by Alex Archer
Only a few Roman cargo ships kept plying the waters after that time. No one was certain why the change had occurred. Some historians conjectured that the cost of sending warships to protect the trade vessels had become prohibitive. But some of Rome’s inner power struggles had been going on at the time. And there had been unrest along the Black Sea, where several ports had come under attack.
Annja kicked her legs and pulled out her flashlight. When she turned it on, the beam almost disappeared in the murk, but it worked fine inside the ship.
A diver—Paresh, she realized—tried to swim past her into the ship’s hold. Annja dropped the flashlight and the shark stick as she grabbed his right leg in one hand and the edge of the hold in the other. She prevented him from entering the broken ship.
Angrily, Paresh turned on her and brushed at her hand.
Annja caught his hand instead, then grabbed his thumb and the edge of his palm in her hands. She twisted the hand into a come-along grip that caused an explosive bleat of pain that she couldn’t hear but could see. Paresh spit out his regulator, and a huge air bubble sped toward the surface.
Giving in to the hold, Paresh rolled backward. He kicked at Annja but she deflected the effort easily because the water slowed him down. She released her hold and let him swim away.
The other divers watched.
As Paresh hastily shoved his regulator back into his mouth, Annja slammed her right fist into her left palm and shook her head.
Paresh touched his chest with his hands and exploded them outward with the palms facing him, signing, Why?
Annja took her marker board from her waist and wrote quickly. “Not safe.”
Paresh shook his head.
She flipped the board over and wrote on the other side. “Search perimeter first.” One of the other divers swam over to Paresh and pulled at his shoulder. With obvious reluctance, Paresh swam off with the other diver.
Annja swam to the sea floor and reclaimed her flashlight and shark stick. She pointed the beam into the ship’s hold but didn’t try to enter. Sea silt, sailcloth and other debris surrounded chests, chains covered with concretion and amphorae.
Annja suspected the ship had been filled with cargo, but it had been spilled across the ocean bed. Most of it was probably lost. There was no real reason to expect that it would be in the vicinity of the ship. The preservation of the ship’s corpse was a fluke. If it hadn’t been buried in the sea floor, not much of it would have been left.
Her curiosity at least somewhat satiated, Annja turned her attention back to the job at hand. She had a site to work.
FATIGUED, Annja knew they would have to give up soon. Diving was hard on the body.
Barely moving, she hung over the sea floor. They’d gridded the area in foot-wide squares and numbered them accordingly. That in itself had taken a lot of time.
She moved the mouth of the water eductor over the sea floor. She didn’t get it close enough to suction the sand from the bottom because that would have defeated the purpose. Instead, she dragged her palm over the sand and caused flurries to rise that were suctioned away. The work was slow and arduous, but it was thorough.
If they worked the site properly, it could take weeks.
I hope Garin’s got deep pockets, Annja thought, because she didn’t intend to quit.
They all took turns with the eductor. A moment later, Annja found another amphora. She quickly took pictures with her camera and made a note of the frame numbers and grid location to reference them later.
Amazingly the amphora was intact. There was no way to know what it contained. Annja swam over to the equipment net they’d brought with them and fished out a lifting bag. She tied the lifting bag around the amphora, then filled the bag with air from a spare tank.
The lifting bag struggled to be free, then finally floated up toward the surface. As Annja watched, the bag got bigger. The air inside the lifting bag expanded, and for a moment Annja wondered if she’d overfilled it and it was going to burst.
But the bag made it all the way to the top.
Tired, Annja turned her attention back to the eductor.
Just one more grid, she told herself.
In the next grid she found an oilskin pouch that felt curiously light. As she calmly dusted the sand away from the pouch, she saw the end had been curled under and the whole package had been tightly tied. She took pictures and made notes. Then she plucked the pouch from the sand, tied a lifting bag to it and sent it on its way.
After she picked up her shark stick, she slapped her flashlight against it to make noise. The heads of the other divers swung toward her.
Annja pointed up, then finned up. The others, including Paresh, followed.
By the time Annja reached the surface, all the lifting bags had been gathered by the men Shafiq had assigned to the task. They paddled around in the lifeboats and used fish gaffs to bring them in.
Seeing the items in the lifeboats made Annja feel good about what she’d been doing. This was honest work, the kind of work that she’d been born to do. Nothing like the pop culture pieces she’d been doing for Chasing History’s Monsters.
Still, she knew if she wasn’t doing the show anymore that she’d miss it.
Admit it, she told herself as she tossed her equipment bag and shark stick into the nearest boat, you’re no longer purely an archaeologist. You like the attention generated by the show.
She hauled herself out of the water and felt immediately chilled. It was dark enough that the boat crews had to use flashlights to find the lifting bags bobbing on the surface. The ones that were too heavy to take out of the water by manpower, like some of the amphorae, were floated into a net waiting at the Casablanca Moon’s port side to be winched up later.
The sailor in her lifeboat pulled up the lifting bag containing the oilskin pouch. Once the bag cleared the water, it deflated immediately.
“Can I have that?” Annja asked as she flicked her flashlight onto the pouch.
