Jack and Annie stood frozen.
The silent soldiers did, too.
Finally, Annie spoke.
"They're fake," she said.
"Fake?" whispered Jack.
"They're not real," she said.
"They look real," said Jack.
Annie walked straight toward the front row ofsoldiers.
Jack held his breath.
Annie pulled the soldier's nose. "Fake!" she said.
"Oh, brother," said Jack. He walked over to thesoldier and touched his painted face. It was as hard asstone.
"It's amazing," Jack said.
Annie nodded. "It's like a museum."She walked down a row between two lines ofsoldiers.
"Wait. This is spooky," said Jack. "What is thisplace?"He put down his sack and pulled out the Chinabook. He found a picture of the frozen army and readaloud:
The Dragon King had 7,000 life-size clay figuresmade for his burial tomb. The clay was baked andpainted.
The Dragon King hoped that the clay army wouldprotect him after he died.
"It's like the pyramid in ancient Egypt," said Jack.
"Remember? The queen was buried with a boat andlots of things to take to the afterlife." He lookedaround. "Annie?""I'm here," she called.
She was far down another row.
"Come back here," yelled Jack.
"No, you come here," said Annie. "It's so cool. Alltheir faces are different."Jack threw the book into his sack. Then he hurrieddown the row to Annie.
"Look," she said. "Just look."In the flickering lamplight, they wandered downthe rows of soldiers. No two soldiers had the samenose, the same eyes, or the same mouth.
"Oh, man. No wonder so many people had to workon this tomb," said Jack.
"They really did a good job," said Annie.
"Yeah," said Jack.
There were kneeling archers and foot soldiersdressed in red and black armor.
There were real bronze swords, daggers, axes,spears, bows, and arrows.
There were even life-size wooden chariots withhorses. The horses looked completely real. They weredifferent colors with white teeth and red tongues.
"I have to take some notes about all this," said Jack.
He pulled out his notebook and pencil. Then,kneeling on the brick floor, he wrote:
No tow faces the same not even the horses"Ja-ack," said Annie. "You know what?""What?""I think we're lost," she said.
"Lost?" Jack stood up. "We're not lost.""Yeah? Then which way is out?" said Annie.
Jack looked around. All he could see were rows ofsoldiers. In front of them, to the right, to the left,behind them--nothing but clay soldiers.
"Which way did we come?" said Annie.
"I don't know," said Jack.
All the rows looked the same. They stretched outendlessly.
Jack tried not to panic.
"I'd better look this up," he said.
"Forget it," said Annie. "Morgan said the researchbook would guide us. But in our darkest hour, onlythe ancient legend would save us.""Is this our darkest hour?" asked Jack.
Annie nodded. "Yeah, it's pretty dark."It does seem to be getting darker in here, thoughtJack. The air was getting thicker too. It seemed harderto breathe.
"Let's ask for help," said Jack.
He reached into the sack and pulled out the bamboobook. He held it up and said, "Save us!"As Jack waited, the tomb seemed unbearably quiet.
Jack held the book up again. "Please help us findour way out," he said.
He and Annie kept waiting. But nothing happened.
The air was growing even thicker. The light wasgetting dimmer. The countless rows of soldiersseemed creepier.
Help did not come.
Jack felt faint. "I--I guess we'll just have--have to--""Look!" Annie said.
"What?""The ball of thread! It rolled out of your sack!" shesaid.
"So what?" said Jack.
He looked at his cloth sack lying on the floor. Theball of yellow silk thread had rolled out. And it wasstill rolling, leaving a trail of yellow thread! |