A/N: If you're not familiar with them, I highly recommend looking up photos of the national park mentioned in this chapter to get an accurate picture of them. The limestone forest is beautiful and nothing on earth is quite like it, so it's a bit difficult to capture with words!
To Light and Titova: thank you for leaving a comment! It means a lot to know that people are reading *and* enjoying. I hope you continue to enjoy the story as it unfolds.

The Watcher's Stone

Chapter 6: Seal of Virtues

The thick, tall tree trunks rising straight up to twisted, splayed branches sprouting with lush green leaves at the top all blurred together like a series of swollen lines as Kurtis and Lara drove by in their rented four wheel drive jeep. Orange and pink light from the sunset flashed between the trees as they proceeded down the Avenue of the Baobabs. The trip from Istanbul to Antananarivo had taken the better part of the day, then the short flight to Morondava another hour. With an eight hour drive ahead of them, they'd reach the national park of Tsingy de Bemaraha well after dark and more troublesome, during the rainy season. The park was inaccessible during this time, and the normally dusty roads leading to the park would be muddy and slick.

Kurtis assured Lara it wouldn't be an issue.

Surprisingly, she put up no objection. Once in Madagascar Lara let him lead the way in arranging the travel and procuring the jeep, and she even let him drive while she dozed in the passenger seat. He had slept entirely through the long flight back to Africa and had woken feeling much better. His stomach felt tight with freshly knitted flesh, newly formed scar tissue gradually covering what was once a gaping hole.

He was glad she slept during the long drive. It gave him a chance to think over everything that happened in Ethiopia and Turkey without the expectation of awkward conversation. Foremost on his mind wasn't even finding the Watcher's Stone – he was sure they'd acquire it sooner or later, especially with Lara at his side – but rather his embarrassing blabber mouth back at the training base in Ani. He had told Lara more than he intended to about his past, his upbringing, spilling dark secrets about the Order. More than that it was how he said it, and what he didn't say that he feared gave so much away. Lara was sharper than a tack and he knew with any bit of information he shared, she'd be able to decipher loads more from it.

But being back at the training base unearthed long buried memories from his childhood. For a few stupid moments he lost himself in the past and let himself remember the pain – both physical and emotional. His father had been a hardass. His father had also loved him. He missed his mother, though she had been complicit in the Lux Veritatis torture that passed for training, and had sent him the Chirugai and Periapt Shards, sending him back down this dark path he wanted to leave behind.

And Lara had likely been able to read most of that on his face, in his voice. Worse yet, he revealed that he had run away from it all and left the others to fight the battles in his stead.

He disturbed her napping only twice: once during one of the ferry crossings over a river and once when he was forced to slow the vehicle to a near stop in order to find a way around a flooded section of road.

When Lara was woken for the final time, it was only by the stars and moonlight that they could make out the distant shapes of the towering, jagged rock formations from the plateau they were parked upon. The peaks of each rose in sharp and uneven lines, lending the appearance of a forest of stone. From one end to another wooden bridges were erected across the peaks, and nestled between the limestone spirals were trees and tight ravines. Rocks sat upon other rock, jutting out in such a way that they seemed to balance precariously and would tip over from the slightest breeze. The local endemic animals chirped and squeaked.

"You're absolutely sure it's here?" she asked, and rubbed the sleep from her eyes.

"Yeah." He paused. "I think."

Kurtis parked the jeep outside the perimeter of the park, and under the cover of darkness they exited, zipping up their rain jackets to keep their attire mostly dry. Lara had swapped her brown shorts for the ones she wore in Prague and her bluish-green top for a black crop-top, its length ending several inches above her belly button. Its neckline was low and scooped so with any amount of leaning over he could see her cleavage, which he just knew was going to be distracting once they removed the rain jackets. Kurtis kept to the same style of clothes, just changing them out for fresh ones and dropping the undershirt as the humidity and warmth of the season here was too much for layers.

The rain had slowed to a drizzle, and when Lara clicked on her torch the beam of light shone through the mist and directly into the glowing eyes of a lemur. It squawked a ghostly howl before scampering out of sight.

