Of Steel and Steam

by Pauline Creeden et al.

  “Can’t forget the reason why I’m here,” I added jokingly.

  Nerves twisted my stomach, but Dr. Moore didn’t seem to pick up on it. “Lovely. You can keep it with you during dinner, if you insist, but I must tell you it’s perfectly safe to also leave it out here, Miss Blake.”

  “I rather keep it safe with me,” I said. “Not that I don’t trust you, Dr. Moore, or your guests, but… I’ll feel better knowing it’s right next to me.”

  “Understood, Miss Blake.”

  We passed through a hallway luxurious enough for a count’s household, with awe-inspiring paintings lined up on each side. “Given your profession, I understand the need for caution. Ah, here we are.”

  I took a deep breath just before a butler opened up the double doors leading to the dining room for Dr. Moore and I.

  The dining room bathed in gold. A crystal chandelier dangled from the ceiling, casting blinding light all around us. A table long enough to seat twenty guests sat in the middle of the room. Luckily, only four guests were present. If there had been twenty, I would’ve probably turned on my heel and ran away.

  “Please, Miss Blake.” Dr. Moore escorted me to an empty seat, pulled back the chair and gestured for me to sit down. Mac jumped on my lap.

  “Most peculiar,” one of the guests, a plump, middle-aged woman with a fake beauty mark on her round face said. She had two chins and a towering blonde hairdo that made her look thirty centimeters taller than she really was. Her lips were the color of blood, and mixed with her pale cheeks, it made her look like a vampire.

  “Mrs. DuChamps, may I introduce you to Miss Blake,” Dr. Moore said, addressing the woman who had just spoken. “Miss Blake, please meet Mrs. DuChamps. She is a connoisseur of the arts.”

  “Pleased to meet you,” I said, although the woman scared me about as much as the archbishop automaton did last night. She seemed like a hawk who had found an easy prey.

  “Why did you bring your cat with you?” Mrs. DuChamps asked, not bothering to greet me properly. “It’s not very polite to bring pets to dinner.”

  “Now, now, Mrs. DuChamps,” Dr. Moore said. “I don’t mind. Mac is quite intelligent, once you get to know him.”

  Mac kept his mouth shut but shot daggers at Mrs. DuChamps.

  The bulging woman arched an eyebrow—not an actual brow, but rather a thin line drawn on her face—and then looked at me with utter contempt on her features, making me feel as if I wasn’t worth the dirt under her shoes. “Dr. Moore tells me you’re a tomb raider?”

  I nodded. My throat felt as dry as if I had been wandering in the Sahara for a month. “I am.”

  “But you’re a woman.” It wasn’t a question, rather a statement of surprise made by Mrs. DuChamps.

  “I for one am all for women broadening their horizons.” The man opposite of me was at least eighty years old, his skin as wrinkled as parchment. He had a monocle, and hair that was almost white. “It’s nice to meet you, Miss Blake. I would be delighted to hear more about what your profession entails. From you, and Mr. Locke, of course.”

  The older man gestured to the gentleman sitting next to me, who I supposed was Mr. Locke. But… what was he saying? I frowned—did he mean Mr. Locke was also a tomb raider?

  Of course I knew Dr. Moore didn’t get his treasures and curiosities from me alone, but I hadn’t expected he would invite one of his other sources to dinner as well this evening.

  Mr. Locke took this as his cue to talk to me. “Delighted,” he said, while lifting my hand and kissing it. Despite his gesture, his voice sounded cold as ice.

  The moment he looked up from kissing my hand, my breath died in my throat. Locke was breathtakingly handsome, in a charming, roguish kind of way. A five o’clock shadow, dark eyes, strong jaw, I could already imagine him galivanting around underground caverns and exploring jungle temples on a quest to find ancient treasures.

  “Mr. Locke just returned from the Appalachian mountains,” Dr. Moore said. “I’m sure you will find his stories most entertaining, Miss Blake.”

  “Dr. Moore told me you made quite a startling discovery yourself.” Locke’s words sounded pleasant enough, but they were still laced with ice. “The lost tomb of the archbishops?”

  “Yes.” I was careful not to reveal too much. I didn’t want anyone else to access the tomb and stand eye to eye with the automaton of doom.

