Chapter 15 #3
Celia let out a laugh. “The Order has been trying to break into this pyramid for centuries! And you believe we can do it in one afternoon?”
Biz shrugged again, her eyes glinting against the pyramid’s golden point. “I believe in Ezra.”
Brightness limned Ezra’s heart. There was a sharp feeling too—did he deserve this? Did she? What was waiting for them, past the whitewashed stones?
“Hear, hear! First, though, we should have a proper breakfast. Can’t get anything useful done without caffeine and carbohydrates.
” Vincent placed a blanket over the sand and began digging through the picnic basket, setting out more croissants, hard-boiled eggs, and a flask of English breakfast tea.
There was aish baladi too, Ezra noted with appreciation.
Though he hadn’t had a bite of the bread in years, it instantly transported him back to mornings with his mother as he chewed.
Celia scowled as she tried peeling an egg. “I believe in Ezra too, but unclouded optimism isn’t going to do us any favors. Especially when we’re trying to break into a cursed pyramid.”
“Looks like you can’t even manage that egg,” Vincent quipped. “Would you like help?”
The young woman’s scowl grew deeper. She flicked a fragment of eggshell onto Vincent’s safari suit.
“Please, you two! Let’s focus on the bigger picture!
” Biz plopped down on the blanket, blond hair feathering her cheeks as she squinted up at the pyramid.
Her expression reminded Ezra of all the times they’d set to solving the clues Lord Blackwood left them.
Granted, those had been more straightforward.
“He who seeks the treasure must walk through night to the special pyramid. Perhaps we have to come back during nighttime? Maybe there’s something on the stones we can only see under the moonlight. ”
Ezra shook his head. It wasn’t a bad guess, but they couldn’t afford to sit around for one more day. Already, the sight of distant strings of tourists’ camels was making his heart race. One of the groups would turn toward them, eventually.
“That translation isn’t entirely correct,” he told them.
“No?” Vincent’s brow puckered. “Damn. My Ancient Egyptian is getting rusty.”
Celia smirked and flicked another eggshell at his outfit.
“Mine too.” Biz brushed her hair from her face and looked back in Ezra’s direction. “So what do the hieroglyphs actually say?”
The scroll was tucked into a pocket in his utility belt.
He pulled the parchment out and unrolled it—careful not to get the fragile paper anywhere near the cups of tea Vincent was pouring.
“Night would be a circle with a star inside.” Like the symbol on Rose’s cursed necklace.
“What’s been drawn on this papyrus is a series of stars.
” He held the sketch up for the rest of the group.
“So the one who seeks the treasure must walk through stars.”
Vincent shrugged. “It’s practically the same thing.”
“Three stars…” Biz leaned forward to study the scroll. “Could that mean Orion’s Belt? Perhaps we should search for the entrance where the pyramid aligns with that constellation. Was anyone paying attention to the sky last night?”
“It’s not Orion’s Belt here,” supplied Ezra. “In Egypt it’s Sah’s Crown.”
“Who is Sah?” Celia had long given up on her egg, tossing it into the sand in frustration. Some jackal was going to be very, very lucky.
“Oh! I know!” Vincent straightened. “He’s the celestial counterpart of Osiris. The two are related… I don’t remember exactly how.”
“Osiris is the god who was torn to pieces by his brother, right? Then resurrected by Isis.” Biz’s green eyes met Ezra’s over the scroll. “Papa loved that myth.” A small frown tightened her mouth. “Is it a myth, though? You don’t suppose that really happened, do you?”
The question was too big to answer on a picnic blanket. Really, it could have been the subject of an entire other dissertation. Myth, he remembered preaching to Rose, is how our ancestors explained the natural wonders around them.
But how could Ezra explain this?
An entire other pyramid gleaming in the early-morning light. What had it been built for? What lay within?
And how the hell were they going to reach it before Hugo did?
“Magic was more miraculous back then,” Celia said. “That’s what my father used to say. I don’t think everything happened word for word—but the stories had to spring from somewhere. There were probably Sancts in ancient Egypt who figured out how to reverse death. Somehow.”
Again, the magnitude of the thought washed over Ezra.
He stood, accidentally knocking over the cup of tea Vincent had poured him.
“I think Biz is onto something. We should start searching for the entrance where Sah’s Crown lines up with the pyramid.
” That would be the south-facing side, if memory served.
It would have to serve, he realized. The constellation didn’t appear in Egypt at this time of year, which meant that if they needed actual starlight to reveal the entrance or open the door, they were out of luck.
“Right.” Celia stood as well, brushing eggshells and sand from her culottes. “Best get on with it.”