The Curse of the Four Skulls

In the jungle, hidden deep,

I offer you the price of greed,

Grandest room in all the ship,

A secret hides, a treasure kept,

Hypnotized and emerald eyed,

Sunken secrets do disguise,

Riches, rubies, treasure untold,

Beyond the Medallion of the Four Skulls,

Turn back now or sacrifice,

The price to pay for paradise,

Find the keys, unlock the door,

Where his love lies evermore.

The haunting words marred the page of the little black book clutched in the dead pirate’s hands. Wisps of a black beard clung to his leathery face, mouth open in a silent scream, with a jeweled, golden eye that seemed to watch them from within the hollow socket. Skeletal fingers wrapped around the edges of the book, seated at an ancient desk, the dead captain’s face twisted in a fit of agony.

“I told you we should have never come in here,” Tycho said.

At once, Gasparro wrenched the black book from the dead pirate’s hands.

How the Spanish galleon had gotten into the middle of the jungle, the boys did not know. Nor what strange compulsion drew them to searching the decrepit depths. Overgrown with the passage of time, as if the dense jungle sought to disguise what hidden treasures lay within. Undisturbed for centuries, standing amongst the rotted beams and creaking wood, the boys could not fathom their discovery.

“It's a buried treasure,” Gasparro whispered, reading over the riddle again. Rubies, riches, treasure untold… his mind swelled with greed at the idea.

Tycho looked uneasily at the book. “Turn back now or sacrifice; The price to pay for paradise. I… I don’t like it,” he whined, “we should leave.”

Gasparro rolled his eyes. “Why are you always such a ninny? A pirate’s treasure? This is our chance!” He turned beseeching eyes onto his best friend.

A street orphan like Gasparro, Ilario stood silent and contemplative. The two of them were shoeless and sun-kissed, searching the jungle for bird nests and beehives, desperate for any bite to eat. The hunger made Gasparro reckless, willing to face his deathly fear of snakes that preyed in the canopy above, big enough to snatch a child his size. What he wouldn’t sacrifice for a chance at riches.

“We should at least see if we can solve the first clue,” Ilario said, deciding for them. “What could go wrong?”

Tycho huffed. “I, for one, can think of several ways this could end horribly.”

Gasparro’s skin crawled. Of course, he would try to stop them, the only one of them with parents to miss him, a home to go to and a hot meal waiting for him when he did.

Ilario still had his eyes on the black book’s riddle. “Only one clue hints towards the treasure’s whereabouts, Beyond the Medallion of the Four Skulls. Search the cabin, see if you can find a Medallion.”

Gasparro’s eyes scanned the captain’s quarters as the boys split off from each other. Once grand, now in a state of disrepair. A tattered rug lay underfoot, scattered with maps and the crunch of broken glass. Gasparro stepped around the captain’s desk, avoiding the withered body seated behind it with that golden eye that seemed to watch him still, finding little that would help.

Four Skulls… Four Skulls…

Behind the captain’s desk, the grand portrait of a woman hung. Lounging suggestively on a velvet chaise, her thin, gossamer gown revealing her ample bosom. The kind of portrait only a lover would paint.

Where his love lies evermore.

“Look at this,” Gasparro called as he ran his fingers along the golden frame. The portrait popped free of the wall, swinging open to reveal a secret door.

Ancient beyond anything on the ship, a deathly cold rippled off the stone, untouched by the balmy heat of the jungle. In the center, carved into the surface, lay a circle engraved with Four Skulls, like a compass with its cardinal directions.

The Medallion.

Gasparro pushed against the door but the cold, eerie stone refused to budge.

Each of the Skulls had a different mouth shape, one long and thin, one circular and wide, one flat and narrow, and the last… shaped like a keyhole.

“We need to find a key,” Gasparro said, looking at the ground.

“What’s that in there!” Ilario said, pointing, and Gasparro pushed him out of the way to look through the Skull’s circular maw.

In the dark depths a gilded bottle gleamed. Through the dusty surface, Gasparro could see something glinting inside. Without hesitation, he rolled up his sleeve.

“Don’t!” Tycho said, catching his wrist. “Are you crazy? Those teeth could clamp shut, take your arm off. What if that’s the sacrifice?”

Gasparro fixed him with a hard stare. “Then that’s the price I’m willing to pay.”

He slid his hand along the cool stone, his arm disappearing into the shadowed depths. Heart racing, he groped through the dusty interior, waiting for a slice of pain that never came.

At last, he gripped the bottle’s neck, pulling his arm free, but the end of the bottle caught itself on the circular hole. A perfect fit, and the eyes of the Skull glowed green.

Gasparro pulled the cork free and fished a new clue from inside, feasting his eyes upon the words in the same, curling script.

So, little thief, too foolish to run,

The treasure you seek, may take only one,

Down below, a secret room,

A choice of fate conceals one's doom,

One who's brave to turn the lever,

One to catch the globe’s endeavor,

One to stay, and one to pray,

Too late now to get away,

Hungry den of sleeping snakes,

Another one asphyxiates.

Before the last word could be read, the door to outside slammed shut, sealing the boys inside the ship.

Tycho screamed and wrenched on the sealed door. “I told you we should have left!”

Gasparro did not pay heed to his incessant racket. Studying the clues of the riddle, he shrugged. “I don’t even know what that last word means, so I’m not scared.”

