Page 28

FENELLA

T he Khan el-Khalili bazaar assaulted Fenella's senses the moment she stepped out of the air-conditioned vehicle.

The heat hit her first, a wall of dry air that seemed to suck the moisture from her lungs.

Then came the smells—spices and incense, leather and metal, sweat and garbage, all mixing into a stinky potpourri that made her eyes water.

Then there was the noise, with vendors shouting about their wares and waving potential shoppers over, tourists haggling in a menagerie of languages, Arabic music spilling from shops, and the constant hum of too many people crammed into the narrow medieval streets.

"Stay close," Ahmed barked, already looking harassed even though they'd been there less than a minute. "Do not walk away from the group! Do not stop for vendors!"

Easier said than done. They hadn't made it more than ten feet before sellers descended on them like hawks on prey.

"Beautiful lady! Come see! Best prices!"

"Papyrus! Real papyrus! Not fake!"

"Perfume oils! Cleopatra's secret!"

Fenella was squeezed between Din and Max, with Kyra on Max's other side and Jasmine behind with Ell-rom.

Kalugal led the way with Ahmed, while two more security guards brought up the rear.

Their formation might have been meant for protection, but it made navigating the narrow alleys nearly impossible.

It was like trying to drive a tank through the market.

"Scarf for lady?" A vendor somehow managed to shove a piece of silk in Fenella's face. "Beautiful scarf for beautiful lady!"

" La, shukran ," Din said firmly, shoving the guy and his scarf away from her.

"You speak Arabic?" she asked, impressed.

"Just the useful phrases. No, thank you. How much? Where's the bathroom? Those sorts of things."

"Husband buy!" The vendor with the scarf wasn't giving up. "Good husband buy beautiful things for beautiful wife!"

Din rolled his eyes and pulled out his wallet. "How much?"

She put a hand on his arm. "Din, no?—"

"Tourists buy things," he said quietly. "It's for our cover."

They were undercover?

Nobody had told her that. She would have put on her oversized sunglasses instead of the small ones.

Oh, well. Next time.

And so it began. The scarf was just the appetizer that had whetted Din's appetite.

Once Din had been given permission to spend money on her, there was no stopping him.

At the next stall, he bought her a silver bracelet.

Then, leather sandals with long straps meant to wrap around her calves.

A small inlaid box that the vendor insisted was made from real ivory, which made Fenella want to gag and throw it at the vendor's head until Din convinced her that it was fake ivory and no elephants had been harmed to produce it.

The last one, for now, was a bottle of perfume oil that supposedly contained jasmine from Aswan.

"You're being ridiculous," she hissed as he examined a display of painted plates. "We're supposed to be looking for figurines, not redecorating our non-existent Cairo apartment."

"The dealer said his cousin sells figurines," Din said quietly, gesturing for the seller to wrap three plates. "Information comes with a price tag, and these plates are it. Jacki can give them to someone on their staff."

Fenella wasn't buying it. "That's the fifth cousin with figurines we've heard about." She watched the pile of packages in Din's arms grow. "They are playing you."

"I can help carry," one of Kalugal's guards offered, taking a couple of packages from Din.

"Thank you, Ibrahim," Din said.

None of the stores had air-conditioning, and after over an hour of touching all kinds of figurines and other artifacts that could loosely be classified as such, Fenella felt sweaty and dirty, and none the wiser.

She'd opened herself to impressions several times, with Kyra and Jasmine maintaining light contact by touching her arm or her shoulder and theoretically amplifying her abilities, but most of the items were completely flat, with no memories embedded in them whatsoever.

The few fragmented visions she'd gotten had been frustratingly mundane.

"This is useless," she muttered, setting down yet another figurine of Anubis that had only emitted a trace of irritation. "We are not going to find Esag by browsing tourist shops."

"Patience," Kalugal said. "This is where we found the other figurines."

They reached another shop, which was larger than the others they had visited so far, and the proprietor spoke excellent English and seemed to know his merchandise.

