by Tom Wilde
I just shook my head as I reached for my cigarettes and lighter. The cigarettes themselves had been crushed into oval shapes during my recent exertions, but none were broken. I fired one up with a nod of thanks to my host as the young woman placed a silver ashtray before me. “You treat all your captives this well?” I inquired. “For some reason, I get the distinct impression that we should be having this discussion while you have me dangled over an active volcano or something.”
Vanya smiled. “Sorry, we’re fresh out of volcanoes. As I said before, Mr. Blake, I’m not your enemy. Although you don’t realize it yet, you’ve done me a great service. But before we proceed any further, I need to know something else. Are you a government operative pretending to be an expert in antiquities? Or an actual antiquarian who happens to work for the government?”
I took a drag of my cigarette to buy some time. Despite the exotic surroundings and veneer of civilized behavior, I was trapped in as dangerous a place as I had ever been, and I’d have to tread carefully through this potential minefield by using a tissue of lies within a fragile framework of truth.
“A little of both, I suppose,” I replied. “But in truth, I’m a thief.”
“A thief? You admit to this?”
“Hey, between being accused of being a government spy or a thief, I’ll admit to being an honest crook any day.”
Vanya looked dangerously skeptical. “You have identification that claims you work for an entity called the Argo Foundation. Is this part of your cover?”
“No, that part is real. I’ve worked for Argo for years. The foundation sends me all over the world to collect artifacts. What they don’t know is that for every collection I retrieve, I’ve been stealing and selling a few choice pieces for myself.”
“So when did you start working for the government?”
“Right after they caught me in the act. I screwed up and got arrested in Central America. The guys from the government gave me a choice; I could either work for them or go to prison. Although I’m starting to think now I made a bad deal.”
Vanya leaned back against his throne, his brows furrowed in thought. “So,” he said almost casually, “as an actual antiquarian, you would probably know where I would find the Spear of Destiny?”
“The Spear of Destiny? Which one? There’s like, four or five of those things floating around.”
“What about the location of the tomb of Genghis Kahn?”
“Go to China and start digging. Good luck. No one’s found it yet.”
“And the city of Troy?”
“You mean Illium? That hack Schliemann stumbled on it in Turkey back in the 1800s.”
Vanya leaned forward, his dark eyes boring into mine. “So tell me, Mr. Blake, how would you recognize the mummy of Alexander the Great?”
“Alexander?” I scratched around my memory. “Well, for one, I’d look to see if the nose was broken off.”
“Really?” Vanya asked silkily.
“Yes. If I remember correctly, one of the Roman emperors made a pilgrimage to Alexander’s tomb. The emperor tripped over himself and busted the nose off Alexander’s mummy. One of history’s better pieces of slapstick.”
Vanya just stared and smiled at me, in a way that reminded me of how Caitlin’s ancient boss, Mr. Jonas, had looked at me after he finished railroading me into this job. “So,” Vanya said at last, “you really are a trained historian and an admitted thief, and became an agent of the government afterwards? How long have you worked for them?”
“Would you believe you’re my first job?”
“No.”
I shrugged. So much for telling the truth. “Oh, well. Now I’ve got some questions for you. Just how did you get Caitlin and me out of Paris? Speaking of that, just where the hell am I anyway?”
“Oh, it’s much easier to sneak someone out of a country than into one, especially if you have a private jet,” Vanya said easily. “And as I mentioned before, you’re a guest in my home. Now, what were your orders concerning the operation in Paris?”
I took in some smoke to buy a bit more time. Rhea had warned me to tell Vanya what he wanted to hear. I decided to try some simple truth. “I was told that you were in the market for a piece of stolen property. A Napoleonic bronze eagle finial, to be precise. I was sent to watch the transaction and see if you or one of your people was actually going to take possession of the thing. Then you’d be caught in the act of receiving stolen antiquities.”
“And you brought your wife along with you? Didn’t you think that’d be dangerous for her?”
