by Nancy Warren
“Nyx? Glad to see you haven’t forgotten your classic mythology.”
My mom was more of a cat person and she leaned over and stretched out a hand saying, “Oh, what a sweet kitten.” I leaned forward so Nyx could jump onto her lap. There was nothing my cat loved more than to be fussed over. However, Nyx suddenly had some kind of a fit. She hissed and twisted in my arms, her tiny, but sharp, claws fully extended and leapt onto the carpet, scratching me as she went. Then she ran at full speed back upstairs.
My mother looked surprised and a little hurt. “She’s not very friendly, is she?”
I was staring after the cat, puzzled. “I don’t know what’s going on with her, today. Maybe she needs to go out.” I excused myself and went back up to the bedroom.
Nyx glared at me through narrowed green eyes, before turning her head and pointedly staring at the window, waiting for me to open it. My arms were smarting where she’d scratched me. She was always so gentle. “What’s up with you?”
She gave an annoyed meow. I had known her long enough that I could interpret the many moods of her meow. This one was angry. She wasn’t the only one. I opened the window. “I hope you’ll have better manners when you return.” As soon as I had the window open, she shot out so fast I was afraid she’d tumble down to the ground. However, with an agility that always amazed me, she jumped to the branch of the old cherry tree and made her way rapidly down to the small back garden.
When she was safely on the ground, she turned and looked up at me. And my beloved cat and familiar narrowed her eyes and hissed at me.
Chapter 2
I rubbed my sore arm, still feeling puzzled by her odd behavior, and went back to my folks. My dad had his head tipped back on the sofa, asleep. Mom seemed wide-awake though, and she still seemed kind of buzzed.
She smiled at me. “I’m so glad to see you. We’ve missed you, honey.” She glanced around. “You haven’t changed much in the apartment, have you? I’m glad in a way. That means you’re not committed to staying.”
I probably would have modernized the place a bit, but I didn’t want to hurt Gran’s feelings. Besides, I was too busy. I really didn’t want to talk about my future plans half-an-hour after my parents arrived, so I settled on, “I’ve missed you, too.” Especially now that Gran was gone. Sometimes, I wanted an older woman I could talk to, someone I could trust. Not that Gran was gone, exactly, but the longer she was a vampire, the more I noticed her losing touch with the little concerns of daily life that are part of being human.
Mom glanced at Dad in a secretive manner. He had his mouth open and was making tiny little gasping sounds in his sleep. She lowered her voice. “Let’s go up to your room, honey. I have something for you.”
She looked both mysterious and excited, and I happily followed her up the stairs to my room. I loved presents. She shut the door, then listened, to make sure Dad was still asleep, before giving a little nod.
She came over and sat beside me on the bed, opened her handbag and then withdrew her cosmetics bag and unzipped that. Finally, she took out an object in a well-worn leather pouch and passed it to me. “The minute I touched this, I knew I had to bring it to you.”
It was such an odd choice of words, that I glanced at her. She had a glow of excitement about her and her eyes were fixed on the bag, waiting for me to open it. So, I did. I slipped my hand into the bag and withdrew something that looked like a hand mirror. On closer inspection, I realized it was a hand mirror, but a very, very old one.
It was beautiful. The mirror, itself, was round, about four inches in diameter, and made of a metal that had dulled with time. I guessed it was bronze. However, it was the handle that drew my attention. It was gold and featured the stylized head of a woman. Her face was painted, and reminded me of the bust of Nefertiti, with large dark eyes, made of obsidian, that seemed to be looking right at me.
The mirror looked like something you’d see in museum, very much like something my mother and father might have discovered in a dig. There was even some hieroglyphic writing inscribed into the handle.
