Siren's Secret

by Trish Albright

  “Above each of these pieces of art is the same warning as before,” Olivia announced. “ ‘What you seek, you already have.’ ” She thought a moment and read the lettering along the bottom of the images, conveying her interpretation based on what she’d learned at the entrance of the tomb.

  “This is ‘the secret men will die for.’ ” She walked backward to the other pieces of art on the walls. She pointed to the pictures of people engaged in life, noting, “ ‘The treasure without price.’ ” Walking to the last chamber, she indicated the image of a person reading scrolls, surrounded by what seemed to be a temple library. “And ‘knowledge of the ages.’ ”

  “But where is the treasure?” Lampley demanded.

  “Or the knowledge?” Merryvale asked. He knocked his hand once against the art, then again, before looking at his daughter knowingly.

  They scrambled to find a latch to release the art until a crash got their attention. Olivia turned in time to see Alex lift her heel and slam her foot through the priceless ancient art a second time, causing it to splinter into bits.

  “Stop!” Olivia shouted, running toward her.

  Moreau leaped at her in outrage. Until he saw the result. They looked through to find a room behind the painted screen.

  “Let me just clear this away for you,” Alex said.

  Moreau stepped in front of her. “That will be enough, Your Grace. I don’t want you to be injured.”

  Olivia debated whether he meant to do the injuring himself. “There must be a lever or release somewhere. Let’s look.”

  “I’ve got it,” Merryvale said. “It’s dry. Careful.” He showed them how to fold open a latch that then allowed the wood screens to be opened like wall-sized doors. Merryvale gasped with awe at what was before him. The room of knowledge was a giant chamber cluttered with objects and instruments—some for learning and some that seemed for everyday use. But what awed him most were the walls. Embedded in the stone of all the walls were shelves filled with ancient scrolls.

  “We did it, Olivia. We did it.” He touched the scrolls and codices reverently, walking slowly along the wall in wonder.

  Olivia joined her father, her hand grazing the parched, dusty records. Gently, she slid one out from the top. Her father laid his jacket on the table and they unwrapped the outer material, which looked to be shreds of linen. Next they unfurled the scroll.

  “Papyrus,” her father touched the scroll. “I’ve seen only one other very rare sample. The dry climate has protected it from rot”—he lifted a section of scroll—“and provided us with a miracle.”

  Olivia read the symbols and explained it to him. “It’s a genealogy, Father. Of the kings. A proof.” She swallowed hard, moved by their find. Then they grinned at each other like schoolchildren up to mischief. Her father’s body shook with delight, and Olivia wiped the sudden tears filling her eyes. She’d done it. She’d discovered mysteries of the ancients. Accomplished something few in the world would ever do.

  “Now what do you have to say to me, Merryvale?” Lampley said.

  They looked up, all three a little dazed. Her father huffed. Then smiled reluctantly. “I still don’t approve of your methods.”

  Lampley nodded. The two men seemed to have a truce of sorts for now. Olivia left them. Where was Stafford? He must see this. She wanted to share it with him.

  Olivia rushed past some guards to find the man. He was in the room at the end. The astrolabe room. The room of the secret.

  She didn’t join him. Instead, she stopped in the center room and went in, mesmerized as she stepped slowly around the giant slab of red granite. Her hand reached out before her and touched.

  The sarcophagus.

  Here lay the librarian.

  Sarcophagus—Greek for flesh eating. Horrific, how her mind worked. Thankfully the victims were already dead.

  She slid her hand along the edge and stopped in surprise. Carved into the limestone cover was not just the librarian, but a couple. A handsome couple. He with the ornamentation of the Greeks. She with the look of an Egyptian. A mixing of cultures. They lay wrapped in a peaceful embrace, as if only down for a short nap, a smile on the woman’s face—as if she had just made love. She recognized the librarian’s necklace from the artwork, the astrolabe with the symbol of Lilith at the top of the necklace. Her fingers traced the lines to the place where their hands met and fingers entwined. She touched a ring on the woman’s hand.

