Chapter Twenty-One

The Key to a Pharaoh’s Heart

 

Verity scrambled to her feet to follow the frantic Doctor Williams back into the first chamber. A howl tore through the air, and from behind her, a green light flared so bright it cast her shadow ahead of her. She dodged to her right, knowing there wasn’t a straight path to the door, unlike the mad Egyptologist who had forgotten about the two corpses stretched across the floor. He gave a shrill cry as he fell, and then a moment later came the wail of a man teetering on the edge of sanity who comes face to face with the dead.

The Silver Pharaoh, far more vivid than he appeared in the library, did not chase Verity even though she was in plain sight. He stopped where the Delancys and completely hysterical Williams lay and gave what could only be described as a wild roar. The tatters hanging from his wrappings were flapping seemingly of their own accord. Either that, or the Pharaoh himself was conjuring some form of æther around him.

Lobelia Delancy would have been able to tell—were she still alive.

She could hear Williams whimpering like a child frantic after a nightmare. Psusennes raised a hand to his face and clawed into the wrappings there, tearing them free to reveal his face twisted in incandescent anger. The emerald light from his eye sockets gleamed brighter—and from the sudden wave of heat, hotter—than any sun than that hung over England. Whatever happened between the two of them in the reconstructed tomb, it was not pleasant, that much was obvious.

Psusennes was yelling now, his unknown words guttural and grating, sounding as if they were pronouncements of Thoth himself.

“I don’t know! I don’t understand!” Williams howled. “Oh God, I can’t understand it—I told you!”

The Pharaoh stood to his full height and shook his head. The fury across his aged, stretched face yielded to disappointment. He muttered something before reaching for Williams with outstretched hands.

“Psusennes…” Verity whispered.

The monster stopped, and both he and the frantic old man looked over to her. She whispered his name again, lifting her hands up to the ancient ruler, and bowed down before him. Again, she whispered his name, and bowed before him again.

“Yes, girl, that’s it!” Williams whispered, “Seven times.” On the fourth bow, he asked, “How do you know of the Amarna letters?”

“My father,” she said as she bowed. That was number five. “He was an archaeologist. That and what I read about at the Museum.”

“I should be so blessed to have more patrons of your ilk,” he muttered.

Verity choked back the urge to tell him it was during one of his lectures he paused to have her escorted out of the museum. She distinctly remembered him glancing at her and using the term raffish. Would it shock this man of learning that she knew seeing a pharaoh was the equivalent of seeing a god to the ancient Egyptians? What she did now was a gesture of total subservience, as well as survival.

A hot breeze ran over her skin as she finished the seventh bow. She did not dare look him in the eye, but she strained her gaze upward to try and steal a glimpse at the ruler from many millennia ago.

Psusennes was looking down at her, utterly ignoring the scientist, his ancient eyes once again examining her closely. The Pharaoh spoke, but his words—still deep and ominous—were of a much softer tone. He gave a gesture for her to rise, and Verity dared to straighten up and sit back on her heels. If Williams just kept his wits about him, there might be a chance of them both getting out alive.

Granted, the Egyptologist was not the only one struggling at present to hold onto reason and sanity. Verity wanted to believe this was some kind of incredible construct of technology—what stood before her, what she smelled, what she heard—but it was all rooted in reality. Agent Thorne told them enough tales of the supernatural, and Verity realized she should have taken more notice of them. Ghosts, spectres, and apparitions had been of no interest to her before, but she had to quickly learn.

The entire chamber shook, knocking a pair of jars off a stone shelf. Psusennes looked around him and then muttered something as he heard another distant explosion.

“What’s going on out there?” Williams asked.

“The school is under siege,” Verity said, “and it sounds like we may be in danger.”

“Now don’t worry, Charity Verity,” a voice spoke from behind her, “we are quite safe in this quaint little hiding place of yours.”

Verity spun on her heels to see Suzanne and Stella standing by the massive silver door. Both girls were slightly dirty—a shock in itself alone—but accomplished in what they had discovered. Stella, much to Verity’s surprise, was armed.

“Suzanne, Stella, what the hell are you doing?” Verity spluttered.

“We’re taking advantage of an opportunity,” Stella said. “Aren’t we, Suzanne?”

“Never lose an opportunity of seeing anything beautiful, for beauty is God’s handwriting,” Suzanne returned, her pistol trained on Verity and not the Pharaoh. “So my father says.”

Pistol or not, Verity could not let that pass. “That’s Ralph Waldo Emmerson, you insufferable bint!”

The Pharaoh snarled, ripping her attention away from the two girls. He stepped towards them with wide strides, but neither girl flinched. Verity was stunned at how composed they were, especially Suzanne.

Stella lifted up a small iron rod in her hand that ticked and clicked, unfolding itself into the symbol Mickey had drawn in the dust. On seeing the ankh, the Pharaoh stopped, transfixed by the ancient symbol. The Key of Life, Verity thought quickly. Of course the Pharaoh would need that if he wanted to return to the mortal plane. In her head, the ticking sequence she heard at the door resumed. Where had Stella picked up such ancient technology?

