The Arkana Mysteries Boxed Set

by N. S. Wikarski

  “About fifty miles as the crow flies,” Griffin replied.

  “Then we should be there in no time.” The pythia breathed a sigh of relief. The sun was getting very hot very fast.

  “He said as the crow flies, toots,” Erik corrected. “Not as the Land Rover drives.”

  On an American highway, the trip would have taken about an hour. But, as Cassie soon learned, this wasn’t anything like an American highway.

  When Bakri tried driving over a very soft dune, the rear tires sank, and the Land Rover got stuck in the sand. The Arkana team had to dig out the wheels and push the vehicle out of its trap.

  As the sun beat down on top of her head, Cassie wished she had worn a white turban like their driver’s. Wiping a trickle of sweat from her forehead, she said, “It must be a hundred degrees out here, and it isn’t even summer yet.”

  Griffin consulted his hand-held GPS device. “Ah good, we’re still on course.”

  The trio slogged up the sand hill and climbed into the now-freed vehicle.

  “Remind me never to visit Death Valley when we get home,” Cassie confided to Erik.

  They got stuck twice more over the course of the next hour.

  Cassie assumed they had to be nearing their destination until Griffin said, “Oh dear.”

  “That can’t be good,” Erik commented.

  “I’ve lost my signal.” Griffin tapped the GPS. “Ah, there it is. Hmmm.”

  “That ‘hmmm’ can’t be good either,” Cassie added.

  “Bakri, would you stop up ahead, so I can get a proper reading?”

  Their driver steered toward something Cassie hadn’t expected to see—a clump of forlorn palm trees in the middle of nowhere.

  “How can these things even live out here?” She stared at them in amazement as she climbed out of the back seat.

  Erik shrugged. “Underground stream, I suppose.”

  By tacit agreement, they all headed for the meager shade provided by the trees while Griffin checked his readout. He then walked several paces away to consult with Bakri who nodded and pointed off into the vacant expanse of dune to their left.

  “I sure hope he knows where he’s going,” Erik whispered to Cassie.

  “You mean Griffin?”

  “Either one of them.” His voice sounded worried. “They don’t look too sure of themselves.”

  The two men returned.

  Griffin smiled brightly at his teammates. “I believe we’ve sorted that out. It shouldn’t be much farther now.” Flopping down on the sand beside them, he suggested, “Why don’t we take a break for a few minutes?”

  “Fine by us,” Cassie agreed.

  Bakri murmured something about a mid-day rest. He then walked to the tree farthest from the Arkana team. Sinking down to lean his back against its trunk, he tipped his turban over his eyes and promptly dozed off.

  “I wish I could sleep like that,” Cassie observed wistfully.

  The scrivener passed around a canteen. “Our lengthy transit time through Egypt has given me an opportunity to read up on Nabta Playa. Fascinating place.”

  “Oh?” Cassie took the proffered canteen and drank before passing it to Erik.

  “Yes, it seems it was once a ceremonial center for the tribes that lived in this area. In recent years, archaeologists have unearthed numerous artifacts radiating out from the calendar circle, as well as stone carvings directly beneath it. This evidence suggests that the site was a major gathering place for thousands of years. Of course, that was millennia before desiccation set in. In fact, the calendar circle itself is situated near a natural basin in the desert. During the rainy season, it would fill with water.”

  “Rainy season!” Erik snorted in disbelief.

  “As incredible as it sounds, this region once had a rainy season. Grass, trees, wildlife, herds of cattle and a thriving human population.”

  Cassie scanned the arid wasteland surrounding them. “Hard to believe that now.”

  “Well nigh impossible,” Griffin agreed. “At any rate, the calendar stones at Nabta Playa were positioned to keep track of the equinoxes and solstices much like other megaliths around the world. Additionally, stones erected at the center of the circle were used to mark the position of stars in the constellation of Orion. That would explain why our lapis dove has a cluster of emeralds in the middle of the diamond circle. It’s meant to be a depiction of Orion. Astronomers have calculated that the position of the central stones at Nabta Playa would have corresponded to the sunrise position of Orion’s stars at the spring equinox during the seventh millennium BCE.”

