MisStaked (27 page)

Wait a minute! Breathred's thinking process jumped-started into overdrive. His mind wandered over to some fact he wanted to make sure of. Yes, he knew what insects in winter meant. Skirting out of the procession, the slayer plopped down beside the first tree he came to.

Luna noticed him squatting on the ground and angled back to see what was going on. When she caught up to him, Breathred was digging in his backpack. He had scattered its contents all over the ground in his search. She thought about asking him what he was doing, but knew how her boyfriend was when he got his mind wrapped around something. She just eased herself down beside him. The last of the group crested the rise and disappeared down the sloping hill. Well, she'd waited long enough.

"Breathred, what are you doing?” she whispered. Once when they had first met, she had tried yelling to get his attention, but that had just frightened him so badly he forgot what he was thinking. It had taken him fifteen minutes to remember his own name, so after a period of trial and error she found whispering in his ear achieved the desired effect.

"I'm looking for something."

"I can see that, but what are you looking for?” Why did everything have to be pulling teeth with him, when he got into his moods?

"Have you noticed there are a lot of insects flying around?"

From the sound of his voice Luna felt she should know what he was talking about. Well, she didn't. “Yeah, but it's the woods. Bugs live in the woods.” Along with birds, rodents and snakes, but Luna didn't feel the need to say any of those things. It would only distract him from telling her what he was up to.

"But it's below thirty degrees. At that temperature they should be in hibernation, or dead,” Breathred explained, absently while still digging in his backpack.

"You're right, but it still doesn't explain why you're sitting down when we should be following the rest of the group."

"Because of this,” Breathred beamed, holding up his Boffrend handbook.

Damn, he was sitting on the ground—wet ground she might add—looking for a makeshift fly swatter. She should have known it would be something silly. With him could it be anything but?

Luna waited patiently while he thumbed through the book until Breathred found what he wanted, then pushed the book into her face. “According to Boffrend, insects swarm around the lairs of the undead."

"So, you think the insects are here because of the Mother's tomb!” Well, she'd learn not to doubt him. He might be goofy, but had his moments.

"Stands to reason. If the Mother's as powerful as the tablet says, she would be a magnet for them and any other loathsome beast that lives off the carrion of evil."

"What is it supposed to mean?” Luna asked in a worried voice. Okay, vampires she could handle, but if there were any type of insect that may or may not be pre-deposed to crawl about her person, she was all for going home.

"That there may be things worse than vampires loose in these woods, feeding off the power the Mother projects. We would be well-advised to be watchful."

"Hello there, stragglers!"

Both of them jumped from where they sat. Luna looked up to see Edmund Truehart waving at them from the top of the hill. Breathred motioned for Luna to keep their talk to herself. She nodded and they strode to the waiting man.

"I thought you were already at the dig with the equipment?” Breathred asked, when they reached the archeologist.

"The camp is on the other side of that rise.” The Englishman pointed over his shoulder. “Dr. Grayson sent me back while she got everyone settled in. She was kind of worried you might have gotten lost."

There was a smugness to the man's voice that grated on Breathred's nerves. Ever since the meeting back at the hotel in Seattle, Breathred had wondered why the man looked so familiar. No matter how hard he tried, Breathred just couldn't figure out where he knew the archeologist from. It was like the annoying feeling you had, when you knew the name of one of those old actors in a movie, but the only name that came to mind was Walter Brennan. No matter how hard you tried to force the name on the person's face, you just knew it wasn't right.

Luna threw her arm around Breathred. “No, we just stopped for a quick snuggle."

"Well, yes ... erm...” Truehart stammered.

"Erm, indeed,” Luna snarked, popping her eyebrow nearly to her hairline.

"Dr. Truehart, as you can see we're quite all right,” Breathred broke in, knowing when she started doing Spock, there was trouble brewing. Best to nip it in the bud before anybody got hurt: namely Dr. Truehart. “But we would appreciate you escorting us the rest of the way."

