The Yawning Grave

[The Master]

Maramures, Romania
April 12, 1982

"The workers are refusing to dig again."

Professor Langsley threw his pen down on the folding table that served as his desk, and swore under his breath. "What is it now?"

His assistant, Simon Lord, nodded in the direction of the dig. "The same sort of thing it's always been. Superstitious nonsense."

Langsley swore again. "In this day and age? That's the sort of thing that aggravates Victorian tomb robbers in Egypt, not a modern survey of a fifteenth century battleground."

Lord laughed dryly. "Tell them that, not me. And tell the locals, who keep filling the heads of the laborers with stories of demons and werewolves."

Langsley rose from his chair, muttering under his breath. "All right, all right."

The two fell into step together as Langsley left the tent and headed for the dig site. "Why do I have to do this?" he complained, "Isn't this what I have you for?"

Lord started to reply, then stopped as angry, panicked shouting could be heard from up ahead. Without waiting, both me broke into a run.

"What happened?" Langsley called out as they reached the dig site. Men were clustered around one of the trenches.

"It's Barbu," said the foreman. "There was an accident. He's dead."

"It was no accident!" shouted one of the workers.

"He's right," shouted another, "It's the work of the devil!"

The Yawning Grave

[The Master]

London, England
April 13, 1982

"Sarah!" exclaimed Nigel Peterson, copy editor of Adventure Travel Magazine, rising from his desk. He was a thin man, with permed hair and a cardigan draped just so over a pastel pink polo shirt and khakis, and he smelled of just slightly too much cologne.

"I'm so glad you could make it, darling! Do have a seat. Can I get you anything?"

[Sarah Jane]

"Nigel. It's a pleasure." She went to him with a smile the, back of her hand offered softly in European style. "Don't you look smart today, as though you never dance with crocodiles." she teased gently. Perhaps he had not actually wrestled a croc, but certainly everyone on staff had survived an adventure or three. "I'll take a cup of tea, no sugar, no cream."

Having received the post from the Broadwick Street, she'd struggled excitedly with what to wear. It was not her first-rate reporter gear, guaranteed to get her into the ritziest gatherings without so much as press pass. She'd decided to go with something more serviceable. A very trim, neatly pressed jungle explorer's jumpsuit had been the perfect thing. It was a bold fashion move out on the streets of London in this age of skin tight pants and sloppy shirts, or women's power suits with large shoulder pads.

Sarah Jane wanted this job. She wanted Nigel to know she would not be researching this story from her hotel room, but intended to follow the story to whatever remote corners it took her.

She is a lean, healthy thing, and craving of adventure. Traveling with the Doctor had given her a hunger for new places, new sites, new cultures. It was hard to believe that almost as many years had passed since he left her as the years they had traveled together. Memories of those days gave her gaze an otherworldly depth.

Yesterday had been her 29th birthday, and it seemed a very fine portent to her future that she had received the letter from Adventure Travel. They had always treated her well.

"You're post was quite intriguing, Nigel, do tell me more."

[The Master]

Nigel smiled as he handed Sarah a cup of tea. "I'm glad you think so, Sarah. I've always been such a fan of your work - particularly those pieces on UNIT from a few years back - and I was so hoping you'd take the offer."

He leaned back in his seat. "There's an archaeological dig going on in Romania. Professor Percival Langsley is excavating a battleground, one of the last where Prince Vladimir of Wallachia commanded the field."

He paused, obviously expecting a response.

[Sarah Jane]

She perched on the corner of his desk, hooking ankle behind ankle and sitting most upright. She took the steaming cup from him. "Thank you."

A subtle ripple ran through her finely shaped, winged eyebrows as she accessed her memory, eyes focused on nothing. Then her eyes finding Nigel's again, she burst into a almost childlike smile of pride,

"Drakulya. Vlad the Third. Known also as the Impaler, and sworn enemy of the Ottoman Empire." She bit her lip, eyebrows working again as she dug further. Sarah Jane sipper her tea, then her next words were delivered less flamboyantly than the first, her smile more secret, but eyes shining for the adventure ahead.

"His bloodthirsty battles spanned 20 years, starting in the middle of the Fifteenth Century."

Now her voice dropped as though to conspire with him a little.

"Nigel, what do you think they are looking for out there? Artifacts from the Societas Draconistrarum? The spoils of Battle?" Her next question she asks with a calculated shrug of humor. It was an invitation to have a little laugh with her, but her eyes were riveted on his. She was looking to see if she could provoke any complex response from him.

"Dracula?"

Nigel's cologne was too strong, but the tea was excellent, she thought, sipping again and watching the man through her lashes and over the rim of her cup.

[The Master]

"Nigel, what do you think they are looking for out there? Artifacts from the Societas Draconistrarum? The spoils of Battle?" She looked him in the eyes.

"Dracula?"

"And wouldn't that be a scoop, darling?" he said with a smile and a twinkle in his eye, then waved his hand. "But no, nothing so... occult. But they are trying to solve a mystery."

