by Casey Lane
“This is a genuine lead. I know it.”
“How do you know it?”
“Because I am a direct descendent of Saint George himself, and I carry his relic.”
“His finger bone? The carbon dating was inconclusive.”
“I’m convinced of the bone’s authenticity.”
Stockhausen shifts to a more sympathetic tone. “I’m sure you’re right. Listen, I’m sorry to tell you this, but it’s not just your department under the budget axe. You’re in your fifties now, and we want you to take an early retirement.”
“What? That’s outrageous! I still have nine years left!”
“Look at it as an opportunity. Do you have any hobbies?”
“Killing dragons.”
“Alexander, please hear me when I say this. There are no dragons. You need a new hobby.”
“I won’t accept early retirement.”
“If you like, we can keep you on until April twenty-third. That’s Saint George’s day, the day you were knighted. That gives you a few months to wrap things up.”
“I can continue with this investigation?”
“Only if you agree to retire in April.”
I take a moment to think it over. This is probably the best deal I’ll receive. Once they see the results of my investigation, they won’t be able to retire me.
“Very well, Preceptor. I accept your terms, predicated, of course, on a generous severance package.”
She nods, relieved. “I’ll do my best. You’re dismissed.”
I leave her office, trying to calm my anger and despair. I’ve always had bad luck, and this is yet another example. But I can still salvage my career. I have the chronomichani, something KoR doesn’t know about, and I have a plan to use it.
Now is the time for bold action. As Alexander the Great once said, there is nothing impossible to him who will try.
Chapter Three
Dragon Blood
TYLER BUCK
I turn over in bed and find Ayana asleep beside me. How did she get here?
How much of that tej did I drink? I feel really tired, but oddly, I don’t have a hangover. My only regret about tonight is that I don’t remember the sex with Ayana. I bet it was spectacular.
I really need to piss. I slip out of bed, duck under the mosquito gauze, and relieve myself in the nearby bathroom. Once my eyes adjust to the bathroom light, I check the slim waterproof travel pouch hanging around my neck. I never take it off, even in the shower. It carries my passport, credit cards, and a bunch of the big-ticket gift cards. I’m relieved to find that nothing is missing.
Traveling a lot has made me wary of thieves. I always leave my survey gear locked up with hotel security, but I never trust my passport with anyone.
I leave the bathroom and head for the table next to the hotel room door. I left my wallet there, and as always, I put a single hair between the folds so I’ll know if someone messed with it. The wallet is just for show. It has a few dollars in it to keep any muggers happy. I also use it to test people. I hold the wallet up to the moonlight and see that the hair is still there.
So Ayana isn’t a thief. That’s nice. But even if she was, it wouldn’t be a deal breaker. In Paris last year, I slept with a girl who had stolen my bait wallet five months before. Of course, she stole it again, but it was totally worth it.
I understand thieves. Some people would call me one. I’m okay with that. My mom followed the rules all her life, and look where it got her. We lived in poverty and despair. But not anymore.
I head back to bed, eager to wake up Ayana and do some stuff with her that I’ll actually remember.
But the bed is empty. She must have slipped out while I was in the bathroom. Damn it to hell.
By morning, I’m in a Jeep with my nervous driver. He’s probably not a day over eighteen, and he’s taking me to a part of the Omo Valley the locals call the Ghostlands.
My two security guys, both former Ethiopian soldiers, left a few hours before us to scout out the survey zone. They’ll radio my driver if they see any problems ahead.
We pass a village with conical huts and makeshift animal corrals. Topless Mursi women with huge clay discs in their lips collect money from leering Westerners who want a picture with them. I hate those kinds of tourists. Exploiting the poverty of the natives just to impress their social media buddies. I hope they’re getting overcharged.
A few hours later we reach the Omo River. My driver stops the Jeep and steps out to check an old bridge with steel railings and wooden planks. Some of the planks have holes, revealing the chocolate-colored water below.
