Day of the Dragon King - Mary Pope Osborne [6]
She dashed over to the book.
“Annie!” cried Jack.
But she had already snatched up the bundle of bamboo strips and was charging back to them.
“Got it! Quick, put it in your sack!” she said.
Jack put the bundle of bamboo strips in his sack. Then he looked around fearfully. He gasped.
The Dragon King was glaring at them! Then he headed their way.
“Seize them!” the Dragon King shouted.
“Run through the burial grounds!” the scholar said to Jack and Annie. “The soldiers will be afraid to follow. They fear the spirits of the ancestors!”
“Thanks!” said Jack. “Thanks for everything!”
“Good luck!” cried Annie.
Then she and Jack took off. Soldiers shouted after them. An arrow whizzed by.
But Jack and Annie kept running. They ran down the path to the burial grounds. They jumped over the low brick wall and ran between the huge mounds of earth.
Suddenly arrows filled the air around them. The archers were shooting from the tower!
“Look!” cried Jack.
There was a doorway in one of the mounds. Jack and Annie ducked inside.
They were in a long hall lit with oil lamps.
“It’s so quiet,” said Annie. She walked down the passageway. “Hey, there are some steps here.”
“Don’t go any farther!” said Jack.
“Why not?” said Annie.
“We don’t know what’s down there,” said Jack. “This is a burial tomb, remember? It’s creepy.”
“Let’s just take a quick look,” said Annie. “Maybe it’s the way out of here.”
Jack took a deep breath.
“You might be right,” he said. “Okay, but go slow.” He didn’t want to stumble upon a dead body.
Annie started down the steep steps. Jack followed. The lamps lit their way as they kept going down and down. Finally, they reached the bottom.
Jack blinked. Even though oil lamps glowed everywhere, it was hard to see at first.
When Jack’s eyes got used to the strange light, his heart nearly stopped.
“Oh, man,” he breathed.
They were in a room filled with soldiers—thousands of them.
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 of soldiers.
Jack held his breath.
Annie pulled the soldier’s nose.
“Fake!” she said.
“Oh, brother,” said Jack. He walked over to the soldier and touched his painted face. It was as hard as stone.
“It’s amazing,” Jack said.
Annie nodded. “It’s like a museum.”
She walked down a row between two lines of soldiers.
“Wait. This is spooky,” said Jack. “What is this place?”
He put down his sack and pulled out the China book. He found a picture of the frozen army and read aloud:
The Dragon King had 7,000 life-size clay figures made for his burial tomb. The clay was baked and painted.
The Dragon King hoped that the clay army would protect him after he died.
“It’s like the pyramid in ancient Egypt,” said Jack. “Remember? The queen was buried with a boat and lots of things to take to the afterlife.” He looked around. “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. All their faces are different.”
Jack threw the book into his sack. Then he hurried down the row to Annie.
“Look,” she said. “Just look.”
In the flickering lamplight, they wandered down the rows of soldiers. No two soldiers had the same nose, the same eyes, or the same mouth.
“Oh, man. No wonder so many people had to work on this tomb,” said Jack.
“They really did a good job,” said Annie.
“Yeah,” said Jack.
There were kneeling archers and foot soldiers dressed in red and black armor.
There were real bronze swords, daggers, axes, spears, bows, and arrows.
There were even life-size wooden chariots with horses. The horses looked completely real. They were different 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:
“Ja-ack,” said Annie. “You know what?”
“What?”
“I think we’re