She Is The Widow Maker Read online

  “Perfect,” she whispered to herself.

  The Drow held the hair between her thumb and forefinger and stared into the mirror as she shimmered into a clone of Shay. She took a few deep breaths as she reached deeper into the link between the hair and the woman. Not a true connection to her soul, but enough.

  I understand now, Shay. You’re a tomb raider? Don’t make me laugh. You’re a scrounging parasite who feasts upon the artifacts of superior beings.

  Widowmaker tossed the hair on the bathroom counter and headed upstairs to Shay’s bedroom. She threw open her closet and looked through the hanging clothes.

  “I have the look. I have the smell. I have what he wants. I just have to find the princess, and then I will have James Brownstone…for lunch or an after-dinner snack.”

  James and Shay made their way through the rough earthen tunnel, their headlamps cutting through the darkness and their footsteps echoing.

  The bounty hunter ducked to avoid hitting his head. “These tunnels are too fucking small.”

  “Guess the average Inca was shorter than the average Brownstone.” Shay chuckled. “Plus, who the fuck knows? These Pucará de Cerro La Muralla tunnels might not have been something that the average Incan even knew about. You saw the shit I had to do to reveal the hidden stairs, right?”

  “What’s some foreign map doing underneath an Incan fortress in a place where people can’t even find it? You never explained that.”

  “You didn’t ask. You’re not always the most curious guy, Brownstone.”

  James grunted. “I figured you’d fill me in when I needed to know.”

  Shay smirked. “The basic deal is that even though many of his maps have disappeared or been destroyed by people trying to cover up the truth, Piri Reis produced maps that were way too accurate for his time. As in, some of that shit people didn’t have down until centuries later, and in some cases, there were things that modern maps don’t show at all. Lost continents and shit like that.”

  “Huh.”

  “Yep. There are a few journal fragments that discuss him using some sort of ‘collective dream’ to help him map, based on dealing with people in certain key points.” Shay shrugged. “Always thought most of it was bullshit, but the Professor dug deeper. A lot of people have tried to explain why certain places had much better cartographical knowledge than they should have, and some have even gone so far as to suggest there was like a guild or a cult or whatever the fuck you want to call it dedicated to understanding the true map of the world. Some sort of metaphor for understanding God or something. Hard to say with people back in the day.”

  “I don’t get it. So you’re saying it’s his map, but someone else here made it after talking to him in a dream?”

  Shay nodded. “Yeah, basically. That was just how they rolled—at least Piri Reis and some of the people he was in contact with. Not a lot of information left about his group.”

  “If all that shit was happening, why did anyone bother to send out explorers? Seems like a waste of time if they already knew everything that was out there.”

  “Same reason as always—control. Can’t have these magical bastards communicating in dreams and sharing information.” Shay ran a finger across her throat. “Lot more people killed for simple shit back then than most people realize. Not like they could just upload it to the internet. Pretty easy to suppress information, and a lot of these guys didn’t even realize they were doing shit that would get them in trouble.”

  “Yeah, guess so.”

  The tunnel widened into a vast stone chamber with three more equally spaced exits. A pile of rocks all but blocked one of the exits, and the partially caved-in ceiling provided their original source.

  Piles of white stones littered the floor. Focusing his light on a white stone, James grunted. No, not rocks.

  “Shit. That’s a lot of bones.”

  Shay frowned and swept her light across the chamber. “Yeah. That’s a shit-load. Too many, especially considering how hard it is to get in here.”

  “The place above used to be a fortress. Got to stick dead soldiers somewhere. Maybe there’s a shaft or something that we can’t see, or it got filled in?”

  The tomb raider shook her head. “I’d still expect fewer intact bones. These might be fresher.”

  “Fresher? How fresh is ‘fresher?’”

  “Who the fuck knows? I could be wrong. It’s pretty dry in here. Could be months. Could be decades. Could be centuries old, and I’m worrying about nothing.” Shay shrugged. “Or it could be a skeleton army ready to rise. Never know on a tomb raid anymore. I don’t tell you half the fucked-up shit I see.”

