Time Dancers (10 page)

Ray and I exchanged puzzled glances. I knew Geaxi had gone for one reason—to watch over Nova—but I had no idea what Nova might have seen. Her visions were powerful, private enigmas that came without warning.

Suddenly Mitch spoke out. “My daddy, if he’s still alive, might be livin’ in Ithaca. On my way back to St. Louis, I could spend a little time there, find out what’s goin’ on with Nova, and maybe pay him a visit. I never have before and this is as good a time as any.”

“What?” I asked, completely surprised. “I have never heard you even mention him.”

“It never came up, Z. Where do you think I got my middle name? My mama wanted me to never forget where he was from, so she gave me the name Ithaca.” He paused. “I might have a sister somewhere, too.”

I didn’t know what to say. None of this was expected. I looked at Ray and he grinned, then adjusted his bowler and said, “Let’s get somethin’ to eat, what do you say?”

“Good idea,” Mitch said.

“This way,” Arrosa said to all of us, adjusting her own black beret. Minutes later we were in a taxi, weaving our way down Fifth Avenue to Arrosa’s loft apartment, three blocks from Washington Square in Greenwich Village. We were due to set sail for Barcelona in twenty-four hours. That is a blink of the eye in New York City. I had hoped for the chance of seeing a ball game at the Polo Grounds, but that would have to wait for another time. Soon, I told myself. Soon.

The next day passed even quicker than I imagined and Mitch saw us off in the evening, looking resplendent in a black tuxedo and white silk scarf. He had an appointment later to meet a man in Harlem about investing in a nightclub, saying, “I can’t resist it, Z. This town is poppin’.” I told him I would cable him as soon as we reached Barcelona. I also wondered why no one was there to say farewell to Arrosa and I asked if any of her friends knew she was leaving. She answered, “No, and this is not a problem, señor. I knew this might happen. It is better this way.”

The
Iona
eased her way into a crowded and busy New York harbor, then steamed out to open seas. By midnight she had set a course east and south, bound for the Canary Islands, our only scheduled port of call before Barcelona.

I turned to Ray just before we said good night. “Any strange weather ahead, Weatherman?”

Ray grinned. “Nothin’ I can see, Z.”

There were few women on board the
Iona.
Most of the crew were Greek and spoke a dialect none of us had heard before. However, I needed no translation to understand what they meant when Arrosa was around. She did nothing to provoke them. Her clothes were simple and she wore no makeup or jewelry. None of their words or leering glances seemed to affect her, but I was uncomfortable with it and so was Ray.

The weather held across the mid-Atlantic and even though I was already missing Opari and the others, it felt good to be at sea again. The three of us spent much of our time on deck, walking or sitting in deck chairs. The passengers generally left us alone, and for the few who inquired, Ray and I were posing as brothers and Arrosa was our aunt. We never quite explained the reason for our trip and kept every conversation confined to the trivial. On the night before we reached the Canary Islands, Ray and I found ourselves alone, leaning on the railing near the stern, staring up at the great sweep of stars from horizon to horizon. My eyes drifted up and across, then focused on the constellation Pleiades, the Seven Sisters. The more I stared, the more they seemed to be whispering, sharing their secrets with each other at the very top of the sky.

I turned to Ray. “When are you going to show me the ‘something else’ concerning the Meq girl?”

“Tomorrow, Z. I got it hid away in a special place in my suitcase. I’ll get it out when we dock. It’s kind of fragile.”

The next morning we made port in the beautiful deepwater harbor of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, a place Captain Woodget and I had visited several times for several reasons as smugglers. The Canary Islands were a haven and an oasis for us, as they had been for sailors and merchants for centuries. I learned later the Meq have known and passed through the islands for millennia. Unai himself told many tales involving the Guanche, a mysterious, tall, blond, bearded tribe who inhabited the islands two thousand years before Columbus sailed anywhere.

The harbor was busy with merchant ships and container ships of all sizes, most filled with bananas or tomatoes. There were some passenger ships and private vessels, but not many. The
Iona
steered a clear path through traffic and we docked safely about midmorning. We would only be in port for the day and nearly every passenger was on deck and planning on going ashore. Ray had his white shirtsleeves rolled up and Arrosa wore a red flower print sundress and sandals. The air was hot and dry and the sky was a sharp, bright blue.

