The granite key, p.17
The Granite Key, page 17
The scrivener shrugged. “Haven’t a clue, but I expect it will be someone who knows what they’re about. We don’t need amateurs mucking this up. It’s too important.” He gave a sigh of relief. “It’s times like these when I’m glad I work in a library.”
“Vault,” Cassie corrected with a laugh. “You work in a vault, remember?”
Chapter 29—Team Quirks
CASSIE ARRIVED AT FAYE’S house at eleven o’clock the following morning. She’d been surprised when the memory guardian drew her aside at the reception the night before and asked her to stop by. Faye neglected to say what she wanted to see Cassie about.
“Sure, no problem,” the pythia agreed, secretly wondering what hoops the old woman was going to make her jump through this time.
When she pulled into the driveway of the farmhouse, two other cars were already parked there. Cassie didn’t recognize them and wondered what other company Faye might have.
The old woman greeted her at the door and ushered her into the kitchen at the back. Two people were seated at the table. Cassie smiled to see Griffin. And then to her horror, she noticed Erik sitting across from him.
“What’s... sh.... he... doing... here!” Their voices clashed in mid-sentence.
Griffin looked in dismay from one to the other.
Faye chuckled. “Calm yourselves, my dears. Cassie, please sit down and help yourself to some banana nut bread. I just made a few loaves fresh this morning. There’s tea if you like.”
The thought of food was the last thing on Cassie’s mind. She sat down at the end of the table, moving her chair slightly away from Erik’s side and closer to Griffin’s.
They continued to scowl at one another though neither spoke.
Faye drew up a chair for herself at the opposite end. “I believe you two got off on the wrong foot,” she began. “That’s unfortunate since you’ll need to work closely together on your new recovery mission.”
“What recovery mission?” Erik asked suspiciously, never taking his eyes off Cassie. “She hasn’t come up with anything yet, has she?”
“Why don’t you ask me yourself?” Cassie snapped. “I’m sitting right here.”
“Well, did you?” the blond man demanded.
“No, as a matter of fact, I didn’t. I’m still in training,” the pythia said primly.
“That’ll take a couple of years,” Erik muttered under his breath.
“Am I missing something here?” Griffin interjected hesitantly.
“I think these two are going through a period of adjustment,” Faye said mildly. “That’s all.”
Out of respect for Faye, neither one of them contradicted her. They just seethed in silence.
Ignoring the tension, Faye sliced a piece of nut loaf and handed it to Cassie, thereby redirecting the pythia’s attention.
“I’m sure you’re wondering why I called the three of you together,” she began.
“I am now,” Erik commented sotto voce.
“I should think it would be obvious, given the outcome of last night’s meeting.” The old woman glanced around the table.
The three visitors looked back at her blankly.
She smiled briefly. “Apparently not as obvious to you three as it is to me.” She took a deep breath. “My dears, I have chosen you to be the team which will retrieve the Bones of the Mother.”
They all sat thunderstruck. If she had just announced that she intended to take up a career as a professional wrestler, the trio couldn’t have been more shocked.
“I beg your pardon,” Griffin said, probably thinking he had misheard her.
“What?” Erik asked flatly.
“Huh?” was Cassie’s eloquent contribution.
Faye seemed to be enjoying their consternation. She laughed. “Oh my, this isn’t going to be easy, is it? Yes, you all heard me correctly. I don’t see why any of you should be surprised. All of you have unique skills that will prove invaluable in recovering these artifacts.”
The three of them started babbling at once, protesting their unfitness for the job. No single voice could be heard above the general rumble of discontent. Faye let them complain for a few minutes and then raised her hand for silence. “I think we might make better progress if each of you spoke in turn. Griffin, dear, why don’t you start?”
It took the scrivener several seconds to catch his breath and assemble his thoughts. He sounded panic-stricken. “Faye, surely you can’t be serious. I’ve never gone on a field mission in my entire life. My skills, as you call them, are of the bookish variety.”
