Flicker Blue 3: Momentum

by Brea Nicole Bond

  Chapter III

  Blood Oranges and Pharaohs’ Tombs

  Jane wasn’t sure what she had expected, but under the dark cover of night, the ancient metropolis of Cairo looked like any other ordinary city. Dr. Sylfaen gave another address in another language to another taxi driver in front of another airport, and Jane found herself looking out the window as the city passed by, trying to absorb whatever details she could. If their stay here was as brief as their time in Paris had been, this might be the closest she would come to sightseeing. Of course, she hoped that the Book would still be in Cairo, but something about her godfather’s interview with Madame Antoinette had hinted to her that it would not be. Try as she might, Jane couldn’t remember the exact words that had insinuated as much to her.

  She was tired again, travel-worn, and frustrated that streetlights look pretty much the same anywhere. The flight had been short—just over four hours, but the day had been long…no, the week had been long. What day is this, anyway? Jane wondered as she pressed her temple against the cool glass of the window. Tuesday? She counted off the days on her fingers, and that seemed right, though she couldn’t fathom that exactly one week before, she had been cramming for the first of her exams on the sunny third floor balcony. The memory made her smile; it was the last image in her head before she closed her eyes.

  Jane jolted upright when Dr. Sylfaen patted her shoulder to tell her they had arrived at their destination. They were pulling up to a small gatehouse at the beginning of what appeared to be a very long driveway.

  “I’m sorry, Jane. You’ll have to come in with me,” he murmured before he began detailing instructions for the driver to keep the meter running and wait for them to return. He promised the driver an extra tip for his pains.

  The driver shrugged indifferently as Jane readied herself. She had little doubt that she looked every bit as much in disarray as she felt, but she attempted to comb her hair into place with her fingers and scrub the sleep from the corners of her eyes.

  The car pulled up to the window of the gatehouse. Not one, but two, guards eyed them as Dr. Sylfaen rolled down the back seat window.

  “Yes?” asked the guard seated closest to the window. She was a tall, heavy set woman with dark hair and eyes, a long slender nose that might have appeared quite elegant except for the two crooked places that indicated where it had been broken and badly repaired sometime in the past.

  “Dr. Mederick Sylfaen and Jane Thomas Sylfaen, to see Ahmose.”

  “Is Mr. Ahmose expecting you?”

  The old man smirked. “I highly doubt it.”

  If the guard woman was amused, her expression didn’t betray her. “You’ll have to wait while I call up to the house,” she said, her accent emphasizing the consonants she spoke. “Your names are both Sylfaen?” she checked.

  Jane watched as her godfather nodded and made a dismissive gesture to the guard, suggesting that she carry on. The second guard, a man with similar coloring as his colleague but a significantly slighter build, watched them appraisingly as the call was made.

  “Mr. Ahmose is not expecting anyone by the name of Sylfaen, this day or any other,” the guard woman announced with an air of condescension. The man nodded, as if the word from the main house had just confirmed his opinion that the passengers of the taxi were not worth his employer’s time.

  Dr. Sylfaen wasn’t shaken in the least. “Call him again. Tell him that Madame Antoinette d’Asp sends him a visitor he cannot refuse.”

  The guard woman blinked and began to send him away, but the old man continued with heightened fervor. “Tell Ahmose that, if he will not see us, then he forfeits his opportunity to see the child who has inherited the Eye.”

  Jane could see her own incredulous expression mirrored on the face of the two guards, and her hand flew instinctively to the green stone at her neck. The…Eye? What the hell does that mean?

  Her godfather maintained eye contact with the female guard. A staring contest ensued for several seconds before she finally relented, shrugging and reaching for the telephone once more. She relayed the old man’s message, and then listened to the voice on the other end of the receiver. “Yes,” she answered in response to a question that Jane couldn’t hear. Her eyes darted over Jane. “Yes…yes…I—” As she listened to her instructions, her dark eyes lit up with shock. She placed the phone back into its cradle and turned toward Dr. Sylfaen slowly.

  “Mr. Ahmose says to return tomorrow at six o’ clock.” She swallowed. “He says that, if the Eye is not present, it will be your last appointment. Ever,” she added, in case Dr. Sylfaen had missed her double meaning.

  “Tomorrow at six, then,” Dr. Sylfaen agreed, once more unaffected by the attempted threat. He rolled up the window and asked the driver to return to the city so that they could find a hotel. Out of the guards’ sight, he displayed his frustration more openly in his tightly drawn eyes and furrowed brow.

