The Ankh of Isis: The Library of Athena, Book 2

by Christine Norris

  “Please take our guest’s wives to the baths, then to a comfortable room and see that they are well fed,” Astarte said. “They are friends of the pharaoh, and we are honored to have them in our house.”

  The women touched their heads to the floor before they stood. One came forward, bowed to Megan, and led her toward the door from which the three servants had come. Megan looked over her shoulder and motioned with her head for Claire and Rachel to follow. Diedrich stayed behind. Megan felt uncomfortable leaving him, but it didn’t appear they had much choice.

  The girls were taken to a room with mosaic tile and a large pool in the center. It reminded Megan of the bath they used in the Acropolis of Athens, but more colorful and exotic. Megan, Rachel and Claire were bathed in warm, fragrant water and dressed in new, clean dresses. Megan adored the soft green fabric the women deftly tucked and draped around her without using a single pin.

  “It brings out your eyes.” The woman slipped a pair of slippers, made of the softest leather, on Megan’s feet.

  The girls were then taken to a large airy pavilion. Three of the walls were simply a series of arches that looked out on a walled courtyard and more gardens. A lotus bush bloomed, white flowers with pointed petals and a beautiful fragrance. Megan took a deep breath, and smelled jasmine and patchouli along with the lotus.

  Three different servant women came in and placed several large, jewel-colored cushions on the floor. The girls sat, and more women came in, carrying bowls of food and pitchers of fruit juice.

  One of the girls gave Megan a bashful smile. “This recipe comes from India,” she said, and set a bowl in front of Megan. Inside was a thick red paste. Megan picked up a piece of bread and scooped some up, then popped it into her mouth without a second thought.

  Her mouth was on fire. She grabbed the carved wooden cup in front of her and drank down every drop of the pomegranate juice. It helped, but not much. Her eyes watered, and tears streamed down her face.

  Flapping her hands over her mouth in an effort to cool her tongue, Megan looked to Rachel for help.

  “Eat the bread, that will take the burn out,” Rachel said, practically rolling on the floor in laughter.

  Megan stuffed a piece of plain bread into her mouth. Immediately the burning receded. She gulped down another cup of juice and it was almost gone.

  “What was that?”

  Rachel giggled. “I think it has curry in it. Most Indian food does.” She took a smaller helping of the paste and ate it. “Yep, curry in a bean paste. It’s rather good if you don’t eat a whole bowl in one bite.”

  Megan stuck her tongue, now feeling back to normal, out at Rachel. “Thanks for the tip.”

  “Don’t mention it. My dad loves Indian food—he actually took a class so he could cook it himself. We have it at least once a week.”

  Diedrich came in. He was also dressed in new clothes, and his hair was still wet from his bath. He plopped down, cross-legged, onto the cushion next to Megan. He reached over and picked up a piece of bread and some dried fish. He put some of the curry paste on the bread, put the fish in the paste, wrapped the bread around it like a sandwich and took a big bite.

  “Don’t!” Megan said. “That stuff is hot.”

  Diedrich looked at her, his face composed. He chewed and swallowed. “This? I’ve had hotter. I’m used to spicy Middle Eastern food.”

  Megan felt suddenly small, like she had missed out on something. She wished she had visited more Indian restaurants in New York—apparently it was all the rage with Europeans. She made a mental note to ask Maggie if she knew how to make any.

  Diedrich picked up a small bowl with some yellow-tinted grain. “Here, try this, it’s saffron and rice. You’ll like it.”

  Megan took a small taste. It was delicious, rich and mellow. “Mmm.”

  “Where did they take you?” Claire said.

  “To a bath, the same as you. It was the one for men. They gave me—I mean us—a suite down the hall to sleep. I’ll show you when we’re done eating.”

  Rachel glanced sidelong at the servants, who stood in a line along the one solid wall, their eyes straight ahead. She leaned in close to her friends. “What are we going to do about the you-know-what?” she whispered. “We need to find it, fast.”

  Megan swallowed. “We’ll have to wait until night, I guess. Get into that throne room when no one is looking. The pillar we’re looking for is in there, right?”

