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Unable to figure out what that something was, however, Logan turned his attention to the mummified warrior standing in front of him. He stepped closer, peering into the dead man's face, wondering who he had been and what had possessed him to give up his life to stand here in this chamber for the rest of eternity.
What prompted such a sacrifice?
Logan turned just in time to see Hale lift the necklace free of its bone stand and carefully place it in the silk-lined wooden box held by one of the other acolytes. Hale spent the entire time berating the other man, telling him to hold the box steadier, to lift it higher, to stop staring at the artifact with such greed--a litany of failures, Hale's hallmark response to those he considered inferior. Logan couldn't wait for the day when he was powerful enough to best the man . . .
When Logan turned back, he found the dead warrior's eyes had opened; the corpse was staring directly at him. Or would have been, had there been eyes left in the dead man's sockets.
Logan froze, staring back, wondering if the figure was actually looking at him. Had the dead man's eyes opened of their own accord? Or had the eyelids flicked open as a result of the disturbances Logan's party was generating in the air of the chamber after all this time?
However, when the warrior turned his head to track Hale as he strode past Logan on his way to the exit, there was no longer any doubt.
"Look out!" Logan cried, even as the warriors surrounding them all sprang to life and attacked.
Two of their number lost their lives in those first few seconds as the Mayan warriors lashed out with their spears, both men impaled through their chests before they even knew what was happening. Logan used the torch in his hand to parry the strike of the warrior in front of him and then swung it like a club, crushing his skull.
Logan's exultant cry of victory died stillborn in his throat, however, as the warrior picked himself back up, spear in hand, just as dangerous as before.
In seconds, the room was utter chaos. Acolytes were fighting for their lives against the undead guardians of the necklace while at the same time doing their best to protect their leader. Hale, meanwhile, was preparing to cast a spell of banishment; Logan recognized the hand motions even as he did his best to keep the creature in front of him from skewering him like a piece of meat.
A horrified scream burst from the man next to Logan as one of the other warriors managed to sink his teeth deep into the flesh of the man's arm. Logan looked on in horror as the life was literally sucked from the other man, his flesh shriveling right before everyone's eyes as the Mayan warrior drank his fill. In seconds the acolyte was reduced to little more than a shriveled husk, not unlike the guardian itself.
Now that he understood the consequences of letting the Mayan get his hands on him, Logan redoubled his efforts to keep his attacker at bay, mentally screaming at Hale to hurry the fuck up!
Logan didn't know if Hale heard him--who really knew the extent of the man's powers?--but in the next second a powerful wave of magick burst from the council leader's fingertips, washing across the room like a miniature tsunami, sweeping over everything in its path. Logan could feel the tug of the magick as it swept over him, but it was looking for the dead, not the living, and so it didn't have any effect on him.
As for the Mayan warriors, that was another story.
The spell had been cast by a master necromancer, with all of his power behind it. Rather than attempting to control the creatures, it was designed to rip the life force animating them from their dead flesh and cast it aside, leaving nothing more than inanimate husks in its wake.
One minute Logan was feverishly fighting for his life, the next the Mayan warrior in front of him collapsed to the floor like a puppet that had just had its strings snipped.
Turning, Logan found the same was true for all of the other warriors; the room was littered with their desiccated corpses.
"Quickly now," Hale said, clutching the wooden box to his side as he stepped over the shriveled body in front of him and headed for the door.
Logan didn't need a second invitation to follow suit.
He was almost at the entryway when the sound of something dragging itself across the floor behind him drew his attention.
He spun around to find the dead men littering the floor stirring back to life, the force that had animated them visibly rushing back into their bodies like smoke sucked into their mouths.
Logan couldn't believe what he was seeing. For the dead men to resist a banishment spell cast by one of Hale's ability was so utterly outside Logan's experience that it was like waking up to find the inmates had taken control of the asylum. He stared in horror as the corpses began to move with a bit more alacrity, dragging their limbs behind them even as they sought to follow those who had dared to disturb their sleep and steal the precious artifact they had been placed there to protect.
"Run!" Logan shouted, then took his own advice.
The next several moments were a blur as the group of artifact seekers fought their way through the narrow twists and turns of the tunnel leading back to the bridge. As they hurried along, Logan was aware of the sounds of pursuit growing behind them, and he knew it wouldn't be long before the warriors caught up with them. He wanted to move faster but was hampered by those ahead, just as the man behind him was hampered by Logan's progress.
Things came to a head when they reached the bridge, as the man behind Logan tried to shove his way past, sending them both sprawling. Logan managed to catch himself against the tunnel wall, but the other man wasn't so lucky; his scream seemed to go on forever as he slipped over the edge of the bridge and plummeted into the darkness below.
The man's death barely gave Logan any pause; he had a horde of undead Mayan warriors at his heels that would have been just as happy to throw him off the bridge as his companion had been, and he wasted no time in scrambling back to his feet and heading out onto the bridge. Never in his life had he been so thankful for his foresight in stringing the guide line, for none of them would ever have been able to make their way across without it.
The fall had cost him precious time, though, and the horde at his back had gained on him as he reached the opposite side. He glanced back, saw the dead men rush onto the bridge without slowing, and knew his lead was dwindling by the second. With his heart in his throat, he rushed after Hale and the others.
He'd barely gone another twenty yards beyond the chasm when one of the Mayans tackled him from behind. They crashed to the floor, though the dead man lost his grip on Logan in the process. Not about to let the small blessing go to waste, Logan scrambled to his feet, snatched the torch he'd dropped off the floor, and ran headlong down the tunnel even as the dead man behind him was crushed beneath the feet of the rest of the undead rushing forward.
When Logan reached the cliff face his team had descended, he found those above rapidly pulling the ropes
up behind them.
