Veil of the Goddess (11 page)

"Compared to what?” she asked. “I mean, if you're talking about historical importance, I think the True Cross is a pretty hard act to follow."

He grinned. “Can't argue with that. But this is pretty cool too."

The black stones of the temple were intricately carved with a frieze that started at the bottom and continued all the way to the top of the ten-foot-high structure.

"Maybe not so cool. This stuff is nasty,” Zack reported from where he had bent to examine the sculptures more closely.

Ivy didn't know what she was expecting—maybe kamasutra-like sexual instructions. Instead, the temple wall was carved with hundreds of miniature statues of humans being slaughtered—and eaten by animal-headed gods.

"People have believed in some pretty sickening things,” she observed.

Although the temple was intact, there was no evidence that anyone had been inside the temple for ages.

A thick layer of dust lay on the temple steps but there were no spiderwebs. Maybe the ugly yellow barrier kept out even insects.

Inside the temple, another sculpted depiction of the god with a human torso and a hawk head stood, his muscular arms holding a basin that drained into his open mouth. A long flint knife lay on his basin. And it was definitely a
him
. The god's enormous erection made that clear.

Richly colored paintings on the wall depicted naked priests using that knife, or one just like it, to butcher a series of children.

The god was turned on by drinking human blood. Very nasty.

"Lots of old religions centered on human sacrifice,” Zack said.

She'd almost forgotten about him and Zack's voice startled her.

"So maybe it's a good thing this place is sealed away."

"People don't worship gods like this any more,” Zack reminded her. “Even by the time Homer wrote, almost three thousand years ago, human sacrifice was seen as perverse.” He paused for a moment, “in this part of the world anyway. This place must be really ancient. More than three thousand years old, for sure. Maybe lots older. I don't see any signs of metal at all. Neolithic."

"It may be old, but the power is still here,” Ivy reminded him.

The hairs on her arm stood abruptly as a chilling idea crossed her mind.

"What do you figure the odds are that we just happened to stumble on the
only
hidden place like this?"

Zack didn't even pause to consider. “About zero. There have to be thousands of places like this. Although you do have to remember that we're in a particularly ancient part of the world. In other countries, there might be fewer things like this."

"And the Cross is the key to opening them all.” She sagged against a wall, then recoiled as the hideous yellow power clawed at her. “If someone could unlock the power that is keeping this place hidden, they could do almost anything."

Zack nodded slowly. “The ultimate weapons of mass destruction. Maybe Colin Powell and those guys weren't lying after all about what was hidden in Iraq. Not completely."

"Maybe."

The air inside the temple seemed suddenly stale to her and Ivy stepped outside, back to the stone courtyard surrounding the temple.

"Okay,” she said. “We'll bring in the bicycles and the longer Cross section. We'll leave the cross-piece hanging out a few inches so we can get back in. I know it's taking a chance, but we'll have to hope nobody can spot it. I think this place's power glow will shield it from any CIA sensors. That's what the orange color was all about."

He gave her a funny look and she had to remind herself that Zack couldn't see the power. It was frighteningly real to her.

"What if you're wrong?"

"If I'm wrong, we're dead, Zack. Is that what you want me to say? Because it's true. But if we just wander into town and walk up to the Turkish Army with pieces of the True Cross and a couple of bicycles we stole from a monastery, we'll be just as dead. We don't have a lot of choices here. One way we're taking a chance, the other way there's no chance at all."

"I'm not arguing. I just don't like it."

She didn't feel great about it, either. She hoped there wasn't any leakage of the temple's power. Letting that sick yellow glow out would probably hit this part of Turkey like a plague.

"Let's head into town and see what we can get, then,” she said. “I'm ready to take a bath and discard these bloody clothes."

"We should leave the Kalashnikovs here,” Zack reminded her. “I don't think the Turkish Army would be any happier than the Dallas Police seeing someone walking around with a machine gun."

She hoped he couldn't see her flush in the twilight. She'd completely forgotten her weapon and had been ready to leave it strapped on her back.

