“I’m so sorry!” he cried out. He did not mean to, but his voice gathered volume in desperation. Lita mistook it for raising his voice to her and before he could retract or explain she landed a devastating blow against his cheek bone, leaving his skull burning and his mind in perceptive twilight for a good 10 seconds.
“Don’t you ever! Ever!” her snarl sank low as she slowly mouthed each word in his ear. Her breath burned into his outer ear, her lips grazing the skin as she grunted. His skin crawled from the sensation, but he did not feel the expected follow-up strike.
“I’m sorry, Madam. I’m sorry. I did not mean to…” he whispered in a shivering whisper which appeased her.
“Don’t grovel, Sebastian. It is not becoming — especially in a man,” she said plainly.
“Leaving my employ will not absolve you of your inadequacies and it will most definitely not save your life if I decide to correct your mother’s mistakes,” she continued. This time Sebastian simply nodded. The sweat trickled from his temples and he could feel his legs numb when she dealt him one of her sadistic looks.
“Now, if the relic was not in the store room, I venture to guess they would have thought to move it from its container, but not from the premises. Unless they thought it good to split up the find to separate possible dangerous conjunctions,” she said to herself as she rounded the table, the hem of her long emerald dress dragging behind her on the untreated cement floor of the small musty room. Then she stood still for a moment and all Sebastian could see was the orange burn of the cigar’s end as she sucked on it.
“Conjunctions, Madam?” Sebastian uttered in deep uncertainty, expecting a roaring reprimand, but Lita simply looked his way.
“This may surprise you, my dear pet, but in ancient times, there were as many biological and chemical hazards as there are today,” she smiled a cold grin of condescension. “In fact, much of what we know about metallurgy and alchemy, things that have helped our historical tyrants create a vast array of killing methods throughout the ages, come from antique scrolls. Museums have become overlooked by recent generations as lazy storage facilities for sentimental objects their benefactors could not bear to throw away. Houses of forgotten glory. Nothing more than pawn shops for the historical snobs and arrogantly wealthy.”
Sebastian watched his employer thinking, but at the same time he knew she was painfully aware of his attempt at provoking her pity by exhibiting interest. As a matter of fact, he knew Lita was humoring him only to use the opportunity to make him feel like an ignorant idiot. She was successful.
“Conjunctions of chemicals, conjunctions of incantations, whatever you can summon to your little brain as being two components of one weapon, are locked away in a myriad of ancient artifacts. The world, those who still bother to employ calculation or philosophy, would be terrified to know what power lies in the past they are so ardently trying to shove onto shelves for school children to marvel at,” she almost whispered now, as she approached him with swaying hips, her hair forming a scarlet halo around her upper body and head in the blinding light of the small window. “Inside many of these relics, you see as dust-covered bookends lie secrets of terrible power, components of deadly force embedded in sciences that could pulverize the world as we know it with consummate ease. Sometimes, in an attempt to preserve the genius discovery, and to prevent them from being utilized as weapons of mass destruction, the past scholars and scientists have elected to harbor the different cog wheels of one machine in different items, usually those that would seem least conspicuous to the scrutiny of the suspicious,” her lips curled as she concluded her sermon and she doused her cigar.
Chapter 4
Fort Kinnaird was its usual bustling self when Nina entered Clarks for a pair of sandals she had been coveting for some weeks now. She simply could not get Dave to let her come back early without some sexual bribery and a promise to wait with her plans to embark on a new independent career until he returned to Edinburgh. It had started raining and she could feel her soles slipping as she sped toward the door and quite literally fell into the doorway.
The assistant, who had a chipped name tag and an awkward smile, helped Nina in, taking care not to let her stumble over the hidden stand near the door.
“Easy now, Ma’am,” the lady chuckled as she gripped the small woman’s arm securely and kept her upright. Nina howled with laughter, more from a bit of embarrassment than anything else. She soon found her footing and acted as her professional attire would have dictated had it not been showering outside. Her hair hung over her shoulders and scalloped on her back, darkened by the wetness and left rather unkempt. Her beauty, however, made up for the messy hair and she quickly made her way to the shelves where the shoes were that she had come for.
On her way to the wall of designer shoes where the delicate flats beckoned, Nina was still trying to compose herself from the surprise drenching she got outside.
With all her might, she controlled her welling temper tantrum and she had a good mind to just drop everything to the floor, tying up her hair and then, one by one, collecting her stuff at her leisure. Wiping her hair back profusely, clutching her bag under her arm, she resisted the urge to meet her reflection in the full length mirror she passed.
Finally, she composed herself well enough to walk with a bit more poise, swearing under her breath. As she took the shoe from the shelf to check the size, a peculiar looking woman to her right caught her eye. She was dressed in slightly worn leather pants and a similar jacket. A lot of ladies in the store were staring, but not for the same reason. They seemed taken aback by her resting Mohawk hairstyle, shaved at the sides and draping to a straight point in the vicinity of her tailbone. Nina smiled. Always enjoying the unorthodox, she reveled in the glares falling on the unsuspecting woman who was bent in half on the small stool, fitting the latest Orinocco sash boots the store offered. She looked up briefly to see how the boots looked in the mirror and noticed the whispering women behind her. Nina was amused and waited to see what she would do.
Instead of feeling self-conscious, the woman stared them each down in the mirror, prompting each in turn to quickly look away. Then she simply continued her fitting as if there was nobody else in the store. It made Nina nod to herself in satisfaction. She enjoyed people who dared to be themselves in this day and age of sheep and bleeding heart cowards. Something else even more particular caught Nina’s attention. The leather clad woman was wearing some distinguished jewelry. One of the rings on her left hand reminded the petite historian of a piece she once saw in a Helsinki museum, cast in an antique bronze method apparently used by early Icelandic and Finnish smiths. Around her neck, the stranger wore something equally astonishing. It resembled a Viking piece she had helped a colleague procure a few years back from a hoard discovered in Dumfries in the early 19th Century.
“The Lochar Moss Torc?” she whispered to herself, forgetting about the shopping bag she placed at her feet when she pulled the shoes from the rack. It was an exact replica, the composition of which was frighteningly precise in design and texture. Trying her best to look inconspicuous, Nina moved gradually around the front of the lady’s seat, pretending to look at other shoes. In the mirror’s reflection she tried to scrutinize the piece.
She held her breath at the uncanny appearance of the neck ring. The brass cast collar was crescent-shaped and engraved with La Tène patterns. The second part was a series of hollow beads upon it, which convinced Nina that it had to be a knock-off. A very good one at that, but a fake nonetheless. The original, which was on display at the British Museum, had one of the beads missing, unlike this one which was complete. Still, Nina could not shake the curiosity of such expert craftsmanship.