"So where's the entrance to this place?" Lara flickered her torch about, lighting up the trees.

In the distance, slightly beneath them, Kurtis could make out a bridge. He pointed his torch towards it. "We need to cross there, and then get down into the ravine. Beneath the largest spiral should be an entrance to a cave… then we follow the path."

Without waiting for further instruction, Lara began to trek through the damp vegetation, making her way towards the bridge. "If you've never been here before, how do you know where it is?"

Another lemur cackled somewhere behind her. Kurtis saw Lara jerk her head towards it. Good thing it was a full moon, or the lack of light pollution out here would make it near impossible to see anything even with the flashlights. But under the moonlight, he could make out Lara's shape, her bare legs pale and stark against the dark.

Kurtis answered her, his boots squishing in the mud. "It left a psychic mark."

Lara lost her footing and began to slide down a muddy slant. "Watch out," she called. "What do you mean by that?"

Kurtis found the edge of the slope and slid down it, taking care to avoid slipping in the mud. He lifted his torch beam to join hers, lighting up the path ahead.

"There should be a symbol close by to the cave entrance. I can feel it. The closer we get, the more… defined the feeling gets."

"I see." Lara said, not sounding convincing.

She stepped onto the wooden bridge first. It swayed as she crossed but remained secure, and he joined her to the other side.

"Here. I can feel it more. We should climb down."

Lara moved her torch along the edge of the limestone rock, scanning the edges of the small plateau. They were surrounded by sharp, deadly rock peaks, only divided irregularly by ravines. Even the edges of the plateau they were perched upon looked sharp enough to slice skin.

"I haven't any climbing gear with me," she said, approaching one side to peer over. "Do you?"

Kurtis walked up beside her and directed his own flashlight to the potential path down. He could probably descend if he could make sure it was straight down with nothing blocking the way, but their flashlights didn't reach the bottom.

"I don't," he answered belatedly as he brainstormed what to do.

Lara clicked off her flashlight and put it in her rucksack. "The fun way it is, then."

Crouching, Lara hopped off the edge of the plateau and gripped the wet edge of the limestone to hang off the edge. She glanced up at Kurtis.

"Keep your light on me, please – I need to see where I can put my hands and feet."

He felt his lips part slightly in disbelief, but did as she asked. She was going to climb all the way down those jagged rocks, in the rain, without rope or any other gear, and with only his flashlight from above to see the way?

He was rendered speechless by her boldness.

Moving carefully, but not slowly, Lara climbed her way down the side of the plateau, avoiding most sharp and jagged pieces. A few times Kurtis saw her rain jacket snag on a pointy part, but she seemed to avoid cutting her skin. When he could barely make out her form anymore, she suddenly jumped down the rest of the way.

"Made it!" she called up, then he saw her flashlight turn on and he could see that the bottom hadn't been that much farther down from where his beam of light could not reach. It was a straight shot down.

She pointed the light beam upwards to where Kurtis was just as he leapt over the edge. As he fell he saw her full mouth part in shock and she stepped out of the way. In the final meters before the bottom he pushed back against gravity, slowing his descent so that when he landed it was no more jarring to his body than jumping down a couple meters.

His boots touched the ravine floor, then he straightened up.

"That's cheating," Lara grumbled.

"Didn't realize we were competing with each other," he said around a smirk. She tried to hide it, but he could tell she was impressed by his abilities. She found him intriguing, mysterious – he only hoped her fascination for him was less the shiny-and-powerful-artifact variety and more so the kiss-and-explore-his-body kind.

"Stop showing off and take me to the cave," she said.

Kurtis looked behind and in front. "Further ahead."

Leading the way, they trekked through the ravine, its width widening and narrowing in inconsistent intervals. When it narrowed the moonlight couldn't reach them, and their flashlights were their only source of light. At some points the path was so slim Kurtis had to turn sideways and behind him Lara squeezed through, her breasts squishing against her body. How he wished he could see her do that without the rain jacket on and with better light.

Various small paths diverged from theirs, but Kurtis never faltered. He occasionally stretched one hand out like a blind person feeling for his surroundings, but the energy always answered back right away and he continued on more urgently, his sense of direction renewed.

