Mayan Darkness (A Hank Boyd Adventure Book 2) (The Hank Boyd Adventures) Read online

  MAYAN DARKNESS

  A Hank Boyd Adventure - Book 2

  By Matthew James

  Description:

  On the heels of their amazing discovery under the Sahara, Hank Boyd and his team find themselves in another precarious situation. This time, they must stop Zero, the shadowy organization that violently hunted them in Algeria, from releasing an ancient and deadly weapon. The target? All of humanity.

  From the Yucatan to the streets of D.C., Hank and company must try to find a way to prevent the potential catastrophe. Time is running out as an enemy from mankind's past, aided by someone from Kane's, tries to continue work set into motion millennia ago.

  Will they succeed in stopping Zero before the fall of the human race? If they don't... The world will crumble to ash and be extinguished by an all-consuming darkness.

  Also by Matthew James

  The Hank Boyd Adventures

  Blood and Sand

  Mayan Darkness

  The God Blood Novels

  Plague (2016)

  Praise for BLOOD AND SAND

  “With Blood and Sand, Matthew James has proven that true adventure is found in the fine line between myth and reality. James walks that tightrope with a master's touch.”

  ~J.M. LeDuc, Bestselling author of SIN

  “Blood and Sand takes readers on a spellbindingly treacherous journey that also manages to have fun along the way.”

  ~Rick Chesler, Bestselling author of HOTEL MEGALODON

  “Blood and Sand, the debut novel from author Matthew James, is everything you could want in an adventure novel. Just a damn fine read! James is definitely an author to watch.”

  ~David McAfee, Bestselling author of 33 A.D.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Book two is here and with it a new adventure. I started writing Mayan Darkness while Blood and Sand were in its editing phase. It was less than a week after finishing book one that I immediately dove into this project.

  I’d like to thank authors David McAfee, Rick Chesler, J.M. LeDuc, Xander Weaver, and Jason Keen for their support. You all have graciously taken time out of your ridiculously busy schedules to aid me. It really means a lot.

  I’d also like to acknowledge a few readers as well. Lyn Askew, Elizabeth and Rob Jenkins, Jerry Zavada, Zach Cole, Becki Laurent, Elizabeth Cooper, and Wendy Paolucci, thank you all for your kind words of encouragement.

  To my parents.

  My first fans and supporters.

  MAYAN DARKNESS

  A Hank Boyd Adventure

  Book 2

  Matthew James

  PROLOGUE

  Teotihuacan, Mexico

  549 A.D.

  Xiuhcoatl laughed at the paranoia his father’s priests expressed caused by the theft of the weapon he now possessed. They thought it would anger Huitzilopochtli, the war god—the god of fire—and bring a damning vengeance down upon the kingdom.

  Fools, Xiuhcoatl thought as he strolled down the Avenue of the Dead—due north—his war party close behind. They know nothing. It is I who am the ‘Bringer of Fire’—the ‘Serpent.’ It is I who will destroy our enemies with this. He gripped the sack he carried tighter, anticipating its contents eventual release. But first, he needed to show his father, the king, that his latest quest was a success.

  His father was a peaceful man by their culture’s standards. Some say he was too peaceful. Those included Xiuhcoatl, who himself was known throughout the land as a savage and a warmonger. But in the end, he was well-respected for his almost guaranteed victories. And it was for that very reason he was also feared. Some say the king even feared him.

  I never fail. Just like tonight.

  He looked around, searching the eyes of his people. His future empire. The king was not long for this world and had been ill recently. His demise would be the rise of a new monarchy. One led with ruthless efficiency and a vision for expansion. He would not rest until all of the surrounding land was under his rule.

  Xiuhcoatl even had his mother’s blessing, though the king wasn’t aware of it. She, the queen, was even more ferocious and callous than her son, but being a woman, she was forced to the background because of tradition.

