Wrath & Bones (The Marnie Baranuik Files Book 4)

by A. J. Aalto

  We eased forward once more, ducking into a chamber. Our headlamps hit the glass of several dig lamps set up in a half circle. Between them was a short dais and a sarcophagus that didn’t look quite right. We stood beside it in silence for a long moment before I pushed at the lid a little. It flipped right off and toppled to the dusty floor. Carved, painted Styrofoam, like a movie prop, but convincingly made. Probably, it would look persuasive in pictures. I resisted the urge to click off a few selfies. There was a blue plastic bin inside that was long enough for a body; that lid was puffed up, as if whatever was inside was producing gas.

  I shot a finger at it. “Your turn. I did the first lid.”

  “Oh, sure, leave the bloated one for me,” Declan said under his breath, shaking his head as he braced himself. “I see how it is.” He braced himself for what might be inside, but when he teased up a corner of the lid, his brow creased, and he whisked it away to reveal a layer of gold goo.

  We dipped our headlamps straight over it, casting shadows across the fake sarcophagus. “There’s someone under there,” he said, and added, “How come every time I see you, we end up in face masks over corpses, Dr. B?”

  The nape of my neck prickled, and I had the sensation we were being watched again. I examined the room. The walls were ornately carved, but that was also a trick: a clever paint job. Why was Pia pretending this was a real tomb? She knew that anyone coming to check its veracity wouldn't be fooled for a second, so what was she after?

  “This isn’t even a proper mummy,” I objected.

  He studied it. “Whoever this was, Dr. B, they warranted the use of unusual…” He drifted off at the look on my face.

  I felt my lips thin and my eyes narrow. “This is a fresh, eviscerated corpse. It’s been sloppily stitched up and covered in…” I smelled the tomb reluctantly, sniffing deeply only briefly and then returning the hot, shallow breathing provided through my mask. “Honey.” (The honey pot, BugBelly had said. The Golden Sap of Huxtahotep.) “Declan, what the fuck is this?”

  “I think it’s…” His lips buckled inward around his teeth as though he could protect them from the words that had to come out. “Mellified man. Someone is making mellified man.”

  “Do I want to know what that is?”

  “Massively illegal, for one,” he said seriously, dropping his voice. “You brought your gun, right?”

  I nodded. “What is mellified man used for?”

  “It’s sold on the black market to certain practitioners as ancient healing medicine. It’s worth thousands, maybe millions. It’s worth more than any street drug I know of.”

  Like the golden seed pods of Lilith’s Heart.

  “The canopic jars seem genuine.” Declan touched one with a jackal’s head on it. If my memory served, and the arrangements had been traditional, this jar was guarded by the god Duamutef, and would contain the dead guy’s stomach.

  “I’m not looking in there,” I said flatly.

  He did. “You really should.” He replaced one lid and peeked in another, this one with a hawk head on it. “It’s quite fascinating.”

  “If you’re Jeffrey Dahmer and low on hors d' oeuvres, maybe,” I said. I went so far as to use one gloved hand to tilt the closest canopic jar. It did not look authentic, as it had three heads: a ram, a boar, and a very familiar sneering human. Asmodeus. Care to explain this inscription on the bottom of the jar, Doctor Edgar?”

  “I don’t read hieroglyphics.”

  “Neither do I, but this one reads — in English — 'Made in Taiwan.' I think this is the misfit.” I tipped the cap to peek with dread inside, but it was empty. That wasn’t better. In fact, I had a sneaking suspicion that was worse. (The honey pot. The Golden Sap.) “Crap. We need some of this honey.” Worry flared in my belly yet again. What if you bring the honey and you really needed a bit of Huxtahotep? Are you actually considering taking a piece of this corpse to the Arctic in a fake clay jar? How the hell would you get that through airport security? “Or something,” I finished.

  The wan color of Declan’s cheeks said he knew what I meant. “She couldn’t possibly imagine she’d get away with this.”

  Pia. He was right. With her experience, she’d never have mistaken this for an actual find. Who was paying her for this, and what had been her price? She’d never take money from revenant pockets for a contest or scavenger hunt. Then again, I thought, looking around at the sad theater in front of me, I never would have imagined she’d set up this mockery, complete with real dead body. Could it have been someone else? Anyone else? No, Pia had told me lies about Huxtahotep (“Definitely Early Dynastic Period, no indication yet what his status was. We were able to gather his name from the stela at the entrance of the tomb. We’ve removed the grave goods to the museum for further study.”) that would have been ridiculous to the point of being laughable, had she told me the lies in this room.