  James shrugged. “In Detroit, I just decapitated a guy who could hop bodies.”

  “We have some fucked-up jobs.”

  They both laughed.

  Once they calmed down, Shay pointed to an elaborate geometric pattern carved above one of the exits. “That’s where we need to go.”

  The pair made their way down another narrow tunnel that opened into an even larger chamber. Small jagged holes covered the walls and ceiling but the stone floor was unmarked, even if the bones made it hard to see.

  A stone obelisk rose from the center of the room, with complex geometric patterns covering it from top to bottom. They spun in a circular pattern that directed the observer to a golden plate inside a hole in the center of the monument. Etched silver lines covered the plate.

  James moved closer to the plaque, bones crunching underneath his boots. He narrowed his eyes. “Wait a second.”

  Shay rushed past him with a grin on her face. “Yep. It’s exactly what you think. I love a good artifact discovery.”

  Now closer to the plaque, James could clearly make out the continent on the gold and silver map. A few large land masses that didn’t exist on current maps decorated the plate.

  How many years had passed since the map had been accurate? Hundreds? Thousands? It was hard to know, given all the knowledge that had been suppressed.

  “Fucking nice,” Shay whispered. “Okay, just one last little bit and we can grab this shit and get out of here. It’ll take a minute or two to complete the ritual to remove it from the obelisk, though.”

  Something chittered in the distance.

  James looked around the room, his headlamp cutting from wall to wall. “You hear that?”

  “I’d like to say no, but that would be bullshit,” Shay muttered under her breath. “I guess if this shit was gonna be easy, the Professor wouldn’t have needed me to do it. Do your ‘kill ‘em all and let God sort them ‘em out’ thing while I get the map.”

  The tomb raider pulled out a dried herb from a pouch on her belt, crushed it, and rubbed it all over her palms.

  Scratching joined the chittering.

  James unholstered his gun. This shit wasn’t going to end well. This was why he preferred bounties. He didn’t like being the one hunted.

  Shay placed her hands on either side of the map and chanted something in a language James didn’t know, not that managing that was hard. A bright yellow glow surrounded the plate and illuminated the chamber.

  Fuzzy, jointed legs covered half the ceiling, connected to spiders with glistening fangs. James didn’t give a shit about spiders normally, but these bastards were the size of pit bulls. It was going to need a little more than a boot heel to take them out.

  Shay kept chanting and the glow grew brighter.

  A spider leapt from above and James planted a .45 bullet in its head, splattering it into pieces. The body crashed to the ground, scattering the bones that covered it. More of the eight-legged monsters emerged from the holes and their scurrying and chittering echoed in the chamber.

  James emptied his clip into the nearest spiders, but for every one he sent to spider hell two more poured out of holes. He reloaded with a grunt.

  “Damn it, this isn’t a fight—it’s fucking pest control. I should have brought a can of Raid.”

  Shay stopped chanting and the glow faded. The tomb r
aider took a deep breath and snatched the plate from the obelisk. She shoved it into her backpack.

  “Let’s get the fuck out of here!”

  They sprinted toward the tunnel. The thuds of spiders hitting the ground echoed in the chamber, but a writhing, crawling mass of fangs and legs continued to follow them like a wave of death, eager to add their bones to the collection.

  James and Shay’s bullets brought down the trailing giant arachnids with ease, but the creatures showed no fear and reinforcements ran right over their dead. The humans wouldn’t be able to outrun the swarm forever.

  “Fuck.” The bounty hunter reloaded. “Run ahead of me. I’ve got an idea.”

  Shay kept up her pace as James slowed. “I hope this isn’t a dumbass idea, Brownstone.”

  “It probably is, but it’s better than getting eaten by giant spiders.”

  “That’s a low fucking bar to clear, but I’ll take it.”

  They hit the earlier chamber, Shay in the lead. James reached into his backpack and pulled out a C4 charge.

