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Chapter 3
The rain had blown itself out overnight, leaving the next day clear but damp. A group of historians and archaeologists made their way across to the henge, where a sparse few people had gathered. The inside of the monument was completely devoid of grass, dark earth showing through.
Jenny, Professor Griffon, Decker, a historian from Oxford named Orlando Scott, a muscular black man with a kindly but stern face and much to Decker's chagrin, Felix and Julia.
By now, Felix knew that Decker found the idea of two high school students being at the dig highly disagreeable, but why he didn't exactly know. "So why doesn't Decker want us here?" he asked Julia quietly as the followed everyone else and making sure Decker was out of earshot. She shrugged her shoulders.
"He doesn't think we should be helping. He says an archaeological site isn't for kids. Sure, there are other students here, bu they're all university blokes who don't have anything better to do over the summer," she explained, shoving her hands in the pockets of her jeans. "There are rumors that he had allowed a high school student to a dig once, but that ended badly." she added as an afterthought.
"What happened?"
"The kid made an Egyptian tomb cave in, or that's what the rumours say."
Besides, he was the one who set up this whole thing. Reckoned the mystery of Stonehenge was solved."
Felix nodded in understanding. Decker was bitter about the tomb incident, and figured students of their age would just be a nuisance and in the way. Felix saw that as being a bit narrow-minded.
"So how did either of us get here?" he now asked, looking over at her.
"People keep raving about how smart we are. Griffon goes on about you and my cousin invited me."
He blinked. "Your cousin?"
"Jenny. She somehow convince Decker to let me c-WHOA!" Her statement was cut short when she slipped on a particularly wet patch of grass. She stumbled but managed to seize Felix around the neck with her arms hang without falling. "Oh, I'm sorry!" she said apologetically, straightening up and brushing a few stray locks of coppery hair out of her slightly pink face.
"No problem," he replied with a strained voice, massaging his throat.
They jogged to catch up with everyone else, just in time to catch Decker giving everyone their digging assignments for the day. He reluctantly sent Felix and Julia over to one of the broken but still standing center stones, but also sent Jenny to keep an eye on them. Jenny passed Felix a leather digging kit, complete with dirt picks, brushes and other implements for getting rid of dirt. They set to work, removing earth and grime, their eyes peeled for anything interesting.
But by the afternoon, they hadn't found anything. The sun beat relentlessly on the backs of their necks. Felix wiped his hand across the forehead and Julia tied her hair back. But they still kept at it, hell-bent on finding something.
Felix chipped and brushed away some dirt. He wasn't feeling too optimistic about finding anything, until his eyes fell on a small stone, half buried in the dirt. He brushed a bit more dirt away and tried to prise the stone free, but it didn't budge. "Hey Julia, gimme a hand over here." he said and motioned for her over. She working adjacent to him and shuffled over on her knees. Together they brushed more earth away and finally pulled the stone out. It was as smooth as a sea stone, oval-shaped and solid granite. A symbol that Felix thought looked like a rune was roughly carved into the surface. The symbol was shaped like a horseshoe, with a short line through the top.
Felix felt an involuntarily shudder pass through him as he looked at it.
"What d'you reckon is it?" Julia asked, peering over his shoulder.
Felix shrugged. "Must be a rune of some kind, but the Druids didn't have runes as far as I know." He ran his thumb over the symbol. It gave off a bright golden-brown light, but quickly stopped. Felix exchanged a look with her. "Please tell me you saw that too." he muttered.
"Yeah, I did. We're not mad, are we?"
"Oh, probably. But I don't think we could've imagined the same thing."
* * *
They joined Jenny, Griffon, Scott and Decker for lunch. Scott was looking at the stone with a jeweler's lens intently. "You're right, this isn't a rune I've ever seen." he told them in a deep baritone voice. "And a very strange find, but it may be worth keeping. It may become important later on, Mr McCoy." he handed the stone around for everyone to look at. They all seemed happy to hear that their two youngest diggers had found something so quickly. Only Decker gave an derisive snort and insisted "It was pure luck. You won't find anything tomorrow."
"That's hardly fair, Alastor," put in Griffon, eyeing the stone himself. "Find anything on a dig is luck. Well done, you two." he told them. They beamed. The only one who didn't look at the stone was Decker, who obviously didn't think it was worth looking at.
He handed the stone back to Felix. While it exchanged hands, Decker caught sight of the symbol and took a sharp inward breath, but mastered himself before anyone noticed.
"But it that is absolutely extraordinary." continued Griffon as Felix put the stone back in his pocket. "You should hang onto that, Felix."
Decker snorted again. "Beginner's luck," he growled. "As I said, you won't find anything tomorrow."
 Pamplemousse Grenouille · Wed Sep 05, 2007 @ 01:18am · 1 Comments |
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