The Last Odyssey: A Thriller

by James Rollins

  Elena believed she had caught a glimpse of it, too, before being taken away. She remembered seeing a horned, fiery figure emerge from the smoke of the burning dhow. “They were called the Khalkotauroi,” she said. “Also known as the Colchis Bulls. Terrifying creatures, with bodies of bronze, horns of silver, and eyes of rubies. They were eventually subdued by Jason of the Argonauts, who doused their flames with a black potion given to him by the witch Medea, ‘a powerful pharmaka called Promethean Blood.’”

  Joe looked at her, not getting what she was implying.

  She sighed. “Mac said the fiery crabs were preserved in black oil in giant storage pots. And when he splashed the same oil on one of them, it killed the fires fueling the creature.”

  Joe slowly nodded.

  “And then there’s the story of Talos, a giant bronze guardian of the island of Crete. It was also built by Hephaestus. The Greek poet Simonides of Ceos described Talos as a phylax empsychos, an ‘animated guardian.’ Talos would run around the island throwing boulders down on anyone who threatened Crete.”

  “I’d say that’s animated, all right,” Joe admitted.

  “But there’s two details about him that I think are important. First, another way Talos killed people was to run up and hug them against his red-hot bronze form, burning them alive with the fires inside his body.”

  “Sounds sorta like what those flaming crabs were trying to do.”

  She nodded. “It was also written that Talos was powered by a golden ichor, an oily fluid that burned with fire and could not be put out. Which again matches Mac’s description of what seemed to fuel those fiery crabs.”

  “If you’re right, then Mac wasn’t the only one who had encounters with these creatures.” Joe stood up and clanked over to her side. “Way in the past, others must’ve run into something like them, too.”

  “And built mythologies around them.”

  As an archaeologist, she knew many myths were based on kernels of truth.

  “But how does any of this help us right now?” Joe asked, turning to the wall clock.

  “It doesn’t,” she admitted.

  Nehir had ordered her to glean some insight about the golden map, to help guide her team to where Captain Hunayn had traveled after leaving the island of Vulcano.

  She stood up and shifted over to the map box and lifted its lid. The golden coastlines gleamed around the rich blue of the lapis lazuli sea. But her gaze focused on the silver astrolabe resting in its cradle. She knew now it wasn’t the same sphere from the ancient dhow. It was clearly too new.

  Someone made a facsimile.

  Last night, she and Joe had risked flipping the lever on the map’s side. They retreated a few steps, remembering the radiation given off by it. They had listened as gears turned, the box hummed, and once again, the tiny silver ship—likely representing Odysseus’s boat—left its port in Troy. It sailed out a few inches into the representation of the Aegean Sea, then stopped and spun in place.

  They had tried it again a few times during the night, but only achieved the same result. She had gained no new insight and finally stopped trying, fearing they were irradiating themselves for no reason.

  Still . . .

  She reached down with both hands and gently lifted the silver astrolabe out of the map. She had not dared try this before, but desperation now made her risk it.

  “If you break that . . .” Joe warned.

  “Hush.”

  She sensed something important about the astrolabe, something she was missing, something her sleep-deprived mind couldn’t grasp. She lifted it closer and rotated the sphere in her hand. She noted the tiny pinprick holes drilled throughout the inner shell. Likely serving as ventilation holes for the clockwork mechanism inside.

  Wait . . .

  She shifted the astrolabe to one hand and reached to her desk. She moved the photocopy of Hunayn’s journal closer and turned to the last few pages and read a line there: “‘Only I was allowed to possess the beams of the Ship-Star, the three tools necessary to unlock the one true course amidst the map’s many false paths.’”

  She straightened with a start. “I’ve been such a fool.” She held out the astrolabe toward Joe. “Hold this.”

  He did so with a sick expression, as if she’d just passed him a coiled rattlesnake.

  She reached into her pocket and removed the three bronze pins that had fallen from Hunayn’s journal. The captain had been protecting far more than just those old books.

  “What are those?” Joe asked as she approached him with the bronze rods.

