Episode 2: For the Pharaoh's Cat, chapter 4

Ezekiel could swear it was colder. It was only a week since he had last visited the dig, before his illness, but he was sure winter had set in completely since then. Professor Wilkins assured him that this was not the case. The weather was actually quite mild for this time of year, and had actually been worse previously. He updated Ezekiel on all their finds, expostulated his theories on the building of the barrow, made tentatively excited conjectures regarding the great age of the relics found within. Everything the young Librarian had expected him to do.

With fake reluctance, and real weariness, Ezekiel excused himself. He had been ill, he explained, truthfully, and was not yet fully recovered. His employer was away on business, technically not a lie as he had not expanded on what that business might entail, and had asked him to check in once he was he was feeling fit. That one was more of an extension of what was assumed. The finds the team had made were of great interest to his employer, completely true, and he was certain that the university would be excellent guardians. He would return in a day or two, depending on his health and his employer's business affairs to discuss matters further.

Ezekiel Jones. Librarian. World Class Thief.

Expert in prevarication.

XXXX

Eve's mind was still tangled up in her dream as she followed Flynn up the slope towards the cliff face. Yawning forth from the bare rock were the shadowy entrances to the temple of Pakhet, known to the Greeks as Speos Artemidos. The four columns had their symmetry spoiled by the apparent presence of a fifth to the left of the entrance, but it was merely the broken down wall of the temple, marking the edge of the room within. Beyond the metal gate, installed long ago to keep thieves and undesirables, but not Librarians, out, were the remains of a further four columns behind the first, hanging down from the weathered ceiling. The floor of the portico was even more difficult to interpret, with the raised foundations of walls threatening ankles everywhere.

Eve stood in the centre of the room, watching Flynn pour over the carefully, lovingly carved and painted reliefs, so brutally and irrevocably damaged by time and invading forces or vandals. There was nothing that caught her eye, but it was difficult to tell. She walked over to the opposite side of the room and started scanning the remaining shapes, looking for the form of a large cat. Nothing fitted the pattern shown in the clippings book. She was beginning to think that a trip to Punt may be inevitable. She reached the doorway to the inner rooms as Flynn did. He pointed to the carved panels on either side of the doorway.

"That there is Horus, if I'm not much mistaken," he said, pointing at the vague remnants of a hawk-headed seated figure on one side of the door. He moved over to the other side. "And this," he said, "is Pakhet. This square panel tells us that someone had damaged the temple previously, and that Hatshepsut had restored it and claimed the favour of the gods in so doing."

"She doesn't look much like a cat," said Eve, looking at the lithe body and legs stretching down from the lioness head.

"It's an early depiction," said Flynn. "You can see she has the lioness head, for a start, but old habits die hard. It calls her a 'resident in the eastern desert' who 'roams the wadis'."

"Does it say anything about traps, secret entrances or large cats?"

"You know, seeing a large cat was considered a sign of good luck by the ancient Egyptians," mused Flynn. "It doesn't mention anything about that here though. It does say something here, though, that might help. Right after something about the colonnades, it says "the hidden place of the house's interior having been made defensive for it with respect to 'bringing away the foot'."

"Hidden place?" Eve's eyes warmed slightly.

"Yep," Flynn nodded. "Now if only we could work out what 'bringing away the foot,' stands for.

"Tripping up?" Eve suggested. "Secret trigger?"

Flynn nodded and pulled a face that told her he was being charitable. Eve sighed and flattened herself out on the mat he handed her, bringing her gaze level with the floor and the exposed foundations. The rock seemed impervious. It had neither been removed nor replaced. Everything appeared in order. She looked over at Flynn, now also down on his belly, looking for cracks in the age-old floor, and smiled.

The work was slow, it bored her, and her joints were starting to ache, but at last, when there was no more floor to peruse, she knew they were getting somewhere. They had ruled out every other possibility, with one or two minor exceptions. The glyphs had to be here. If they were not in the outer chamber, then they must be in the inner one. She pushed herself upright and held out a hand to help Flynn up.

"Inner chamber it is then," she said, as brightly as she could muster.

Together, they walked through the doorway that separated the inner room of the temple from the hustle and bustle of modern-day affairs, like whose camel ate the last summer shrub. Eve felt her body jerked back suddenly and looked back. Flynn, whose fingers were firmly wrapped around her own, had stopped. He was reading something indistinguishable on the wall. He raised a feather-light finger and brushed away the sand.

"This is Horus, he said, almost to himself, reaching up and brushing grit off the hawk head, then the sun disc at the top of Pakhet's forehead. "and this is Pakhet. She's wearing the crown. That associates her with Hathor."

As he spoke, running his fingers over the symbols that spelt the goddesses name, he felt something give way a little. He looked back to what he had been doing, repeating the action without a second thought, and felt something click. He turned to Eve and smiled, a little dubious but arrogant none the less. His charming smile was infectious, and Eve returned it with interest.

She took a step towards him and, together, they plunged downwards as the floor opened up and swallowed them.

XXXX

Eve looked up groggily. She wasn't sure she wanted to know what had just seemed to lick her face, or why she could have sworn that a furry tail brushed by her. She did want to know where Flynn was.

"Still alive, Librarian?" Eve called out to the darkness.

A flashlight penetrated the dark. The floor above them showed signs of breakage. Whether or not their entrance had been some kind of reaction to the clicking hieroglyph that Flynn found, or just the incessant wear and tear of time and tide, she didn't know.

"Still alive Guardian," came the reply.

