The Ancient Spirits of Sedgwick House (Grayson Sherbrooke's Otherworldly Adventures Book 3)

by Catherine Coulter

  I had my tongue down her throat. Grayson’s brains fell out of his head.

  Miranda said quickly, “No, you misunderstood, P.C. It was the only way I knew to bring him completely out of the nightmare. It worked.”

  “Yes,” Grayson said, “it did indeed.” Nefret, it had been Nefret, but then she’d become Miranda, his Miranda. That drew him up short. His Miranda? It was true he’d hadn’t known her for that long a time, but now, in the still of the night, it didn’t seem to matter. He concentrated on getting his wits back and drank the rest of the water. P.C. took the glass out of his hand and handed it to her mother.

  Grayson felt Pip’s small hand pat his whiskered cheek. “Did you hurt someone in your nightmare, Papa?”

  P.C. went back on her knees beside him and scrutinized him closely. “No, Pip, someone was going to hurt him.”

  Grayson asked, “Why do you say that, P.C.?”

  She lightly touched her small palm to his chest. “Your heart is still beating fast, Mr. Grayson. I think you were angry, maybe fighting with someone? To the death, like the knights in battle?” She sat back on her heels and frowned. “Well, like most gentlemen still do, like my father did.”

  “P.C.,” her mother said, “your father didn’t fight. He believed in causes. Any injustice made him very angry, but he didn’t fight if he could avoid it.”

  Both Miranda and Grayson saw P.C. would clearly prefer blood and guts strewing the dream landscape, not some vague notion like injustice. Grayson said, “Yes, I was going to fight an enemy.” P.C. perked right up. Pip did a little bounce beside her. “You wouldn’t lose a fight, Papa. You’re strong. You can carry me under your arm, and I’m a big boy.”

  P.C. gave him a considering look, and he knew she wanted to know all about this enemy. He wanted to know more about Jabari as well. Instead, she took Pip’s hand and pulled him off Grayson’s bed. “Mama, take care of Mr. Strath—Mr. Sherbrooke—Mr. Grayson. I’ll take Pip back to bed.”

  “’Ey, wot’s all this about?”

  P.C. turned on him, hands on her hips. “Barnaby, you will be quiet until you can speak proper English.”

  Barnaby was standing in the open doorway, his nightshirt not quite covering his bony knees. “I thinks I wants to say, what is happening here now, in this bedchamber, sir?”

  “Excellent,” P.C. said, and lightly tapped her fingers to his cheek. “Mr. Grayson had a nightmare, Barnaby. Now that Mama and I have taken care of him, we can all go back to bed. Mama, you may see to Mr. Grayson now. Come along.”

  “But I want to stay with Papa.” Pip wasn’t usually a whiner, but he was now.

  P.C. said patiently, “Mrs. Minor told me she would make us nutty buns for breakfast, but not before seven o’clock. She said Mr. Grayson gave her the Sherbrooke family recipe. If you’re asleep, Pip, the time will go faster.”

  Grayson and Miranda watched the three children troop out the door, Barnaby looking back over his shoulder.

  “The little general,” Miranda said, and shook her head. “Isn’t she perfectly splendid, Grayson? Ah, Mr. Grayson?”

  “She is. I do wonder how many more years will pass before Barnaby attempts to take the reins from her.”

  “The Great thinks about seven years, when Barnaby is a young man.” She made the mistake of looking down at him. That look of hers brought him fully to life.

  She licked her lips. “Oh dear.”

  It nearly killed him, but Grayson said, “Go back to bed, Miranda. Now. Trust me, you must leave me now. Go back to sleep. Dream of nutty buns that will make you swoon. You want to be well rested to enjoy them fully.”

  She paused a moment and stared down at him. “I’m not Nefret, Grayson. Tell me who she was tomorrow morning, all right?”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Tuesday morning

  Grayson waited until the house was quiet again, Miranda and the flock hopefully settled in their beds. He felt frustrated, the memory of Sadek’s attack still vivid. Who was Sadek? He pushed back the blanket, pulled on his dressing gown, and fetched the key to Lord Lyle’s treasure room from the top drawer of his dresser, beneath his cravats, washed and well starched by Marigold just that morning. He lit a candle and walked barefoot as silent as a ghost downstairs, unlocked the treasure room door, and pushed it open. Soft gray dawn light filled the room. I’ve stepped into doom. The air itself is pulsing. I hear a hundred faint beating hearts at rest, waiting.

