Owl and the City of Angels (2 page)

Emperor Caracalla, the guy who built the catacomb, was the head of the Roman Pharaonic cult of Alexandria in the second century AD. His lifelong obsession was getting his hands on the Egyptian burial spells that would grant him a Pharaoh’s ticket to the immortal afterlife. As part of his spirit quest, he massacred twenty thousand Alexandrians, slaughtered a perfectly good set of chariot horses—one of which I’d spent the last three days excavating—and assassinated his own brother. A real all-around, outstanding citizen . . . Shame he never did find the right Egyptian burial spells.

I wasn’t sure I wanted to know what—or who—Caracalla stuck in the second sarcophagus.

I took another breath. The IAA cleared the place, and World Quest had no monsters listed in here . . . and Caracalla at least had the good taste to bury himself with a gold-and-emerald-encrusted Medusa head . . .

I set a climbing hook into the stone pillar above the hole and secured my rope, doing my best to think about the Medusa head and not the second sarcophagus.

I started lowering myself down the hole, when my phone started to buzz and chime in my pocket. I frowned. I was sure I’d turned the damn ringer off—in fact, I know I had . . . I glanced at the number. Son of a bitch . . .

“What the hell do you want?”

“You missed game time,” came Carpe’s voice, closer to feminine than masculine on the sliding gray scale of male vocal texture.

Goddamn it—he must have been monitoring my or Nadya’s phone. “I’m working—” I started.

“You’re in
Egypt,
” he said, his voice thick with accusation.

I closed my eyes; I didn’t have time for this. “Carpe, I don’t know how many times I have to tell you, I’m not getting your goddamn book!”

“You’re doing this out of spite because I didn’t tell you I was an elf.”

Ha. Far from it. In fact, I wished to hell he’d never told me. “No, I’m not refusing out of spite, I’m refusing on grounds of self-preservation.”

“It’s a quick trip past the pyramids, you could be back in a day—”

“I don’t care! I’m more interested in my neck—specifically that at the end of the day it’s still attached to both my head and body.”

“Alix, it’s a matter of life and death—”

Knowing Carpe, I doubted that very much. I started to lower myself through the hole. If I lost reception, all the better. “No, if you keep this up, I’m going to take out hits on you in World Quest—
then
it will be a matter of life and death.”

I heard the rumble overhead before I felt the chamber shake around me. I swore.

“Owl? What’s that noise?” Carpe said, his voice wary.

“Got to go,” I said, and shoved the phone back in my pocket. I grabbed the edge of the floor with my free hand and held on to the rope with the other. I wasn’t risking my neck going against a real mummy just for Carpe’s stupid spell book . . .

As the growl of the truck above faded into the distance, the chamber didn’t stop shaking. I felt the hook holding my rope give.

Shit. I threw my weight against the edge of the hole as the rope slipped through my fingers and disappeared into the shadows of the pool below. With a last look down at the pool I started to pull myself up. That had been way too close—

A snap echoed through the chamber as the stone tile I was holding onto cracked.

My legs were still suspended over the crypt. I held my breath and carefully pulled myself up. I could still climb out and get the hell out of this mess . . . I kept thinking that even as the tile snapped cleaned through.

“Son of a—” The rest of that sentence was distorted by my hitting the stone sarcophagus.

Pain shot up my side as the ornate lid of the stone sarcophagus broke my fall, knocking the wind out of me. I lay there for a moment, my ears ringing as I mentally checked that everything was working and still where it was supposed to be.

Well, look at the bright side: at least the sarcophagus stopped me from plunging into the stagnant water. It smelled so much worse down here . . .

Back still smarting, I pushed myself up to seated. By the weight, I knew my flashlight was still tucked inside my jacket, so I fished that out first and turned on the high beam to quickly survey the burial chamber and get my bearings. The entire room was roughly sixteen by sixteen feet, maybe bigger, and consisted of rounded, arched walls and a vaulted ceiling. All four walls were decorated with carved and painted Medusa heads, a common protection symbol Pharaonic Romans buried themselves and their goods with. For some strange reason, out of all the Greek and Roman gods out there, the Pharaonic Romans had focused on Medusa as a protector. Thank God Gorgons were isolated to the northern side of the Mediterranean—something about a deep-seated fear of water. They don’t actually turn you into stone, in case you were wondering. That’s a myth. They cover their victims with ash and a gluelike substance that cauterizes flesh on impact before solidifying—think Pompeii.

