Poseidon's Fury: A Sean Wyatt Archaeological Thriller

Book 22: Sean Wyatt Adventure

by Ernest Dempsey, Jason Whited, Anne Storer

Genres: General Fiction; Historical Thrillers; Action & Adventure; Sea Adventures

Synopsis

A past Sean Wyatt forgot catches up to him, and shoves him into the crosshairs of his most dangerous treasure hunt yet.

Sean Wyatt of the International Archaeological Agency receives a desperate message from an old friend. It's a riddle from a five hundred year old text, a riddle only Sean and his team can solve.

Together with his wife, Adriana Villa, and best friend Tommy Schultz (the IAA Founder), the team travels to Istanbul, site of a grand theft at an auction in the affluent neighborhood of Besitkas. There, they uncover a mystery they never saw coming, and the rabbit hole opens wide.

But they aren't the only ones searching for this mythical treasure. With no end insight for the war in Ukraine, and casualties in the hundreds of thousands, the Russian president has sent his own team of elite soldiers to discover the location of an artifact they believe will not only end the war in one, swift stroke, but will make them the unstoppable superpower on Earth.

The adventure leads through the streets and hidden passages of Istanbul, where Sean and his team discover a secret they never imagined to be real.

 

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Release date: January 27, 2023

Publisher: 138 Publishing

Print pages: 362

Sample

Prologue:
Constantinople 1547
“You’re certain this is the place?” Francisco peered at his comrade with eyes that were darker than the night. His black hair rustled over his ears as a warm breeze washed through the quiet street. 
He and his partner watched from the shadows of a vacant market stall, crouching behind a stack of baskets and unused tables. 
Flickering lights danced in the windows of the apartments along the street. Many had already extinguished their lamps for the night. No sounds of children’s laughter filled the air. Only the occasional adult speaking rattled through the canyon of buildings on the streets. 
“Of course I’m certain,” Luis answered. “You asked me that ten times on the way here. Why would it be different now?” 
His dark blond ponytail shook as he emphasized his words by bobbing and twisting his head. 
Francisco only breathed steadily in response as he glanced over to the three-story home. Palm trees swayed in the wind thirty feet beyond the nearest corner. 
Even though the two Spaniards had already accounted for the trees, the movement still startled them. 
Luis, twenty years old, had served the Spanish Navy for two years. Francisco, twenty-two, had done so for four. Both men had distinguished themselves from most of their peers with valor in battle, and courage when it came to volunteering. 
The two were easily among the best swordsmen in their ranks, their reputations already spreading in the military. Only some of the higher-ranking officers could best them while sparring. 
Even considering their prowess—something the two young men were surely aware of—Luis and Francisco were surprised when given the honor of this mission. After all, it had come directly from the Holy Roman Emperor himself. 
They’d been called in from duty in Southern Italy, and told that they were being given a mission of the highest importance. At the time, the two young men didn’t know they were going to meet the emperor from the rising Hapsburg Dynasty. But when they were taken to the palace and given audience with the emperor of the entire Holy Roman Empire, they realized the gravity of the situation.
The meeting had taken place in a lavish sitting room in the east wing of the palace. “Completing this mission,” the emperor had said, “will bring peace to the entire world. No more suffering brought by the evil hands of the Ottomans. And now that our greatest enemy is dead, nothing will stop us from accomplishing this holy task.” 
Holy task, Francisco thought, just as he had the evening the emperor said the words. What does that mean?
He still didn’t know. The emperor had given no other details regarding how this quest would bring such peace, such lasting prosperity for the world. 
Neither Francisco, nor Luis, understood how finding a book could accomplish something so big. 
Being more pragmatic than Luis, Francisco couldn’t help but think the emperor had embellished his view of the mission as something holy. He’d tagged it as such, but deep down, Francisco believed the man’s reasons were nothing more than ego driven. Like all the other pawns serving under various banners, Francisco knew his role, and while he loathed it to a degree, he played the game knowing it was better than becoming a slave. His standing in society was better than average, and once he and Luis pulled off the mission, he had no doubt they would receive titles, land, and all the trappings that the emperor afforded his heroes. 
If the man wants a book, we’ll get him the book. 
“Strange, no?” Luis asked out of the blue. 
Francisco wasn’t sure what he was talking about. “What?” 
“All this for a book,” he clarified. “The emperor sending two of his best deep into enemy territory, just for a book? Seems a bit much, no?” 
“You read my mind, Luis,” Francisco confessed. “I was just thinking the same thing. But we have no choice. And it shouldn’t be too difficult. I saw no guards below.” 