“Hell, yeah. It certainly wasn’t my idea to bring her along,” I said with sincerity. “But some government idiot back home thought it’d be good cover to show up with my wife. Besides, I was told the job wasn’t going to be dangerous. I was just supposed to observe the transaction go down.”
“You sound angry.”
“I am. She should never have been there.”
“So you’ve been forced to work for the United States? Tell me, what would you say if I offered you an alternative?”
The light from the sky was darkening, filling the courtyard with indigo-tinted twilight. “What do you mean?” I asked quietly.
Vanya didn’t reply, and instead stood up and strode off the dais, walking along the length of the table with Rhea and the guard falling in behind. I put out my cigarette and stood as well, putting my pack and lighter into the pocket of my robe. It felt good to have a weapon again, even a diminutive, last-ditch knuckleduster like my lighter. I matched their course on my side of the table, with my own armed escort falling in line behind me. As he walked, I noticed that Vanya was well over six feet tall, and broad through the shoulders and chest, and that the robe he wore didn’t quite conceal the swell of his stomach. We met at the end of the table and Vanya proceeded toward a large, life-sized marble statue on a raised pedestal, framed against the fading sunlight. I saw the statue was of a man clad in ancient Grecian armor, with an angelic alabaster face. There was no inscription, but the visage was familiar to me. Vanya spoke toward the statue as he said to me, “So what do you know about the men who attacked you and kidnapped your wife?”
“You mean Ombra and his group? They weren’t supposed to be at the meeting, and I don’t know a damn thing about them, other than the fact that they’re completely ruthless killers. Worse than that, Ombra and his men were organized, and prepared for every contingency. Whatever treasure was down in that underground chamber must be melted into unrecognizable slag by now. But who in the hell would go through all that trouble to find such a treasure, only to destroy it?”
Vanya sighed. “I’ve dealt with their kind before. They are like an unseen plague, lurking in the shadows like venomous spiders. Twice before now, I almost had Napoleon’s eagle in my hands, only to have these assassins attack and ruin it all. Until now.”
“What do you mean? And just what is your interest in Napoleon and his treasure anyway? It doesn’t look like you need the money.”
In the fading light, Vanya seemed surprised. He turned to face me and said, “Napoleon? I have no interest in that failed, would-be conqueror, save one.”
Vanya looked away, as if weighing a matter of deep importance. Finally he said to me, “Mr. Blake, what do you know of Napoleon’s Egyptian campaign?”
I searched my memory. “Not much,” I admitted. “If I remember right, it was a failure. On the other hand, that’s where the Rosetta Stone was discovered.”
“Yes, but do you recall where Napoleon and his troops first landed when they reached Egypt?”
“No.”
“Alexandria,” Vanya stated. “Napoleon took control of Alexandria first, before he did anything else, even though his ultimate destination was Cairo. And do you know why he did that?”
I just shook my head. “Because,” Vanya explained, “he was looking for something. Or to be precise, someone.”
That’s when it all came together for me. I didn’t have to ask Vanya who Napoleon was looking for
as I finally recognized why the face of the statue seemed so familiar. Vanya and I were standing together under the marble avatar of Alexander of Macedonia, known in some parts of the world as Alexander the Great, and in others as Alexander the Scourge. I was staring up into the twilight-shadowed face of the Conqueror of the World as Vanya said, almost in a whisper, “And he found him.”
I broke the spell of the moment as I said, “You’re kidding.”
Vanya seemed to come out of a half dream, shaking his head and saying, “No, Mr. Blake, I’m not. As a matter of fact, you yourself have provided me with the best proof to date.”
“Me? What are you talking about?”
Vanya looked around and said, “We need some light.” I heard a series of hisses and pops, and then the courtyard was illuminated in dancing firelight from a series of torches. This bit of common magic reminded me that everything I said was probably being recorded and could be used against me later. Vanya headed back to his elevated chair at the table and I returned to my place on the other side as our retinues followed. Rhea and the guard silently assumed their stations by Vanya’s side. From his throne, Vanya stared down at me, the torchlight sending flickering shadows warring across his face as he said, “I’ve spent years of my life and a fortune hunting for the tomb of Alexander.”