He sipped his tea. "Apparently, in 1460, he took two months out from his ongoing conflict with Sultan Mehmed the Second to beseige some out of the way castle named Schomvaal, slaughter the defenders, burn the castle to its foundations, and then collapse the stonework with explosives. Nobody knows why, exactly, because he then had all references to the castle burned and made it a capital crime to even mention the place."

He smiled. "Catches the eye a little, yes? But anyway, the archaeologists are - with the blessings of the Ceauşescu government - excavating the battlefield and the castle."

[Sarah Jane]

Smooth as fresh vanilla bean ice cream, Nigel was. She put her tea down carefully in it's saucer, and leaned in a little closer, one palm pressed to the table. The mystery did indeed entice her past the point of no return.

"I'll take the job, Nigel, for everything in the contract, if- " She smiled, " -you will let me borrow a Sub-Miniature Minolta 16. A little something to sweeten the deal for having to come up with six different ways to say 'He impaled his enemies on big spikes.' Please?"

[The Master]

Nigel smiled. "If it was anyone else asking, darling, I'd refuse. But who am I to turn down a simple request from the finest freelance writer in the business?"

He pulled a thick manila envelope from his desk drawer and pushed it towards Sarah. "There you go. Tickets, hotel reservations, everything you'll need. Oh," he said, then paused to scribble a note out on a piece of stationary. "And my approval to borrow the camera."

Nigel leaned back in his seat and sipped at his tea. "Make me proud, darling."

[Sarah Jane]

It was a fine flight into Henri Coandă International Airport, Bucharest. The tickets were simply coach, for Nigel knew even those seats were generous for her. A car had picked her up and taken her to the Gara de Nord railway where Nigel had furnished an absolutely quaint single sleeper. It felt like living in a picture window, laying there as the green hills rolled by. The man knew when to spend, and when to thrift.

For the last leg of her journey to the far North reaches of Romania, she was picked up by a horse drawn hay cart and a very dapper looking old fellow wearing something that looked suspiciously like lederhosen. Lederhosen for street gangs of elves. She must buy some immediately. For now her good, wool, chocolate brown dress suit and long overcoat would do. All in all she was glad she had not worn the jungle rumpus jumper.

Sarah Jane was uncertain if this rather casual form of transportation was a little joke for her from Nigel, or sheer poetry on his part. Perhaps, though, she thought as she looked around, this was the only public transit in Maramure.

The countryside was perfectly, pastorally raw with plenty of sheep. It felt like time traveling. In fact, she felt near tipsy with the joy that this trip was already bringing her. She was traveling into the past, and would travel back farther still before she found her way home again.

Then, there they were before her just as the book had said, the Wooden Churches of Maramure.

Perfect. She did not bother to get a picture. This moment was just for looking, gape mouthed, as the cart trundled slowly nearer the delicately towering structures.

[The Master]

The wagon wound its way thorough the narrow streets of Baia Mare, finally coming to a stop in front of a restaurant that proclaimed itself to be the "Scottish Pub". Given the time of day - early afternoon - it was not particularly busy. Most of the lunch crowd had departed, and it was too early for dinner yet, so all that were left were the professional bar patrons - backpacking college students, old men, and archaeologists.

Doctors Simon Lord and Nigel Langsley were not hard to pick out. Seated in the courtyard, drinking the local beer, they were the two gentlemen speaking English in refined accents. Doctor Langsley - usually called Professor Langsley - was the older of the two, with a thin face and a hatchet nose, salt-and-pepper black hair brushed back from a pronounced widow's peak and a grey and black goatee, and just enough lines to make his face interesting. His eyes were dark, and his features were expressive.

Doctor Lord, at first glance, appeared to be aping his senior's appearance with his black goatee. That impression faded quickly, as you took in his black hair (parted on the left) and his broad face bearing a mildly amused expression.

Both wore black, with the casual assurance that comes from being bachelors uninterested in having to worry about matching their clothes.

Doctor Lord spotted Sarah first. He rose, lightly kicking Professor Langsley's chair leg as he did, and waved. As Langsley rose as well, Lord called out "Ms. Smith? I say, are you Ms. Sarah Jane Smith?"

[Sarah Jane]

Cârciumă Scoţian
:

boldly proclaimed the sign over the door, utterly delighting her. So did the tartan curtains, something she'd never seen displayed as such Scotland, but it was a successfully flamboyant way to illustrate their claim as a Scottish pub. It reminded her very much of the 1950's she'd grown up in.

There was much rugged woodwork, and the soft swells and dips of lath and plaster walls. It smelled most deliciously of lamb stew. It certainly would be fresh, she thought, remembering the wobbly legged, white tufted, little beasts that had frolicked in the fields beside the road. She licked her lips shamelessly. There was also the unusual addition of tiny hot peppers, small pickles and wee wedges of no doubt stinky cheeses on plates along with the requite pitchers and tankards of beer.

"Ms. Smith? I say, are you Ms. Sarah Jane Smith?" asked a cultured English voice beside her, startling her, for it had been a full two days since she last heard her own language. One of the things she missed about traveling with the Doctor was the Universal Translator. Turning to him, she let out an inadvertent sigh of relief, extending a hand. Her face is flushed and her smile bright with the excitement of her journey so far.