Luis snorted. “Why would there be? He’s a scribe, a historian. Who would be guarding him? And for what? It isn’t as though the man is wealthy.” 
Francisco looked around the street and again at the three-story villa. “He isn’t poor either,” he observed. 
The building looked like all the others in the city, but instead of it being divided into apartments on every level, this one was a single-family home, owned by a man with more to him than met the eye. 
Most scribes wouldn’t have been able to afford such accommodations, often living in much humbler abodes. The two Spaniards knew the man who owned this home was much more than a mere scribe.
Muradi Sinan Reis was a pirate, a corsair who had sailed under the banner of the Holy Roman Empire’s greatest nemesis of the seas—Admiral Hayreddin Barbarossa. At the end of Barbarossa’s life, he’d dictated his memoirs to Reis—both a friend and a comrade in arms. 
That much was all Francisco and Luis had been given regarding the book they were to find. That, and where it was hidden. 
A spy for the emperor had gained entry into the Reis home by way of servitude. This servant worked diligently for his master, earning the former buccaneer’s trust in a short amount of time. According to their spy, Reis had been gone for several weeks—probably on a mission to plunder and pillage one of the emperor’s holdings. 
Now, months into his employment, the servant’s work had paid dividends, and he’d passed along the message to the emperor’s men as to where the book could be found. None of the people who managed the household—loose relatives and friends—would notice if the journal was gone. 
“What do you think is in the book?” Luis asked, his voice impatient. 
“Our deaths if you don’t quit talking.” 
Luis sighed. “No one can hear us up here. No one saw us.” 
“And I would prefer to keep it that way.” 
“You aren’t the least bit curious?” 
Francisco stared out into the night. “Of course I am,” he said. “Maybe it isn’t memoirs we’re trying to steal. What if it’s a map to a treasure? There’s no way we can know what’s in that book.” 
That seemed to shut Luis up for a minute as the younger man considered the words. 
While they hadn’t seen any guards during their reconnaissance of the home, that didn’t mean there was no danger. The man known as Sinan Reis had been one of the most dangerous people in the world as far as Charles V was concerned. The pirate had killed untold hundreds, or even thousands, and that didn’t include what his ships had done on the seas. Reis was a scourge against the Holy Roman Empire, and with him gone on some mission, the emperor knew it was time to seize the opportunity. 
“Do you think it’s some sort of book of magic?” Luis whispered. 
Francisco rolled his eyes at the insinuation, though he’d considered the notion himself at one point. “No. I don’t think it’s magic. Now, shut up. It’s nearly time.” 
“What is he waiting for?” Luis complained. “He should have signaled us by now.” 
Every window in the villa was dark, which would have seemed ordinary to any passersby, and there’d been few of those since the two Spaniards arrived in the stall. 
“Patience, Luis. You really must learn patience. It will come.” 
Luis sighed and continued watching. 
He didn’t have to wait long. A window on the third floor at the right end of the building suddenly lit up with lamplight. Then a figure appeared in the opening, looked out at the stars as if simply taking a deep breath of fresh air, and then disappeared. 
“That’s it,” Francisco said. “Come on.” 
The two men left their hiding place, checking down both sides of the street to make sure no one was watching. 
It wouldn’t have been so dead quiet on the streets of Barcelona. That much the two knew for certain. 
They scurried across the thoroughfare and stopped at the front door. Francisco checked the door while Luis continued to watch the streets. 
Francisco twisted the latch and found it unlocked, as the servant had promised. Even though the two Spaniards had been told it would be, Francisco felt a measure of relief as the door gave way to his subtle force. 
He led the way in and held the door open for Luis, closing it behind him once he was inside. 
With the door locked, the thieves took in their surroundings. The downstairs featured a small kitchen to the right and a wooden table with four chairs close by. A hearth fit into the back-left corner, where a couple of chairs with lavishly designed cushions angled toward it. 
“Third floor,” Francisco said. “I don’t want to be here longer than necessary.” 
He hurried over to the steps that disappeared up into the second floor. Taking them two at a time, Francisco bounded upward until he reached the next landing. He ignored the second floor’s design and the things that occupied it. He wasn’t there to take a tour of the pirate scribe’s home. He was there to rob it. 
They continued up the next flight of stairs until they reached the top floor, slowing only at the final step just in case this entire ruse had been one elaborate setup. 
Francisco drew his sword and held it at his side as he rounded the wall that blocked the view of the steps from the rest of the room. 
He saw the servant standing near the window where he’d been a few minutes before. The lamp flickered on a wooden desk next to it. 
Several papers festooned the surface, along with multiple writing utensils, maps, and navigational tools. 