Eventually they reached a wider section of the ravine with a small crevice beneath one of the limestone spirals. Kurtis paused and dragged his palm against the jagged rock. A blue glow trailed after, and underneath where his hand had been a symbol lit up in the rock. A downward pointing arrowhead with notches towards the top; the symbol of the Lux Veritatis.

Kurtis glanced behind at Lara. "In here."

The cave was more of the same: dark, damp, humid, and even hotter without the airflow from outside. Though the temperature wasn't particularly high, he began to lightly sweat without the breeze counteracting the mugginess. They removed their rain jackets and trekked through the stifling cave. The path gradually widened as well as cooled as they descended, and there were no off-shooting paths or room by which to get lost in, but every now and then they heard a disconcerting squeak. Some kind of animal lived down here.

The battery in Kurtis' flashlight died, so they stopped to change it. It was still too dark to see anything without it, and the cave, though relatively simple, had a few drop-offs that could cause a serious injury if one couldn't see where to walk. As Lara was crouched retrieving her extra batteries from her backpack, Kurtis saw her suddenly jerk away. She directed her flashlight towards her calf, then leapt to her feet.

Shaking her leg, she dislodged the large rat that was attached to her boot. She quickly drew one of her pistols and shot it. Kurtis cursed through the echoing ring of the gunshot, his eardrums aching.

"Why'd you shoot it?" he asked, annoyed.

Lara holstered her pistol, passed her flashlight to him, and proceeded to finish replacing the batteries in the other torch, arching a brow at him.

"It was attacking me."

Kurtis' boots scraped against the stone as he knelt near the bloodied rodent. "I'm pretty sure this was an endangered animal, Lara. Looks like a Malagsay giant rat."

"Then it shouldn't have gnawed on my boot." She clicked on the torch and her beam of light shone on him.

Kurtis flashed her a disapproving glance before stepping past her. "They don't eat humans."

"Tell that to all the hungry vermin that chase me about these places. They don't get to be that size by eating nothing."

He supposed she had a point – it had approached her. If it had been a harmless rodent, it would have avoided them. Shrugging the encounter off, they pressed on, and a short distance further, came to a wide cavern. Kurtis slowed his steps, then whispered the Latin phrase. The entire cavern lit up at once. Wooden torches stuck to the walls suddenly erupted with flames.

Though still dim, they both clicked off their flashlights to preserve their batteries and scanned the room. This was the entrance to the Lux Veritatis base: beside the southwest path they entered from, there were four other corridors at the cardinal points, and the northeast cavern wall was covered in a large puzzle. Lara approached it to inspect the symbols.

Though Kurtis hadn't attempted to get past the archaeological dig in Paris, instead leaving that work to Lara, this looked similar to the code puzzle guarding the entrance to the Lux Veritatis tomb there. Four columns, with four rows each of symbols was in the center of a circular doorway, which appeared as though it rolled to the side. Four levers–two on each side of the door–linked to the four columns. Covering the circular doorway was a hexagram housed inside a circle, and within and without the points of the star were the various symbols in random order. Written along the top of the circle was SAPIENTA DOCET, and following along the bottom of the circle was IN VITAM SUMMUS. It appeared they needed to find the correct symbols and correct order for the ones in the center.

"I recognize these symbols," Lara said. "Do they mean anything to you?"

Kurtis came to stand beside her. "They encode a message. What the message for this door is, I don't know. If someone isn't meant to come here, they wouldn't know the code." He pointed to the west side corridor. "Clues are probably somewhere down these paths. But they won't be unprotected, or easy to get to." He looked at her. "Split up?"

Arms akimbo, Lara glanced down his body. "Are you sure that's wise in your condition?"

"I'm feeling much better now."

"You'll undo all that healing you slept so much for." She turned to face him directly. "Look, you requested my help precisely for a situation like this. I used to do this sort of thing for fun," she stated matter-of-factly. "I'm not being arrogant when I say it's no problem for me. If we're dealing with the Cabal and potentially more Nephilim, I'll need your expertise, which means I want you alive and intact."

