Into The Jaws Of The Lion (The Arkana Archaeology Mystery Series Book 5)

by N. S. Wikarski

  “Have I?” She shot him a doubtful glance. “Maybe. But it’s just that my son Abel is missing, you see. And I have to find him. He’s been stolen away and I don’t know where to look next.”

  Abraham realized that the situation was even graver than he’d supposed. She had originally told Daniel of a recurring dream that her son was missing. Now, she seemed convinced that an abduction had actually taken place. She could no longer distinguish between illusion and reality.

  “Your son hasn’t been stolen away,” the Diviner explained calmly. “The Lord has seen fit to take him back to heaven. He’s dead, Annabeth.”

  She caught her breath sharply. “That’s a lie.”

  Abraham stared at her in disbelief. Nobody, least of all a woman, had ever flatly contradicted the word of a Diviner. He tried again. “I assure you, I am not lying. Your son is dead.”

  Annabeth shook her head. “No, no, no! The angel told me I would find my boy soon. She said—”

  “She!” Abraham pounced on the word. “There are no female angels. What an absurd notion!” He caught himself. Keeping his temper was going to prove difficult in the face of her obstinacy.

  “There are SO female angels.” Daniel’s wife gave a secret smile. “I know it was a she because I saw her as plain as I’m seeing you now. She said she was my guardian angel and had been looking after me my whole life. Then she told me she didn’t like to see me so sad and that I shouldn’t lose hope. She promised that I would see my son again very soon.”

  “And what did this...” He paused and smirked. “This angel of yours look like?”

  Annabeth closed her eyes, picturing the apparition. “She was a beautiful lady with long flowing hair and a white gown that was so soft it must have been spun from clouds. The hem of her robe shimmered with stars. And she had wings too. Wings that reached from the top of her head all the way to the ground. Huge wings that could soar higher in the sky than I could see.”

  The Diviner leaned forward in his chair, peering closely at her. “I am the Diviner, am I not?”

  The woman nodded uncertainly.

  “The Lord has appointed me as the guardian of his flock. God speaks to me, Annabeth. Not to you. And I tell you there are no female angels. This is surely a trick of Satan’s!”

  “It is not!” She unexpectedly jumped out of her chair. “This is no trick. The lady angel was the only one who could make those demon voices go away. She banished them just like that.” Annabeth snapped her fingers in a casual gesture of dismissal.

  She continued. “I know you don’t believe in female angels. You don’t even believe women belong in heaven unless their husbands let them in. Mother Rachel told me so. I think you’re wrong about that. Women can get to heaven all on their own otherwise there wouldn’t be any lady angels.”

  The Diviner took a deep breath and counted to ten. He rose and towered above her. “Let me repeat once more—a female angel is an illusion fabricated by the Devil.”

  “Then why do I feel better when I listen to her?” Annabeth stamped her foot impatiently. “Why is it she can stop the demons in my head when you can’t?”

  He glowered at her. “Because you are being deluded by Satan, you foolish woman. Read the scriptures! It’s right there in print.” He pointed to the oak stand between the windows that held his leather-bound Bible. “All the angels who are mentioned in both the Old and the New Testament have masculine names. They are referred to as ‘he’—never ‘she’. There is not one instance, not a single case, in which an angel is described as female.”

  Annabeth darted over to the Bible stand. She gripped the edges of the sacred tome, studying the lettering with keen interest. Flipping rapidly through page after page, she scanned the text, mouthing the words as she went. After several minutes of fruitless searching, she raised her head. “I can’t find her,” she said plaintively.

  The Diviner struggled to suppress a smile of triumph. He was finally getting through. “It’s as I told you. There are no female angels, Annabeth.”

  A cunning expression flitted across her face. “Only men get to write in this book, don’t they?”

  Abraham was taken aback by the question.

  Before he could formulate a reply, she had drifted off and was apparently talking to the Bible itself. She released her grip on its pages and they fluttered back into place. “No. You wouldn’t allow any lady angels in here.” She transferred her attention to the locked bookcases filled with prophecies written by former Diviners. “Only men get to write in those books too, I’ll bet.”