The young man—no more than sixteen years of age from what Francisco could tell—watched the two interlopers with both curiosity and fear. 
“Where is it?” Francisco asked. He kept his tone direct and firm. 
The boy trembled for a few seconds then raised a skinny arm and pointed his bony finger at the opposite wall. 
“It’s in there,” he said in forced Spanish. 
Francisco and Luis followed the servant’s finger across the room to a table where a small wooden chest sat on the surface. 
The Spaniards hurried across the room and hovered over it for only a moment. The chest, made of sturdy timber, was bound with iron brackets and closed with an iron clasp—a lock dangled from it. 
“Do you have the key?” Luis demanded of the boy. 
“No,” the servant replied. “He did not leave it with me.” 
Luis felt a twinge of irritation. “Perhaps you could have told us that before we got here. No?” 
The boy lowered his head, as Luis figured he’d done much of his young life so far. He was nothing more than a servant, and servants were often put in their place—no matter what culture or nation they lived in. 
“It is no problem,” Francisco said. He set his sword down on the table and drew a thin blade from a sheath on his belt. He stuck the knife tip into the keyhole and began to work it around. 
The sounds of metal scraping on metal filled the room, and while subtle, the three occupants felt it might have been as loud as a thunderstorm. 
After finagling with the lock for nearly two minutes, the clasp suddenly let go, and the piece of iron hung loose on the clasp. 
Luis looked surprised, despite being aware of his partner’s skills to some degree. 
Francisco returned the knife to its sheath and flipped up the clasp. He held his breath for a second and then lifted the lid. 
For a second, he merely stood there staring into the chest, his eyes blinking every few seconds. Then he turned to the servant by the window. 
“What is this? Some kind of joke?” 
Confusion, quickly turning to concern, the boy shook his head rapidly. “No, sir. That is the chest. I’m sure of it. I saw him put the book in there many times.” 
“Are you sure it was the right book?” Luis pressed. 
The boy nodded, never showing a doubt in his eyes. “Yes. I’m sure of it.” 
“And you didn’t see him take it?” Francisco asked. He took a menacing step across the room, picking up his sword once more. He brandished it at the servant. “Do not lie to me, boy. Did he take it? Or did you sell it to someone else?” 
The young man shook his head vehemently. “No. Of course not.” Tears welled in his eyes. “I did not sell it.”
Francisco searched the boy’s face, angling his chin down to see if he could meet the servant’s eyes and find a lie within them. All he found was a harsh truth. 
“So, the book is not here,” Francisco realized. “The emperor will not be pleased.” 
“It was there the other day. I swear it. I saw it with my own eyes. He put it in there.” 
Luis let his anger get the better of him. “And were you watching him every minute of the day?” 
“What? Of course not.” The servant sounded baffled. “How could I?” 
“This is information that could have saved us a lot of time,” Luis sneered. He felt the handle of his sword at his hip, and with it the temptation to cut down this whelp where he stood. 
“Easy, Luis,” Francisco urged. “Killing him won’t bring us the book. Master Reis must have taken it with him.” He reached out the sword and touched the flat end of it to the boy’s chin, lifting it carefully in a show of sympathy, and threat. “Where did your master go?” 
The boy shook his head. “I… I don’t know, sir,” he said, his Spanish faltering. “I overheard him say he had business in Italy. But that was all.” 
Francisco lowered his weapon and turned around. He paced back over to the chest and looked into it again, as if doing so might somehow manifest the book. He shook his head in disappointment, and closed the lid. 
“Italy,” he muttered. “That doesn’t narrow it down much.” 
Luis glowered at the servant for a few more seconds before he tore his gaze from the young man. He looked to his partner. “What should we do?” 
“What can we do?” Francisco answered. “He’s gone. And I suspect we won’t find him now. A man like Reis is cunning. He won’t make any mistakes.” 
He reached out and touched the edge of the wooden chest, running his finger along the side of it. 
“It would appear we have failed our mission, Luis. The emperor will not be pleased.” 
“No. He won’t,” Luis agreed with a snarl back over his shoulder at the servant. 
“Pay him.” 
“What?” 
“I said pay him. He held up his end of the deal,” Francisco stated. “Give him his money.” 
“But he didn’t—”
“Do it.” Francisco fired a warning look at his partner. “Reis left. And he took the book with him. There’s nothing we can do about that now.” 
Luis grumbled something unintelligible as he reached into a pocket and withdrew a small leather pouch. It jingled as he handled it. Then he tossed it to the servant, who caught it reluctantly. 
“Enjoy it, urchin,” Luis spat. 
Francisco kept his eyes locked on the bottom of the chest. The emptiness of the container signaled the end of any dreams he may have had of titles, land, and riches that would provide him a life of ease for the rest of his days. 
As he watched those visions slip from his grasp, he could only stare at the symbol of a trident engraved on the chest’s bottom, and wonder what could have been so important about that book.