"Right.” She stripped off the assault rifle and leaned it against her bicycle, careful not to let it come in contact with the temple itself. “Are we ready now? Because this temple is giving me a headache you wouldn't believe."

Simak wasn't much, but its coffee shop had a single room for rent, and it served a sort of falafel sandwich that was the best thing Zack had ever eaten.

He had to claim that he and Ivy were married before the coffee shop proprietor agreed to rent them that room—and didn't miss the doubt and lust in the man's eyes as he stared at Ivy. Considering that she was still blood-soaked and filthy from days of wandering through the mountains, Zack could only conclude that they didn't get many blondes in this part of the world.

At least no one would mistake them for soldiers. With his three day beard and Ivy's uncombed short hair, they looked more like hippies in search of the perfect drug deal than they did like members of the world's greatest fighting force. Even the ratty remains of their uniforms, mixed with the few pieces they'd saved from the insurgent gear they'd stolen, added to the stoned-loser look.

After a quick shopping trip garnered them a bar of scratchy soap and some used clothing that smelled clean, they headed for the room they'd rented.

Zack
really
wanted a shower, but settled for soaking in the diminutive bathtub in the bathroom down the hall.

He had to replace the filthy water three times before he was clean enough to dry off. Then he dressed himself in the rough but clean wool pants and heavy cotton shirt he'd bought and knocked on the door to their room.

"Finished,” he admitted. “The bath is all yours."

"Good. How's our money holding out?"

"I've got a few thousand left. Plus the gold coins."

"Good. If we can buy a truck, we should be able to move more quickly."

"Take your bath and we'll talk about it.” Now that they had a safe hiding place, Zack's military instincts were telling him to lay low, resupply and recuperate, and let the hunt die down. Ivy seemed ready to push ahead, but pushing without a plan and without adequate preparation was asking for failure.

His face must have given his thoughts away because he saw Ivy biting her tongue to keep from snapping back at him. She grabbed the bundle of clothing and her towel and headed down the hall.

Zack considered flopping on the lumpy bed, but the leer from the coffee shop owner kept coming back to him. Instead, he forced himself to his feet, followed Ivy down the hall, and parked himself outside the bathroom door.

Ivy could take care of herself, but there was no lock on that door and Zack figured the police wouldn't be sympathetic if he had to explain why Ivy had murdered their host.

A couple of minutes later, large brown eyes and a mop of dark brown hair peeked up from the steep stairway leading from the coffee shop downstairs. “You are needing something, perhaps?"

It wasn't the proprietor but his teenaged son.

"Everything's under control,” Zack said.

"Ask him about a truck,” Ivy shouted from the other side of the thin bathroom door.

"Right. My uh-wife and I are wondering if anyone in Simak has a truck they're interested in selling. I'll give you twenty dollars if you find one we can afford.” Plus whatever commission he could wangle out of the seller.

The young man studied him. “Euros would be better than dollars. And are you sure you only want a truck? I can find you Hashish. Plenty."

Well, Zack had been right about the disguise. Nobody thought they were soldiers. “I'd rather have Euros myself, but what I've got is American dollars. And we're not interested in drugs."

"No alcohol here."

Now that he knew he couldn't get one, he craved a beer more than he could imagine. “What we need is a truck,” he repeated. “Not expensive, though."

"Fifty dollars and I'll see if I can find.” The kid held out his hand.

"Fifty dollars if you find one that we can afford. I'll pay you then."

The kid's grin let Zack know he'd been suckered. Well, it wasn't the worst thing that had happened.

That grin widened considerably when Ivy stepped out of the bathroom wrapped in nothing but a towel.

Zack was used to seeing Ivy in baggy military pants and the armor-encrusted tunic. Not that he was unaware of Ivy as a female, but that awareness had always been somewhere in the back of his mind rather than a conscious thought. He'd never feel that way again.

The small towel the coffee shop proprietor had supplied covered her strategic areas, but just barely. She was tall for a woman and there was definitely a lot of leg going on there.

Both the kid and Zack puckered their lips to whistle, but Zack managed to stop himself before he actually let out any noise.

