Murder on Masaya (Kea Wright Mysteries Book 3) Page 2

  Once Friar Blas del Castillo had been successfully lifted to the crater rim, the remaining brothers clustered together as far away from the lake as they could manage. In groups of three, the brothers were lifted skyward. Despite his pleas, Diego found himself, Thomas, and Rafa last to be raised out of the pit. While they waited for the basket’s return, baking in Masaya’s glow, they took refuge behind a boulder. As the minutes crawled past, Rafa grew impatient. Pacing back and forth, he squinted through the smoke for any sign of the basket. Thomas fiddled with his cross, his gaze twitching like a parrot, first to the cliffs, then up to the sky, as if searching for another way out of this hell.

  From the shelter of the boulder, Diego observed that the lake’s surface appeared to froth and rage with even greater ferocity, as if angered by the recent theft.

  A tortured groan caused Diego to turn. The assemblage of poles on the opposite side of the inlet toppled beneath the weight of the bucket into the lake, sending a fiery cascade of fluid into the air.

  Fearing that he would be burnt alive by the glowing chunks, Diego cowered behind the boulder as they rained down around him, hitting and spitting as if possessed. One globule, no larger than his thumb, came to rest on the ground by his cheek. Its trembling form sighed as it cooled and settled onto the ashen floor.

  Curious, Rafa walked over to examine the iridescent object. His hands shook as he extracted his flask and poured water over the glowing rock, as he had seen Friar Blas do at the shore. The water caused the tear-shaped blob to crack sharply, as if in pain. Steam curled upward and its glowing orange-red skin shimmered jet-black. Within seconds, the rock was cool to the touch.

  “I fear greed has overtaken Friar Blas’ sanity.” Smirking, Rafa held out the object for Diego to inspect.

  To his astonishment, Diego saw that not only was the black, beaded object not gold, but it resembled any lump found in a blacksmith’s slag heap or any of the other millions of pieces of rock scattered across the floor of the plaza.

  Before Diego could draw breath to comment, another crash echoed around the crater. Pulled down by the chains, the remaining tower crashed into the lake, spewing a cascade of golden spray across the crater. A foot-long rope of molten rock soared through the air end over end before landing with a wet slap across Rafa’s throat.

  Rafa clawed at the glowing slab, screaming in terror as his fingers burst into flame. With a crackling sound, the scalding rock ate through his neck and spine. Before Rafa even hit the ground, Diego could see that his brother was dead.

  Father Thomas ran away toward the crater wall, screaming in horror. Numb with shock, Diego could only watch helplessly as wispy tendrils of gas from the lake enveloped Thomas with their thick embrace.

  Terrified, Diego attempted to return to the spot on the plaza where the basket should be. Blinded by the dense fog and gagging from its vapors, he searched desperately with outstretched arms for the safety of the basket, praying it had returned.

  One hesitant step after another, Diego shuffled forward. After twenty paces, he realized that he must have passed the basket. If it had ever even returned for them at all.

  He was lost.

  It was then, steeped in panic, that he heard a mocking laughter and turned. Before him, a ghostly visage of an ancient woman appeared in the poisonous clouds. Naked save for a clutch of long, wild hair draped around her obsidian skin, she smiled, exposing fetid teeth and sharp fangs before surging toward him.

  Diego bolted in terror, running blindly across the plaza. In his haste, his foot slammed against something soft and heavy that sent him tumbling onto the ground. Almost swimming through a layer of ash, he realized he had stumbled over his tools … the tools that he had left by the basket!

  Shaking with adrenaline, he pulled himself upright and scanned the mist for any sign of the goddess. In the shifting clouds he could discern nothing at first but then he spied the basket. He sprinted toward it and leapt inside headfirst. With two frantic tugs, he signaled his brothers, weeping as he felt the basket lift upward.

  As he began the agonizingly slow ascent to the crater rim, Diego imagined he could hear the demonic laughter following him. Peering over the edge of the basket, he searched in desperation for any sign of Brother Thomas’ fate, but instead was met with the sight of the old hag rising out of the clouds, her pendulous breasts …

  Chapter 2

  Masaya Volcano, Present

  “PENDULOUS BREASTS?” Maria Martinez yanked the buds out of her ears in disgust and turned on her instructor. “I thought you said this was educational!”

