I hope that this helps. I hope that I’ll come back and be like I was when I started. I hope that…
He was still listing off hopes when sleep draped a soft blanket over his mind and took him, leading him to a picnic in a grassy field while his cappuccino cooled in the machine.
THE CHILD
“We’re going where?”
Sam suppressed his irritation as his adopted daughter scrunched up her dark-skinned face like she had just tasted something rotten. “We’re going to Jerusalem, Sara, for a visit. To see the sites of ancient religions, like the Holy Temple.” He smiled to himself as his mind sketched the itinerary. “We might also head to Mecca and Medina, see the Ka’aba.”
Sara scratched her head and flipped off her iPod, removing the headphones from her ears. “Um…why? I mean, not that I mind the time off of school or anything, but it’s the middle of the semester, Sam. It’s not even break time yet.”
He sighed as he took his laptop bag from his shoulder, hung it on its appointed place on the wall, and began removing his shoes. A golden pendant slipped out of his shirt as he bent down, and he tucked it back into place. “Do you really want to head to another country over the Christmas break? I figured you’d want to stay home, hang out with your friends, that sort of thing.” He crooked an eyebrow in her direction. “If you’ll recall, last year I tried to get you to go to Italy and you shut me down.” He padded over to the refrigerator and pulled out a carton of orange juice. “So you get to miss school this way, and you won’t even get in trouble.”
Sara pursed her lips and tapped her foot. “I did not shut you down, Sam. You just forgot that I had other things already planned.” She leaned against the wall, crossing her arms. “Besides, you were going for some sort of meeting. When I asked if we would have time to go see anything, you told me…” Sara brought her hands up to make air-quotes. “And I quote, ‘Probably not.’”
“I…” He took a deep breath as he poured his juice. Patience. “Well, this time there’s no meeting. So, do you already have something planned?”
“Well…no.”
“Okay then.”
“So it’s a real vacation? Like, us going, looking around, seeing new things?”
Sam nodded.
Sara’s smile burst forth. “When are we leaving?” She took a seat at the kitchen bar. “All of my friends are going to be jealous when they hear.”
Sam winced, his muscles and joints aching as he sat down at the kitchen table. “Our flight is for tomorrow afternoon. Get yourself packed because I’m going to be picking you up after school and we’ll be heading straight to the airport.”
“Is there a reason we’re going?” Sara cast an appraising eye over her adoptive father, who glanced up at her from his downcast face. “Not that we need one, but…well, you don’t usually take time off yourself, you know. You’re always rushing off to some conference, some event…”
“Yeah.” Sam sipped his juice and rubbed the back of his neck. “Maybe that’s why I need to go. Been trying to do too much, even for me.”
“Oh, please not the ‘genius’ thing again.” Sara rolled her eyes and turned, grabbing a tangerine from a nearby bowl. “I know my friends laugh every time you say that, but seriously. It gets old. You don’t need their attention that badly.”
Sam took a sip of his drink. “Trust me. I’m not looking for the attention of teenage girls.”
A moment of silence stretched before Sara spoke up again. “Well, anyway, guess I’d better get packed. I don’t want to forget anything I might want while we’re in the Promised Land.”
Sam nodded and leaned back. This is going to be good for us. He closed his eyes and cast his mind back, back to when Gabriel had touched his heart with that moment of divine vision. The overwhelming, desperate love that had engulfed him then echoed back at him now, and tears trickled down his face.
“…Sam?”
Sam blinked his eyes open; Sara was watching him from across the table, her brow wrinkled, concerned.
“Oh, sorry.” Sam wiped his face and eyes. “Just remembering something from a few years ago.”
Sara got up from her seat. “In the immortal words of Qui-Gon Jinn, keep your mind here and now where it belongs.”
“And who am I to argue with Qui-Gon?” Sam polished off his juice and stood up, stretching his arms in front of him.
“So when are you going to tell me about your days in the voodoo cult?” Sara pointed at the tattoos on his hands and forearms.
“When you’re old enough to not have nightmares.” Sam adjusted his sleeves so the markings were mostly covered.
