Owl and the City of Angels (38 page)

“Quiet in there,” said one of the new players to the party. I couldn’t see him, but his voice alone told me plenty. An unfamiliar, soft-accented English, mixed with a quick pronunciation and the ease with which the phrase rolled out, told me he was no stranger to the language. That was good. The more everyone understands each other, the less trigger-happy they are. The high pitch hinted at something else as well.

“Hey, great, you speak English. Would you believe we were on a hike and got lost in that cave? I know, crazy American tourists—”

“I said be quiet,” the male voice said, with more emphasis this time. He rounded the cage, and I got my first look at one of our captors.

If I hadn’t been tied up in a cage, I’d have felt bad for the kid—and he was a kid. Even if the voice hadn’t given it away, his face did. He was tall for his age, but if he was a day over twelve, I was a dancing bear.

I made a point of looking him in the eye—something I’d learned when bartering with vampires. Funny thing about a kid pirate, they don’t have the eyes of a kid anymore.

Or maybe that was the fever and hallucinations hitting me again.

Regardless, the rifle slung over his shoulder didn’t escape my notice; neither did the way he played with the strap and butt.

Despite the English, I added trigger-happy back into the equation and decided to forgo the dumb tourist routine. “Why are we here?” I asked.

The kid frowned at me. “I told you. No speaking.”

I made a point of not breaking eye contact even though the kid was glaring at me. Harder to shoot someone while you’re looking them in the eye—mechanically, not ethically. Like I said, jaded . . . “Look, all I’m asking, kid, is why we’re here. I’m not asking you to let me out—” His frown deepened, so I added, “Ransoming tourists? Figure we have money on us? Just curious.”

“You are to stop speaking now, or I will make you.”

“Oh come on, you’ve already got us tied up in a cage. A little overkill, isn’t it? What’s the harm in telling us—”

The kid swung the gun off his shoulder and rammed the tip into my side right about where my sore rib was. “OK, kid—you made your point, I’ll shut up.”

“Do not call me a child. I am the one with the gun, and I am the one in charge. You will do what
I
say,” he said, and pointed a finger at his chest. It was the kind of aggression you get from a kitten or puppy when it’s done playing—a kitten with a loaded rifle and not afraid to use it, but still the uncomfortable analogy stands . . .

If I’d had my hands free, I would have lifted them in surrender. No sense risking another prod with a loaded gun from a twelve-year-old unhappy pirate. Instead, I said absolutely nothing, showing the kid that yes, he was in charge.

He waited, watching me before standing up and slowly walking around the cage, checking the lock and rope knots.

Oh very interesting.

I waited until the footsteps faded and the canvas of the tent once again muffled the retreating voices.

“How frequently does he come in?” I said to Nadya.

“Every thirty minutes or so. I’ve been counting—four times since we got here.”

So I’d been passed out for two hours or so.

Yeah, they definitely knew who we were—or who I was, at least. No way Somali pirates would go to all this trouble for two foreign girls. Which begged the question: who was pulling the strings?

“You’re lucky he didn’t shoot you,” she said.

“They wouldn’t bother tying us up if they were planning on killing us.” I probably should have added
yet
to that statement . . . if I was being completely honest.

“Note, I said shoot, not kill. The two can be mutually exclusive.”

“If he was going to hurt me, he’d have hit me with the butt of his gun. Someone told him not to.” I craned my neck around to see if I could get a better look at what was on Nadya’s side. I caught a glimpse of yet more crates and boxes piled high. They really had a hodgepodge of goods from just about every corner of the world. I was impressed in spite of my predicament. It takes a lot of effort to amass this many antiquities in one spot. “What else do we know besides they have no problem giving children guns?”

I felt Nadya shake her head. “Surprisingly little. I got the distinct impression on the way over here they were told to knock you out.”

“How’d they get Rynn?”

“We didn’t have a chance to speak. But I think it was deliberate. He only had two guns on him.”

Yeah, well Rynn had better know what he was doing with the pirates. Carpe’s whereabouts just worried me in general. I think the only place I trusted the elf was a few thousand miles away in front of a computer screen.

More muffled voices traveled from outside.

