The linguistic connection between the keystone and Eldh was a new piece of the puzzle. Only it didn’t make the picture any clearer. The arch was a gate–a gate created by sorcerers. But why had they fashioned it? How had it ended up buried on Crete while the keystone came to rest at the site of Greenfellow’s Tavern? And who were the Sleeping Ones, and what was their blood the key to?
Deirdre stared at the documents and photos until her head ached, but all she came up with were more questions. By the time Anders returned that afternoon, she was staring at the wall like a zombie.
“Afternoon, partner,” Anders said, shrugging off his suit coat.
She didn’t answer.
“What’s the matter, mate? Cat got your tongue?”
“More like my brain,” she croaked. She took a deep breath, trying to clear her mind. Coffee. She needed coffee. Her eyes strayed toward the percolator.
“I’m on it,” Anders said before she could speak the word, grabbing the empty coffeepot.
Twenty minutes later she sat at the timeworn mahogany table that dominated the center of their office. Deirdre gripped her second mug of coffee and enjoyed the pleasant tingle as caffeine permeated her brain.
“So did you get them?” she asked Anders.
“Did he get what?” Beltan said from the doorway.
Deirdre glanced up and smiled. By his much improved appearance, the blond man had gotten a shower as well as some rest. His green eyes were clear, though his face was still grim.
Anders set another mug on the table, as well as a plate of shortbread cookies. Beltan took several of the cookies, crammed them in his mouth, and chased them down with a long swig of the scalding coffee.
“So what were you supposed to get?” he said, eyeing Anders.
“Photographs of the arch.” Anders had rolled up his shirtsleeves and had loosened his tie, which was as close to casual as Deirdre had ever seen him. “It turned out it wasn’t too hard. I’ve got a source at one of the satellite television companies. He dubbed a copy of the archaeology program to tape for me. I saved some stills from the tape, but they were a bit on the grainy side, so I took them down to the lab for computer enhancement. The techs said they’d have them done by–wait a minute. Here’s Eustace now.”
A speck of a man appeared in the doorway. Even sitting, Deirdre was nearly as tall as he. His thick shock of brown hair stood straight up–an effort to win him another inch, perhaps– and he wore wire‑rimmed glasses as well as an eager expression.
Eustace bounded into the office, holding a large manila envelope, and his blue eyes went wide behind his glasses. “Is that really him? The otherworldly traveler?” The apprentice didn’t wait for an answer. Instead, he approached Beltan, who towered above him. “I can’t believe this is happening. I’m having my first Class One Encounter, and I’ve only been a Seeker for six months.” He thrust out a hand. “I’m terribly honored to meet you, sir. Is there something you can tell me–some bit of knowledge from another world you can impart?”
Beltan squinted down at the young Seeker. “The cookies are not for you.”
Deirdre could see Eustace silently repeating the words to himself, as if trying to fathom the wisdom they contained. And there waswisdom in them, because if given cause, Beltan might scoop the small Seeker up and crumple him into a ball like so much aluminum foil.
Luckily, Eustace appeared uninterested in the cookies. He kept gaping at Beltan with a look of awe.
Anders cleared his throat. “So what do you have for us, Eustace?”
The young man snapped back to his senses. “The techs in the lab told me to bring this to you right away.” He handed the envelope to Anders. “So what’s in it?”
Anders grinned. “None of your business. At least not until you’ve got Echelon 3 clearance. Which you’ll never get if you don’t keep at that research Nakamura assigned you. So scurry along now.”
Eustace cast one last glance at Beltan, then hurried from the room, shutting the door behind him.
“Let’s see those photos,” Deirdre said.
The lab had done a good job. Though still a bit grainy, most of the symbols were clear, incised into the stones of the arch with sharp, angular lines. When she was finished examining the photographs, she slipped them back into the envelope.
“So what are you going to do with those?” Anders asked.
She sealed the envelope with wax. “I’m going to send them to Paul Jacoby over in linguistics. He was able to translate the passage in Linear A on the clay tablet, and I know he’s been comparing it to the passage written in the language of the Scirathi. I’m going to see if he has enough information to decipher any of these symbols.”
Anders cleared his throat. “And you think we can trust him?”
“I don’t think we have a choice. We have to learn everything we can about the arch if we’re going to have any chance of using it.” She sighed. “That’s assuming, of course, that we ever find it. I don’t know how we’re going to manage that one.”
Beltan frowned at her. “Isn’t it obvious?”
“Not particularly.” She glanced at Anders.
“Don’t look at me, mate. I’m beginning to think I’m not the one with the brains here, after all.”
“You don’t have to be smart to think like a thief,” Beltan said, pacing lionlike alongside the table. “The Scirathi must want the arch for something important. Why else would they go to all the trouble of stealing it? However, it’s worthless to them if they don’t have the keystone. That means at some point they will have to come for it.”
“But the Scirathi can’t know the keystone is here,” Deirdre said, trying to follow his logic.
“They could be made to know.”
Anders let out a low whistle. “So you want to set a trap for them, to lure them with the keystone and nab them.”
“No,” Beltan said, his voice hard, “I want to let them capture the keystone. Once they have it, they will surely go to where the arch is located. All we have to do is follow them.”
“You make it sound easy.”
“I did not say it would be easy,” Beltan growled. “I imagine it will be anything but. Yet it is our only chance of getting to the arch.”
Anders looked queasy. “I suppose it is. All the same, I can’t imagine the Philosophers will let us take a priceless artifact from their collection and dangle it out there like a piece of bait.”
“They will, if you convince them to.”
“I don’t know, mate. . . .”
Beltan leaned on the table, green light flickering in his eyes. “You promised to help me.”
Deirdre knew she had to intervene before this came to blows. “It’s a good plan,” she said, standing up and touching Beltan’s shoulder. She felt the big man relax. “But we still need to learn what we can about the arch before we do this. If we’re going to follow the sorcerers back to where they’ve hidden the arch, then we have to be ready to act when we get there. We won’t get a second chance.”
Beltan grunted; he couldn’t disagree with that.
Anders gave her a grateful look. “There’s one thing about all this that doesn’t make sense. The Scirathi already had a gate, and they used it to kidnap Nim. So what do they need the arch for?”
Deirdre chewed her lip. She couldn’t answer that one. “The only ones who know the answer to that question are the Scirathi themselves.”
“Then why not ask one?” Beltan said.
Anders scowled at him. “This is no time for jokes, mate.”