Stealing Sacred Fire (43 page)

‘You’re sure of that, aren’t
you?’

He nodded.

‘But what will happen. We’ve
found no other Grigori. Time is running out.’

Kashday sighed. ‘I know, but
the worst that can happen is the New Year will pass us by and I
will have been wrong. Then we can go home.’ He grinned boyishly.
‘To have to find new jobs, no doubt.’

Pharmaros would not join in
with his humour and frowned at the table, painting patterns in the
spilled coffee with her finger-tips.

Kashday left her to her moody
silence and stared through the window of the restaurant at the
hectic crowds milling around in the street outside. He thought he
heard the snap of gun-fire, a distant scream. ‘This place is
madness.’

‘It will get worse by the new
year.’

He sighed through his nose.
‘Yes.’

Taking a sip of coffee,
Pharmaros peered at the passing crowds. ‘Everyone seems to be
searching, searching. Everyone seems to be lost. It is Pandemonium.
A true hell of lost souls.’

Kashday nodded absently,
wishing she wouldn’t be so relentlessly gloomy. Perhaps she was
right and they should return home. Perhaps the reason for their
being here had simply been to meet each other. Then, he saw a face
in the crowd and his right hand made an abrupt, involuntary jerk
against the table-cloth.

‘What is it?’ Pharmaros
asked.

He looked at her, winced
inwardly at her obvious fear. It was so easily kindled. He shook
his head. ‘I don’t know. A face…’ Then he was on his feet, throwing
money onto the table cloth, far more than their meal was worth. It
was the last of their cash. ‘Come on.’

‘Where?’ She was already
following him, out into the steamy heat of the night, the amorphous
press of hot bodies.

Kashday reached for her hand,
dragged her behind him. Babbling crowds parted before them; their
bodies felt insubstantial. Ahead, Kashday caught sight of a blaze
of red hair, a head that stuck out above the seethe of the
surrounding crowd. A shock-wave passed through his body. Grigori!
But more than that; a sense of familiarity.

They emerged into a square,
lined by awned shops, which even at this late hour were open for
business. Kashday paused. He could see the red-haired man clearly
now. He had stopped at one of the stalls and was talking to the
merchant.

‘He’s Grigori,’ Pharmaros
whispered. ‘I just know it. Shall we approach him?’

‘I don’t know. Perhaps we
should watch him for a while first.’

The stranger seemed to hear
their whispered conversation, for he froze and then turned towards
them quickly. Pharmaros pressed herself against Kashday’s side.
‘He’s seen us!’

The stranger’s expression was
unreadable, but he was clearly waiting for them to make a move.
Kashday drew in his breath. ‘Well, let’s get this over with.’ He
began to walk towards the stranger.

Pharmaros hissed, ‘No!’ but
still followed him, taking hold of his arm.

The red-haired Grigori had a
flimsy, cheap necklace dangling from his fingers. The shop-keeper
was attempting to grab his attention again, pawing his arm,
gabbling in Egyptian. The Grigori stared at Kashday and Pharmaros
and raised his eye-brows in enquiry. He appeared suave and haughty,
although he was dressed casually in desert fatigues, his thick red
hair spilling riotously over his shoulders. He would have stood out
in any crowd.

‘Do I know you?’ he said.

‘I think you might,’ Kashday
answered. He could not keep a certain tightness from his voice. He
might be wrong about this person, embarrassingly wrong. ‘My name is
Kashday Murkaster and this is Pharmaros.’

The stranger looked them up and
down. He smiled. ‘Kashday Murkaster,’ he said and dropped the
necklace he was holding into the aggrieved shop-keeper’s hands. ‘I
think I might know you, yes.’

‘Who are you?’ Pharmaros
asked.

‘Salamiel,’ he answered. ‘Are
you looking for me?’

‘Yes,’ Kashday said. He laughed
in relief. ‘We are.’

Salamiel took them to a nearby
bar and insisted on buying them drinks. He seemed at ease and
strangely casual about having encountered them. It was almost as if
he’d expected to, but perhaps that should not really come as a
surprise. The whole scenario felt peculiar to Kashday. They did
know this man, but he was a stranger. There was none of the acute
stab of recognition he’d felt when he’d met Pharmaros, simply a
vague sense of familiarity.

Pharmaros told Salamiel the
story of how they’d come to be in Egypt. He listened patiently,
swigging his beer. ‘Well, now you know why you were drawn here,’ he
said, when she’d finished speaking.