The words stung, no matter how true. As if sensing this, she tacked on softly, "Besides, I'd appreciate you watching my back out here. In case any more of those nasty rats come for a nibble?"

He pretended to mull it over, huffed softly and gave a half-hearted smirk. "Coulda just left it at 'I want you'."

Lara pressed her lips together, stifling a smile that wanted to break out, and she lightly shook her head. Bolstered by this, Kurtis's smirk turned to a genuine smile. Slowly but surely he was winning her over.

Turning on her heel, Lara left him and proceeded to the north corridor.

Lara entered a small foyer, an arch dissecting the area from the long corridor beyond. Clearly it was man-made just like the cavern behind her, and above the arch was a word etched into the stone: FORTITVDO.

Fortitude. Resilience. Strength. Was this a clue to the door code, or to what laid ahead?

She passed beneath the arch, her guard raised for traps and danger. Briefly she glanced behind, but a gate had quietly shut behind her. Forward it was, then.

Stepping carefully, she stopped abruptly when the stone square in front of her erupted in flames.

The entire hallway lit up, and heat enveloped Lara. Instinctively she leapt back and raised her arms protectively over her face. The fire was shooting all the way down the corridor as far as she could see, from all directions. The inferno lasted for moments longer, then began to shut off in a pattern starting with the section closest to Lara. Then the next, the one after, all the way down the corridor as far as she could see until suddenly the first section lit up again.

It looked like the only option was to time it carefully and sprint through. She waited until the first section turned off again and took off.

The floor was almost too warm that the soles of her boots would melt if she stood still, not to mention she'd quickly be consumed by the fire turning back on. So she sprinted and kept her eyes on the flames before her, feeling a small bit of relief each time the section in front of her turned off before she reached it.

But she saw the end of the corridor, and there was nothing there. A dead-end.

She skidded to a halt, frantically glancing around for a clue where to go next.

Then the floor beneath her gave out and she tumbled forward. She landed on a slope, its surface slick against her boots, and she balanced herself upright as she began quickly sliding down the ramp. Before her more flames burned at the bottom of the slope, threatening to consume her alive.

Fortitudo, she recalled in the seconds she had to make a decision. Well, what choice did she have? She bent her knees and pushed against the slope, launching herself outward and towards the flames. She pulled her legs up, feeling the heat lick at her exposed skin.

She landed, tucking and rolling, and used the momentum to leap to a stand. The ground was hot but–the flames had disappeared!

But the ground was hot. Lara hopped from foot to foot and quickly ran to the end of the hall, which dead-ended in a small room. A single lever greeted her, and etched into the wall was one of the symbols from the door puzzle: the one that looked like a sun. She flicked the lever down and heard behind her mechanics moving, and when she returned the slant had been replaced by a vertical ladder, leading back to the top. At the top the rest of the fire was also extinguished and the gate lifted, allowing her to return to the main room without issue.

Kurtis was sitting on the floor smoking a cigarette when she returned. He flicked the ash from the butt.

"Find anything?"

"The sun," she replied, gesturing towards the door symbols. "Time for the next one."

"You sure I shouldn't help?"

She considered it. He could possibly use his powers to bypass the traps like in Ani, but if the Stone was housed within it was just as likely these traps were meant to keep other Lux Veritatis out as well as thieves. Better not to risk it. Kurtis still had bandages around his wound, and it had only been a couple days since the injury had been aggravated to bleeding and passing out again. Judging by how he described the self-healing process, he'd need weeks more worth of uninterrupted sleep–a coma, basically–before it would be completely healed.

"Really," she said, injecting confidence into her tone, "it's no problem."

Next she entered the east corridor. Again the entrance was like the north, but the word above the arch differed. TEMPERANTIA.

Temperance. Self-control. A trait she had in abundance, when she wanted to.

She went down the hallway and through a small door, entering a large cavern. Huge wooden spikes protruded from the bottom of the pit, and erected in random placement were narrow platforms. Across the gorge was another small platform like the one she stood on and a matching door, and on either side of the pit were large stone faces with pursed lips, blowing strong gusts of wind in random order. The skinny platforms swayed and creaked in the wind.