“Mom, it’s beautiful. Is it a replica of something that you found?” I’d often seen copies of famous artefacts in museum gift shops around the world. Sometimes Mom or Dad would point out the ones that had been copied from objects they had personally found. I always thought they were torn between pride at having their work so honored, and horror that something so valuable and unique could ever be mass-produced. However, some of the copies were very good. This one certainly was. The bronzed mirror part was a little clouded. It was such a perfect re-creation that it must’ve been very expensive.
Mom sighed and reached out with her index finger. “Look at the exquisite detailing on the hair. This is really a most extraordinary piece.”
I was starting to get a very peculiar feeling. Mom wasn’t acting like herself and, now I looked closer, I saw that her pupils were dilated, like she was high on something. “Did Dad help you pick this out?”
She shook her head. “No, dear. And let’s keep this our little secret, shall we?”
My mom and dad did not keep secrets from each other, especially not about anything related to the ancient world. My unease increased. “Mom, this isn't an actual historical artefact, is it?"
My mom laughed, then. A delighted trill that sounded nothing like her. "I found it, and, you know what they say, ‘finders keepers.’"
When archaeologists were paid by universities, museums, and government funding bodies to discover ancient treasures, the finders keepers rule did not apply.
Was she playing some kind of trick on me? I looked at her, but she was transfixed by that mirror. Mom did not joke about the sanctity of the artefacts they discovered and she was a strong and insistent voice in the attempt to save vulnerable ruins from pirates and marauders. She and my dad had worked hard to stop looting and destruction in war-torn areas. She would never take something from a dig. Never.
She reached over for my hand where it was still clutching the mirror. "It was strange, but the moment I unearthed this mirror, I knew I had to bring it to you. I haven't let it out of my sight since then and now it's safely in your hands, I can finally breathe a sigh of relief.”
I was glad someone was breathing sighs of relief, because my anxiety was rising. "Where, exactly, did you find it?" I asked, trying to keep my voice casual.
"We’re working in the valley of the kings. This was in the burial chamber of one of the minor wives of Senakhtenre Ahmose. You’ll remember, he was Pharaoh of Egypt in the seventeenth dynasty, mid sixteenth century, BCE to us, of course.” Mom and Dad always used the more scholarly, BCE— Before Common Era— instead of BC, though they meant the same thing.
I did the math in my head, as I always had to do when Mom or Dad threw out historical dates. If my quick calculation was correct, this wife had been buried around thirty-five hundred years ago.
“There was the usual bric-a-brac in the burial chamber: alabaster urns holding the internal organs of the dead queen, ivory combs, jewelry, and tools for the next life. But this mirror, this mirror was something special and because you're so special I brought it for you as a present."
I was stunned. There’s no other word for it. First, my mom, the famous archaeologist, did not term precious relics found in a tomb as ‘bric-a-brac’ and second, she would never, in a million years—or thirty-five hundred years—pilfer from a dig.
I didn't want to accuse my mother of stealing and I didn't want anyone else to find out and accuse her, either. All I could think was that she was suffering some kind of memory lapse or perhaps heatstroke. Or could she have picked up an exotic virus that was making her act crazy? I wanted to discuss her condition with my father. And then, maybe get her to a doctor for a check-up.
Taking a treasure from an ancient burial site was not only a crime but it would get Mom fired from the job she loved. Possibly my father, too, because he’d been an unwitting accomplice..
My mother, oblivious to my thoughts, was still
studying the mirror. “Just look at the exquisite hieroglyphics. Do you remember how to read them?"
This was beyond bizarre. Now I was getting a pop quiz on hieroglyphics? Of course, I knew how to read them. When you spent weeks and weeks in an archaeological dig, there wasn’t a lot else to do. As I looked at the beautifully carved shapes I obediently tried to make sense of them. I studied the tiny figures, the birds and mythical animals. "It looks like a protection spell."
"Very good. Let's hear you read it aloud."
My ancient Egyptian was pretty rusty, plus there wasn't really a standard pronunciation, but I did my best. Reading the words aloud took me back to times I'd spent in the desert as a teenager, when I’d longed for the Internet, friends, sometimes even electricity.