  “She’s put us through quite a lot today,” Alex said.

  Olivia startled. Then she realized Alex knew.

  “Of course it had to be a woman,” the duchess continued. “It’s always the women in this story.” She observed the couple. “He was handsome. She on the other hand …” Alex looked back and forth at Olivia and the librarian. “She looks a bit like you.”

  Olivia felt lightheaded. “That’s impossible.”

  “Of course,” Alex agreed, staring at her curiously. “It would indeed be peculiar if she was an ancient ancestor.”

  Olivia closed her eyes briefly, fighting off the dizzy spell.

  Strange how my balance is upset in certain parts of the tomb.

  She shook off the reaction and reached out to touch the linked fingers carved in stone. They each wore a ring. A simple band.

  Olivia stepped back, then swayed again as the room appeared to move.

  Alex reached to catch her at the same time as Samuel.

  “You’re exhausted,” Samuel said. His fingers soothed over her temples, comforting, and Olivia began to relax.

  “Better?” he asked.

  “Yes.” She squeezed his hand in thanks and stood to face an impatient Moreau urging her to the last room.

  Lampley studied her in Stafford’s care. “I will tell them you need a moment. It has been an exhausting experience.” Olivia was grateful, if surprised by his sympathy.

  Samuel helped Olivia forward. A clammy hand clasped his. A sure sign of her growing strain.

  They paused outside the splintered door of the astrolabe room, and he pulled Olivia in front of him to watch. She leaned her back into his chest and he wrapped an arm around her waist, his chin touching the top of her hair for the briefest of moments.

  The entire group stood around a large circular table. Engraved on the top were stars of different sizes with lines connecting them.

  “It’s Canis Major,” Samuel said. They looked at the largest star in the constellation map, and he pointed. “And that would be Sirius.”

  “The brightest star in the sky,” Olivia said. “I learned that from your books,” she told Samuel. To her father, “It’s important for navigators.”

  Moreau lifted the funerary cone. “Sirius, it is.”

  The star shape of Sirius made yet another insert, and Moreau placed the artifact in the slot. It fit only halfway, but made a familiar click, indicating a correct action. Then another click sounded … and another. They listened.

  Silence.

  “Now what?” Merryvale asked in hushed tones.

  Samuel’s attention was diverted by Olivia stiffening in his arms.

  He stepped aside to see her face, one hand keeping connection with her. She studied the walls. He knew that she was reading whatever mystery lay before them, and whatever it said spooked her.

  Olivia studied the hieroglyphics on the walls. It was not the Lilith story as depicted outside the tomb, but a continuation—a prophetic vision promising great power and riches and a transformation of the world as they knew it.

  This was the prophecy the Staffords feared.

  The daughter of Lilith had to restore balance at the altar of the original transgression. Through her death and transformation, a new era would begin, and those who offered the sacrifice would dictate the power of a new age.

  Olivia’s skin tingled with worry. The astrolabe was the beacon that would lead the family of Lilith home, should they become lost.

  Startled at the realization, the importance of that one instrument, she turned to the duches
s again. And understood her fear. Olivia just wasn’t sure she believed it. If the art the duchess had just tried to destroy was correct, then the astrolabe had been divided and sent to the ends of the earth—a precaution against it falling into the wrong hands?

  That is—all but one piece. The piece the librarian guarded herself.

  The piece Moreau wanted.

  He was behind the thefts and murders across Europe. He was trying to find the mythical treasure. And he thought the key to lead him to it was in this tomb.

  The keeper of the astrolabe was depicted on the wall near the prophecy, a necklace hanging over her white robe. She looked more like a goddess than a librarian, but it was this woman who had made the astrolabes. Olivia also understood something else of this very logical, accomplished sage to the pharaohs. She was a prophetess. Olivia cursed inwardly.

  Can no one stick with pure science?

  Moreau stared at the round table waiting for something to happen.

