"So Andrew and I made our way through the passageways as carefully as we could. If you think the Egyptians were very clever at setting booby traps, well, you have not had an encounter with an ancient Chinese fire pool (1)."
Alex gazed at Catherine, his eyes showing that he was held, completely and utterly, under the spell of her story. "A fire pool? How did they do that?"
Catherine shrugged. "I do not know, and neither does Andrew. We've never managed to figure out how the builders of the tomb managed to keep the oil in the pool they had constructed, since even oil can leach out of stone, eventually." She smiled, and winked. "And besides, Andrew and I were more concerned with making it across the fire pool than wondering how it was made."
Jonathan watched as his dear friend told his nephew more stories of her adventures. That girl is an endless source of them, he thought with an amused smile.
He was very glad that Catherine was back. It was the three of them together again, just like it had been in their younger years. Catherine was still as vivacious and lively as ever, still the same little firecracker that she had been as a little girl.
But there was something about her now that made Jonathan feel a little concerned about her. While he suspected that it was because she was grown up now, and more mature than she was in her younger years, she seemed to have this air of quiet melancholy about her, a constant darkened pall that was a sharp contrast from the Catherine that he remembered. He was not so sure if Evie had noticed it, but he had.
Jonathan did not notice his expression grow dark as he remembered the last summer that he and Evie had spent at the Ashlar country manor - the summer that had also been the last time they had ever spent quality time with Catherine...
Jonathan winced as he heard the horrid retching sounds coming from the bathroom. Was Catherine really feeling that bad?
He glanced at his sister, who was sitting at the foot of Catherine's immense four-post bed - the bed that Evie and Catherine shared whenever the Carnahan siblings stayed over at the Ashlar manor during the summer. "What is wrong with her, Evie? Did she eat something bad last night?"
Evie looked up at him, her face reflecting her own worry. "I don't know," she murmured in response. "I mean, we ate the same things she did, didn't we? If it were bad food, then all three of us would be sick to our stomachs. But we aren't. So it must have be something else."
Just then, the door to the bathroom banged open, and Jonathan watched Catherine stagger out. She looked much paler than usual, and she looked rather gaunt. She wiped one hand across her mouth, while the other was firmly pressed against her stomach, as if to keep it in firm control.
Evie immediately stood up, and went to Catherine's side. "Cathy, are you alright?"
At first Catherine did not respond, since she seemed too busy inhaling air. After a while, however, she managed to compose herself, and straighten up. "Yes... I think so." She squeezed her eyes shut, and swallowed. "I will be fine. Just... I've been feeling awful these past few mornings."
"We could tell," Jonathan said, a small, wry smile curling on his face.
Evie glared at him. "Jon, hush!" She turned once more to look at Catherine. "Are you sure you still want to go riding with us? We can stay closer to the house, if you'd like."
Catherine shook her head resolutely. "No, let's go out riding." She gave the two of them a smile so weak that to Jonathan, it seemed she had made such an immense effort to do it. "I wouldn't want to spoil the day for you, and maybe the fresh air and exercise will do me some good. And I will be fine by the afternoon - I always am."
Jonathan knew in his bones that she was lying, and he knew that Evie knew that too, but nevertheless, his sister nodded her head, and said: "Alright, if you say so. Now come on, I'll help you choose some riding clothes. Jon, could you please go to the stables and get our horses ready?"
Jonathan sighed, and nodded as he exited the room, leaving the two girls to do their business, while he headed over to the stables to prepare their mounts.
He remembered how bad it had been: how Catherine seemed to get skinnier and skinnier, how she seemed to wither into a skeleton right before their eyes as the days passed. Perhaps realizing that their presence was tiring her out - and because the sight of her so weak and lifeless really did trouble the two of them - Jonathan and Evie decided to leave earlier than usual, to give Catherine some time to rest.
Jonathan sighed, recalling the conversation that he and Evie had on their way back to London, the day they left the manor - and Catherine - behind...
"What do you think could be wrong with her?"
Jonathan turned his gaze to Evie, who was sitting across from him in the carriage. He sighed, and shook his head. "I really don't know, Evie. I cannot imagine what would make her so sick."
Evie sighed. "I know. She told me that she had talked to the doctor when he came over to check on her mother, but he said that there was nothing really serious about it, that what she was experiencing was all part of growing up."
"That's hogwash Evie. I mean, you and Cathy are more or less the same age, and do you wake up every morning feeling horribly nauseous?"