  As he reached the end of the long road, entering the Plaza of the Moon, Xiuhcoatl quickly became aware of the surrounding crowd changing from local citizens to more and more of a military presence.

  A brief look of worry could be seen on the young Prince’s face if for only a second, but he soon scoffed at the idea of his father sending a platoon of troops to kill him and his party. Instead, being the showman that he was, he stuck out his broad strong chest, which only accentuated his blood covered physique, adding to the intimidation.

  Seeing a few of the onlooker’s eyes widen at his malevolent form, he continued past the central altar that sat in the middle of the plaza. He then continued on to where his father awaited him, at the foot of the Pyramid of the Moon.

  The pyramid was one of Teotihuacan’s most sacred and important sites, even to one as heartless as Xiuhcoatl was. Elaborate ceremonies were conducted here in the name of the Great Goddess herself, the goddess of fertility, water, and of the earth.

  His father spent most of his time here, praying and asking the goddess for guidance and wisdom. He should have been taking matters into his own hands like me, Xiuhcoatl thought, sneering at the idea of asking for help. He believed begging and pleading to anyone, even the Great Goddess herself, was a waste of time and a show of weakness. Action needed to be taken and he had no problem stepping in and fulfilling that role, even at the request of his father to do otherwise.

  As he reached the base of the pyramid, Xiuhcoatl stopped, commanding his men to do the same. Then as one, they all bowed, kneeling to one knee and dipping their heads in respect to their king. All, except the prince that was.

  “Son, why do you not pay your respects like the others do? Have I not earned at least that much from you?” The king asked, descending the last of the stairs. “If not for me, you could at least pay reverence to your goddess.” He motioned back towards the peak of the megalith.

  The prince just stood there stone-faced and unamused as he bore holes into his father’s eyes. The king, not one to back down from anyone— especially in front of more than half the kingdom—stood his ground, crossing his arms.

  King Meztli halted his descent, stopping on the second step of the staircase. Standing tall, he was still barely eye-to-eye with his disobedient son, his empire’s general.

  The king did not speak, waiting for his son to explain himself. He specifically forbade Xiuhcoatl from crossing the eastern border, especially if it was to retrieve what he knew his son wanted.

  A weapon was said to reside inside a tomb dedicated to the Maya’s death god. It was supposed to bring upon an unstoppable plague to the enemies of whoever wielded it.

  That was a risk Meztli couldn’t afford to take. He would not be responsible for something going wrong within the walls of Teotihuacan. He would not cause the people he protected any harm.

  “Father, I—” Xiuhcoatl started, but was interrupted.

  The king simply raised his hand for him to stop, shook his head in disappointment, and turned, ascending the stairs once again.

  Roaring in anger, Xiuhcoatl stomped towards the pyramid but was cut off by twelve highly skilled royal guards. He looked to each man, knowing how capable they really were. He had trained them after all. They were the best. Even better than any of the warriors standing at attention behind him.

  Meztli turned, now twenty steps up, “You have dishonored your k
ing and your people by bringing that…” He paused finding the right word to describe the contents of the sack his son carried. “That…abomination here.”

  “Go,” the king shouted, pointing back towards the plaza entrance. “Leave here and do not return until you have rid us of this evil—this darkness.”

  Enraged, the prince spun and stomped towards the central altar, seething. The embarrassment he just suffered will not be overlooked or go unnoticed. He will have his revenge.

  Then, not thinking rationally, Xiuhcoatl called his lieutenant over, thrusting the sack into his arms. He aggressively threw back the top flap containing his prize.

  Before anyone could shout for him to stop, Xiuhcoatl, the prince of Teotihuacan, thrust his hand into the opening of the skin and felt…dust. Or was it ash?

  Even as he came to realize what he felt, it was too late. He violently yanked his arm free of the satchel and screamed.

  The fingers on his left hand were gone, replaced with ashen nubs. The shadow-like substance continued higher up his hand until it too was gone.