Din walked over to an ornate brass lamp that Fenella had to agree had some charm to it despite being ugly, but it wasn't worth carrying with them through the market, let alone taking back to the village.

"We don't even have a house, Din," she protested.

"We will." He motioned for the shopkeeper to wrap it up.

Shaking her head, Fenella moved over to the figurine collection, with Kyra falling in step with her.

"Anything?" Kyra asked quietly.

"The usual tourist junk made in China and pretending to be authentic." Fenella picked up a small statue of Isis. "Nothing."

"My dear ladies!" The proprietor appeared at her side, all obsequious smiles. "You have excellent taste! That statuette of Isis is very special. Very old!"

Yeah. Perhaps it was two months old, the time it took to ship it over from China.

"How old?" Jasmine asked.

"Oh, perhaps one hundred years! Maybe two hundred! From my grandfather's collection!"

Fenella set it down carefully. She didn't see the point in crushing his sales pitch. "It's lovely, but not what we're looking for."

His expression shifted, becoming calculating. "Ah, you are collectors. What are you interested in?"

"Unusual pieces." Kalugal joined them. "Unique. Pieces made by real artisans and not mass-produced overseas." He pulled out his phone and showed the guy a picture of the figurine modeled after Wonder's sister.

The man's eyes shone with the excitement of a shark identifying prey. "Unique is difficult to come by. Expensive."

"Money isn't an issue," Kalugal assured him. "For the right kind of item."

Another furtive glance. Then the proprietor leaned closer.

"I know of such an artist. Very talented and very strange.

He comes by occasionally and sells one or two pieces.

Very unusual work. I pay him top pound because his pieces sell for much more and never stay on display for more than one day.

I don't have anything of his at the moment, but if you leave me your contact information, I will let you know as soon as he delivers another piece. "

Fenella's pulse quickened. "Do you know where he lives?"

"The City of the Dead." The man shuddered slightly. "Al-Qarafa. It is not a safe place for tourists. You shouldn't go there. Wait until he comes here."

Obviously, the guy didn't want to be cut out of the deal, and he wasn't going to tell them where to find the artist. He might even be lying about his living in the City of the Dead just to discourage them from attempting to find the craftsman.

Fenella turned to look at Din, signaling with her eyes that he should just reach into the human's mind and pluck the information out of there.

"Does he have a name?" Din asked.

Fenella hoped he'd understood her eye signals.

"He calls himself Isa. He doesn't talk much. Just brings pieces, takes money, and disappears again."

"When was he last here?" Kalugal asked.

"Maybe two weeks? Three? He's not regular." The man studied them with shrewd eyes. "So, you are not just interested in his work but in him in person?"

Kalugal nodded. "I have a project I would like to discuss with him."

"I could maybe arrange an introduction," the shopkeeper said. "For a fee."

"That won't be—" Kalugal began, but stopped mid-sentence. His posture had shifted subtly, and then he flashed the proprietor a charming smile. "Actually, yes. Let's discuss terms. Inside your office, perhaps?"

The guy looked puzzled but pleased. "Of course! This way!"

Kalugal followed him, but instead of going into his cramped office, he herded their entire group toward the back door. "Everyone out. Now. Act natural."

"What's wrong?" Fenella whispered.

"Suspicious company about to enter." He pulled the shop door shut behind them and turned to the confused proprietor who'd followed them out. "You're closing early today and going home. Lock the door."

"Yes... Yes, of course." The proprietor fumbled for his keys, moving like a sleepwalker.

"This way," Kalugal directed, leading them not back into the main bazaar but down a narrow side alley. "Quickly, but don't run."

They followed, packages rustling, trying to look like a group of lost tourists, except for Ahmed and his two companions, whose eyes darted in all directions.

"Are they following?" Max asked, his hand drifting toward where Fenella knew he had a weapon concealed.