  “‘The beams of the Ship-Star,’” she said, quoting the journal. “As a nautical archaeologist, I should’ve already figured this out. The Ship-Star is one of the old names for the North Star, a shining beacon for sailors going back millennia.”

  “And that’s important, why?”

  She ignored his question and examined the tiny flags at the tip of each pin. A tiny Arabic symbol was inscribed on each. As Joe held the astrolabe, she searched its surface, looking for the corresponding mark.

  “There you are,” she whispered as she found the right one.

  She carefully inserted the pin with the matching flag into the little hole next to it. Then after some furtive squinting, she found the second and pushed its rod into place

  She explained as she looked for the last symbol, “Astrolabes have to be constructed to the latitude of the user, fixing the North Star at its center.” She tapped the silver artifact. “But not spherical astrolabes. They’re universal tools. One can set them over and over again, almost like programming them, by recalibrating the astrolabe to each location you go.”

  “How?”

  She found the last symbol and seated the final pin. “Like this. Depending on where and how many pins you use to lock it down, you can reset it.”

  To unlock the one true course.

  She took the astrolabe and seated it back into its cradle. She swallowed and glanced to Joe, passing on a silent questioning look.

  Do we try this?

  He nodded.

  She reached to the side of the box.

  “Stand back,” she warned and flipped the lever.

  11:34 A.M.

  Here we go . . .

  Kowalski held his breath and retreated two steps with Elena. He worried that the entire contraption might blow up in their faces. He found himself holding Elena’s hand. He felt her tremble—but was it from fear or anticipation?

  Ahead of them, the map box hummed, and the astrolabe turned in its cradle, spinning one way, then another. Its inscribed arms swung over its surface in a complicated dance.

  “Look at the silver ship,” Elena exhaled in wonder. “I think it’s working.”

  The tiny boat glided over the shiny blue gemstone. It sped across the Aegean Sea, briefly pausing at various tiny islands, then onward again.

  “I wager those are ports that Hunayn believed Odysseus stopped at. Maybe that last one was the island of the Cyclops, or perhaps the sorceress Circe’s home. . . .”

  Kowalski watched as the ship left the Aegean and sailed around the southern tip of Greece. It then spun wildly as it crossed the Ionian Sea.

  Elena pointed. “I think that represents when Odysseus’s crew opened a bag of winds given to them by King Aeolus, thinking there was gold inside. The released winds drove the ship away from Odysseus’s homeland in Greece.”

  Finally, the silver ship stabilized as it rounded the end of Italy’s boot and passed the island of Sicily. From there it crossed over to a row of tiny golden islands topped by tiny rubies.

  Volcanos.

  They both glanced out the yacht’s windows to the sunlit calderas of Vulcano. Kowalski almost expected to see a great silver ship glide past the yacht and head to that island.

  “Looks like they definitely came here,” Kowalski said and returned his attention to the map.

  After the tiny ship reached the chain of volcanic islands, it stopped again.

  Elena squeezed hi
s hand.

  They both held their breath.

  Where will it go next?

  But the silver ship remained alongside those islands—and stayed there.

  Kowalski finally exhaled in defeat, no longer able to hold his breath. “Maybe it’s broken.”

  She shook her head, apparently refusing to believe it.

  “Then maybe you have to put in new coordinates. Move those rods around to—”

  The map box quaked on the table, making them both jump back. The humming intensified to the whistle of a kettle—then the entire gemlike surface of the Mediterranean broke apart, shattering outward from the volcanic islands into a spiderweb of cracks. The fragmented seams released a sulfurous steam.

  Kowalski drew Elena back by the hand. “It’s gonna blow.”

  “No.” She freed herself and stepped closer to the map. Her gaze visibly ran along the maze of steaming lines, crisscrossing and bisecting each other across the sea. “It’s like Hunayn wrote. The map’s many false paths.”

  Curious, Kowalski risked joining her.

  As they watched, all the cracks sealed back up, erasing those false paths, so perfectly that the lapis lazuli looked as pristine as before, like one big piece of the gem.

