From the front of the truck, the engine coughed a final time and died with a sighing gasp of smoke. Black clouds billowed over the truck, issuing from under the hood. A reek of burned oil accompanied it. The flatbed coasted to the side of the road, bumped into the sandy shoulder, and braked to a stop.
“End of the line,” Omaha said.
The Arabian stallion stamped a hoof in protest.
You and me both, Omaha thought. He stood along with the others, dusted off his cloak, and crossed to the drop gate. He yanked the release. The gate fell away and crashed with a clatter into the sand.
They all clambered down as Captain al-Haffi and his two men, Barak and Sharif, vacated the cab. Smoke still billowed, smudging into the sky.
“Where are we?” Kara asked, shielding her eyes and staring down the winding road. To either side, sugarcane fields climbed in swaths of dense fronds, obscuring distances. “How far are we from Salalah?”
“No more than a couple of miles,” Omaha said, punctuating with a shrug. He was unsure. It could be twice that.
Captain al-Haffi approached the group. “We should go now.” He waved an arm toward the smoke. “People will come to see.”
Omaha nodded. It wouldn’t be good to be found loitering around a stolen truck. Or even a borrowed one.
“We’ll have to walk the rest of the way,” Painter said. He was the last out of the flatbed. He had the stallion in tow on a rope lead. He led the skittish horse down the dropped gate. It shook and danced a bit once on solid ground.
As Painter consoled it, Omaha noted the man’s left eye had begun to purple but appeared less swollen. He glanced away, balanced between shame for his earlier outburst and the residual anger he still felt.
With no gear, they were soon under way, trekking along the road’s shoulder. They moved like a small caravan, in twos. Captain al-Haffi led them. Painter and Coral trailed last with the horse.
Omaha heard the pair speaking in whispers, strategizing. He slowed to drop beside them. He refused to be left out of the discussion. Kara noted this, too, and joined them.
“What’s the plan once we get into Salalah?” Omaha asked.
Painter frowned. “We keep low. Coral and I will go to-”
“Wait.” Omaha cut him off. “You’re not leaving me behind. I’m not going to hide away in some hotel while you two go traipsing about.”
His angry outburst was heard by all.
“We can’t all go to the tomb,” Painter said. “We’ll be spotted. Coral and I are trained in surveillance and intelligence gathering. We’ll need to reconnoiter the area, search for Safia, stake it out if she’s not arrived there yet.”
“And what if she’s already been there and gone?” Omaha asked.
“We can find that out. Ask some discreet questions.”
Kara spoke up. “If she’s gone, we won’t know where they’ve taken her.”
Painter stared. Omaha noted the worry shadowing the man’s eyes, as dark as the bruise under the left one.
“You think we’re already too late,” Omaha said.
“We can’t know for certain.”
Omaha stared off into the distance. A few buildings could be seen near the horizon. The city’s edge. Too far. Too late.
“Someone has to go on ahead,” Omaha said.
“How?” Kara asked.
Not turning around, Omaha pointed a thumb back over his shoulder. “The horse. One of us…maybe two…could ride the horse into town. Go straight to the tomb. Check it out. Keep hidden. Watch for Safia. Trail her if she leaves.”
Silence answered him.
Coral met his eyes. “Painter and I were just discussing that.”
“I should go,” Painter said.
Omaha stopped, turning to face the man fully. “And why the hell’s that? I know the city. I know its back alleys.”
Painter stared him down. “You haven’t the experience in surveillance. This is no time for amateurs. You’ll be spotted. Give away our advantage.”
“Like hell I will. I may not’ve had any formal training, but I’ve had years of fieldwork in places where it’s best not to be seen. I can blend in if I have to.”
Painter spoke bluntly, no bravado. “But I’m better. This is what I do.”
Omaha clenched a fist. He heard the certainty in the other’s voice. A part of him wanted to pound it out of the man, but another part believed him. He didn’t have Painter’s experience. What was the best choice? How could he walk when he wanted to run to Safia? A cord of pain wrapped around his heart.
