Call of the Goddess: A Bona Dea Novel (Stormflies Book 1) (18 page)

19th September, 307

The Northland
represented the heart of metal production for the continent. Veins of gold, silver, copper, aluminum and iron ore ran through the stony ground. Miners entered caves from day-to-day and removed the amount required for new manufacturing. Mining was not a full time operation and required special training due to dangerous spelunking in natural caves. The usage of metal was reserved for objects requiring extreme strength, such as building materials and tools. All discarded metal was recycled into new items.

On occasion, the miners uncovered artifacts of a much older civilization underground. Archeologists exposed a great deal of evidence that, in the distant past, another sentient race lived on this world. Traces of their existence remained buried underground, leading humans to believe that a cataclysmic event destroyed those ancient people, leaving the planet inhabited only by the most hardy animals and insects.

Sara and Suzanne eagerly led the Protectress to the archeological excavation near North Compass. Having little working knowledge of the dead race, Axandra asked her hosts to give her some details.

Suzanne offered the lesson, exhibiting a fascination with the old culture that emerged from the ground nearby. “Different tribes of people lived across the continent. This particular group of Ancients were hunters, using the native animals for food, clothing and tools. They made use of every part of the kill. They also made use of stone and metal. They may have been the first of their kind to melt ores and smith them into desired shapes, utilitarian and ornamental.”

That morning, they traveled to a remote camp in the foothills of the mountains. Off the established roads, they rode atop dardaks. Unused to any type of four-legged travel, Axandra rode tandem with Sara on a shaggy white female while Suzanne rode alone on a dark brown male. Ty and one of his officers rode separately, hurrying forward like scouts, checking behind rocks and outcroppings for hidden dangers.

The animals trod on four strong legs capable of supporting the weight of several humans, and their long snouts housed a row of sharp teeth in the front and grinders in the back. These creatures were omnivorous, rather than strict herbivores, feeding just as often on rodents as on grass. Two broad ears listened to each and every sound around them. Splayed hooves gave the animals secure footing on rocky surfaces. Prized for weaving warm clothes, the thick fur formed a natural cushion for the riders atop the flat back. At the rear, a bushy tail wagged, swiping away insects. The most unpleasant part of the ride was the smell of digested grass wafting from the rear.

They stopped on a high ridge overlooking the busy site. Down in a spacious rift, the archeologists and their assistants excavated a nine-meter wide, ten-meter long and three-meter deep trench. Ladders descended into the trench and several workers shoveled dirt into buckets to be hoisted up and out of the cavity on a system of pulleys. In the center, still half-buried in the gravelly soil, rested a sizable silvery orb.

Axandra stared in bewilderment at the object. “What is that?”

Near the oblong shape, several people hunched toward the ground with brushes and cameras. Clouds covered part of the sky today, and the surface of the capsule reflected the glare of the sunslight as the rays poked between the clouds.

“You two go on down,” Suzanne urged. She pulled out a sketch pad from her pack and dismounted. “I'll be down in a bit.” She sketched hurriedly on the paper, outlining the orb, the people and the mountains.

With a click of her tongue, Sara urged the dardak to move forward, down the well-trodden path used by the diggers as they accessed the site.

Noticing the visitors, two gentlemen walked away from the tents to greet them. The men donned dusty button-up shirts and tan twill pants. They each wore heavy boots. The taller man wore a wide-brimmed straw hat, tattered and cracked in some places. The other donned wire-rimmed glasses and a bandana tied about his neck to wipe a bit of dust from his face. The day was not particularly warm, but the suns combined with work prompted the stripping of layered clothing.

The taller one removed his hat as he bowed in greeting. The other stepped up beside the dardak to offer balance for the dismount. Through the touch of his hand, Axandra sensed his delight to have her visit, and not just as a scientist showing off his pride. He wasn't blocking much of his emanations.

She's here,
he thought to himself.
She's really here. Don't mess it up this time.

As she thanked him and said hello, Axandra thought she recognized him from somewhere. She definitely remembered his smile, but she could not remember exactly where she had met him. After crossing paths with so many people in the last couple of months, she often dreamed of faces to which she couldn't attach names.