  “So, they were doing all that three thousand years before the Babylonians supposedly invented astronomy,” Cassie observed archly.

  Griffin paused to regard her with amazement. “I had no idea you knew that.”

  “Maybe it’s time you stopped thinking of me as the slow kid in the back row,” the pythia cautioned. “I’m starting to catch up with you guys.”

  “Point taken,” the scrivener said. “And you’re quite right about the Babylonians. Overlords enjoy taking credit for inventions which they actually appropriated from the civilizations they conquered. In the case of the Babylonians, they borrowed astronomy, and I use the term ‘borrowed’ loosely, from the matristic Sumerians who preceded them.”

  “The Egyptians are glory hounds too,” Erik offered. “You can’t believe everything you read in the hieroglyphs.”

  “Also spot on,” Griffin agreed. “Much, if not all, of the astronomical lore which dynastic Egypt claimed as its own came from the region we’re exploring today—from the cattle culture of Nabta Playa. The people who inhabited pre-pharaonic Egypt possessed a highly sophisticated knowledge of the stars thousands of years before Kurgan and Semitic invaders took over their lands.”

  “And nobody knows about any of it.” Cassie sighed.

  “That’s because tourists pay to see pyramids, toots,” Erik countered. “They’ve bought into the overlord myth about the pharaohs bringing civilization to this part of the world. It would spin their heads to realize that nothing they’ve been taught is true.”

  Cassie stood up and dusted sand off her khakis. “Maybe we’d better get going,” she suggested. “We don’t want to be stuck out here after dark.”

  “Certainly not.” Griffin leaped to his feet, and Erik followed suit.

  After rousing Bakri from his siesta, they all sauntered back to the Land Rover.

  The remainder of the trip was as quick as Griffin had promised. After traveling for about fifteen minutes, the vehicle came to a halt. Cassie looked out the window but didn’t see anything worth noting.

  “Yes, this should be it,” Griffin confirmed.

  Bakri switched off the engine and got out to stretch. The others followed suit.

  Surveying the landscape, Cassie said, “This isn’t what I expected.”

  Chapter 29—Trash Talk

  The Arkana team regarded the Nabta Playa site in silent dismay. It was nothing but a jumbled scattering of rocks and sand. There was no sign or other marking to designate the calendar circle.

  Bakri took refuge on the shady side of the Land Rover. He sat down on the ground, resting his back against one of the rear tires presumably to continue his interrupted nap until the crazy tourists had finished looking at whatever they had come out here to see.

  The Arkana team circled the rubble despondently.

  “Not too impressive as megaliths go,” Erik commented.

  “Some of the articles I read about Nabta Playa mentioned vandalism in recent years, but I had no idea it would be this extensive.” Griffin studied the remnants of the circle. “With no protection around the perimeter that’s hardly a surprise.”

  The circle could easily have been mistaken for a natural rock formation. At least until a person noticed the equidistant placement of some of the taller stones.

  Cassie stepped into what she guessed would have originally been the cent
er of the circle. She smiled. “They were here. I’m sure of it.”

  “What, no vision?” Erik registered surprise.

  The pythia shrugged. “It’s more like a trace heat signature that you might pick up with infrared goggles.”

  Apparently satisfied with her explanation, the paladin asked, “So, what’s our next move?”

  “Look for lilies, I should think,” Griffin replied. “Though given the deplorable condition of this site, I’d be surprised if we find any. It appears as if someone made off with several of the taller stones.”

  “Did you bring those photos of the reconstructed site from the Nubian Museum?” Erik asked the scrivener.

  Snapping himself out of his temporary slump, Griffin perked up. “Yes, I see. We still might be able to extrapolate something from the pictures. They’re in the Land Rover. I’ll fetch them.”

  Erik walked up beside Cassie. “You getting anything else?”