  He tried to laugh at himself in the absolute stillness, and he did, but his laugh sounded strangely hollow to his own ears, as if from somewhere else, sometime else, like the laugh of another. He was making himself mad, becoming Gothic, something he couldn’t abide. He was in the blasted treasure room filled with artifacts, ancient, to be sure, but nothing more.

  But he knew there was something more, knew it to his bones. And it involved Nefret. He raised the candle and found himself looking at Anubis’s jackal head, directly into the god’s dead black eyes. He felt a skitter of something strange, something not of this world, something dangerous, coming close, closer. He wanted to turn and leave this room, lock it, and leave it locked.

  Instead, he raised the candle high. Even in the early morning light, shadows roiled and pulsed toward him from the dark corners. He walked directly to Nefret’s golden arm cuff displayed on its red velvet stand. It is special, timeless, both in and of our time and world, and other worlds as well. He couldn’t believe he’d remembered exactly what Nefret had thought to him. He didn’t question it, simply picked up the cuff. It felt warm, warmer than it had been when he’d held it two days before. It seemed to pulse in the air around him. He felt no malevolence from it, nothing to make his blood freeze. He set down the candle and cupped the cuff in the palms of his hands, held it tight. Did he feel a faint beating heart? Was that soft breathing? Close, not a foot behind him? He didn’t move, stood quietly, holding the cuff. Waiting. For what? Then the air seemed to blur as if a veil had dropped in front of his eyes, and he heard the faint heartbeat become stronger, louder, closer.

  The veil lifted. He was standing in a magnificent room, walls of flowers and interwoven vines painted in vivid colors. The floor was a golden marble with inlaid mosaics of sea creatures. In the center of the room was a raised dais, a large square marble bathing tub at its center filled with scented water, jasmine—he could smell the lovely fragrance from where he stood. He watched a graceful thread of steam rising off the water. Behind the bathing pool on a deep ledge stood a gold statue of a colossal female figure, wearing a golden robe, her arms outstretched, a protector.

  The girl in the bath was humming softly, sponging herself with fragrant soap. It was Nefret. He recognized her instantly. A young serving girl stood silently a few feet away, watching, waiting, a drying cloth in her arms. Or was she humming as well?

  His heart pounded. What was going on here? There was magic in the cuff, meant, evidently, only for him, an ancient magic able transport him thousands of years in the past. It is special, timeless, both in and of our time and world. No, that was impossible. The cuff hadn’t transported him; the cuff had drawn him into a vision of the distant past.

  He watched Nefret rise and stretch, then squeeze the wet sponge one last time over her face, her breasts, her arms. He watched her breathe in deeply. She was still no older than fifteen, a beautiful girl, her exotic sloe eyes dark as a midnight pool, her black hair bound atop her head, her young body lithe, graceful, well shaped, but not quite a woman’s full shape. But what shocked him was the realization he actually knew what she was feeling. It was coming off her in waves—dread, fear, so much fear, swirling madly in her. He watched the servant girl hand her a drying cloth, then help her to step out of the bathing pool and walk down the three steps to the golden marble floor. Nefret spoke to the girl as she dried herself, but Grayson couldn’t make out her words. He watched the servant unbind Nefret’s long hair and pull it free, thick and lustrous, to fall straight down her back to her hips.

  He said, “Nefret.”


  To Grayson’s astonishment, she started, looked up, and stared straight at him, then jerked the drying cloth in front of her, her eyes never leaving his face.

  “Who are you? Why are you here? How are you here?”

  She didn’t sound frightened, merely surprised at his sudden presence. He knew she was speaking ancient Egyptian, yet he’d understood her easily, just as he’d easily read the curse on the unnamed boy’s coffin. When she looked at him, what did she see? A shadow, an actual man, or did she hear only his voice? No, she was looking directly at him. He held up his hand. “I am not here to hurt you. My name is Grayson, and I believe your golden cuff brought me here. I’m a visitor, from a faraway land to the north, a land you have never heard of.”