“Exactly,” she concurred. “My dear, you carry an encyclopedia in your head. It’s very impressive.”
“At cocktail parties, possibly,” he admitted. “But I hardly think it will be useful out in the middle of nowhere.”
“Don’t you?” she asked gently. “On the contrary, that’s precisely where your knowledge would prove to be the most useful. This mission won’t allow the luxury of a portable library or a reliable internet connection. Thinking quickly on one’s feet is what will be required.”
“But what about the central catalog? I am its director, after all.”
“And you have a very capable staff who can fill in until you return,” the old woman suggested helpfully.
He didn’t appear convinced but was at a loss to come up with any further objections.
“And what about you, Cassie?” the old woman focused her attention on the pythia. “What is your principal concern about making the journey?”
“Me?” Cassie asked in astonishment. “I only signed on less than a month ago, and now you want to send me overseas? Even army recruits get more time in boot camp than that!”
“I never thought I’d say this,” Erik admitted ruefully. “But the kid is right.”
“I’m not a kid!” Cassie rounded on him.
“Yeah, you’re a veteran.” The blond man rolled his eyes and folded his arms across his chest.
Cassie turned her attention back to Faye. “Besides, I don’t know what help I could be. You’re expecting to find a code chiseled into stone somewhere, right? It doesn’t take a pythia to decrypt that. Griffin should be able to crack the code with no problem. He’s incredibly smart.”
“Please stop helping me, I beg you,” Griffin protested weakly.
“To tell the truth, we can’t be sure what you’ll encounter when you get to Crete,” Faye countered. “It may very well be that the skills of a pythia are exactly what is needed.”
“You really think she’s up to it?” Erik looked at Faye curiously.
“I’ve seen her telemetric abilities firsthand. I can assure you; she’s quite adept.”
“Huh, go figure.” Erik seemed genuinely amazed at Faye’s glowing endorsement of Cassie.
“I hope the shock of knowing I’m competent doesn’t kill you,” Cassie commented acidly.
“It just might,” the blond man said with an impudent smirk.
Cassie was about to go at him again, but Faye preempted her. “Erik, dear, what possible objection can you have for going on this expedition? After all, you love field work, and you’ve had plenty of experience.”
Erik let out a long sigh. “It’s not me I’m worried about. It’s these two.” He jerked his head in the direction of his companions. “I know what I’m doing, and I can handle whatever gets thrown at me. But I’d have to watch out for them every step of the way. It would be like letting toddlers loose in a mine field.” He shrugged. “I know I’m only the security guy, and I can’t actually find the artifacts. But I can think of five people in the Arkana right off the top of my head who could, and it isn’t these two. You should listen to them, Faye. They’re both telling you they’re not up to it.”
“Now just a minute, old man,” Griffin protested. Apparently, it was one thing to downplay his own experience but to hear Erik’s dismissive opinion was too much of an insult.
“You know what?” Cassie shot back at the blond man. “I’m suddenly feeling really up to it. If I don’t do anything other than make your life miserable for a couple of weeks, then I’ll die happy.”
“‘Die’ being the operative word,” Erik retorted.
Faye shook her head and laughed. “So much sound and fury signifying nothing. Please try to trust my judgment, my dears. I wish you could see yourselves as I do. I have very good reasons for choosing each one of you.”
They glanced at one another dubiously, trying hard to imagine what shining qualities Faye could see.
She continued. “This mission is unlike anything the Arkana has attempted before. The circumstances are unique. We don’t know the location of the message which the key unlocks, nor do we know what artifacts we’re searching for. We don’t even know how many of them there are. On top of that, we’re very likely to run into dangerous competition for those relics. This is a highly unorthodox retrieval mission, and I believe it calls for an unorthodox team to bring it to a successful conclusion.”
She peered at them all earnestly, willing them to understand the point she was trying to make. “This mission can’t be conducted by the book. Seasoned experts often grow complacent, and complacency would be fatal in circumstances where you need to be especially on your guard. The project requires flexibility and ingenuity—a new perspective that comes from a fresh set of eyes.”
