STORY CUBES STORY #1
The Treasure of the Pyramid
It was a dark night, as is every night when you are exploring mysteries deep within a 4,600-year-old pyramid. My colleague for nearly twenty years, Annette Dubois and I had been at work wending our ways through the maze of narrow passageways for what seemed like days. Therefore, I was more than a bit surprised, when I glanced at my luminous pocket watch, to find the time was only 1:45 AM, scarcely an hour and forty-five minutes since our real adventure began.
For sure, we entered the pyramid of Scrofulu more than four hours ago, but at the exact stroke of midnight, just as we came to another dead end deep within the structure, Annette sighed and brushed her fingers across a faded hieroglyph, and by the dim light of my torch we discerned a fine crack alongside the unknown Egyptian symbol. For a moment neither of us spoke. But our locked eyes spoke volumes. My weariness and frustration vanished, replaced by excitement and anticipation.
Annette stepped back, allowing me to approach the wall. With my fine chisel and hammer I pried and tapped along the seam, when to my amazement, the wall suddenly and silently slid open, revealing an inky black passageway.
“Hiram,” Annette gasped, “what should we do? Walls shouldn’t act this way. It may be a trap. We could die here.”
Saying nothing, I stepped forward, directing the light of my flashlight into the darkness. Within the feeble circle of light, I only saw a smooth limestone wall, devoid of any hieroglyphs. I sensed that same smooth wall disappearing into the ominous blackness. Nevertheless, I felt magnetically drawn into the spell of this place and stepped forward, Annette following nervously. As she did so, the door behind her closed as suddenly and silently as it had when opened before. Annette let out a muffled shriek and bumped into my back, causing me to drop the flashlight. It crashed into the wall and bounced a few times before its light flickered and went out.
“Now what on Earth did you do that for?” I fell to my hands and knees, groping for the flashlight.
“It scared me half to death. I’m so afraid. What if we’re stuck in here and cannot find a way out?” Her voice trembled on the edge of panic.
“Annette, calm down. This is not your first rodeo. We’ve been in tight spots before and always have emerged with our colors flying, right?. This is no different, only a bit weirder.” I paused to catch my breath and calm my racing heart. “And look.” My eyes were adjusting to the dark, and I noticed it was no longer pitch black. “There is light here.” The walls glowed with a dim pink phosphorescence. “Surely if this was designed with no way out why would the builders provide light?”
I rose from the floor, covered in the dust of ages, brushed myself off, rattled the useless flashlight, and tossed it away, listening to it echo down the hallway. And then silence.
“You’re right,” she said and exhaled. “There must be an exit. I apologize for being so rattled.”
“I wonder if…”
She interrupted my thought, her voice intense. “Hiram, listen. Do you hear that?” She paused and we both listened. “What do you think it is? It sounds like running water.”
“I hear it too. Well, at least we won’t die of thirst.” I tried for a moment of levity.
“Perhaps we should turn around. Maybe we can open that door again.” Those were her words, but her grey eyes, shining oddly in the pink light, shone with excitement. I knew then that my intrepid exploring companion in no way intended to retreat. I realized she was testing my courage.
“Annette,” I said. “Do you really think that’s what we should do? After we’ve come so far? This can make our careers. We’d be famous. Gal, think of the write-ups for us in the journals.” I smiled. “Not to mention the commercials we could do for flashlight batteries. This is the opportunity of a lifetime. I wouldn’t go back for all the pharaoh’s treasure. Would you?”
Dear Annette reached out and took my hand. In a soft voice she said, “No, I would not, not without you. We’ve been together our whole careers. If I am to die in this place, I want it to be with you. But I don’t intend for that to happen. Now let’s find that water.” She pushed a lock of hair behind an ear, and we walked toward the sound.
A few minutes later the hallway made a right angle turn, revealing to us a large rectangular space, lit by the same glow. In the center of the room was a circular pool, encompassed by a glittering waist-high ledge. In its middle a fountain spouted upward several feet from what appeared to be a large Egyptian vase. It was an enchanting scene. On further examination, we noticed the room was filled with animal artifacts. I picked up a turtle artifact, Its shell composed of various shimmering jewels, red, green, gold, and blue.
“Look at this, Annette. Someone, thousands of years ago made and placed this priceless turtle beside this pool and then locked it away for eternity.” I gazed at it in wonderment.