  “That’s what the legend says,” Diedrich said.

  “Do you think we have time?” Claire said. “Before Mr. Hemmlich gets here, I mean.”

  “My father won’t be a problem,” Diedrich said. “When you girls left I told the king there is someone who might come and try to gain entrance. That he may claim to be my father or some other representative of the Pharaoh. I told the king not to believe him, that he was a fraud, and not to let him in.”

  “Good thinking,” Rachel said dryly. “I’m almost impressed.”

  Megan sighed. I thought we were past this. Come on, Rache, can’t you let this go already, please? She hated her best friend couldn’t get along with her…whatever he was. Something else to figure out later.

  “That might not be enough,” Diedrich said. “My father is a clever man. And he’s determined. If I know him, he’ll find a way in here. We have to be quick. And prepared.”

  Megan grabbed a handful of small black, crunchy things from another bowl. She munched on them. “Mmm, these are good. Wonder what they are?”

  Rachel looked in the bowl and laughed. “I think they’re roasted ants.”

  Chapter Thirteen: The God’s Box

  The suite that the king and queen supplied was luxurious to say the least. Everything was inlaid with ivory and gold, the furniture elegantly carved, the pillows covered with exquisite fabrics. Like much of the palace, everything was painted or made using deep, rich colors; ruby, sapphire, emerald.

  Diedrich dismissed the servants, who were never more than three steps behind Megan and her friends, and closed the double doors. Three other rooms led from the main room, but none had actual doors, just archways between.

  “I’m exhausted,” Rachel said.

  “We should try and get some rest.” Claire lay on one of the large cushions in the suite’s main room. “We might have a long night ahead.”

  “Yes, once we find the box, we’ll have to get out of here quickly.” Diedrich sat on a cushion next to Claire. “I’m afraid we’ll also have to steal some sort of transportation. Camels or horses.”

  “We don’t know where the next clue will lead,” Megan said. “Maybe we should figure out where we have to go next before we plan an escape. If we can find it quick enough we can be back in here before morning, and leave tomorrow.” She lay on her own soft cushion and closed her eyes. “Who’s going to wake us up when it’s time?”

  She got nothing but soft snores in answer.

  “Ow!”

  Someone had kicked something—a chair? Megan kept still, her eyes closed, and listened.

  “Be quiet, we don’t want to wake the whole house.”

  That was Claire. Megan opened one eye. Diedrich stood next to her, a torch in one hand.

  “Is it time already? I don’t want to get up.” She rolled away from him.

  “Get up, you great lazy thing,” Rachel said. “Quit your lollygagging.”

  Megan threw a small pillow at her. “All right, all right, I’m up. But when we get out of here, no one had better wake me up for two days, okay?”

  “Shh,” Claire said. The torchlight flickered across the lenses of her glasses—it gave her eyes a strange, bug-like look. “Keep it down.”

  Megan collected herself, and the four of them tiptoed out of the suite. The servants lay on the floor outside the door, in case any of their charges needed anything during the night. One of the women let out a grunt and rolled over. Her arm brushed Megan’s ankle—she froze. Come on, come on, go back to sleep.

  The woman’s hand slid over Megan’
s foot and to the floor. Megan let out a small sigh and continued on.

  Diedrich held the torch high and led them to the throne room. In the dark, the room looked like a cave. A single ray of moonlight shone in through an open skylight in the ceiling and formed a circle of light on the floor. The smallest sounds echoed, and Megan wondered how long it would be before someone heard them. What would happen if they were caught? She crossed her fingers that the pillar and the box would be easy to find.

  “We won’t have much time,” Megan said. “Let’s spread out and look at the pillars.”

  “How will we know when we’ve found it?” Rachel said.

  “The legend doesn’t say,” Diedrich whispered. “But there are only ten pillars here. Maybe there will be an identifying mark, or maybe it’s painted with a different pattern than the others. It’s a special pillar, after all.”

  “I can hardly see anything,” Claire said. “Is there another torch?”