  His second in command, the one who was holding the animal skin that contained the now open pot, grabbed for his leader, touching some of the retreating death. He too screamed, but unlike Xiuhcoatl who was trained to stay calm under duress, fled. The frightened man ran, pushing through the crowd of spectators.

  Screams of fright and pain echoed throughout the plaza, filling the night sky with chaos. As a person contracted this disease they reacted like any normal person would, they cried out for help, grabbing and clawing at their neighbor, unknowingly spreading the darkness like wildfire.

  Before Xiuhcoatl lost consciousness, he looked back towards the Pyramid of the Moon and asked the goddess and his father for forgiveness.

  “What have I done?” He asked aloud, looking to the heavens, before throwing himself into the burning flames of the altar.

  ASHES TO ASHES

  1

  Isla de Jaina, Campeche, Mexico

  Present Day

  “We’ve found something! Get Dr. Weaver over here now! He needs to see this!” The crowd of diggers that huddled around the small tomb entrance split down the middle, letting one of them dash off to find the site’s project leader.

  The tenderfoot anthropologist stood, wiping the sweat from his brow, silently cursing the early morning heat this part of the world was famous for. At twenty-five-years-old, Dr. Jason Keen was one of the youngest in the field. He was also one of the most disliked.

  Damn summer humidity, why the hell am I here helping this crazy old coot? Being the new guy—or noob as his American associates called him—he was sent anywhere and everywhere on a whim, whether he liked it or not. Plus, he also knew that no one wanted him around, even calling him a backstabber or an ass-kissing brownnoser, even to his face on a few occasions. The young Aussie didn’t care what they thought, though. He did what he needed to do to get ahead and screw anyone who got in his way.

  A commotion arose from behind him as his superior, the great Dr. Weaver, wobbled over from the excavation’s research tent. “The wanker could probably lose a good fifty pounds and still be classified a fat shit,” Keen said under his breath. He disliked the man wholeheartedly.

  Keen then stood and rushed to meet the older balding man halfway, urging him forward. “Dr. Weaver, you must see this, I think we may have found—”

  “Calm down, Jason,” Weaver calmly interrupted. “Whatever you’ve found can wait. This particular gravesite has been here for over a thousand years, my young and eager friend. I’m sure it can wait a few minutes longer.”

  The ever-patient Dr. Weaver continued his stroll at his usual, excessively-leisure tempo. Keen was forced to abide to his supervisor’s will and continue with him at the snail’s pace for the rest of the one-hundred-yard trek.

  The Aussie hated that the man called him by his first name. “He calls you Jason because he respects you,” a female colleague had said earlier in the trip. “He doesn’t call Sean by his first name, you know. He calls him Ellis.” But, Keen didn’t believe her. He knew the real reason Dr. Weaver did it. It was because he knew it bugged the shit out of him.

  The old man had favored the woman over him from the get-go and it really chafed his undies. No way was some flirty French tart going to get in his way too.

  When they finally reached the newly uncovered entrance, Dr. Weaver awkwardly kneeled, flashlight in hand, and examined the find. Grunting with discomfort, the older archaeologist ducked down, peered inside the three-by-three hole, and saw what looked like another tomb.

  That wouldn’t come to anyone’s surprise here, though. The island was filled with burials—about 20,000 of them—but only around ten percent of them had been excavated thus far. Some of these graves even dated back to the third and fourth centuries.

  God, the old man can barely bend over. Keen thought, watching the old man. Hopefully, the rumors of his retirement are true. He remembered his interview with the Smithsonian’s head curator and a legend of sorts, a man named Dr. William Boyd.

  “Production is more important than favoritism. I’m not here to make friends,” Keen had said in his conference last year. “I’ll get the job done and get it done quickly. It’ll save us both time and the institute money.”