Chapter 1: Tanzania

Sean Wyatt didn’t even think about moving. He wanted to. His pistol hung in the leather shoulder holster, dangling near his ribs. He felt it there—so painfully close, yet so abysmally far away. 
“What’s going on in there?” Tommy asked. The voice came through a radio earpiece concealed in Sean’s right ear. “Do you see it?” 
Sean felt beads of sweat rolling down both sides of his face. The Braves baseball cap he wore backward helped with some of the perspiration, but not all of it. 
“Sean? Do you copy?” 
He swallowed as he tried to decide what to do, and based on the breed of snake staring back at him, he knew time wasn’t necessarily on his side. 
Black mambas were known to be some of the most aggressive snakes in the world, and highly venomous. Sean felt somewhat fortunate he hadn’t been bitten already. 
The huge, skinny gray snake sat with two-thirds of its body coiled in front of an opening in the ancient stonework. The other third of the serpent sat erect, dancing back and forth as it flicked its tongue at the warm body that had entered its abode. 
“Sean?” 
“Tommy,” Sean finally replied in a muted, desperate tone. “Please. Shut. Up.” 
“What’s the problem? You need me to come in there?” 
“Shut. Up.” 
The serpent continued to waver back and forth as if trying to decide when, not if, to attack. 
Sean knew a little about snakes from his childhood. He hadn’t been allowed to watch regular television on Saturdays due to his parents’ strict religious guidelines, but he was permitted to watch nature shows. 
In the colder months of Tennessee’s winter, a boy didn’t have many options. So, nature videos it was. 
He’d viewed several about snakes, learning as much as he could about the reptiles. It wasn’t because he liked snakes. Quite the opposite. In fact, the only thing Sean seemed to fear more than snakes was heights—and given the current circumstances, the former was easily winning. 
“Okay,” Tommy said. “I’ll hang back.” 
What part of shut up don’t you understand, Schultzie?
The mamba continued flicking its tongue, tasting the heat radiating from Sean’s body. From what he recalled, black mambas could, and often did, strike more than once. He’d heard stories of them attacking groups of men, killing more than one in the process. 
For the moment, Sean felt lucky the thing hadn’t come after him already. 
There was nothing else in the chamber that could help him besides the gun dangling from his shoulder, and making a move for that might scare the snake into an attack. 
“Easy, snake,” Sean soothed, hoping the calm tone of his voice might send the serpent retreating through the three-foot-high hole in the wall behind it. Not that that would make things better. Sean needed to get through that opening. Beyond it lay the Eye of Akulu—or so he hoped. 
The eye was supposedly an extremely large ruby, about the size of a fist, and had been hidden in this ancient temple for over a thousand years—which predated most colonial settlements in this region. 
Sean and Tommy had spent months preparing for this expedition, but nothing could have prepared him for the deadly mamba he faced now. 
Keeping the flashlight on the snake, Sean remained perfectly still. He wondered if the snake thought the black rope dangling behind him was another serpent—perhaps a friend, or more likely a rival. 
Sean knew that was ridiculous. The rope gave off no body heat, and so posed no threat to the mamba. 
Getting down to this level in the tunnel—where no one had been in centuries—required descending a forty-foot drop into the heart of a hillside. Why the snake was down here where the temperature was cooler, Sean didn’t know, but the fact was the thing was here, and he had to deal with it. 
If he drew his pistol, the mamba might strike. The creature only being ten feet away didn’t give Sean any comfort about that option. But he was running out of time, and ideas. 