“The talisman was also believed to stand for strength and health,” Verity heard an unsteady voice whisper into her ear. She flinched to find Williams at her side. He was still terrified, but somehow more in possession of himself.

“All right then, Stella,” Verity said, trying to ignore the high-pitched ticking coming from the ankh, “you have the Silver Pharaoh’s attention.”

“Yes, I do,” she sighed with delight. “Isn’t he magnificent?”

No, he was bloody terrifying. “Stella—”

“Oh, do be quiet, Charity Verity,” Suzanne sneered, “lest we grow tired of you and let King Psusennes here finish what he evidently intended with the two of you.”

Her brow furrowed. “You know about the Silver Pharaoh?”

“Stella told me about quite the scandal at the British Museum,” Suzanne stated proudly, “about how her father has been charged with finding the Silver Pharaoh’s stolen artefacts. With my father’s influence, I assured her we would bring to light this horrible turn of events.”

“What are you blathering on about, girl?” Williams insisted.

“Lord Delancy, the original sponsor of the Silver Pharaoh’s archaeological dig discovered this chamber of achievements after the initial party returned to the British Museum with their spoils. He then arranged for all of this”—and Suzanne motioned to all the tablets around them— “to be brought here to his manor, reconstructed as it had been found.” The little brat was rocking back and forth on her feet, quite pleased with herself. “When Stella’s and my father expose this, it will make them both quite the talk of London. My father might even receive a knighthood.”

“But first,” Stella said, raising the ankh higher, “we need to reach an accord with His Majesty here.”

The girl’s dark eyes narrowed on the Silver Pharaoh who was changing his attention between the ankh and its wielder. He gave a slow nod, and then began stepping backwards, beckoning them with a single hand.

“He wants us to follow,” Williams whispered to Verity.

Verity looked at him incredulously. “Are you certain of that, Doctor?”

Suzanne waved her gun in the direction of the pharaoh now leading them back to where Verity had found Williams. “Come along, Charity Verity. Bring your learned friend, too.”

“You don’t need us,” Verity said, pulling Williams closer to her. It would not come as a shock to her if the old man had soiled himself. “I need to get Doctor Williams here to the Infirmary.”

“You’ll never reach it.” Suzanne motioned with her eyes to the gun. “Where did you think I got this? Dead teacher in the corridor. It’s Bedlam out there.”

There were no options remaining, especially with Suzanne holding them as she was. It was impossible to gauge if her upbringing included shooting lessons. She could be a crack shot, or simply preening like a peacock. A well-armed peacock, but armed nonetheless. Verity looked at Williams who was pleading with his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” Verity whispered. She watched him glare at Suzanne. “Doctor, even if you take the gun from Suzanne, you heard her. How far will you get?”

His gaze went to the gun, and then to the doorway as the chamber trembled again. “And I thought Odysseus and his men faced a terrible fate with Scylla and Charybdis.”

“Come along, Doctor Williams,” Suzanne urged.

They turned to follow Stella and the pharaoh, leading the way deeper into the network of secret passages.

“Julia mentioned the school was fortified against attacks like this. I wonder if it was also fortified to keep something in, as well,” she said, her eyes fixed on the pharaoh.

“If what your friend says is true,” Doctor Williams began, his voice less frail than before, “Delancy was following a far more diabolical notion than merely hoarding a pharaoh’s treasure.”

“Charity Verity is not a friend,” Suzanna chimed in from behind them.

“What do you mean by that?”

“Did you not see the machines?” he asked. “The paintings Delancy had in the first chamber?”

This would be the second time in only a few minutes she gave an incredulous look to the mad doctor at her side. “You noticed those? In your state?”

“Tosh, my child, if I am overcome with anything, be it fear, sorrow, or anger, a touch of history tends to calm the nerves. While you and your…schoolmate…were enjoying your tête-à-tête, I was noting the hieroglyphics. Quite an astounding find. A shame Delancy concealed it from the rest of the party.”

“So, Suzanne and Stella are correct. This was all some mad hare scheme cooked up by Lord Delancy.”

“And apparently, the Delancy family.” He watched the Silver Pharaoh intently as he continued. “According to the hieroglyphics, this grand machine was His Majesty’s crowning achievement. It would have to be an important creation to find representation in the carvings on the tomb.”

“But why not have his accomplishment on the walls around him? Suzanne and Stella mentioned it had been discovered after you and your party returned to London.”

“That, my girl, is a mystery in itself. Perhaps Psusennes himself knew the dangers of this technology. Perhaps he felt guilty of the destruction he caused from such science. Who knows?”

A sharp scent of cedar suddenly filled her nostrils. One of many ingredients used to mummify a pharaoh. The smell almost choked her, but served as a marker for them all in these gas-lit catacombs.

The tomb was close.