  “Such dreadful business,” Mrs. DuChamps said. “Totally not becoming of a woman. Tell me, Miss Blake, do you have a suitor, a fiancé? And if so, what does he think of these shenanigans?”

  My cheeks turned as red as a tomato. “I—uh…”

  “Mrs. DuChamps, I’m sure Miss Blake’s private life is none of our business.” The person who spoke was the only one I hadn’t been introduced to yet. A woman of about my age, perhaps a year or two older, sat next to Mr. Locke. She wore a fancy, stylish, dark green dress and her black hair was held up by an expensive-looking pin.

  “You’re right, Miss Rivers,” the older man said.

  At least one of the people on this table had my side. I wondered why Dr. Moore had decided to put the lot of us together. We made a strange combination, with Mrs. DuChamps scrunching up her nose while looking at me, Locke seemingly detesting me simply for sharing his profession. The young woman, I had no idea about, and the older man seemed friendly enough.

  “Miss Blake, this is my fiancé, Miss Rivers,” Locke said, introducing the younger woman to me.

  “Nice to meet you.”

  “Miss Rivers is at least sensible enough to let the men do the exploring without wanting to join in,” Mrs. DuChamps said. “It’s not proper for a young woman.”

  I felt Mac growing tense. He stabbed his nails into my dress, and a rumble rose up from inside his tiny body. For all his nagging that I should find myself a proper husband and settle down, Mac wasn’t about to let anyone else order me to do the same.

  “Shh,” I whispered to him, petting his back. Now was not the time nor place for one of Mac’s legendary outbursts.

  “How did you gain an interest in your current profession, Miss Blake?” the older man asked.

  “Dr. Evans used to be a history professor before he retired,” Dr. Moore explained, “so his real question is where you got your interest in history from.”

  I smiled at Dr. Evans. The older gentleman had surprisingly kind eyes.

  “My father always taught me the importance of history. I liked to read up on little tidbits, anecdotes, forgotten stories, even as a young child. In my ancestral home, there was a crypt I liked to play around in. I memorized all the names of the people buried there. According to the legend, a treasure was hidden below our ancestral crypt, but no one had managed to find it, and it was buried at least three centuries ago.”

  The memory brought a smile to my face—I recalled the proud look on my father’s face as I showed him the secret compound I had uncovered under the vault containing the body of Agatha Blake; the only one of our family members whose name I had not been able to find back anywhere in the house. Not in the carefully woven tapestry showing our family lineage on the second floor, not in the portrait gallery on the third floor, not in any of the diaries left behind by a long line of Blakes before me. Instead of stumbling upon a corpse, accessing the tomb of Agatha Blake led me straight to the promised treasure.

  “I followed the clues and tracked down the treasure, and well, you can say, I was hooked right away.”

  My father had been blown away by my discovery, and he let me tell the story again and again of how I had unraveled the clues and found something many a grown-up Blake hadn’t been able to locate.

  Tears threatened to choke me, and I gritted my teeth, focusing back on the present rather than on my trip down memory lane.

  “How dreadful and ghastly,” Mrs. DuChamps said. “Who would let a child play in a crypt?”

  “I found it quite comforting to be surrounded by so much history,” I said.

  In all honesty, my father was usually
too busy with his research to realize what I was up to.

  The family home. Having to leave it behind left a hole in my heart roughly about the size of it. Not for its faded grandeur—by the time Father and I occupied it, it was slowly turning into a haunted house, tormented by the ghosts of the past, and falling into disrepair as Father could no longer cope with the gargantuan repair bills—but for the memories it held. A palace of memories.

  “What an amazing story.” Dr. Moore clapped his hands. “I knew it was a good idea to bring all of you here together. We shall get to know each other better, and we shall have marvelous discussions.”

  I thought this was some wishful thinking on his behalf, especially given the spiteful looks Mrs. DuChamps was shooting in my direction.

  The butlers came into the room, bringing with them trays of food smelling delicious. Mac instantly sat up, no doubt already hungry again. The first course was an orange-colored soup. My guess was pumpkin and carrots, and when I tasted it, I realized I was correct.