Sara’s eyes widened and her mouth dipped in a scowl. “Fuck you.” She stormed off, slamming the door into her room. The sound echoed through the house, a gunshot in the silence.
Sam didn’t even look up. Instead, he rolled the glass between his hands.
“That was fantastic, Sam.” Light reflected off the moisture beads. “Way to go.”
She doesn’t need to know. It’d be too much for her. She’s just a child.
“And you would have reacted real well if Mom or Dad had told you that when you were her age, huh?” He stood and brought his glass to the sink, running water over it and putting it into the dish rack. Wiping his hands on a nearby towel, he turned to face the hallway that led to Sara’s room.
A stray thought brought a smile to Sam’s face. Funny how this is harder than facing down the Angel of Death. He took a deep breath, squared his shoulders, and headed down the hall. Before knocking, he leaned in and put his ear to the door.
Nothing.
He rapped his knuckles on the wood. “Sara?”
Something hard slammed into the door on the other side and thumped onto the ground.
“Right.” He sighed, rubbed his forehead, put it against the door and closed his eyes. “Sara, I didn’t mean that exactly the way it sounded. You’ll hear all about it one day. Just…just not yet. It’s not time yet. All right?”
No answer.
“I’m sorry.” Sam turned from the door and began his return trip down the hallway, but before he got halfway through, the door opened.
“Apology accepted.” Sara leaned against the doorframe, her arms crossed again. “But only because you’re bringing me to Jerusalem.”
Sam laughed. “Fair enough.”
~~~
“I remember when airlines let you check two bags free per passenger.” Sam shook his head as he and Sara walked away from the counter, taking a bite of his napkin-clad chocolate donut before continuing. “Now it’s fifty per.”
“You shouldn’t say things like that, Sam.” Sara hitched her small carry-on backpack up on her shoulders as her eyes roamed the airport. “It makes you seem old.”
“I feel old.” Sam’s eyes also took in his surroundings, but what he saw was not the same as what Sara did. To his left, several scuttling spider-demons, about a hand-span in size, scrabbled toward a nearby line. Ahead, a security supervisor berated an employee, holding her in place with his authority as his taunts and insults lashed into her soul. Sam could see the tears leaking down her freckled face…and the barbs on the tongue of the fat man before her.
He paused, watching. The air around the supervisor shimmered, a heat-wave undetected by everyone else, and, as Sam’s attention focused in, he could smell rotting flesh and brimstone.
Dammit. Even when I’m trying to go on fucking vacation.
“Sam? What’s the matter?” Sara turned around, looking at him stopped in the middle of the walkway, people flowing around him like water in a stream. “Sam?”
“Just a second, Sara.” Sam watched a moment longer. A taskmaster. Hate those bastards. Making abusers out of people. He set his shoulders, then began walking toward the pair, tossing the donut in the trash, unfolding the napkin, and scribbling on it with his pen.
“What are you doing?” Sara’s eyes flicked from Sam’s face to the TSA man, whose face was now red with his anger. Everyone else in
the crowd was doing a fantastic job of pretending to be deaf, turning their eyes away from the spectacle going on in the airport lobby.
“No, Sam, you can’t. Just let them—”
“Stay here, Sara. Don’t move.” Sam put out one hand to block her, then stepped up to the employee and boss. The woman was fully weeping now, babbling apologies, and Sam’s heart broke for her.
“Hey, it’s going to be okay.” He clicked his pen shut and returned it to his pocket, then put that hand on the young woman’s shoulder. She looked up at him, her face a war between anger, fear, confusion, and embarrassment, and the big man in front of her rounded on Sam.
“What the hell is your problem, asshole?” The supervisor rose up on his toes, trying to look down into Sam’s face. The barbs on his tongue were clearer, now, and Sam flinched at the sight of the sick, green ichor which coated them. “This isn’t any of your fucking business! Why don’t you just—”
Sam put his right foot back, widening his stance. “You know, you should really watch how you talk to people.” His left hand gripped the napkin. “You never know when someone is going to turn out to be more important than you thought.”