  “Huxtahotep, my ass,” I whispered in sad disbelief.

  “Careful,” Declan whispered back. “Given this death may be recent, it isn’t wise to speak the name of the dead in this place.”

  “You know that’s not his name. I don’t have time to wonder about the legal ramifications of this. Let’s just be grateful the Dark Lady was smiling on us when she put a wild hair up Batten’s ass about going on to Nepal without us. Didn’t realize that was going to be such a blessing.”

  “Let’s get this jar and get the hell out of here, it’s giving me the creeps. Though I guess his age means we can forget worrying about a mummy’s curse?”

  “I think so. I hope so,” I said, leaning a hip against the open sarcophagus.

  “You think he was murdered and desiccated for this purpose?”

  “Does it make it better if his corpse was stolen from a mortuary?”

  Declan grimaced. “No.”

  “Does it make it better if this is a recently-deceased relative of Pia?”

  “Not a whole lot, no.” His eyes were as wide as I’d ever seen them. “Suggestions?”

  I ran through what little I knew about ancient Egypt to see if I could find anything useful. I’d read the Book of the Dead ages ago, but only skimmed it out of interest at the time. In no way had I studied it in detail.

  Declan asked, “Are those legitimate warnings there on the wall?”

  I pointed specifically to the squatting baboon figure with the big erection. “That boner seems to be a big warning to me. To be fair, no one needs to warn me about stealing meat off a corpse or scamming stuff from a tomb. If I had a choice…”

  “That’s Babi, the Bull of the Baboons,” Declan said, examining the painting. “I don’t know a lot about Egyptian gods, but I think he’s kind of a ferryman, and a virility god. Maybe he guides the spirits after death? What if we disturb the body and…”

  “And what?”

  “So many things occur, which to suggest?” he lamented with a high, tittering laugh.

  “Could it get worse, Declan?” I said, hearing the horror in my own hushed voice. “Three words: Human. Mummy. Confection. Yes, I'll have two eggs over-easy, a side of bacon, and for dessert? Well, gosh-golly-heck, as I do every damn day, I'll just have my usual: honey-drenched man jerky and a nice cup of tea. Hold the sugar, thanks. Huxtahotep is more than enough sweets for the day.”

  “Are you done?”

  I blinked with surprise; I was hearing Batten’s voice out of Declan’s mouth, and I had never appreciated that so-done-with-your-shit tone more. “I think so. Wait.” I considered. “Yeah, that’s all I’ve got for now.”

  “Get me the shovel, Dr. B.”

  “Nope!” I said, shaking my head to reinforce this.

  Declan gave me a look that made me consider that he was taking serious notes from Batten. His jaw legit did the clench-unclench dance. “I’ll do the digging, you make sure it gets in the jar.”

  As I went to get the shovel, I repeated, “Nope, nope, nope,” mostly just to comfort myself, to convince myself that this wasn’t happening, though it was clearly not
open for discussion. “Not doing this. Ain’t happenin’.”

  Declan had brought the fake canopic jar to the side of the phony sarcophagus. He took the lid off and we traded jar for shovel. He considered the slab-like corpse under all that cloudy honey; the body had very few features left. The honey had done weird things to the face, if the face had been unmarked before it had been placed in its sweet, sticky bath. Declan’s lip curled and he tried to use the shovel to nudge the chin and turn the face away from him, but the honey was way too thick to allow for maneuvering. He prodded a bit, fished around by the closest arm, shot me a look.

  “It’s going to be okay,” I said, more to myself than to Declan. “It's just a sham. A shammy sham. The shammiest sham that ever shammed.”

  “Are we absolutely sure this is what the Overlord meant by the Golden Sap of Huxtahotep?” he said, and I could tell by the tension in his shoulders that he was just waiting for my nod to jab a hunk off the corpse.

  I couldn’t say for sure. I couldn’t promise. But I also couldn’t imagine what else the Golden Sap could be, if not this. The rest of the tomb was empty but for that feeling of being watched.