The snake abruptly snapped its head forward. Sean took a step backward to the sheer rock wall behind him while at the same time pulling the pistol from its holster. He reacted on instinct alone, and twitched his trigger finger without even trying to aim. 
The tiny box on the end of the pistol muted the report to the sound of a loud click. The snake’s head instantly exploded in a splash of blood, dropping the creature to the floor. 
A shiver shot through Sean’s body as he watched the lifeless serpent continue to writhe and flop on the stone at his feet. He kept the pistol trained on the thing, even though it no longer presented a threat. 
For nearly two minutes, Sean merely stood there watching the headless creature until it stopped moving. And then for another minute, he couldn’t make himself move. Paralyzed by the encounter, he breathed slowly to calm himself down. 
He’d faced enemies in the field when he was a covert operator for the Axis agency, but he’d never felt this kind of fear from facing an assassin or a terrorist. Then again, they didn’t have fangs. Not usually. 
“What was that sound? Did you just fire your weapon?” 
Sean stuffed the pistol back in its holster and dusted his hands off on his khakis. “You heard that?” 
“Of course I heard.” 
“Let’s just say I wasn’t alone down here,” Sean said. He looked around the circular space in the pit, making sure there weren’t any other creatures hanging around. 
“What?” 
“Black mamba,” Sean said. “Nasty suckers. Don’t want to get bitten by one of them.” 
“Is it dead? Are you okay? It didn’t get you, did it?” 
Sean chuckled as he shook his head. “If it did, I’d have about one hour before I went into a paralytic coma. Dead in three.” 
“Okay, just be careful.” 
“Thanks for the warning, Mom.” Sean shuffled past the dead snake and then kicked the rest of the body out of the way with his boots. 
He got down on all fours, casting a last glance back over his shoulders at the serpent—as if blowing its head off hadn’t made certain it was dead. Then he pointed his flashlight through the opening. 
At the top of it, a symbol of an eye stared back at him—carved into the stone. 
“There’s a room down here,” Sean announced. “I’m gonna go through and see what’s in there.” 
“Okay. Be—” Tommy cut himself off. “I mean, let me know what you see.” 
Sean lowered himself a little more so he could belly-crawl through the hole in the rock. He slithered forward, not missing the irony of his movement in comparison to the snake he had just killed. 
He only had to crawl ten feet before emerging on the other side in a square room with four pillars, each a grotesque-looking animal wearing distorted, angry faces. 
The mouths of the stone totems pointed inward, toward an altar in the center. As Sean turned his flashlight around toward the middle of the room, a red glow danced along the far wall. 
“I’m in the other room,” Sean said, his voice full of awe. He ran the flashlight beam around the ceiling where it met the four sides, examining a sequence of ancient runes and hieroglyphs. “I gotta tell you, Schultzie. You and I have seen a lot of weird stuff. But this is a new one.” 
“I hope you’re taking pictures.” 
Sean slid his phone out of its pocket and started doing just that. He turned on the phone’s light, and combined with the flashlight in his hand and the one on his headlamp, was able to get incredible images from the chamber. 
“When I get a signal, I’ll send these to you,” Sean quipped as he noticed the lack of bars on the phone. 
“Shoulda brought your SAT phone.” 
“Thanks for that.” 
“Anytime.” 
“Well, if I did have a signal, and I was able to send you the pics right now, you’d see something pretty amazing.” 
Sean walked unconsciously toward the middle of the room. He approached the stone altar, staring straight at a four-pronged golden claw sitting on top of it. The claw clutched the largest ruby—or precious gem, for that matter—Sean had ever seen in his life. The thing was bigger than his fist, and from what he could tell, the ruby was immaculately cut. 