Satisfied with the bridge’s condition, the driver returns to the Jeep and we cross without a problem. It’s a little bumpy, but not the worst bridge I’ve seen.
We soon pass another village, this one not meant for the tourists. There are no beautiful girls with painted clay discs in their lips, just tired women with babies on their hips, and brown-toothed men carrying AK-47s. There isn’t any terrorism here, but there are a lot of fights over grazing rights.
For a few minutes, a group of boys chases after our Jeep, calling out something I don’t understand. I ask the driver to translate, but he ignores me. His English isn’t very good, so maybe he didn’t understand my question.
The boys break away when an old man starts waving a green stick at them.
We pass the next few hours without seeing any people at all. I also haven’t seen any animals. I read online that Ethiopia has leopards, cheetahs, lions, giraffes, hyenas, crocodiles, and monkeys. So where are they? I guess I was expecting a nonstop safari.
I track our progress on my mobile phone’s GPS. There’s no cell signal out here, but the GPS still picks up the satellites and I cached the maps before I got here. We have trouble finding a road that leads to where we need to go, so the driver reluctantly sets an off-road course.
In the distant north, I can see the blue mountains of Ethiopia’s highlands. That’s the source of the Omo River. The silt it picks up there turns the water brown.
I smell something smoky and sweet and realize the small thorny bushes we’re passing are myrrh trees. There is also an occasional mushroom-shaped acacia tree, which for me is the symbol of Africa.
We finally manage to find the survey zone, where the driver refuels the Jeep from the battered metal tanks of gas we’ve been carrying.
I unload my survey gear, along with the camping equipment I got in Arba Minch. I also have an old rifle I bought off the driver’s boss. I’m no gun expert, but I know it’s best to have one out here.
I don’t see any sign of my security guards, but the driver insists they are here. I ask him to stay until they show up.
After I unload, the effing driver takes off without a word. He damned well better return in a week to pick me up. He wanted me to pay in advance for the return trip, but I refused. If I did that, I’d be stuck out here forever.
I stop and take a moment to study my surroundings. I’m in an area of desert scrub. It reminds me a little of the high desert outside of Pueblo. A vulture glides in slow circles high above, the first sign of life I’ve seen out here.
I survey the terrain with my treasure hunter’s eye. I can see why Beasley is interested in this spot. His satellite images no doubt picked up the large hill nearby. There are other hills in the area, but none like this one, which stands alone from the others.
If I was going to build a Coptic shrine, it would be on top of that hill. But I know not to look there first. If there was a visible structure, Beasley would have mentioned it. I’ll need to hike around the hill and study the erosion patterns. When buildings fall apart, they tend to get washed away, so I always search the low points first. Ancient, dry riverbeds are a great place to find interesting pieces. When I caught the treasure hunting bug, I took some geology and archeology classes at the community college. I learned a lot. It’s a shame you can’t get a degree in treasure hunting.
I get to work setting up camp and barely finish by
dark. There isn’t enough wood around for a fire, so I cook dinner on a propane stove: chili from a just-add-water package.
There’s still no sign of my security guys, and I’m worried. I keep thinking about those men with AK-47s. Did they kill my security men, or did my guys simply abandon me?
This situation isn’t looking good, so I should report in to Lord Beasley.
I unpack the kit with the satellite phone and am stunned to find it empty. Who took it? The driver? Someone at the hotel? I doubt it. It was probably taken at the airport. I should have done a full inventory of my equipment before I left, but I was irritated and wasn’t thinking. That was a stupid mistake.
So here I am, in the middle of nowhere, with no security and no communications, and my driver isn’t returning for a week. Assuming, of course, that he is coming back. He didn’t look too happy to be out here.
I try to calm myself by watching the stars. There’s no light pollution here, and the sky is so clear I can see the dust of the Milky Way.
I’m really tired, and despite this bad situation, I have to get some sleep. As I crawl into my tent, I find myself wishing it had windows. I won’t be able to see the lions sneaking up on me, and these thin tent walls won’t do much to stop them.
