Stealing Sacred Fire (44 page)

Helen could not suppress an
involuntary shudder. Would operatives of Enniel’s make her feel so
troubled?

* * *

Daniel stared up at the Sphinx,
shading his eyes against the blinding morning sunlight. The
monument’s enclosure was thick with tourists, but just by gazing on
the mysterious, impassive countenance above him, Daniel could blot
their buzzing presence from his mind. He remembered the time he had
stood before Azumi, the rock sphinx of Cornwall, equally mystified
yet desperate for answers. Why won’t you relinquish your secrets?
he thought. Will you only reveal them to Shem? He sighed heavily.
Today was New Year’s Eve. The new millennium was only hours away,
and still Shem had not appeared. Daniel had no idea what he and his
companions should do. He could only keep looking, keep guessing,
until the last possible moment.

The Giza plateau was swarming
with people, and there was a heavy military presence, supposedly to
protect the road crews of the bands who were due to begin playing
around mid-day. Mesh fencing had been hastily erected around the
central stage area. A massive sound and lighting system had been
installed, and a pyramid erected over the stage. Nearby, the
original monuments seemed to look down in distaste. Daniel didn’t
blame them.

Where was the entrance to the Chambers?
The meditation last night had been helpful in that they had all
picked up imagery of a crypt beneath the church, but the dedication
name of the church had eluded them, so they still had no way of
locating it precisely.

Salamiel and the others had
gone off on a field trip. They were investigating as many churches
as possible, although it seemed likely that all Coptic churches in
Cairo would have crypts and also priests who would object to
strangers poking around them, in fear of Muslim persecution. Daniel
closed his eyes and attempted to blot out all sounds around him. He
had to get the information they needed.

As he tried to concentrate, he
became aware of being watched and opened his eyes quickly. Quite a
lot of people were milling around the monument, but his eyes were
drawn immediately to a woman who stood smoking a cigarette, leaning
against the eroded wall of the enclosure. She was dressed in jeans
and a black shirt and wore shades, her dark hair pinned up loosely
on her head. A large leather bag was slung over her shoulder. Why
was she watching him? He got the impression it was more than a
casual interest. Daniel stared back at her, although he could not
see her eyes and could no longer be sure whether she was looking at
him. She stubbed out her cigarette and walked away, quickly,
pushing aggressively through a knot of sight-seers, who complained
loudly. Daniel followed her, making people repeat their objections
as he shouldered past them. He kept the woman in sight as they left
the enclosure. She walked purposefully through the temple complex
that lay before the Sphinx. Daniel was confused when she
disappeared for a few moments as a crowd of sight-seers, freshly
delivered from Cairo’s centre, disembarked from a coach and milled
around like mindless sheep in front of him. He clawed his way
through them, and saw the woman ahead of him, about to board one of
the buses that ferried people to and from the city. He ran after
her and managed to climb on the bus just as the driver was about to
shut the doors. Quickly, he sat down and scanned the passengers,
finally catching sight of his quarry further up the bus. She
appeared to be examining something in her lap.

Daniel clasped his hands
together between his knees. What was he doing? He shouldn’t have
followed her. She was doubtlessly just a tourist who had no
interest in him at all. Yet his instincts screamed otherwise.

Once they reached the city
centre, the woman got off the bus, along with several other people,
in a busy market area of the older part of the town. Daniel
followed as discretely as possible, lingering by the bus as the
woman strode off across a stall-packed square, where reproductions
of Ancient Egyptian art were laid out on tables to tempt the
gullible tourists. Once the bus pulled off, Daniel could not see
his quarry at all. Perplexed, he began to wander through the
stalls, inspecting the crowd minutely. Stall-holders attempted to
interest him in their wares with some persistence, but he ignored
them. The woman had vanished very quickly.

Daniel had just given up the
idea of being able to find her, when someone grabbed him and pulled
him roughly into a narrow, empty side street, where the blank walls
of what appeared to be residential buildings rose high to either
side. His face was pushed roughly against the wall and he heard the
unmistakable sound of a gun being cocked close to his ear.
Something cold and hard was pressed against his hair. Daniel forced
himself to relax. He sensed he mustn’t struggle.

‘Who the fuck are you?’ a
woman’s low voice demanded.