Evie raised an eyebrow. "How can you be so sure?"
"I'm not. It's just that...well, it doesn't seem natural, you know?" He moved in his seat so that he was facing his sister more fully. "You know how sometimes, you can tell whether something comes naturally to a person or not? Well, it's the same feeling I get with Cathy. Whatever it is she is going through right now, it is not natural." He frowned, and looked away, gazing out the window instead as the countryside rolled by. "Something is wrong with her, but I cannot really say what it is."
There was a pause, and when Evie spoke to break it, her voice was soft and wondering. "Do you think it could be her mother?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, try to follow me, if you will: Cathy and her mother are very close, correct?"
"Yes."
"Mrs. Ashlar is very ill, right?"
"She has been for quite a while, so yes."
"And you heard that Mrs. Ashlar's condition has been worsening, haven't you?"
"Yes." Jonathan looked once more at his sister. "Evie, I really don't understand what you are trying to get at here."
Evie's eyes seemed cloud with tears then, and her voice was slightly strangled when she spoke. "Jon, I think Mrs. Ashlar is dying."
Had that been the reason, then? Was Catherine's illness really her body's way of expressing her grief at the possibility of losing her mother?
It was the most likely explanation. He learned from Catherine's letters to Evie that Mrs. Ashlar had died giving birth to Catherine's little sister, Erica, and that Catherine had fallen very ill from the grief of losing her mother. Jonathan would have wanted a chance to learn all about it from Catherine herself, but then his entire family relocated to Egypt, and the only times he heard of news from Catherine was from her letters to his sister.
Yes, it had to be that.
"I just have to ask this Jon: are you drunk?"
Jonathan snapped out of his stupor to see Rick looking at him with a questioning look. It took a while for Rick's words to register, but when they did, Jonathan replied indignantly: "I am not drunk! I was merely thinking about something very important, if you must know."
Rick snorted. "Uh huh, yeah. And what'd that be?"
"I was thinking about Cathy," Jonathan replied, and his voice took on a serious tone. "I was just remembering the last time Evie and I had seen her."
Now that got Rick's attention. "You're not usually this somber," the American muttered. "What happened back then? Did you guys part on bad terms or something?"
"Oh no, no, we did not part on bad terms - quite the opposite, actually. It is just that the last time we saw each other, poor old Cathy was very sick. Her mum had been horribly ill the last time Evie and I visited Cathy at her family's manor, and Cathy was taking it really hard. When her mum died, I guess..." Jonathan shook his head. "I guess that was the last straw on Cathy's part. The poor thing really took it hard, losing her mum. Evie and I had intended to visit her one more time, but then we moved to Egypt, and that was the end of that. All the contact we've ever had with Cathy was through her letters to Evie - until now, of course."
Rick glanced over to where Catherine and his son were laughing over some joke or other that the woman had cracked. "She seems normal. Maybe she was able to recover from her grief."
"Maybe," Jonathan murmured.
Why was he worrying so much to begin with? His brother-in-law was right; it did indeed seem as if Catherine was all right. It appeared as if she had moved past the grief she felt over her mother's death, and that she was now picking up the pieces of her life.
But that did not sufficiently explain why she had been so ill the last time they had seen each other. On hindsight, Jonathan could have labeled Catherine's symptoms back then as morning sickness, of the variation that takes hold of women during the early months of their pregnancy, but Catherine had been a teenager then, and completely single - no thanks to her father, of course.
Jonathan could not help but smile at the silliness of his own thoughts. Morning sickness? How absurd! No, it had to be something else - even though the theory that it was because of her grief that Catherine had been so sick did not completely hold water.
There was something else at work here, and though Jonathan had absolutely no idea about what was going on, he felt determined to find out - if only to understand why Catherine was no longer the same as she used to be.
Alex was not in the least bit impressed. Dendera did not look any different from the other dig sites that he had been to with his parents - except maybe this time, there were more of the Medjai around than he had expected. But he shrugged it off, thinking that maybe it was to make sure that this time around, nothing went wrong.
I'd rather be in Mexico right now, he thought wistfully, remembering the stories that Catherine had told him. The idea of searching for ruins deep in the heart of a jungle appealed to him more than digging through sand, rock and dust.
"At least in a jungle it won't be as hot," he grumbled as he squinted briefly up at the sky. It was nearly high noon - the hottest part of the day. He quickly followed the grownups as they made their way towards the collection of tents nearby. He knew enough from visiting digs with his parents that it was never a smart thing to stand out in the midday sun for too long.