Just like the Breath of Hades trial in the Hall of Seasons, except much cooler in temperature.

Temperance, she reminded herself. She had to use her self-control. The opposite of the previous hall, where she was required to charge through with bravery. This one she would need to wait for the right time before jumping, or she'd miss the platforms.

She waited until the closest platform held still and hopped onto it. Kneeling, she gripped the edges and scanned for the next best move while waiting for the air to blow. Her braid whipped from its force, but she maintained her grip on the platform until it stopped. Then she leapt to the next platform and repeated her actions: lowered her center of gravity, held the edges, watched and waited for her moment to move. Gradually she worked her way across the gorge of spikes, feeling the adrenaline coursing through her from the danger.

When she was about halfway across, the winds changed.

She was about to leap to the next platform when the nearest statue blew a gust of wind so strong she lost her balance. Lara fell. She caught the ledge of the platform and held on, squeezing her thighs around the stem for added leverage. When the gust ended, she had only enough time to pull herself back on before it started up again, nearly blowing her right off once more.

She didn't dare attempt to stand. She waited, clutching the platform, through two more timed gusts, realizing she'd have to time her jump precisely to risk being blown into the abyss. She couldn't rush through this at all or let impatience get the better of her.

Finally she pushed herself up just as a gust ended, and hopped forward to the next platform, slamming herself flat onto her belly just as another gust rushed over her. Lara blew out her own breath in relief.

She only had to do that oh… five more times.

Finally she reached the other side and went through the door. An identical room to the north one greeted her, with a lever and a symbol on the wall: The shape of a crescent moon. She flung the lever and went back to through the spike room, now with the wind statues no longer blowing and swaying the platforms.

When she reached the main hall, Kurtis was in much the same state as he had been before, except he had finished his cigarette and there was another Malagsay giant rat dead on the floor a few feet away from him.

Lara made a 'hmph' noise in the back of her throat and relayed the symbol to him as she crossed to the south hallway, eying the rodent which appeared to have been cut down by Kurtis' Chirugai. She had only been joking about him guarding the place from rats…

PRVDENTIA was the word above the south arch. Prudence. So far, the words above the arches were all Stoic virtues, but also gave a small clue to what she could expect ahead. She kept the word in mind as she went down the hall, turned the corner and came to a room in the shape of a half-circle. Along the curved wall were several doors, evenly spaced apart, each with a button in their center in the shape of different symbols.

Lara stepped forward, examining her surroundings. She noticed straight away that nestled within the ceiling above each door were spears. If she opened the wrong door, she had no doubt they would deploy to stab her for her folly. In fact, the remains of one such fool was still crumbled in front of one of the doors, nothing but a pile of tattered cloth and bones.

The answer seemed to be in the symbols on the doors. She studied them carefully, walking from one end of the room to the other. Prudence. She must exercise caution and wisdom.

They were the same symbols as the selection from the door puzzle in the main cavern. Some resembled objects from real life, such as the sun, moon, and star, but others were abstract. There was a circle with a marking within, a bulbous figure with two pieces branching off, a crescent with a notch at the top. The second to last door from the left was an oval with an incomplete circle sitting on top of it.

How was she to know which symbol was the correct one? She couldn't just try them. Her first choice had to be the correct one.

She inspected the room more thoroughly. Right away she could rule out the moon door – the skeleton had chosen that one. She also decided the other symbol she'd already encountered in the other hallway could be ruled out. So no sun, no moon. If only she had gone to the last hallway before this one, then she'd be able to rule out another symbol. Still, that would leave four symbols as the potential option, so there had to be another way to tell.

Lara glanced back the way she came. The gate would be closed and remain so until she pulled the switch. She swallowed a sigh, wondering if Kurtis would have better insight. But no, he hadn't indicated the symbols were special on their own; they were only used to encode a message – in this case, it seemed the four cardinal virtues.

She looked at the buttons more carefully. The edges of some of the symbols were worn down more than others. The star button was worn down so much to appear nearly flat, the dark filled-in etching more gray than black, the points rounded off instead of sharp. The strange oval with the open circle sitting atop it was the opposite: it looked as though no one had ever touched it at all. The etching was pure black, the edges sharp and pronounced. The other symbols were somewhere between the two in their state of use.

