Ultimate Supernatural Horror Box Set Read Free

stand in the heart of its power.
    He thought he saw a depression on the far side of the field, at the base of the opposite wall of the canyon.  He ran for it.
    As he neared he noticed that the otherwise smooth sand of the field was increasingly littered with shards of stone and streaks of darker earth, and how that trees surrounding the depression were broken or knocked flat.  The sparse grass smoked from fires that had already burned out. 
    This was it.  The missile must have exploded here.
    When he arrived at the crater he saw that the blast had shattered part of the cliff wall, causing a minor landslide into the crater.  A deep cavity there in the wall.  Almost as if...
    He picked up a stone and hurled it at the hollow.  It flew into the blackness but did not bounce back.  It disappeared, as if it had been swallowed.  Then Achmed heard it strike.  Not with the solid impact of rock upon rock—with more of a clink .  And then a clatter.  As if it had struck something hard and thin and hollow...and broken it.
    Achmed stood on the crumbling rim of the crater and stared into the blackness in the wall.  No mere blast cavity here.  This was a cave.  He shivered with anticipation as thoughts of Muhammad adh-Dhib raced through his mind.  Every Bedouin knew the story of the ten-year-old boy who discovered the first Dead Sea scrolls in Qumran, not too many miles north of here; the tale had been told around the fires for more than half a century.  And had there been a Bedouin boy since who did not dream of finding similar treasure?
    “Nabil!  Nabil come quickly!  And bring the light!”
    Nabil come running up.  “What is it?”
    “I think I’ve found a cave!” Achmed said, pointing to the dark splotch in the wall.
    Nabil snorted.  “There are caves all over these hills.”
    “No.  A secret cave.”
    Nabil froze an instant, then flicked on the flashlight and aimed the beam into the darkness.  Achmed’s heart picked up its rhythm when he saw the smooth edges of the opening and the deep blackness beyond.
    “You’re right, little brother.” Nabil kept the beam trained on the opening as he moved around the rim of the crater.  “It is a cave.”
    Achmed followed him to the mouth.  Together they peered in.  The floor of the cave was littered with small rock fragments, a thick layer of dust, and...something else.
    The beam picked out an object with four short straight legs and what appeared to be a seat.
    Achmed said, “Is that —?
    “A bench or a chair of some sort.”
    Achmed was shaking with excitement.  He grabbed Nabil’s shoulder and found that his brother too was shaking.
    “Let’s go in,” Nabil said.
    Achmed’s dry mouth would not allow him to speak.  He followed his brother’s lead, climbing over the pile of broken and fallen-away stone.  They entered the cave in silence.
    Dry, musty air within, laden with dust.  Achmed coughed and rubbed his nose.  They approached the little bench, covered with a think coat of dust like everything else.  Achmed reached out to brush the dust away, to see what sort of wood it was made of.  He touched it lightly. 
    The bench gave way, falling in on itself, crumbling, disintegrating into a lumpy pile of rotted flakes.
    “Oaf!” Nabil hissed. 
    “May Allah be my witness, I barely touched it!”
    Apparently Nabil believe him.  “Then this cave must have been sealed for a long time.  This place is old .”
    He flashed the beam around.  To the right—another bench and what looked like a low table; to the left—
    Nabil’s gasp echoed Achmed’s. 
    Urns.  Two of them: one lying on its side, broken; the other upright, intact, its domed lid securely in place.
    “That’s what my stone must have hit!”
    Nabil was already moving forward.  He angled the beam into the broken urn.
    “A scroll!!”  His older brother’s voice was hushed.  “There’s a scroll in this one!  It’s torn and crumbling...it’s ancient! ”
    Achmed dropped