The Hunter in the Shadows Read online

  BOOKS BY JOAB STIEGLITZ

  The Old Man’s Request: Book One of the Utgarda Series

  The Missing Medium: Book Two of the Utgarda Series

  The Other Realm: Book Three of the Utgarda Series

  The Utgarda Trilogy Omnibus

  The Hunter in the Shadows: Book Four of the Utgarda Series

  The Hunter in the Shadows

  Book Four of the Utgarda Series

  Joab Stieglitz

  Copyright © 2018 Joab Stieglitz

  All rights reserved.

  Published by Rantings of a Wandering Mind

  Cover illustration by Eugene Chugunov

  ISBN: 1983577970

  978-1983577970

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  DEDICATION

  This book is dedicated to my wife, without whose continual support and relentless encouragement it may never have been finished.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I would like to acknowledge all the people who inspired, encouraged, assisted, and supported me through this effort.

  Many thanks to Steph, Greg, Jenna, and Josiah for wading

  through my drafts and proposing, or demanding, edits, changes, and other suggestions.

  Thanks to the Springfield Writers group for listening, critiquing, and suggesting things that made the story all the better, especially Carol, David, Fred, and Duane.

  Chapter 1

  March 9, 1930

  The air was thick and heavy, permeated with the smell of decomposing vegetation. Anna Rykov stepped carefully through the lush foliage. She had a machete in one hand and her revolver in the other. Sweat poured into her eyes from beneath her pith helmet, and her khaki shirt and trousers were already soaked through. The canteen on her belt was nearly empty.

  The German was just ahead. The drops of blood were getting closer together, indicating that the wounded man was starting to slow down. Eventually, she would find von Juntz, and he would get his comeuppance.

  Anna stepped carefully. Wolfram von Juntz had been at the site for some time. Who knew what manner of traps and tripwires he had lain. Still, he did not appear to be taking special care. His path through the undergrowth was evident, and it was more or less straight. Between the uneven footing among the thick vines that criss-crossed the ground, the wide-leaved bushes, the tall palms that blocked the sunlight, and the ever-present mist that limited visibility even further, Anna had to be careful.

  Anna climbed over a tree trunk that had fallen across the trail she and her quarry had been following and was startled by a leering face in the foliage. She immediately realized it was a statue. She stopped and listened, attempting to ascertain von Juntz’s location, but she heard nothing. The cries of the monkeys and birds were gone.

  Anna approached the clearing cautiously. She stopped short of the tree line to take in a Mesoamerican-style complex. The buildings were set in the middle of a stagnant lake. Greenish algae coated its surface, obscuring whatever lurked below. Here and there, Anna saw bubbles, indicating some kind of movement under the water.

  The staring face was in the form of a dragon-like head, and it was one of a pair mounted on each side of an ornamental wall on either side of the entrance to the city. From the colorful and fairly fresh iconography, Anna could tell that the site was not Mayan in origin, nor that of any other Central American civilization she was aware of.

  There were a dozen or so adobe-style structures. Each sat on an artificial platform connected to others by narrow walkways. In the center of the complex was a wide-open area, beyond which was a stepped pyramid. Something seemed strange about the pyramid, and it took a moment for Anna to realize that it had only three sides, rather than the usual four, with two of the sides visible to her.

  Anna crouched behind a bush and observed the scene, looking for signs of movement or anything else that might betray von Juntz’s location. Large insects pestered her, and it took all of her resolve to ignore them. Just when she was about to give up, Anna heard two gunshots from within the ancient complex. She scanned the landscape, and this time she saw the blond archaeologist limping from a building on the right toward the central square.

  Anna leapt out of the foliage and ran between the dragon statues. As soon as she stepped onto the path, the walkway dipped under her weight. The path was not stationary — it was floating on the surface. Two more gunshots rang out inside the building von Juntz had emerged from.

  Anna fought to regain her balance. Once stable, she looked closely at the footing and saw that the walkway was made from wide bamboo stalks lashed together. She scanned the area, but there was no sign of von Juntz. Then Anna noticed several trails of bubbles rising from the muck and moving toward her.

  Using the balance and reflexes she had acquired in the land of Brian Teplow’s visions, Anna expertly crossed the gap to the square and stepped onto the solid stone foundation as several gavials, large, narrow-jawed crocodiles, snapped at the bamboo. The wood was too unstable for the giant creatures to climb onto the path, and the platform had concave sides clearly designed to prevent them from doing so.

  Anna took a moment to catch her breath. The thick, fetid air was nauseating, and she tried not to breathe through her nose. After a moment, she led with the revolver and advanced toward the pyramid.

  ◆

  Anna crossed the square carefully. She noted the mosaic pattern laid into the surface resembled the dragon head on the gate posts. On closer inspection, she realized that it was not a dragon head, but rather that of a crocodile. The image was anthropomorphic and wearing a golden headdress that draped over and past its shoulders. The body was male, dressed in a white loincloth over its scaly, green skin. It had golden cuffs beset with green gems. Its hands were splayed, revealing long, imposing claws.