  Olivia stepped up and ran her hand over the writing on the surface around the edge. If she told them, would they discover the final disc Moreau sought? Did she want him gaining access to unknown power?

  “It’s a lever,” Moreau said, pointing to the artifact now attached to the table. “It should turn.” To some guards, “Help.”

  It required three men to loosen the stiff axis. They turned the table, but nothing happened.

  “Keep turning,” Moreau insisted.

  Something fell and crashed.

  Olivia and the duchess jolted back in terror, expecting asps or something even more horrible.

  Stafford picked up the object that had fallen.

  Not a creature. A thing. An astrolabe, its antique chain shattered.

  They tilted their heads upward. The lines in the ceiling were not engraved patterns, but slots.

  “Keep turning,” Moreau said. His voice became urgent, filled with excitement.

  As the stone table circled, nearly fifty ancient astrolabes lowered from the ceiling on chains of various lengths. All were different sizes—from four to twenty-four inches in diameter. As they were lowered they began to spin gently in the air—some made of brass, some bronze, and others Olivia thought were perhaps gold. The twirling metal discs reflected and bounced the torchlight around the room, creating a kaleidoscope of light and color.

  Fantastic.

  Only Moreau didn’t think it so fantastic.

  He grabbed Olivia’s arm. “Which one is it?”

  “Is what?” She yanked her arm free as Stafford stepped forward.

  “Which of these is the secret? The one we need?” His eyes turned dark.

  “None,” she said. Her chest got tight and her breath came in short gasps. “The secret was divided.” She explained the picture that lay shattered and the stories written on the wall. “The pieces were sent to the ends of the earth.”

  “It’s true.” Alex stepped forward. “If you look at some of these, the styles are clearly different. Made by different hands. A study of them would perhaps find common signatures. The person buried here was an inventor, but also a collector.”

  “Not all the pieces were sent. I was told the librarian kept a part,” Moreau said.

  “I don’t know,” Olivia said, backing up into Stafford. His arm went around her protectively.

  Moreau leaned into her face with his. “Then you’d better find out.”

  “Don’t threaten me, sir. I need to perlustrate. I cannot do that with you acting like this. Calm yourself, please. It is imperative that I have calm surroundings to think!” Olivia panicked. Moreau wanted answers, and she did not know them. If there was a piece of the astrolabe to be collected in the tomb, she did not know where it was.

  “Perhaps it is in one of the astrolabes, or in the tomb chamber.” Olivia hoped to delay any answers. And she was eager to explore the middle chamber. It was surely the most important, being in the center and larger than the others.

  Moreau led them to the third chamber. Olivia’s father joined them. The walls were covered in writings.

  “Well?” Moreau said.

  Olivia opened her leather pouch and took out her writing materials. “There is too much. Too many unfamiliar words. I need to copy them and check with words I know.”

  “What do you mean?” Moreau said. “I thought you understood the language.”

  “It’s a science, sir. Not magic.” Stubborn, Olivia pulled out her inking pen and jar. “I will likely need more ink if I am to copy all this today.”

  Her demands silenced the room.

  “But this is the treasure room, is it not, Lady Olivia?” Lampley asked.

  “Yes, but—” Olivia didn’t know how to explain. “It may not be the type of treasure you seek.”

  “I don’t understand,” Lampley said. “Why go to this trouble?”

  “I don’t understand either. That is why I am trying to copy and study the words. Perhaps you can help my father in the first chamber.” She lowered her head to her work and ignored them all, hoping they would go away.

  Samuel ordered a guard to find her a seat and table. Moreau nodded his assent. Olivia wrote in her journal, but her hand shook violently. Samuel rubbed her shoulders from behind. “All is well for now, Olivia. Just write your notes. It will all be well.”

  One of her hands reached up over his and squeezed, her head still down, afraid her face would reveal something she didn’t want to disclose.

