The Scorpions of Zahir

by Christine Brodien-Jones

  She sprang to the door and he strode in, looking distraught. “Where on earth have you been? Duncan and I were searching all over for you! I was about to call the police.”

  Staring at her feet, Zagora tried to imagine what a Moroccan jail cell looked like—worse than the third-floor girls’ bathroom at school, she was pretty sure.

  “You didn’t go to the casbah, did you?” Her father was using his blustery chief inspector’s voice, and it was clear he was seriously upset. “You’re covered in dust and you smell like spices. Zagora, those winding dark alleys go on for miles! That was extremely reckless of you.”

  “I know, I know, but I really wanted to go.” She felt terrible, knowing she’d let him down. No use trying to defend herself; her father always caught her making things up. Sometimes she wondered if he had a lie detector machine wired into his brain. Still, she knew he’d get over it.

  “I wasn’t really lost,” she said in a meek voice. A turtle appeared in the doorway, looking like it wanted to ask a question. “And I didn’t stay there very long at all.”

  Her father gave a weary sigh. “Duncan and I were both worried when we couldn’t find you.” He reeled back, his foot just missing the turtle.

  Zagora frowned. Duncan had been worried about her? That seemed highly unlikely.

  “Any more shenanigans like this,” her father added with a severe look, “and you’ll be on the next plane home—to Auntie Agnes.”

  Zagora cringed at the thought of grim Auntie Agnes, who worked in a mustard factory and had moon-pebble eyes. Agnes, her least favorite aunt, was one of many relatives she and Duncan stayed with when their father went on expeditions.

  “It won’t happen again,” she said earnestly. “Hey, guess what, I met this—” She started to say weird girl, then stopped. Telling her dad about Mina might not be a good idea. He’d ask questions, and if he found out she’d sneaked off with the Oryx Stone, she’d be in big trouble.

  Luckily he hadn’t been listening.

  “I haven’t forgotten the Galileo incident, you know,” he said, closing the door behind him with a definitive clunk.

  When Duncan had brought Galileo, the class hamster, home for the weekend, Zagora, feeling sorry for it, decided to let the hamster stretch its furry legs. But when she opened the cage door, it darted down a heating duct. Weeks later Duncan had found Galileo, by then a hamster mummy, behind the washing machine. At first Zagora denied any wrongdoing. When she finally admitted she might have opened the cage accidentally, she lost two weeks’ allowance and missed going to the Big Top Circus. Worst of all, her credibility rating in the Pym household had plummeted to zero. Now it seemed she was going to have to prove herself all over again.

  Looking befuddled, the turtle peered up at her. Its vacant expression reminded her of Duncan.

  Zagora lay stretched on her stomach beside the fountain in the hotel lobby, coaxing a turtle (nicknamed Duncan II) to climb over an empty candy box. Her brother sat nearby, polishing his telescope lenses. Hearing someone whistling “If I Were a Rich Man,” she looked up to see her father coming down the stairs. He wore a crisp yellow shirt with blue parrots and multi-pocketed safari pants—his idea of dressing up. Zagora considered his taste in clothes part of his unique personality.

  “Ready for dinner, kids?” he called. “I’ve booked the Café Meknes for seven o’clock”

  “Man, I’m so hungry I could eat a camel,” said Duncan.

  Zagora glared at him. “Don’t say that, Dunkie.” As a little girl she’d been devoted to a toy camel named Lila, which she’d carried everywhere she went, and even now she adored camels. On her list of Favorite Desert Animals, camels were second only to oryxes.

  “Olivia Romanesçu, Pitblade’s cousin, will be joining us,” their father added.

  “Wow, fantastic!” said Zagora, imagining a wiry, sun-scorched woman in khaki who rode camels all over the desert, looking for buried cities. “I can’t wait to meet her.”

  “Hey, hear that, guys?” Duncan set down his telescope. “They’re talking about Nar Azrak on TV!” Jumping out of his chair, he lumbered through an open archway.

  Zagora and her father followed him into a room with velvet-upholstered chairs ranged around a tiny black-and-white television with rabbit-ear antennas on top.

  “One country which has come under scrutiny regarding the rogue planet is Morocco,” a British announcer was saying. “Astronomers at the Royal Observatory in Edinburgh have determined that Nar Azrak’s orbit is shifting significantly closer to Earth, and today issued warnings that the planet is moving at an increasing speed.”