“You and just about every other archeologist in the world. What makes you think Napoleon Bonaparte is the key to it all?”
Vanya held up a hand. “Let me start from the beginning. When Alexander died in 323 BC, his body became a bone of contention, as it were. Since Alexander’s succession was unsure, the leaders at the time knew that the body and sarcophagus of Alexander could be a powerful symbol. His sarcophagus was taken first to Babylon, then Memphis, and finally to Alexandria. And there it remained.”
Vanya’s recitation was stirring my own memories. I said, “Right. As I recall, Ptolemy was the guy who first stole Alexander’s mummy and gold sarcophagus. If I remember right, one of Ptolemy’s descendants took the gold sarcophagus and had it melted down for the precious metal.”
Vanya nodded and stroked his long white beard. “Ptolemy the Ninth,” he affirmed. “He then had Alexander’s body placed inside a casket made of glass. And so he remained in the tomb that Ptolemy prepared for him. Finally in 200 AD, the Roman emperor Septimius Severus made his visit to Alexandria, and according to the historian Lucius Cassius Dio, ordered the tomb to be sealed after he placed some books of Egyptian magic inside. Some believe these may have been the Lost Books of Thoth. The last recorded visitor to Alexander’s tomb was Septimius’s son, Caracalla. There is where the story seems to end.”
“Not quite,” I countered. “Alexandria was razed to the ground by a war or two since then, not to mention a giant earthquake. No one knows what could be buried under the ground there anymore.”
Vanya smiled. “No,” he said as if to a child. “I said the story seemed to end. In 1517 Leo Africanus wrote that the tomb of Alexander was in ‘a small house in the form of a chapel,’ and later, in 1575, the map of Alexandria prepared by the Europeans Braun and Hogenberg indicates a place with the notation ‘Domus Alexandri Magni.’”
“Latin for the house of Alexander the Great,” I translated.
“Correct. Then in 1798, when Napoleon set off on his Egyptian campaign, he publicly stated that he was ‘following in the footsteps of Alexander the Great,’ and he doubtless had the Braun and Hogenberg map in his possession. After conquering Alexandria, Napoleon set up a fortification in Kom el Dikka, in the very heart of the city. And there, I have cause to believe, Napoleon took possession of the tomb of Alexander.”
I shook my head. “Hold it. If Napoleon found Alexander’s tomb, why didn’t he tell the world?”
Vanya’s eyes seemed to catch the fire of the torches as he said, “You forget, Mr. Blake, Napoleon was defeated in Egypt. The British Lord Nelson destroyed most of Napoleon’s invasion fleet, and later Napoleon was forced to flee with only a small contingent of men and ships. With the British in control of Alexandria, Napoleon would be forced to first hide his Egyptian treasures, and then he would have had to smuggle them away without the British knowing they were taken out of Egypt.”
“Just how do you know all this?”
“Because some years ago my people discovered a document written by Joseph Fouché, head of Napoleon’s secret police, that contained clues to the secret locations of Napoleon’s hidden treasures. The plan included the use of the bronze eagles that were the keys to the treasures’ location. This document also makes mention of a secret expedition to Alexandria in the year 1815, the year Napoleon was exiled to the island of Elba. Using the Fouché document, I began to hunt for one of the eagles that held the key information inside. But it was you, Mr. Blake, who provided me with the vital evidence that all but proves my theory.”
“Me? What evidence?”
Vanya stood again, and this time he walked toward the center of the garden. Rhea and the guard stayed put near the throne chair, and I stood up and joined Vanya, though not so close as to spook anyone who may have had a restless trigger finger. Vanya himself seemed almost oblivious to me as he held his head back and looked straight up into a darkening, star-filled sky. At last, Vanya spoke, almost as if he was speaking to himself.
“Tell me,” he said softly, “what made you risk your own life to pick up that wooden box you found down in the catacombs of Paris, right before the bomb exploded?”
