David Sakmyster
The Pharos Objective
For Amy
Acknowledgments
This is the part of the book that I like to think of as the author’s Oscar acceptance speech. It’s our chance (and obligation) to thank everyone who’s ever touched our careers, nurtured our souls, flexed our literary muscles and given us hope that our Olympian-sized dreams might actually have a chance of coming true someday.
And since for more than one reason I can’t go all Jack Palance on you and do a set of one-armed push-ups, I’ll follow the typical tradition and give well-earned thanks to a bevy of folks without whom I’d still be lost in a mountain of rewrites and half-finished dreams:
To Tim Schulte and the Variance team for seeing the potential in my little slush pile submission, and to Shane Thomson for helping improve the work and creating such an excellent final product. To my agent, Hannah Brown-Gordon, for taking a chance on me and jump-starting my career.
To Tim Powers, KD Wentworth and all the classy people at The Writers of the Future organization for all the wisdom they impart. And to Nancy Kress and my hometown writing group heroes at Writers&Books for their endless encouragement.
To my parents, for their unfailing support, advice and inspiration (and all those early-morning emails that begin with, “Here’s a story idea…”). And of course to my wife — my eternal muse and most-appreciated critic. You’re all indispensible.
And finally, a shout-out to the dedicated people at the Sodus Bay Historical Society who run and maintain the Lighthouse Museum at Sodus Point. Thanks for the history lessons, the technical explanations and for patiently answering a myriad of research questions. If one warm summer day you find yourself up that way, grab a delectable cheeseburger at Zoot’s, eat at the picturesque bayfront park, then walk off the calories with a climb to the top of the lighthouse and enjoy the view.
Okay, okay, I hear the orchestra cueing up. Time for me to shut up, exit stage left and let the show begin.
Morpheus (Greek: Μορφέας, Μορφεύς, “he who forms, shapes, moulds”). The Greek god of dreams, Morpheus is the son of Hypnos, the god of sleep, and Pasithea, the goddess of hallucination, her name meaning “acquired sight.”
PROLOGUE
One hundred sleek Arabian horses and their dark riders, carrying torches and armed with hammers, pikes and rusty axes, thundered across the wave-battered promontory toward the lighthouse. The riders roared past Dakhil, who stood upon the crumbling red granite stairs between two colossal statues with missing limbs and fractured torsos. In the shadow of the towering Pharos Lighthouse, Dakhil imagined that the sun had been anchored permanently behind the massive structure, unable to escape its dominion.
He trembled as the riders headed straight into the arched doorway — the toothless, yawning mouth of the Pharos — and he shivered as the Mediterranean winds tugged at his black robes and snatched at his turban. The ancient lighthouse stood in silent indifference, and by a trick of light and shadow it appeared to be expanding, calmly breathing in the Muslim riders, inhaling men and horses alike.
“I hope you have been true to me,” said a voice at his shoulder. Dakhil turned to face Barraq Najdeelen, caliph of Alexandria and commander of the military forces occupying the city.
Alexandria had fallen to the Muslims two hundred years earlier with little resistance from the Christians. Once the jewel of the Roman-Egyptian era, an unparalleled center of wealth and knowledge, the gods had all but abandoned Alexandria; and now the once-proud cosmopolitan city was a mere strategic port, valued only for its access to the rich interior trade routes. And of course, for its military potential. This harbor, well-protected by jagged reefs and low-lying shoals, had seen fleet after fleet sail against Constantinople while enjoying the defense of the marvelous Pharos Lighthouse.
Barraq knew his enemy would eventually seek to recapture the city. “The infidel King Michael despises the Pharos. It is a sign of our strength and a looming reminder of Christian impotence.” He breathed in the sea air, and his long, oily beard whipped over his shoulder.
“I have spoken only the truth,” Dakhil said, nervously taking a step back. High above, the great mirror, a twenty-foot disc of reflective metal, scratched and clouded with age, winked at him, threatening to expose his lies.
Barraq tilted his head back. “You have been in Constantinople two years, my friend. Perhaps they found you out as my spy, and in exchange for your life you offered to come back here with malicious rumors?”
“No, My Lord. I am ever your loyal servant.”
“We shall see.” Barraq let his fingers drop to his belt and carefully trace the hilt of his scimitar. “This treasure — you do not have further specifics?”
“My Lord?” Dakhil trembled again, and wished he could step out of the shadow of the lighthouse. All the way up its precipitous walls, the crumbling statues of the ancient gods of Egypt, Greece and Rome pointed accusingly at him while the tower itself appeared to lean over for a closer look.
“What is it exactly? The men speak of Alexander the Great’s lost hoard. Is it gold and silver? Jewels beyond compare…?”
“More valuable still,” Dakhil said, and again offered a prayer to all the gods that were ever dreamed up by men, hoping the legends were true. The timing for this had to be perfect. He had inherited certain knowledge, information that was beyond the understanding of popes, kings or caliphs. Information, he had been told, that must remain hidden until directed otherwise.
But Dakhil was not one for patience. The title of Keeper did not suit him. Life was short, and who knew if the world would continue to exist after his own breath expired? So he had decided to release just a hint of what he knew, disguised as a rumor from the enemy’s camp, hoping to excite the caliph’s men to do what he himself could not. Brute force would surely succeed where patience had failed.
“What could be more valuable?” Barraq asked. Suspicion flashed in his eyes.
Just then, a muffled cry reached their ears from above. A shout, then a horrifying scream. Barraq and Dakhil looked up and shrank back, although they were in no danger. The huge mirror had been wrenched free of its mounts in the zeal of the treasure-seekers and rolled out one of the porticos and over the edge hundreds of feet up. It took two men with it, rotating end over end as it plummeted from the top spire and slammed onto a ledge, crushing one man and dislodging a hail of stone and debris before it bounced off and plunged another two hundred feet. Finally, upon the limestone blocks of the courtyard, it shattered in an eruption of glass and metal, releasing a tortured cry — a lament for the end of its twelve-hundred-year existence.
Dakhil cursed. “Why did they go up? That was not the way. The secret tunnels… the chambers are below the foundation!”
Barraq waved away his protests. “I instructed my men to be thorough.”
“Fools,” Dakhil whispered. He now began to fear that the caliph’s men were not up to the task.
Barraq withdrew a stick of dried wheat from his saddlebag and chewed its tip. “Tell me, Dakhil, what reward would you ask if we find this treasure?”
Still ruing the loss of such a mighty artifact, the great mirror that had reflected the sights of a millennium, Dakhil said, “I would ask, My Lord, for but one item.”
“One only?”
“Yes, if I may have first pick. A little thing, of no use to anyone.”
Barraq studied him. “If no one else has use for it, why would you?”