  Samuel stood guard over her, studying the sarcophagus room as he waited. There were three star-shaped inserts, five feet apart from each other, in the center of the room, with a stone lever just to the right of each. The insert holes were nearly shoulder height for the average person and much larger than the funerary cone inserts. He brought his torch over to examine them and see if light would explain their purpose. Above each option there was a symbol. He frowned. A star, a triangle, and a circle. Another puzzle? He bent and looked inside. There was something at the end, barely within reach. It looked innocent enough. Next to each hole was a lever of sorts. He stood back and pushed the third lever next to the circle symbol.

  A heavy guillotine-like blade whooshed past the opening next to him and lodged in ground. Swallowing hard, he raised his torch to discover a contraption in the ceiling. He warned the guards, then turned and left the room, checking his toes and feeling more than a little ill.

  Merryvale and Moreau took over the organization of conveying the relics and scrolls to the outside. Moreau had them take down all the astrolabes to transport as well.

  Lampley stayed with them, and much to Samuel’s relief, the duke and his sister were allowed to return above. Alex may have been in perfect health, but she was with child, and Samuel wanted her as far from this business as possible.

  It seemed as though Moreau was content to give Olivia time to figure out the treasure room.

  That would give him and Nathan time to plan their departure.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Nathan met Samuel at the entrance of the tomb many hours after the rest of the expedition had surfaced. Olivia stumbled as he helped her out, her eyes bleary, her fingers ink-stained. Elizabeth rushed to assist her to her father’s tent to rest.

  The captain shared the details of the adventure, though the others had already heard of the day’s success and watched the conveyance of artifacts being brought from below.

  Dinner was a short, simple affair. Neither Merryvale nor Moreau and his men joined them. Lampley also ate apart from the others, in the company of a few of his trusted companions.

  While not permitted to leave, Samuel and the rest were allowed to set up their own tents and supplies. Nathan made sure Kelley and the men were taken care of, then went about making a modest tent space as comfortable as possible for Elizabeth. Lack of privacy from the constant guard was the most difficult. He welcomed time simply to hold his new wife.

  Nathan did not think Moreau could keep them much longer under any civilized arrangement—which meant things could turn
ugly at any moment. Since it seemed they were making progress in the tomb, he thought they might be safe for a bit longer … at least through the night.

  He entered the tent with another bucket of water. “Here, Elizabeth—to bathe the dust off.”

  Elizabeth thanked him with a long smile, her eyes softening in appreciation. She was easy to please. Too easy. She deserved so much more, and soon she would have it. He had enough money to settle harborside and run Alex’s fledgling Emporium. His house was in need of care, but it would do until they could build a new one with rooms enough for half a dozen children. He’d grown up alone after his family was killed in the war with the English, and had always appreciated the noise of the Stafford household.

  Elizabeth gave him her back to unbutton her dress and slowly folded it down off her arms and over her hips. She dipped a cloth in the water then pressed it gently up her arms, across her chest, over her breasts. Nathan took the wet fabric from her and finished the job himself, his hands stroking over her silky, dampened skin, his head bending down to suck moisture from the taut pink nipples teasing him to attention.

  “Not yet, love.” Elizabeth raked a hand through his hair and pulled him back for a kiss. “Your turn.” She unbuttoned his linen shirt, careful of the scar that had healed, but was still tender. “Let me wash some of the day off you.”

  She took the cloth, wrung it over the dirty water, then soaked it in the fresh before soothing it over his face, neck, chest, back, and arms, then eventually over his fingertips. Finally she put the rag down, lifted his hands, and kissed them lovingly.

  Nathan didn’t waste any time. He scooped her in his arms and laid her on the cushioned area of the floor. On his knees he worshipped her head to toe, then slowly made love to her until her body screamed for release and he had to capture her cries of pleasure with kisses.

  In the aftermath, she stretched catlike against his body, her cheek resting on his chest. “I don’t want to go to sleep,” she whispered.

  “Neither do I!” he whispered back loudly, wanting to make her laugh.