“Yes,” she says. “It was—it was amazing. Just ama—”
“Yjb ‘an nasrae,” the guide hisses. “Yjb ‘an nasrae!”
“Can you walk?” Julia asks. “We’ve got to go.”
Loche sits up from the sand. Energy surges through his limbs. He blinks. Hopeful. Powerful. “I can,” he says.
Julia starts to repack the strewn contents of Loche’s bag. The Red Notebook, water bottle and other items she gathers out of the sand and secures them inside. She places the strap back over Loche’s head and motions to the guide who is crouching a few meters away in the dark. “After you.”
On the verge of sleep, Edwin staggers. Loche lifts him onto his back for a piggyback ride. “Not long now, Bug.”
The guide ducks low and runs. Julia, Loche and Edwin follow. The cold desert air tastes sweet. Jutting out and circling, the lights of Cairo and the laser light show fade. With each footfall forward the stars above seem to pierce and rend the black sky deeper.
“Look,” says Julia through running gasps.
“I see it.” Above Menkaure, like a splashed mist of silver paint, the trail of Julia’s constellation hovers over the apex. The lucida appears to blink—but only when it is positioned in one’s periphery.
He can hear Julia singing, breathy and quiet. “Just find that single star and watch it blink…”
Their guide takes a sharper turn now, his course circling back toward the dark side of the approaching pyramid. “No guard,” he says. “No guard here. Come.”
And no sign of Neil, Alexia and Gary. Loche searches the thick dark but can see nothing but a black horizon, and a blacker, approaching triangular colossus.
At the base the stones are waist-high. The climb will be tough. And long. The peak disappears into the cosmos. Stepping between Loche and the pyramid, the guide motions to the rising stairway to the stars. He points to his open palm. It is difficult to see the man’s facial expression in the dark, but after a moment, Loche understands.
“Of course,” Loche says, “payment.” Loche sets Edwin on the pyramid edge and rummages in his bag for the wallet that Corey gave him. His fingers brush over the Red Notebook, the energy bars and other items, but no wallet. “It’s not here,” he says.
“I hope it made it back into the bag,” Julia says. “It may be in the sand where you fell—”
The absurd notion of money at this moment wrinkles along Loche’s forehead. Finding nothing, he pulls his hands from the bag, unbuckles his wristwatch, passes it to the guide and shrugs. “It’s all we have,” he says.
The guide takes the watch, holds it close to his face and examines it. After a few moments he whispers, “Marr.” With a glance to the apex, to Loche’s face and then to the timepiece again, he says, “So be it. Shukraan.” Then he waves and points upward, “Eajil. Tslq. Tasalluq Alan.”
Loche turns and lifts Edwin atop the first block. He and Julia climb up beside him. Looking back, their guide is gone.
“I guess the watch was enough.”
“Hopefully,” Julia says. “Hopefully it didn’t insult him and he’s off to find security.”
“Let’s not wait to find out.”
Julia scrutinizes the steep rise. “Here we go again.”
Edwin begins to cry after they manage clambering over some thirty blocks. “I’m tired, Dad. I want to sleep. I want to sleep.”
Loche holds him and kisses his forehead—it tastes like dust and salt. “It won’t be long now. Let’s have a snack and see how we feel, okay?”
Julia is already handing Loche an opened energy bar and her water bottle. “Chocolate, peanut butter,” she tells Edwin. The boy takes the bar and bites into it. His tears subside as he eats.
Loche feels Julia’s hand caress his back.
“You okay?” she says.
“I feel strangely alert. It must be the properties of the leaf.” As he speaks he scans below. Nothing. A welcome breeze flutters into his open coat.
“Well, like Edwin, I could use some sleep, too.”
“It’s been a long day,” Loche says. “We’re at the halfway point by the look of it.”
“Then what?” Julia asks. “Somehow I don’t think we’re going to find Basil sitting up there.”
“I think you’re right,” Loche agrees. “But then, stranger things have happened.”
“And I know we shouldn’t celebrate just yet, but there’s been no sign of Albion’s people—no security either.”
From below, Loche hears a whisper, “Dr. Newirth?” It is a woman’s voice.