“You fool! It means we’re going to die,” Tycho cried.

“Clearly we have to solve the puzzle to get out,” Ilario said, unfazed. “Down below, a secret room… Quick, let’s check under the rug.”

Gasparro and Ilario moved to the corner, pealing back the edge of the moldy carpet. Tycho eventually stopped his hollering to help, shifting aside the bigger bits of broken debris to reveal a trapdoor concealed within the floor.

Ilario felt around the seam, finding a handle, and the three boys put their weight into it, swinging open the wooden door.

Darkness yawned before them, an empty chamber save for a wooden ladder, disappearing into the shadows. Tycho reached into his pocket, pulling out a box of matches. Striking one, he let it fall. The flaming tip streaked through the air, landing on a seething pile below.

Snakes.

Their writhing bodies caught the light as they swarmed away from the fire. Heavy bodied boas, the largest Gasparro had ever seen, coiled and hissed where they waited beneath the ladder.

Tycho fixed Gasparro with a hard glare. “Well, go on then.”

All the color drained from Gasparro’s face. “I’m not going down there.”

“You’re the one who wanted to drag us all on this foolish endeavor.”

One who’s brave to pull the lever. The words came back to Gasparro through his fog of fear. Not snakes, anything but snakes. “I… I can’t do it.”

“I’ll go,” Ilario said, offering a smile towards his best friend, shouldering Gasparro’s deathly fear of snakes on more than one occasion. “I’m brave enough.”

Clasping the box of matches from Tycho’s shaking hands, Ilario descended the ladder, striking a match into the face of a looming boa. The snake recoiled at the heat, spitting angrily, watching Ilario inch closer to the wooden lever in the center.

The match burnt itself out and Ilario struck a new one, stepping over the muscled forms of waking boas, stirring under the threat of fire. The snakes stood on end, immobilized, transfixed by the flame, until Ilario pressed the lever.

And the trapdoor slammed shut.

His screams where strangled out in moments, devoured by the swarm of snakes.

The two remaining boys stared deep into each other’s eyes.

“Was that the sacrifice?” Tycho breathed.

Gasparro’s eyes flicked to the globe, newly cracked with the hint of a sword poking through, the gleaming blade tagged with another clue.

Silver eagle on the wall,

To only sing if one should fall,

Bloodied blade fulfills the test,

To find where the treasure kept,

Sealed in time, locked in chaos,

Taken in forbidden séance,

Emerald eyed in homicide,

One minute now, if you decide,

Is there treasure more precious than gold?

Decide correct and soon you'll know,

What riches await, but be warned,

The fabled fate of the Eye of the Storm.

A clock started ticking as the last word was read, a silver eagle high on the wall, counting down the seconds.

Bloodied blade fulfills the test… Realization hit both boys at once, staring with horror into each other’s eyes as Gasparro gripped the handle.

“Now, wait a minute,” Tycho said.

“We don’t have a minute,” Gasparro said as he slit his blade along Tycho’s throat, watching the boy bleed out on the floor with a ruthless smile. “Thanks for your sacrifice.”

The clock stopped ticking as all life drained from the boy and the eagle’s beak opened, dropping an iron key.

Key in one hand, blade in the other, Gasparro turned to the secret door, to the Four Skulls and the single pair of glowing eyes, contemplating his next move.

Find the keys, unlock the door…

Book, bottle, key, and sword.

Gasparro slid each item into the waiting mouths of the Four Skulls, each fitting snuggly into place and the eyes glowed one by one, finishing with the bloodied blade slick with sacrifice. He backed away, heart racing as each of their eyes pulsed brightly before extinguishing.

“No!” he shouted. “I did what you said, that treasure is mine!”

With the grinding sound of stone against stone, a small piece slid open at the center of the Medallion, revealing a golden impression shaped like an eye.

His fingers traced the empty eyehole, a hint of green at the center.

Emerald eyed… it was the only phrase repeated twice.

With a look of dawning horror, he turned towards the dead pirate captain with the jeweled, golden eye that seemed to watch him. Hands shaking, Gasparro dug his fingers into the hollow eye socket, ripping free the emerald eye and pressing it towards the hole.

A seam zipped along the edge of the door, golden light pouring through as the sealing spell was broken. The seam widened and Gasparro feasted his eyes upon the treasure horde.

A mountain of riches, jewels and golden coins. There must be $20,000, the money his for the taking. He sunk to his knees, taking fistfuls of the treasure as an eerie chuckle filled his ears.

The pirate captain, standing from his chair.

Gasparro fell back as the dead pirate ensnared him.

Skeletal hands ripped into his skin, razor-sharp talons piercing his eye. Gasparro screamed, blood running down his cheeks as the captain forced the emerald eye into his skull. Gasparro’s flesh began to wither around the eye, his body shriveling to a skeletal husk, stripping away his vitality while life returned to the dead captain’s face.

Gasparro’s life, siphoned away as the cursed treasure passed to him, watching as a Fifth Skull joined the others on the Medallion.

The warning, the sacrifice, all of it he ignored. One final truth echoed through his dying mind. Is there treasure more precious than gold…

A silken voice filled his thoughts. The Emerald Eye, speaking an answer inside his mind, cackling its glee as all his flesh withered away.

“‘Tis your life, little thief,

To escape while you can,

Or be lost to the curse of greed,

Never seen again.”