Cassie and Griffin smiled at one another. Their shared naïveté created a bond. Neither one had ever considered lack of experience to be an advantage before. It was a comforting thought that there might be a strategic benefit to it after all.
“So, you’re saying greenhorns are good?” Erik asked incredulously.
Faye tilted her head to the side, considering the question. “Yes, I suppose I am. For this particular mission anyway.”
“Then why include me? I actually know what I’m doing. If you want a greenhorn to handle security, then bring in a blind German Shepherd.”
The old woman remained unflustered. She smiled sweetly. “You have been chosen to provide balance. I think one field-tested veteran will round out the team nicely.”
Erik’s expression remained skeptical, but he held his peace.
The other two were still glowing at one another under the conviction that their shared weakness was really a strength. They offered no further objection to Faye’s plan.
“Now, let’s discuss strategy while I put on a pot of coffee,” Faye suggested.
Cassie thought back to the previous evening when Faye had been able to sway an audience of two hundred to do what she wanted. This morning she had persuaded three antagonistic people to jump on a plane and retrieve lost relics for her. All that and she still had time to bake banana nut bread. “She’s good,” the pythia said to herself.
Chapter 30—Happy Hour
IT WAS A HOT AFTERNOON for mid-May. At least it would have been considered hot in Chicago, but this was Greece. A little seaside town in Greece called Pylos. Leroy Hunt was sitting alone at an outdoor café fanning himself with his Stetson hat. Three local boys strolled by and noticed his outfit.
“Cowboy. Bang! Bang!” they said cheerily in passing.
“Right back at ya, pardners,” Leroy replied affably. He made a mock gesture with his thumb and index finger simulating firing a gun. The boys laughed and moved on.
Hunt briefly flashed on an image in his mind’s eye. He saw their smiles congeal into expressions of terror when he pulled out the Sig Pro pistol that was actually concealed in his shoulder holster. The thought amused him. He chuckled. Too bad he was minding his manners this trip. He was ripe for a little dust up, but he had to keep a low profile.
He took another sip of liquor and considered his plight. A low profile was one thing, but he might as well be dead. He was bored out of his mind. No fun in trailing along behind Metcalf’s hangdog kid watching him scratch around in the dirt.
Hunt rolled his eyes in disgust. So much for special skills. His talents were wasted on this trip. It was small comfort that he was getting paid handsomely to do nothing. He craved some action to get his adrenaline pumping, but it sure didn’t look like he was going to get any. A glorified babysitter was all he’d turned out to be. The next time that crazy old preacher man came to him with some work, he’d tell him where to go.
In the meantime, his days were spent cooling his heels at every taverna between Thebes and Pylos while he waited for the kid to turn up something. He’d learned a few useful words in Greek though: Roditis, Retzina. Man, those Greek wines really packed a wallop. Almost as good as the shine back home, but ouzo was his favorite. It must be something like 160-proof. They even named restaurants after the liquor—ouzaria. It was a place where you could sit all afternoon and sip the stuff while they brought you snacks to go with it. Too bad they didn’t have any fried pork rinds. He couldn’t bring himself to eat calamari. The dish reminded him of boiled rubberbands in glue. He sighed and drummed his fingers impatiently on the table and then looked at his watch. Four p.m. The kid said he’d meet him here at four, but the little runt was always late. He beckoned the waiter to order another drink.
This whole trip was screwy. When they flew into Athens, two of the Greek brethren showed up to whisk them off to a Nephilim compound out in the hills. Leroy took a pass and made them bring him back to a proper hotel. He wasn’t going to sleep in a place that felt like a mausoleum for the living. Same as the compound in Chicago. All stone floors and squeaky-clean silence. Besides, he figured Junior would be safe in the hands of his freaky fan club. They practically kissed the ground he walked on. They kept calling him “the son of the diviner.” You’d think he was Elvis the way they carried on. No, Leroy was sure Daniel was safe enough with them.