  “Okay, just get some and let’s go. If we overthink this, we’re going to fail, and Sarokhanian will rule, and trolls will cull the human herd, and it’ll be my fault because I couldn’t handle honey-dipped human jerky,” I said. “Just do it.”

  “Sure you don’t want to do it?” Declan said ridiculously.

  “You’re my assistant,” I reminded him. “Assist me.”

  “This isn’t the first time you’ve handed me a shovel and said that,” he said.

  “Won’t be the last, either,” I promised. “You have a limited skillset, so I have to take that into account. Now spork the dork, Irish.”

  Declan squeezed his eyes shut and pressed the shovel down, sliding through the honey and pinning the body against the bottom of the blue plastic bin. It slipped a little but he managed to wedge it against the edge and get a better grip, then twisted into the meaty part of Huxtahotep’s — or whoever this was' — shoulder. I heard Declan gag, but he pressed further, cupping the shovel against the side of the container and sliding it up, honey and meat together. As it got closer, the meat looked greyish and dry.

  Declan went erp but held it together as I tilted the jar as close to the shovel as I could get. “You okay, Dr. B?” he asked, taking a deep breath as the meat slid slowly into the confines of the clay jar. “You look a little green.”

  The groan that came from behind us wasn’t human, and raised all the little hairs on my body in instant unison. It was the sound of a large animal awakening. It was followed by an eerie, echoing bark-snort that sounded like wah-hunh!

  “That's the best part about this sham,” I told Declan on a dismayed whisper. “It just keeps getting shammier."

  “I knew we weren’t alone,” Declan said. “I felt it. Did you feel it?”

  “Of course,” I hissed.

  There was no doubt after the second, nasal wah-hunh! There was a thud. A warning. The thing that had been monitoring us was displeased. I sensed it was time to go, and Declan put the shovel down carefully while I fumbled with the canopic jar's lid. Somewhere in the tomb there was a loud roop roop and a thud.

  “I’m not meeting anything that goes roop roop too,” I hissed. “I wasn’t pleased with wah-hunh, but roop roop is straight up not happening. We’re leaving now.”

  “This isn’t a real tomb, how can it have a guardian?” Declan wondered aloud as he took the canopic jar from me and wedged it snugly in my go-bag. Neither of us had the answer to that, but it may have had something to do with the jars, the intentions, the focus, and the nature of this honey elixir. Only Pia would have our answers. “We need to be careful.”

  I tried to Feel what he was sensing, sending the Blue Sense out to test the dry, close air in the tomb. Anticipation, it reported. Pursuit. Preparation. This was clearly different than the displeased and unsettled silence of the guardian. It was followed by a subtle waft of burnt sugar and the final emotion: smugness. I cut my eyes at Declan. He nodded that he’d follow me.

  That’s when Folkenflik bounded around the corner and plowed into two of the real canopic jars, spilling their meaty contents with a wet splurch and kicking something that looked like a kidney into a dark corner. He yipped at us.

  “No, Folkenflik! Bigger problems!” I flapped a hand, trying to get my whistle out of my shirt. “Big weird tomb-thing problems!”

  He gnashed his teeth and lunged forward, aimed at my midsection. I shoved out my right arm to block my belly and felt Folkenflik’s canines go through my shirt and into my flesh. My mouth popped open and I shouted with surprise more than pain.

  “Ow!” I told him. “Folkenflik, you flapsnapper!”

  Folkenflik came away from my arm with a bloody muzzle and snarled, preparing to spring again.

  Declan and I whooped in alarmed agreement and did a bumping scramble down the other hall, ducking into a dark chamber with the werefox hot on our heels. There were thuds, though, big thuds that shook the ground, and the werefox was forced off into another chamber by something enormous that I definitely did not want to run into.

  Declan grabbed my arm and shoved my sleeve up, drawing the fabric over a wound that was starting to bleed copiously. I hissed a complaint as he turned it under the aim of his headlamp. Declan said, “Mellified man is supposed to be a powerful elixir.”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “Dr. B., it’s a full moon. You’ve been bit by a werefox! You’ve got lycanthropy coursing through your veins right this second.”

  “Fuckanut!” I swore, grinding my teeth.

  “Marnie, eat the mellified man.”

  “Uhhhhh,” I said, “That’s a big no, crazy person.”