The sailor passed it over.
Paresh clung to the other side of the lifeboat and gazed at Annja with hot, dark eyes. His anger stained his features.
Annja chose to ignore him and turned her attention to the bag. She had trouble untying the knots but got them at about the time the last of the lifting bags had been dealt with.
When she opened the pouch, she found a slim book inside. Intrigued, and surprised to find that it was still dry, she pulled out the book.
It was covered in some kind of leather. That marked it instantly as something the Indian cultures would never have made.
When she flipped the book open, she found the script was handwritten, not printed by machine. She couldn’t read the language. She wasn’t a linguist and she didn’t expect to be able to read everything.
What surprised her, though, was the full-color picture on the first page. It was of a beautiful woman. From the top of her head, to her bountiful breasts, to her trim waist, she was human. But from that point on she had the body of a snake covered in iridescent blue, green, burgundy and gray scales.
27
Back aboard the Casablanca Moon, Annja worked under the canopy while the cool night air blew around her. She’d changed into jeans, and a long-sleeved blouse.
The book she’d found consumed her interest. She hardly noticed when one of Shafiq’s men pressed a bowl of soup into her hands. Hunger prompted her to lift the spoon and eat. But she was careful to keep the food away from the book.
Page after page of the author’s brushstrokes met her gaze. The writing was unrelenting in its clarity while still maintaining its secrets.
There were several illustrations, but those tended to be just as mystifying.
Annja finished the soup and pushed the bowl away. She didn’t know when it disappeared, but she eventually noticed it was gone.
Finally, her back and shoulders no longer able to take the continued strain, Annja straightened up. She was surprised to see that most of the crew was belowdecks. A glance at her watch
showed her it was after 1:00 a.m. She’d been working for over five hours straight.
“You should get some sleep.”
When she turned to track the voice, Annja found Shafiq sitting in a canvas chair with his feet up on the railing.
“It’s going to be an early morning tomorrow,” Shafiq went on.
“I know. But when I get wired like this, it’s hard to sleep. I usually pass out.”
Shafiq grinned a little. “You’re a beautiful woman, Annja Creed. You should take care not to get old before your time.”
Annja didn’t know how to take that. Was it merely a compliment, or was something more intended? For the moment she chose to ignore it. At another time, she might have pursued it.
“I thought maybe if you went to sleep, she would, too.” Shafiq pointed a forefinger behind Annja.
When she turned, Annja saw that Lochata was still working on the artifacts that had captured her interest. The gold disks spread out on a velvet square in front of the woman told Annja the professor had dedicated her time to the coins that had been recovered.
Lochata had pronounced them Roman based on the numismatic studies she’d done. With all the research done into the Indo-Roman trade history, coins were a good indicator of the time frames.
As if sensing the attention being paid to her, Lochata straightened and turned toward them.
“Were you speaking to me?” she asked.
“Not to you,” Shafiq assured her. “About you.”
“That can’t be good.” Lochata picked up an insulated cup of hot tea and walked over to join them. She looked at Annja. “We should get to bed.”
“That’s what he was suggesting,” Annja said.
Shafiq shrugged disarmingly.
“It looks like everyone else has already headed that way.” Lochata sipped her tea. “Have you had any luck with that book?”
After a brief, rueful glance at the book, Annja sighed. “I think it’s a history, but I can’t read it. Apparently the person who authored the book lived on an island,” Annja said.
“There are plenty of those in these waters,” Shafiq said. “The Andaman Islands in the Bay of Bengal consist of nearly six hundred islands. Not many of them are habitable, of course. Then there are the Lakshadweep and Nicobar Islands in the Arabian Sea and the eastern Indian Ocean respectively. It wouldn’t be that unusual.”
“Whoever it was, they were obsessed with the nagas,” Annja said. She shook her empty water bottle, then tossed it into the nearby trash can. “Did you have any luck with the coins?”
“I did,” the professor said, nodding. “Based on what I remember, and on the references I had regarding Roman coins found in this area—land and sea—I think the coins were primarily from the fourth and fifth centuries.”
“A hundred-year span?” Shafiq asked. “Isn’t that unusual?”
“No. Hard currency in those times tended to stay in circulation. It wasn’t like the paper money that gets recycled these days. Money didn’t go in and out of political favor, although new rulers were vain enough to want coins struck with their images and symbols of their power.” Lochata nodded toward the end of the table where she’d been working. “Those coins are well worn. Traders’ coins that had seen a lot of ports.”
“Now that you’ve found the ship, I’m starting to worry. News about this will get back to Kanyakumari and other cities,” Shafiq said.
“The coast guard and the Indian navy are within hailing distance,” Lochata said.
“If we get the chance to call them,” Shafiq said. “I’m just pointing out that it’s something to keep in mind. You’ve found your shipwreck. Maybe now would be the time to sit back and call in reinforcements.”
Annja swapped looks with Lochata. Calling in other people was an option. She didn’t want to, though. This was her find—our find, she corrected herself—and she didn’t want to share it with anyone.
“No,” Lochata said. “At this point, that’s unacceptable. We want to explore more of this site before we turn it over to someone else.”