Annette reached out to touch its shell. “With just this one thing, Hiram, do you realize we could sell it and live comfortably for the rest of our lives?”
“My dear, that will never happen. Look around you. These walls were once painted but now stand faded with the centuries.” I carefully placed the turtle on the ledge surrounding the fountain and approached the room’s wall, being careful not to damage any other of the various artifacts lying about. “There is no way out of here that I can detect, not a flaw, not a seam. No. I don’t believe that anything in this place is meant ever to leave it.” I went back over to the bejeweled turtle on the fountain ledge. On a whim I picked it up and once more examined this beautiful item. Then, with a chuckle, I leaned over the ledge and carefully placed it in the pool. It just seemed like the right thing to do. “There you go, my hard-shelled friend. You have been dry far too long.”
It might have been the ripples in the water playing tricks on my eyes, but it seemed to me the turtle turned its head to look up at me. And then I was certain. It moved.
“Annette, come quick. Look at this.” She rushed over from where she had been studying a huge, bejeweled scarab. The turtle rose to the surface and with a graceful motion swam to the center of the fountain, where he pressed his beak against a jewel embedded in the Egyptian vase disgorging the fountain. I detected a slight tremor in the floor. Then one of the floor slabs dropped several inches and slid aside, revealing descending steps.
“When you placed the turtle in the pool instead of clinging to it or claiming it for yourself, you unlocked the escape passage,” she said. We stepped over to the stairs and Annette led the way down confidently. “You did the right thing, Hi. And if that gets us out of here, I’ll be yours forever.” She laughed for the first time since we entered the pyramid. I was not sure how I was to take her declaration. I had proposed marriage to Annette a dozen times over the years, and she had always deflected me, until I gave up. But now…
At the foot of the steps a bluer, warmer glow than before greeted us. The air felt somehow moister. The floor slab above slid closed so we turned and proceeded in the only direction available, straight ahead to the sound of more water. But this was no tinkling of a fountain, but the sound of running water, a torrent.
“Of course,” I said. “The fountain must have some way of draining, and where the water exits, perhaps we can as well.” Within fewer than twenty paces we came to another room, smaller than the previous, with a small arched stone bridge spanning the stream that flowed in through one wall and out through the other. The room was surrounded by columns, but oddly enough none of them reached the ceiling. We confidently strode to its top and paused.
Looking down into the water, Annette pointed and said excitedly, “Look, Hi, do you see that fish? Isn’t it beautiful!”
I looked where she directed and saw a gorgeously striped fish of a breed I had never seen before. Clearly, it was alive, swimming with and then against the gentle current. Every twist and turn of its supple body revealed a subtle play of color, almost unidentifiable. Together we stood bedazzled and with a sigh continued over the bridge, coming to a halt, standing on a stone circle beside what appeared to be one of the incomplete stone columns, facing yet another wall. By unspoken agreement we turned and encompassed the scene again.
“This truly is an awesome place,” I almost whispered. “Annette, I am going to ask you to agree,” I took both her hands in mine and gazed steadily into her eyes, I want you to agree that if we are released from here, you will never tell a soul about what we have found here. The world would only defile it.”
She looked into my eyes and nodded her head. “I swear,” was all she said.
Our commitment to honor this holy site must have triggered another response. I heard sand flowing as if through a giant hourglass. Looking up I spied a column of sand flowing through a hole in the distant ceiling, directly down into the column beside us. Clearly, the column was hollow and designed to capture the sand. As the hollow column filled, we felt ourselves being lifted. As we were, a section of the ceiling slid into an invisible slot. This ingenious apparatus performed like a giant scale. The falling sand exposed a growing aperture above us until we came to rest in an alcove, far above the floor of the now distant chamber. We apparently had been weighed in the balance and been found worthy.
The space we now stood in was smaller than either of the previous rooms, so small one could scarcely call it a room. One wall sloped sharply over our heads. As if on a signal, the sloping wall slid to one side, revealing to us yet another stupendous view. Our exit door was nearly one-half the way up the pyramid. Beneath a brilliantly full moon, sand dunes stretched almost to the banks of a dark ribbon of river, the Nile. We two gaped in silent awe as the moon crossed the sky. Carefully side-stepping from the alcove we began our descent. With the merest whisper of sound, the door to the side of the pyramid slid shut. So ended our incredible adventure.
THE END
Karl Stewart
Nov 5, 2026