  “What is this land?”

  “It’s called England.”

  She seemed to taste the strange word, but she did not repeat it aloud.

  “You want me to tell you why I am here. I really do not know, but your cuff obviously wanted to bring me here. Actually, I really am not here at all.”

  “Why do you speak nonsense, spout riddles? Of course you are here, in my bathing chamber. I see you quite clearly. You say you are a visitor? From a land I don’t know? To the north? It is called Eng-land?”

  “Yes. You must travel through many other lands to reach mine. England is an island, you see. It is not set in the middle of a desert.”

  She pursed her lips, considering this, then said, “It is absurd what you said—one of my cuffs brought you here? You must be a magician, a powerful one, more powerful, even, than Sadek.”

  “I’m not lying.” Grayson held out the golden cuff.

  She was shaking her head back and forth. “This is not possible. You cannot have my cuff. I removed it only before I bathed.” And she stared over at her dressing table. He did as well. He didn’t see a golden cuff.

  He looked down at the cuff glowing softly on the palm of his hand. He held it out for her to see.

  She walked to him and reached out her hand, drew it back. She stared at the cuff and whispered, “It is my cuff, the one Jabari gave me, the timeless cuff, he told me. But how come you to have it? Did you sneak past Raia and take it from my dressing table? And neither of us saw you? You are a magician.”

  Grayson shook his head. “No, I am not a magician. As I said, your cuff brought me here to your bathing chamber.”

  Nefret took several steps back away from him, drew herself up, and now her voice was arrogant, haughty. “My cuff has nothing to do with your being here. It is only a piece of jewelry, no matter what Jabari told me. No, I believe you are a stranger here to visit the pharaoh and you happened to come in here. Since I cannot believe no one stopped you, you must be a magician. Somehow you took the cuff from my dressing table without my seeing you.” Her voice trailed off. He was aware she was studying him now, her look uncertain, a bit of fear in her voice. “Look at you, wearing an odd robe that goes to your feet. I have never seen that material before nor that color. It looks strange, mayhap not of this world, and you are very white.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “If you are not a magician, then are you a god? Are you Ammut disguised as a man? You made yourself invisible so you could kill me? Or did you wish to rape me?”

  “No, no, I mean you no harm. I am not Ammut. I am not a demon. As I said, your gold cuff brought me to you. You must believe me, for it is true.”

  Grayson realized the servant girl was standing still as a stone, her arms clasped around herself, obviously terrified, watching her mistress speak to someone who, to her, he supposed, wasn’t there. She cried out, turned, and ran out of the chamber, covering her face in her hands.

  Nefret looked after her and said, her voice emotionless, “Raia will not say anything about me speaking to you. I do not believe she even saw you. All would believe her mad. You said your name is Gray-son. What sort of strange name is that? You say you are not a god, you are not a demon, and you claim you are not a magician, but my cuff—how could it bring you here? How could you be holding it in your hand? Explain this to me.”

  “I imagine my name does sound strange to you. Your name sounds strange to me as well. Listen, Nefret, I do not know how much time I have here with you. I arrived here with no warning, so I could leave as quickly.” Suddenly the cuff flared, and warmth streaked through him, and knowledge. He knew exactly what he must do. He said simply, “Please tell me about the unknown boy in the sarcophagus. There are paintings of him throwing a disc to a man, but then the boy flings the disc into the Nile and it floats away, hovering above the waves. What happened to him? Who was—is he? What is the disc? Who is the other man?”

  She stared at him, shaking her head back and forth, and then tears filled her eyes as she shook her head. “How can you know this? No, you are a god, you have to be to know this—”

  Before she could continue, Grayson repeated without hesitation:

  Open this keeper of my spirit

  and know the agony of a thousand burning spears.

  See your children disappear into the stygian blackness,

  shrieking their pain and hatred of you.

  Attend me or you will know mortal agony without end.