"Be happy to,” Truehart answered. Breathred could tell the man was glad to be free of Luna's freezing glare. “You know the site is quite exciting, even in its raw state."

"How so?” Breathred couldn't help but ask. He loved a good mystery.

"Well, Dr. Easily and I have been here since yesterday morning and just our preliminary scan of the area has unearthed some outstanding discoveries. We found several pottery shards predating anything unearthed in this region before. If I'm correct, they may even predate the Incan and Aztec ruins in Central and South America!"

"But, it is a well-known fact the Native Americans indigenous to North American were here at the same time as those peoples. To find artifacts that predate those other cultures isn't too spectacular. The common theory is the entire shooting match came over on a land bridge in the Bering Sea.” Breathred's comment drew a puzzled stare from Luna.

"Yes, but these artifacts prove this northern culture had a written language before either of their southern relatives did,” Truehart answered back.

"That's impossible. The northern peoples used no written language. Their histories were passed down verbally. If you're right, this would totally change history as we know it. At least where this is concerned."

"That's what I've been trying to tell you,” Truehart said.

Breathred mumbled under his breath and walked past Luna and Truehart, who had stopped to watch him. After less than twenty paces he stopped too, and turned around.

"My God, what if this site is proof the theorized link between the Egyptians and Incans was true?"

"I believe that was one of your less idiotic theories. Wasn't it, Petrifunck?” Truehart asked in a haughty voice.

"Excuse me, but do we know each other?” Breathred asked, totally ignoring the jab. He had finally given up trying to figure it out on his own. It was hurting his brain. Besides, Truehart knew the answer, so why not let him give it, since the man wanted to, anyway?

"Not personally, but you were a classmate of my brother Reginald,"

"That's it. I've been trying to sort it out for four days. Thank you ever so much. You just don't know what a load that is off my mind,” Breathred said, wiping an imaginary bead of sweat from his brow. “Where is Reginald now?"

"He's dead. He died at the Shrine of the Seven Veils to be exact.” Truehart's voice was cold and hard.

"Yes, that's right. Must have forgotten it."

"I think you can find your way from here. It's just past that tree line. I need to check the outer perimeter. If you have any trouble, just yell. Someone from camp should be able to hear you."

With that the archeologist strode into the forest and disappeared. Luna watched him go. She didn't know what had just passed between the two men, but it was enough to shake them both. For the first time Luna realized just how much she didn't know about Breathred. She had just always assumed he'd lived his entire life in his father's basement. Now, it appeared she was wrong. He had gone to school with Truehart's brother, which meant he had gone to school in England, or somewhere other than Seattle. She seriously doubted a Truehart would go to a college anywhere in the U.S., let alone near Seattle. And, let's not forget about Slutty MacSlutty, Jessica Easily.

What did this all mean? What else was Breathred keeping from her? No, that wasn't fair. She had never asked him about his past. So, he wasn't hiding anything. But he wasn't forthcoming with any information either. Now that she thought about it, Breathred never talked about himself. The closest he came was rambling on about whatever had caught his childlike fancy. The more she thought about it, Luna doubted even Stud knew much about Breathred's past.

Silly twit, just ask him.

She couldn't do that. What if he didn't want to tell her anything? She wasn't prepared for a brush-off, or a big fight. Breathred was just now beginning to come to grips with being her boyfriend. She really hadn't scheduled a fight for at least a few more months. It was always best to let men think they were in charge of things before hitting them with the hard truth of the matter. Her mother had been quite adamant about that fact, which was a good lesson to learn and helped explain why her father was hiding out in parts unknown to this day. Apparently, Mother was a little late learning the lesson herself.

Luna knew what to do. She would arrange a quiet word with Stud. Nothing that would reveal she was searching for anything specific mind you, just a few general questions. The last thing she wanted was to let Stud know anything was up. All she needed was a suspicious Stud running around. The chimp had a big mouth and would run straight to Breathred, asking all the right questions at the wrong time. Luna would have to be subtle with them both. How hard would it be to fool a monkey and a man? She was a woman after all.