Pharmaros frowned. ‘No we
don’t. We’ve only met you. Why are you here?’

Salamiel sighed. ‘Well, we were
looking for you, although we didn’t know it would be you, of
course…’

‘We?’ said Pharmaros.

‘Yes. I have Gadreel and Daniel
with me.’

‘Gadreel, yes,’ Kashday said.
‘I remember him, but who is Daniel?’

Salamiel smiled. ‘The modern
version of Gadreel is female.’ He gestured at Pharmaros. ‘Like you.
Daniel, you might recall, is Shemyaza’s vizier.’

‘Shemyaza!’ Pharmaros murmured.
Her face was set in a revealing expression.

‘That’s right. I’m afraid we
have mislaid our esteemed leader. It’s a long story.’

‘I want to hear it!’ Pharmaros
snapped.

Salamiel stretched languidly.
‘Of course you do. Look, I think it’s only right that the others
are here for this. We’re staying in a hotel near here. Let me call
them. OK?’

‘Yes, of course,’ Kashday
said.

They watched Salamiel slink
over the pay-phone. ‘Well,’ Kashday said.

‘He’s like Shemyaza,’ Pharmaros
said. ‘He always was. The side-kick. The lackey. How can we trust
him?’

Kashday, who had always had a
soft spot for Salamiel, and had once wished to be more like him,
said, ‘Who did you want to find?’

‘Gadreel is all right,’
Pharmaros conceded. ‘But I would have preferred finding Penemue to
Salamiel. And this Daniel, he was just Shemyaza’s glorified
concubine. Why is he involved?’

‘These are Shemyaza’s closest
confederates,’ Kashday said.

‘Yes. It’s as I feared. He’s
come back to us.’

Daniel and Gadreel were nothing
like how Kashday or Pharmaros remembered them. Gadreel had been a
quiet, sensitive man, but was now a strong, opinionated woman.
Daniel, who had been hardly more than Shemyaza’s shadow, a thin fey
youth, was now a pleasant and communicative individual. Despite her
earlier misgivings, Pharmaros was quickly won over by Daniel’s
charm. It was he who oiled the social wheel, effected the
introductions and told the story of how he and his companions had
ended up in Cairo. He was clearly in emotional turmoil over
Shemyaza’s disappearance, but tried to make light of it. ‘He’ll
show up, I’m sure. We just have to do what we can to be ready for
him.’

‘These chambers,’ Pharmaros
said. ‘Do you know where they are?’

Daniel shrugged. ‘Well, I’ve
visited the sphinx three times. I was pretty sure the entrance to
the chambers must be concealed nearby, but so far I’ve found
nothing. I’ve photographed the monument from every angle. I had a
theory that the entrance would be between its paws, because then
the Elders could have emerged from the chambers to greet the rising
sun, due east. It’s very strange. I could feel the presence of the
chambers all around me on the Giza plateau, but I’m beginning to
think the entrance is somewhere else entirely.’

‘Away from Cairo?’ Kashday
asked.

Daniel shook his head. ‘No. I
think it’s in the city. I’ve been picking up images of a Coptic
church. Perhaps, because there are now five of us, we should
meditate together and see what information comes out of it.’

‘We need to work on discovering
the dedication of the church,’ Gadreel said. ‘That will save us the
time of investigating every one in the city.’

Daniel scraped his hair back
from his face and sighed. ‘Of course, we’re limited in what we can
do, because Shem isn’t here. He holds the key and is the key.’

‘You said there should be seven
of us,’ Pharmaros said. ‘If Shemyaza is the sixth, who’s the
seventh?’

‘I don’t know,’ Daniel said.
‘We can only trust they’ll turn up over the next few days.’

Kashday took Pharmaros’ hand.
‘Well, now we know why we’re here,’ he said. ‘Does it make you feel
any better?’

Pharmaros nodded thoughtfully. ‘Yes.
Opening the Chambers of Light is certainly something I can put my
heart into.’ She smiled at Daniel. ‘I was afraid we’d have to
repeat some terrible event from the past, be punished again.’

‘We have been punished,’
Gadreel said. ‘You’ve nothing to feel guilty about.’

Pharmaros coloured slightly. ‘I
don’t,’ she said, without conviction.

They decided to conduct the
meditation that night, at the hotel used by Daniel, Gadreel and
Salamiel. There seemed no point in wasting time. On the short walk
back, Salamiel fell into step beside Kashday and Pharmaros. ‘I know
your daughter,’ he said.

