Dark Muse (22 page)

Otis had pushed his way to the front, eager
to try his hand at deciphering the secrets Muddy couldn’t. His
bruises and cuts were already healing to the point they were nearly
invisible. Maybe Poe’s song kept working on him. It was either that
or his own drumming had affected his body chemistry. They had
learned about how the body was affected by vibrations and music in
class, but back then, Muddy never thought it could actually heal or
save a life.

“I can’t see squat. Just scribbling, that’s
all. It doesn’t even look like a language to me,” he said. His
parents spoke several languages, learned from their travels and a
vast background of studies. Some of it had to trickle down to their
son. If he didn’t recognize it, maybe it was just rambling
symbols.

Lyra rubbed her hands over it where the
barrier had come down. She cleared away debris and found more room
to move. Most of the dust had settled and an oval opening stood
before them. The band stepped inside and examined their
surroundings. Upon the wall on their left were etchings that none
could decipher. On either side, lights now illuminated the hall,
not with fire from the tiki torches expected in every cheesy cave
movie, but rather with splotches of blinding white material within
the walls themselves.

“Guys, maybe this isn’t our last day alive
after all,” Muddy said. He viewed the various shapes on wall and
believed he knew what to do.

“Caves hold some interesting secrets, don’t
you think?” Luke smiled. “It’s just simple minerals that the slaves
used to find their way during the construction. You’d probably find
it in your caves back home.” He wiped the greasy surface with his
hand, which now glowed almost as bright as the markings on the
wall.

Muddy examined the indentations of people and
creatures and objects in many formations. So many options, he
thought, so many odd carvings all around him. There could be only
one choice, the choice presented to him in the River dreams. He
pressed his fingers into a carving on the cave wall that resembled
a guitar and the world came down around them.

Behind them, a wall crashed to the cavern
floor. The walls to the front and sides fell away into dust,
leaving them blinded for the moment, choking at the foul-smelling
substance. The cavern behind them was gone.

“What did you do?” Otis screamed. “We’re
going to die, I know it.”

Muddy’s brain scattered in confusion,
thinking his friend might be right. He’d simply dug his fingers
into what looked like the one thing that had made him happy all
these years and nearly crushed them as a result.

Lyra and Luke rushed forward when they could
see again. “We’re trapped, all right, but there are more
messages.”

“Great,” Muddy replied. “Let me try again and
land the killing blow.” But he felt more confident than he
sounded.

“There’s gotta be a way,” Poe said, echoing
her words from before. “The booby trap wasn’t designed to kill.
It’s a test. It’s got to be.”

“Muddy,” Corey stepped in, “you’ve got to
find us a way out of here. Silver Eye trusted you with the River.
He
knew
you were the one with the skills.”

Right, Muddy thought. He knew how to kill
them all, how to lead them all to their demise. If Silver Eye
wanted company, wherever he was, he was likely about to get
some.

As he allowed himself another weak moment to
brood, Poe walked up to each wall and hummed to herself. Not in
song, but in thought. As she did so, she made sure to press each
finger lightly over the symbols on the walls, avoiding a repeat of
the disaster Muddy brought upon them.

She walked back and forth, touching this wall
and that one.

What was she doing?

“When the wall fell, that wasn’t all that
happened,” she said, as though reading his thoughts. “We also sunk
several feet into the mountain as well.”

“Great,” he said. “Now, I’ve really buried
us.”

“Will you please shut up?” Corey snapped.
“Enough of the
Sad Sack
stuff. Like you’re the cause of all
of our problems here. Really.”

Otis piped in, “Sorry for yelling at you but
seriously, this downbeat stuff, really not attractive, man.”

“That would explain a lot,” added Corey,
focusing on the wall. “I thought it was just a tremor. It wasn’t.
The room essentially fell. That’s why the cavern disappeared. It’s
still there, it’s just above us. I have no clue how far down we
are.”

