The Rosetta Key

I ignored him, twisted the cylinder open, and unrolled part of the scroll. Once again I was struck by how alien the characters appeared.

She held the book with both hands, bewildered, but reluctant to give it back. “Where was it?”

“Deep in a Templar tomb. I gambled there was a twist to their clues, and they required seekers to use pyramid mathematics to prove their knowledge.”

“This will change the world, Ethan.”

“For good, I hope. Things can’t get much worse, from my perspective.”

“Guv’nor!” Ned’s shout broke us from our mutual trance. He had his hand to his ear, pointing. It was the echo of a gunshot.

I grabbed the book from her, twisted the cylinder shut, thrust it back in my shirt, and ran to where the sailor was looking. Sunlight was beginning to flood down the face of the temple, turning the cliff and carvings a brilliant rose. But Ned was pointing back the way we had come, toward Silano’s camp. A mirror was winking as it tilted.

“They’re signaling somebody.” He pointed to the sandstone plateau the entry canyon cut in two. “Some devil on top there, ready to roll a rock.”

“Silano’s men are coming, effendi!”

“So we have to get those tethered horses away from the Arabs at the entrance. Are you up to it, hearties?” It seemed the sort of rallying cry Nelson or Smith might use.

“Home to England!” Ned shouted.

So we ran, swallowed in an instant by the tight entry canyon and absolutely blinded by its many curves. Our footsteps echoed as we charged uphill. Ned’s arms pumped with his club. Astiza’s hair flew out behind her.

t h e

r o s e t t a k e y

2 3 3

There were shouts far above, and then bangs. We glanced up. A rock the size of a powder keg was ricocheting between the narrow walls as it came down, pieces flying off like grapeshot.

“Faster!” We sprinted, getting beyond the missile before it hit the canyon floor with a crash. Arabic was being shouted on the rim above.

On we jogged. Now there was a roar, and a flash of light. The bastards had rigged the whole canyon! Silano must have guessed we might outfox him and that he’d want to block our escape. An avalanche or rock blasted out by gunpowder sluiced down, and this time I pulled my companions back, all of us ducking under an overhang.

The avalanche thundered down, shaking the canyon floor, and then we were running again through its concealing cloud of dust, clambering over the rubble.

Bullets whined, to no effect since we were invisible.

“Hurry! Before they set off another charge!” There was another explosion, and another deluge of rock, but this time it came down behind us where it would slow the pursuing Silano. We were more than halfway through this snake hole, I judged, and if all the Arabs were on top setting off gunpowder, there wouldn’t be any left to guard the horses. Once mounted, we’d stampede the remainder and . . .

Panting, we rounded another bend in the canyon and saw our way blocked by a wagon. It was a caged contraption of the type I’d seen to transport slaves, and I guessed it was the one we’d seen shrouded near camp that the horses had shied from. There was a lone Arab by it, sighting at us with a musket.

“I’ll handle this,” Ned growled, hefting his club.

“Ned, don’t give him an easy shot!”

Yet even as the sailor charged, there was a whistle in the air and a stone flicked by our ears with nearly the speed of a bullet, striking the Arab in the forehead just as he fired. The musket went off but the ball went wide. I looked back. Mohammad had removed his turban and used its cloth as a makeshift sling. “As a boy, I had to keep the dogs and jackals from the sheep,” he explained.

We raced to tackle the dazed Arab and get past the wagon, Ned in 2 3 4

w i l l i a m d i e t r i c h

the lead, Astiza next. Yet as the man groggily slid down, he released a lever and the back of the cage dropped with a bang. Something shadowy and huge rose and bunched.

“Ned!” I shouted.

The thing sprang as if launched by a catapult instead of its own hind haunches. I had a terrifying glimpse of brown mane, white teeth, and the intimate pink of its mouth. Astiza screamed. Ned and the lion roared in unison and collided, the club whacking down even as the predator’s jaws crunched on his left forearm.

The sailor howled in agony and rage, but I could also hear the crack of the lion’s ribs as the pine club smashed into its side, again and again, the velocity so powerful that it shoved the animal onto its side, taking Ned’s arm, and him, with it. The two rolled, the human shouting and the cat snarling, a blur of fur and dust. The sailor reared up and the club struck again and again even as he was raked by the claws. His clothes were being shredded, his flesh opened up. I was sickened.

I had out my tomahawk, puny as a teaspoon, but before I could think things through and turn tail like a sensible man, I charged too.

“Ethan!” I heard Astiza only dimly.