“Do you see it? The eye? It’s there?” 
Sean nodded absently. “Oh, it’s here, all right, buddy. We did it. We found the Eye of Akulu.” 
A loud “woo-hoo!” pierced Sean’s ear, and he grimaced, squeezing both eyes shut tight. “Thanks for blowing out my eardrum.” 
“Oh, sorry, man. My bad. But this is so incredible. I wish I could have come down there with you.” 
“Yeah, well, I don’t think you would have liked the snake.” 
“You seemed to handle it just fine.” 
“I guess. Then again, if I missed, the ricochet could have killed me. In hindsight, not my smartest moment. Probably shoulda just jumped for the rope and climbed back up, sent you down to handle it.” 
“Okay, okay. What does it look like?” 
Sean tilted his neck to the side, inspecting the piece. “Uh, it looks like a huge ruby. What did you think?” 
Tommy sighed through the radio. 
“There’s some kind of a golden claw holding it.” 
“Claw?” 
“Yeah,” Sean confirmed as he cautiously climbed the first step up to the altar. He aimed both lights onto the glimmering gem and its unusual pedestal. “The thing comes up out of the stone altar like a zombie coming out of a grave.” 
“That’s an interesting description.” 
“Well, I’m happy to hear suggestions.”
“Is it a bird claw?” 
“No. Looks more like a dragon claw. Weird. The talons are longer. Really interesting they did it this way.” 
“Cool. Hey, listen, maybe you should go ahead and grab it and get the heck out of there.” 
Sean chuckled at his friend’s suggestion. “What’s the hurry, man? We have permits to be here.” 
Silence. 
“Schultzie?”
Still nothing. 
“I said we have the permits to be here, right?” 
“Sorry, you were breaking up there, buddy. Yeah, we got the permits.” 
Sean sighed. He and his partner had done a few things without the required paperwork in the past; not that they advertised that. 
The International Archaeological Agency was a world-renowned artifact recovery operation. Their exploits, and their reputation, had spread to every corner of the globe—for better or worse. While most of the time they operated by the book, certain missions required a less “official” way of doing things. When working in areas where the governments were more corrupt than others, the agents of the IAA often had to bend the rules. 
Sometimes those rules were shattered into a thousand brittle pieces. 
Sean took the second step up to the top tier of the altar. He leaned closer to the object in the center, studying it carefully. 
“Hey,” he said, inching his nose closer to the gem, “do you ever wonder why people so long ago would go to such ridiculous lengths to hide their valuables?” 
The square altar’s surface stretched seven feet from one side to the other. Half-inch grooves were cut into the stone and ran to the center from each corner, meeting at the arm of the golden claw. 
“What?” Tommy asked. 
“Treasures like this. People always hid them. They did it throughout history. I just think it’s weird.” 
“What is? That they’d hide treasure?” 
“Yeah, I mean, I understand them hiding it.” 
“Then what is your point?” 
“If you’ll let me finish.” 
“By all means.” 
Sean rolled his eyes, exasperated. “As I was saying, they hid their stuff. Which doesn’t surprise me.” He craned his head to the right, tilting it in such a way that the ruby cast bizarre, melting refractions onto the wall. “But all the clues and booby traps. Those are the things I don’t understand.” 
“Oh, you mean why all the traps?” Tommy clarified. 
“Yeah.” 
“To keep other people from finding their treasure, obviously.” 
Sean stood up straight again and shook his head. “I know that, genius. But think about it. They left all those clues for someone to eventually find their loot.” 
“Yes. Ideally, themselves.” 