  She backed toward the center of the room and then revolved in a slow circle. Her index finger pointed accusingly at the Bible and at the other volumes lining the walls. “Men’s books everywhere I look. Men stole all the words.”

  Rounding on the Diviner, she said, “Men think they know everything but they don’t. Men don’t know what mothers feel: the pain of birthing a new life into the world, how your heart bleeds when that little life is ripped out of your arms for no reason at all.” She paused. “The lady angel knew. I didn’t have to explain any of that to her.” She gave a bitter laugh. “Men busy as bees. Stealing all the words. Writing all the rules. Telling me how I should feel about things they can’t even guess at.” Annabeth shook her head vehemently. “No more!”

  She ran back toward the Bible, her eyes flashing with hostility. With a violent shove, she toppled the oaken stand, pitching Abraham’s sacred volume to the floor. She kicked the book open, exposing its thin sheets of text. Then in an act of supreme sacrilege, she crouched down and ripped out handfuls of pages and threw them in the air. “No more SHOULD! No more MUST! No more WORDS!” she screamed. “NO MORE!”

  “Annabeth!” Abraham roared. He rushed over and dragged her up by her hair. She squirmed in his grasp but he managed to haul her to the door, ejecting her forcibly from the room. “Be gone, witch! Back to your quarters!”

  She wasn’t in the least cowed by his display of temper. Instead, she stuck her tongue out at him like an unruly child and then ran away.

  Abraham slammed the door and leaned his back against it, winded by the physical exertion. Truth be told, he was even more shaken by the appalling display he had just witnessed. In all his years as Diviner, he had never seen such an outright act of defiance. Not even from his most rebellious archwarden. And to think a woman was capable of such conduct. A mere woman, he repeated to himself, gazing at his desecrated Bible. No, not a woman, his inner voice told him —something far worse.

  He hobbled over to the windows and righted the overturned oak stand. Then he gently lifted the holy book back to its rightful place, gathering the torn pages and fitting them into proper order. He realized with a sense of shock that his hands were trembling. His own immobility in the face of Annabeth’s rampage alarmed him as much as the outburst itself. Satan had chosen his vessel well. The Diviner felt a sense of mortification that this creature was the principal wife of the Scion—his heir. He’d had a premonition since their earliest encounters that Annabeth’s folly might open a floodgate that could wash them all to perdition.

  The Diviner knew that the Lord would surely hold him accountable. If the Devil succeeded in infiltrating the Nephilim, it was because Abraham had not been strong enough to prevent such a catastrophe. The prophet would pay a high price for his negligence. He rubbed his forehead wearily, recalling his ambitious plan to win the Lord’s favor. He had aspired to sit at the right hand of God. And now...

  He shivered involuntarily. All his designs would go for naught if he couldn’t check Satan’s poisonous influence over his flock. Despite his careful measures, Abraham had been a fool to believe that a fence, or a surveillance camera, or a dozen soldiers with guns could stop the invisible source of all evil. The Diviner felt himself at a complete loss.

  He limped over to his prie-dieu and knelt down, wincing with pain. He shut his eyes and rested his forehead against his clasped hands, beseeching the Lord to guide him—to show him the means to fight this incor
poreal foe. His inner voice immediately reminded him that Satan might be incorporeal but his vessel was not.

  Abraham opened his eyes, startled by the obvious realization. Annabeth was mortal. She might be under the thrall of the Devil but she, herself, was quite tangible. Certainly, there must be a way to restrain her. Over the years, the Diviner had dealt with many cases of insubordinate wives. The usual procedure was to send such women to asylums where they could be medicated and kept out of sight. Some could be rehabilitated. Others remained there for the rest of their lives. He brightened. Yes, he could send her away.