  “Getting the job done right is more important than the cost of it, or the length of time it takes,” countered the salt-and-pepper haired man. “In some instances, you only have one shot at getting it done. There is no need to rush it to save a few days’ time. One day you will learn this. We are looking for an eventual replacement for Dr. Weaver after the excavation in the Yucatan is complete. You and Ms. Dubois are very high on our very short list of candidates.”

  Keen disliked Dr. Boyd as much as he did Dr. Weaver. Damned codgers. Production is key. Maybe in time I’ll take Dr. Boyd’s comfortable job at the Smithsonian too. He looked down and saw Dr. Weaver slip into the hole and stop at his waist.

  One thing at a time, Jason. Keen knew he’d have to bide his time and wait for an opportunity to come about. And when it did…he’d throw Dr. Weaver under the proverbial bus, quickening his own ascent. Then, once Weaver was officially out of the picture and gone, he’d formally ask for his position as one of the project leaders and never look back.

  Keen smiled slightly at the thought of being in charge. He could feel it coming soon and would do anything to speed up the process. But, he also knew that before any of his plans came to fruition he needed to succeed here and show the people back home that he belonged. They knew he had the smarts—finishing in the top of his class—but they hadn’t seen him in action yet.

  “Jason, you must see this!” Yelled the muffled voice of Dr. Weaver.

  That’s when Keen noticed that Dr. Weaver had vanished. He dropped to his hands and knees and peeked inside, seeing the man another five feet farther in. Keen then crawled in, also carrying a flashlight, and stopped when he was within six inches of the other man’s rear.

  Oh, God. Please don’t…

  Keen remembered the chili-combo they had for dinner last night oh-to-well. Just about everyone in the expedition, including himself, had some “bowel discomfort” that night. If this wombat lets one go in my face, I’ll kill him.

  After a long and agonizing minute of being that close to another man’s butt, Dr. Weaver finally continued forward, shuffling on all fours. The tunnel started to open a little, almost enough to sit up. There were rows of bodies on both sides of them as they scooched through the access tunnel.

  To either side of the men’s heads were multiple pairs of feet and Keen did his best not to look. Seeing that many dead bodies was slightly unnerving—even for someone as cold and calculating as him. He was a shark for sure, but a mass burial chamber still gave him the willies. He could feel the goosebumps already forming on his skin.

  He wasn’t a violent man and always wondered if he could take another man’s life if the situation called for it. He quickly shook off the thought, continuing behi
nd Dr. Weaver through the passage for another twenty feet, until they reached a chamber roughly the size of a small barn.

  The two men stood, barely clearing what must have been six-foot ceilings, and stopped. What they saw was astonishing.

  There was gold…lots of gold…and gems too. It was in piles all over the room. There were thousands—maybe tens of thousands—of pieces, ranging in all different shapes and sizes. Some of the mounds even reached the ceiling. There wasn’t anywhere for them to walk either. It’s like it was just poured in here, bucket by precious bucket, Keen thought.

  He had always dreamed of discovering a find like this when he was a boy. He specifically remembered a scene from the 1985 American movie, The Goonies, when the ragtag group of teenagers found One-Eyed Willy’s fortune on his decaying pirate ship. The utter joy on their faces had always stuck with him.

  “What’s that, in the back?” Dr. Weaver asked wide-eyed with his flashlight splayed against the rear wall, dancing back-and-forth. Keen looked down and noticed the man’s hands were trembling. Is he scared?

  Keen joined the other man’s light at the back of the room and saw a large lump sticking out of the floor, underneath a layer of gold. He then stepped onto a section of the gleaming hoard, careful not to cause a mini-avalanche. Being buried alive and suffocating under such a mass fortune would be the ultimate slap to the noggin,’ he thought.

  Keen tripped and stopped, looking down at what almost made him fall. A golden sword, or maybe a type of ceremonial dagger, stuck out of the heap like a beacon. He bent over and plucked the heavy ornate piece from the mound and instantly felt a strange and unnerving feeling roll up and down his body. It’s nothing, Keen deduced. Just my nerves.