  “You expected that this would be enough to get us in tonight,” Jane whispered, her hand still clutching the green disc-shaped pendant.

  Dr. Sylfaen nodded. “No matter. One more night in Cairo should make no difference,” he said as he threw a dejected glance at the waxing moon, platinum white against the deep purple sky. He sighed and wrapped his arm around Jane’s shoulder. “The respite will be beneficial, in any case.”

  Jane uttered a low sigh of assent as she cuddled into his shoulder and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

  The next morning, Jane awoke to unfamiliar surroundings. She was in a large bed dressed with fine linens in varying shades of brown. The hotel, she assured herself, though she had zero recollection of arriving there on the previous evening. I wonder if I walked in, but I was too tired to remember it now, or if someone had to carry me in. The possibility embarrassed her, so she shook the thought away as she surveyed the room.

  She was alone in what appeared to be a very nice hotel room, though it was sparsely furnished in comparison to the room she’d occupied at Madame Antoinette’s home in Paris. On the bedside table, next to the telephone, she spotted a note waiting for her. The heading on the stationary read The Scarab, with directions listed in several languages. Below, Jane recognized her godfather’s fluid hand.

  My dear Jane,

  Once you are dressed and ready, you will find me in the room directly across the hall. There is no rush, unless you want to explore the city during the morning.

  Uncle Mederick

  Maybe I will have a chance to do a little sightseeing, after all, Jane thought with a satisfied smile. I wonder if there is time to see the Pyramids. She didn’t want to get her hopes up, as she wasn’t even sure how far away from the city they were. He had specified during the morning in his note, no doubt to remind her that her time playing tourist would have to be cut short by their impending interview with The Egyptian. Jane shuddered.

  As she dug through her suitcases for a pair of jeans, a light top, and a pair of flat sandals, Jane decided to lay out her clothes for the appointment, in hopes that her dread might be lessened if she felt better prepared. She decided on the black dress, the shoes she’d worn to the interview in Paris, and, of course, the pendant necklace…the Eye. She laid out the ensemble on the bed and bit her lip. The Eye. So it’s more than a “pretty bauble,” then. She ought to have known better. Nothing that her godfather or any of the others like him did seemed to be random. Madame Antoinette had given it to her so that she would be successful retrieving the Book, or at least its whereabouts, from the man called Ahmose, who for some reason hated her godfather. With a fond, grateful sigh at the thought of Madame Antoinette, Jane decided to wear the necklace while she saw the sights of Cairo, too. After overhearing the conversation between her godfather and The Egyptian’s guard, the pendant made her feel safer, somehow. Whether it provided protection, or leverage, Jane wasn’t sure, but she thought she’d keep it on her person until she was out of Ahmose’s city.

  Jane showered and dressed quickly—she was especially eager t
o rejoin her godfather’s company. Why am I so anxious today? Not two minutes after she’d pulled her clothes on and swept her hair into an untidy ponytail, Jane found herself rapping softly on the door across the hall, all the while watching over her shoulder.

  “Good morning,” Dr. Sylfaen said as he opened the door and gestured to a small table inside his room. A room service platter of oranges and what appeared to be small cakes dusted with sesame seeds was laid upon it. “How did you sleep?”

  “You could say that,” Jane answered as she sat down for breakfast. “I don’t even remember coming here last night. Is that normal?” As she asked, she picked up a knife and sliced into one of the oranges—the fruit inside was blood red. A cold shiver ran down her back to the base of her spine. Everything in this place gave her the creeps.

  “It’s not abnormal to feel a bit travel weary. Would you like to rest this morning, then?” Dr. Sylfaen settled into the chair across from her and picked up one of the cakes.

  Jane swallowed. “No. I think I’ve slept long enough. Are the Pyramids nearby?”

  The old man nodded. “They are. Don’t you remember me pointing them out to you from the plane last night?”

  “I told you. I don’t remember anything from last night.” She shrugged and swept her orange peels into a neat pile at the side of her plate. “Do we have time to see them today?”

  “We will not have time to do anything else…and there are many sights to see in the city. Still, if that’s what you’d most like to do, we can make the trip to Giza this morning.”

  “I think I would like to see them. We can do some of the other stuff tomorrow, right?”

  Dr. Sylfaen didn’t answer.