“Protectress,” Sara began the introductions. “This is Quinn Elgar and Tomas Kirk. They are leading the team on this dig, and they are good friends of mine, even though Quinn spends most of his time in Southland.” Sara teased her round-faced friend, and her smile proved infectious.

Quinn beamed, his cheeks reddening slightly. Realizing he still held Axandra's hand, he let go with a hurried jerk and dipped in greeting.

“Welcome, Esteemed Protectress. I am so happy you came out here to see us. We—” Quinn gestured broadly toward the orb. “We have made a most remarkable discovery… and probably the most frustrating.”

The group walked toward the tents while Quinn and Tomas took random turns explaining what occurred in each area of the camp. Under the tents, shards of pottery and metal tools lay spread on tables, the wooden handles long ago rotted away. These more primitive pieces seemed completely out of synch with the shining metal capsule in the trench.

Gazing from the edge of the pit, Axandra noticed the surface of the orb appeared completely seamless and immaculately smooth, without a scratch or dent. In fact, she watched as circulating dust seemed repelled from the polished surface, leaving no residue. The object reflected almost every bit of light, giving the metal an unnatural and painful glow.

“As you can see, the object appears completely solid,” Quinn told her. Axandra felt familiar with the voice and sought to pinpoint the sound in her memory. “There are no cracks or openings, not even a microscopic fissure, and we have used our scanners and our eyes on every available inch of it.”

“We've even whacked it with a hammer,” Tomas chimed in, acting out a hammer strike. “Accidentally the first time. We found it indestructible. You can't even tell we tried to pulverize the blasted thing.” He slipped his hand back onto his bald head and ran his thick fingers over his graying mustache.

Axandra listened to the scientists while watching the workers go about their duties across the expansive site. Everyone present applied her- or himself to a specific task, either hauling buckets of dirt to a discard pile to the south, cleaning pieces in basins of liquid, or packaging the cleaned and cataloged items into wooden crates.

In the back of her brain, Axandra felt a buzzing, a minute, soundless vibration that caused her vision to blur just slightly around the edges like tight ripples in water. The sensation reminded her of having too much wine. The buzz faded away after a moment.

“Some refreshment, Protectress?” Quinn offered, motioning across the camp to another tent storing food and water.

“I remember you,” Axandra said as realization suddenly struck. She pictured his face in her mind surrounded by the machines in the Lazzonir.

“You do?”

“Yes, from the Lazzonir. You're a custodian there.”

“That's correct,” Quinn admitted with barely contained excitement. “I didn't think you recognized me.”

They turned slightly toward the dining tent. Sara and Tomas walked several meters in front of them, laughing between themselves.

“You seemed so disinterested in the museum,” Quinn stated, reminding her of their past meeting.

Axandra remembered that day, suffering from fatigue and disappointed in her lack of concentration. “I apologize,” she told him sincerely, radiating the emotion toward him. “I wasn't feeling well that day.”

“So I was told—and saw,” Quinn accepted. Nearly everyone had heard about the intruder at the inn. “That bump on your noggin must have hurt. You will have to visit again.”

Smiling, she agreed. “I will. I enjoy learning about history.”

His proximity emitted waves of adoration and a desire to touch her, though he attempted to keep such carefully hidden from his face.

Quinn was an adorable man. He stood just a few centims taller than she, even in his heavy-soled boots. His round face with its round cheeks dimpled at the corners of his mouth when he smiled. Brown freckles dotted the pale skin on his muscled arms and smooth shaven face. A few dark moles dotted his skin, one above his right eye in a wrinkle of his brow. Thin dusty-blonde hair, which was just a tad long, feathered in the wind. His eyes, his most boyish feature, peered out in grayish-blue, and their expression made him appear many years younger than she suspected him to be. Those eyes sparkled with enthusiasm.

He peered quietly into her eyes for a moment as they walked on, then looked away shyly.

Don't stare,
he scolded himself.
Nobody likes to be stared at.