  “Guess we didn’t need to dig with this shit, but it can still be useful.” He keyed in a delayed timer and threw it with full strength toward a crack in the ceiling before sprinting into the entrance tunnel.

  Hope I judged that right or it’s gonna be a sad fucking day for me.

  The swarm grew closer.

  “Four, three, two, one…”

  The tunnels shook with the force of the explosion and a grinding rumble continued to shake them after. Screeches and shrieks echoed through the tunnel and clouds of dust billowed from the chamber behind them.

  James sped after Shay, his heart pounding. The shaking and rumbling continued, and portions of the tunnel behind them collapsed.

  Both kept running until they arrived at the stone stairs leading them back to the main ruins.

  Shay leaned over, panting. Sweat covering her forehead. “Way to close the back door.” She winked. “But just so you know, I don’t like back-door action.”

  “Huh? I got those things off us, didn’t I?”

  The tomb raider rolled her eyes. “Never mind; too lowbrow for you, I guess. Or maybe some shit in the past didn’t go the way you liked.”

  James wiped at the dust coating him. “Is this something I need to look up? And what about my past?”

  Shay held up a hand. “You know what, never mind. I don’t want to know. If you had a bunch of women in your past, I’d have to go kill them one by one.”

  The bounty hunter stared at her, more confused than when they’d started the conversation.

  “Let’s get the hell out of here. At least tomorrow shouldn’t involve…” Shay gestured down the stairs. “Any of that sort of shit.”

  “Okay,” James rumbled. He still didn’t understand what Shay had been going on about before, but even for the Scourge of Harriken, sometimes discretion was the better part of valor.

  20

  Widowmaker walked into the Leanan Sídhe, enjoying the looks men shot her way. So many weddings rings, so many targets—but she wasn’t there for a harvest. At least, not yet.

  Shay had a nice appearance. The Drow wasn’t sure if she preferred it to some of her other recent disguises, but it would be a useful weapon even if she weren’t hunting Brownstone.

  Still, even a quality weapon should be tested before its use in battle, and that was why she’d returned to the pub. The Professor had acted as if he’d smelled through her disguise before, so it’d be good chance to see how thoroughly her new appearance would fool someone who knew Shay well.

  The man wasn’t anywhere in the room, so the Drow headed to the bar.

  The bartender smiled. “Hey, Shay. What can I get for you?”

  Widowmaker smiled back. “I was looking for the Professor, but I don’t see him anywhere. Is he in the bathroom or something?”

  “Nope, he’s not here at all. He left a couple of hours ago. I can give him a message for you if he comes back in.”

  The Drow shook her head. “No, it’s all right. It wasn’t anything important. I’ll just throw him a text and catch up with him later. Hey, you seen Brownstone around?”

  “Nope. Him neither. Sorry.”

  Widowmaker gave him a little wave and headed toward the door, smiling to herself.

  Not a full test, perhaps, but still a successful outing.

  Her heart swelled with confidence. The plan would work. Soon the location of the princess and James Brownstone’s life would both be hers.

  The way Shay had built up the ruins in Argentina, James had expected some vast temple filled with hidden chambers; something similar to what they’d wandered through in Chile the day before. Instead, what he got were a pile of broken rocks and a few cracked pillars.

  Previous expeditions had pushed back the trees and bushes, so at least they didn’t have to dig anything up.

  Archaeology struck James as what the Devil might force him to do as a punishment. Sitting around carefully digging while worrying about breaking some lost unique thing sounded painful.

  Shay grinned. “Whip it out, Brownstone.”

  James blinked. “Huh?”

  She nodded toward a pillar. “Your amulet, dumbass.”

  He pulled out the amulet. “What about it?”

  Shay pointed to the top of the pillar. Glyphs circled it. “Look familiar?”

  James didn’t even need to check his amulet to know the answer to that. This was the first time in his life he’d seen anything that matched the symbols on his amulet.