I curl up with my hands on my rifle.
After a mostly sleepless night, I crawl exhausted from my tent and start some oatmeal on the propane stove.
The air is different in the morning, wetter and muskier. A haze is blocking my view of the highlands.
I’m eager to get started on the survey. Hopefully, the work will keep me from worrying about all the ways there are to die out here.
I gulp down my oatmeal with a cup of instant coffee. Nasty stuff, this coffee. I use a double dose and it wakes the hell out of me.
As I prep my survey gear, I notice animal tracks in the dust outside my tent. Shit, I don’t remember seeing those when I made camp. They look like dog prints. Were the hyenas here, hunting for human flesh?
I once had a guide who peed a circle around the tent before going to bed. Marked it as his territory. I should probably start doing that.
After breakfast, I get all my gear together and hike toward the hill. Almost immediately I find a likely washout area and set up the ground-penetrating radar to have a quick look. If this place proves promising, I’ll build a proper search grid and walk the transects.
My badass 3-D underground imager cost about thirty grand. Beasley picked up the tab, of course. It looks like a lawnmower on two big wheels. It runs on solar-charged batteries and shows the ground in colors, with green being regular dirt and red being objects of interest. I can send the feed in real time to my phone or a pair of goggles. All the chronological and spatial data is recorded with the imaging. I can even run time slices at different depths in the soil. Took me a month to learn how to use it, but I love this thing.
After a few minutes, I get a hit on something with a promising shape about seven inches below the surface. I grab my shovel and dig, being careful not to strike the prospect.
A few minutes later, I pull a long object from the sandy soil. Crap, it’s a JAFR. Just Another Fucking Rock. The shape fooled me. That happens sometimes.
Still, I have a good feeling about this area. Without wasting any more time, I run ribbon to make a thirty-by-fifty-foot grid with corridors for the GPR. It takes me a few hours to make three passes over the grid, each at a different depth.
It turns out to be a huge waste of time. The JAFR was the only thing here. I’m not off to a great start, and I’m second-guessing myself. Who’s to say the shrine was built on exposed ground? It could be under the hill, hidden inside a sealed-off cavern. Maybe I should have started on top of the hill.
Suddenly, I hear hooting and laughing. I recognize that sound from a video I watched before I left Florida. Hyenas! God, they sound creepy.
I grab the rifle and survey the scrub. I don’t see anything. Suddenly I feel a pain on the back of my neck. Adrenaline hits me as I slap my neck, crushing a giant fly. Shit, I didn’t put on repellent this morning! What if it’s a tsetse fly bite?
As I scramble to dig the bug spray out of my pack, I can’t help feeling like I’m already getting sleeping sickness. What was I thinking, coming out here by myself? That Roman payroll cache is looking pretty good right now. New rule: I don’t go anywhere where the drivers drop you off and flee for their lives.
By the time I return to camp and cook some freeze-dried lasagna, it’s already late afternoon. I should hike to the top of the hill and set out another grid, but I don’t have the energy. I’ve been tired since my night with Ayana. That must have been some really wild sex I’ve forgotten. If I didn’t know better, I’d think she slipped me a roofie. But nothing was stolen, so what would be the point?
How should I spend the last of the afternoon? I think about trying to gather wood for a proper fire, but it’s hard to come by out here, and the hyenas are probably lying in wait. I think I’ll stick with the propane stove.
I hook up my electronics to the solar chargers and settle down in a folding canvas chair to read an e-book on my phone. It’s a book on dragon lore I didn’t have time to start before I left the States.
The book is big, so I skip to the section on African mythology. For some reason, I don’t think of Africa as having dragons, but boy, am I wrong. The dragons here are like giant flying snakes. They have something called Aido-Hwedo. It’s a rainbow serpent that can fly between the realms of heaven and earth. He prefers cooler places, so he stays in the water. And he eats iron bars made by red monkeys. Pretty wild stuff!