Lara stood before the star, tentatively reaching a hand out but not touching the button. So far she's found sun and moon; wouldn't logically the next be a star? It was the most used button…

She backed away and went to stand before the open circle button. This was supposed to be a hidden base. No one – not even other Lux Veritatis – were meant to come here unless it was for something very important. And then they'd have to pass these tests. How many others could have had reason to step foot in this place before Kurtis?

Clearly the signs of use and wear were a trick themselves. The normal response would be to pick the button most used, as evidence someone before had chosen it and made it through, like picking the most worn down numbers on a keypad to guess the passcode. And the symbol itself – a star – others would have a similar thought that it matches the sun and moon. But none of the other symbols really matched those three. The others were more abstract. There was no reason to believe the third symbol must be the star, when the fourth had to be something unrelated.

No, the star was too simple.

Lara chewed over the decision several more moments, examining the other buttons in turn, coming to the same conclusion: the one that looked untouched was likely the correct one. This room was designed to trick the less prudent, to test the wisdom of the interloper.

She pushed the button. Immediately she hopped back, though she knew if the spears were going to deploy they would have already ran her through before she could move. Instead the door swung open.

Lara let a terse breath out. The door opened to nothing but a wall, the room inside smaller than even her bedroom closet back in Surrey. On the wall was the same symbol as the one above the door.

She exited the way she came.

There were no additional dead rats when she passed through the main hall, but Kurtis was pacing around with his weapon out as though on the hunt. She told him the symbol.

The last and west hall had the word IVSTITIA above the arch. Justice, righteousness. The last cardinal virtue. She carried on down the hall until it split into two different corridors, one to her left and one to her right. In front was a closed gate, no handle or way to open it.

Now she had a choice to make, and if the previous trials were anything to go by, the cost of choosing wrong would be her life.

The right side path was wide and open. Careful examination revealed nothing hidden or hanging waiting to cut her to pieces. Nothing about the floor looked suspicious, either. Too simple, she determined. Nothing good ever came from something so easy. Someone intent on stealing would take the path of least resistance, but if a Lux Veritatis was coming for just reasons, they would endure a test to prove themselves.

Said test was clearly taking the left path. The left was narrow and filled along the sides by bronze briars and prickly wired-thicket. There was no way to proceed through without being injured, even if only a little. Poised above the threshold of both paths was a gate ready to slam shut. There could be no changing her mind.

Lara thought. Two paths, one wide and easy, the other narrow and difficult–why did that seem familiar?

Out of nowhere, a memory from her childhood of Father Bram Patrick Dunstan giving a homily surfaced: "Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road is easy that leads to destruction, and there are many who take it. For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it."

Well, if the Lux Veritatis were trying to ensure whoever made it inside was worthy, surely knowing basic parables from scripture would be expected?

Justice, fairness, righteousness… The righteous seek God on the narrow path? Lara shrugged her shoulders to herself – she wasn't sure how exactly the Lux Veritatis saw the connection between this test and the virtue, but she was certain of the correct choice. It couldn't be the one that was easy and harmless; judging from Kurtis' experience, the Lux Veritatis was all about pain and difficulty.

Bracing herself, she began heading down the narrow path. The thorns, though somewhat pliable, were impossible to avoid completely. They scratched her, snagged at her clothes and belt and backpack, caught her hair. Everywhere her skin was exposed – legs, belly, arms – it stung with little cuts and scratches, but there was no other way. At what she estimated to be the halfway point, she saw on the walls and ceiling the Lux Veritatis downward pointing arrow symbol, which consoled her she had chosen the correct path.

Eventually the path took a sharp right and up ahead she saw the end. To the left on the wall was a lever, and above it a symbol resembling a king's crown. Straight ahead, what she presumed to be the end of the wide path, was a huge pit of spikes. A slope fed into the spike pit, and above it was a trap door. She couldn't see what the wide path contained, but she guessed the path climbed upward and had a false lever with a symbol, to trick whoever entered into thinking they'd chosen correctly–only to be dropped to their death.