The TSA man reached out and shoved Sam, rocking him in place but failing to dislodge him. “Shut the fuck up! I don’t give a rat’s ass who you think you are; there’s fucking work to be done and this bitch—”
Sam shoved the napkin into the man’s face.
Scrawled on the thin paper was a complex diagram, a series of pentacles, circles, and other symbols. The other man’s skin blanched, going from red to white in a moment, and his next word emerged as a whispered hiss.
“Keeper.” He tried to withdraw but his muscles were locked in place. Sam stepped up to him.
“No shit, asshole.” He brought his right hand up, two fingers extended toward the demon.
“Begone, taskmaster. Your term here is ended. Return to Hell, where your feet bleed and burn and the whip you hold tears open your own flesh.” He placed the napkin on the half-bald head in front of him.
“Begone.”
The thick thorns on the man’s tongue melted into the same green fluid which Sam had seen, pooling, running out of his mouth and up his face, soaking the napkin through until it was a sodden green rag. Sam plucked it from the now-speechless supervisor’s face and flicked it into the air, making a sharp gesture with his left hand as he did so.
The napkin burst into flame, eliciting a gasp from the surrounding crowd, many of whom had stopped to watch the interaction between Sam and the supervisor. Sam glanced around, smiled, and touched the girl’s shoulder again.
“Wh…what’s going on?” The supervisor rubbed his head, as if he still felt the wet napkin on it. “I…I…Greta, are you okay?” He moved toward the young woman, who recoiled from him.
Sam shook his head, and turned to walk away. The onlookers whispered as he went past them back to where Sara stood, her eyes wide as an owl’s, staring up into his face.
“I just explained to him that he should be nicer to his employees.” Sam’s words interrupted Sara’s attempts to form any sort of question. “Come on, we need to get to gate six.”
The rest of the trip through the airport was quiet, with Sara stealing glances at her father every chance she got. It’s not her fault. Sam tried not to look back, to return the stares. You’d be curious, too. You’d be staring.
“Ummm…Sam?” Sara’s voice was meek, quiet. “What the fuck was that?”
“Can it wait until we get on the plane?” Sam did not turn as he spoke. “I really don’t want to miss it.”
“I guess.” Sam spared his daughter a look; she had retreated into the classic posture of self-defense, her arms crossed across her chest as her eyes held to the ground. The stone walls he had erected to keep out judgment and whispers crumbled, and he stopped, putting a hand on her shoulder.
“Hey.” Sara stopped, still not looking up. “Look at me for a second, okay?”
Sara did so, her brown eyes meeting Sam’s. They were wide, shaking, searching his face.
“I promise, I’m not crazy. There was just something that I had to take care of, and I did.”
Sara licked her lips. “Then what the hell was that?”
“Sara, do you remember that show we watched together, ‘Mind Control?’”
She looked up at Sam from the corners of her eyes. “With that Darren Brown guy? Where he made people do all sorts of weird shit.”
“Exactly. He was using psychology, tricks of how the mind works.” Sam felt the bite of the lie in his chest, but he forged ahead. “When you need to get someone in a suggestible state, you do something that throws their mind off track. Something unexpected.”
“…Like throwing a napkin on their head?” Some of the tension had left Sara’s muscles, and her posture was loosening.
Sam smiled. “Exactly.” God help me, now I feel like Caitlin, grinning in front of a fawning crowd. “It shook him up, let me talk to him for a second, give him a suggestion.”
Sara’s eyes had become saucers, all fear and confusion gone in the wake of this new revelation. “You can hypnotize people? Why the hell didn’t you tell me about that before?” Then her eyes narrowed. “Wait a minute. Have you ever hypnotized me?”
Sam laughed, and this time it was genuine, a rich, warm sound from the happy places in his heart. “No.” He waved one hand as he spoke in an attempt to calm her down. “Now, can we keep moving? I don’t want the security people coming by and telling me that we shouldn’t be blocking the walkways or something.”
“Okay, okay.” They resumed their walk. They had been moving for about thirty seconds when her voice came again. “So…can you?”
“Hypnotize people?”
Sara nodded.