  Almost as soon as the plan occurred to him, its flaw became apparent. He slumped back over his cushioned armrest. The Diviner realized that Annabeth was no typical Consecrated Bride who refused to submit to the will of her husband. She was much more dangerous than that. By sending her to a Nephilim asylum, Abraham might be providing her with the means to cast her wicked spell over the other inmates—encouraging them to flout the word of God as she, herself, had done. The spiritual contagion which had thus far been contained within the walls of the compound would spread and Annabeth’s evil master would rejoice.

  If that weren’t reason enough to prevent the Diviner from institutionalizing Annabeth, the old man belatedly remembered the promise he had made his son. Abraham never went back on his word and he had vowed that Annabeth would be at peace by the time Daniel returned. How in the name of heaven was he supposed to make that happen? Once more he shut his eyes and beseeched God to show him a solution to this insurmountable difficulty. He waited in silence while the clock on the wall ticked out the minutes. He didn’t know how long he knelt there motionless before he heard his inner voice whisper to him once more. At last! He gave a sigh of relief and opened his eyes. Rising on rickety limbs, Abraham murmured a prayer of thanksgiving that the Lord had been merciful. God had just revealed to him the solution to his problem. He would be able to fulfill his promise to his son after all.

  Chapter 43—Observations

  Daniel stood on a hot, dusty hillside surveying what had once been the ancient city of Dholavira. It had come as a shock for him to realize how technologically- advanced these prehistoric people were. In fact, it called into question much of what he had learned through his studies in the library as well as what his father taught. The Diviner preached that the world was only six thousand years old. In all likelihood, the Indus Valley civilization was already thriving by the time Adam and Eve took their first bite of the apple.

  The Scion consulted his map of the dig site. Chris had told him to find a section of the excavation called the bailey and to locate any circular structures within its walls as these might have been astronomical observatories. The word “tower” in the riddle could refer to such a place. Daniel looked ruefully at the ground. There were no structures. Only squares of brick indicating the foundations of long-demolished buildings.

  He glanced off in the distance toward the guest house where Leroy Hunt had sequestered himself to nurse a particularly stubborn hangover. As Daniel had expected, Hunt drank himself into a stupor the night before they left in anticipation of several days without alcohol. Needless to say, the early morning flight from Mumbai to Bhuj and the lengthy car ride to Dholavira only aggravated the cowboy’s already vile mood. Upon arrival at the archaeological site, Hunt immediately commandeered a guest room and told Daniel he was on his own for the rest of the day.

  Truth to tell, the Scion was relieved to be allowed to search the ruin alone. Hunt’s only purpose at this stage of the trip was to keep a lookout for the appearance of the three relic thieves. Since it was highly unlikely they would pop up in the middle of this exposed stretch of desert, Daniel felt the cowboy’s presence was superfluous. The Scion entertained the fleeting hope that the trio had taken his advice and abandoned the quest altogether. Only time would tell.

  By a process of mental association, Daniel’s brain skipped from his anxiety about the trio to his anxiety about Annabeth. He felt a sense of foreboding every time she crossed his mind. Of course, his fears were groundless. Each time he called his father to give a progress report, he inquired after his wife’s mental state. Each time, the Diviner assured him that she was doing well. Abraham would then pointedly remind his son to devote his full attention to the relic quest and leave domestic concerns to the Diviner. Everything was as it should be. Daniel chalked up his apprehension to an overactive imagination. He sighed and did as his father ordered. He focused on the ruined city before him.

  The Scion took out a compass and oriented himself toward the north, then consulted his map again. Yes, he was standing in the middle of the bailey. Now all he had to do was find some circles in the midst of all these squares. Lost in thought, he fairly tripped over the first one. Upon closer examination, he couldn’t see anything significant about it—a ring of flattened rocks and nothing else. He continued his search a little farther up the hill and spied the second circle. His pulse quickened as he glimpsed something much more important than the structure itself. He ran toward the spot with feverish anticipation and dropped to his knees. There was no mistaking it—the lily inscription. It was carved on a stone embedded in the earth—part of a line of stones encompassed by the circle. He’d found it! He’d actually done the impossible and found it.