Archaeology is very exciting when you're an archaeologist, but to me, as a teenager, it was about the most boring occupation there was. I’d never been allowed to help with anything important. The grad students got to do the fun stuff, if you could call using tiny brushes to shift sand and debris off of ancient chunks of stone, fun. Mostly, all I’d done was run errands. One year, I was given high school credit for a history course, so Mom had made me study hieroglyphics. That had been cool once I got into it. The tiny drawings and stick figures began to take on meaning and drew me into the ancient world in a way Mom’s and Dad’s lectures never did.
I never slept well when I was on those digs. Not only because the accommodation was pretty basic, but because my dreams would get worse. I'd always been plagued by nightmares, but I’d ended up dreaming that I was one of the people we were currently digging up, which was rather disconcerting. What sixteen-year-old wants to go to sleep hoping her boobs will grow bigger and wake up in the middle of the night experiencing the world through the eyes of a two-thousand-year-old mummy?
I got to the end of the incantation, with Mom making me re-pronounce a couple of the words I got wrong. The minute the final word left my mouth, I knew something bad had happened.
How could I have been so stupid? I was a witch. I knew the power of spells. This mirror was so old that I’d assumed any magic it once held, or any spell it might have carried, would be as mummified as the woman who’d owned it.
I was wrong.
The mirror grew warm in my hand, so I felt like I was holding hands with another living human.
My mother's eyes rolled back in her head and she fell backwards on the bed. I’d have gone to her, but I couldn't look away from the surface of the mirror. It was emanating a strange blue light that shimmered.
As I stared, the wavering opaque surface became clearer and clearer. It was like my scrying mirror, except that when the surface stilled, I was looking at the image of a very young and very beautiful woman. And she was staring back at me.
Her eyes were dark brown and rimmed with kohl. Her eyebrows were thick and painted black in the fashion of Egyptian women of three thousand years ago. She had full, sensual lips, a long, elegant neck, and delicate bone structure. She wore her long black hair in complicated braids that wrapped around her head. If she'd stepped out of that mirror and I lent her something to wear, we could have gone clubbing.
I was so freaked out, I tried to drop the mirror to the ground, where hopefully it would break, but I couldn't let go. The mirror’s handle was clinging to me, and the more I tried to loosen my grip, the tighter it held on.
The young Egyptian woman was looking right at me, as though she were real. Even though I was freaked out, I said, aloud, “You are so beautiful.” She was, too.
“You are beautiful, also,” she said, politely. I really did try and drop the mirror then. I even shook it, the way you’d shake off a dog biting your ankle.
“Please,” she said, and she sounded as freaked out as I was. "Who are you? What is this place?"
I stopped shaking the mirror and looked at her once more. I had some rudimentary knowledge of ancient Egyptian, but she wasn't speaking her native language. She spoke mine. The words were said in English, but with a slight, exotic accent.
What do you say when an apparition in an ancient mirror asks your name? I gave it. "My name is Lucy Swift. Who are you?"
"I am Meritamun. Daughter of Amenemhat, High Priest of Amun. And you are in grave danger."
Not me. It was my mom, currently passed out on my bed, who had filched a priceless antiquity that had magic powers. I’d heard of cursed, Egyptian tombs, who hadn’t? "You've been separated from your gravesite. I'm very sorry about that, and I'm going get you back where you belong." So please don’t send disease and pestilence to my family.
She shook her head, looking impatient with me. "It is too late. Having me in your hand has put you in great danger."
"What about the person who actually found you? Are they in danger, too?"
Amazingly, she shook her head. "Only the person who has conjured me. He will use my power to destroy you. That which was meant to protect, now kills. I wish it could be different. You must prepare yourself."
And then the picture went fuzzy, as though we were communicating online and the connection were getting lost. She began to fade away. "Wait!" I cried. "Who is out to destroy me and how do I stop them?"