Still intact above the waterline were paintings of the usual Egyptian pantheon suspects: Horus, Isis, Anubis, Osiris. The entire chamber was overly elaborate for the time period and depth, even for an emperor.

As my flashlight illuminated the north wall directly across from me, I picked out the second sarcophagus sitting in a raised alcove, Latin words carved into the wall above it, and underscored with hieroglyphs.

Caracalla
.

Pass go and collect two hundred dollars.

Next, I checked the hole in the ceiling I was partially responsible for. There was no way I’d reach it standing on the sarcophagus—too high. Climbing was out—the walls arched inwards towards the ceiling. I was trapped until Mike and the rest of the dig team came looking for me.

Well, at least with the collapsed floor I wouldn’t have to explain what the hell I was doing down here.

I spotted my backpack a few feet away from where I’d landed on the sarcophagus. Flashlight in mouth, I made my way towards it. Get bag, get Medusa head, figure way out . . .

Unfortunately the sarcophagus had different plans. Years of dampness had covered the domed lid with a slick slime. A hand’s reach away from my backpack, my knees shot out from under me. “Oh you’ve got to be kidding—damn it!” I said as I slid off and landed in knee-deep, stale water.

Soaked and smelling worse than I had any right to, I pushed myself up and noticed a hole in the side of the sarcophagus—a small one, but a crack nonetheless. I swallowed. Sarcophagi and tombs in general don’t bother me—they come with the territory; it’s when they’re broken open in a sealed-in room that I start to worry.

OK, Owl—here goes the hard part . . . I edged my flashlight beam through the crack to see if there were any remains left inside . . .

I yelled as two rats shot out. One dove headfirst into the water, but the second leapt off the stone lid and landed on my head. I shouted again and tried to pull the rat off, but it held on to my hair for dear life. I shook my head in an attempt to dislodge it, but that only gave it the bright idea to dive down my cargo jacket. I batted my body until the rat fell into the water, squeaking once before swimming off after its friend. I shook my head; I’d seen a lot of rats on dig sites, but I’d never had one try to use me as a hiding spot. I chalked it up to rat cabin fever and turned my attention back on the sarcophagus.

Empty.

My calves steadied in the water. Empty was good.

I checked the submerged floor for uneven breaks or outright holes before wading through the knee-deep warm water towards Caracalla’s sarcophagus. Halfway there the stale water deepened past my waist. The floor must have shifted over the past few thousand years. From the blue-white light cast by my submerged light stick, I got a better look at the green-and-blue Medusa-decorated floor, which was even more impressive up close. Days like this, what I wouldn’t give for a few hours and a decent camera . . .

I also noticed there wasn’t a passageway out in sight, with the exception of the one in the ceiling directly above me.

Caracalla had been sealed in. Couldn’t blame whoever made that call. With the exception of an IAA fiber optics camera, I was probably the first evidence of humanity to set foot in this chamber in almost two thousand years. Two thirds of the way across, my flashlight beam caught gold, and a glint reflected off the lid.

Bingo.

The water shallowed out as I approached the platform. The sarcophagus was raised high enough off the floor that I’d have to climb on top to reach the Medusa head. The left corner of the stone pedestal was cracked where it met the water, but otherwise it looked sturdy enough.

It was by chance that I caught the submerged tiles switch from pictures depicting Medusa heads to a Roman numeral five inches from my foot. I checked the rest of the floor between me and the pedestal; laid out in a four-by-eight grid was a series of Roman numerals, each one different.

Shit. A Roman numeral code? But how many numbers, and what was the sequence? More importantly, what happened if I screwed it up?

Time to call Nadya.

“Alix, what the hell happened? The entire city shook.”

Leave it to Nadya to bypass all pleasantries . . . “Just a minor cave-in—I’m fine, in fact it might have bought me some time.”

“Where are you?”

“Let’s just say the good news is I don’t have to explain to anyone what the hell I’m doing down in Caracalla’s tomb since the floor collapsed underneath me. You should see the artwork—”

“Alix, just the Medusa head!”