“And what will you do if you find her?”
“Nothing.” Painter continued, “I will study their manpower. Find a weakness. Wait for the proper moment.”
Kara spoke up, hands on her hips. “And what about us?”
Coral answered her as Omaha and Painter continued their standoff. “We have a safe house prearranged as backup in Salalah. Cash and supplies.”
Of course they would, Omaha thought.
“Guns?” Kara asked.
Coral nodded. “We’ll go there first. Load up. I’ll make contact with Washington. Debrief them on our status. Arrange for additional-”
“No,” Painter interrupted. “No communication. I’ll contact you all as soon as I can. We’ll move forward from there on our own. No outside help.”
Omaha read the silent discourse that passed between Painter and his partner. It seemed it was not only the Omani government that Painter suspected of leaks, but also their own government. This woman, Cassandra Sanchez, had been one step ahead of them all along. She must be getting inside information.
Painter’s eyes settled back to Omaha. “Are we straight with this plan?”
Omaha slowly nodded, though it was like iron bars had been rammed down the back of his neck. Painter began to turn away, but Omaha stopped him, moving in closer. Omaha pulled free the pistol from inside his cloak and passed Painter the gun. “If you have a chance…any chance…”
“I’ll take it,” he said, accepting the weapon.
Omaha stepped back, and Painter mounted the stallion. He rode bareback, using a makeshift rein of towline. “I’ll see you all in Salalah,” he mumbled, and kicked the horse into a trot, then a full gallop, crouched low.
“I hope he’s as good a spy as he is a rider,” Kara said.
Omaha watched painter vanish around a bend in the road. Then the group set off again, moving slowly, too slowly, toward the waiting city.
3:42 P.M.
SAFIA LEANEDover the topographical map of the Dhofar region. It lay spread over the hood of their truck. She had a digital compass resting in the center, along with a straight-edged plastic ruler. She made a subtle alteration in the ruler’s position on the map, aligning it exactly along the same axis as the tomb of Nabi Imran. Before leaving the vault, she had spent several minutes using the laser-calibrated compass to get the precise measurement.
“What are you doing?” Cassandra asked at her shoulder for the fifth time.
Still ignoring her, Safia bent closer, nose almost to the paper. This is the best I could do without computers. She held out a hand. “Pen.”
Kane reached into an inside jacket pocket and passed her a ballpoint. Glancing up, she caught a brief glimpse of a gun holstered at his shoulder. She took the pen cautiously from his fingers. She refused to meet his eyes. More than Cassandra, the man made her edgy, shook her resolve.
Safia concentrated on the map, focusing her full attention on the mystery. The next clue to the secret heart of Ubar.
She drew a line along the edge of the ruler, then pulled it away. A blue line arrowed straight out from Nabi Imran’s tomb and shot across the countryside. She followed the line with her finger, noting the terrain it crossed, searching for a specific name.
She had a good idea what she would find.
As her finger followed beyond the city of Salalah, the lines of the topographic map began to multiply as the landscape rippled up into foothills, then mountains. She followed th
e line of blue ink until it crossed a small black dot atop a steep-sided mount. Her finger came to rest and tapped the spot.
Cassandra leaned closer and read the name printed beneath her finger. “Jebal Eitteen.” She glanced to Safia.
“ Mount Eitteen,” Safia said, and studied the small black dot that marked the small mountain. “Atop here lies another tomb. And like the one here, this spot is also revered across all faiths-Christianity, Judaism, and Islam.”
“Whose tomb is it?”
“Another prophet. Ayoub. Or in English: Job.”
Cassandra simply frowned at her.