  A picture flashed on the screen, showing Earth and the surrounding planets, with a broken line depicting the path of Nar Azrak. “As this drawing illustrates,” the announcer continued, “Nar Azrak is moving at an unheard-of rate. Astronomers are trying to gauge how near it will come to our planet. Some predict that it may even collide with Earth. If their views prove correct, Morocco, which lies directly in Nar Azrak’s path, risks complete destruction.”

  Duncan fell into a stunned silence. Zagora couldn’t quite believe what she was hearing.

  “Can we go home, Dad?” asked Duncan quietly. “Like, today?”

  Oh no, thought Zagora. What if her dad was having second thoughts about bringing his kids to Morocco?

  “Don’t worry, nothing’s going to happen,” said their father reassuringly. “These astronomers are alarmists, Duncan. They thrive on worst-case scenarios. And I for one don’t believe them: this is media hype, pure and simple. Trust me, we have nothing to fear.”

  In the cool of the evening, the Pym family made their way through the serpentine streets of Marrakech. Zagora sniffed the spice-filled air, feeling the dry wind against her face. All around her rose deep voices from the shadows and sounds of children playing in the alleys. None of the Pyms mentioned Nar Azrak, and Zagora pushed any negative thoughts out of her head. She wasn’t going to let those doom-and-gloom astronomers wreck her visit to Morocco.

  “Notice how you can’t see any stars?” said Duncan. “That’s light pollution, same as we get at home. Lights from the city wash out the night sky.”

  Looking up, Zagora realized that it was impossible to see even one star overhead. That meant all Duncan’s astronomical charts and instruments were useless. She felt a little bit sorry for him: stargazing was the one thing he’d been looking forward to on this trip.

  Moments later they were sitting at a table on the terrace of Café Meknes, overlooking the bustling torch-lit markets of the Djemâa el Fna. Zagora could hear music from street performers drifting up, mixed in with shouts of vendors and the babbling crowd.

  Tense and impatient, she was eager for Olivia Romanesçu to appear. The Oryx Stone lay discreetly hidden beneath the folds of Zagora’s silky purple blouse, and she was wearing her fanciest clothes, including her floral-print harem pants, a gift from trendy Aunt Claire. (She sometimes found herself wishing Claire could be her mom, because it would be nice having a mom with such cool taste in clothes.)

  Their father cautioned her and Duncan not to ask any impertinent questions. “Let me do the talking,” he told them. “After all, Ms. Romanesçu is a total stranger. We don’t want to overwhelm her.”

  “But there are things I want to ask,” said Zagora, watching waiters hurry past with trays of jasmine-scented couscous and grilled meat on skewers. “Like where did she travel in the desert and did she meet any nomads and sleep under the stars—stuff like that.”

  Her father threw her one of his stern looks. She knew he worried about her becoming noisy and overexcited, which often happened when she talked about the desert.

  “What makes you think Ms. Romanesçu spends time in the desert?” he asked.

  “This Olivia has to be an explorer, I just know she is.” Zagora was dying to meet a fellow adventuress who shared her passion for the desert. “Why else would she be in Morocco?”

  “Lots of reasons,” said Duncan. “She could be a tomb robber
or an illicit trader—did you know there’s a huge black market trade in meteorites these days?—or she could be spying for the Russians, using Romanesçu as her nom de guerre.”

  Ignoring Duncan, who in her opinion watched way too many spy movies, Zagora went on: “So, Dad, does the Oryx Stone really belong to Pitblade Yegen?” After reading Edgar’s journal, she was bursting with questions. “Is he the true owner?”

  Her father nodded. “The stone was bequeathed to him by his grandfather. And as there are no Azimuth left to claim it, Pitblade is indeed the rightful owner.”

  Hmm, thought Zagora. Mina was trying to trick me, saying the stone belonged to her tribe. She was probably planning to sell it.

  “Did you bring the stone with you, Dad?” asked Duncan. “To show to Ms. Romanesçu?”

  Zagora froze. She’d meant to sneak the stone back into her father’s pack, but she hadn’t been able to resist wearing it one last time.

  “You know, I’ve been so caught up planning our trip to the desert I totally forgot,” said her dad, looking sheepish. “It’s still in my rucksack.” He grinned.

  Zagora gave a secret sigh of relief. He hadn’t noticed it was missing—not yet, anyway.

