinations of the walls were correct. There was no way to scale them, no outcroppings or natural ledges that would allow a somewhat safe descent to the ground. The source of light in the shaft was also revealed: a large, copper or bronze pit sitting atop a large square podium housed a flame. It was a quite large flame, perhaps more equitable to a fire, as it might appear in a large bonfire. Curiously enough however, all this was emitted by one sole flame, as if it were a single candle with a very large wick.

There was nothing of interest in the shaft until the floor was reached. At the opposite end from the ledge were they currently stood Lara could see the foreboding gothic doorway, with an ornately carved arch over a metal door, at the end of a series of steps. She couldn't make out the carvings of the door, but she knew that was where they were headed.

Kurtis had stepped to view the room next to her. He took in the vastness of the room, but also the lack of opportunities to reach the ground. He continued taking it in while Lara turned around to inspect the alcove. Her eyes suddenly spotted a lever in the rear.

"Here. Give me a hand, will you?" Kurtis acquiesced. Within seconds a vast rumbling threw the two un-expecting adventurers to their feet. As soon as the rumbling stopped, Lara quickly ran to the mouth of the niche. Kurtis was soon beside her.

As they peered down they saw that the podium holding the vast fire pit had shot up into the air, level with them now, and that the copper pit holding the flame had flipped, revealing a smooth, flat surface; it was ideal to jump onto. Kurtis thought that that was the obvious method of descending, but Lara held him back.

"Wait. It could be a trap. Or timed. And where would that leave us?" Kurtis only grunted as he watched for a moment, when suddenly the podium retracted into the floor, the copper pit flipping back again, and the flame relighting as though it had never ceased to burn.

"It seems safe enough. No?" Lara tried, enthusiastically but uncertain. Kurtis too was a little apprehensive.

"You're the tomb raider," he said with a shrug.

"Alright. Then we'll go for it." She turned and ran to flip the switch, leaving Kurtis at the mouth with a warning. She flipped it, and both she and Kurtis braced themselves for the resembling shockwave it would emit. Having lost less time, Lara sprinted to the mouth before vaulting into the air and landing gracefully on the Podium, Kurtis beside her.

They allowed the column to recede into a podium with them on it, but jumped off just before the copper pit re-formed, thus finding solid ground beneath their feet at the foot of the stairs to the doorway that challenged them.

Kurtis braced his stance, threw open his palms, ready to use his telekinesis to thrust the doors open. Lara looked on as nothing happened.

"So how do we get it open?" A slightly shocked Kurtis asked Lara's back, she now having bounded up the few stairs to inspect their next trial.

"I'm not sure. There doesn't seem to be a handle or keyhole. I don't suppose there are any once-forgotten Veritatis classes that instructed on how to proceed?" She said, hands drifting over the smooth surface.

Lara had only meant it as a joke, a tease centered on his earlier admission. She didn't expect to see the flicker of understanding in Kurtis's eye as she turned to face him.

"Funny you should mention that." He said, lifting his hand to eye the ring on his finger. "They'd told me some crazy shit when they gave me the ring. I never thought about it-- I brushed it off, like I did most of the Lux Veritats shit. But it still doesn't make sense." He said now fingering the ring on his finger. "They basically said that the ring is the key."

"That's all you got?"

"Hey, it was not something I wanted to be a part of." He returned with a frown.

Lara just sighed. "Well let's think about this. If that's all they told you, there has to be a key hole around here somewhere." Her eyes scanned the room as she moved from her position near the door to one near the copper pot. She now noticed something on the engraving above the door that had once gone unnoticed. An inscription, presumably of the Lux Veritatis, flanked the barbed arrow symbol. "Tantum Lux lucis est validus ut patefacio ianua. Only the light can open the door. Well that doesn't help much, we know that you are supposed to pass this way, hence the Lux. Unless, Lux could have a double meaning…" she trailed off as she glanced at the flame in the copper pit.

"Are you crazy? There is no way I'm sticking my hand into fire!"

"Fair enough. Maybe it doesn't need to be your whole hand?"

"Well it's still a whole fire!"

"Well what else do we have!" Kurtis sighed as he realized they had no other lead and turned to stand next to her, observing the solitary flame in the pit.

He noticed something that Lara had previously missed. In the center of the pit, engraved on the copper, was an ancient Lux Veritatis symbol. The barbed arrow pointed towards the door, foreboding and ominous. Kurtis could barely make it out, but in a moment of clarity he could see it perfectly, and read the inscription that surrounded it in a circle.

"Prognatus ex flamma, quondam reunited is orbis mos partis lux lucis exhibeo semita vos votum. Born from the flame, once reunited this ring will share the light to show the path you desire." He sighed. "I guess that really is what I have to do."

"Are you sure you're up to it?"

"God Croft, you have so little faith in me!" he teased her, suddenly thrusting his ringed hand into the flame before he could contemplate what he was doing.