  Except one seam remained—and widened.

  Steam from that crack hissed away, replaced with golden fire, the flames rising from the fuel inside the map. They formed a fiery river flowing west from the shores of Vulcano, across the Tyrrhenian Sea to the southern tip of Sardinia, then due south until it reached and traced the northern coast of Africa, heading west.

  Elena leaned even closer, risking the heat, the radiation. “All this drama almost looks like some fiery representation of plate tectonics. Look at how—”

  “Ship’s moving again,” Kowalski warned her, drawing her straighter again.

  Back at the ruby-tipped representation of Vulcano, the tiny ship finally set sail again, diving into that golden river of fire. The flames masked most of its path, but the silver ship flashed out of the gold fire as it paused at Sardinia, then turned and headed south toward Africa.

  Kowalski followed that fiery stream along the continent’s coast until it passed through the Strait of Gibraltar.

  Where is it—?

  A loud voice rose from beyond the lounge’s double doors.

  Uh-oh.

  Kowalski rushed to the map, while checking the wall clock.

  She’s early.

  He flipped the switch on the side of the bronze box and closed its lid. He kept a palm there, feeling the vibrations inside slowly subside. The humming also grew quieter.

  “C’mon . . .” He willed the device to fully shut down. To Elena, he warned, “Don’t say a word. They can’t know what just happened.”

  Elena’s eyes widened, the wonder shining there turning to fear. “But you’ll be—” She waved to his leg.

  “I can take it.”

  He turned to the doors as they crashed open. Nehir stalked into the lounge, followed by the brute Kadir.

  At least, I hope I can.

  11:58 A.M.

  Elena shivered as Nehir approached, leaving the giant at the door. She fought to keep from looking at the map box. She glanced guiltily at Joe.

  What am I going to do?

  The fiery triumph from a moment ago died to cold embers. She knew that if she stayed silent about what they had just learned, Joe would suffer.

  That’s if we can even keep this secret.

  As Nehir crossed toward the desk, the woman’s nose crinkled. “What’s that burning smell?”

  Elena stiffened. Moments ago, struck by realization about the astrolabe and the bronze pins, she had been too excited not to try operating the map. Up until then, she had gotten no sense that she and Joe were being watched, of hidden cameras. And from Nehir’s question now, the enemy had clearly not been eavesdropping, likely overconfident that they had the upper hand.

  But what now? Had she and Joe been caught red-handed?

  She swallowed, struggling with what to say.

  Joe took the lead and marched forward, stepping in front of the woman, momentarily blocking Nehir’s view to the map box. “If you don’t like the smell of burnt flesh, then quit shoving red-hot pokers into me.”

  He turned slightly to rub his leg, while casting a worried look at Elena.

  Nehir rounded past him awkwardly. “That’ll depend on how productive Dr. Cargill has been this morning.”

  Elena hid her relief, but they were not out of the woods. She nervously opened and closed a fist. “If I had more time—”

  “Ah, but you don’t.” Nehir waved back to Kadir. “My brother has no patience, I’m afraid. If you can’t entertain us, I may have to find another distraction for him. You will be allowed to watch, of course.”

  Elena felt the blood drain from her face—even more so, when Nehir elbowed her aside and reached to the map box.

  “As I warned you last night,” Nehir said, “we need your valuable insight into the Banū Mūsā map. To tell us where to go next.”

  “I don’t know if I’ll be able to—”

  Nehir touched the side of the box, then placed her palm against it. “Why is this hot?”

  Elena cleared her throat, searching for a lie. “We . . . we tried running it multiple times this morning. To see if it would help me figure anything out.”

  Nehir nodded at this explanation. “And?”

  Elena couldn’t speak, striving to think of something to keep the woman from opening the box. She failed.

  Nehir shifted her hand and lifted the box’s lid, exposing the map.

  Cringing, Elena tilted up on her toes to get a better look, fearing the worst, expecting flames and defeat. Instead, the expanse of the Mediterranean looked intact, the lapis lazuli as flawless as it had been for centuries. Even the tiny silver ship of Odysseus had returned to its port along the Turkish coast.