“How much do you want to bet the guy in charge is about to walk in now that I’m awake?”

I felt Nadya shrug. “Fifty-fifty they send someone lower down the ladder. Just in case we managed to get out.”

“You’re on.”

Sure enough, the voices cleared as the tent flap opened.

“Two?” I asked, guessing from the number of distinct voices I thought I’d heard.

“No, three—”

“Why, hello, my guests. My little brother tells me you are both awake now,” one of the men said, followed by an enthusiastic clap.

Definitely an adult, but not the deep, menacing, testosterone-fueled voice of the kind of tyrant I’d associate with running a band of pirates. It was more what I’d expect in a courtroom—or a business merger—or maybe even politics. If I had to guess, I’d bet on it being the same man who’d greeted us outside the temple, the same one claiming to be me.

When something surprises you, sometimes the best course of action is to hold your tongue until you have a better grip on your surroundings. I decided to wait until I got a better look at him.

Yes, I’m capable of rational thought.

The three men stepped around to my side of the cage. The first two looked like pirates—tall, muscular, large men decorated with guns and knives and a worn mismatch of fatigues. It was the third man who drew my attention. A foot or so shorter than his companions and less muscular, he was in fact the same one who had greeted us, except now he was dressed in a crisp, short-sleeved khaki shirt with matching shorts—expensive, if my tutelage with Nadya was any help. Whereas the other two pirates wore stoic expressions, on this man’s face was what could best be described as a politician’s smile. In fact, if it weren’t for my current predicament, I’d guess businessman on safari over pirate any day.

“My name is Odawaa Siad Barre, and I am the one in charge.” He raised his hand to point behind him. “These behind me are my men and will shoot you if you do something I do not like.” The smile didn’t falter as he added, “Do we understand each other?”

The tingling down the back of my neck rose four notches on the Spidey scale. Someone like this didn’t become king of the pirates because they threatened and intimidated people. That was the job of the two in back. Someone like Odawaa rose to power through his wits.

“Crystal,” I said.

Apparently Odawaa liked that answer. He crouched down to the dirt floor, arranging himself carefully and deliberately into a cross-legged position. It was a message; he didn’t need to sit above me to know he had the upper hand.

It’s the really dangerous ones who know posturing is for those who need to overcompensate.

“That is very good. Misunderstandings are unpleasant and unfortunately lead to people losing their fingers.”

Odawaa’s muscle stood a few paces behind, scowling. I didn’t miss their hands on the guns. Or the assortment of knives.

“Imagine my surprise earlier this evening when I and my men came across two American women rummaging around old unmarked ruins,” he said, and tsked. “Very dangerous for tourists this far south.”

Now who was wasting time pretending . . . “Yeah, that’s us. Just a couple of tourists running around unmarked dig sites in the middle of the night. What do you want?”

Odawaa smiled, but this time it wasn’t friendly. “At first I thought I would ransom you back to your government. Two lone women who travel with an armed guard must be worth something.” He rubbed his fingertips together, the universal sign for money.

He thought Rynn was a bodyguard and didn’t seem to know about Carpe—or my cat. That was good.

“But then, I thought to myself, What are two young women doing out here in the middle of nowhere?” He feigned surprise. “I thought, Perhaps they are archaeologists with the IAA. I had better check, I know how particular they can be. I thought, I will ask my good friend.” He pulled out a cell phone and turned the screen around so I could see the picture. It was me—unconscious, with my mouth open and drooling.

“Imagine how much more surprised I was after sending this picture to find I was playing host to the famed thief Owl.”

Yeah, I couldn’t quite hide my own expression at that statement. I lifted my bound wrists as far as I could. “I think our cultures have very differing definitions of ‘host.’ ”

Odawaa’s smile widened. “I was told to expect a strange sense of humor. Though I believe it is me who does the laughing. We are—how would you say?—great admirers of your work. Imitation is the best form of flattery, no?”

Strange didn’t begin to cover this. I nodded at the crates and boxes surrounding us. “A bit upscale for Somali pirates, isn’t this?”

