Stolen Dreams (40 page)

 

Shara awoke
with a jerk. The burning pain across her shoulders brought tears to her
eyes. Gabriel?

 

Gabriel blocked his pain from her and assured
her he was fine as the soldier ordered him to stop.

 

"You are
new here, are you not?" he asked Gabriel.

 

"Yes. I was just
reassigned," he replied, humbly bowing his head.

 

"The
first crack of the whip orders you to get to work. Quickly. If it is
necessary to strike you again, I will not be so gentle. You appear to
be strong. Go over there and help place the blocks."

 

Gabriel
followed his direction and was put to work with a crew of men. Their
task began by tying four long ropes around a large block of marble.
With twenty men pulling each rope, they hauled the block up the side of
the pyramid on a ramp, the center of which was constructed of logs that
rolled in place. The trick was for the men to balance themselves on the
stationary sides of the ramp. Gabriel was given a pair of sandals with
metal studs on the soles and shown how to use them to secure a foothold
on the steep slant.

 

Once they started up the ramp, no one man
could
afford to relax, let alone slip, without endangering everyone else, and
the higher they climbed, the more precarious the trip became. Gabriel
was afraid to
use his levitation power with so many people involved, so he pulled his
weight along with all the others. By the time they reached the top and
pushed the block into place, Gabriels muscles were vibrating from
overexertion. They were given a short spell to catch their breath
before going back down again.

 

From that higher vantage point,
he
could see the royal citadel in the distance, and he discreetly withdrew
Beauty to get a recording to the entire area. It may only have been a
kilometer away, but it was all open space from the monument to the
royal city, with a small army of soldiers in between.

 

Escape
was not going to be easy.

 

The
crew was cautiously descending the ramp when a rumbling sound warned of
approaching danger. The ground quaked and the entire monument trembled.
The men on the ramp crouched down and hung on to the sides as the
tremor ran its course.

 

Suddenly one man lost his grip and
tumbled
off the edge. His screams pierced the rolling thunder as his body
plummeted to the ground. When all vibration ceased, a soldier ordered
that the slave's broken body be dumped into the new crevice that had
opened in the ground not far from the base of the monument.

 

Shara
had seen enough. Gabriel had to get away from there this second! She
was about to order him to do so when Odette knelt down beside her and
captured her attention. At the same time, she felt Gabriel preventing
her from seeing any more of what was going on at the monument.

 

"You
are to come with me," the girl said. "Hurry." Be careful, Gabriel
thought, reassuring her that he was not blocking her out of his mind
completely.    
 

 

You just get yourself back here, she retorted. I'll
be fine.

 

Odette
led Shara up endless flights of stone stairs and down a corridor to a
richly appointed room. Seated on colorful pillows on the floor and
lying on plush divans were a dozen noblewomen. Odette bowed and left
the room, closing the door behind her.

 

A petite, gray-haired
woman
sitting in the only chair in the room snapped her fingers at Shara.
"Has no one trained you? Bow to your betters!"

 

Shara imitated
the low bow she had seen Ester and Jarad perform.

 

"You may
lift your head, but do not rise. You are much too tall for a woman, and
I never look up at a slave."

 

"Are you really a witch?" an
adolescent girl with heavy kohl around her eyes asked.

 

"Hush,
Mirabel," scolded the elder. "I will determine the truth." To Shara she
said, "Our menfolk could not pleasure their spouses last night because
of a witch's spell. Was that your doing?"

 

Shara tried to
choose the
answer that would get her in the least trouble. "My spell will increase
their desire for their spouses a hundredfold, but in order for it to
work, the men must avoid all sexual activity for a time."

 

The
spokeswoman pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes. She was clearly
unconvinced.

 

"Perhaps there is something I could do for you,"
Shara offered.

 

The woman glanced at the others in her group,
then said, "We are bored this morning. Tell us our fortunes."

 

Shara
had  the distinct feeling that this one woman
could do her more harm than all the men she'd met last night, but it
also seemed as though another key had just been handed to her. "I will
need a hair from your head and the name of any ancestor of yours that
arrived on Atlantis with Poseidon."

 

Most of the women appeared
excited by the prospect of having their fortunes told, but the eldest
continued to look skeptical, even as she handed Shara a hair and said,
"Penelope."

 

Shara had already checked off that name, but she
knew she had to be convincing to this woman to get samples from the
others.

 

"I
must communicate with the spirits in private for a moment," Shara said.
"May I go behind that screen?" Given permission, she slipped behind the
divider in the corner of the room and quickly ran a test on the hair as
a double-check. No matches.

 

Since Gabriel was first to
construct a
partial wall between them, she didn't feel all that guilty when she did
the same thing to keep him from seeing exactly what she was doing. He
had enough problems where he was without fearing for her safety as well.

 

She
came out and knelt at the older woman's feet. 'The spirits told me of
your great wisdom. They know you have not always been treated with the
respect you deserve, but they asked me to tell you to be patient awhile
longer. What you deserve will be given to you before the next royal
gathering."

 

The woman was delighted and encouraged the rest of
the
noble ladies to cooperate. Shara stepped behind the screen each time
she got another hair, tested it, then made up a vague fortune for each,
based on their appearance and demeanor. One was told of a secret
admirer, while another was warned of an accident to one of her limbs that could be
avoided by taking care when she climbed stairs.

 

In
the end, they were all satisfied but Shara. She had eliminated three
more names from her list, yet still had no match for Khameira or
herself. The worst of it was that there were only four names of exiles
left on Misha's list, but thirteen rebels' names remained on the
original list recorded in the history texts. Added to that was the fact
that most of the people on Atlantis did not survive to continue their
line.