Safia elaborated. “Job appears in both the Bible and the Koran. He was a man rich in wealth and family, who remained steadfast in his devotion to God. As a test, all was stripped from him: wealth, children, even his own health. So horrible were his afflictions that he was shunned and forced to live in isolation here.” She tapped the map. “On Mount Eitteen. Still, despite the hardships, Job continued in his faith and devotion. For his loyalty, God told Job to ‘strike the ground with your foot.’ A spring was called forth from which Job drank and bathed. His afflictions were cured, and he became a young man again. He lived the rest of his life on Mount Eitteen and was eventually buried there.”
“And you think this tomb is the next spot on the road to Ubar?”
“If the first signpost was erected at this tomb, it only follows that the next would be in a similar location. Another gravesite of a holy personage revered by all the religions of the region.”
“Then that’s where we must go next.”
Cassandra reached to the map.
Safia slapped a hand atop the paper, stopping her. “There’s no way I can be certain what, if anything, we’ll find there. I’ve been to Job’s tomb before. I saw nothing significant related to Ubar. And we have no clue where to begin to search. Not even an iron heart.” She again pictured the way the heart had wobbled atop the marble altar, aligning itself like a compass. “It could take years to discover the next piece to the puzzle.”
“That is why you’re here,” Cassandra said, snatching up the map and waving for Kane to get the prisoner back into the SUV. “To solve this riddle.”
Safia shook her head. It seemed an impossible task. Or so Safia wanted Cassandra to believe. Despite her protests, she had a distinct idea of how to proceed, but she was unsure how to use this knowledge to her advantage.
She climbed into the back again with Cassandra and settled into her seat as the truck angled through the entry gate. Out in the street, the vendors were beginning to load up their wares as the afternoon waned. A lone stray dog, all ribs and leg bones, wandered listlessly among the strip of stands and carts. It lifted its nose as a horse passed slowly along behind the row of makeshift shops, led by a man draped from head to toe in a bedouin desert cloak.
The truck continued down the lane, aiming for another Mitsubishi parked at the end. The procession would continue into the foothills.
Safia stared at the GPS navigation system on the dashboard. Streets radiated outward. The countryside awaited.
And another tomb.
She hoped it wasn’t her own.
4:42 P.M.
MOUNT EITTEEN
D AMNED SCORPIONS…
Dr. Jacques Bertrand crushed the black-armored intruder under his heel before settling to the rug that cushioned his workspace. He had been gone only minutes to fetch more water from his Land Rover, and the scorpions had already invaded his shaded alcove in the cliff. In this harsh landscape of hardscrabble, bitterbrush, and stone, nothing went to waste. Not even a spot in the shade.
Jacques sprawled on his back in the niche, faceup. An inscription in Epigraphic South Arabian had been carved into the roof of the niche, an ancient burial crypt. The surrounding landscape was littered with them, all overshadowed by Job’s tomb atop the mount where he labored. The entire region had become a cemetery. This was the third crypt he had documented today. The last for this long, interminably hot day.
He already dreamed of his hotel suite at the Salalah Hilton, a dip in the pool, a glass of Chardonnay.
With this thought firming him to his task, he set to work. Running a camel-hair brush over the inscription, he cleaned it a final time. As an archaeologist specializing in ancient languages, Jacques was currently on a grant to road-map early Semitic scripts, tracing their lineage from past to present. Aramaic, Elymaic, Palmyrene, Nabataean, Samaritan, Hebrew. Gravesites were great sources of the written word, immortalizing prayers, praises, and epitaphs.
With a prickly shiver, Jacques lowered his brush. He suddenly had an intense feeling of being watched. It welled over him, some primeval sense of danger.
Raising up on an elbow, he stared down past his legs. The region was rife with bandits and thieves. But in the shadow of Job’s tomb, a most holy shrine, none would venture to commit a crime. It would be a death sentence. Knowing this, he had left his rifle back in the Rover.
He stared out into the brightness.
Nothing.
Still, he pulled his booted feet fully into the niche. If someone was out there, someone meaning him harm, perhaps he could remain hidden.
A tick-tick of a pebble rolling down a rocky slope sounded from the left. His ears strained. He felt trapped.
Then a shape moved across the entrance to the crypt.
