Chapter One
It was a hundred and fifteen degrees Fahrenheit in the shade. Sand dunes, sixty feet high, reached the horizon in every direction like an ancient ocean, swallowed by the arid sands of time. Not a single piece of vegetation was visible. With the exception of her camp, there was no permanent sign of life. Nothing lived in this hostile land. A few nomadic tribes borrowed the land as they traversed it for trade, taking direct, labored routes using camel trains. She adjusted her green headdress. She was born in the desert, but had spent years away from it. They were painful years, and although important, she had spent a long time feeling lost. Instead of daunting her, the extreme heat made her feel alive. Today the temperature was particularly high — and none of the tribes would risk traveling during daylight.
She stood up from the desk where she scribbled notes on an old map, covered in recently marked gridlines. The tarpaulin shade cloth did nothing to alleviate the intense heat. She grinned curiously as she watched the strangers travel south. There were three camels. The first two had riders. Both men were covered completely in traditional desert robes worn by the local Tuareg nomads, but she could tell neither were nomads.
Their faces were mostly concealed with the indigo blue shesh — the traditional headwear worn by the nomadic men who’d roamed the Saharan desert for thousands of years. Their eyes were covered with dark sandglasses, designed for protection from the sand as much as the sun. One was considerably larger than the other, both in height and muscle. The other was of an average height with broad shoulders. The shorter one rode at the head, rigged like he was prepared for battle, while the other appeared relaxed in the saddle, possibly even asleep.
A third camel trailed behind, tied to the second. It carried a number of dive tanks. On the back of one of the tanks were the words, Deep Sea Projects. She smiled. Deep Sea? There’s no water big enough to swim in, let alone dive in, for a thousand miles. She was just about curious enough to stop the two men and ask. But they didn’t stop to talk and she didn’t interrupt their progress. It was a strange land with stranger rules, and if a couple of loners don’t stop to talk to the first humans they see while crossing a desert, you don’t go out of your way to find out why.
Dr. Zara Delacroix smiled. It was a wonderful smile. Full of wit and intelligence, it teased while at the same time betraying some hidden mischievousness. Her perfectly even, white teeth shined against her dark olive complexion. What could be seen of her black hair was so dark and lustrous it appeared blue beneath her green headdress. Her thick, dark, lashes guarded her hazel green eyes. These were her most powerful, seductive and deceptively pleasing aspect. To all who met her, she was exotic to her core — and for the past two years she’d been the greatest mystery of the Sahara.
She was an educated woman, an archeologist, with both ancient Persian and French blood in her veins. She freely roamed the massive ergs, the ocean-like sand basins, scattered throughout the Sahara, without fear. In a land rife with corruption, wars, dictatorships, tribal battles, and an environment capable of killing most people within a day, she walked unhindered in search of some great wonder — forever gaining followers.
She had been given the name of Malikat Alssahra — which, translated from Arabic, meant, Queen of the Sahara. She thought it was a ridiculous name, but the people who followed her thought it perfectly matched her beauty and ability to command those who followed, with great respect, dignity, and unwavering loyalty.
Rumors, if they could ever be trusted, said she’d come in search of something extraordinary. A book that not only told the future, but held the power to change it. She was willing to pay a king’s fortune to find it and had hired an army of nomads from several different tribes to help her with her quest. Tribes who had never agreed on anything together, now pledged their allegiance to her. She now commanded over two hundred people, from a multitude of tribes and countries — and still more came to offer their loyalty and services.
At the sight of the two strangers, Adebowale stood directly in front of her. Like an overly protective guard dog, he was waiting for the opportunity to bite. He had only recently joined her party, but had taken a great interest in their quest and had self-proclaimed to be her bodyguard. He commanded forty warriors and brought a strange aura of unnatural power to her command. Many of the tribal nomads who wandered the region were superstitious, and she saw the benefit of working on this image.
Adebowale was her most ardent supporter. He followed her with the religious fervour of a zealot. In truth, his zeal frightened her. She put up with him, of course, because he brought forty warriors, who, although not quite as powerful as he, were certainly useful for both protection and digging. It was the protection that would be required if she ever found what she sought.
He played the role of her bodyguard, but he was much more than that. At six foot ten he was a good head above most tall people. He was also somewhere in the vicinity of three hundred pounds of solid muscle. His skin was as dark as they come and his eyes a deep and frightening blue.
He smiled at her, revealing perfectly even, white teeth. “Good afternoon, Doctor.”
“Hello, Adebowale,” she replied.
“They found the brass howdah this morning,” Adebowale said. He was the only one within the camp who treated her as his equal and not the savior, or the deliverer of the great prophecy. “It won’t be long now before they find It.”
She turned to him, her eyes still fixed on the strangers heading south. “Yes, I heard.” Her voice was indifferent, but inside, her heart raced at the thought.
Adebowale shook his head. It was big and riddled with scars. The bristly hairs on his head were cut short and his eyes piercing with their almost hollow grayish-blue, giving him the appearance of some nightmarish and unreal fiend. Despite that, he was quite attractive, in a warrior kind of way. His English was articulate and expressive, showing his level of education was much higher than she would have guessed. There was the slightest tinge of an American accent. “You still don’t believe It will be here?”
“No. I believe it will be here,” she replied, finally turning to meet his eyes.
“Then why are you not down there, reveling in the joy? The new future is now and you and I are to be the bearers of that new knowledge.”
Zara smiled. She enjoyed his unwavering belief in the prophecy, even though she didn’t believe a word of it. “I just don’t believe a word Nostradamus said, that’s all.”
“Then why have you spent your life searching for his book?” Adebowale asked. His cheeky smile betrayed his inability to accept what she was saying.
“Because others do, and because I can find it.” A pert, and sheepish grin formed on her lips. “And like you, because I need the money they will pay me!”
“But you have spent two years searching this small area alone! Why waste your time searching for something you don’t believe in?”
“I believe the Book of Nostradamus is buried here. That much is fact. What I don’t believe is that Nostradamus had any idea what was in the future.”
“How do you explain why so many of his prognostications came true?”
Zara shrugged. “Yeah, well he got lucky — and he left things pretty open to interpretation. It’s no more impressive than a tarot card reading at a novelty shop.”