  Anna’s inspection was interrupted by a cry of pain from a structure to her right, the one that von Juntz had emerged from. Anna approached the structure cautiously, testing the walkway to that platform before moving onto it. It was also floating on the surface, and Anna stepped quickly but lightly, crossing the gap before the creatures below could react.

  The path ended at the darkened opening to the structure, but there was a dim light coming from a space beyond the initial room. Anna waited a moment for her eyes to adjust to the darkness before entering. As she did so, luminescent qualities in the artwork on the walls made the imagery seem to leap out in three dimensions all around her.

  Insubstantial humanoid and non-humanoid creatures were gathered in worship and ceremony, including insect-men similar to those serving Queen Sif of Brynner; the Pointee goat-man followers of Goh-Bazh; and the large-eyed, large-eared Draunskur of the Endless Barrens. As Anna moved about the scene, the imagery moved along with her. There were no sounds or smells, but the visuals made it seem as if she was among the crowd gathered on the central platform.

  As she looked about at the scene projected all around her in the chamber, a procession of beings emerged from the jungle, passed between the gates, and crossed the walkway just as she had. Crocodile-men armed with spears appeared first, escorting a prisoner bound with ropes. The blond-haired woman walked solemnly, her head bowed. She wore a wide, green, beaded collar around her neck that revealed the bottom of her breasts, and a matching beaded loincloth. Both the collar and the loincloth were embroidered with the image depicted in the mosaic in the plaza.

  As the visionary procession passed by, the crowd hissed and made rude gestures at the captive. When one cat-headed being attempted to hit the prisone
r, a soldier speared the would-be attacker and threw her behind him over his head. The cat-lady flew free of the spear and landed somewhere in the lake out of Anna's view, but Anna was distracted when the prisoner looked up and made eye contact with her. It was Sobak, her little sister from the world of Brian Teplow’s visions. The girl looked to be slightly older than when Anna had last seen her — perhaps sixteen. Her eyes were lined by dark rings of black paint that ran with her tears down her cheeks. She silently mouthed, Nygof, help me, with a pleading look.

  Suddenly, an enormous crocodile man, the original from which the statues and iconography were made, towered into view, his bare chest visible over the crowd that swarmed around him. When Anna turned back, Sobak had moved on, now at the foot of the steps to the pyramid.

  Anna’s gaze returned to the giant being, who acknowledged the admiring crowd, glancing to each side in turn. His shadow passed over Anna as he looked in her direction. They made eye contact, and Anna thought his gaze lingered for a moment. Then the giant crocodile followed Sobak and her escorts up the steps of the pyramid. Once at the top, the object of the assembly’s admiration stood behind Sobak with his long-clawed hands resting on her shoulders. Then the spectacle faded, and Anna steadied herself against the wall of the darkened chamber.

  When the room stopped spinning, Anna considered what she had just seen. Surely the vision was of some time in the ancient past. Yet her fictional sister, from the imagination of retired spiritualist Brian Teplow, had been in the scene and had recognized Anna as her alter-ego, Nygof. Anna tried to replay the vision, but nothing she tried was successful.

  Anna followed the light into a smaller chamber. There she found a portly, older man dressed in explorer’s khakis lying face down in the corner. Anna could see the dark stains of gunshot wounds in the back of his shirt. The light came from a lantern, which sat on the floor on the other side of the body.

  Anna knelt next to the man and felt his neck for a pulse. He was alive. She raised the lantern and set it on a pedestal, where it illuminated the whole room. Anna estimated that the man was in his fifties or sixties. He had thinning white hair and mutton chops. Anna rolled the man over onto his back. She noticed that the bullets had entered from the front, but the smallish wounds and trivial amount of blood on his back were inconsistent with chest wounds. And there was little blood staining the floor where he had lain.

  Anna had started unbuttoning the shirt to examine the wounds more closely, when the man’s hand reached up and gently grabbed her wrist.

  “Excuse me, my dear” his aging, English-accented voice said, “but we haven't been properly introduced.”

  Chapter 2

  March 9, 1930

  “How are you not dead?” Anna asked the old man as he rose to a sitting position against the wall.

  “Oh,” the man said with false modesty, “just lucky I guess.”

  “Who are you?” Anna said with suspicion, “And what are you doing here?”

  “I could ask the same of you, young lady,” the man said with a schoolmaster’s tone. Then he softened. “My name is Dr. Cornelius Lyton, and I am an archaeologist, currently with the Royal Academy. I was looking for the key to enter the main temple there. I thought I had found it, but then that von Juntz chappie appeared, shot me, and ran off with it.” He glanced at Anna. “Well, that’s my bit. Now, what’s a pretty, young, Russian woman such as yourself doing in a place like this?”

  Anna thought for a moment. Prior to running through the jungle after von Juntz, she had no idea where she had come from or why she was there. All she knew was that she had to stop von Juntz. Stop him from what? She did not know.

  “I am pursuing Wolfram von Juntz,” she said with reservations. “I must catch him before he does something terrible.”

  “Really? What?!”