  Dr. Kea Wright glanced up from her tablet. “Viramonte’s original translation of the Masaya mythology is fairly accurate, however you’re listening to the pulp fiction version.”

  Kea adjusted the brim of her straw hat and squinted in the bright sunlight. Despite frequent applications of sunscreen, her pert nose was profusely freckled. Her ginger hair draped about her shoulders, protecting the fair skin of her slender neck. Her bare legs glowed in the sun, her thighs toned from the daily hikes up and down the volcano’s slopes. She wore a dingy t-shirt and matching khaki vest and shorts, although the fastenings struggled to contain her belly, a casualty of too much beer and coconut bread.

  In contrast, Maria’s skin was exposed at every opportunity and shone a deep copper. Her head was hunched over a device the size and shape of a lunch box, her slender legs crossed on the black ash. Barely nineteen years old, silver bracelets tinkled and clanked as she swept her raven black hair out of her face to frown at her professor. “You said this would help me understand more about Masaya. This is just cheap horror … a fantasy.”

  “Real life is often much stranger than fiction.” Kea tilted her head. “In the sixteenth century, the Dean of the Cathedral of Leon asked the emperor for a couple hundred slaves to drill a tunnel through Masaya’s walls to empty out all the ‘gold.’ Imagine their surprise if they’d succeeded in releasing all that lava.”

  “Still,” Maria rolled her eyes, “demons?”

  “Not a demon, a goddess,” Kea corrected. “You’re certain that you don’t want to listen to the rest of the story?” She tried to keep the disappointment out of her voice. She had hoped the audio book would have kept Maria quiet for at least another half hour.

  “Did any of those things actually happen?”

  Kea waggled her hand as if to say sort of. “Friar Blas del Castillo did lead a secret expedition into Masaya. He presented the lava rocks to the governor and asked for a larger expedition to be mounted. The governor didn’t agree, of course. As for the goddess …”

  “Which is ridiculous.”

  “It’s only a book.” Kea swallowed a sigh of frustration. “Do you want to be entertained or do you want to learn?”

  “Can’t it be both?” Maria rocked back from the device and sat on her heels. “This thing doesn’t really work, does it? I bet you’ve given me a broken one just to mess with me.”

  “It merely requires practice.” Kea crouched beside her. “Like any instrument, it takes patience and repetition.”

  “It’s a gravitometer, not a piano,” Maria waved an obscene gesture at the box.

  About a foot square, the device stood on four little knobbed feet, like an old-fashioned bathtub. The white porcelain cover was chipped from years in the field and the tiny grooves in the black dials were caked with grit. It looked like something out of a 1950s science fiction film.

  “It shouldn’t be this difficult to operate. It should just … work,” Maria grumbled.

  “It’s very simple.” Kea shifted the box on the circular brass plate that sat on the sand. “First, center the bubble.” She scooted the gravitometer around until it looked about level, then spun the dials above its feet to fine tune its position. “Then, adjust these two dials, horizontal and vertical, until you get a reading.” She smiled as the numbers settled into place. “See? Easy.”

  “It should just have a big red button.” Maria pouted, obviously annoyed at how qui
ckly Kea had obtained a measurement – and that Kea obscured the reading with her thumb.

  Kea reset the device, then stood upright, her knees clicking in protest. “Your turn.”

  Maria accepted her position beside the unit with a moan. “You do realize that it is going to take me another twenty minutes to do what you just did in twenty seconds.”

  “Try again. I’m sure you’ll get it in no time.” Kea settled back down on her boulder and opened a battered copy of Alistair McLean’s Night without End.

  Hearing the faint, tinny sounds of explosions floating across the rocky terrain, she glanced up from her book. The noises were coming from Rudi, a mountain of a man sitting under the shade of a boulder a dozen feet away. Judging from the sounds, he was playing games on his phone.

