Page 12 of Ruined Wolf
I shook my head and leaned close. “Morbid.”
I could hear the roar of the water rushing far beneath us, fed over and over by the colossal waves that battered the cliffs.
“Whoever carved them must have got pretty wet,” I observed, darting back as the water blew out of the hole again.
I was a little disappointed. Part of the reason I’d been so keen to come on the tour as soon as possible was because I’d realised when I’d been talking to Kathy that the tour would take me right past the coast where the third part of the map had indicated the fourth location would be. The symbol on the map had merely been a wavy line with a curved lump on top and what looked like a small tree. I’d had no idea what it could symbolise, but when Lucas had mentioned petroglyphs, I’d got quite excited. The carvings didn’t look anything like the ones I’d been collecting so far, and they seemed much older too, though they could have just been worn away quicker because of the location.
A thought struck me. “How big is the cave?”
“It’s a fair size, actually,” Lucas replied, perching on a nearby boulder. I did the same, far enough back that I only caught a light spray on my face when the wind blew.
“You’ve been inside? Can we go in?”
He shook his head. “Absolutely not, my inquisitive little omega. It’s dangerous.”
I raised my eyebrows and gave him a sceptical look. “You don’t often come across as a guy who’d avoid doing dangerous stuff.”
He gave me a hard stare. “I don’t, but I’m not about to subject you to any.”
I decided to redirect the subject back to the cave. “When were you down there?”
“When we were kids. Maverick nicked a boat and wanted to take her out, and I wanted to see if the devil really did live down here.” He shrugged. “Even Jaxon wanted to see inside. He reckoned there was pirate treasure inside.”
My mouth fell open at this sudden revelation. “Pirate treasure? Like Spanish gold and Jolly Rogers?”
Lucas rolled his eyes. “Don’t get too excited. It’s a complete myth. Pirates never came this far up the coast, but Jaxon was into all the old stories, and he reckoned he’d heard a myth that talked about pirate treasure from one of the original tribes who lived here back then.”
“So there could actually be treasure down there...”
“Like I said, pirates never came this far north. It’s a kid’s story. Plus, the cave was supposed to be haunted by the ghosts of the pirates. I think some ancient mothers decided to spread a little story to keep their kids away from here.”
“But it’s possible that someone did come this far north and we just didn’t know about it.”
“It’s possible, but it would be a long trek from Central America, and you’re talking thousands of miles to come to Desolation. There are plenty of other places to watch sea lions, little omega, or to bury treasure along the way.”
“I suppose.” I was itching to tell him and wanted so badly to get him on board. With everything he knew about the island, Lucas would have made a perfect partner, but it would have brought up more questions than I was ready for. I looked down into the dark hole, listening to the roar down below. “What did you see in the cave when you went in?” I asked.
“It was a long time ago,” Lucas said. He shoved off the rock and walked towards the hole, bending to scoop up a small rock. He waited until after the next water burst, then leaned forwards and dropped the rock down the hole. I waited to hear a splash, but instead I heard the echo of a rattle of stone as the pebble bounced along hard rock.
I jumped down and wandered over to where Lucas stood. “It’s not flooded.”
“No. The section of cave where this leads to is on a steep slope of broken rock and rubble. It’s not the cave flooding you need to worry about, it’s that once you’re trapped in there, there’s no way of getting out until the next low tide.”
“But surely that happens every twenty-four hours?”
“Normal low tide, yes, but the water only actually gets low enough for you to get into the cave three or four times a year. Strangely, sometimes they happen only a few days apart. It depends on a range of factors.”
“Oh, I see.” I did, and my thoughts of coming back at low tide to check out the cave were fading fast. “How long does it last for?”
“What do you mean?” He eyed me warily.
“When you came, the low tide must have lasted for a decent amount of time if you were able to get into the cave, check it out, and then get out again.”
Lucas let out a short laugh that was more of a bark. “Well, yes. Technically, you have a window of about six hours between low and high tide, but the way the cave fills up, it’s more like an hour before you’re trapped there. We did get in, but Jaxon mucked up the tidal times. We managed about twenty minutes before we realised the tide was coming in fast, and we barely made it out. Like I said, bloody dangerous.”
“I take it you didn’t find pirate treasure then?” I grinned.
“Nah, just a dark, damp cave and some more petroglyphs. Apparently ancient inhabitants of the island had a death wish.”