It padded past, sauntering, lazy, but confident with power. Its red fur, speckled in shadow, blended with the red rock.
Jacques held his breath, trapped between terror and disbelief.
He had heard tales, been warned of their presence in the wilds of the Dhofar Mountains. Panthera pardus nimr. The Arabian leopard. Nearly extinct, but not extinct enough for his tastes.
The large cat moved past.
But it was not alone.
A second leopard strode into view, moving faster, younger, more agitated. Then a third. A male. Huge paws, splaying with each step, yellow claws.
A pack.
He held his breath, praying, near mindless, a caveman huddling against the dangers beyond his hole.
Then another figure strode into view.
Not a cat.
Bare legs, bare feet, moving with the same feline grace.
A woman.
From his vantage point, he could see nothing above her thighs.
She ignored him as surely as the leopards, moving swiftly past, heading higher up the mountain.
Jacques slipped from the crypt, like Lazarus rising from his grave. He could not stop himself. He poked his head out, on his hands and knees. The woman climbed the rock face, following some path known only to her. She was the color of warm mocha, sleek black hair to the waist, naked, unashamed.
She seemed to sense his gaze, though she did not turn around. He felt it in his head, the overwhelming feeling of being watched again. It bubbled through him. Fear prickled, but he could not look away.
She strode among the leopards, continuing upward, toward the tomb at the top. Her form seemed to shimmer, a heat mirage across sunbaked sand.
A scratching sound drew his glance to his hands and knees.
A pair of scorpions scuttled over his fingers. They were not poisonous but dealt a wicked sting. He gasped as more and more boiled out of cracks and crevices, scrabbling down walls, dropping from the roof. Hundreds. A nest. He scrambled from the crypt. He felt stings, sparks of fire on his back, ankles, neck, hands.
He fell out of the opening and rolled across the hard soil. More stings flashed like cigarette burns. He cried out, maddened with pain.
He clambered up, shaking his limbs, stripping his jacket, slapping a hand through his hair. He stamped his feet and stumbled back down the slope. Scorpions still scuttled about the crypt’s opening.
He glanced higher, suddenly fearful of drawing the leopards’ attention. But the cliff face was empty.
The woman, the cats, had vanished.
It was impossible. But the fire from the scorpion stings had burned all curiosity from him. He fell
back and away, retreating for his parked Rover. Still, his eyes quested, moving higher, to the top.
To where the tomb of Job waited.
He pulled open the door to his Rover and climbed into the driver’s seat. He had been warned away. He knew it with dread certainty.
Something horrible was going to happen up there.
4:45 P.M.
SALALAH
SAFIA’S STILLalive,” Painter said as soon as he strode through the door of the safe house It was not so much a house as a two-room flat above an import-export shop that bordered the Al-Haffa souk. With such a business fronting the safe house, none would question the comings and goings of strangers. Just a normal part of business. The noise of the neighboring market was a chatter of languages, voices, and bartering. The rooms smelled of curry and old mattresses.
Painter pushed past Coral, who had opened the door upon his knock. He had already noted the two Desert Phantoms posted discreetly out front, watching the approach up to the safe house.
The others were gathered in the front room, exhausted, road-worn. A run of water tinkled from the neighboring bathroom. Painter noted Kara was missing. Danny, Omaha, and Clay all had wet hair. They had been taking turns showering away the trail dust and grime. Captain al-Haffi had found a robe, but it was too tight for his shoulders.
Omaha stood as Painter entered. “Where is she?”
“Safia and the others were leaving the tomb just as I arrived. In a caravan of SUVs. Heavily armed.” Painter crossed to the tiny kitchenette. He leaned over the sink, turned the tap, and ran his head under the spigot.
Omaha stood behind him. “Then why aren’t you tracking them?”
Painter straightened, sweeping back his sodden hair. Trails of water coursed down his neck and back. “I am.” He kept his eyes hard upon Omaha, then stepped past him to Coral. “How are we equipped?”
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