‘Daniel Cranton,’ he said.
Would she kill him?

‘Daniel...’ With one final
unnecessary shove, she released him. He turned round slowly. The
woman was standing before him with folded arms. There was no sign
of a weapon in her hands, but perhaps she had already secreted it
in her shoulder bag. She smiled at him. ‘I thought I knew who you
were, but I had to be sure. Sorry.’

Daniel rubbed his head. ‘Who
are you?’ Could this be the seventh avatar they were looking for?
She did not look like a Grigori, mainly because she wasn’t tall
enough. Her manners, however, had a certain rogue Grigori flavour
to them.

‘It doesn’t matter who I am.
I’ve been looking for you. You must come with me, now.’

‘I don’t think so,’ Daniel
answered, adding insouciantly, ‘I was always told to keep away from
strangers’

She removed her shades and took
a step towards him. Hands on hips, she tapped her foot impatiently.
‘Look, I asked nicely, so don’t give me any trouble.’ Her eyes were
hard. ‘Let’s go.’

‘I think you’d better give me a
good reason why first.’

‘Brave boy, aren’t you!’ She
shrugged. ‘OK. A friend of yours sent me. You really want to meet
him. So come on. We’re wasting time.’

Daniel’s heart lurched. He knew
then that he had to go with her. ‘All right. You go ahead. I’ll
follow.’

‘Right!’ She stalked off up the
street and Daniel went after her, maintaining a slight distance
between them. They did not speak to one another. She led him
through a maze of alleys to a cramped street of tall buildings with
narrow doorways approached by short flights of steps. The woman
marched up to one of the doors and turned to Daniel. ‘Here we are.
Come in.’

Daniel followed her into the
building. It was spacious inside, yet bare, the walls scabrous with
age. He could see a courtyard beyond a window and wooden stairs
leading to an upper storey. The floor was tiled and covered with
Turkish rugs. The air smelled of frankincense and tobacco.
Somewhere, in a distant room, someone was moving what sounded like
iron pots around.

The woman began to climb the
stairs, Daniel following. On the first floor, she turned down a
small landing and then entered a room, where she paused in the
door-way and beckoned for Daniel to enter. Hesitantly, Daniel
squeezed past her into a small, low-ceilinged room, where a man sat
at a table by the window. It was Shemyaza. He did not turn round
immediately. He had a glass of tea in front of him and appeared to
be looking out at the courtyard, the planes of his face sculpted by
mellow light. Daniel paused at the threshold, stunned. ‘Shem!’

Shemyaza turned then and looked
at him. ‘Hello, Daniel.’

Daniel was not altogether
surprised, but still felt slightly disorientated to find Shemyaza
there. ‘What’s all this about? Where have you been? Who’s this
female thug?’

‘Come in,’ Shemyaza said. ‘Sit
down. Drink tea.’

Daniel walked over to the
table. Shem appeared to be relaxed and in good health. What game
was this? ‘Why didn’t you contact us? We’ve been half crazy with
worry!’

Shemyaza did not react to
Daniel’s carping tone. ‘I have contacted you. That’s why you’re
here. My friend Melandra has been looking for you for some
days.’

‘Was the gun necessary?’

Shemyaza laughed and glanced at
the woman, who was now leaning against the closed door. ‘Gun,
Melandra? I hope you haven’t been intimidating poor Daniel.’

The woman bared her teeth in a
predatory grin. ‘You want me to work for you, but I do the job my
way.’

Shemyaza shook his head and
poured Daniel a glass of tea from a tall brass pot. ‘Are you ready
to work now, Daniel?’ He pushed the glass towards Daniel’s
hands.

Daniel felt dazed. ‘Work?’

‘Yes, you remember. The
Chambers of Light? Have you found the church yet?’

Daniel groaned. ‘Why do you do
things to me like this? Why couldn’t you just come to the hotel
like any normal person?’

‘Of course, you do not expect
me to answer that,’ Shemyaza said. ‘We need to start work tonight.
Are the others ready?’

Daniel blinked at him. ‘There
are five of us. We lack one.’

‘No, that has been attended to.
Have you had a good look round St Menas?’

‘St Menas?’

‘Daniel, you seem half asleep!
The church, where we have to perform the opening rite.’

Daniel rubbed his eyes. ‘The
Coptic church. No. We were unable to discover the dedication.’