Odawaa’s smile and businesslike swagger didn’t drop, not for a second, as he shrugged. “Governments get very upset when we steal ships, and it’s no secret that the good ships carry more guns now as well. I find that they are much less concerned about vanishing antiquities, and there are no guns. It is a very lucrative business, as I believe you are already aware.”

Great—not only were pirates getting involved in the antiquities trade but they were also impersonating me to do it. Fantastic.

“Look, Odawaa, neither of us are idiots.” I hoped, though according to Rynn and Nadya, my omission from that club was tentative at best. “My head is killing me and I’m kind of on a time line here. What do you want?”

He gestured towards me. “Perhaps I simply wanted to see the legend—and my competition.”

I shook my head. “No. You’d just shoot me. It’d be easier and less messy. What do you want?” I said, and gave the question more emphasis.

He turned to his men and tsked. One of them handed him a tablet and a large-grid notebook, the kind archaeologists use to map locations and track dig items.

“Two of my men are dead and three more are dying,” Odawaa said. “All the same symptoms, all the same time, but do you want to know what the truly interesting thing is? They were on different continents. Two in Syria, one in my beloved home of Somalia, and two in Los Angeles, California. Strange coincidence, no?”

A familiar chill ran up my spine. When I didn’t say anything, he continued, “I asked myself, Odawaa, what did these men have in common? Health? No. Women? More possible but also no. Something they ate? But how could they have shared food on different sides of the world?”

He lowered his head like one of the large predators the African continent is famous for. “The only thing these men had in common was that all handled the artifacts from the IAA’s city in Syria. I want to know why.” He turned the tablet around. I recognized an article I’d seen in L.A. only a few days before, though it seemed much longer. It was an update on the two foreign undocumented workers who had fallen ill and been quarantined. Both were now dead, and the health authorities were still investigating and warning people to report in to a hospital if experiencing flulike symptoms.

Yeah, that chilled feeling only got worse. I swallowed my nerves. “So? Ask your friend at the IAA. You know damn well I haven’t set foot in the city.”

Odawaa grinned and laughed, making a show of slapping his legs and gesturing to his men as if we were sharing in a great joke. “You know, I did just that. They say it is merely coincidence. Many viruses float around in Africa, which is true.” He dropped all pretence of friendliness. “But they kill more than five men. I want to know what you know of this disease that kills like a poison and the IAA need to lie about.”

So many ways to answer that question . . . “Do you believe in curses, Mr. Barre?” I asked.

He smiled. “ ‘Mr. Barre’—I think I like that—Owl. Do I believe in curses?” He nodded at the men standing behind him, still holding their guns. “You see my men? They only speak a few words of English and believe in all manner of things, from curses to demons.” To prove his point, he asked them a question in what I guessed was Somali. Both men’s hands left the hilts of their guns, and they made the sign of the cross.

Odawaa turned back to me. “You see? Very superstitious. Me? Before my country imploded and this line of work found me, I studied tropical diseases in London, of all places. They may not know better, but you and I? We do.”

“No offense, but how the hell does a doctor end up king of the pirates?” I said.

He smiled. “At the risk of quoting old children’s tales, I decided I’d rather be the thing that goes bump in the night than the one waiting to be eaten, and the only things that go bump in the night in Somalia are the pirates, so here I am. Who knew I would have such a talent for this line of work?”

The universe in its unholy wrath rains down all sorts of surprises on the unsuspecting . . . as much as I was pissed Odawaa and his crew were using me as their business model, I’m not the one who could judge him for joining the side with all the guns after the government collapsed.

I also didn’t want to spend an extended period of time with an ex-MD who’d crawled the ranks to Head Somali Pirate . . .

“Now, I tell you all this because my contact believes I am just another superstitious thug of a pirate. I ask you again, what do you know of this hemorrhagic fever that lives in the old caverns and acts like a poison? What disease is this that hides on old stone and drowns its victims in their own blood?”

Hemorrhagic fever. That was bad, and also not what the previous teams/victims had called it in their dig notes . . . then again, they hadn’t had a doctor on team.

Bigger problem; how the hell did I explain to someone who knew better than to believe in supernatural monsters and curses that what his men were experiencing was a supernatural curse?