Page 25 of Us in Ruins
“There’s treasure. There’s always treasure.”
“But what if it’s—”
“The power of love?” Van asked, his voice lightly mocking. He rolled his eyes. “You can have it. But every ounce of gold is mine.”
“Deal. Yes. Absolutely.” The words spilled out of her.
Because Van might be wrong about the gold, but he was right about her. Without Venus’s magic, Margot would always be too impulsive, too unpredictable, too emotional. Only the Vase could change all that. She’d stop being a problem her dad wanted to solve and start being the daughter he always wanted.
Without another word, Van climbed the rusted rungs and punched open a hatch. Margot followed after him, knowing he would not hesitate to leave her behind again if given the chance, gritting her teeth and vowing to keep up.
But the second she stepped off the ladder, Margot’s jaw unhinged, gaping. “What is this place?”
“This,” Van said, “is the Nymphaeum.”
9
The Nymphaeum stretched what seemed like miles above them, culminating in a domed ceiling that had been painted sky blue and dotted with feathered clouds. Lining the walls were a hundred niches, each wreathed with sprawling vines and blooming flowers all handcrafted from stone. The room was dominated by a paved basin. Inside it, columns jutted upward, holding up intricately carved statues of beautiful women—or, Margot supposed, nymphs.
The statues seemed to dance, each midtwirl with skirts billowing around their lithe frames on an invisible breeze. Their hands clasped together, a daisy chain. At the highest point, a nymph with angled features raised her hand toward the heavens.
Van closed the hatch they came through and, as if reading her mind, said, “It used to be a reservoir. A sanctuary. A place they would worship the nymphs, goddesses of the springs. There would have been all kinds of plants—trees, flowers, you name it. The fountain fills from a redirected spring. Surprisingly advanced for the first century.”
Margot tried to imagine it. A chill radiated off the stones, seeping through her skin and demanding to be felt. What used to be a sparkling grotto of blue waters had long since dried up, but Margot trailed her fingers along the stones and felt the indentations where pouring water had worn it away. Fresh vines of too-green ivy crept down the walls, thirsty and searching.
It would have been so romantic if it weren’t for the skeletons.
Mismatched piles of dried-out bones were scattered across the floor. An empty rib cage in a heap by the statues, a skull in front of a staircase that wound up and around the walls of the Nymphaeum. Margot’s stomach rolled at the sight, but no way in hell was she going to let Van see her squirm. He already thought she had no merit as an archaeologist—the last thing she wanted to do was prove him right.
“So, the shard’s in here somewhere?” Margot asked. It felt wrong to walk across the mosaic floors. Chipped glass had been pressed into ornate patterns, not that different from the floor in the temple, the color faded from the years. Too beautiful for a place so haunted—and, if the skeletons warned of anything, dangerous.
Van, however, didn’t take such a delicate approach. He slammed the side of his fist against the wall, testing it. Dust scattered in the wake. The stone he’d punched bore the image of a gold-plated shell, now fractured. “Used to be, at least.”
“Did you ever consider not destroying this place in the process?” Margot asked. She could hear it in her memory, the way Dr. Hunt has chastised her. Try not to destroy a UNESCO World Heritage site. Getting blamed for Van’s heavy-handed approach was not something she was interested in.
He didn’t answer. Typical. But he did sucker punch another stamped stone. Margot cringed, imagining the bruises forming on his fist. The structural integrity of this build seemed pretty solid based on the way he wrung out his aching fingers after the second hit.
“Where did you find it last time?” Margot asked.
Van smacked another brick, and this time, the stone budged. He cocked an eyebrow and said, “Here.”
Nothing happened. Margot watched Van, waiting, but he was undeterred by the anticlimactic moment. Okay, hot shot. Now what?
He climbed up the staircase, shoulders squared and taking them two at a time. Halfway up, he wavered, dragged back as if something had tugged on his shirtsleeves. Like, maybe his conscience.
“You can swim, right?”
“Um. Yes?” Margot jogged up the staircase, careful not to slip on the crumbling edges. Swimming hardly seemed of relevance. This place was as dry as the bones strewn across the floor.
A noise behind her had Margot spinning on her heels. Thankfully, the statues of the nymphs stayed blessedly still. The noise happened again, and this time, Margot recognized it.
A drip.
“Is that...?” her voice trailed off as she listened. Another drip, and then another.
Water poured out of shells that dotted the limestone facade. It spilled against the stones, washing away the layer of dust on the mosaic basin and rendering everything in stunning, sparkling clarity.
“The trial of Aqua,” she said, thunderstruck.