He walked to the far wall and pressed his
fingers to the smooth, dark surface. It felt cool, hard and
unforgiving, especially because it could easily tumble in on them.
His fingers searched out another few feet and found an edge. Then
he discovered another few feet of black coolness. Another edge. He
kept going. Each section of the wall was partitioned by an edge of
some sort but he didn’t press hard. 1. 2. 3. 4. He counted as he
circled the band and they greeted his actions with odd
expressions.

“What are you doing?” Lyra finally asked.

“Sh-h-h…” he replied. “Come here and follow
me with your fingers. Run them along the edges and tell me what you
feel.”

Without questioning, she did, trailing behind
him as her fingers rubbed against the dark surface. As they
completed the circle, she stopped then reversed course and rubbed
with her other hand, walking counter-clockwise this time.

“It’s this one,” she said.

“What about it,” Muddy challenged her.

“It’s warm. I don’t know how or why, but it
is,” she said. “It
must
be the way.”

The others felt the wall for themselves and
agreed with her assumption.

Poe cocked her head at Corey. “How did you
know?”

He shrugged. “I’m amazed I felt anything with
these calloused fingers, but I did. There are twelve different
sections, just like there are to the western scale, from C to C and
all the sharps and flats within it. All seemed the same and I
thought it was my imagination, but Lyra felt it, too. One of them
was warm. That’s got to be a sign, right?”

Poe’s eyes lit up. “That means something’s
behind it, a path, maybe.”

“Hopefully, not one that’s on fire,” Corey
said. “That would explain the cool to warm factor.”

“Geek,” Poe said, punching him in the
arm.

They agreed, even Luke, who hung back a
little.

“Now what, genius?” Otis readied his sticks.
“Should I bang something?”

“No!” said the group in unison. Due to the
cave-ins they’d already faced, they didn’t dare risk another.

“Lighten up, folks. Just kidding,” he said,
grinning ear to ear. “Someone’s got to kill the tension.”

“So how
do
we get through?” Poe asked
then answered her own question by placing both hands on the wall.
“Twelve steps. It’s got to be a specific note.”

Otis jumped up and down. “I never forget what
a woman tells me, even if she’s a beast. An actual beast this time.
Remember what they sang to us? The ones who had a ‘crush’ on us?”
Muddy groaned at the joke, cringing at the image. “That’s right.
They told us the key of this place, how to find entry.”

Corey looked at his friend as though he’d
been hit too hard by those falling rocks. “Dude, what are you
talking about?

“She said, ‘The key of earth.’ Remember
now?”

“And what key is that? I only recall the keys
of fire, air and water.”

The drummer smiled his sarcastic half-smile.
“Good one, but the key of earth, ground, the lifeblood of most rock
and blues songs. Which is it?”

Poe blinked. “
Duh
. And I’ve been
hearing it since the walls collapsed before. Stand back. I think
I’ve got this one.”

Chapter Eighteen

She sung a beautiful note, an E, the most
universal tone in all of rock and blues keys. She didn’t belt it
out, didn’t whisper it. She simply sang it aloud while pressing
against the wall, flexing her arms and voice against it until it
moved.

The wall became a door before them and
creaked inward.

They followed her through in awe.

“Oh, wow,” she said, still in key. “Now,
what?”

Once inside the door, they walked into in an
antechamber. It shook and then sank the moment all of them stood in
the center of it. “What gives?” Otis moaned, steadying himself.
“How many of these trials do we have to go through?”

And why did it sink when they stood on it?
Did that mean they were in the right room?

As the room came to a halt, they were faced
by a dozen more walls, but this time, each was notated, a specific
pitch etched into every one of them. A dozen carvings in
silvery-white beckoned to them against pitch-black walls towering
at least ten feet high.

E. F. F#. G. G#. A. Bb. B. C. C#. D. D#.

The twelve notes of the diatonic scale in the
key of E.

“A dodecagon?” Corey drew the incredulous
looks from the group. “What? I actually studied in geometry.” The
others shook their heads, but took in the odd-shaped room. “Things
just keep getting stranger, but at least this one makes sense.”

“I suddenly feel like I’m in a bad Indiana
Jones movie,” Otis said. “Are there snakes? I hate snakes.”

They gathered close and mused together.

