David Gibbins - The Tiger warrior

A little boy suddenly appeared in the ruins in front of them. “Look,” Costas said. “There’s some of that fair hair you were talking about.” The small head bobbed up and down, coming toward them. He stopped, cocking his head, hearing but not understanding them. He darted into the dust again, then emerged above the loam wall, cautiously peering out. His hair was flaxen, more red than blond. They waved and smiled at him. Jack shaded his eyes, staring into the face. The boy’s eyes were a striking green color, almost olive. And there was something strange about the features, something fleetingly familiar. The boy scrambled over the wall and dropped down in front of them, still standing a few meters back, cautiously. His clothes were rags, and he was barefoot. He seemed suddenly assured, with the confidence of a child. He grinned at them, and held out his hand.

“What do you give a child like that?” Katya murmured.

Costas was still fingering the stone he had picked up earlier. He stopped turning it in his hands, then held it up so the boy could see. A light flashed across Jack’s eyes, and he realized that the stone was reflecting the hazy sunlight that was now breaking through. He glanced at it, and saw that it was a rich orange hue, translucent, like amber. He stared again. Amber. He could see an insect preserved inside, a mosquito. He saw that the stone had a hole in the center. It had evidently once had a cord through it, perhaps been worn as jewelry. It was old, worn. He saw marks on it. It looked like incised decoration, swirling. An animal, a swirling creature. Jack’s heart began to pound. He reached out for it.

It was too late. Costas had not seen him, and tossed it to the boy. He caught it, and held it up, his face rapt with delight. The light shone through the stone. It was amber, there was no doubt about it. It could have come from thousands of miles away. Amber from the Baltic. Jack’s mind was racing. The belongings of a Roman legionary? A legionary who hailed from the Celtic north, from Gaul or Germany, even Britain? He remembered Fabius, tall, ponytailed Fabius, from the tomb carving in the jungle. Could it be? An heirloom, somehow concealed over all those years of captivity? But then this was the Silk Road. All the riches of the world had once come this way. The boy smiled impishly, and held the stone tightly in his fist. He had seen Jack’s hand. He was not giving it up. He stared at Jack with fathomless eyes. Then he was off, scampering away across the ruins. His flaxen hair suddenly seemed perfectly in place here, the color of the mountains, of the dust that rolled through the valley. The color of the Silk Road. But there was something else, something Jack knew with dead certainty. Someone had been here. He took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly. Ave atque salve, frater. He turned to the others. “I wonder whether we’ve just stared into the eyes of a Roman legionary.”

Rebecca held his arm. “Do you think the jewel was here?”

Jack rubbed his chin. “We may just have found it. That boy. The legacy.”

“She means the real jewel, Jack,” Costas said.

“Maybe that’s best left just beyond the horizon,” Jack murmured.

“Yeah, right. Don’t tell me you didn’t want to find it. Don’t tell me you didn’t want to put those two jewels together, and see what would happen.”

“I don’t know.” Jack narrowed his eyes. “I really don’t know.”

“It would have been fun to try though, wouldn’t it?” Costas said. “Just once, I mean. To see what it was like. Immortality. Then we could have put the jewels in the IMU museum at Carthage, on opposite sides of the room. Close enough for a warm fuzzy feeling. People would come out of the museum feeling extra good. And make donations.”

Jack looked at Rebecca, and jerked his head toward Costas. “That’s what I mean. He brings things down to earth. With a crash.”

Costas grinned. “I have got a lab though, and I can check out the properties of peridot and lapis lazuli. Pradesh talked about trying it. There may be something in it. Not immortality, you know, but something more than a trick of the light, a prismatic effect. Some channeling of energy. Some refractive quality.”

Some refractive quality. Jack looked up toward the sun, shutting his eyes against it. The last few days had been a series of refractions, between past and present, between the world of a century ago and two millennia before that, between lives that seemed to run on parallel trajectories. For a moment he felt as if they were the same, Licinius the Roman legionary, John Howard his ancestor, himself, that they were fueled by the same yearning. Maybe the jewel did that, the idea of immortality, allowed those drawn by it to tap into a trackway far above the ephemeral. He took a deep breath, and put his arm around Rebecca. “I think mortality will do me for a while.”

Costas looked down at his crumpled shirt, and picked at it despondently. He eyed Jack. “Immortality might give us time to get to Hawaii.”

Jack got to his feet. “Point taken.”

“Now I know what Costas means,” Rebecca said.

“About what?”

“About diversions. He said your expeditions always end up being diversions. You never know where they’re going to take you. He says that’s what keeps him on his toes. This was one, wasn’t it?”

Jack took a deep breath, and stared into the ruins. He reached into his bag, then remembered he no longer had the little lapis lazuli elephant. He remembered where they had been, and wondered how he had changed. He gave Rebecca a tired smile. “A bit more than a diversion, I fancy.”

Costas looked at Jack expectantly. “So where do we go from here?”

“Got any ideas?”

“I thought we might go in search of the Isles of the Immortals. You know, that place Katya told us about. The First Emperor sent out expeditions to find them. Somewhere in the eastern ocean. In the center of the Pacific, to be exact. A small but delightful chain of volcanic islands.”

“Aloha,” Rebecca said.

“Aloha,” Costas replied. He made a whirling motion with his fingers, and pointed at the helicopter. Jack scratched his chin, looking at Costas’ sun-beaten face. “You know, you look as if you could do with a few days on a beach.”

“Damn right I could.”

“But Rebecca wants to go to the jungle. To the shrine.”

Costas got up and stretched. “It can wait. Anyway, there’s probably not much more to see. When we were there, I felt a hole in the base of the tomb. I remembered you showing me stone coffins in Rome, with the drainage hole to let the decomposition products flow out. If Licinius was in that tomb, there’s probably not much left there now.”

Jack stared at Costas. “A hole, you say.”

Costas put up his hand, and curled his fingers around. “About this big.”

Jack’s mind was racing. “Big enough to shove a bamboo tube through?”

“I guess so. A small one.”

Jack had remembered something. A possibility that Rebecca had mentioned. She looked at him now, reading his mind. “Robert Wauchope,” she murmured. “The velpu?”

Could it be? Could he have made it back there? Jack’s heart was suddenly pounding. He felt the familiar thrill of excitement. He slung his old khaki bag on his shoulder.

“Oh no.” Costas shook his head defiantly. “No way. I know that look.”

“We’ve got to get back to Seaquest II anyway. She’s in the Bay of Bengal. It would just be a diversion.”

Costas looked despairingly at Rebecca. “See what I mean?”

Rebecca put her arm around Jack. “Don’t worry, Dad. He’ll follow you anywhere.”

Jack looked questioningly at Costas. “Well?”

“You really think we might find it?”

“No promises.”