  She narrowed her gaze, regarding the random mess that had once been a calendar circle. “Not much. Only that there’s something here for us. I’m sure of that.”

  Griffin scurried up to join them. “Here we are.” He passed out several images of the calendar circle. Some were simulations, some reconstructions from the museum exhibit and some taken by archaeologists when the actual site was still intact.

  “I was never good at puzzles when I was a kid,” Erik said ruefully. “I don’t think I’ve gotten any better over the years.”

  “Wait a minute, guys,” Cassie intervened. “Let’s see if we can find anything in the ground here that might be an original calendar marker. Maybe I can get a hit off of it.”

  They all scrutinized the photos intently, comparing the images to the rubble that remained.

  “That one,” Griffin said decisively, pointing to a rock jutting up out of the sand. “The shape is quite distinctive. It would have been one of the Orion stones in the center of the circle.”

  “OK, then,” Cassie said cheerfully. “We have a place to start.” She walked over to the megalith and sat down on the ground in front of it. The sand was very hot. She reached out to position both her palms flat against the standing stone. It burned her hands. Immediately a succession of images flickered through her brain causing her to blink rapidly while trying to process all the information. When the zoetrope show was over, she turned to her companions.

  “You didn’t get anything, did you,” Griffin said gloomily.

  “On the contrary, my dear Eeyore,” she replied.

  “Eeyore?” Griffin echoed.

  “You know. The sad sack donkey from Winnie the Pooh?”

  “Am I really that bad?” Griffin asked in an alarmed tone.

  “Ummm, yeah a little bit.” Cassie jumped to her feet. “But not to worry. I did get something. They were here.”

  “It sure didn’t seem like you had a vision,” Erik remarked skeptically.

  “That’s because it wasn’t so much a vision as snapshots flashing in front of me. I saw one of the Minoans chiseling a lily symbol on a rock. Not up to their usual standard, I have to say.”

  “In what way?” The paladin squinted at her uncomprehendingly.

  “I mean it was a hurried job. Not elaborate like their usual lily carvings. Just the bare outline of the flower. Maybe they didn’t like being stuck out here any longer than they had to be. Judging from where we’re standing...” She paused to look around and get her bearings. “It would have been over there.” Cassie pointed to a now empty spot about six feet away and to her right.

  “This is just as I feared.” Griffin shook his head in discouragement. “The lily rock is gone. We have no idea where to dig for the treasure.”

  “But they didn’t bury anything here,” Cassie added almost as an afterthought.

  “What!” Both men exclaimed in unison.

  “Nope. They just carved the symbols. On two rocks, not one. At opposite ends of the circle. Then they left.”

  “What the bloody hell were they playing at?” Griffin cried in irritation.

  “Calm down. It’s all good.” Cassie patted him reassuringly on the back. “I got the feeling that the lily marks were just meant to point us to the real hiding place. And by the way, you should be glad they didn’t bury anything here.”

  “I should?” the scrivener asked half-heartedly.

  “Yeah, she’s right.” Erik came to Cassie’s defense. “Remember you told us this place was dug up awhile back. Archaeologists were crawling all over this site. What if they’d found our artifact?”

  “Oh, I’d quite forgotten.” Griffin seemed slightly contrite. “Sorry for the outburst. I just don’t see where we’re to go from here. “

  “Then it’s a lucky thing my eyes can see a little farther than yours,” Cassie reminded him. “Let’s take a look at that snapshot of the dove relic.”

  Griffin flipped through the photos in his portfolio and drew out the picture of the lapis dove.

  The three of them bent over the picture and studied it.

  “There!” Cassie announced triumphantly. “Look at the two rubies. One’s bigger than the other, and they’re at opposite ends of the diamond circle. Maybe they’re meant to be a pointer. The bigger ruby would be the tip of the arrow and the smaller one would be its tail.”

  Griffin paused to ponder her theory. “Yes, that sounds plausible.” He brightened a bit. The old spark was back in his eyes when he glanced at her. “I believe you’re right. What we need to do is reconstruct the approximate location of those missing megaliths to see what the Minoans were pointing to.”

