The silver-haired Akila lingered outside the villa wall. Eleanor stared at her in disbelief and anger both. No coincidence, she told herself and she ran, heading for the woman even as she sensed Pettigrew at her heels. She did not look—if Pettigrew and Akila were working together, if they were leading her toward some fate she could not yet see, she did not care. She was tired of games and rings and of feeling that even after everything she had given up for her mother, that she was not yet in control of her own destiny.
Eleanor ran after Akila, pursing the woman until she thought her skin would burst, and when at last she let her human self fall away—when she could no longer hold any part of it—it was with a sigh of relief. The jackal stretched and threw itself into pursuit of the prey Akila had become. The city spread out in a simple grid of streets around them, but these straight lines were garbled with baskets, troughs, and the occasional alarmed camel side-stepping at their passage.
Around them in the night air, Eleanor became aware of the hum of locusts. Gentle at first, and only occasional. And then, more, and more as if they were raining from clouds, until even the evening sky was dark with them, surging everywhere overhead and underfoot. Eleanor squashed them as she ran in jackal form, and Akila must have too, for she slipped on locust-slick stones as they entered the alleys of the Arab Quarter. Eleanor pursued. Akila fled.
Eleanor pressed Akila deeper into the alleys, but the locusts grew so thick she could not stop snapping at them. Some burst against her tongue in sour explosions. They crawled over her back and her head, trying to burrow into her ears, biting everywhere they landed. Eleanor could not control her reaction to the beasts, jumping and jerking when she meant to run, when she meant to haul Akila to the stones and demand answers. She threw herself to the stones, to roll and thrash and try to shake the insects loose, but they remained intent upon her.
Then, Akila was there, pressing a hand against Eleanor’s head. Her touch was like fire even though Eleanor’s fur, uncomfortable but tolerable to the jackal if not the locusts. They crisped up as if they had been burned, falling dead to the stones around them.
“Incendia,” Akila whispered and the air around them turned to flame.
The locusts did not die quietly, but went up with strangely human-sounding shrieks that caused Eleanor to shudder and retch. She pushed herself up from the stones as the locusts began to fall, to escape the papery rain of them. Akila snapped her fingers as if bringing a dog to heel and Eleanor, knowing she might not get another opportunity, followed her deeper into the alleys.
Chapter Eight
23 November – Paris, France
Dear Cleo,
A six-meter tomistoma. I can hardly picture such a thing, and yet my mind goes on to do that very thing, crafting the most extraordinary scenarios. I picture the queens of Egypt riding them in a fleet down the Nile herself, under fluttering parasols of violet, gold, and green. Eating little fishes when they may. The tomistoma, not the queens, but then again…
The snow has stopped, but the cold remains. I find myself also dreaming about a winter spent in Egypt’s sands, with or without six-meter crocodiles. I wonder if the Lady’s body is still in those sands, and with her the rings. Did things come full circle? Is there yet a mummy in your archive that is my long-lost grandmother? And if the answers are yes, what do we do with that knowledge? Can the rings be both here and there? Safely in Anubis’s possession, but also not, given my grandmother will flee the palace when Hatshepsut’s reign comes to an end. Or does she no longer walk into the desert? This is what I wonder. This is what I cannot answer.
When next I visit you, we shall see the tomistoma. When you next come to Paris, I will take you to the Louvre, where you may see its collection of Egyptian artifacts. They are out of place in these cool marble halls and part of me wishes they would be returned home—ever Egypt—but they are safe here, well cared for, and seen by countless people who will otherwise never have the means to reach Egypt. I cannot regret those things.
Until your next letter, dear friend,
Eleanor
* * *
“Ah, see here, gentlemen! The Thomson-Widmanstätten reveals itself! Beautiful, like a metal lattice within the metal.”