  During dinner, Dr. Evans and Dr. Moore discussed the Peloponnesian wars, Mr. Locke detailed the reasons for his trip to the Appalachian mountains, namely, to uncover a grave dating back to the prehistorian era, and Mrs. DuChamps commented on everything she could, ranging from me feeding Mac leftovers to how my dress had gone out of style at least a century ago and I should really invest in something new.

  After dinner, Dr. Moore ushered us all into the study. As we took a seat, Mrs. DuChamps and Miss Rivers sharing a couch, Dr. Evans seated in an armchair, Mr. Locke drinking brandy by the bar and Mac and I sitting behind a chess table, Dr. Moore gestured to me.

  “Miss Blake, I would be most thrilled to see the treasures you have brought for me.”

  “Here?” The word escaped my mouth before I could stop myself. I had thought that we would hold the transaction in private, not in front of the other guests.

  “Yes, of course. We’re all interested in art and history here, please show us your find.” Dr. Moore seemed like a kid giddy to get into the playground and start playing with his friends.

  Reluctantly, I leaned over to my backpack and started taking out the miters and jewelry one item at a time. When I took the first miter out, Miss Rivers gasped. By the second, Mrs. DuChamps’ pale skin seemed even paler. After I dug up the third and fourth miter, Locke came over to inspect them.

  He whistled through his teeth. “Gold. Do you mind if I touch them?”

  It took a second before I realized the question was directed at me. “No, go ahead.”

  The study was a lot warmer than the dining room had been, courtesy of the oversized fireplace on the left wall. The other walls were decorated with wooden panels, and an oak desk stood to the right. The atmosphere in the study was quite oppressive, almost claustrophobic, and I felt the corset of the dress crushing my lungs against my ribs.

  Locke lifted one of the miters. “Solid gold even.” He seemed more impressed by the minute. “If archbishops are buried with this kind of loot, I should change my focus from pharaohs to bishops, it seems.”

  He put the miters back down, briefly inspected the rings, and then and sat down in the empty seat opposite mine, sipping from his brandy.

  “Miss Blake, I will write you a check for whatever amount you require,” Dr. Moore said. “We can discuss the monetary details later, but I wanted the others to see the bounties of your profession.”

  He glanced at Mrs. DuChamps for a second. The crone had turned as silent as a grave, and I realized the whole display was not Dr. Moore wanting to settle business right then and there, but rather him wanting to shut Mrs. DuChamps up.

  “My dear guests,” Dr. Moore said while he walked toward the fireplace, “I’ve gathered you all here for more than one reason, I’m afraid. Of course I invited you because I most enjoy your company, but also because of an ulterior motive. You must forgive me for this.” He sipped his drink, and then walked forward, about to say something else, when the room of the study opened.

  One of the butlers strode in. He went straight to Dr. Moore and whispered something in his ear.

  “What’s that?” Dr. Moore said. “Hm. Fetch security.”

  Dr. Moore seemed distraught while he motioned for the butler to leave again, but he recovered quickly. “Where was I? Oh, about the true reason why I invited all of you here tonight.” He clapped his hands. “I have a mission. An assignment. Something that will require your help.”

  “A mission?” Dr. Evans leaned forward in his seat. “Richard, I’ve known you for decades, and this is the most serious I’ve ever heard you speak.”

  “You all know that I collect history,” Dr. Moore said, ignoring his friend. “Ancient vases, golden miters, sarcophaguses from ancient Egypt, I collect it all. But while I’ve enjoyed buying curiosities from tomb raiders such as you, Miss Blake, and you, Mr. Locke, I now feel the need to do something else.”

  Dr. Moore turned around and took a box from the mantlepiece. I hadn’t even noticed the box was sitting there.

  Mac sat up straight on my lap, intrigued by what was happening.

  Moore put the black box down on the coffee table. “Friends, you must promise me that what I tell you here tonight, will not leave this room.”

  He looked at each of us, and we all nodded in return. I wondered if the others were as startled by the turn of events as I was. This was about the last thing I had expected when I came here tonight.

  Holding his breath, Moore slowly removed the lid from the black box, revealing rolled-up parchment. From my position, I couldn’t make out much besides that it looked ancient.

  When he opened the scrolls, I realized it wasn’t parchment at all, but the older variety, papyrus.