“You don’t have to turn it over,” Shafiq said.
“Yes,” Lochata said, “we would. Once you go to someone bigger, you have no choice but to hand it off.”
“All right,” Shafiq said. “But we’ll keep a weather eye peeled all the same.”
“WAKE.”
Goraksh barely registered the voice before someone slapped his chest. He blinked his eyes open and glanced at his window. It was still dark outside.
Then the room’s bright light flared and hit his eyes with physical force. He groaned, cursed and covered his face with a hand.
“Get up,” his father commanded. “We have no time to lose.”
Certain his father wouldn’t leave him alone until he did as he was ordered, Goraksh sat up on the edge of his bed. He hadn’t slept well. Nightmares of the International Maritime Bureau agent pursuing him had all but left him exhausted. The woman’s death, her head shattered by his father’s pistol, had moved in there, as well.
After a moment, Goraksh peered over his hand. His father was hurriedly packing a suitcase with his clothing. The fear that had lain with Goraksh in his bed returned full measure.
“What’s happened?” Goraksh asked.
“A most wondrous thing,” his father replied. The first honest smile Goraksh had seen on Rajiv’s face in years filled it then. “It appears that Annja Creed’s archaeological expedition has borne fruit.”
“I don’t understand.”
Finished packing the suitcase, Rajiv stood and crossed the room. He clapped his son on the shoulders. “She’s found a most unusual book.”
Goraksh sat quietly and hoped that everything happening was just part of another nightmare.
“Where are we going?” Goraksh asked. “Has the IMB agent—”
“He’s done nothing,” Rajiv said. He reached into his pocket and took out a folded printout. “This is about the book.”
“What book?” Goraksh felt his father was going too fast.
“The one the woman archaeologist found on the ship. After she had found the naga figurines, I’d hoped she would find the ship.”
“What ship?” Goraksh felt as if he’d stepped into a play after an intermission.
“The Roman trade ship Sahadeva was sold into captivity aboard.”
Like some vague, barely remembered dream, the old tales his father had told him came crashing back into Goraksh’s mind. When he’d been a boy, he’d grown up with thoughts of Kumari Kandam dancing in his head. He’d talked about the place where the nagas ruled supreme and took care of their people until the jealous water gods pulled the island kingdom below the waves.
Rajiv held forth the printout. It was a bad picture and barely showed the book. But Annja Creed looked stunning as she pored over it.
“I don’t understand,” Goraksh said hesitantly. He hoped he didn’t incur his father’s wrath with his ignorance.
Rajiv’s face darkened. “Ever since you were a boy, I told you that the blood of kings flows in your veins. I told you that somewhere you had a heritage that you could claim. Now the time has come for you to claim it.”
The half-remembered stories bounced around inside Goraksh’s skull like popcorn. The wildly improbable stories of a group of the Kumari Kandam people making their way to the coastline of India were just tales his father had told during occasional moments of tenderness.
Those people had tried to find homes among the cities already in existence only to be rejected from place after place. Eventually they found a land of their own somewhere up the Vaigai River and had quietly dropped out of sight of the world.
When Goraksh was a child, the stories had been amazing and wondrous. They’d made him feel special. Even around his father. But in the end, he’d discovered nothing about him was truly special—except for his ability in college. He’d felt certain that would take him anywhere he wanted to go.
But that’s over now, he reminded himself.
&nbs
p; “Get up,” his father commanded. “Get dressed. We have no time to waste. We have a future to secure.”
“All right,” Goraksh said, but he felt foolish all the same.
Still, he’d never seen his father so animated. That was even more unreal than the stories of Kumari Kandam.
28
With his duffel bag over his shoulder, Fleet paused at the slip beside the coast guard cutter. An armed guard in uniform pinned him with a deck-mounted spotlight.
The man addressed him in Hindi.
With a hand held up to block the intense barrage of light, Fleet said, “I’m James Fleet. Captain Mahendra is expecting me.”
“Aye, sir,” the guard responded. “Let me get the officer of the watch.”
A few minutes later, the officer of the watch appeared at the railing. He was young and rangy, with dark eyes and an easy smile.
“Special Agent Fleet,” the officer called down.
“Aye,” Fleet replied.
“I’m Lieutenant Rohan.”
“Permission to come aboard, sir.”
“Permission granted.” Rohan gestured at his men. A gangplank was rolled down from the ship.
Fleet shifted his burden across his shoulders. Although the prosthetic foot he wore had stood up under every physical challenge he’d put it through, he still had a tendency to favor it from time to time. It was a challenge climbing the incline. Across level ground it was amazing.
“Special Agent Fleet,” Rohan greeted with a crisp salute. “It’s a pleasure to have you aboard.”
Automatically, Fleet responded with his own salute. “Thank you, Lieutenant. It’s a pleasure to be aboard.”
“Captain Mahendra expected you earlier.”
“I was watching our subject,” Fleet replied. He’d been with Ranga observing Rajiv’s final preparations to set sail on his own ship. Fleet had remained there until he’d been sure it wasn’t a feint.