Virgil peered at the rings held in the careful hands of Miss Rachael Tyrell, Mistral’s lead geologist in Alexandria. Virgil did not believe it an exaggeration to say the geologist was more excited about the rings than he and Auberon were. Having no ties to strange rings and the potential powers therein, she was not worried about slipping them onto her fingers and had done so countless times during their cleaning. Virgil thought they paired well with her gray waistcoat and trousers. The rings gleamed in the light of the laboratory, revealing patterns unlike any Virgil had seen before. There appeared to be bands of light and dark metal both, within what Miss Tyrell had confirmed was iron.
“But you said they were iron,” Virgil said, still not entirely clear on the matter. “This looks like no iron I know.”
Miss Tyrell peered at Virgil with bright hazel eyes over the golden rim of her glasses. “Indeed I did, and indeed they are—just because you haven’t seen this kind of iron does not make it anything else.”
Auberon cleared his throat at the jab and Virgil shifted from foot to foot. “You have a point,” he said.
“Several, I promise,” Miss Tyrell said. She tipped the rings in the light, letting the patterns in the metal reveal themselves better. “Only meteorite shows this striking pattern, Mr. Mallory. It is said the ancient Egyptians crafted jewelry from such metals, but I have never seen such brilliant evidence before me until today.” With this, she handed the cleaned rings to Virgil with a resigned sigh. “I should rather like to keep them, but suppose you mean to take them elsewhere?”
Virgil pondered the rings within his hand. “I should rather like to leave them with you,” he murmured, then grunted when Auberon elbowed him in the ribs.
“Consider Miss Folley’s reaction to that,” Auberon said.
“Indeed.” Virgil didn’t like any of the answers because they confirmed what Eleanor said of Anubis, and the god’s own starry claims.
Emerging from the Mistral laboratory where he and Auberon had worked with Miss Tyrell, Virgil was astonished to discover that night had fallen. He stared at the sky, unable to believe it for many long moments. Eleanor and Cleo were supposed to have finished their work with Pettigrew after the lunch hour, but now, it was full dark.
“That is not possible,” Auberon said at his side, and withdrew his pocket watch.
Virgil peered at the silver watch face as it came open, but it only confirmed they had somehow lost a complete day within the laboratory. An entire day, given to the study of two rings? It was not remotely possible—the study of the rings had not consumed that much time—and yet, the moon stared down at them, a pale, accusatory eye that proved otherwise.
“Sirs?”
A driver from the carriages parked at the curb drew Virgil’s attention. It was the driver who had brought them from the hotel to the lab earlier that day. He looked no different, nor did he appear terribly concerned over the fact that it was now night.
“Just …back to the hotel, if you would?” Virgil asked. The driver nodded and skipped toward his carriage. Once inside, Virgil stared at Auberon, waiting for an explanation.
Auberon shook his head. “I have no logical way of explaining how the entire day has passed. I am, however, hungry, as if I have not eaten for the entirety of it. Do you think the rings have anything to do with it?”
Virgil noted his own hunger, the wolf within him discontent over that status once it was realized. He opened the display box of rings from the auction, which now also included the ring that had been left to them in Paris. They looked as they had all day, perfectly normal if curious in their compositions.
“Are you suggesting that we…” Virgil swallowed a curse as the carriage lurched into motion. He snapped the ring case shut once more, setting it on the seat beside him. “It was a
few hours at the most? I am not certain a small bit of metal can speed up or alter time—or even our perception of such.”
“Given its possible origin…”
Virgil waved a hand. “Nonsense. We are not…” He pressed himself back into the seat, staring at Auberon. It was the look of a man on the edge of something he didn’t wish to be on. “We are not doing this again.”
“Certainly not,” Auberon said. “Miss Folley and Miss Barclay are safe at the hotel, no doubt annoyed and perplexed as to where we have spent these past hours. The rings simply occupied us as …nothing has before.”
Virgil startled. “Miss Folley and Miss Barclay. And if they aren’t at the hotel?” Had they returned from Pettigrew’s as normal? Had they noticed the strange slip of the day into night? “Good lord. You don’t suppose…” He had no idea what he meant to propose.
Auberon did and rose an eyebrow in question. “Are you suggesting that George Pettigrew has somehow turned day to night?”