  Their father frowned. “A pity I couldn’t find Edgar Yegen’s journal. I was certain I’d left it in my desk drawer. Oh well, it’ll turn up eventually and I’ll give it back to Pitblade.”

  Zagora squirmed in her seat, feeling a trifle (but not too) guilty, for sneaking off with the journal. She had every intention of giving it back to Pitblade Yegen—once she’d finished reading it.

  “Was Edgar Yegen famous?” she asked, eager to change the subject.

  Her father slipped on his reading glasses and opened the menu. “Edgar made many important discoveries in North Africa and was highly respected in archaeological circles. Zahir, sadly, was his final expedition. It was there he met his untimely demise.”

  “Edgar Yegen died in Zahir?” asked Zagora, shocked by this revelation. “But … how? Did the stone have a curse on it or something?” She hoped that wasn’t true, because she loved the Oryx Stone so much.

  Before her father could answer, a woman’s voice cut through the air. “Halloooo, Dr. Pynn? I’m looking for a Dr. Pynn! Anyone here by that name?”

  “Uh-oh,” said Duncan, slouching down in his chair. “This doesn’t sound good.…”

  Zagora gave a little gulp, seeing a stout woman approach their table in a flurry of vibrant colors, moving with a careless elegance. Olivia Romanesçu was big boned and heavily made up, her wheat-colored hair swept high into a topknot. In the light of the overhead lanterns she looked not so much like a desert explorer as like an aging film star from a wacky comedy film.

  Striding behind her were two men in dark glasses: the taller one had a goatee and shaved head; the shorter, toadlike man had a thin mustache that looked drawn on. Zagora noted that both wore cream suits, what appeared to be authentic snakeskin shoes, and serious expressions.

  “Hey, cool, she’s got bodyguards,” said Duncan. Turning to Zagora, he whispered, “Olivia must be the brains behind a Moroccan crime syndicate.”

  “Charmed, I’m sure, Dr. Pynn,” said Olivia Romanesçu in a throaty voice, extending a thick freckled hand garnished with rings.

  Dr. Pym looked up into the woman’s wide, pale face. “The name’s Pym.” Zagora noticed that his eyes looked startled behind his reading glasses. “Charles Pym.”

  Her dad probably hadn’t been expecting such an imposing presence. It seemed when Olivia sat down next to Zagora, she took up all the breathing space at the table.

  “He’s Dr. Charles W. Pym, actually,” said Zagora shyly. “Our dad has two doctoral degrees.”

  The woman gave a faint smile and arranged her voluminous robes. “Is that so? Most impressive.” A rich scent of lime and lavender drifted off her shoulders as she turned to address their father. “We are birds of a feather, Dr. Pym, are we not? Both of us are scientists, one working to unlock the secrets of the past, the other investigating medicines of the future. A perfect balance, wouldn’t you agree?”

  The stone-faced guards took up positions behind Olivia’s chair. Zagora thought her makeup was amazing—terra-cotta lipstick and eyes outlined in black, like Cleopatra—and her dazzling clothes, cut from expensive fabrics, were straight out of a glossy magazine. Glamorous, that was the word: Olivia Romanesçu was glamorous.

  “Toxins,” she heard Olivia say as the woman launched into a summary of her career as an entomologist, “and the effects of insect venom on human nervous tissue.”

  She talks so fast, thought Zagora. Sounds like she has an English accent—sort of. She listened with rapt attention while Olivia talked about cutting-edge experiments with snake poison and scorpion venom, and perilous journeys to remote areas of Senegal, the Maldives and the jungles of Brazil.

  “I’m taking my experiments to a completely new level,” Olivia told them. “By manipulating toxins through genetic engineering, I intend to create a new class of drugs: painkillers based on scorpion venom, to treat severe pain from trauma, extreme injuries and even organ transplants.”

  Olivia was talking so fast that Zagora had trouble keeping up with her. Chin in hands, Zagora sat thinking how Mrs. Bixby would have a fit listening to all those run-on sentences. Even so, she was impressed: Olivia was obviously a top-notch scientist. The details of her experiments were fuzzy, but she had a way of making her work sound dramatic. Zagora wondered what it would be like to have such a smart and sophisticated woman for a mother.

  “When my cousin first went missing, I thought, How absurd,” said Olivia, moving on to a new topic. “Pitblade is a formidable explorer, a genius at desert navigation.” Zagora watched the woman’s eyes grow moist with tears. “But lost he was—for eleven years.”