As Loche whirls toward the sound. His sword rings from the umbrella sheath.
“Fear me not, Dr. Newirth. I am Alexia Lerxt, Orathom Wis.”
Relieved, Loche raises his hand and waves. He’s unsure if the shrouded voice waves back.
“Gary and Neil are scaling the opposite faces. It is safe above. Proceed at will. But do hurry. We have eliminated three Endale Gen. Gary has spied seven more approaching from the North. We must hold the way. You must cross the apex before us. We will follow, if we are able, after tea.”
Turning, his little boy is staring up toward the apex tracing the cluster of crowning stars. Loche says, “Are you ready?”
The boy god in his mind:
—A thousand poems with each step.
The words come, soundlessly. Loche has trouble distinguishing if he indeed heard something or if he simply understood—a bridge between words and simple knowing.
—That is why we come. That is why we die.
Edwin’s little face is now tranquil. Loche wonders at him.
—You remember me, do you not?
His son’s visage transforms into the deity at the Center of Basil’s painting. Loche’s mouth begins to reply but feels the answer lift out of a thought:
—I do. What of my son, Edwin?
—We are here.
—Leave my son! Leave him be!
—Your son, like all sons, like all daughters, children, are heaven on Earth. I exist with them.
—Leave him with me!
—Not yet. We must end what you have begun. When it is done, we shall part.
—When what is done?
—Cross the omvide.
Edwin begins to cry again. “I want to sleep, Dad.”
—Cross the omvide, the thought forms.
“Come on,” he says lifting Edwin and lunging higher.
“Are you alright?” Julia asks.
Loche does not answer.
Fifteen minutes later Loche, Julia and Edwin stand a stone below the Menkaure omvide summit.
“Of all the pyramids, this is the one with no recorded destination, and a lengthy missing person’s list,” Julia says. “And Basil wanted us to come here.”
“The big, deep heavy,” Loche offers.
She smiles and looks skyward to her constellation. “At least the stars are familiar.” Their light is so clear, so close, Loche thinks that if he reached up he might pluck one from the night. With Edwin between them, the three hold hands, step to the top and start across.
“Lonwayro.”
The air sweetens.
God Save the Queen
November 11, this year
Upper Priest Lake, Idaho
1:50 pm PST
Marcus Rearden’s words are like a fracture. “So much for your metaphorical immortality, Dr. Finnelly.” There is a trace of mocking laughter in his voice.
Astrid cannot understand. She’s forgotten to breathe, and realizing the fact, she gasps. Her hand covers over the mask—over her open mouth.
“Get a medic in here, now!” someone says.
A white-coated tech lifts a radio and makes the call.
Graham’s fingers search for further signs of life. The Queen of the Immortals lies silent, stoic and wide-eyed within a coffin of crystal. Alive.
“Mal, let’s get the tenesh and the sword out of the way.” Two technicians approach. Mal moves to Graham’s left and pauses a moment. The wooden sap covered tene
sh measures roughly a single square foot, maybe six inches deep. A metal handle is bolted to its top, the cruciform sword is unsheathed, and there are darkened patches of oxidation along the fuller. Lacey veins of blue and green patina stretch the length of the blade while the cross guard and pommel are both blackened steel. Engraved into the heavy cylinder of the pommel is a solitary eye. “Careful,” Graham says, “it’s still quite sharp.”
A leather skin still clings to the hilt. Mal’s gloved hands hover over it. “Why do I sense that I shouldn’t touch this?”
“I was thinking the same thing,” Graham agrees.
Astrid searches the sarcophagus for more signs, more runes—perhaps a warning. “Wait,” she cries. Mal’s hands jerk away, suddenly.
“There,” she points.
Queen Yafarra’s right hand is lying just below the sword’s black cross guard, against the razored edge. Is it moving? Graham thinks as he lowers down to inspect it. Her hand is still. However, a small, carmine wound is sliced into her skin. Tiny red beads are forming at the wound’s center, along with strange, whitish rings surrounding them.
“Mal,” Graham says, “let’s take the sword. Nice and easy.”
Reluctantly, Mal lowers his hands again and nudges his fingers beneath the hilt.