  “I do not know.”

  Lyton did not appear to be satisfied with her response, but seemed to let it pass.

  “Well, you have your reasons, and now I have mine. I suggest we pool our resources and give that scoundrel his due!”

  “What do you have to offer me?” Anna asked.

  “I know this site fairly well,” Lyton replied with confidence. “Aside from the pyramid, I have explored all the structures on this side of the central plaza. Von Juntz and I ran into each other early on, and we agreed that I would stay west of the plaza, and he would stay to the east. I kept my end of the bargain, but von Juntz had been spying on me over the past few weeks.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I found my notebooks open to different pages, various artifacts had been moved from where I had left them, and so forth. I don’t know why he was so keen to see my findings, but for whatever reason, I seem to have found what he was looking for.”

  “Do you know where he went?”

  “I expect that he went to the chamber at the top of the pyramid. There is an indentation with a distorted human face set into the floor there. It is the only iconography on the entire pyramid structure. The figurine that sat on that pedestal appeared to fit precisely into the mouth of that face.”

  “Do you know what is inside the pyramid?”

  “That would be telling,” Lyton said, “as if you don’t know.” He stood, seeming no worse for having been shot, and dusted off his clothing. “We best get after him,” the Englishman said, indicating the door to Anna.

  ◆

  Anna and Lyton both expertly crossed the floating walkway and the central plaza to the pyramid. About halfway up the steps, Anna stopped to help the old man.

  “I usually take a short break every ten steps or so,” he said apologetically.

  “It would be better to reach the top alive than not at all,” Anna replied, “You are of no help to me if you have a heart attack.”

  Lyton eyed Anna appraisingly.

  “Spoken like a Russian,” he said coldly. Anna ignored the comment.

  “Von Juntz is already there,” Anna said. “He can wait for us until we are ready. Unless we need to stop him from completing whatever he has in mind.”

  Lyton shook his head.

  “For all I know, he expects to find riches that he wants to keep for himself,” Lyton said flatly. “I expect he will be disappointed. If he has any other motivation, I am not aware of it.” They waited a moment in silence until Lyton had caught his breath, then continued. They stopped two more times before they reached the top.

  The triangular platform on top of the pyramid was roughly five feet on a side. Within a foot-wide lip on the surface there had once been some kind of door, but now the space was empty, revealing a dark shaft below. A thick rope had been tied to a stake that had been hammered into the stone, its end disappearing into the darkness. A reptilian gargoyle was mounted in the center of each of the three sides of the shaft peered up malevolently at the two about ten feet below the opening.

  Anna looked to Lyton, but it was clear that the old man would be unable to climb down the rope.

  “How did you intend to explore this structure?” she asked.

  “I hadn’t expected a pyramid such as this to be hollow,” Lyton said sheepishly. “I presumed that there would be a side entrance to an altar at the top, as with other Mesoamerican pyramids.

  “Well, my arrival appears to be fortuitous for you,” Anna said. “I will climb down the rope and see what is to be found. You wait here.” Lyton nodded. Anna glanced at the thick, rough rope, and then said. “Give me your handkerchief.” Lyton did so without hesitation, and Anna tied it around her left hand. As she did so, Lyton produced another from his pocket. When Anna was finished, he tied it around her right hand. “Thank you.”

  Anna sat with her legs over the lip of the opening. She wrapped her legs around the rope, and then slowly slid over the edge, taking hold of it before dropping her shoulders through the gap. She crawled carefully down the rope into the abyss. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, Anna noticed that the walls of the shaft were wet, and as she descended the humidity within the pyramid gr
ew as well, and a gibbering sound floated up from below.

  Anna continued her descent. The air had become so thick, and the smell of rotting vegetation so strong, that she fought to breathe in the foul atmosphere.

  “How is it going?” Lyton shouted from above, startling Anna, who lost her grip and slid a short distance. She could feel raw abrasions on her thighs, and a burning sensation as they were irritated by the sweat streaming off her.

  “I am well,” Anna said through gritted teeth. “Please allow me to concentrate.” She looked down and spotted a ledge a few feet lower. “I think I am nearing the bottom.”

  Anna noticed the dim light from above fade, and then there was a crack and a cry as the old Englishman fell past Anna to land a short distance below her with a soft thud. The gibbering sound resumed and seemed even closer.

  “Are you all right?” Anna said anxiously. She heard groaning and could barely make out his form sprawled below her. Anna was within jumping distance of the floor, though the triangular shaft continued through it into unknown depths.

  She slid onto the floor and knelt beside Lyton. The elderly man had managed to fall onto the remains of a large bush. On closer inspection, he had landed on something on top of the bush. It was a man. Wolfram von Juntz lay sprawled beneath Lyton. There was a bullet hole smack in the center of the German’s forehead.

  Anna glanced from side to side, looking for the shooter. From what she could see, the rope was the only way out, aside from the hole in the floor. The chamber was littered with plants and small animals, all in a state of decay. Lyton stirred.

  “Are you hurt?” Anna asked. Lyton sat up slowly and looked around.