“In a fashion, but I prefer not to.” Sam stood up and he and his daughter began walking again toward their terminal. “The skill does come in handy during therapy, though.”
“I bet. Must be nice.” As she walked, Sara grasped hold of an imaginary clipboard. “Yes, all this deep-seated abuse from your childhood is gone. You’ll walk out of here as sunshine and roses. Congratulations.”
Sam shook his head. “No, Sara. That’s not quite the way it works in psychology. I’d be wasting my time and theirs if I tried that kind of treatment for most of them.”
The two arrived at the boarding area for their flight and sat down. “What do you mean, ‘wasting your time?’ Why would that be wasting it?”
Sam laid his bags on the floor in front of him. “Solving people’s problems for them, doesn’t help them get any stronger. He pursed his lips. “I try to…to remove the obstacles that are getting in their way and then let them figure it out. Not to take the easy road, you know?”
Sara cocked her head. “Whatever. Just seems like you’d be able to help more people that way.”
“Yeah.” Sam laughed, shaking his head. “It does seem like that, doesn’t it?”
THE AWAKENED
Jamila Al-Nour stepped out of her tent in the Egyptian desert. The stars twinkled above and she shivered as a cool wind cut through the light jacket she wore. She hitched up her garments and turned to look at the unearthed structure. It was long, but low to the ground, a silhouette of solid black against the diamond sky on the horizon.
“We did it.” She pulled out a small cedar box from an inner pocket, running her fingers over the smooth lid before opening it. From amongst the metal compass and a roll of ancient Arabic writing, she drew out a small photograph of a middle-aged man of Middle-Eastern descent with a little girl perched on his shoulders.
“We’re here, Dad. You were right.”
Replacing the box, Jamila looked around the sleeping campsite. Most of the lights were off and the workers down for the evening, but she could hear a few night owls still up, murmuring about the day’s work, or the last hand of their card game. She pulled on her shoes, zipped up the tent flap, and headed toward the building, doing her best to keep hidden.
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Too easy. She suppressed a giggle as she moved into a full run, her feet sinking into the sand with each step. The structure grew larger as she approached, until she stood at one of the three doors leading in. She traced a finger across the hieroglyphs that guarded the entrance.
“Enter and your name shall be forfeit, food for the Gods in Duat, and your soul shall fall into the vaults of Ammit the Devourer.” She stepped away, moving toward the walls again. “Powerful threats, whoever you are.”
It’s so well preserved. Jamila reached out, her hand brushing off some of the remaining earth to reveal the marble underneath. It was pitted in several places, worn by moving sand, but still whole, still recognizable. And why marble? No one ever used that for a mastaba, not that I remember. Excitement coursed through her spine like an electric shock. This must have really been someone special.
She took her first steps in, reaching into her pocket and pulling out her flashlight, the beam cutting through the darkness like a spear. The workers had broken through earlier that day, clearing the dirt and rubble that had overlain the tomb.
Jamila smiled at the memory of the crowd of workmen making way for her and her team to investigate the ornate doorway, to take rubbings and photos before breaking the long-held seal.
Never heard of a curse like that one, either. She glanced back at the dark shapes behind her that led into the chamber, then refocused on moving forward.
Can’t touch anything or they’ll know I was in here. Step by step she advanced, the beam lingering whenever she found an artifact or inscription. But I had to see it first, before everyone else got in.
She stopped in front of an ornate vase, decorated in hieroglyphics and drawings.
What is this? The pottery depicted two men, throwing fire from their hands at what seemed to be…
What are those? She knelt closer. The other figures were also humanoid, but with great wings stretching from their backs. One held two flaming swords, while the other carried a mighty horn, curved into a circle, at his waist. Her fingers stretched out, reaching for the vase, caressing the contrast between pottery and paint.
A small fragment flaked off.
Oh, shit! She scurried backward, running the flashlight over her fingers. Her flight sent her into the arms of an imposing statue, its ibis-beak curving over her head. She turned and wrapped her arms around it just in time to keep it from tipping over and crashing to the ground.
Chains of Prophecy: A Tale of Mythic Discovery Page 21