 

She had no choice but to face the strong probability
that she
had missed some Friends at Zeus s commune. With the way her luck had
gone on this mission thus far, if she had an ancestor among the rebels,
it was undoubtedly one of the people she'd failed to test. On the other
hand, considering the evil strain that ran through Poseidon's
descendants on Atlantis, it seemed quite likely that Khameira was
located somewhere further down on his family tree.

 

When the
women
dismissed her, she returned to the slave quarters to let Rebekah know
she was still around. From there she headed for the cookery in hopes of
being assigned to meal service.

 

In spite of the law against
touching
the nobility, she was determined to get a hair from as many of them as
possible before she and Gabriel left Atlantis behind.

 

 

Gabriel
could sense that Shara was doing something she shouldn't, but it was
taking all his concentration and energy to perform the task assigned
him. The ache in his head and the welt on his back were now minor
irritations compared to the rest of his body. The palms of his hands
had gone from blistering to bleeding and his muscles and joints had
been strained to the point where the pain was nauseating.

 

And
it was only midday.

 

He
needed to save himself. He had to get back to the temple and find out
what Shara was up to. So far, however, no opportunity for escape had
presented itself.

 

The eighty-man crew had another block of
marble
almost to the top of the ramp when something went wrong. It happened
too fast to place blame, but suddenly the huge stone toppled over the
edge, taking four men down with it. One was crushed beneath the block;
the other three lay bent and broken around it.

 

Several
soldiers
marched over to the ramp and shouted for the rest of the men to
descend. Other slaves were ordered to dispose of the bodies while the soldiers used their spears to prod the crew
into one long line.

 

They were to be whipped for their
clumsiness.

 

Gabriel
tried to think of a way to prevent the beating without calling
attention to himself, but neither his paralyzer rod nor his new powers
were adequate against such a large force of soldiers. All he could do
was try to block the pain as the whip cracked over his back five times,
then moved on to the next man.

 

The salt of his perspiration
mingled
with his blood to set his torn flesh on fire. He almost reached out to
Shara, but he knew there was nothing she could do but worry for him, so
he held back his need of her.

 

By the time every slave had
received
his five lashes, at least twenty of them had collapsed. Gabriel was
tempted to give in to the pain and exhaustion as well, until he saw
that the fallen slaves were being dragged over to the bottomless
crevice in the ground. If they could not stand on their own, they were
tossed in with the dead.

 

The soldiers were demanding that the
crew
begin again with the fallen block. It would have to be in place before
they would be given any nourishment, water, or rest.

 

A
momentary
reprieve was granted them as a horse-drawn chariot raced up to the
monument. A soldier held the reins, but next to him stood a man in a
purple robe. The noble scanned the swarm of laborers as his driver
spoke to another soldier. That soldier nodded and pointed at Gabriel.

 

Gabriel
didn't care why he was wanted. Whatever the nobleman had planned
couldn't be much worse than another trip up the side of the pyramid, and one
soldier was a far easier obstacle to eliminate than an entire army. He
kept his head bowed as he let himself be pushed on to the chariot.

 

Having
been at the top of the pyramid, Gabriel knew the departing chariot and
its passengers could be seen the entire way back to the city. Thus, any
aggressive action on his part could bring the army down on him. At any
rate, he desperately needed time to regain a little strength before
attempting an escape.

 

The chariot sped away as quickly as it
had arrived, stirring up a dust storm that briefly shielded it from any
onlookers.

 

"Here, Friend, drink this," the noble said in a
loud voice, and extracted a covered crock from inside his robe.

 

Gabriel
was gripping the side of the conveyance with both hands to keep from
falling, but the offer of a drink was incentive enough to risk letting
go. As soon as he removed the lid, he recognized the smell and color of
the cider he had helped carry the evening before. Drugged or not, the
fluid would help his body recover. It took great effort not to gulp the
entire contents in one swallow.

 

He was halfway through the
contents
when he realized that the nobleman had called him Friend, but since he
had no idea what the situation was, he held his questions. There was
something familiar about the man's features, though Gabriel couldn't
pinpoint what it was.

 

As the soldier drove them through the
series
of gates into the royal city, Gabriel finished the cider. The screaming
pain in his body had been reduced to a whimper, which told him that the
drink had indeed been laced with opium, but his mind seemed
perfectly clear.

 

Other
than the offer of the drink, neither the nobleman nor the soldier said
another word to Gabriel during their trip. Even when they stopped in
the rear of one of the smaller mansions near the citadel, the nobleman
merely motioned for him to follow.

 

The moment they were behind
the
closed doors of the residence, however, both the nobleman's and the
soldier's demeanors changed from indifference to solicitousness.

 

"Eva!
Borok!" the nobleman called out, and immediately a young native couple
hurried into the foyer. "Fetch our friend a large cup of cider and
prepare a cool bath for him. He will need your ointments, Eva. They
whipped him before I could get there."

 

Eva reached for
Gabriel's hand, but when she saw the condition it was in, she grimaced
and grasped his elbow to lead him away.

 

Gabriel
welcomed the kindness being proffered, but he wanted a few answers
before he took another step. "I don't mean to sound ungrateful," he
said to the nobleman, "but why are you doing this?"

 

The man
looked
somewhat embarrassed. "Forgive me. In my excitement, I have overlooked
good manners. My name is Daniel. I am one of a very secret group who
have been waiting for your arrival for almost two centuries. I regret
that you were forced to undergo mistreatment, but I only learned of
your presence this morning."

 

Gabriel thought perhaps his mind
had been dulled by the opium-laced cider after all. "Exactly who do you
think I am?"

 

Daniel nodded. "You are right to be cautious.
Jarad and Ester passed the word among our group that
two Friends had finally arrived from the Otherworld to save us. There
are only two nobles besides myself who have held to the beliefs of
Poseidon and the Friends. We know the truth of our origins, though we
have kept it from the natives."