The next morning, he went out with the boy and his groupies to the first site. It was a heap of old ruins, and they started crawling over rock piles like a bunch of dung beetles looking for their dinner. The day was hot and dusty. After a few hours, Leroy decided he’d had enough of being sunburned and parched. He went to find the nearest taverna and did the same in every town they’d searched since.
So far nobody even remotely shady or suspicious had showed up to throw a monkey wrench into Junior’s plans. Per the instructions of the old man, the local Nephilim had gotten Leroy his favorite type of hand gun, so he didn’t have to try smuggling one into the country. Not likely he was going to get a chance to use it though. Hunt felt it was safe to relax his guard and doze away his time in Greece in an alcoholic stupor. He just told Daniel to check in with him every afternoon. That way he could expend the minimum amount of effort to be sure the little punk hadn’t fallen down a rat hole or got himself killed some other way.
Hunt looked at his watch again. 4:10. At that moment, Daniel sloped around the corner of the building and slid into the other chair at Leroy’s table.
“Well, son, glad to see you made it on time.”
The young man glanced around nervously. He was clutching a black leather portfolio and still wearing that creepy Nephilim get-up even though it was ninety degrees in the shade. Hunt thought he looked like a demented Jehovah’s Witness with a briefcase full of flyers to stick on people’s windshields. Leroy flashed on another image involving his gun and a dead Bible thumper.
“Any luck today?” he asked pleasantly.
The boy appeared apprehensive. “No, Mr. Hunt. Nothing. I’m beginning to get very worried.”
“Why’s that now?” Leroy scratched his chin, doing his best to sound interested. The waiter returned with his ouzo.
Daniel glanced up at the man and lowered his voice. “We’re running out of locations to check. Linear B tablets have only been found in four places in this part of the country. We’ve already combed Thebes, the ruins at Tyrins, and Mycenae. I’ve spent today at the local museum, but there’s only one site left to check. I pray I find something at Nestor’s palace or Father will be very displeased.”
“Yep, I imagine your daddy won’t be too happy if you come up empty-handed.”
The young man’s shoulders jerked tensely. “It isn’t just that Father will be unhappy, Mr. Hunt. I would be failing God himself.”
Leroy lifted his glass to his lips and sipped his ouzo. “Son, you spend way too many waking hours frettin’ about perdition.”
Daniel made no comment. Instead, he opened his portfolio and started reviewing the papers inside.
Leroy was just bored enough that he actually felt some curiosity about the boy’s mission. “What you got there?”
Daniel slid one of the papers across the table toward Hunt. It was a magnified photograph of one side of the stone key.
It took a moment for Hunt to get his eyes in focus. Too much ouzo or maybe not enough.
“The hieroglyphic markings,” the young man offered. “I expect to find them carved somewhere near the sites where Linear B tablets were excavated.”
“So that’s why you been crawlin’ over them ruins and wanderin’ around in museums?”
“Yes.” The young man nodded. “The granite key possesses some markings in the Linear B language and some in hieroglyphic code. The only way to connect the two is to find the places where Linear B script has been found before.”
“Uh huh,” Hunt said knowledgeably. “And then what? What happens when you find them squiggly marks.”
“They will lead us to the treasure.”
Leroy’s head snapped to attention at that last word. “What was that again?” he prompted.
“The reason we came to Greece,” Daniel explained. “To find the heathen relics. The Bones of the Mother.”
“You think maybe them Bones might be worth somethin’ in cash money?” Even though Metcalf had told Leroy that the relics had no value, Hunt wanted a second opinion. The old man might have been lying. “Is that why your daddy wants you to find ‘em so bad?”
Daniel looked puzzled. “I don’t think so. I’m not sure why Father needs them, but I’m sure money isn’t a motive. I’m sorry. It was a poor choice of words to refer to the artifacts as treasure.”