  Elena exhaled too loudly, drawing Nehir’s attention, which at least kept the woman from noting the tiny bronze pins in the astrolabe.

  “Well?” Nehir asked. “Where do we go? And why?”

  Elena knew the answer to the first question, remembering where the tiny ship had stopped at briefly after leaving Vulcano—but she dared not share with Nehir how she had come by that information.

  I need another explanation that she’ll buy.

  Elena stared across the piles of books. Maybe it was panic, maybe it was desperation, but suddenly she knew what had been escaping her all morning. It struck her like a hammer between the eyes. She might have missed it still, except for the tiny ship stopping along the coast of Sardinia.

  “If you can’t help us,” Nehir threatened, “then I may need to inspire you.”

  Elena rubbed her temples. She remembered holding the astrolabe a moment ago, sensing its significance, but she got too distracted by all that followed.

  “It’s the Daedalus Key,” Elena said.

  “What about it?” Nehir pressed.

  “Hunayn and his brothers picked that name for a reason. I imagine the Storm Atlas got its name because Odysseus’s ship was tossed about repeatedly by god-driven tempests. But why did the brothers choose Daedalus—out of all the mythic characters’ names—to christen their astrolabe?”

  “Intriguing,” Nehir admitted. “But what of it?”

  Elena drew upon her night-long research. “Daedalus was a master craftsman, like Hephaestus. Only he was a man, not a god. Still, he invented all manner of ingenious devices.” She stressed the last to reference the Banū Mūsā brothers and their most famous book. “Daedalus fashioned the confounding Labyrinth where the monstrous Minotaur was kept. He crafted Icarus’s wings.”

  She waved toward the books. “According to both Sophocles and Aristophanes, he also built animated lifelike statues. So deft of foot, that they had to be tied down or they’d escape. His reputation was such that the word daedala was coined to describe moving statues that were so perfect in form that they seemed beyond anything humans
could create.”

  Nehir folded her arms, trying unsuccessfully to hide her interest.

  Elena continued. “Is it any wonder then that Hunayn—who came here because of Hephaestus’s reputation—would not seek out the trail of Daedalus just as ardently?”

  “And where would that lead him?”

  “According to myths, Daedalus was forced to flee Crete after he betrayed King Minos by revealing the path through the Labyrinth. On the run, he first fled to Sicily, then over to nearby Sardinia, where he made his home. That’s where we need to go next.”

  Elena hated to give away the next port on Hunayn’s journey, but if it helped keep her secret about the map—and keep Joe from the tortures at the hand of Kadir—so be it. It was not like that information would prove all that useful. It was but one stop among many.

  Nehir’s firm frown suggested the woman doubted the value of this information. Elena knew she had to drive this home for any hope of saving Joe.

  “Two other details,” she said. “We know Hunayn was following what he believed to be Odysseus’s trail, hoping to find the mysteriously advanced Phaeacians, the people he likely believed were the destroyers of civilizations.”

  Nehir uncrossed her arms long enough to wave at Elena to continue, plainly accepting this.

  Good.

  “One of the places where Odysseus tried to dock was at the island of the Laestrygonians. It was the home of man-eating giants who cast giant boulders at Odysseus’s ships, destroying all but the hero’s boat.”

  “And what does this have to do with Sardinia?” Nehir asked.

  “Because of a first-century Roman geographer, Ptolemy. Like Strabo, this scholar wrote a book titled Geographica. Surely Hunayn would’ve read this text, too.” She pointed to a scatter of books. “I certainly did, at least the parts pertaining to Homer’s Odyssey.”

  “So?”

  “In that book, Ptolemy mentions a tribe occupying northwest Sardinia. He called them the Lestrigoni—which sounds an awful lot like Laestrygonia. Upon reading that, how could Hunayn not go there? Plus, the western side of Sardinia has ancient giant statues that were said to protect the island by hurling boulders at ships. Again, just like the Laestrygonians.”