  “Son of a bitch.! I know you’ve been talking about them, but seeing them… Shit, it’s weird.”

  “So here’s the deal. I’ve traced these symbols all over the world. Here, Japan, Egypt, Iceland, and Australia, and those are just the ones I’ve been to so far. I think people have been looking at them the wrong way, since the few people who are aware of them have assumed they have something to do with Oriceran.”

  “What do they mean, beyond being associated with sky gods?”

  “That’s where things get interesting.” Shay grinned. “There are mostly the same symbols, but they have different patterns in the different locations. It’s taken me a while to figure out why that is, and that’s the big key to the mystery.”

  James stared at her, waiting for her to elaborate.

  Shay lifted her phone and snapped a picture of the symbols on the pillar. “I collected all the data from the different locations and tried to figure out if there were any associations between the symbols and something about the location. I kept running into dead ends, and nothing made sense.”

  “But you figured it out?”

  “Yeah, the Japan trip finally helped the pieces of the puzzles slide into place.” Shay took a deep breath. “Look, it’s not anything about the places. It is the locations themselves. Using algorithms to process seasonal variations along with the longitude and latitude of the different places, and putting that together with the symbols, I think I found out what they are trying to tell people.”

  James grunted. “All that shit sounds complicated.”

  Shay pointed to the sky. “You’re damned right it is. From what I can tell, these symbols are kind of an astronomical arrow. I think they point to the star system you’re from. The fact that some of them are on your amulet prove your connection, not just that it’s some other random alien planet.”

  “Shit, really?” James lifted the amulet and stared at the glyphs. “Where the hell am I from, then?”

  Shay shrugged. “That I can’t be sure of that yet. The more places I find the more refined things get, but I’m not an astronomer and we’re still talking a really general direction. Not only that, it went against my first theory.”

  “Which was?”

  “I figured it had to be in the star system Zeta Reticuli.”

  “Why?” James moved toward the pillar to get a closer look at the glyphs. “I’m guessing this shit wouldn’t spell out anything modern-sounding, and even if it did, it’s not like the ancie
nts would have called it that.”

  Shay nodded. “Yeah. You see, before everyone started assigning all past weirdness with Oriceran, there were a lot of reports of alien abductions associated with gray aliens, and some people claimed they came from Zeta Reticuli.” She shook her head. “Once I got going, though, the arrow wasn’t indicating that system at all.” She pointed to the sky again. “It’s somewhere in that general vicinity, but I still need to collect more information before I can narrow it down. It’s a big fucking galaxy, you know, and like I said, I’m a tomb raider, not an astronomer. But I’m getting closer, Brownstone. A lot closer.”

  James stared at the sky. Night had yet to fall. Any of the nighttime visitors hanging in the firmament might mark his true home, a planet lost to his normally-perfect memory.

  “I wonder if it matters.” The bounty hunter shook his head.

  “What do you mean?” Shay furrowed her brow.

  “Look, I appreciate what you’re doing, but I grew up on Earth. It’s not like I can go back to Amulet Land or wherever. I don’t even know how the fuck I got to Earth.” James rubbed his fingers over the amulet. “Huh. Listen to me… Guess I’m through fucking second-guessing this. I don’t know if I believed I was an alien before, but I do now.” He shrugged. “But I can only be me—James Brownstone, bounty hunter.”

  “I’m about the last person to be giving advice to people about their past, but I think you need closure or some shit, and if I can help provide that I will. Maybe you can’t go back. Maybe the planet got blown up by some space dragon, but it’ll feel good to know.”

  James grunted. “Yeah, probably would. Thanks for figuring this shit out for me.”

  “No problem, and now the next step will be unlocking your amulet.”

  “Huh? What unlocking? I didn’t know it was locked.” James turned the amulet over as if he could find some obvious mechanism he’d missed before.

  Shay pointed to the amulet. “It’s got the symbols that I’ve found all over, but it also has some I haven’t found elsewhere. I think the inscription is the key to unlocking its true power.”