  “Come, friends.” Moore gestured for us all to come closer.

  I shuffled forward.

  Mac crawled onto my shoulder, digging his nails into my skin. Luckily, I wore leather patches and barely felt it.

  The moment my gaze fell on the scroll, my breath choked in my throat. Not because of the contents as such, but because of how familiar they were.

  The upside-down black pyramid.

  The Egyptian hieroglyph for queen.

  This scroll was the twin to the papyrus I had gazed at this morning in Maximillian’s bookshop.

  Chapter 6

  What were the odds of two almost identical ancient Egyptian scrolls showing up in London at the exact same time? The only reasonable conclusion would be that the scrolls were a hoax, the papyrus artificially made to look much older than it was, and if Maximillian himself hadn’t told me this morning that his seller had three scrolls for sale, of which he had only been able to buy one given his limited funds, I would’ve been sure this was a set-up.

  “This scroll is part of the Necronomicon of the Forgotten Queens,” Dr. Moore said.

  Dr. Evans’ eyes shot wide open, and he stared at us as if he couldn’t believe what Moore had just told us. His hand flew to his chest, and for a second, I feared he was having a heart attack.

  “This… I had no idea this was real.” Dr. Evans let his hand glide over the scroll, his mouth hanging open in awe. “I thought it was just a myth.”

  “Enlighten me,” Mrs. DuChamps said as she pushed me aside to obtain a closer spot to the scrolls, her enormous body now pressing uncomfortably against my side. “What in God’s name is the ‘Necronomicon of the Forgotten Queens?’” She managed to spit out the title as if it was a curse.

  “Dr. Evans, to you the honors,” Dr. Moore said, gesturing at his friend.

  I was curious too; the name didn’t ring any bells to me. It obviously did to Locke, though, who had golden coins swarming in his eyes.

  Dr. Evans cleared his throat. “A lifetime ago, I taught Egyptian studies at university. That’s when I learned about an obscure scroll that is supposed to lead to the tomb of the Forgotten Queens: Queens who once ruled over Egypt, but simply because of their gender were scratched from history.”

  “I thought the Egyptians were all abo
ut girl-power?” Miss Rivers said. “Cleopatra?”

  “An exception. Plus, Cleopatra lived in the Roman era, in the first century AD. The Forgotten Queens ruled over Egypt more than four thousand years ago.”

  “Oh.” Miss Rivers blinked, and perhaps she was like me, trying to imagine the span of time that had passed since these Queens ruled over Egypt and this very moment, how much the world had changed and at the same time, how much it had, sadly, stayed the same.

  “The Forgotten Queens were just rulers; three of them, grandmother, mother, daughter. Life prospered under their rule,” Dr. Evans said, “but not much else is known about them. Their tomb was never found. When they died, they received a proper burial, but in the years after, when their descendants did everything in power to erase their very existence from the annals of history, this knowledge was lost. Their tomb, despite never having been found, is said to hold the riches of all three Queens, a treasure of phenomenal size.”

  “What is this paper then?” Mrs. DuChamps asked, still sounding about as impressed as if she was looking at a dog’s turd.

  “It’s the key to finding the pyramid in which the Forgotten Queens were buried,” Dr. Moore said, moving back and forth like a ship lost at sea. “Yesterday, a friend of mine who works for the British Museum stumbled upon this marvel. A merchant from Egypt had come here to sell three scrolls, each of them worth a small fortune. My friend could get his hands on one of them, and then sold it on to me.”

  “Where are the others?” Locke acted like a dog who had spotted a bone. “We’ll need the other two to decipher this one.”

  “Sounds suspicious to me,” Mrs. DuChamps said, the only intelligent thing she had said the entire night. “How do you know this is legit? I don’t want to spend money on a campaign searching for a hoax.”

  Money. That was why Dr. Moore had brought her in, of course. I stared at my companions. Mrs. DuChamps, despite her condescending attitude, was dressed in luxury, her earrings pure gold, her fingers flashing diamonds and rubies. She was the money goose for this campaign. Dr. Evans was the one with the knowledge, the retired professor who taught about ancient Egypt and knew all about this myth. That left Locke and I: the tomb raiders.