The Bone Conjurer

by Alex Archer

“Probably not,” she decided with a sigh. “I’m much too busy most of the time. And running about like a mad woman the rest of the time.”

  “No time for a love life? Annja.” He shook his head. “What did I teach you about taking time for yourself?”

  “The enslaved soul dies. Or something like that.”

  “Close enough. You need to take care of yourself, is what it boils down to. All work and no play, well, you know how that one goes.”

  She did. But somehow, even when Annja finagled a little vacation time, it managed to become work. Or adventure. Or both—with bullets.

  She had to laugh at her life sometimes. It was either that or scream.

  The professor pried off the box top and let out a whistle. “Standard skull enhanced with decorative gold. You seen one, you’ve seen a million. Small though. Newborn. What’s so special about this one, Annja?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  She was surprised at his dismissive assessment of the skull. Though his focus was on sociology as opposed to anthropology, which went a little way in explaining his lacking interest.

  “As I’ve said, someone has already been killed for it. The guy I got this from was able to tell me he was afraid someone wanted to take it away from him before he was shot.”

  “Such a life you live. Puts my world-crossing shenanigans to shame.”

  She doubted that one. Annja did dodge a bullet or two more often than most. But she had nowhere near as many notches on her bedpost as this man.

  The professor fished out a magnifying glass from a drawer by his hip and studied the gold creeping along the sutures. “Cross pattée. Teutonic? The gold was added much later than this baby died.”

  “You think? What’s your guess on age?”

  “Haven’t a clue. Though Teutonic is thirteenth century—formed at the end of the twelfth. That means little. We don’t have the supplies in the lab to properly date it. We don’t have a department dedicated to archaeology, as you know. Though perhaps Lamont might have the carbon-14 equipment. They do dendrochronology—dating tree rings—so they could probably take a look at this skull.”

  Annja knew all the earth and environmental science people were located at Lamont.

  Danzinger turned the skull upside down to peek inside the hole on the occipital bone at the skull base where the spinal cord normally ran through.

  “There’s something inside. Carvings?” he asked.

  “What?” Annja was caught off guard.

  “You didn’t notice the interior designs? Looks like carvings. I’ll need a scope.”

  He tucked the skull against his rib cage and wandered to a cabinet on the wall. Rooting around like a mechanic who sorts through a toolbox, he produced an articulated snake light from a scatter of tools and returned to the lab table with it.

  The end of the snake light had a USB connection. He plugged it into his computer. It opened a program that, Annja realized, streamed video from the light.

  “It’s a little camera on the end?” she asked.

  “Cool, huh? Isn’t technology a marvel?”

  He poked the device inside the skull. Carved designs appeared on the computer monitor.

  “Wow.” Annja inspected the image. His movements were jerky and she could only make out lines here and there. “Stop. Let me look at this. You think those were carved? But how? That would take a pretty precise instrument to work through such a small hole, and these are very elaborate carvings.”

  “Unless the skull sections were pried away for the carvings and then the sutures were resealed with the gold.”

  “No, it hasn’t been separated like that. The skull is intact.”

  “Annja, you think it came this way? Or rather, it was born this way?”

  It was a silly conjecture, she realized. “Let me see.”

  He handed her the skull and camera, but she only took the skull.

  Poking a finger inside the hole, she traced it along a carved line and dug in her fingernail to test the depth. It was shallow and the edges were smooth. It felt natural, as if the lines had existed since the skull had, well, been born.

  It was utterly ridiculous. Human skulls were not embedded with a worm’s nest of interconnecting carvings. The designs had to be manmade, and the gold supported that guess.

  Still, she smoothed the pad of her finger over the designs. It was remarkable no sharp edges appeared that would give a clue the lines had been carved. Of course time would soften all knife edges and chisel marks. But even on the inside?

  “Can you leave this here with me overnight?” Danzinger asked. “With patience I might be able to map the interior with the camera.”

  “So you’re interested now? It’s no longer just another skull?”

  “Hey, with the holiday this weekend the building is serene. It’s difficult to leave when there’s not a soul to bother me. I’ve got a few hours to spare tonight. Joleen broke our date.”

  “I don’t even want to know.” She caught his sly wink. “What holiday?”

  “Seriously? Annja, it’s Thanksgiving in two days.”

  “Oh, right. I don’t pay much attention to the calendar.” She tapped the skull. “I’ll leave it. I’d love to see what’s going on inside this thing.”

  He took the skull and nestled it carefully in the lamb’s wool. “Cool. I will call you as soon as I have something.”

  She scribbled her cell phone number on a piece of paper and he tucked it in his pants pocket.

  “So, Annja, if you ever need an expert on classic electric guitars for the show, you know where to find me.”

  “You’ll be the first I ask. What a pair you and Kristie would make on the screen. They’d have to do up posters and send you to fan conventions to sign them.”

  “You think?”

  She smirked, and shook his hand. “Thanks, Professor. Call me as soon as you have something.”

  ANNJA STOPPED in the lobby below her loft and chatted with Wally, the building’s superintendent, while she sipped coffee. The building’s residents were all on friendly terms. She liked the small community and felt safer for it.

