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Marius released his tight hold on her but didn’t completely let go. He glanced at Rumy. “Sorry, just having a moment.”
“Yeah. I can see that. But you’re still not into her, right?”
Marius glared at him, then said, “Can’t let you share with Shayna.”
Rumy’s grin broadened. “Didn’t think you could. Besides, I’m sure Shayna really didn’t understand what she was asking.”
“I’m getting the picture now. It’s a vampire thing having to do with the blood-chains.”
“Exactly,” both men said at once.
Shayna addressed Rumy. “Well, can you put the images into Marius’s head? Then he can share them with me.”
For a moment, Rumy looked dumbstruck. “Are you saying this is normal stuff between the pair of you, this kind of sharing?”
Marius responded succinctly. “Shayna gets visions.”
“I know that, but then she can put them inside your head?”
Marius nodded.
“You know that’s fucking Ancestral power, right? I mean, the average vampire can’t do that, but an Ancestral can. Marius, have you taken the leap?”
“Not that I know of.”
Rumy wagged a finger between them. “But you don’t have the proximity issue, either.”
Shayna shook her head. “And flight’s a piece of cake now as well.”
“Huh.” Rumy frowned heavily, then added with a clap of his hands, “Well, okay. Marius, let me give it a shot.”
Shayna watched him close his eyes. A few seconds later Marius said, “Got it.”
Turning toward her, Marius smiled. “The image is really clear. Ready?”
“Sure.” And there it was, a picture, clearer than a photo, of Daniel in Rumy’s office, the room that was now destroyed, and smiling in that horrible way of his. He wore a snug shirt with the silver hawk emblem and above it the symbols, six altogether with the first symbol repeated two times.
She blinked and stared at Marius. “I’ll bet the first word is the ancient version of either ‘the’ or ‘one,’ and I’m feeling a need to get back to the Pharaoh system. I have some studying to do. But my guess is that Daniel has a plan and that he’s been working on it a long time. And if he’s made use of your ancient language, then my guess is that I’ll be able to find an English translation somewhere, if I keep hunting through your Internet. And Marius, I’m going with my gut here, but I think he’s been building something big and that despite our destruction of the extinction weapon, he won’t be needing a weapon to bring his ambitions to life.”
“Fuck.” Marius drew close. “Then we’d better get you back to Egypt.”
* * *
While Shayna dove back into her work, Marius paced the adjacent library. With each pass, he caught sight of her. She was on the computer, one that had access to his world’s private Internet. She tapped away, her shoulders tense as she worked, her mind completely focused.
The tablets that she’d been examining were arrayed in precise order on the table at a right angle to her computer, but her own papers and notes lay scattered in front of her. He got her: She needed some chaos so that her mind could remain fluid.
Unfortunately, the more he walked, the more distressed he became. The revelations from the refugee camp had set his mind down a new path, and Shayna had posed the right question: What if Daniel was up to something that didn’t involve either his sex-slavery operation or the extinction weapon?
“Marius, come here.”
The tension in Shayna’s voice put him in motion and he joined her at her work desk.
She glanced up at him. “I found this obscure site after going through about three hundred search pages. One of your French scholars has translated some of the ancient language and I was right about the first word. According to his partial working dictionary and subsequent English translation, the repeated word stands for ‘one’ as in ‘only’ or ‘exclusively.’ Maybe Daniel knew this or has had his own people on the translation himself, but his choices can’t be either accidental or decorative.” She put her finger on the screen. “This is what I have.”
As Marius read Shayna’s translation, his heart thudded in his chest. “‘One Earth, One Race, One Ruler.’” He felt as though every concern he’d ever had about his world coalesced in this moment. “You’re sure? You’re absolutely sure?”
She nodded, a deep frown between her brows. “He’s talking about both our civilizations, isn’t he? The human race and your world.”