“Yeah, but if it was them, why did they need the clues? The treasure maps? The ciphers? All that stuff.” 
Silence came through the earpiece, then: “I guess I never really thought about it like that before.” 
“Exactly!” Sean exclaimed, extending both hands out to no one. 
“I mean maybe the point was that if they couldn’t return to it, someone should have it if they could prove themselves worthy.” 
Sean rolled his head to the other side in a dubious expression. “Even the pirates? Lifelong criminals? Those guys were worried about someone being worthy of their treasure?” 
“It’s just a theory,” Tommy said. “You’re the one asking the crazy question. And could you hurry up? I don’t want to hang out here longer than we need to.” 
Sean caught something in his friend’s voice that caused a spear of doubt to stab through his gut. “Schultzie? Is there something you’re not telling me? You got the permits, right?” 
“Permits, yes,” Tommy answered.
“Okay, why did you say it like that?” 
No response. 
“Tommy? What did you do?” 
“Nothing. But I don’t think poachers care too much about permits.” 
“Poachers? Did you say poachers?” 
“Yeah.” 
“As in guys that hunt animals illegally for profit? Those poachers?” 
“Yeah.” 
“Schultzie, I need you to be real honest with me. Are we in an area known to have a lot of poachers?” 
Tommy hesitated. “No. I mean. Yes, but there haven’t been any incidents or sightings in this area for the last two months.” 
“Two months? We should have brought a whole team. I knew we should have.” 
“Relax,” Tommy said. “But please hurry. I hear something.” 
Sean felt a surge of concern pulse through him. “What do you hear?” 
“Sounds like truck motors.” 
“Motors? Plural?” 
“I know. Not good.” 
“No, Schultzie. Definitely not good. You could have mentioned the poachers.”
“I didn’t think they’d be around right now.” 
Sean mustered every ounce of patience he could so he didn’t lay into his lifelong friend. “Okay. Stay on the rope. I’ll be right up. We’ll figure it out.” 
“If it’s poachers,” Tommy guessed, “and they see the gem—” 
“I know. I know. You don’t have to spell it out for me. Just keep a lookout.” 
Sean leaned across the altar, stretching out his arm at full length until his torso lay on the surface and his legs left the floor. It was still out of reach, so he pulled himself up onto the altar and squatted down next to the priceless relic. 
He inspected the artifact more closely, noting how the claws seemed to clutch the gem in such a way that simply lifting the ruby from its grasp wasn’t an option. 
“You got it?” Tommy pressed, urgency trembling in his voice. 
“Almost.” 
“Almost? What’s taking so—” 
“This claw, it’s gripping the gem.” 
“Then pull up the claw with it, and let’s get out of here.”
Sean had considered that, but something in his gut told him that was a bad idea. He looked around the chamber for any signs this could be a trap, but noticed nothing out of the ordinary—other than ancient architecture that no eyes had seen for centuries. 
“Okay,” he said, reluctance still coursing through him. “Here goes.” 
He cradled the base of the claw with one hand and the stem with the other. Sean took one deep breath, sighed, and pulled. 
The entire piece came up from the stone with such ease he nearly lost his balance and tumbled over backward. 
“Wow,” he exclaimed. “That was easy.” 
“You got it?” 
A loud click echoed through the chamber, reverberating deep inside the altar. Sean’s eyes flicked left and right, from one side of the surface to the other. 
“Um. Yeah. I got it.” Sean sounded uneasy as he stuffed the artifact into the drab green satchel strapped across his shoulder. 
A sense of dread filled his gut as more clicks and thumps continued from somewhere underneath him. 
“Great. Now get the heck out of there. We need to go.” 
“Schultzie?” 
“What?”
“I think there was a booby trap.” 
“What?” 
“Yeah. And I think I tripped it.” 
More clicks. Then suddenly, a deaf