  “Marnie, if we were in a hospital, we could pump you full of antivirals and hope, but we’re way out here in the desert, and this might be your best shot to fight the disease trying to take hold in you.” He gave me his most serious look. “Do it.”

  “Dude, don’t make me panic-puke on your shoes.”

  Declan grabbed my go-bag from my shoulder. I held onto it, fighting him for the strap, but between his being half-immortal, a dude, and my arm hurting like hell where I'd been bitten, I totally let him win. He unzipped it and wrestled out the jar, tossing the lid aside. There was an unidentifiable chunk of sweetened meat floating in the dark yellow goo. My stomach did a slow roll.

  “I can’t eat candied dead person,” I said. “I can’t!”

  “Lycanthropy is fatal in forty-five percent of cases. Those odds aren’t fabulous. The surviving fifty-five percent carry the virus their whole lives and turn into hopeless monsters, succumbing to irreversible, permanent psychosis after thirty years or so. Would you rather die, or end up a furry lunatic once a month?”

  “Declan!”

  He used his fingers to snag a chunk, and then tore off a strip. It melted into a stringy, crispy chunk, dripping goo. He pushed it closer to my face. “Marnie, quickly.”

  I squeezed my lips together tightly and barely squeaked out, “It may not even be reversible now.”

  “But if it is, it would only be so if you catch it early.” He put the human mummy confection right under my nose. “Probably the honey makes it taste okay…”

  “Who buys this? Who eats this shit?” I whined, shaking. “I don’t think I can…”

  “Do it, Dr. B. Please. For me.”

  “Will you call me Glenda Hasenpfeffer for the rest of the trip?” Tears filled my eyes and even the Baranuik defense, humor, wasn’t going to make this easier.

  “I’ll call you DJ Jazzy G-Pfeff for the rest of your damn, un-furry life, woman, just eat it!”

  I muttered a quick, “Mighty Hecate, this I ask; Guide me in my gruesome task!”

  Declan answered under his breath, “By the power of the Three; An’ it harm none, so mote it be.”

  Whimpering, I opened my mouth, slamming my eyes shut. Declan slid the hum
an mummy nugget onto my tongue, and I gagged. It was the consistency of beef jerky covered in sticky slime, and the flavor of honey did precisely nothing to hide the stench of dried, dead flesh. It should have been okay. After all, it was just meat, and it had apparently been smoked or dried before Pia or her accomplices placed it in the honey bath. That’s what I tried to tell myself. It’s like candied bacon, Marnie. You’ve tried that. It was mmm-mmm yummy. This is just caaaaaaandied bacon. Unfortunately, I am not easily duped, and the knowledge of what it actually was ruined the entire experience for me. I chewed only as much as I needed to and swallowed hard. One more gag almost undid all my hard work, but I managed to get it down.

  “Now what?” I asked. I watched him dab a little of the honey on my fox bite and fish around in vain for a bandage in our go-bags.

  “Now we get the fuck out of here with the rest of it, and hope like hell it works.”

  We stood, and crept to the door. No sounds, now. The tomb guardian had chased Folkenflik down a corridor far into the depths. My guts rebelled right away, rolling threateningly. “Mercy of Isis, I’m going to barf.”

  “Keep it down as long as you can,” Declan advised on a whisper. “Let’s go. Super quiet.”

  We slinked back the way we’d come, listening for any motion. Moving was difficult; my guts wanted to escape whatever I’d shoved in them. One way or another, something had to give. My upper lip began to sweat. We crept past the tomb, past the sticky, abandoned shovel. I averted my eyes. We made it as far as Pia’s bucket before hearing the quick shuffle of paws ahead of us, and a yip, followed by another howl ending in roop roop!

  I drew my dog whistle out of my shirt and gave it a sharp blast. Folkenflik was in the process of turning when he came into view around the corner, throwing himself like a furry missile between us and the lump that was chasing him.

  The protector of the tomb finally appeared and every follicle on my scalp prickled with terror. What I’d expected to be Babi the Bull of the Baboons was actually a being closer in appearance to a fat-bellied jackal up on two legs; long canine snout, pointed ears, human-like eyes that reminded me of Folkenflik. This creature was ten times the werefox’s size and ran like a man. My brain offered up: Duamutef?