My mind flashed back to that moment of mad chaos. “I had to try to save something. It was the only thing I saw at the moment that I could carry. So what was in the box?”
“I think you’ll be very interested to know that you managed to rescue a pair of papyrus scrolls, inscribed with Egyptian hieroglyphics and possibly thousands of years old. They will need much more study, of course, and very careful handling, but I believe them to be the books of magic that Septimius Severus placed inside the tomb of Alexander. The first physical proof that Alexander’s remains are within my grasp.”
I made the mistake of looking up when I heard this news, and I felt dizzy as the implications pounded into my brain. I focused on Vanya as he stood with closed eyes, his head surrounded by stars.
“And because of what you’ve found,” he whispered, “the very course of the world may change.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“You mind telling me how finding one old broken-nosed mummy is going to change the world?”
Vanya, wrapped up in a vision only he could see, opened his eyes, and I caught a flash of regal annoyance. I reminded myself it’s not smart to antagonize someone who can have you killed, by his own minions no less. Vanya walked back to his throne and seated himself with a sigh. With Rhea perched over his shoulder like one of Odin’s ravens, he spoke to me in the manner of a teacher addressing a not particularly bright student. “Millennia ago,” he began, “our ancestors knew where the home of the gods lay. In their imperfect understanding, they referred to that place as heaven, but when they looked up, they were all looking toward the stars.”
“Well, sure they were,” I said. “They were also looking at the sun and the moon, not to mention that the sky was the source of all sorts of phenomena, like thunder and lightning. Early mythology was their only way to explain such things.”
Vanya’s deep voice held amusement. “Mr. Blake, you don’t give your forebears nearly enough credit. Our ancestors not only experienced those commonplace events, they were also witnesses to the actions of the gods themselves. Tell me, are you familiar with the theory of Clarke’s law?”
“No.”
“Arthur C. Clarke postulated that any advanced technology, if seen by a primitive people, would appear to be magic,” Vanya said, leaning forward from his throne. “This, I believe, is the basis for every religion on the face of our planet. Elaborate rituals created in response to witnessing the actions of gods—technologically advanced visitors from distant worlds.”
I kept my poker face on as I said, “Well, like most
religions, your theory lacks proof.”
Vanya’s dark eyes flashed. “Proof!” he roared. “The proof is everywhere! It’s been recorded in every religious text ever written! The Bible, the Quran, the ancient Sumerian tablets, and all the innumerable surviving scraps of knowledge from all over the world describe, in specific detail, acts and events which now can be explained by our so-called modern science. And according to that passport of yours, you’ve been to many of the ancient lands and must have seen these wonders for yourself.”
Rhea silently reached down to the table and came up with a silver goblet. Vanya suddenly seemed to become aware of her presence, accepted the goblet from her, and took a drink. Vanya was right about my having been to many of the Lands of Antiquity, but I never had time for sight-seeing, and the last time I was in Alexandria I spent my final night running through garbage-strewn back alleys with a Twenty-sixth Dynasty statuette of the Egyptian cat goddess Bast in my backpack, escaping from the looters I stole it from. I was in no hurry to go back there.
Handing the goblet back to Rhea, Vanya sighed, closed his eyes, and said, “We as a species have finally ascended to the doorstep of those ancient astronauts that came to our primitive planet all those centuries ago. Only somewhere along the way, we perverted our memories into the religious beliefs that we have killed each other over since recorded history.”
Vanya opened his deep, dark eyes and said, “If we had but time enough, Mr. Blake, I would show you the passages written by those first observers. The descriptions of Elijah’s ‘fiery chariot,’ the likes of which are also recorded in Buddhist and Hindu writings. These same events are mirrored in the writings about the Egyptian king Pepi, who ascended to the sky, and the god Quetzalcoatl, the ‘plumed serpent’ who, whenever he flew, was accompanied by a ‘great wind.’ All the comings and goings of the gods of our ancestors, the ascents into heaven on pillars of fire, are described in ways that are exact observations of rockets and jet engines.”