Arrosa smiled. “Are we going ashore? I have never been to this place.”

“Of course,” I said. “But, Arrosa, there is something I must ask you and I hope you aren’t offended.”

“I will not be offended. What do you ask, Zianno?”

“Only that you wait ashore for Ray and me. He has…he has something to show me in private.”

She laughed slightly. “That is not a problem, señor.” She turned and pointed toward an area on the dock that was a hundred yards from the
Iona,
away from the stream of passengers and cargo handlers and close to a tangled stack of banana crates. “I will wait for you there,” she said, adjusting her black beret to the proper angle.

“We won’t be long, Arrosa. I promise.”

“It shouldn’t take but a few minutes,” Ray said.

She laughed again. “It is not a problem, believe me. I will be waiting.”

She turned to leave and Ray and I watched her until she was walking down the gangway, then we went directly to his cabin. He pulled out his battered suitcase and opened it on top of the small bed. There was a false bottom in the suitcase and Ray dismantled it carefully. Underneath, hidden in a padded compartment, lay a papyrus scroll, weighted at both ends with long pieces of carved ivory and rolled into a coil. Ray lifted the scroll gently and spread it across the bed. Once he had it completely secured, he shook his head and looked over at me.

“Can’t make heads or tails out of what it says, Z, but I thought you ought to see it. Especially when I found out who had it and who it was for!”

I stared down at the stained, ancient paper. At first, I saw nothing on it except a group of red dots in the upper left section, possibly made with ocher. Then, below a fold and crack in the center of the papyrus, I saw a few blurry, faint scratches in black. I leaned over, looked closer, and was astounded.

“Who had this, Ray? Where did you get it?”

“In the ‘special place’ the Baroness Matilde talked about. It was a room, Z, a huge room in the oldest part of the castle, right up against the mountain. It used to be the entrance to a salt mine. One of the first von Steichens sealed it off, then converted it into an enormous space attached directly to the castle. Susheela the Ninth used it as her home for a thousand years. The papyrus was hers, Z. When she left without a word, she left this behind.”

A few seconds passed in silence. I was dumbfounded. “How old was, or is, Susheela the Ninth?”

“I don’t know, but the Baroness said the girl always referred to herself as ‘the last of her kind.’”

“You said you thought I ought to see this because you found out who had it and who it was for. What did you mean?”

“I mean there was another piece of paper with the papyrus. It was written by Susheela the Ninth and gave instructions, in German, as to exactly who was supposed to see the papyrus. The Baroness had to translate the instructions for me, but not the name.”

“What was the name?”

Ray grinned and picked up his bowler, spinning and twirling it on his finger. He opened his mouth to answer and just before he spoke, I stopped him. “Wait! Hush! Do you hear that?”

Ray was startled at first, then understood immediately that I was using my “ability.” “I can’t hear nothin’, Z,” he said.

I listened again to make sure the sound was what I thought. Then it came again, this time in panic, and I realized who it was. “No! No!” the voice shouted. “Get off me, you pig!”

“Come on,” I said to Ray and took off running for the gangway, dodging several people and pushing others to the side. Ray had no difficulty keeping pace. He was right on my heels and once we were down the gangway, I could hear the shouts and curses behind us of the people who had been knocked out of the way. I paid no attention and was in a full running stride.

“Where are we going?” Ray asked casually.

“Arrosa is in trouble!” I shouted back.

Ray caught up with me. “Did you ever get that Stone back?” he asked with a wink.

“Sure did,” I said, tapping my pocket and slowing down to a trot. We were getting close. Even Ray could hear the struggle now. Ahead of us a jumble of crates filled with bananas were stacked one on top of the other in front of an open warehouse. On the opposite side of the crates Arrosa was being dragged into the warehouse. She was screaming in Spanish and fighting back.

Ray grabbed my sleeve. “Let me go first,” he said. “If there’s more than one, then they’ll all go for me, and you can do your little trick with the rock. What do you say?”

“Go,” I said without hesitation, then reached in my pocket and found the Stone.