  “How are we supposed to do that?” Now it was Erik’s turn to sound hopeless. “Look at this mess.”

  “Don’t give way,” the scrivener counseled with surprising optimism. “We know the original circle was twelve feet wide. We have a few of the original Orion stones to tell us where the center of the circle was.”

  “We can also figure out the direction of the arrow from the position of the rubies on the dove’s back,” Cassie pointed out. “Remember the clue? The dove is flying east.”

  Griffin understood in a flash what she was suggesting. “Yes, brilliant!”

  “Huh?” Erik asked in bemusement.

  Cassie held the photo out in front of him. “See, if the dove is positioned with her beak to the right and we assume that’s east...”

  “Oh, I get it.” Erik completed the thought. “The way the rubies are placed along the circle, that means our arrow is pointing someplace southeast of here.”

  “Precisely.” Griffin was already busy checking a compass to determine which direction was southeast. Then he placed small stones at opposite ends of the imaginary circle to mark the southeast and northwest positions. After that, he hurried back to the central stone where Cassie and Erik were standing. “I doubt Bakri has a tape measure in our vehicle,” he said gazing off toward the Land Rover.

  Their driver, hearing his name, peeked around the wheel to regard them dubiously before ducking back into the shade.

  “That’s what I thought,” Griffin murmured. “Not to worry. I know the length of my stride.” Pacing off the distance from the center, he said, “The first lily mark would have been just here.” He nudged one of the small stones into place with the toe of his boot.

  “Stay there,” Erik instructed, moving to the opposite end of the circle. Visually calculating the distance from Griffin to the center, he moved the other stone into place where the tail of the arrow should have been.

  “Well done,” Griffin said approvingly, returning to the center again. He regarded their progress with satisfaction for a few seconds before his mood began to darken again. Turning helplessly toward his teammates, he asked, “Now what are we supposed to do with this new information?”

  Chapter 30—The Arrow of Their Ways

  Griffin stared listlessly at the horizon to the southeast of their position, trying to guess what the Minoans wanted them to see. “There is abs
olutely nothing out there but more sand.”

  Cassie shielded her eyes to follow his gaze, saying nothing.

  “What about the rest of the riddle?” Erik asked hopefully. “We haven’t even considered that yet.”

  His question brought Griffin up short. “You’re absolutely right,” he said with wonder in his voice. “How did I manage to forget about that?”

  “What did it say again?” Cassie prompted.

  “One dove flies to wake the helmsman,” Griffin repeated from memory.

  “Yeah, we got the bit about one dove and flying east,” Erik said. “But who’s the helmsman?”

  They all remained silent, contemplating the question. When nobody offered a reply, Cassie urged, “Tell us the next line. Maybe that will give us a hint.”

  “The course he sets reveals his fate,” Griffin recited.

  “Okay, so maybe not,” Cassie said. “But wait,” she added as a new thought struck her. “Isn’t a helmsman a ship’s navigator?”

  Griffin nodded uncertainly. “Yes, but what of it?”

  “So, he sets the course of a ship,” she said. “He’s like the pointer.”

  “The pointer,” Erik echoed.

  “As in our ruby arrow,” Griffin said.

  “So, it’s all connected,” Cassie summarized. “This helmsman, whoever he is, is somehow connected with our arrow that points southeast.”

  “Why did they come here?” Erik asked.

  The other two stared at him.

  “Dude, are you on a different page than the rest of the class?” Cassie asked, thinking he’d completely lost the thread of the conversation.

  “No, listen,” Erik said urgently. “Why did the Minoans need to come here? What is it about this place that made them think it would help us?”

  “It’s a calendar circle,” Cassie replied simply. “They always steer us toward calendar circles.”

  “But why do they usually do that?” Erik coaxed, obviously already having a theory in mind.

  Cassie raised her eyebrows, waiting for him to answer.