Kashday glanced at him in
surprise. ‘My daughter?’

‘Yes. Her name is Lily. She is
with a Grigori family now in Cornwall. I met her there. She used to
ask me about you.’

‘Really? I have never met
her.’

‘I know. She has a twin brother
too. Owen. You should ask Daniel about him. They were very close
friends.’

Kashday paused for a moment,
glanced at Pharmaros, then spoke. ‘What of their mother?’

‘Dead, I’m afraid,’ Salamiel
said. ‘But you have a grand-daughter. Lily named her for her
mother. Helen. You can look forward to meeting them when all this
is over.’

‘Yes. That would be...’ Kashday
shrugged helplessly. ‘I never thought I would.’

‘I believed I was the father of
Lily’s child for a while,’ Salamiel said casually, ‘but when she
was born, it was clear I wasn’t.’

Kashday fell silent. Salamiel
hadn’t changed.

Helen sat
beside her mother on the plane. They had managed to get seats by a
window, and Helen could look out at the clouds. Lily sat beside
her, reading a magazine. Helen knew her mother had gone to a lot of
trouble to get them on this flight, not least a protracted verbal
attack upon Enniel to wear down his objections. Helen had heard one
of the restrained arguments, which had taken place in the kitchen
of the cottage, following a phone call by Lily to summon Enniel to
their home to discuss ‘an urgent matter’.

‘You cannot take a child into
that part of the world at present,’ Enniel had said. ‘Especially
not one of our children. Where’s your sense, girl?’

Helen, listening beside the
door, had gone taut with anticipation, expecting that her mother
would not react well to being called ‘girl’. For a moment, there
had been silence. Then, Lily spoke, in a cool, collected voice.
‘Enniel, I am more than capable of looking after myself and my
daughter. You should know that. I’m not asking for money, but a
little assistance, just so the journey will be safer. You know the
Grigori families in Egypt. Please contact them for me.’

Helen had smiled to herself,
proud of her mother.

Later, Enniel had spoken to
Helen herself, asking why she wanted to go to Egypt so much. Helen
had explained about the scarab, causing Enniel to frown.

‘Can’t you see that we are part
of it,’ Lily had said, unable to keep out of the discussion.

‘Part of what?’ Enniel had
enquired icily.

‘You know what. It began with
the eclipse, when Daniel had that peculiar experience...’

Enniel had glanced at her
sharply. ‘We do not know where Daniel is,’ he’d said. ‘Neither he
nor Shemyaza have deigned to contact me.’

‘I think we do know,’ Lily had
answered softly. ‘But you have been told to keep out of it.’

Enniel had finally agreed to
help them, although he suggested that someone else, perhaps Lily’s
brother Owen, should accompany them. Lily made it clear that she
and her daughter wished to travel alone.

Helen was aware of the fact
that, quite often, her mother instinctively deferred to her.
Sometimes, it felt as if Lily was the younger of the two. But this
wasn’t the only reason Lily was so keen to support her daughter’s
desire to travel to Egypt. Although she was quite used to getting
her own way with people, Helen knew that the man named Shemyaza had
a lot to do with Lily’s decision. Just the mention of his name made
different colours shoot off from the aura of light around Lily’s
body. Helen did not know that only very few people saw these
colours naturally, and that for most it involved a lot of
self-discipline and practice. The name Shemyaza affected Helen too.
It was a golden word and made her think of the sun. It made her
tingle. There was blue in the word too, possibly in the last two
syllables. Helen knew instinctively that she was connected with
this mysterious person in some way, not least because of the vision
she’d had of a golden man walking towards her across the water.
Helen had not told her mother about this. The intense feelings that
Shemyaza conjured in Lily made Helen uncomfortable. Helen wanted to
meet Shemyaza and knew that, eventually, she would. She had once
asked her uncle Owen about him because she knew Owen had met him.
The word had affected Owen’s aura too; it became muddy, shot with
sparks of intense red. He would not speak to her. Owen was the only
person Helen had any real trouble in controlling. She suspected,
without knowing why, this too had something to do with the one they
called Shemyaza. He affected everybody he met.

Helen fidgeted in her seat.
They were nearly there. She knew that Enniel had superficially
agreed to let them go their own way, but there were certain people
on the plane she felt uneasy about. She’d mentioned them to her
mother, who’d merely pursed her mouth in annoyance and said, ‘Don’t
worry. If anyone’s our unofficial bodyguard, we’ll give them the
slip when we land.’