  Diedrich pulled one of the unlit torches from a bracket on the wall, and used the flame from the one in his hand to light the new one, then handed it to Claire.

  “You two go look on that side.” He clasped Megan’s hand and pulled her toward the pillar closest to them.

  The pillars were large and round, painted with beautiful designs of birds and animals. Megan wrapped her arms around one—they didn’t even reach halfway. There were five on each side of the room, lined up one behind the other. The first two that Megan and Diedrich looked at were exactly the same. Diedrich rapped on them with his knuckles, but nothing happened.

  “Anything yet?” Claire’s whisper floated across the room.

  “No,” Megan whispered back. She circled the third pillar, squinting in the flickering light from the torch. It was the same as the other two.

  Or is it…?

  “Diedrich, bring that light closer.”

  He came around and stood next to her. “What did you find?”

  “Look here.” She ran her hands over three small squares carved into the wood. Inside each square was a relief of a different animal-like creature. “These weren’t on the other pillars.”

  “Wait here a second.” Diedrich ran to the other end of the room and checked the remaining two pillars. He came back to Megan.

  “Nope, not on either one. This must be it.”

  “Rachel, Claire, over here.”

  The girls padded across the room and stood beside Megan. “What do we do now?” Rachel said.

  “We have to get the box out of the pillar,” Megan said. “I guess the pillar opens up?” She tried to grip one of the squares around the edges with her fingers. “Maybe one of these squares pulls out or something.” She couldn’t get a good hold. “Guess not. What do you think those animals mean?”

  Claire tilted her head. “They look like hieroglyphs.” She touched the first one, a snake. “What do they symbolize?”

  “Set,” Diedrich said. “In the New Kingdom, he became the God of Evil, the treacherous snake who betrayed his brother.”

  “Why is the snake always the bad guy?” Rachel said to no one in particular.

  Diedrich pointed to the second. “A jackal. This one must be Anubis. Remember, Megan, I told you about him. Set’s son, and the God of Mummification. He taught the process of embalming to the Egyptians and led Osiris into the underworld.”

  Megan nodded. “And this one?” The last looked like some kind of bird. It was purple and had a pair of curved horns on its head. “The God of Birds?”

  “No, that is the Benu. An Egyptian phoenix of sorts. It’s usually symbolic of Ra, the Sun God. If it had a disc on its head I’d say it was Ra. But…”

  “But what?”

  “I remember my father telling me…the Benu is also associated with Osiris, because of the eternal renewal thing. God of the Underworld and all that. When it’s painted with the headdress like this—” he touched the horns, “—it’s Osiris. The Benu flies to the Heliopolis, the city of the sun, and burns every evening. In the morning it is reborn from the ashes.”

  “So we have Set, Anubis and Osiris,” Claire said, touching the squares in order.

  Diedrich shook his head. “Egyptian, like Hebrew and Japanese, is read right to left. So it’s Osiris, Anubis and Set.”

  “Okay, great, how do we get inside the pillar?” Rachel asked. “I don’t see a hole or a knob. Or even a sign that says ‘open me here’.”

  The little squares reminded Megan of buttons. “Don’t laugh at me for doing this, all right?” She pushed the square with the bird. It sank into the wood, but nothing else happened. Megan tilted her head. “Um, where’s the box?”

  “Maybe you have to push them all.” Claire pushed the snake and the jackal. There was a click, and all three buttons popped up again and reset themselves.

  Diedrich rubbed his chin. “Pushing them all might be right, but the order is wrong.” He reached out and pushed the snake, then the bird, then the jackal. A panel in the pillar, a little shorter than Megan, slid open.

  “How did you figure that out?” Megan said.

  Diedrich shrugged. “I followed the story of Osiris. Set killed Osiris and put him in the box. Then Anubis took him to the underworld. Just made sense.”

  “Bring the torch a little closer, would you?” Rachel said. “I can’t see a thing.” She ducked down and stepped into the black space.

  “What do you see?” Megan said. “I would think a coffin would be a pretty big thing. Like, you-can’t-miss-it kind of big.”