Lynn Eastman’s voice is heard, “Assist him,” she says. One of her security officers positions himself beside Mal and reaches to the blade. The moment his fingers touch the steel, several things happen at once.
Yafarra screams. Her fisted left arm catapults out of the quartz and smashes into Mal’s chest. Her leg rises, kneeing the security officer in the chin. There is a nauseating crack as his head ratchets too far to one side. Both men fall away. Graham presses both of her shoulders back into the coffin, as he advises, “Easy! Easy!”
Astrid rushes to the coffin. She rips her mask off and cries, “Ag shivcy. Ag shivcy. Fenor. Fenor.”
Yafarra’s impossibly green eyes latch on Astrid for a moment, but a moment only. With a vicious nod her forehead knocks against Graham’s cheek. The blow sends him back a pace. Yafarra’s knees rise. She kicks toward the ceiling and her body vaults forward and out of the coffin—her sword whistles into her grip. Her other hand grips the metal handle of the tenesh. As her feet touch the stone floor, she wobbles and stumbles.
“Ulk! Valso!” the Queen of Immortals says. She raises the blade in defense. “Ulk! Valso!” rattles from her throat, like pebbles in a box. She searches the faces surrounding her.
Astrid says, “Song, fenor.”
Tears appear in Yafarra’s eyes. When her circling scan lands on Marcus Rearden, she cries out, “Ag nesh! Ag nesh!”
Rearden pales.
Yafarra reaches one hand toward the psychologist, “Diloy veli. Rathche, chalfea shawis.”
He freezes. “I—I don’t know what she wants.”
Astrid moves between them facing the Queen. “Fenor,” she says gently. “Fenor.” She lowers her eyes and stares at Yafarra’s feet. “Fenor,” she repeats. “Peace, peace, peace.”
“What did she say?” Rearden begs.
Without turning Astrid answers, “She is speaking to you. She said, ‘It is not safe here. Come to me, family. Protect the crown and Queen.’”
Rearden gasps, “Why me?”
“I don’t know,” Astrid replies calmly—her eyes averted.
Frantic, Yafarra’s face twists with panic, “Thi gzate, Iteav! Ne! Iteav!”
“Astrid?” Graham asks, “What now?”
“Her son,” she translates. “Her son, Iteav. She wants her son.”
“Aethur! Aethur! Ne. Ne.”
“She now calls for someone called Aethur. Find Aethur, she says.
“Tell her to stand down!” Eastman says.
Astrid replies, “We might deflate this situation if we all take a knee and show her there is no threat. We are in the presence of a Queen, don’t forget. We’re in her city.”
Holding a hand to his bruised cheek, Graham removes his mask, joins Astrid and lowers himself to his knees. Astrid follows.
“Everyone! Now!” he says.
“Fenor,” Astrid breathes out as she bows down.
One by one they lower themselves and wait.
Only a few remain standing—Lynn Eastman and her Coldwater security team.
“Eastman,” Graham growls, “now is not a time to flex your—”
“You do your job, I’ll do mine,” she interrupts with gentle precision. “She may have been a Queen once—but now she threatens the safety of all within this chamber. I am tasked with protecting not only you, Professor, but everyone here. Tell her to drop the sword and the tenesh.” Astrid watches Eastman’s hand move to her holstered pistol.
“Miss Eastman, please. Yafarra’s culture is civilized beyond—”
“Professor, do as I ask.”
The calm in Eastman’s voice is maddening.
Twenty heart beats pulse in Astrid’s ears.
“Tell her to drop her sword, or I will make her drop it.”
Yafarra is listening and watching as the two converse, skeptical of the group still standing. Particularly the woman.
“I will try, but I don’t think—”
“She will drop it one way or another,” Eastman states.
Astrid raises her face to Yafarra. “Lain, O chalfea, Yafarra. Thi Astrid Finnley. Fenor. Ag zish. Tengnen lifoth. Uta nesh. Uta nesh tengnen.”
“What did you say?” Eastman demands.
“I said polite things,” Astrid answers.
“What did you say?”
“I introduced myself. Offered greetings to her Majesty. Assured her there is nothing to fear. I then asked her to offer her sword and the tenesh.”