Lara cranked the lever and behind her a section of the wall rose, revealing another narrow, albeit painless corridor. It took her straight back to the closed gate from earlier, which was now open, and Lara exited the hallway.

Kurtis' eyes widened upon falling on the nicks and little trails of blood that marred her arms, legs, and belly, and he stood to attention, his mouth parting slightly in an expression Lara could think of as none other than concern. He stepped towards her then redirected his path to meet her at the door puzzle, though his gaze continued to flicker to her injured skin. Lara always found the pointless concern of others irritating, and somewhat more so when coming from a man, because she couldn't help but wonder if there was some ulterior motive in the display.

"You want a hand cleaning those up?" he asked mildly.

Lara refrained from giving an unladylike snort as she pulled out a small medkit to apply disinfectant to the marks that drew blood. No doubt Kurtis would enjoy laying his hands all over her bare skin. And you would enjoy it too, a small quiet part of her added. A memory from the last time Kurtis felt her up surfaced, his rough yet gentle hands caressing down her arms and over her belly as he disarmed her. Lara quelled a shiver and shook her head, kneeling down to begin cleaning the cuts.

"So what did you find in the last hall?" he asked.

"A crown."

"A crown, a sun, crescent moon, and a uh, incomplete circle thing… That certainly narrows down the potential combinations from over 65,000, but we still don't know the order. Was there anything else in the halls that might give us a hint?"

"Actually," she said, putting away the medkit and standing, "at the start of each corridor was a Latin word. Fortitudo, temperantia, prudentia, and iustitia."

"Fortitude, temperance, prudence, justice. The four cardinal virtues from Stoicism."

"Right. Was Stoicism important to the Order?"

Kurtis looked at the door, tilting his head in thought. "Philosophy was important, sure, so was many other subjects."

Lara crossed her arms. "You're the expert here, Kurtis. Come on, you've been saying all this time that I'll need you to get through this place; now's your chance to prove it."

He stepped closer to the door, his eyes flicking from one point to the next, brows furrowing in thought. After a moment, he raised a hand and tentatively pointed at the Latin words at the top and bottom of the circle.

"'Wisdom teaches'... 'Supreme in life'... Does this…?" He looked back at Lara. "This look like a Seal of Solomon to you?"

Lara tilted her head slightly. "Other than the gibberish symbols, it does."

"King Solomon was renown for his wisdom. The four cardinal virtues don't only show up in Stoic philosophy. The Book of Wisdom, allegedly written by King Solomon, lists these same virtues."

Lara nodded, following along. "Perhaps the order listed in the book, then? Do you know it?"

Kurtis went over to the first lever and cranked it. "It's part of the quote, talking about wisdom: 'And if a man love justice: her labors have great virtues; she teaches temperance, and prudence, and justice, and fortitude, which are such things as men can have nothing more profitable in life.'"

He stopped cranking at the crescent moon, the symbol for temperance. Catching on, Lara went to the other side and began moving the symbols to the ones for justice and fortitude – the crown and sun.

As soon as all the symbols were placed, each of the squares over them locked down over them and the cavern began to rumble around the door as the mechanism activated. The triangular points of the hexagram slid into the middle strip of symbols then the strip depressed slightly. Separating, the strip disappeared into the left side of the wall and the remainder of the seal rolled away into the right side of the wall, leaving a large circular opening to the other side.

Kurtis looked at Lara, a hint of a smile on his lips. That smug bastard. He opened his mouth but she spoke before him.

"No need to say it."

"Told ya so," he said anyway.

Lara huffed playfully, squashing her matching smile. "A little humility wouldn't hurt, Kurtis."

"You first," he retorted, and then nodded his head towards the passage ahead.

Casually putting her hands on her hips, Lara turned her face away and towards the next room, lifting her head haughtily. She felt Kurtis' gaze follow her, could feel his eyes slide up and down her body as she crossed the threshold. She allowed her lips to stretch into a smirk where he couldn't see.

A/N: The quoted scripture in this chapter are Matthew 7:13-14 and Wisdom 8:7