  If Jane was seeking a slice of Egyptian culture that didn’t give her the creeps, she failed by going to see the Pyramids of Giza. The short taxi ride took less than an hour—they had the same driver as the previous evening, and Jane doubted the unlikely coincidence. She wondered, as the cab barreled through the crowded streets of Cairo, how much hiring the same driver for the duration of their stay in the city must have cost her godfather.

  The densely-packed hodgepodge of towering buildings—a mad assortment of structures that dated from modern to merely old to downright ancient, in the case of several mosques she glimpsed as they sped along—eventually gave way to the faded brown of the natural desert landscape. Jane spotted the largest three pyramids several miles before they arrived at the monument park. Further on, she could make out the Sphinx and several smaller pyramids, as well, and she was surprised by way her chest tightened as the ruins came into view; she was more than merely curious now. She was excited. She turned her head to look at Dr. Sylfaen, expecting to see the passionate expression that he’d revealed on her first glimpse of Paris. That was amazing, of course, but this…this is the most amazing thing I’ve seen in my whole life—probably the most mind-blowing sight I’ll ever see.

  Dr. Sylfaen was looking out the window in the direction of the Pyramids, which were growing ever more colossal as the taxi cab approached, but his gaze was somber. Why on earth would something like this make him sad? Jane wondered as the car pulled into the congested parking lot. I haven’t seen him look like that since…she had to think for several seconds to recall where she’d seen his expression before…since Mom and Dad’s funeral. Since the cemetery. Of course, Jane had learned in school that the Pyramids were actually tombs built for Egyptian pharaohs, so the monument park was a cemetery of sorts. But it’s not like he’s ever met any of the people who were buried here.

  They exited the cab and wove their way into the throngs of backpack-clad tourists. Dr. Sylfaen wore a similar bag across his shoulders, stocked with sunscreen and water bottles. Jane hadn’t considered bringing along any such necessities, as she’d never before traveled to a desert, and she was grateful for her godfather’s attention to detail when her throat became parched within half an hour of their arrival. You can rest assured that he’ll take care of everything—that’s what Gregory had told her on the day of their departure, and it was proving truer as each day passed.

  As they entered each of the structures, Jane couldn’t shake off her realization that she was crossing the threshold of someone’s tomb. Someone she’d missed meeting by a thousand or more years, granted, but someone who had lived and breathed and died just like anyone else. Dr. Sylfaen was no help. He walked softly and whispered details of the histories of the kings and queens who had inspired each pyramid. His hushed tone was reverent. By the second pyramid, Jane’s excitement had mellowed into a solemn sense of intrigue; the look in her eyes very closely mirrored Dr. Sylfaen’s.

  The goosebumps that covered Jane’s arms defied the oppressive summer heat, yet she felt oddly drawn to the site of each tomb. Though the old man told far too many stories that morning for her to retain more than a handful of names, she envisioned each one as if it were playing out before her—she could almost hear the long-buried pharaohs whispering from the stone walls. The constant camera flashes seemed disrespectful and, though Dr. Sylfaen had brought a camera along for her—paid extra admission, in fact, to bring it into each pyramid—Jane took no pictures. She would no sooner have taken a picture of her parents’ graves.

  As they viewed the Sphinx, the old man explained that all of the structures were steadily eroding away to the desert wind. She wasn’t a particularly sentimental girl, but Jane had no control over the tears that sprang into her eyes and leaked over her slightly sunburned face. Some things were never meant to die.

  Too soon, the morning was gone, and it was time for the Sylfaens to return to the Scarab and prepare themselves for their appointment with Ahmose the Egyptian. Jane might have been able to squeeze in a short nap before showering and dressing, but she felt far too keyed up to rest. The surprising array of emotions she’d experienced during the excursion to Giza left her feeling restless and thoughtful, and the weary sense of apprehension she’d felt earlier in the morning began to creep over her once more. One emotion after another bombarded her brain as she scrubbed the film of desert grime from arms and shoulders. She let the water run hot over face, pretending for a moment that she was back at home—carefully, so as not to focus too clearly on any one detail. She simply allowed herself to briefly escape into a relatively simpler time and place. I thought I had questions then, she thought as she rinsed out her hair. How much worse is this going to get before any of it begins making sense? How much worse could it get?

  Jane sighed. Of course it can get worse…and it’s about to. In just a couple of hours, with no more knowledge than she possessed right now, she would go toe-to-toe with the Egyptian.