Virgil lifted an eyebrow in return. “Are you suggesting that is somehow outside our realm of possibility, given that we were, not at all that long ago, speaking with Hatshepsut herself, witnessing Anubis’s judgment of the Irvings? We did see them turn to dust, did we not? We did,” he said, gripping the display box on the seat, “travel from present day, to ancient Egypt via a collection of rings not wholly unlike these.”
“Breathe, old man,” Auberon said. “Let us reach the hotel and have the ladies mock us for our worry, before we begin jumping to conclusions, yes?”
While his voice was even as ever—Auberon was never one given to outright anger, in Virgil’s experience—there was a rasp of unease within it; something was not quite right, and matter did not improve when they arrived at the Twelve Palms Hotel and discovered the ladies were not in residence. Their rooms remained locked, no sliver of light beneath either door. Virgil could not smell any recent trace of them, either; there was a faint hint of Eleanor’s morning soap, and the oil Cleo used on her mechanical arms, but nothing more. The desk clerk who had been on duty all day, shook his head and said that no, the women had not returned, nor had their driver.
“All right,” Virgil said. He had taken the time to tuck the rings beneath his bed’s mattress, given there was no room safe, and now paced a slow path through the lobby, his hands clasped together. “There is but one place they can be, surely? Just one, and in this time frame, thank you very much, not any other, be it distant past or far-flung future.”
“Unless they met with peril after having left Pettigrew’s,” Auberon said and took a step back from Virgil’s path, to keep himself out of arm’s reach.
Virgil unclasped his hands and drew them into fists. “This is positively not happening.”
“We have no idea yet as to what has happened,” Auberon said, “only that the ladies have not returned to the hotel. A ride to Pettigrew’s and then we shall reassess.”
It was Auberon’s calm voice and demeanor that helped Virgil though, he was certain. They called a fresh carriage and driver, and made the ride to Pettigrew’s. The entire house was illuminated against the night’s darkness, glowing like a rusty gem against the blackness. There was no lingering driver or carriage outside and the gates were closed, but as Virgil stepped down onto the drive, he could smell it.
Eleanor’s anger was sharp in the air and upon the dirt at the edge of the drive, there lay a button once attached to Eleanor’s blouse. He bent and scooped it into his hand, staring at it until Auberon’s hand upon his shoulder drew him back up.
“A button bodes neither good nor ill,” Auberon reminded him, but the sudden appearance of George Pettigrew within the brightly illuminated frame of his front door surely meant something.
“Gentlemen!” he called out, and walked down the drive toward them, his pace casual and not at all worried.
Of course he would not be, Virgil figured, not if his hand had set all of this into motion. Not if he were pulling strings and orchestrating even now.
Virgil’s hands shook the closer Pettigrew came. He wanted to blame it on the lack of opium, but knew it was the fault of the wolf within, the beast wanting to run. It would be easy to let himself seek an accomplice in the wolf and throw Pettigrew to the ground. But if Eleanor and Cleo were already in jeopardy at Pettigrew’s hands, such actions would do little to ease their plight.
“This is unexpected,” Pettigrew said, “but I am relieved to see you, yes indeed.” With these words, he opened the gates, swinging one side open to allow them entry. “Have you received word from Miss Folley?”
The worry that spiked through Virgil was like the coldest steel coated in ice and jammed into his neck. The wolf inside was so close to the surface, Virgil had to close his hand into a fist to keep the claws from bursting out.
“What do you mean, have we received word from Miss Folley?” he asked. He took a step forward, but no more when Auberon’s hand came to rest on his shoulder.
“The last we knew, Miss Folley and Miss Barclay were working here, with you, Mister Pettigrew,” Auberon clarified.
“Indeed, indeed. Miss Barclay yet remains, but Miss Folley…” Pettigrew drew in a breath and his shaking fingers fussed with his jet tie tack, covering it before smoothing his tie flat once more. “Come inside, I shall pour some tea and we will discuss what has happened. I believe something Miss Folley found within the sarcophagus disturbed her. She left in a poor temper.”
It took everything in Virgil to walk the distance to the front doors with a calm demeanor. If Eleanor was not here, where had she gone, and why?
