I thought he smiled again, but it was there and gone so fast I could have imagined it.
“Everything.” He placed the photo back in its spot, moved a pile of books from the other chair, and sat. The wood groaned. I eyed it speculatively. I thought it would hold him. He shifted and something snapped.Hmm. Maybe not.
“Start at the beginning.”
Irritation at his superior tone sliced through me. “I don’t have time for ‘everything.’ ” In fact, I wanted to get to the Bodleian to review a tenth-century description of Zeus on the Lighthouse at Alexandria—one of the seven wonders of the world.
He crossed his arms. I bet he didn’t hear ‘no’ very often.
We glared at each other until finally, he sighed. “Do you think more people are looking for the rest of the artifact you found?”
The chair creaked as he shifted again. There was no reason to answer him, but there also wasn’t reason not to. It was actually pretty obvious.
“Yes.” I’d barely gotten that pottery shard to the university in Istanbul before a herd of archaeologists and historians descended on my dig site. The thought made my stomach clench.It wasn’t my spot. I didn’t own it.
In my head, I sounded like a toddler, pissed at having to share her toys.
“But they didn’t find anything there, which is why you’ve come here.”
This conversation was going around and around. “Who are you?” I asked.
“Is it in England?”
I threw my hands in the air. “We’re getting nowhere.”
His lip lifted again as he smiled. “Does that little piece of pottery have you believing gods are real?”
I swallowed. That kind of statement… that got an academic labeled a nut job. It finally became clear to me, what he was, and why he was bothering me. “You’re a journalist.”
“Nope.” He placed his elbows on his knees and eased forward. “That’s what you think, though. It’s what everyone thinks, even if they’re not saying it. It’s like going to Mt. Ararat and finding a perfectly preserved boat that says,Noah’s Ark. Made by Noah.And then you radiocarbon date it and it’s from the dawn of man.”
I shook my head. “No. What you have is a boat. An old boat.” It sounded false because I was lying. The thought crossed my mind a million times. Did that shard prove the divine had a hand in our history? “As mind blowing as that would be, it’s more likely the tools I have to date this aren’t precise enough. Someday, long after we’re gone, someone will invent a machine that will tell us what we don’t know. That’s a more reasonable explanation.”
“But much more boring.” His tone was almost friendly.Almost.“You have a once in a lifetime discovery, Leo.” He smiled when I squeaked at his familiarity. “Once in a lifetime. So that piece? That’s all you’ll ever find.”
In those dark hours at night, when I poured over books all alone in the Bodleian, I said the same thing to myself. It was different hearing it from this stranger, though. He’d drawn back an arrow and when he released it, it went right into my heart.
“You should go.”
He stood, towering over me. There was a brief flash of emotion on his face. Regret? Guilt? Stuffing his hands in his pockets again, he stared at me. “Thank you for meeting with me. I look forward to your next lecture.”
Without waiting for me to answer, he turned to leave.
Pollux
Apit of dread grew and grew inside me. It yawned, black and gaping.
What I’d expected, what I’d been waiting for, was suddenly real. It wasn’t an event out in space. Here it was.
Warm brown eyes, full of confidence, held mine. Respect for this small mortal woman warred with my anger and panic.
Shewouldfind the pieces of the seal. I’d believed her when she’d said that.
And the thought terrified me.
Dr. Ophidia hadn’t backed down when I’d challenged her. She’d merely studied me. I was used to the attention. My size generally drew focus to me, but for some reason, my skin had heated at every spot her gaze had landed on.
The reasons I’d come here today had nothing to do with this firecracker of a woman whose face had stared out from the exhibit at the British Museum.