  “I wanted to thank you for forwarding Pitblade’s letter to me,” said Dr. Pym. “The good news is he’s alive.”

  “Alive, yes, but is the man sane?” snapped Olivia. “Of that I am not so sure.”

  Zagora could see her dad frowning.

  “Did he indicate that he was in any sort of trouble?” asked Dr. Pym.

  Olivia pushed a loose strand of hair back into her topknot. “His letter was cryptic, very brief. Between the two of us, I fear my cousin has gone mad—quite mad indeed. As the saying goes, ‘The desert consumes the reckless and destroys the weak.’ Not to mention that insanity runs in the family.”

  Uh-oh, thought Zagora, this conversation’s going downhill fast.

  “I do not believe for one moment that Pitblade is insane,” said Dr. Pym tersely, glowering at Olivia across the table. “Disoriented, perhaps … but who wouldn’t be? And Pitblade tends to write messages using code and metaphor, which can be quite confusing.”

  “Ah, merci.” Olivia gave the waiter a regal nod as he set down a plate of braised lamb with dates. “Pitblade sent his letter by falcon to the American embassy in Marrakech. Can you imagine, falcons in this day and age?”

  In her mind’s eye Zagora saw a falcon land on the embassy roof, a rolled message tied to its claw with camel-gut string. Better yet, maybe it would be fitted out with a mini backpack.

  Duncan scooped up a forkful of tagine, a rich stew of meat and vegetables. “Hey, I saw this BBC program about pigeons on top-secret World War II missions, delivering messages to Allied troops behind enemy lines.” He stuffed the food into his mouth, chewing fast. “Nowadays you could send messages by remote-controlled model helicopters. Right, Dad?”

  “Yes, that’s possible,” said their father, tapping a finger against his front tooth. Not a good sign, Zagora knew. “Did you bring the letter Pitblade wrote to you?” he asked Olivia.

  “No,” she said, shaking her head, “because I didn’t want to risk having it lost or stolen. Simply put, he wants the Oryx Stone. If you prefer, my men could deliver this artifact to him. Save you the trouble of going to the desert.”

  “Thanks, but it’s no trouble at all,” said Dr. Pym. “I’m
looking forward to this journey.”

  Olivia sniffed, as if she found the subject distasteful. Zagora had a funny feeling that she wasn’t all that fond of her cousin Pitblade.

  “About this stone … I’m anxious to have a look at it, if I may, to check its authenticity.” Gem-studded bracelets clashed together as Olivia held out her hand. “You do have the Oryx Stone with you, don’t you, Doctor?”

  Zagora noticed that Olivia’s eyes were unusually bright and that an eagerness crept into her voice every time she mentioned the Oryx Stone.

  “I assure you, the stone is quite safe,” said Dr. Pym.

  If only she knew, thought Zagora, feeling a bit smug, the Oryx Stone’s right here under her nose!

  “Like you, Ms. Romanesçu,” Dr. Pym continued breezily, “I prefer not to take chances.”

  Duncan kicked Zagora under the table and they exchanged looks. My dad’s one cool character, Zagora thought, watching Olivia press her lips into a tight line.

  “Should anything happen to my cousin,” said Olivia when her mint tea arrived, “this artifact—the Oryx Stone—would revert to next of kin. That would be, of course, yours truly.”

  Stirring his cardamom-scented coffee, Dr. Pym narrowed his eyes. “Nothing is going to happen to Pitblade.”

  Zagora could almost see sparks flying between the two adults.

  “How about if I send my men around to your hotel on Rue Moulay Ismail tonight, to collect the stone?” Olivia gave an odd little laugh that made Zagora wonder if she was somehow threatening her father.

  She noticed her dad glancing nervously at the bodyguards. Why was Olivia sending bodyguards to pick up the stone?

  “That won’t be necessary, Ms. Romanesçu. I’ll deliver the Oryx Stone to you myself,” said Dr. Pym in a brisk, confident tone. “I’ll be at your apartment first thing tomorrow.”

  Suddenly Zagora was struck by a wild notion. She reached into her trousers for the dead scorpion, stiff and springy at the bottom of her pocket. Nobody threatens my dad and gets away with it, she thought. I’ll show her. She slid her hand across the top of Olivia’s glass of tea, which was sitting untouched next to her plate.