But with a final look of sadness she disappeared, and the mirror was once more only a mirror.
Chapter 3
"Mom? Mom! Are you all right?" I sat on the bed and chafed my mother's hands. She was breathing regularly and seemed to be sleeping naturally. After a minute or so, her eyes fluttered open and she looked at me, puzzled. "Lucy? What are you doing here? I thought you were in Oxford?"
Oh, I was seriously going to get her to a doctor. "I am in Oxford. So are you. You and Dad came to visit me, remember?"
She sat up and rubbed her temples. "No. I don't remember. I feel so strange."
And she had the behavior to back it up. "What's the last thing you do remember?"
She squinted, as though she were being interrogated, but that was her expression whenever she was thinking deeply. "It was such an exciting day. We found the tomb of one of the minor queens. I was deep inside the tomb. I remember something catching the light and glittering. Of course, nothing ever does glitter when it's been underground for that long, not even pure gold. I bent down." She shook her head. "That's the last thing I remember."
The spell on that mirror had led her straight to me, and the woman in the mirror, whoever she was, seemed to think that spell could destroy me. But why? And why had my mother felt compelled to hand-deliver death to her own daughter?
"And then you suddenly decided to visit me? In the middle of this exciting find?"
She put her hand to her head once more. "I wonder if I've got a touch of fever. It's all a blur. Perhaps that's why your father insisted we come. Because I was ill."
"Let's ask him."
I put the mirror on the bedside table and my mother didn't even glance at it as we both left the room.
Dad had napped through the entire incident, but when Mom called his name, he jerked awake. "Excellent idea. I'll call the college right away." Then he blinked fully awake and yawned. "I think I dropped off."
"Dad? Why did you and Mom suddenly decide to visit me?"
He looked at my mom and back at me. "We've been planning to come since your grandmother passed away, but we were going to wait a few weeks until we’d catalogued this new find. However, your mother suddenly decided she had to see you immediately. It was strange, because we were in the middle of something rather exciting, but your mother is a woman of strong determination.
“I agreed to come along, as there are some colleagues here in Oxford I'd very much like to see. Besides, we've been worried about you. We wanted to make sure that you’re living the life you've chosen rather than one your grandmother may have chosen for you."
That all sounded perfectly reasonable, except for the part where they had run out in the middle of a dig, and my mother had brought some kind of death-cursed mirror with her.
I asked, "Were you two together, your last day o
n the dig?"
"No," he said. “I was preparing a revised budget, asking for further funds since we'd discovered another tomb that we didn't know was there. Looking for funding is one of the things I hope to do here in Oxford. I also hope to find some promising graduate students who might like to spend a term out there with us. Anyway, your mother came running in, her eyes all bright and her cheeks flushed, to say we must come home immediately to see you, Lucy."
My mother had been listening to this. Now, she nodded, as though a tricky question had been answered. "I must have had a touch of fever. I don't remember any of that, or the journey here. If I had flushed cheeks and bright eyes, I'm sure that was it was fever."
He looked concerned. "You have been behaving strangely. Let’s get you to a doctor while you're here."
"Yes," she said. "It's probably time I had a check-up. In fact, we should both have one."
I wondered whether I should tell them about that mirror. Dad clearly didn't know anything about it and I had a feeling that Mom didn't remember. But, if I told them about the mirror, then I’d have to tell them about the magic spell that surrounded it. The thing was, they didn't know I was a witch. And they didn't know Gran was a vampire or that we hosted knitting circles for the undead several times a week. In the delicate state my mother seemed to be in, I didn't think revealing all that shocking, new information was a very good idea. If she’d fainted from the power of that mirror’s spell, finding out her daughter was a witch and her mother a vampire might be the end of her.
However, a woman in an ancient mirror had warned me I was in terrible danger. I needed help, probably of the supernatural kind, and fast. I also needed all the information about that dig site, and the tomb, that they could give me. "Who was in the tomb, exactly?"