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Looks can be deceiving—you never know where the bodies are buried and when they'll get mad at who's walking on their heads

The site was nothing like Luna expected. It all seemed rather ordinary, like a recently buried trash heap, only with fewer beer cans sticking out of the muck. She expected something, you know—grand. Luna wasn't thinking pyramids or anything, but something more than nearly-flat ground with a few pine trees peeking through. She couldn't see any evidence anything had ever been here at all except for two stone pillars sticking up from the earth at odd angles across. Even they looked like nothing more than two plain rocks.

Breathred, on the other hand, saw it for what it was: un-panned gold. Beneath centuries of earth, a whole civilization awaited them. He could see the possibilities for knowledge lying at their very feet. After what all he'd heard from Dr. Grayson, the thought scared him.

He was afraid even to touch the ground. Breathred had no idea, what kind of evil the Mother of all vampires might have pumped into the earth over the years, but it couldn't be good. He knew from the Boffrend handbook evil had a way of infecting everything around it. A three thousand year old vampire's corpse was a large amount of evil with a lot of time on its hands. For all Breathred knew, this whole place could be a giant sponge for the darkest power the earth had ever seen.

Or, he could be overly paranoid. The thought had occurred to him. From practical experience Breathred found there was no such thing as being overly paranoid. Overly crazy, yes. Overly paranoid, no. As one of his many therapists told him after a grueling session—crazy you could cure, or at least control, with the proper balance of chemicals. Paranoid was with you for life, or until better chemicals came along. For the amount of money R.J. had been paying for that sage advice, Breathred tended to believe the man's statement.

His gaze wandered back over to the clearing the team had inhabited for the time being. It was alive with activity. The site had been sectioned off into three areas. A row of tents was being set up for living quarters to one side. Stud was helping a pair of undergraduates set them up. Slightly to the right stood the main tent the team would be using for the documentation of any artifacts they found. It would also act as a radio base for contact with the authorities in case of trouble.

Finally, encompassing the remainder of the area was the main dig. Drs. Truehart and Easily had already set up a grid over the space. It was from there the team would split into individual groups to cover as much area as they could before they were forced to leave.

The setup was pretty much standard operating procedure for these things. The main hope was they would find what they were looking for in those grids already laid out without having to redraw another grid in a different area. They had only five weeks to uncover the tomb before they would run out of funding.

Dr. Grayson's last dig found the antechamber, but sediment and storms had erased the evidence of the discovery in the time since she had left. Even the homing beacon she planted during her earlier excavation was gone. So, basically, they had to start from scratch.

It was like the land didn't want the tomb to be found. Maybe Breathred was reading too much into it. Vampire slayers tended to do that. Living in the supernatural world, you saw ghosts behind every tree and vampires under the bed. That's why his box spring sat securely on the floor and there was a padlock on his closet door.

Luna grabbed his jacket sleeve and pointed toward Dr. Grayson, who was making her way toward them.

"Good to see you two. Guess Truehart found you, okay. Where is he by the way?” she asked breathlessly.

"He went to check the perimeter,” Luna answered. Breathred could tell from the sound of her voice she, like him, hoped the man wasn't in any hurry to return to camp.

"Good. There have been several animal attacks, according to the locals who have been watching over the site for us. He spent the day setting up early warning sensors,” Dr. Grayson explained.

Breathred shot Luna a knowing look, then changed the subject, “It looks like the camp's already in shape.” He saw no reason to let Dr. Grayson in on his suspicions until he had more proof.

"Yes, it is. Doctor Easily has worked wonders. Hasn't she? With Doctor Truehart handling the security measures, I was afraid we'd be behind schedule."

"When do we start excavating?” Luna asked. Breathred was happy to see her getting excited at the prospect.

"Tomorrow, first light,” Grayson said with a huge grin.