  She looked terrified. She splayed her hands in front of her to keep him away from her. “No, no, it is impossible. How can you possibly know the curse? Only the pharaoh knew it, and Amenken, the scribe who carved it into the stone as it was recited to him by Sadek, and, of course Sadek himself. Sadek is the pharaoh’s magician. He claimed if buried deep, hidden, the coffin would remain concealed for all time, for all eternity, so all would be safe. But how can you have seen the coffin? How is it possible you found it, and so quickly? The sarcophagus with the coffin within was secreted away only three years ago. You of the strange name and strange land? You who are holding my cuff.”

  Grayson said, his voice steady, “It was much longer ago than three years, Nefret.”

  She cocked her head at him. “No, only three years, I remember clearly that day—at dusk the sky was golden, clouds sifting through the air, and a cool wind blew off the Nile. It was dusk because Sadek said it was the time he was counseled by the black smoke to remove the coffin, to hide it, so all would be safe forever. He and his men took it away. Why are you lying to me?”

  What to tell her? He said, “Nefret, explain this to me. Sadek’s curse—it was meant to keep us safe from a boy? Or isn’t a boy buried the coffin? But if not, then why the painted scenes of him on the sides throwing the disc?” He paused, studied her face. “Who is inside the coffin, Nefret?”

  She stared at him. “But how can you know about the coffin? And the curse? How?”

  He said simply, “I have the sarcophagus. I read the curse carved on the side. How do you know the curse, Nefret? You said only the pharaoh, Amenken, and Sadek knew.”

  She moistened her tongue over her mouth. “I’ve never told the pharaoh or anyone else, because I knew they’d believe me mad, but I dreamed the curse, night after night, for many nights. I could not escape it. Then slowly it began to fade away as I grew older until one night it was simply gone. I have never forgotten it; I cannot forget it. It is terrifying. The drawings you said you saw on the sides of the coffin—you are certain they show a boy chasing the disc?”

  “Yes, I am certain. Do you know the name of the unknown boy?”

  “There is no unknown boy. It should have been Kiya, my younger brother, son of the pharaoh, but Sadek swore Kiya was not buried in the coffin—” She shook her head. “No, what Sadek really said was that Kiya, my brother, the pharaoh’s eldest son, beloved by all, was not in the coffin.”

  “But how can that be? What did this magician Sadek mean?”

  “When Kiya disappeared, the pharaoh sent Sadek to Nubia to discover what any knew of Kiya. The king of Nubia told Sadek that Kiya had indeed appeared in Nubia, but he had died a short time after he came to court. The king told Sadek that his own priests had warned him that what was sealed inside wasn’t Kiya that he had become someth
ing else entirely. Kiya was no longer a boy, no longer the pharaoh’s son—he was now a demon. The king of Nubia said his priests counseled him that the coffin must never be opened, that what was imprisoned within was a demon of unspeakable malevolence and power, and he must be hidden forever. When Sadek returned and told the pharaoh, he was distraught, inconsolable. He didn’t understand how this could happen, not to his beloved son. But he believed Sadek, for Sadek had proven his worth and his loyalty over the years, and so the pharaoh oversaw the inscribing of the curse and bade Sadek to hide the coffin. And then he withdrew into himself.”

  She whispered, her voice thin and scared, “I ask you again, Gray-son, how did you find the coffin so quickly? You said it was longer than three years. That is not possible. Three years ago, Sadek took the coffin away, at dusk. I remember it well.

  “I believe you must be a sorcerer, bringing magic from this land called Eng-land. And the golden cuff Jabari gave me helped you?” Her terror was a palpable thing, but she didn’t run screaming away from him. She had courage in the face of an unknown phantom, namely him, who’d suddenly invaded her bath and somehow had the cursed sarcophagus.

  “I am not a sorcerer, not a magician. Believe me, I am not lying.”

  He held out her cuff. She hesitated, then grabbed it out of his hand. “I heard your thoughts, Nefret, that day Jabari gave you the cuff and told you it was special, timeless, both in and out of our time and world and other worlds as well. That is what I heard you thinking.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Her expressions went from disbelief to fear to a desperate hope. She moistened her tongue over her lips. “It cannot be possible, can it? You saw me, heard my thoughts? You heard me thinking of Jabari? But no one knows of Jabari.”