As the sun sets, I realize my bowels are moving, so I grab my rifle, toilet tissue, wet wipes, and shovel. I walk about fifty feet from the tent, where I find a good place to do my business. I dig a hole, take one last look for hyenas, and drop my pants.
I finish up quickly. As I’m cleaning my hands with a wet wipe, I see someone grab the rifle sitting on the ground beside me.
Panic hits me as I turn to face a black man wearing a rainbow-colored dragon mask. He stares at me with dead eyes but makes no aggressive moves.
Many more masked figures emerge from the cover of a ravine, a mix of men and women, all wearing scary masks with a fanged rainbow serpent. The more muscular men are wearing something that looks like brass knuckles with sharp crystal claws.
Holy shit! Please tell me I’m dreaming. I was reading that book and I fell asleep and now I’m dreaming about some crazy-assed dragon cult. It’s time to wake up, Tyler. Wake up!
But I don’t wake up.
One of the women approaches, speaking softly. “Don’t be afraid, Tyler.”
The voice sounds familiar. Is that Ayana? Her body looks right, but I can’t see her face behind the mask.
She reaches out for my hand, but I take a step back.
She slides the mask to the top of her head. It’s Ayana all right, wearing rainbow eye shadow. She looks crazy, but hot!
She reaches out her hand again. If this is a dream, I’m damn sure going to have some fun in it.
I take her hand, immediately regretting it when I feel a prick on my palm. As I pull my hand away I see she’s wearing a ring with a tiny pair of gold dragon fangs on the underside. My palm feels numb. Did she poison me? What the fuck, Ayana? I thought you were cool.
I wake up with a pounding headache and find myself lying on a stone table in a dimly lit room. The walls are rough stone and it feels like I’m deep underground. My hands and legs are bound to the table by stone manacles. I struggle to free myself, but it’s hopeless. The stone cuffs don’t seem to have any hinges. I wonder how they got them on me.
In a niche on the far wall I see a stunning piece of art. It’s a rainbow dragon sculpture covered with gemstones. The jewels twinkle in the flickering light of the candles all around the room. That dragon relic must be worth a fortune!
Below the gemstone dragon, on a long mantel, is a row of mummified human heads. The ones on the far left are nearly dust, and
the ones on the right look newer. A scorpion crawls through the dark hair of one of the heads.
What the hell is going on? The Mursi aren’t headhunters. But something tells me these dragon freaks aren’t Mursi.
I hear someone enter the room. It’s Ayana, who puts a gentle hand on my chest. “I’m so sorry about this, Tyler.”
“Sorry! You’re sorry? That doesn’t even begin to fix this, you crazy bitch. What’s going on? Are you cutting off heads to get your jollies?”
She winces at my harsh words. “No, Tyler, we didn’t behead them. We simply preserved their heads after they died.”
“Look, we can talk about this, but first you have to set me free.”
She shakes her head sadly. “I cannot. The bindings have taken hold.”
“Get a sledgehammer and bust them open. I don’t care if you break a bone or two, just get me out of them.”
She strokes my forehead. “Tyler, if you truly understood the gift we are bestowing, you would not want to leave.”
“How about the gift of freedom? That’s a great gift. No one ever returns it.”
A man in a dragon mask enters the room carrying an old-fashioned silver syringe with a huge needle. He hands the device to Ayana, who holds it down below my eye line, just like my dentist.
“What’s in the syringe, Ayana?”
She whispers the words with reverence. “Dragon blood.”
I shake my head. “There’s no such thing as dragons. Somebody sold you some snake oil.”
She looks disappointed. “Listen to me, Tyler. Nearly two thousand years ago, the Coptic Church killed a dragon and enshrined its bones nearby, in one of their foul churches, as a warning against evil. But there’s nothing evil about dragons. They are wondrous creatures. Four hundred years later, my comrades destroyed the Coptic shrine and buried those sacred bones in a place where they will never be found.”
“What comrades? The crazies with the Halloween masks?”
