AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Maggie snorted. “Less than twenty minutes, and this isn’t even the roughest part. I thought you were a field-tested archeologist who’s dealt with rough terrains.”
“I am and I have,” I grumbled, not wanting to admit to my natural clumsiness regardless whether I scaled Mount Kilimanjaro or walked a straight line along a smoothly paved New York City sidewalk.
“Don’t be such a drama queen, McEwan. Suck it up, city girl. And watch your step.”
Grr.
Hilarity was right. This sharp-tongued woman was too much like myself, and it ticked me off. It’d be a miracle if we both made it out of this cave alive. And not because of any danger of the cave itself.
“The sulfur is due to pockets of dormant volcanic activity,” she explained. “Here in the Pacific Northwest, we’re part of the Ring of Fire that stretches down the west coast on both continents and across the Bering Strait then back down the coast of Asia into New Zealand.”
I knew that, of course, and well remembered the famous eruption of Mount St. Helens eight years earlier. Just a few hours south of where were now, in fact. That reminder didn’t set my mind at ease.
“Dormant, huh?”
Maggie grinned back at me. “For now. One never knows when Mother Earth is fed up with her unruly children and decides to blow her top.”
“Comforting.”
“It’s the summer solstice today, too, so anything could happen,” she added with broadening smile. “Grandma always told me that the magic of the earth is at its strongest at these times, so you’d better watch your step today, school teacher.”
“Hmph.”
Maggie laughed, then sobered when adding, “That’s the official suggestion of how the other site was destroyed last year, you know. Natural causes.”
“Which you’re not buying for a minute,” I added for her.
“Either way, let’s get this done fast, then get out of here. Best not to tempt fate.”
“With you there, sister. How much farther to these glyphs?”
Maggie pointed to the group of stalactites a hundred yards ahead. “They’re in the room right behind that archway.”
I followed her as we both ducked under protruding stalactites and into a cramped circular cave room, one that had been used by someone at some point. Painted pictographs and hieroglyphs were covered every wall.
A small circle of stones centered the cave itself that indicated a possible firepit, but it was the drawings themselves that held my full attention. Most of them were scenes of people, entire families, warriors that hunted enormous animals that were shockingly familiar.
“Dinosaurs?” I questioned with amazement.
Maggie nodded at them with her own sense of wonder. “That one sure looks like a mastodon to me. Not to mention the velociraptor right there. And that one I swear looks like a T-Rex grabbing a man with his pointy chompers and tiny forearms.”
It did. To a tee.
It had been suggested by many paleontologists that mankind did live with dinosaurs, and more recently than first believed. These weren’t the only glyphs, ancient documents and artifacts in the world that pointed to this theory either.
“You know, this could shatter belief about the millions-of-years theory of the earth’s origins,” I posed, sweeping the light beam across every picture.
Because if it could ever be proven that dinosaurs lived with mankind, then the scientists’ dating theories were off as well. Which further begged the question...
“Ifthis can be officially authenticated,” Maggie added. “Then not accidentally destroyed.”
Like her last one.
Yes, this indeed needed to be protected at all cost. Which meant the sooner I could get my deadbeat ex-boyfriend out here to officially date and document it himself, the more protection this discovery would have.
I was definitely making a phone call to Collin first thing tonight.
“Look at these,” Maggie said, sweeping her own light beam along the rock walls. “Our people always believed in such animals. We believe that the earth is very young, and because of this we are caretakers of its wellbeing like a parent is to their child.