  Daniel sank back on his heels to contemplate his own personal needle in a haystack. He tilted his head to the side, studying the carving. It appeared as if the top portion of the stone had been cleaved away from the base at some time in the past. Then, at a more recent date, someone had restored it. He could see a seam of concrete running beneath the carving. He sat down cross-legged and sank his chin into his hands, meditating on this puzzle. The repair looked recent. It wasn’t weathered as the stones around it were. Well, that wasn’t particularly suspicious. Perhaps a careless digger had struck the rock while the site was being excavated. Certainly, the archaeological team responsible for Dholavira would have ordered it to be repaired if that were the case. Such an explanation was plausible but something about that seam of concrete bothered him.

  He referred to his notes on the site. The last dig had taken place nearly a decade before. This repair looked fresher than that. A chill ran down his spine as a new thought struck him. What if the relic thieves had gotten here first? What if they had found the artifact itself? His heart was racing with panic.

  Daniel jumped to his feet and paced around the circle, searching for evidence of other footprints. Unlike the sands of Nabta Playa, the hard-packed ground at Dholavira wasn’t revealing any clues. Besides, if the trio had discovered something here, why would they take the time to repair a cracked piece of stone? Surely, they would have vandalized it to keep the Nephilim off their trail. What could it possibly mean?

  Daniel’s heart rate slowed to normal. He dismissed his suspicions as vague paranoia. There was no evidence of digging anywhere near the circle. Even if his far-fetched idea was true and the relic thieves had beaten him here, they obviously hadn’t found the artifact. He slumped back down on the ground, peering at the bare circle and the line of stones that bisected it. He recalled the exact words of the riddle. “On an island tower she alights to drink, biding til her kindred fill the jaws of the lion.” He had found the island tower mentioned in the clue. In fact, he was sitting in the center of it but the rest of the riddle indicated that there was something more to be discovered. In fact, the words of the verse implied that the artifact had never been hidden here at all. So where was it?

  He took a legal pad out of his backpack and recorded every visual detail about the place. He noted the size of the circle, the number of rocks crossing the center, the position of the lily stone among them, the observatory’s position relative to the other structures surrounding it, even the location of its entrance door. He knew he was going to need that data when he contacted Chris to discuss the situation. Thankfully, the guesthouse had a strong enough cell signal for him to get through. It was well before dawn back in Chicago. He wondered if the libraria
n would bite his head off for calling so early. He chuckled to himself. Chris’s interest in the relic hunt was even keener than his own. His friend would take the call, no matter what the hour, especially when he learned what the Scion had found. Daniel decided not to share his theory about the relic thieves with Chris. It was an idiotic notion. Of course the trio hadn’t been here ahead of him. Of course they hadn’t repaired the rock for his benefit. There was no earthly reason for them to do so. It was absurd. He shook his head at his own fanciful notions and jogged back to the guesthouse to place his call.

  Chapter 44—Witch Doctor

  Doctor Rafi Aboud idled the engine of his BMW at the entrance to the Nephilim compound. He waited for the two iron gates inscribed with the giant letters “P” and “X” to part. Glancing casually at the guard tower, he noted that surveillance cameras were trained on his automobile. It had been a long time since he had been summoned to his benefactor’s headquarters. In the interval since his last visit, security had obviously been tightened considerably. The guards motioned him forward. They carried rifles now. That was also new.

  He drove up the gravel driveway to the main building. A nervous looking young man in a black suit was standing on the front steps, apparently waiting for him. Aboud got out of his car and was ushered inside then led down a series of vacant stone corridors. To his surprise, his guide wasn’t taking him to Abraham Metcalf’s office. Instead, the young man stopped in front of a door which was protected by two tall, muscular men. They wore the same uniform as the guards at the gates though they didn’t appear to be armed.

  His guide said, “I’ll wait out here. My instructions were to tell you to examine the woman inside to see if she’s physically healthy.”

  Aboud raised his eyebrows inquiringly. “For what purpose?”