“All right, all right.” I transferred the phone to my shoulder to get a better look at the layout with my flashlight. “Listen, off the top of your head, have you ever heard of a Roman numeral booby trap associated with Caracalla’s tomb?”

“I don’t see anything on this map, but the Romans were fond of math problems. Is there an equation nearby?”

I scanned the area, but nothing stood out. I also didn’t see any major levers or plates—nothing that would indicate poison darts or giant rocks.

Oh hell, I was never good at math anyways . . . I tossed my bag onto the sarcophagus. “Never mind, Nadya—I’ve got it.” I shoved my phone, which was still on, in my pocket, backed up to the edge of the shallows, took a running start, and leapt right before my foot touched the first Roman numeral.

I landed halfway on, halfway off the sarcophagus. I was ready for the slime this time and dragged myself up before I slid back into the water.

I pulled my phone back out of my pocket and balanced it between my ear and shoulder. “OK, I’m on the sarcophagus—”

I heard Nadya swear. She was not a fan of my run-and-jump method of avoiding traps. “Just be careful with the head piece. It’s high carat.”

The purer the gold, the easier to dent. That noted, I started to work on the surrounding rock with my chisel. I winced as the chisel hitting rock echoed around the room.

“Alix, quietly! I can hear you banging over the phone.”

“I can’t do it any quieter,” I said as I hit it again. The sarcophagus stone chipped as I struck it, and I cringed at the damage. Normally I’d use something more elegant, like acid or some other solvent, but I was short on time.

“Come on, you stupid decoration—get out of the damn stone,” I said, and wedged my chisel further into the groove. The gold Medusa head lifted a quarter of an inch.

Two or three more strikes and I’d be able to work it out . . .

Something larger than a rat scraped against the stone wall, and I got a whiff of something astringent and rotten at the same time.

A chill ran down my spine. I spun in the direction the noise had originated in, careful to watch my footing on the sarcophagus.

Nothing moved as my flashlight illuminated the shadows, and the noise didn’t repeat. I chalked it up to my own personal brand of paranoia.

Still, I picked up the pace on the Medusa head. A minute later it popped free. I switched the phone to my mouth so I could use my chin to hold the head while I fetched the duct tape out of my bag. Trust me, duct-taping an artifact to your stomach sounds a little gutter trash as far as thieves go, but I’m a hell of a lot less likely to lose it that way than if it’s stuffed in my bag or pocket—especially if I have to run.

Which, if things went as planned this time, wouldn’t happen . . .

Oh God, I hope to hell I don’t have to run this time. I had enough of that in Algiers . . .

“Alix, do you have it?” Nadya’s voice came over the phone.

“Uh—ye-ah—” I finished securing the Medusa head to my stomach and retrieved the phone from my mouth. “Yeah, got it—” I scanned the ceiling and wall on this corner of the chamber, looking for a way out I might have missed. Nothing . . . Shit. “Look, I’ve got to find a way out of here—I’ll call you back as soon as I’m out of the dig site,” I said, then hung up the phone and stuffed it in my front cargo pocket before she could argue.

Maybe I could figure out a way to get back out that hole in the ceiling . . .

I grabbed my bag and, after one last pat on the duct tape, leapt off the sarcophagus past the Roman numerals. I swayed as I hit the water and overcompensated, stumbling forward to avoid falling back on the grid . . .

Something solid brushed up against my leg.

I swore, more from surprise than anything else—I hate running into things in the dark. I aimed my flashlight to remove the dark factor.

The front half of a fresh rat corpse brushed up against my khakis.
Son of a—
Out of reflex, I scrambled back.

I felt the tile sink under my foot.

“Oh shit.” I stood perfectly still as the room grumbled, the sound of stone grating on stone. Now what the hell had I just triggered? No holes in the wall, no trapdoors underneath me . . . I glanced up and caught the stone slab sliding open above.

I dove out of the way before the first cannonball-shaped stone hit the water in front of me, making a loud clicking noise as it struck the tile floors beneath. I let out an involuntary yelp as the second cannonball hit my shoulder. I heard more slabs begin to slide open above.

So much for keeping my head dry. I took a deep breath and dove under the surface towards the broken sarcophagus on the other side of the room. The stones pelted the water around me, but soon I was in the deeper section and out of range.