Astrid’s gaze drifts to the floor, stunned that she has just introduced herself to the Queen Yafarra of Wyn Avuqua. Never in her wildest dreams had such a thought crossed her mind. And if the notion had occurred to her, it certainly did not include kneeling before Yafarra in a sacrificial, beheading position. Sweet Christ, she thinks, I’ve just asked a royal daughter of immortal blood, after being buried alive for over a thousand years, to give up her sword while she is surrounded by a host of strangers with masks—and she’s naked. Oh Christ.
Astrid says quickly, “Menoth usag ag arch.” She bows lower.
“What was that last piece?” Eastman snorts.
Astrid replies, “Forgive the idiots still standing.”
Imaginings
Place and time unknown
Loche Newirth remembers the first time he saw Julia Iris. It was at the Floating Hope restaurant while he waited for Basil to join him. He was seated at the counter. She was serving. It was just days ago.
Of course, the experience was imagined.
It is strange to think of the traits that attract one person to another, especially now while peering into a colorless mist of impenetrable fog atop what he assumes is another pyramid far from Menkaure. He looks to his right and sees Julia crouched down beside him. Edwin is dozing, leaning against her. She meets his gaze. He remembers again the moment she turned and said her first word to him, “Coffee?” Certainly, her beauty arrested his breath. Her smile shot a volt of electricity through his senses. The rawest form of attraction. But there was something more. A familiarity. A trust. As if he’d known her for his entire life. Perhaps somehow, he did.
Of course, the experience was imagined.
She moved with confidence. Thinking back, Loche pictures her gliding from table to table—professional attire with a hint of sensual grace, elegant poise and a way of bringing comfort to everyone in the room. It made sense when she revealed that she owned the boat. The memory is a delight.
Of course, the experience was imagined.
Julia represents a number of firsts for Loche Newirth. She was the first to make the world around him disappear. Even now, her nearness can eclipse the horrors encircling their every move. He thought he had felt love for his wife, Helen, but upon meeting Julia, love had been totally
redefined. Quite likely, he thinks. The first time he’d felt it. Never before had he experienced anyone or anything to cause him to question his marriage. Julia was the first.
Of course, the experience was imagined.
But how could the taste of her skin linger? The joy in her voice still lilt in his ears? The depth and breadth of her past life be as real as his own? He introduced her on paper in a few short sentences—that was all. There was no mention of her upbringing, or how her own choices through the years forged the woman she had become. Julia had her own memories. Her own light. A thousand untold stories she’ll never tell a soul.
Loche may have imagined her—wished her to life, but that was all. Julia’s life was hers.
“Julia?” Loche says. “Are you there?”
She is staring at him. “Of course,” she answers. “I’m right here.”
He kisses her.
“Can you imagine,” he asks, “when this is all over, what it will be like for you and me to wake up together in, say… a bed? Maybe it will be midmorning and raining outside.”
“I would love that,” she says. “Maybe it will be foggy.”
Loche searches the nebulous white around them for some landmark. “Let’s start down and find a place to rest.”
Somewhere out there in the fog, they are being hunted.
As soon as he secures Edwin in his arms, the little boy falls asleep. They descend slowly. The pyramid steps are steep and smaller than the Egyptian blocks.
This experience is not imagined.
Julia is beside him. He knows her. Not everything, but he knows her. They move together. Down and down. Step by step.
“Do you feel it?” Julia says. “It feels like—
“Like home?”
“Weird,” she says.
A slight breeze unveils the tops of evergreens.
A section of flat stones juts out and away from the slant of the pyramid and they walk along the smooth path for another few meters. The air is cool. More spikes of cedar and bull pine appear. After a few more strides, a drop off to a blurry haze stops them at an edge. They look for another route when, like lace blown from a window, the veil peels back revealing a crystal blue lake. Slanted light angles and sits on the shoulders of southwestern hills. Loche follows the line of surrounding mountains and ridges. He scans the shape of the shoreline. He inhales the sweet decay of maple leaves, and the moisture rising from sun on moss in the cracks of rock at his feet.
The Shape of Rain Page 14