Shemyaza expressed his
impatience. ‘Tch! What have you been doing?’

‘Waiting for you mostly. What
else could we do?’

‘Daniel, I am disappointed. You
were clever enough to bring everyone here, so I would have expected
you to have located the church by now.’ He sighed. ‘No matter. It
shouldn’t take long.’ He gestured at the woman. ‘Perhaps you could
make some enquiries instead?’

Melandra made a languid gesture
with one arm. ‘I’m onto it already.’ She left the room.

‘Efficient but dangerous,’
Shemyaza said.

‘Who is she?’

‘The assassin who stalked me in
Istanbul.’

Daniel couldn’t help laughing
at the absurdity of the situation. ‘Shem! What have you done to
her, or perhaps I shouldn’t ask?’

Shem did not join in with the
laughter. ‘Daniel, there might be complications.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘That woman, Melandra, she
works for an organisation dedicated to making sure I’m dead.’ He
raised a hand to silence Daniel’s outburst. ‘No, you don’t
understand. There is a Grigori faction behind it.’

‘What?’

‘You heard me. Oh Daniel, you
won’t believe what I’ve learned, but the truth is there are
elements of our people who do not want me to fulfil my destiny.
They will try to stop me.’

‘Can that woman be
trusted?’

He shrugged. ‘She may be
unpredictable, but she’s furious to discover that she’s not working
for enemies of the Grigori as she’d been led to believe.’

‘What do you think your enemies
will do?’

‘They will use people to
obstruct me, as they already have. I don’t know if they’re aware of
the church, but they are certainly behind the threat to bomb the
Sphinx. That’s what happens, Daniel. They use people’s beliefs for
their own ends, whether they are Islamic or Christian. People
believe they are fighting for god, but they’re not. They’re
fighting for Grigori, the traditional enemies of their gods.’

Daniel drew his hands over his
face. This was so much to take in. ‘We’ll need protection,
then.’

‘We have Melandra. As I said,
she’s quite efficient and happy to be putting her talents to some
use now that I’ve convinced her not to kill me.’

‘One woman against — what? How
many?’

Shemyaza took a sip of tea.
‘Return to your companions,’ he said. ‘We must all go to the church
at sunset. Tell Gadreel to bring Qimir’s swords with her.’

Daniel nodded. ‘OK. But what if
your killer woman can’t find the church?’

‘She will.’

Daniel returned to his hotel,
with the promise that the woman, Melandra, would contact him in a
couple of hours. Shemyaza told him to make sure the others were
ready. He had told Daniel the story of what had happened to him
since they were separated, and had introduced him to Penemue and
Tiy. Shem’s whole attitude seemed to have changed. He seemed more
confident and sure about his role, but also more distant and
melancholy. It was as if something was bothering him, of which he
would not speak.

Although Daniel was glad that
Penemue had been found, he could not help but feel slightly annoyed
that other players had been brought into the game: Melandra and
Tiy. He found it very hard to credit Tiy was actually Shemyaza’s
mother. As for Penemue, he was a revelation. He still lived in the
body that had walked the earth in the days of Eden. He seemed ill
at ease in the western-style clothes he wore — desert fatigues — as
if his body was made for being draped in long robes. He could speak
only in the ancient tongue, which meant he necessarily remained a
silent, looming presence.

Back at his hotel, Daniel
gritted his teeth before summoning the others to his room and
filling them in about all that had happened. As he’d expected,
Gadreel and Salamiel seemed put out that only Daniel had been taken
to meet Shemyaza, while Pharmaros became jittery at the prospect of
coming face to face with him later on. Only Kashday appeared
pleased with developments and was clearly eager for the next stage
of the game.

While they were still
discussing the situation, the phone rang and Daniel answered it. He
recognised the drawling American tone straight away. ‘We have a
location, Mr Cranton. It’s in Old Cairo, of course, the Coptic
quarter. Shemyaza calls this Old Babylon. Do you think you and your
crew will be capable of finding St Menas alone?’

Daniel stiffened with
irritation. He had the impression that Melandra believed him and
his companions to be bumbling idiots, helpless without Shemyaza’s
guidance. ‘We’ll see you outside in an hour,’ he said and was about
to put down the phone without waiting for her response.