To his surprise, the flame did not burn. It caressed his hand with warmth; a soft warmth such as one might find in a kitchen of a loving mother, a warmth that soothed and comforted. As soon as his hand was in the middle of the fire, a blue cylinder erupted from the symbol in the center. It moved as to impale his hand, focusing on the ring and, after encompassing it, shooting ever upwards. With a fierce wind that blew his hair back and almost threatened his stability, and that of Lara standing next to him, the cone receded upwards, turning red again at a crawling pace as the blue collected in a sphere above the flame. Kurtis, assuming that his role had finished, attempted to move his hand but found he could not; some ancient force was holding him captive. Suddenly, without warning, the sphere exploded, sending to prominent rays out from the bulbous center. The first shot to the symbol above the door, the second hit Kurtis's shoulder, the force knocking him back, pulling his hand out of the flame and causing the sphere to implode, reverting to it's solitary flame and leaving the room as though the spectacle they just witnessed had never occurred.

Lara rose to her feet shakily, her balance distorted by the force of the… of whatever that was, she thought to herself. It took her a few moments to regain her footing, to glance at the door with dismay that it was not open, and lastly to find Kurtis up against a wall, eyes closed but visibly conscious. He was clutching his shoulder, where the beam of energy had hit him. She walked to him, taking her time, still unsure of her own footing. By the time she had reached him his eyes were open, and he stared at her. She was not surprised to see fear in his eyes, but was admittedly a little shocked when she thought she still saw a reflection of the sphere in his eyes, brief and gone the second she thought that maybe that's what it was. She realized that it was not that at all, merely the intensity of his blue eyes.

"I take it they didn't tell you that would happen when they gave you the ring." She tried, attempting to ease the tension in the room. Kurtis shook his head before grunting as his body was racked with pain. Lara hurriedly pulled his shirt away to look at his shoulder. She gasped at what she saw.

"Oh come on, it's just a burn, it couldn't be that ugly." Kurtis said. Lara smiled at the fact that he was clearly not too harmed after his experience.

"No. It's certainly not ugly. It's—" she was cut off as Kurtis cocked his head so to see.

"Jesus." Escaped his lips as he stared at the barbed arrow on his shoulder, inked as if it was a tattoo. As soon as he saw it, the throbbing pain of a burn disappeared. In a minute it was as though he'd always had it. Recognizing the Lux Veritatis symbol, he shrugged it off, pulling his shirt back over it. He hated that he'd know been branded as part of the order he tried so hard to escape.

Lara looked at him with sorrow. She could tell he hated the reminder of how he'd abandoned the order, the reminder of the weight that now stood on his shoulders. But above all, she could tell that Kurtis was not one who wanted sympathy or a reminder. She quickly changed her expression to a more determined one before pointing out that the door was still closed.

The two of them moved in silence up the stairs to the door. Lara stopped before the metal doors, and stared, confused, as Kurtis approached them with his eyes closed. In a second a blue shadow emerged from his shoulder to find the seal in the engraving, sending the metal doors open with the loud creaking noise of metal on metal.

Kurtis opened his eyes to a bewildered Lara. "Betcha couldn't do that on your own."

"Then it's lucky that I made an exception." She smiled as she passed through the doors into the unknown beyond.

The coolness of the room hit them square in the face. Apparently, the previous had been sickeningly hot but neither realized it. Only a few steps into the room and the metal doors clanged shut, sealing them in. Although neither realized it; they stood transfixed by the room, and by what it housed.

It was pristinely tiled, although the materials of the tiles could not be discerned. It was presumably the cold gray stones of the church and tunnels of the catacombs, but it held more of a shine to it. The room was square, with torches holding a blue flame every so often along the wall, leaving the ceiling in darkness and reflecting across the pond that covered the entire floor. In the center of the room; in the center of the pond rose a marble platform, the base of a podium holding the sixth obscura painting

Kurtis stood there transfixed by the room, but it was Lara who jumped into the water with a graceful dive, ready to swim towards her prize. Kurtis jumped in after her; his dive less graceful but his stroked more powerful, and soon he overtook her, reaching the podium first. He pulled himself up, she right behind him, as they stared at the painting.

"Could it really be that easy?" Lara asked, slightly bewildered.

"I guess so. I've already proved I'm not a nephilim enough times."

She shrugged as she reached for the painting. Grabbing it, she put it in her backpack and turned to Kurtis. "Don't go stealing it from me this time—" her words were cut off as the room shook violently, and out of instinct both she and Kurtis dived into the water.

"What the hell?" He yelled as she took in the room, the walls pouring water and rapidly increasing the water level, aiming to overflow the room, with them locked in. Lara too saw it, but looked around with her accustomed eye, looking for an escape. She saw it.

The torches that once embellished the walls were no longer lighting the room, instead the room found its light from above. A small, dome like recess in the ceiling, directly above the podium, was giving off light. It was there exit, she knew it, but she could also see the grating prohibiting them from salvation.

"There must be a switch!" she called to Kurtis over the drowning noise of the water, gesturing to the alcove above. Kurtis looked, understood what she was referring too, but as he returned his gaze to her she wasn't there. He splashed around for a few moments, the water level pushing him to the ceiling, before she burst through he surface, using the few moments of air left to tell him she got it and come on. She took one final breath, as did he, before there air supply was cut off and there only exit a long, water filled tunnel. Ever upwards they swam; ever upwards towards air; ever upwards, towards the light.

A/N: wow that was a long one- took long enough to write too! please forgive the latin translations- I admit that i used an online translator, so it's probably not very exact.

Special thanks to N.F.I for beta-reading it, and thanks to all my reviewers too!

hopefully the next update won't be too far off, but don't forget to respond!