  “I don’t think it would fit in there lying down,” Claire said. “Is it standing on end, Rachel?”

  “Uh, guys, you’d better come here.”

  Megan stepped through the opening, and promptly bumped into Rachel.

  “Oops, sorry.”

  Diedrich and Claire were framed in the entrance, their faces lit by the torches.

  “Hmm,” Diedrich said. “The coffin should be right here, according to the story.”

  “Yeah, but myths are always subject to interpretation,” Megan said. “This is really Sir Gregory’s story, isn’t it? And inside the pillar doesn’t necessarily mean at the bottom. Claire, hand me that torch, would you?”

  She held the light above her head, lighting up the smooth, circular interior of the pillar. A tightly wound spiral staircase traced its way upward, connected to the pillar’s wall.

  “Where does it go?” Rachel said.

  “Duh, it goes up,” Megan said. “I can’t see much more than that. So, I guess we go up.”

  Pictures were painted on the curved walls, spiraling up alongside the stairs. “What do these mean?”

  “It’s hard to say, but it looks like the story of Osiris. Here’s where he gets into the box, and Set traps him.” Diedrich climbed a few more steps. “And this looks like Isis searching for him, and finding the pillar.”

  Diedrich continued to follow the paintings. “See here. Set was so angry that Isis had found Osiris, he ripped Osiris’ body into thirteen pieces and scattered them throughout Egypt.”

  “How is it you know this story so well?” Rachel said. “You don’t seem like you’re interested in your father’s work.”

  Diedrich chuckled. “As I explained to Megan and Claire, I love mythology. And while you were listening to stories of Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty, I was being told the story of Isis and Osiris and the journey to the Land of the Dead.”

  The stairs ended in front of a plain black door with a brass ring in the center. Diedrich stopped and moved to the right. Megan stopped in front of the door, and was shoved forward. Her head banged against the wood.

  “Hey, cut it out.”

  “Sorry, my fault,” Claire said from below. “Why did you stop?”

  “There’s a door here.”

  “What are you waiting for? Open it,” Rachel said.

  Megan inspected the door. It didn’t make sense for the door to open outward. When it swung open it would knock her down the stairs. So why the pull ring? She put her hands on
the door and pushed. It didn’t budge.

  She shrugged. Okay, pull it is.

  “Rachel, Claire? Take a step back, please,” Megan said. “Diedrich, catch me if I fall, okay?”

  Diedrich nodded.

  She gripped the ring with both hands and pulled. Nothing. She pulled as hard as she could, even put a foot on the door for leverage, but the door didn’t move.

  What the heck? Maybe the ring isn’t for opening the door? It does kind of look like a knocker. Megan lifted the ring and banged it against the wood three times. The door swung inward.

  “I’m going in,” Megan called over her shoulder.

  “Be careful,” Claire called back.

  Megan stepped into a long, dark, narrow room with a high ceiling. Unlike the palace downstairs, this place was plain, undecorated. The walls were bare except for spider webs that stuck to them and hung from the ceiling in thick sheets, like drapes.

  If these are the webs, I don’t want to see the spiders. Something crunched under her feet. She lowered the torch and saw an array of dead scarabs, scorpions and other creepy-crawly things. Their sharp edges poked her feet through the thin slippers.

  “Ick.”

  “What was that?” Rachel said.

  “Nothing…” …you want to know about…

  On the floor at the far end of the room was a long rectangular box.

  Looks like a coffin to me. This must be it. Megan pushed through the webs, some of them going up in brief, bright flame as the torch touched them, and stood in front of it.

  “Don’t touch it,” Rachel said from right behind her.

  Megan jumped. “Don’t sneak up on me like that!”

  Rachel, Claire and Diedrich stood a few feet behind her.

  “Sorry,” Rachel said. “But you shouldn’t touch it, it could be booby-trapped.”

  “I don’t doubt it.” Megan wiped the dust from the lid. Gold, silver and ebony designs were inlaid into the smooth, polished dark wood. It glittered in the flickering torchlight.