  Kea narrowed her eyes. It was not unusual for her team to be escorted by a representative from INETER, the Nicaraguan National Survey. Indeed, over the last three years, Kea had met many of their ranks. However, following the civilian protests last year, a new squad of heavily muscled escorts had appeared. Aside from the standard issue government blue overalls, all the new thugs had a generic ‘special forces’ look: high and tights, biceps like bowling balls, and, unlike the INETER scientists, they rarely engaged in conversation.

  Rudi, however, was special. While the other special forces types kept tabs on the scientists, he never left Maria’s side. A special favor for a special family, as Maria put it. Kea understood that Rudi was essentially Maria’s bodyguard, as evidenced by his sidearm, however, she was less sure what he would do to protect Maria if Masaya’s active vent erupted – was he planning to shoot at it?

  Kea had exchanged little more than a good morning with the man, but he seemed pleasant enough. While he never got in the way of their work, she assumed everything they said or did would be reported back to Nicaragua’s president.

  The thought re-ignited a fire that smoldered deep inside her. Science, she believed, should be used for discovery, not for furthering the career of a quasi-dictator. Exhausted by the week’s labor, however, the flame inside her fluttered and died. Eventually, she drifted off into a light snooze. To anyone viewing from above, it looked as if she were on a day out at the beach, not asleep in the center of one of the world’s most active volcanoes.

  The survey station was located on the surface of an old lava lake named Nindiri, nestled within the giant volcano. To the north, the crater walls of Masaya rose up to the sky, the escarpments layered with alternating thick bands of white and gray lava flows. To the west, the world fell away into a giant pit, where the lake had collapsed into a crater. To the east, another, larger crater, gaped open and a skylight within its base revealed a churning sea of lava. This easternmost crater was Santiago, and its frequent belching of sulfur was a constant reminder that somewhere beneath them, the rest of the magma chamber simmered, waiting for its release.

  The goal of the gravimetric survey was to determine how deep the magma chamber lay beneath them. Kea had led the expedition for the last few years, but the survey dated back decades. The brief pause resulting from the pandemic meant a gap in their data, however, the best part of the project was that there was no rush. The survey also taught Maria techniques that the student needed to learn to conduct her own thesis work.

  The ability to nap while teaching was a bonus.

  Twenty minutes later, Kea snorted herself awake. Wiping a smear of drool from her chin, she glanced up to see if her charge had noticed.

  Maria was oblivious. She had shuffled closer to the plate, intently focused on delicately twisting the gravitometer’s dials.

  Kea watched as Maria set about fine tuning the instrument, no doubt terrified that the reluctant needle might suddenly leap past its mark, which meant starting over again. Maria would have to turn the dial a miniscule amount each time, waiting for the needle to dance and settle. Then again. Wait. Repeat.

  After ten minutes, Maria sat back and let out a long breath of frustration. “This is less like science and more like casting a magic spell.”

  “Some people would consider using only a spring and a grain of sand to determine the depth of a giant mass of magma several kilometers beneath our feet nothing other than magic,” Kea said from underneath the paperback that she was using as a sunshield.

  Maria spent another few minutes fiddling with the device before announcing, “Ding!”

  “You got a reading?”

  Maria shook her head. “I want it to go ding. I want to press a big red button, have it do the science, go ding, and give me the answer. Is that so wrong?”

  “Science,” Kea remarked sluggishly, “is an art.”

  “No, it isn’t.” Maria balled her hands in frustration and wiped beads of sweat from her brow. “Science is math. Science is fact, not … decoupage.”

  “You’d be amazed how much algebra it takes to define a decent bit of decoupage. Keep at it,” Kea encouraged. “I’m sure you’ve nearly got it.”

  Kea couldn’t fault the young woman for complaining. The device was notoriously temperamental; even experienced students took more than thirty minutes to take a single reading. The gravitometer was a refurbished model from the 1960s, and rarely used by the rest of the team.