Up ahead of him, he saw his parents, Uncle Jonathan, Aunt Catherine, Ardeth and Andrew crowded around a rickety wooden table, on top of which was spread what looked like a map. Knowing that he would be welcomed either way, Alex squeezed himself in between his father and mother, the former placing a hand on his shoulder almost as if by instinct.
"The entrance to the crypts was said to have been here," Evie said, tapping a point on the map. As it turned out, the map was a piece of papyrus, detailing the layout of the Temple of Hathor, as it had been at the height of its glory.
Rick shook his head. "Yeah, but our tents are pitched right above that place, and the overseer told us there's nothing under here but rock."
Evie nodded. "True, and that does not surprise me, since that entrance collapsed during an earthquake. And even if we did manage to pry through all that rock and open it up again, it would not lead us to our actual goal: the crypt of the High Priestesses."
Andrew spoke up then. "Do you mean to say that the High Priestesses had a separate crypt all to themselves?"
"Exactly," Evie replied with a smile. "It is said that the High Priestesses of Hathor were buried in a crypt separate from where the other priestesses were laid to rest. That crypt was buried deeper underground than the other one, which means that it is still intact."
"Our only problem, then," Catherine said, "is to find the other entrance, correct?"
Evie nodded. "Yes, that is the problem we have to face. My sources tell me that there were two entrances: one inside the temple, and another outside it. However, these sources do not record the location of these entrances, so we will have to find them on our own."
"And what would that entail?" Ardeth asked.
"Well, we might have better luck finding the entrance inside the temple itself," Evie replied after a moment of thoughtfully tapping her finger against her lip. "As for the one outside, we might have to widen the area of our search, not simply limit it to the immediate temple area."
"I see. I will go and inform my men of today's plans." Ardeth nodded his head, and walked out of the tent.
There was a moment of silence, and then Andrew uttered a soft chuckle. "He's a strange one, that," he murmured, "but I like him, if only because he and I are almost the same."
Catherine raised an eyebrow at him teasingly. "At least he is not running away from whatever business needs to be taken cared of."
Instead of laughing, Andrew's lips seemed to thin slightly at that. "Lass, I thought you promised you would never talk of that."
Catherine bowed her head, and murmured something in a soft, apologetic tone, but she was too far away and her voice was too soft for Alex to catch what she had said.
An uncomfortable silence settled in, which Rick broke by saying: "Alright, since we know what we've got to do, let's get to it, shall we?"
Alex followed his parents as they walked out of the tent, but stopped at the entrance to watch Catherine and Andrew. Catherine seemed to be apologizing for something, and judging from his gestures, Andrew was telling her that it was nothing.
A few moments later, however, Ardeth came up to them, and though the Medjai greeted Andrew, he seemed more focused on Catherine. He said a few words to her, but whatever they were, they seemed to be rather troubling to Catherine, because she went quite pale. She nodded, and then said a few words to Andrew before she followed Ardeth to that part of the site where the Medjai had set up their camp.
Now Alex was very curious. It had never occurred to him that Catherine and Ardeth would have any sort of business to do with each other.
And, as was often the case, his curiosity got the better of him, and he followed the two adults, ducking into tents and behind posts when necessary, to see what exactly was going on.
(1) – I really do not know if such things exist. If they do, forgive me for not using the proper term for such things, if ever the one I have used is not it.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
Belphegor - Thank you for saying that this is one of the best Ardeth romances you have ever read. Although it is true that romance played a central role in The Mummy and The Mummy Returns, I do not wish to make it an all-encompassing thing. Moreover, I believe that I have found my niche in writing action/adventure stories that are sweetened with romance, rather than writing romantic storie peppered with action/adventure.
And regarding your grievance about the lack of Jonathan and Alex's presence, I have done my best to remedy that in this chapter, though this is mostly Jonathan's chapter, and him recalling what happened in the past. I have attempted to present a more serious side to Jonathan, and although I felt that it was something of a stretch, I would like to think that there is more to him that his simply being a drunkard, a gambler, and the source of comic relief.
Again, I would like to thank you for taking the time to read this story, as well as More Things in Heaven and Earth. Your comments are always very much appreciated.
lilylynn - As always, I would like to thank you for faithfully reading the chapters of this story that I put up, in spite of the fact that I do it rather slowly. I hope that you will forgive me for taking my own sweet time in writing, since I also have much to do for university.
Nevertheless, I would like to thank you for your constant and unerring support.