  The connection to people who didn’t necessarily know her well, but well enough to smile at sight of her and offer a few friendly words, was something she cherished. A girl who had grown up in an orphanage will take all the camaraderie she can get.

  Climbing the fourth-floor stairs, she was glad for the residents’ rule of no elevator after-hours because the thing was creaky and loud. Who needed an elevator when the exercise felt great?

  Tugging the thief’s backpack from her shoulder, she swung its empty weight by her side as she took the stairs.

  A strange touch of grief suddenly shivered inside her rib cage. She hadn’t known the guy at the bridge. They’d had a few online conversations, shared some common knowledge and a fascination for old skulls. Yet he’d died standing right next to her. She had used his body as a shield to break the water during their fall.

  As much as she’d encountered death in her life—and it had increased tenfold over the past few years—Annja would never become so used to it that it didn’t at least make her wonder about the life lost. It was the archaeologist in her.

  If some goon were intent on killing her, and she had to take his life to save her own, the regret was minimal. But innocents caught in the line of fire? That was tough to deal with.

  Had Sneak been innocent? Bart suspected he might be a thief from the description she’d given him of the tools. Yet, if he were a thief, why bring the booty to her? Wouldn’t he have his own network of experts to authenticate an artifact?

  Unless he was just forming that network, and he’d neglected to mention she had been chosen as his expert archaeologist.

  What nest of vipers had she stepped into by meeting the man and claiming the skull?

  Whoever had killed the thief had gotten a look at her, surely, through the rifle scope. She hadn’t looked her best last night with a ski cap pulled to her ears and bundled against the c
old so, hopefully, whatever look the sniper had gotten hadn’t been enough to pick her out from a crowd. With her face flashed across the TV screen on occasional Thursday nights it wasn’t easy going incognito.

  She pushed open the fourth-floor stairway door. The sudden awareness that something was not right made her pause before her loft door labeled with 4A. She held her palm over the knob, not touching it.

  The door wasn’t open, but she sensed a weird vibe in the air. Intuition had always been good to her.

  Had someone been here while she was gone?

  “Paranoia does not suit you, Annja,” she muttered, and twisted the knob.

  Apparently paranoia fit this time.

  Her loft had been ransacked. The messy desktop was now clear save the laptop. Books, papers, manuscripts, pens and small artifacts were spread haphazardly across the floor. One sweep of an arm had cleared them from the desk.

  Curtains were pulled from the rod and heaped on the floor. So much for dusting them. Couch cushions were tossed against the wall and the couch overturned. The filming setup in the corner of her living room was trashed. The green screen coiled on the floor, and the camera sprawled on top of that.

  Everything had been touched. She didn’t want to venture into the kitchen. She got a glimpse of a cracked peanut-butter jar from the doorway.

  The reason Annja didn’t rush into the kitchen sat on the desk chair before her. As if waiting for her return.

  Annja lowered her body into a ready crouch, but she did not summon her sword to her grip. She didn’t know who he was, but she wasn’t so quick to reveal her secrets before she learned the secrets of others.

  Besides, he didn’t jump her, nor did he have a pistol aimed on any important body parts.

  The man was bald, seeming tall from his seated position and his broad shoulders and dressed in a dark suit with a black tie. He looked up from his canted bow through his lashes, which made him seem more sinister than the business suit could ever manage.

  Could he be the man who’d pulled her from the canal? That man had been bald.

  “Annja Creed,” he said calmly. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

  7

  He sounded Russian. The voice was deep but the tones were even and he didn’t sound threatening.

  What was she thinking? The man had destroyed her home. And she had a pretty good idea what he must have been looking for.

  “You know my name. It’s only polite I learn yours.” Still in defensive mode, Annja kept the open door behind her in case a quick escape was needed.

  “Serge,” he said, putting a Slavic lilt on the second syllable. “You know what I am here for, Miss Creed.”

  “I have no idea. How about you tell me? That is, after you apologize for tearing my place apart. You’ve tossed valuable artifacts about as if toys.”

  “Unfortunately, not the valuable artifact I seek. You slipped through my fingers last night.”

  So he was the guy at the canal. That explained the bruise at the corner of his left eye. Points for the half-frozen chick.

  “I know you have it. I saw the pictures you posted online.”

  Crap. For as many times as she’d posted photos—and said postings had resulted in cluing the bad guys to finding her—she would never learn. And yet…

  “How did you find me? I cover my tracks well online. My Internet profile is secure. You couldn’t have traced me.”

  “I have my ways.”

  She chuffed, then thought better of angering the guy who had turned over her heavy leather couch. His ways may simply include following her cab home last night. She only took it eight blocks. And she had been out of her head, not thinking clearly.

  On the other hand, she’d left him flat on his back. He couldn’t possibly have followed her.

  “So you knew the man I spoke to last night before you shot him?”

  “I fired no weapons last evening.”

  That supported her theory on the existence of both the sniper and her attacker.

  “So, you and the sniper work together?”

  The man looked aside, breaking eye contact, but he didn’t drop his dead calm. He reconnected with her gaze immediately. “No,” he said quietly.

