Excerpt:
It had all started as an exercise to fight the unending
boredom of being locked in this Alexandrian prison cell.
When Jess Brightwell woke up, he realized that he’d lost
track of time. Days blurred here, and he knew it was important to remember how
long he’d been trapped, waiting for the axe to fall—or not. So he diligently
scratched out a record on the wall using a button from his shirt.
Five days. Five days since he’d arrived back in Alexandria,
bringing with him Scholar Wolfe and Morgan Hault as his prisoners. They’d been
taken off in different directions, and he’d been dumped here to—as they’d
said—await the Archivist’s pleasure.
The Archivist, it seemed, was a very busy man.
Once Jess had the days logged, he did the mental exercise
of calculating the date, from pure boredom. It took him long, uneasy moments to
realize why that date—today—seemed important.
And then he remembered and was ashamed it had taken him so
long.
Today was the anniversary of his brother Liam’s death. His elder
brother.
And today meant that Jess was now older than Liam had ever
lived to be.
He couldn’t remember exactly how
Liam had died. Could hardly remember his brother at all these days, other than
a vague impression of a sharp nose and shaggy blondish hair. He must have
watched Liam walk up the stairs of the scaffold and stand as the rope was fixed
around his neck.
But he couldn’t remember that, or watching the drop. Just
Liam, hanging. It seemed like a painting viewed at a distance, not a memory.
Wish I could remember, he thought.
If Liam had held his head high on the way to his death, if he’d gone up the
steps firmly and stood without fear, then maybe Jess would be able to do it,
too. Because that was likely to be in his future.
He closed his eyes and tried to picture it: the cell door
opening. Soldiers in High Garda uniforms, the army of the Great Library,
waiting stone-faced in the hall. A Scholar to read the text of his choice to
him on the way to execution. Perhaps a priest, if he asked for one.
But there, his mind went blank. He didn’t know how the
Archivist would end his life. Would it be a quiet death? Private? A shot in the
back? Burial without a marker? Maybe nobody would ever know what had become of
him.
Or maybe he’d end up facing the noose after all, and the
steps up to it. If he could picture himself walking without flinching to his
execution, perhaps he could actually do it.
He knew he ought to be focusing on what he would be saying
to the Archivist if he was called, but at this moment, death seemed so close he
could touch it, and besides, it was easier to accept failure than to dare to
predict success. He’d never been especially superstitious, but imagining
triumph now seemed like drawing a target on his back. No reason to offend the
Egyptian gods. Not so early.
He stood up and walked the cell. Cold, barren, with bars
and a flat stone shelf that pretended at being a bed. A bare toilet that needed
cleaning, and the sharp smell of it was starting to squirm against his skin.
If I had something to read . . .
The thought crept in without warning, and he felt it like a personal
loss. Not having a book at hand was a worse punishment than most. He was trying
not to think about his death, and he was too afraid to think about the fate of
Morgan or Scholar Wolfe or anything else . . . except that he
could almost hear Scholar Wolfe’s dry, acerbic voice telling him, If only you had a brain up to the task, Brightwell, you’d never lack
for something to read.
Jess settled on the stone ledge, closed his eyes, and tried
to clearly imagine the first page of one of his favorite books. Nothing came at
his command. Just words, jumbled and frantic, that wouldn’t sort themselves in
order. Better if he imagined writing a letter.
Dear Morgan, he thought. I’m trapped in a holding cell inside the Serapeum, and all I can
think of is that I should have done better by you, and all of us. I’m afraid
all this is for nothing. And I’m sorry. I’m sorry for being stupid enough to
think I could outwit the Archivist. I love you. Please don’t hate me.
That was selfish. She should hate him. He’d sent her back
into the Iron Tower, a life sentence of servitude and an unbreakable collar
fastened tight around her neck. He’d deceived Scholar Wolfe into a prison far
worse than this one, and an inevitable death sentence. He’d betrayed everyone
who’d ever trusted him, and for what?
For cleverness and a probably foolish idea that he could
somehow, somehow, pull off a miracle. What gave him the
right to even think it?
Clank.
That was the sound of a key turning in a heavy lock.
Jess stood, the chill on his back left by the ledge still
lingering like a ghost, and then he came to the bars as the door at the end of
the hall opened. He could see the hinges move and the iron door swinging in. It
wasn’t locked again when it closed. Careless.
He listened to the decisive thud of footsteps against the
floor, growing louder, and then three High Garda soldiers in black with golden
emblems were in front of his cell. They stopped and faced him. The oldest—his
close-cut hair a stiff silver brush around his head—barked in common Greek, “Step
back from the bars and turn around.”
Jess’s skin felt flushed, then cold; he swallowed back a
rush of fear and felt his pulse race in a futile attempt to outrun the
inevitable. He followed the instructions. They didn’t lock the
outer door. That’s a chance, if I can get by them. He could. He could sweep
the legs out from under the first, use that off-balance body to knock back the
other two, pull a sidearm free from one of them, shoot at least one, maybe two
of them. Luck would dictate whether he’d die in the attempt, but at least he’d
die fighting.
I don’t want to die, something in
him that sounded like a child whispered. Not like Liam. Not on
the same day.
And suddenly, he remembered.
The London sky, iron gray. Light rain had been falling on
his child’s face. He’d been too short to see his brother ascend anything but
the top two steps of the scaffold. Liam had stumbled on the last one, and a
guard had steadied him. His brother had been shivering and slow, and he hadn’t
been brave after all. He’d looked out into the crowd of those gathered, and
Jess remembered the searing second of eye contact with his brother before Liam
transferred that stare to their father.
Jess had looked, too. Callum Brightwell had stared back
without a flicker of change in his expression, as if his eldest son was a
stranger.
They’d tied Liam’s hands. And put a hood over his head.
A voice in the here and now snapped him out of the memory. “Against
the wall. Hands behind your back.”
Jess slowly moved to comply, trying to assess where the
other man was . . . and froze when the barrel of a gun pressed
against the back of his neck. “I know what you’re thinking, son. Don’t try it.
I’d rather not shoot you for stupidity.”
The guard had a familiar accent—raised near Manchester,
most likely. His time in Alexandria had covered his English roots a bit, but it
was odd, Jess thought, that he might be killed by one of his countrymen, so far
from home. Killed by the English, just like Liam.
Once a set of Library restraints settled around his wrists
and tightened, he felt strangely less shaken. Opportunity was gone now. All his
choices had been narrowed to one course. All he had to do now was play it out.
Jess turned to look at the High Garda soldier. A man with
roots from another garden, maybe one closer to Alexandria; the man had a darker
complexion, dark eyes, a neat beard, and a compassionate but firm expression on
his face. “Am I coming back?” he asked, and wished he hadn’t.
“Likely not,” the soldier said. “Wherever you go next, you
won’t be back here.”
Jess nodded. He closed his eyes for a second and then
opened them. Liam had faltered on the stairs. Had trembled. But at the end his
elder brother had stood firm in his bonds and hood and waited for death without
showing any fear.
He could do the same.
“Then, let’s go,” he said, and forced a grin he hoped
looked careless. “I could do with a change of scenery.”
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