“What now? Muddy? Where do we start? E—the
tonic note? But, then what? Is it a scale, a chord? What do we
do?”

This time, instead of feeling overwhelmed
with anxiety, Muddy simply looked into each person’s eyes. “I think
you know what we have to do.”

He gauged their blank stares.

“Who made this trail? What would they do? Not
the Tritons, who want music removed from the people, but the music
of
the people who created this. Those who would make it so
that anyone with a hint of musical knowledge within their world
could pass.”

The others stood in silence.

“No,” he continued, “Especially if they
needed to get back in, or out. Or get their families or friends
inside. All slaves—from the Egyptians, who made to pyramids, to
now—all of them devised codes. I watched a video on something like
this where musicians the world over relied on
one
scale to
communicate across cultures. It didn’t work for everyone, but it
sure did when slaves and captives of war were concerned. The
leaders, those who held the power and ignorance, figured that if it
was music, it must be complicated and must be classical or ethnic
in the nature. It’s not. We’ve been playing this for years.”

“Seriously?” Corey said. “It can’t be that
easy.”

“It’s gotta be,” Muddy argued. “It’s the only
way.”

Lyra pressed against the E door. “Well, I
have no idea what you’re talking about, but I hope you do.”

“He does,” Otis said. “He does. He’s never
let us down before, musically, and we came to kick some Triton
butt. Let’s go rock their world.”

The drummer raised his sticks over his head
and threw himself into the door with the “E” marking and it
shattered into a million little pieces. “This
is
an Indiana
Jones movie.”

“That likely means, we’re headed for death.”
Muddy, like the rest of them, gazed at the open expanse ahead of
them and exhaled deeply.

Muddy took in the scene before him; a vast
expanse of stone squares filled the floor. Every inch was covered
with either a black or gray tile of about two square feet, plenty
of room for a person to stand. Every square had a note etched upon
it. Not the lettered note, but one on a staff. Thankfully, it was a
standard one, he muttered to himself. At least, he could read music
just fine.

He gazed across the floor. It spanned at
least a hundred feet, maybe more. He couldn’t tell from where he
stood, but knew it would be a task to get to the door on the other
side. Actually, two doors awaited them on the opposite side.

More etching covered a slab on the floor. A
clue?

Poe kneeled down and read, her fingers
brushing away years of dust. “‘Walk this way said the blind man.
Walk this way and not that way if you wish to proceed.’”

Corey approached the edge and nearly took the
first step. “Could it really be that simple?” He grinned as he
checked the others’ amused faces. Only the twins wore blank
expressions.

Poe stood next to him. “Dude, most people or
things who got to this point likely have never heard that song.
It’s a perfect trap.”

“So, let’s go,” he replied, shrugging in
agreement. “Seems simple to me. We just step on the notes in the—”
The tile marked E before him fell away. Corey steadied himself as
Muddy reached out to help his friend from falling. He grabbed the
bigger boy’s hand, but he was just too big.

Without a scream, Corey, not the bass player,
suddenly fell
through
the floor and tumbled into space.
Muddy saw a look of utter confusion tattooed itself onto each of
his friends’ faces.

Gone. Just like that. Dead, Muddy thought. I
should’ve stopped him but I couldn’t hold him. This was my gig.

He felt as if he were watching a horror movie
instead of seeing his friend tumbling into the darkness below.

* * * *

Poe screamed in agony over Corey’s fall.
Tears streamed down her face. “I could see enough to watch him go
over, but not enough to help.” Her voice, beautiful at most times,
sounded strangled by pain and wrung out of tune.

Muddy stared into the abyss, hoping that it
wasn’t a long fall. Nobody heard a thump or a scream.
Maybe,
just maybe?
“It was his own fault just like it was ours. Maybe
we’re not meant to succeed.”

Poe looked at him and slapped him–hard. “How
dare you?”

He ached to shrink back, but knew he had it
coming. “I’m sorry.”

“You’re always sorry!” she yelled in his
face. “Don’t be! We’re all here because we want to be. You didn’t
drag us here. That idiot stepped over the edge out of arrogant
confidence. You didn’t push him!”