  In truth, Kea was just killing time and, if she were being honest, taking out her frustrations on Maria. Over the last three years, running the Masaya project had been Kea’s pride and joy. Hired away from her publish-or-perish academic career, Kea’s salary had tripled overnight since joining the Outpost. Recently, however, everything had soured. Civil unrest had roiled the nation, putting two of her team members in an unwelcome spotlight. Their family had close ties with the President, and the press followed them relentlessly.

  Maria started the undergraduate geology program this year, following in the footsteps of her brother. While Emilio ditched geology to start a climbing company, at least Maria was dedicated to pursuing a career in science.

  “Mierda!”

  “Language,” Kea chided.

  “I got a reading!”

  Kea heard a muffled thump. She reached down to pick up the notebook that Maria had thrown at her feet.

  “The needle keeps bouncing,” Maria whined. “I’m not touching it, I swear.”

  Kea frowned at the scribbled reading, then flipped through her own notebook. “Are you sure about this number?” She pulled out a device the size of a smartphone and placed it on the ground. Activating the digital display, she pressed the red button on the screen to activate the mini-gravitometer, which produced a similar reading along with a friendly ‘ping.’

  “Are you shitting me?” Maria spluttered.

  Kea waved away the young woman’s fury as a buzz on her wrist signaled an incoming call. She swatted at it in irritation while running through figures in her head.

  “The words ‘you owe me,’ can’t begin to cover this afternoon.” Daniela’s voice in Kea’s earpiece was stuttered with static.

  “I’m doing my share,” Kea muttered quietly. She threw a cautious glance at Maria who looked like she was about to hit something. “You have the fun job. I’d kill to be in the crater today.”

  Whatever obscenities Daniela said in response were garbled by a background hiss.

  Kea checked the time on her watch: four p.m., about five hours till sunset. By the sound of the interference, Daniela and her team must still be deep inside the volcano. “What level are you on?”

  “Delta level. Our influencer made us stay down here,” Daniela said, referring to Emilio. “I think he wants night shots for his Instagram followers.”

  “I didn’t authorize that!” Kea leapt up off her boulder and paced back and forth. Delta, situated at the very edge of the active magma chamber, was the deepest and most dangerous sublevel. She should have guessed from the hissing background noise; the roar of churning lava. This was not the message she’d been expecting to receive. They should have checked in a half hour ago. “What is he thinking? You know we need to finish working down the
re today! Why didn’t you stick to the schedule?”

  “Yeah, like I didn’t realize that,” Daniela snapped. “If I kill the prick, will I keep my dental plan in prison?”

  “Tell him I ordered you all back to basecamp.”

  “Amirah said to keep Emilio happy, remember, and that’s what I’m doing.”

  “What? One sec.” Kea pressed the ‘hold’ button and launched another call, this time to Amirah in San Paulo.

  Amirah only managed to get a word in edgewise when Kea ran out of expletives beginning with ‘s.’

  “Kea, my dear, how are you?” Amirah’s voice was infuriatingly calm.

  Nothing pissed off Kea more than people being reasonable when she was furious.

  “Why is Emilio running this expedition?” Kea seethed, having regained enough sense to walk out of Maria’s earshot. “Babysitting these two is one thing, but Emilio’s not following any of the expedition’s protocols.”

  “There wouldn’t be an expedition without support from our sponsor,” Amirah reminded her smoothly. Kea imagined Amirah reclining in her chair, twirling one of her silken scarves as she spoke. “With full government support, we continue to have unprecedented access to one of the most unique sources of data in the world. Surely that is worth an afternoon or two of indulging Maria and Emilio.”

  Amirah’s lack of concern ratcheted Kea’s anger up to a solid rage. “Not if it means putting people’s lives at risk.” She disconnected the call and switched over to Daniela, who was still on hold. “I just spoke to Amirah. Emilio has to come back up now.” Technically, not a lie, Kea thought, but a conflation of facts.

  “… been acting very oddly ever since,” another roar drowned Daniela’s words. Daniela’s tone suggested she hadn’t realized Kea had ever put her on hold. “I think there’s some …” another rumble of static swallowed the signal.

  Kea fumbled with her watch, frantically jacking up the call volume.