“Something she found?” he managed to ask as they crossed the threshold of the gaudy house.
“Indeed,” Pettigrew said again. He closed the doors behind them and gestured for them to follow. “She and Miss Barclay were positively rapt by the sarcophagus all day—they feared they overstayed their welcome, but worry not. They are welcome to stay as they will, having so much more knowledge of these matters than I.”
“And what did she find?” This question was asked through clenched teeth, Virgil having to swallow down wolf and worry as Pettigrew passed him another slick smile.
“A ring! Much like the one she acquired at the auction, the corroded one. Though this one was preserved—for the sarcophagus was entirely filled with honey. Can you imagine?”
Virgil supposed there were all kinds of ways to stop time; the mention of a third ring did it for him, as they ticked ever closer to an edge he still did not want Eleanor to go over.
Pettigrew clasped his hands together. “Come. Miss Barclay and I can tell you more over tea and surely by now, Miss Folley has returned to the hotel.”
Virgil doubted this, but if this were the last location Eleanor had been, he would study all there was to be had before he moved elsewhere. Eleanor was no stranger to Egypt, even if Alexandria was new, so he found some comfort in that idea, but not the idea that she had left in a poor temper.
Pettigrew led them down mummy-lined halls, where Virgil picked up only the slightest scent of Eleanor’s anger; if he had to guess, he would have said that hours had passed since she had been here. Hours. Did this play into the day-into-night occurrence? He kept the possibility close to hand.
Cleo was in the parlor where she had recovered after her fainting spell at the unwrapping. She looked considerably better, but it was surprise and worry both that flickered through her brown eyes at the sight of Virgil and Auberon. Her mouth parted, then closed, and she stared, faint lines creasing her brow.
“Has something happened to Eleanor?” she asked.
“We wondered the same,” Auberon said, “not finding either of you at the hotel, and night having arrived.”
Cleo looked to the windows, as if she was only just discovering this for herself. She moved toward the nearest window as if in a trance, feet silent on the tiled floor. Her fingers rested lightly on the window’s sill, her confusion reflected back at Virgil within the window’s glass.
“That’s not…
”
“She did leave in quite a temper,” Pettigrew interrupted. He moved toward the tea cart, settling four cups into place and pouring. The fragrant scent of Earl Grey reached Virgil’s nose, but the familiar floral black tea didn’t calm the pacing wolf inside.
“I rather think I should go back to the hotel,” Virgil said, “and wait for her, if she has not yet returned on her own.”
Pettigrew waved him toward the couch. “Sit, and have tea, and we will tell you all we know before you go.”
“There was another ring,” Cleo said as she turned from the window. She crossed back to the sofas and sat, exhaling. “There was a body within the honey.”
Virgil did not miss the way her eyes flicked to Auberon, as if they shared a secret. About bodies? About honey?
“And the body wore a ring?” Auberon asked. “This body was encased in honey?”
Cleo’s head bobbed in a nod and she did not meet Auberon’s intent look. “Yes. It…” She squirmed in her seat, relaxing when Pettigrew pressed a delicate china cup in to her metal hands. “The body of a man. A man wearing a ring much like the one Eleanor got at the auction.”
“And as was left to her in Paris,” Auberon said.
He sank onto the couch, albeit a good distance from Cleo. Virgil watched them, each sneaking glances at the other as if they could not quite believe they were in the same room together. It was not young love, but something else entirely. Unfulfilled love? Unrequited? But no, he found reciprocation in both pairs of eyes.
Cleo set her tea aside and leaned forward, to nudge a small wood box closer to Virgil. “It’s not corroded like the others,” she said. “It’s perfect.”
Virgil could not bear to look at it—he knew it would surely show the same pattern as on the rings Miss Tyrell had cleaned. Instead, he took the cup of tea that Pettigrew offered him and drank it down in one hard swallow. He asked for another and Pettigrew poured again, before also offering a cup to Auberon.
The Honey Mummy (Folley & Mallory Adventure Book 3) Page 11