Axandra decided to add to the conversation. “I don't know much about the Ancients. Only a few tidbits I've read in newssheets,” she told him. “How long ago do you think they lived?”

“Oh, many of the artifacts date about seven thousand years. That's not long on a geological time scale,” Quinn added. “In the areas where we've found items, they've been buried by volcanic activity or silt from massive floods, covering them rapidly. Here, it was a rock slide that likely buried the pottery and tools, though we've found no humanoid or animal remains. All of these disasters appeared to have occurred about the same time. Now that we have Soporus visiting, we believe She had a lot to do with it. The planet may have veered much closer in the past.”

He waved to a bench-style table where metal cups of sunjuice and a covered plate of chewy pastries waited for them.

“However, the large object is distinctly different from anything we've ever found. There are no such materials anywhere else on the planet,” Quinn commented, looking back at the shining orb in the trench.

“In other words,” interjected Tomas, “we have no idea who made it, what it is or where it came from. It could have been buried here as recently as five to five hundred years ago.”

“Why not a month ago?” Sara asked with her teasing lilt.

“Because the soil has settled enough—”

Sara bumped Tomas on the arm and giggled. “Leave it to you to actually answer the question.”

“It's what I do, Sara,” Tomas reminded in a defensive tone, brushing crumbs from his whiskers with a fingertip. “All day long, I answer questions.”

“Though right now we are just creating new ones,” Quinn added with frustration.

The buzz came again, this time making her skin tickle up her neck and in her nose. She reached back to sooth the hairs, discreetly leaning toward Quinn. His body offered a momentary shield to the sensation. She noticed immediately how the buzz faded when she neared him. She sneezed suddenly, and the fizzing disappeared from her nose.

“Good health,” everyone wished in near unison in response to her sneeze.

“It must be the dust. Thank you.” Axandra rubbed her nose with the handkerchief Tomas handed in her direction. Then she continued with the conversation. “So just seven thousand years ago, an entirely different race of people lived right here in this spot.” She looked out toward the rocks and soil around her, trying to picture what a camp of these people might look like.

Quinn continued by describing the Ancients, depicting small-statured and heavily built bipeds who wore furs in the cold climate and used fire to cook meat and other foods. The tools found here were forged metal and consisted of long knives and heavy axes. The people were advanced enough to be fully clothed and communicate with a moderately advanced spoken language. No evidence existed of written language other than pictograms. The pottery discovered was often decorated with bas-relief figures of their people and animals. Water pitchers showcased waves of water and fish. Bowls exhibited images of fruit or animals, though the contents had disintegrated millennia ago.

Even though Quinn stayed near her, the buzzing became more incessant. Her entire head seemed to be vibrating, and her stomach began to revolt against the intrusive sensation. Gingerly she sipped her glass of juice. Her tongue felt numb to the acidy-sweetness of the pulpy liquid.

“May I have a closer look at the capsule?” Axandra asked abruptly midcourse.

Eager to comply with her wishes, Quinn gave permission and hopped up from the bench, volunteering a hand to help her up. “As you wish, Your Honor. I'll take you over.”

Suzanne finally came down from the ridge and found the group, bouncing excitedly along the way. “There you all are! Did I miss anything?”

“Snack?” Tomas offered her, thumbing over his shoulder.

“Oh, please,” Suzanne accepted, grabbing a metal cup and taking a long swig of juice. “It was getting a little warm up there.”

Sara lingered with Suzanne and Tomas, waving to Quinn and Axandra. “You two go ahead. We'll be along in a few minutes.”

At that moment, Axandra got the distinct feeling that she had been set up on a romantic meeting, rather than an educational one. It may have been Sara's crafty smirk that tuned her in, or the way the trio whispered as they spied on the couple. For the time being, Axandra wasn't opposed to the idea. His affection came as a welcome delight. He genuinely craved to learn about who she was as a person, not as Protectress. Smiling in his direction, she walked with him back to the trench.

Ty, who had stayed in the background since their arrival, jogged to catch up with her. “Your Honor, I do not believe touching the object would be wise.”

“I didn't say anything about touching it,” she dismissed, avoiding his eyes. “Just a closer look.”