Captain Richard's Arc

Chapter 6 of 13

Richard stood with the map still warm in his coat. The wolf paced the small stone room, nose low, claws ticking on a wooden floor laid in a tight herringbone pattern. Richard had not noticed the wood before. It did not belong in a place this old. Someone had set it down to cover something. Kovu stopped at the center and began to dig. Splinters flew. Richard knelt and pulled the loosened boards up by hand. Beneath them sat a small chest, its lid carved with a golden fox head for a lock. The metal was scratched but bright. Whoever buried it had meant to come back. Richard worked the lock with his knife until it gave. Inside lay rough coins, a few cut stones, and a folded oilskin. He opened the oilskin last. It held a single page of notes in a hand he did not know, and a key tied with red thread. The notes named tides and hours. Someone had used this room before him, and used it well. Then the wolf whined and pulled at the far boards. Richard tore them up too. Cold air rose. Below the floor, a round pool of clear water held the shape of the open sky. Moonlight, somehow, still slept on its face though the sun was up. A narrow shaft climbed through the rock above it. A moon pool. A second way in. A second way out. Richard sat back on his heels. The sanctuary he had asked for did not exist. This room had a throat to the sea and a stranger's key in its floor. He had not been the first. He would not be the last unless he changed the lock, sealed the shaft, and learned the name of the hand that wrote those notes. He folded the oilskin into his coat beside the map. Kovu lay down at the pool's edge, eyes on the water. Richard set his palm flat on the boards and made himself a short, hard promise. Before nightfall, he would close this place or leave it. There would be no third choice.