Eve let go of the breath she hadn't realised she was holding. He was alive. He was okay. Weird things had started happening. Maybe it was time to tell him.

"Flynn?"

"Yes, my love?"

"These cats the Egyptians fill their stories with: is it bad or good luck if one of them decides to come to you in a lucid dream, then decides to wake you up from a fall in its temple?"

"Umm," hesitated Flynn. "Are we hypothesising about something that might happen, here, or something that will, or something that already has?"

"Why?" Eve asked.

"No reason, no reason," he assured her. "It's good luck if one of the cat goddesses take notice of you in any way, according to Egyptian tradition. Pakhet is associated with hunters, but she's also associated with motherhood, remember. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if she took a liking to you."

"I'm not a mother yet," she reminded him.

"Not in the biological sense, maybe, but to our three back home..."

"I am just coming to terms with the possibility of being old enough to be Ezekiel's mother," she warned him. "Don't you dare rope in Cassandra and Stone!"

"In a purely metaphorical sense..."

"Go find that carving, Librarian," said Eve, glaring sternly. Maybe the dream could wait a while yet.

In answer, Flynn shone the torch to the wall directly behind her. The untouched carvings here were much easier to read than those above, and the panel showed an exact match to the clippings book. The pharaoh and cat were facing each other, and the pharaoh was pointing. Eve dragged herself to her feet and held out a hand to Flynn. He got up with only one minor trip over a fallen piece of rock and swung the torch around to follow the pharaoh's directions. Eve took it from him.

"My turn," she growled. She shone the torch ahead and led the way. Something glittered in it's distant light.

The cavern they were in was small, merely a vague widening of a tunnel. They followed it in the direction the had been going, until they were directly below the inner chamber of the public temple. The room they stood in now was a true reflection of the one above. An alcove faced them, smoother sides fanning out like opened doors into rough hewn rock on either side, just like the one above might once have been. Unlike the alcove a floor above them, the figure carved on the right outer panel was unmistakably the goddess Pakhet. And just as its upper counterpart might once have done, the alcove contained a statue.

It was the statue of a large gold caracal, its eyes and the tips of its long, pointed ears painted black and its bejewelled collar flashing in the light.

"Is this it?" Eve breathed. "Do we take it back to the Library? Do you even know what it is?"

"Yes. Yes," said Flynn, answering each question in turn. "And I would say it is one of four things. First, and most likely, it is an idol to the goddess Pakhet. Second, and also not entirely improbably, it is a sarcophagus, most likely for a cat. Perhaps one that belonged to our formidable female pharaoh. Third, it is just a statue, although the interference of the Library would suggest not. And fourth, it's something entirely different that I haven't thought of yet."

"Nice base covering there, Librarian," replied Eve, her voice dripping sarcasm.

"Just base-ic logic, Guardian," he smirked back.

Eve stuck her tongue out at him. "Will it fit in that bag of yours?"

"Will the two foot tall gold statue of the ancient Egyptian goddess fit in my magical multidimensional bag?" Flynn deadpanned.

"Point taken," she admitted. "Is it safe to just pick it up?"

Flynn paused and read the hieroglyphs surrounding the figure on the panel beside the alcove. He shrugged. "I can't see any indications why not, but I'd wear gloves anyway, just to be on the safe side."

Eve nodded then pulled on the pair of gloves he handed her. She reached up and lifted the statue down. As it moved in the light, the eyes sparkled, reflecting off Eve's own. She placed it reverently into the bag Flynn held open for her. Her fiancé closed the bag, then opened it and took out rope and a grappling hook.

"Time to go home," he smiled up at her. "Let's go find a door."

They had asked the skipper of the boat they had hired to wait on them, so he was their first port of call. Flynn paid him the money he was due, and told him they would be staying in town for a few days and would make their own way back. After that it was easy enough to find a suitable door, call Jenkins and make the link. The realisation that the day they had almost completed in Egypt was only just beginning in Portland was less welcome, but jet lag of the extreme nature was becoming par for the course for all of them. Eve, under Jenkins' careful direction, carried the statue to a sturdy ornate stand, which she was sure hadn't been there before, and placed it facing the aisle she had just walked up.

"How was your trip?" Jenkins asked, watching her carefully as they walked back to the office.

Eve pulled a face. "Educational," she replied coyly. "How's your patient?"

"Ineducable," grimaced the old man. "But it doesn't seem to bother him."

"And the others?" Eve pressed.

"Paris, safe and sound," nodded Jenkins. "Rheims was another dead end, more or less, but they have a new lead that's taken them back there."

"It sounds like the case has them running round in circles!"

"Amiens, Paris, Rheims, Paris," Jenkins shrugged. "I could never see the appeal of the capital, myself. The provincial towns and villages are much more... welcoming."

"They don't tend to have quite so many museums though, do they," laughed Eve.

"That I will grant you, Colonel Baird," said Jenkins. "That I will grant you."

"And the archaeology team you persuaded Ezekiel to obtain?" Baird's voice took on a more businesslike tone and she looked sharply at the old man.

"They still believe they are working for a wealthy modern-day dilettante, namely Flynn, and his secretary, Ezekiel. He has an alias, though, I believe. He has been back for a fleeting visit," Jenkins admitted, much to Colonel Baird's displeasure. "Just while you were away, but not for long and straight back here. They are making good progress and should have the entirety of the barrow excavated within another week. Cataloguing the finds will take longer, of course, but that can be done in their labs at the university. Professor Wilkins seems a capable man and a renowned scholar in ancient Norse culture and mythology. I am certain the artefacts are all in very capable hands."