No such luck from the kid.

"If you two perverts would get out of my way, I'll put some clothes on,” Ivy snapped.

"I was just guarding—"

"Good. Keep on guarding.” She walked down the hall, gave the kid a hard stare until he blushed and looked away, then slammed their bedroom door.

"Your wife, she is quite, uh, glamorous,” the kid observed. “Is that right? Glamorous? Movie star?"

"Glamorous, yes. Movie star, not yet, kid.” But the discoverer of the True Cross was likely to be quite a media favorite when word got around. Who knew, maybe Ivy would make it to Hollywood and become an actor.

"I go look for a truck.” But the young Kurd remained in place, as if glued to the floor where he sat, waiting for another vision.

It took Zack a few seconds to figure out the problem. The kid was embarrassed to stand up because his arousal would be sticking out like that bird-god statue's.

He pretended he had to look at a faded print on the wall so the kid could leave without being ashamed. “I appreciate your help,” he called to the kid's retreating back.

"I'm very a big help. Maybe you give me one hundred dollars. Fifty U.S. dollars are not so much. Only thirty Euros."

"Fifty dollars.” Zack wasn't going to get suckered again.

He waited until the kid nodded and vanished before softly knocking on the door to the room he and Ivy shared. The kid might not think anything of it, but the proprietor would get suspicious if he learned Zack was waiting out in the hall while his supposed wife was getting dressed.

Ivy planned on getting about twenty-four hours of sleep. She'd recognized the predatory look in Zack's eyes as well as those of the young Kurdish man who'd offered to help find them a truck, but she figured she could trust Zack to keep his pants zipped. He certainly hadn't caused her any problems before. Then again, before she'd had her bath, she reeked enough that she would scare a skunk.

"Do you think one of us needs to stay awake?"

Zack glanced at the thin door. It didn't have anything as sophisticated as a lock and wasn't strong enough to resist a kick even if they used a chair to prop it closed.

"I don't—"

Whatever he did or didn't became irrelevant because the hard knock on the door cut him off.

"Police. Open."

The proprietor's son, apparently drafted into translation duty, looked visibly nervous as three Turkish soldiers shoved him into their room and followed.

A Sergeant barked something at the young man. He wasn't speaking Kurdish, which made sense. The Turks probably didn't trust local Kurds given their continuous low-level conflict against Kurdish insurgency.

Fortunately, the multi-lingual young man seemed to understand.

"He wants to know if you're English."

"American,” Zack answered.

The Kurd translated and got a growled response.

"He wants to know where is your baggage. Your passports. They think you are carrying drugs."

Since the Kurd had offered to find hashish for Zack, that wasn't a bad guess. Ivy remembered an old movie about Turkish drug prisons and was glad Zack had turned down the offer.

"We lost our bags,” Zack claimed. Probably smarter than telling the truth.

Zack's translated answer provoked a heated discussion amongst the three soldiers.

"They want you to go with them,” the kid finally reported. “They're going to take you to their headquarters in Batman. Many kilometers away. They say maybe you are drug smugglers, maybe someone they have been told to look for. You want me call American Embassy?"

From the young man's nervous expression, he feared the soldiers almost as much as Ivy did.

"No Embassy,” she said.

He gave her a strange look, almost as if they were somehow allied. “You come back, I have truck,” he said.

Ivy didn't think he was translating. She also didn't think she'd be coming back if these soldiers had anything to say about it.

"Thanks."

He blushed and hung his head, unwilling to meet her eyes. Turkey wasn't supposed to be as conservative as a lot of the Middle East, but here in the eastern part of the country, looking a woman in the eye was still a bit more daring than this young man could quite bring himself to do. Not that he'd minded looking at her legs when she'd come out of the bathroom.

The soldiers hustled them downstairs, away from the lumpy mattress that had felt like paradise during the few moments when she'd actually been able to lie down and enjoy it.

They left the young Kurd behind. Ivy hoped that meant the Army had its own translators in Batman, wherever that was. The alternative was worse.