"Ahh! Hello! Yes, Sarah Jane Smith, Adventure Travel Magazine." By his accent alone she had guessed it was one of the archaeologists, Langly or Lord, bu turning tot see them standing there together clinched it. Their frontal lobes were so nicely displayed by their widow's peeks, and wisdom's streaks of shining gray. They were not the type to wear lederhosen.

[The Master]

"Ahh! Hello! Yes, Sarah Jane Smith, Adventure Travel Magazine."

The man smiled broadly. "A pleasure, Mrs. Smith! A real pleasure!" He shook her hand firmly, but not aggressively. "Simon Lord. PhD, etc., etc., but please. Don't bother with all that. Simon will do quite well. May I take your suitcase?"

Without waiting for an answer, he hefted the case and led Sarah back to the table he and Langsley shared. Setting the case back down, he pulled out a chair and gestured for her to sit.

"Mrs. Smith, allow me to introduce Nigel Langsley. Professor Langsley, Mrs. Sarah Jane Smith."

The older man took Sarah's proffered hand, bowed slightly, and kissed it lightly on the knuckles. "Charmed, my dear."

[Sarah Jane]

She was happy to release her bags to Simon. She gave her shoulders a bit of a flex, glad to be done with that for now.

"Please, then Simon, you must call me Sarah Jane." she answered, letting him seat her. It was also good to sit down on something that wasn't moving.

They seemed perfectly fine gentlemen, the pair of them. It was nice not to be treated like an oddity as she had been these past two days. Professor Langsley even did a top class job of kissing her knuckles without even damping them.

"Simon, Professor Langsley, thank you for meeting me here to welcome me. This is much better." She looked at them both bright eyed, hoping someone would come soon with beer and lamb stew. And some of those pickles

"Tell me, has the dig been living up to your expectations, gentlemen?"
It was a question that did not press for specifics, but she had learned to shoot one over the bow early in the game, just to see what would happen.

[The Master]

"Please, then Simon, you must call me Sarah Jane."

"Of course, Sarah Jane," Simon said as he took his seat.

"Simon, Professor Langsley, thank you for meeting me here to welcome me. This is much better."

The Professor smiled thinly. "Much better," he agreed. "We even have a car, so we'll make better time getting back to the dig than I fear you made getting this far."

Simon signaled for a waiter. "Another round, please. And one for the lady." He looked at Sarah, half apologetically. "If you'll pardon me ordering for you - the Bohemian Granát lager is the best of the local brews, and I'd hate for you to waste your time on one of the piss-weak - excuse me, water-weak - imports."

"Will there be anything else?" the waiter asked in thickly-accented English.

"Two bowls of the house stew, and whatever the lady will have."

"Tell me, has the dig been living up to your expectations, gentlemen?"

"Oh quite, quite," came Professor Langsley's response. "A little behind schedule -"

"Mostly because of the deaths," Simon muttered as he took a drink.

Langsley fixed him with a baleful glare. "A little behind schedule," he repeated, frostily, "but one musn't rush science." He glared harder at Simon. "Nor should one bandy gossip about."

Simon, unphased by the Professor's irritation, simply smiled and took another drink.

[Sarah Jane]

"Two bowls of the house stew, and whatever the lady will have." Simon invited. Sarah Jane grinned up at the waiter.

"Stufat de miel, Murături de iarnă, şi mici Bohemian Granát lager. Va rugam sa, Doamnă." She most carefully ordered in clear, if slow, Romanian. Sarah Jane had been listening to language tapes. For some reason, the names for the food seemed to sink in most deeply. She had heard of the lamb stew and pickles and looked forward to them.

She returned her attention to her lunch companions, and not long into her questioning probe, Simon clammed up, muttering into his beer. "" . . .Mostly because of the deaths"
Her heavy, dark lashes often gave her away, but she tried to not show her curiosity even as her gaze flicked low to the muttering Simon.

"A little behind schedule, but one musn't rush science." Professor Langsly admonished the other man.."Nor should one bandy gossip about."

In case Professor Langsly noticed her curiosity she then threw him a quick smile of innocent guilelessness, charm factor 7.

"Well, now Professor Langsly, I've been sent by the most respectable Nigel Peterson of Adventure Travel Magazine, not one of those Berliner rags. Mr. Peterson - " A formal name that she never bothered to call the swishy swashbuckler to his elegant face, "- Is only interested in in articles about death if there has been time for it to turn back into dust and rumors."

"Speaking of dust and rumors," She went on " is there something in particular you're digging for? Or are you just seeking answers to the mystery of why Prince Vladimir of Wallachia would leave his vendetta driven campaign against Sultan Mehme and the entire Ottoman Empire, just to go lay waste to the small encampment and castle of Schomvaal?"

Her food was delivered almost instantly. Oh the lamb stew! Oh the cold, malty piatră! The pickle appetizer was festive on the table with cauliflower, peppers, and cucumbers, and Sarah Jane was on the hunt.

Poor little lambs. Poor little Archeologists.