"Not yet, but they might once they realize—there." Kalugal grabbed a door handle seemingly at random, only to find it locked. A quick twist of immortal strength broke the mechanism, and he ushered them all inside what appeared to be a carpet shop's storage room.

They emerged into a different section of the market, and Kalugal kept them moving, taking seemingly random turns until Fenella had no idea where they were.

"Why didn't you just shroud us?" Din asked quietly as they paused in the shade of an archway. "You can make us look like different people to whoever was following us."

Kalugal gestured with his chin at Ahmed and the guards. "Because my security team would not understand what's going on and might run off screaming about dark magic or djinn. As I said earlier, it's hard to find reliable security in Cairo."

"Fair point," Din conceded.

"Who was watching us?" Fenella asked. "Brotherhood goons?"

"I'm not sure," Kalugal admitted. "They were watching us through the display window, so I couldn't sense if they were immortals. They could have been just common thieves who zeroed in on tourists who are buying everything in sight." He gave Din a pointed look.

"Hey, I was maintaining our cover," Din protested, shifting his armload of packages. "And nothing in here is particularly valuable."

"You bought the lamp," Fenella said flatly.

"It's a nice lamp, and it was well priced."

"We don't have a house!"

"We will, and I want us to decorate it. I could see this lamp over a reading chair."

He was so cute that she felt like kissing him right then and there, but it really wasn't the time or the place. "You're impossible."

"I prefer adorable."

"If you two are done," Max interrupted their banter, "maybe we should focus on the fact that we just got actual intelligence? This Isa character in the City of the Dead sounds promising."

"That's true," Kalugal said. "I peeked inside the shopkeeper's mind and, surprisingly, he was telling the truth about that. But we can't go there today. We need to lose the tail, go home, and explore the place tomorrow."

"The City of the Dead," Jasmine mused. "That's the cemetery district where people live among the tombs, correct?"

"Indeed," Kalugal confirmed. "Many thousands of people make their homes there, some families for generations. It's a maze of mausoleums, crypts, and improvised housing. Easy to get lost in, easier yet to disappear in."

"Sounds perfect for someone who wants to stay hidden," Ell-rom observed.

"Right then," Ahmed said, finally finding his voice. "Professor, please, we should return to the cars. This is becoming dangerous."

Kalugal turned his most charming smile on the man. "Ahmed, my friend, I apologize for the excitement. Academic passion sometimes overrides common sense. You're right, of course. Let's return to the house."

The security chief looked mollified. "The vehicles are parked near the Khan. We'll need to backtrack carefully."

"Lead the way," Kalugal said.

They began the journey back through the market, taking a circuitous route to avoid retracing their steps and traversing their earlier path. Fenella kept checking over her shoulder, searching for faces that appeared too often or eyes that lingered too long.

"Stop that," Din murmured. "You're attracting attention."

"Says the man carrying half a bazaar's worth of merchandise."

"Touché."

They were nearly back to the main thoroughfare when it happened.

A man stepped out of a shop directly in front of them—tall, European features, eyes that tracked their group with predatory interest. Not a local. Not a tourist either.

"Keep walking," Kalugal said quietly. "Don't react."

They passed the man, who made no move to follow or intercept. But Fenella could feel his gaze burning into her back.

"Doomer?" she breathed.

"No. But he might be working for them."

"Reporting," Max said. "Or he could be just a random dude with a resting bulldog face."

When they reached the vehicles without further incident, got inside, and pulled away from the Khan, Fenella let out a sigh of relief.

"Well," she said, settling back in her seat. "That was educational."

"We learned about Isa," Kyra pointed out. "That's progress."

Fenella touched the scarf Din had bought for her, the silk cool and soft beneath her fingers.

Din's ridiculous shopping spree was kind of sweet. He'd bought her things simply because he wanted to, prompted by a street vendor who had suggested that a good husband should buy his wife nice things.

"Thank you." She leaned against his shoulder.

"For what?"

"For the lamp. It's hideous, but I love it."