  Interesting. So if this one had been tracking the thief for the skull, then what stake had the sniper in the whole thing? How many parties were involved? She counted three so far—the thief, the sniper and this lunk.

  “I’ve spent an hour going through your things,” he said. “It’s not here.”

  “I could have told you that, if you’d been polite enough to simply ask.”

  Her things? That implied something so personal. Things that were meant for her eyes only. The idea of this creepy bald guy shuffling through her underwear sent a shiver up Annja’s spine. He didn’t look the sort who would linger over silky things.

  Then again, crazy never did look crazy until it was too late.

  “News of the skull’s emergence pleased me.” The slow calm of his speech made her wonder if he thought out his words before releasing them into the ether. “It is quite the prize. I thought to have it in hand last night. But then the contact you know as Sneak switched things. I was unaware of your clandestine meeting on the bridge.”

  That meant Serge had been tracking the thief. Or the sniper, Annja thought.

  Emergence? That might rule out the possibility of it being taken from a dig sight.

  “I still cannot understand why he would give it to you,” Serge said.

  Well, he didn’t have to make it sound as if she were a distasteful tangle of octopus sitting on a plate of greens, she thought. She said nothing in response.

  “I have studied you, Annja. On your own computer.”

  That explained the laptop on the desk, powered up and open to Google. Nice of him to spare that expensive piece of equipment. The green screen and camera, on the other hand, were definitely a loss.

  “You’re a television personality.” His grimace was accompanied by strange wonder. “As well, an archaeologist. But you’re no one special, Miss Creed. You are common. Your schooling is common. Your expertise not equal to the world’s foremost in your field. Why would he give the skull to you?”

  She shrugged. “I’m cuter than you are?”

  The man tilted a malevolent frown at her.

  What did he expect after that berating put-down? Common? She’d show him common. And he wouldn’t see it coming.

  He stood in one smooth motion. The dark navy suit was tailored to his body. It revealed thick biceps and a broad chest. She couldn’t detect any sign of a shoulder holster for a gun bulging under the arm.

  He didn’t approach her. Annja maintained her ready position by the door. Knees slightly bent, hips aligned with her shoulders. Fluttering her fingers, she thought of the sword. It was right at her grasp with a beckon—but she didn’t call it.

  If he was willing to talk, she’d get what information from him she was able. Then she’d show him how very uncommon she could be.

  “It’s not here,” she offered.

  She wasn’t about to give directions to Danzinger or Columbia, because she could guess how that would end. One body last night was enough for her.

  “I believe you,” Serge said. “You don’t have it on your person, either, because you entered with nothing but that empty backpack.”

  She’d dropped it inside the doorway.

  “Do you work for Benjamin?” he asked.

  “Benjamin?” Annja cursed silently. If she’d played that one right, she could have danced around, tried to finagle exactly who Benjamin was. The name meant nothing to her.

  Serge nodded, picking up on her lacking knowledge.

  He toed a thin steel lock pick that had scattered during his melee. “You don’t know what you’ve been given, do you, Miss Creed?”

  Held by his pale gray gaze, she stared at him as if to dig the answer out from his expression. Phrenology was the science of determining character and personality from skull shape. She
wondered what a big, rugged cranium meant.

  The longer she looked into his eyes, the more she felt creepy crawlies skitter up her spine.

  “No, I have no idea what it is.” She looked aside at the mess, then caught movement in her peripheral vision.

  Serge reached inside his suit coat and drew out a blade.

  Any previous reluctance to calling out her sword fled.

  With a lunge to her right, Annja dipped low. She summoned the battle sword. It emerged from the otherwhere in an instant. It fit into her palm with a sure grip. She hoped she’d made it seem as though she were plucking the sword from the floor behind the couch. With a bend of her knee she thrust toward Serge.

  With minimum movement, he flicked his wrist, blocking her stab with the edge of his bowie knife. A nod acknowledged her challenge. His dark eyes narrowed.

  Annja swung low, seeing if she could get a rise out of the guy. He had only to step back, then forward, as the sword swept past his thigh.

  He retaliated with swift grace. The knife passed near her cheek, but didn’t cut flesh. His reach was long and surprisingly agile for one so large and bulky.

  “I don’t know how you think fighting me is going to help you find the skull,” she said. A twist of shoulder and a double step backward put her out of reach from his next swipe. Annja slashed her sword across Serge’s shoulder, opening the seam of his suit coat. “I don’t have it,” she said.

  “But you had it. Which means, you know where it is now.”

  She didn’t answer. Couldn’t. A knife to the thigh sliced out a painful chirp from her. It cut through her jeans and a couple of layers of skin. Score one for the bald guy.

  Annja countered by spinning and putting her shoulder to his. She twisted and gripped his knife wrist. Releasing the sword she grabbed his sleeve. A twist moved Serge into a spin and he wobbled and fell. The force of landing popped the bowie from his grip. The knife flipped in the air and hit the wall with a clank, dropping onto a stray couch cushion.

  He slapped a hand over her throat and shoved her off him. Annja’s hips connected with the desk. Turning and rolling across the desk she came to her feet with sword again in hand.