Ray ran around the stacks of bananas, which were piled twenty feet high. Within seconds there were shouts and loud curses in Greek. There seemed to be at least three men attacking Arrosa. They were screaming back and forth and Ray was shouting in English to let the girl go. Arrosa was shouting, too, asking Ray in Spanish if I was with him.

I came around the last stack of bananas and as I reached my arm out to use the Stone, two thick, bare arms encircled me from behind and held me in a viselike grip. The man who grabbed me was heavyset and stank of sweat and stale rum. He held me in the air like a doll. My arms went numb and the Stone dropped out of my hand and rolled on the ground.

“Damn,” Ray said. Someone even bigger was holding him in the same manner. I thought I had seen the man on board the
Iona.

“Are you all right?” I shouted to Arrosa. She had quit struggling and was almost out of sight, being dragged inside the warehouse by a third man. The man had a knife pressed against her throat. His undershirt had been torn to shreds by her teeth and fingernails.

“Not for long,” she shouted back, trying to sound brave. The man laughed and ran one hand through her hair, grabbing a fistful and holding it. Then, in a weak and terrified voice, Arrosa said, “I am scared, Zianno.” The man laughed again in the shadows, telling her in Greek and Spanish, “You will love it, my flower.”

Suddenly, in the blink of an eye, something happened that did not make sense, as if everything had stopped, or slowed down, or changed dimensions. The man dragging Arrosa fell silent and let go of her. Arrosa’s bare legs rose off the ground slightly and her sandals floated off her feet and then moved in a flash, by themselves, into the shadows of the warehouse. There was a slapping sound from inside, then a yelp and a scream. The man in the undershirt appeared in the sunlight, staggering forward and unable to speak because his own knife was embedded in his throat. Blood shot from the wound spraying his undershirt and arms. His eyes rolled back in his head. He took three steps, then fell forward, falling directly on top of Arrosa’s black beret. In the next second, the men holding Ray and me screamed in agony, cursing in Greek and letting go their grips as if they had been burned or shocked. Then they each began a series of involuntary tumbles and back somersaults, ending in a heap at the bottom of the tallest stack of crates. Something invisible had pulled or pushed them with great force and speed.

Ray and I looked at each other. Neither of us had moved a muscle. I started to reach for the Stone I had dropped, but before I could, it came to me. At a fairly rapid pace and in a gentle arc, like a baseball toss, the Stone rose from the ground and flew over to me. I caught it softly in one hand.

“What the…” Ray said and never finished. His mouth was hanging open.

Behind the two men, who were barely conscious, the stacked crates full of bananas began to shake and vibrate. In ten seconds they were falling in an avalanche of wood and bananas and buried the two men where they lay.

Arrosa crawled out of the shadows of the warehouse. She was barefoot and her red dress was torn and bloodied. There were several places on her neck and arms beginning to bruise. Still, she seemed to be all right.

A shadow moved in the open space between Ray and where I was standing. It appeared to leap and dance in a diagonal line. Something or someone was on top of the stacks behind me. I turned and saw a figure bounding down from crate to crate. In the glare of the sun, I couldn’t make out who or what it was, but the movements were quick, graceful, intuitive. There was no doubt or hesitation about where to land or where next to leap. In seconds the figure had dropped eighteen feet, then hit the ground with both feet and started walking toward Ray and me. He wore loose black trousers tucked into boots laced to the knees. His shirt was a simple white cotton tunic with intricate orange stitching. He was exactly my height and weight and looked exactly the same as the last time I had seen him, except the braid behind his left ear was now weighted with black onyx. He stopped in front of me. His “ghost eye” swirled with clouds. On his forefinger he wore a ring of star sapphire set in silver. He reached out and lightly tapped my hand, the one holding the Stone.

“You should learn to hold on to that, Zianno.” Then he smiled, which I had not seen in a very long time. “Sorry I missed your birthday. I was…preoccupied.”

He turned without another word and walked over to where Arrosa still sat on the ground, bewildered and exhausted. He gave her his hand to help her stand and steady herself.

“Arrosa Arginzoniz, no? Allow me to introduce myself. I am Umla-Meq, Egizahar Meq, through the tribe of Berones, protectors of the Stone of Memory. Please, call me Sailor, if you wish.”