At the moment, Joshua was studying his brother with an expression of cool appraisal. “You’ve been spending a good deal of time with our father lately.”
Daniel hesitated before replying. He could hardly explain why they met so frequently. The relic hunt was a closely-guarded secret. He had to think of another pretext. “Since I’ve been appointed as Father’s successor, he feels the need to instruct me in the work of shepherding the Nephilim.”
For some unaccountable reason, Joshua bristled at his explanation. “Yes, of course. The role of the scion must be a great responsibility for you. Are you sure you feel qualified to carry that burden?”
Now it was Daniel’s turn to give his brother an appraising look. Was he actually jealous? The scion chose not to answer the question directly. “It’s not for me to decide if I’m qualified to carry that burden. Father obviously thinks I am.”
Daniel could tell he’d struck a nerve. Joshua turned aside hurriedly to cover something—but what? After a few seconds, he recovered and resumed the conversation. “There are rumors. You know how the women like to gossip. I don’t give them any credence, you understand, but some believe that Father has given you a special task to fulfill. Something so secret that no one is allowed to know of it.” He paused and then added, “Silly idea, isn’t it?”
Daniel raised his eyebrows, feigning surprise. “That’s ridiculous,” he agreed. Apparently, his recent mastery of the art of deception suited a variety of occasions. No wonder the diviner singled out lying as a capital sin. A person who was as adept a liar as Daniel could get away with a great deal.
The two men came to a junction in the corridor.
“Well, I’m going off to the study hall,” Daniel offered, hoping his brother would take the hint and leave him alone.
Joshua wasn’t to be deterred so easily. “What a coincidence. I’m going in that direction too.”
Daniel sighed in resignation and turned down the hallway to the right. Joshua wasn’t the only one who had been listening to gossip. The scion had heard a few choice rumors himself, and he decided to test their accuracy. He began with just the right note of innocence in his voice. “My wives have been chattering lately as well. It’s impossible to ignore them, really. I heard a tidbit about you, brother.”
Now it was Joshua’s turn to mimic surprise. “About me? What did they say?”
“Oh, it wasn’t only the three of them. These rumors have been circulating around the compound for some months now. It was something about a secret organization within the Nephilim whose job it is to report sinful behavior to the diviner. Somehow you got mixed up in that rumor. Supposedly you’re part of this new group. Talk about far-fetched.”
Daniel peered hard at his brother. Joshua appeared momentarily too stunned to respond. Then he threw his head back and laughed—a bit too loudly and a bit too long.
“That’s absurd,” he finally replied. “Surely you don’t believe such stories?” His dark eyes searched Daniel’s face intently.
The scion cultivated a blank expression. “I believe that you’re in charge of a spy organization just about as much as you believe I’m working on a confidential project for Father.”
The two men stared unblinking at one another for a few moments.
“Here’s my destination.” Daniel opened the door to the study hall. “Time for me to work on that clandestine task of mine.”
‘Yes, I may as well be going too,” Joshua volunteered. “Time for me to write up a report on everyone’s suspicious behavior. What an amusing notion.”
Daniel cast a final look at his brother’s face. Joshua wasn’t smiling.
Chapter 22—The French Connection
Cassie absently watched the elevator’s illuminated panel mark their ascent. It was only five flights to their destination, but the lift seemed in no hurry to get there. She and her teammates waited patiently as people filed in and out on the second floor. One of the men was wearing a hooded cloak, called a burnoose, with a skullcap on his head. One of the women wore a shapeless sack of a coat and hid her hair under a hijab scarf.
The pythia inwardly mused about the paradoxical nature of this place. They were now in Rabat, Morocco. Rabat was a modern city complete with an expressway and taxi cabs, but somebody forgot to tell the camels that their services were no longer needed. Urbanites dressed in jeans and tee shirts walked down the same streets as turbaned locals whose weather-beaten faces made Cassie think they’d just arrived in town via desert caravan. In this progressive metropolis, the twenty-first century rubbed elbows with the seventh.
The architecture seemed equally contradictory. White-washed fortress walls and ancient mosques existed side by side with steel and glass skyscrapers. When the Arkana team arrived the day before, they had wandered into the old section of the city called the medina. It looked like the market from Raiders of the Lost Ark: narrow, winding streets cast perpetually in shadow; merchants draping their wares over every available doorway, awning and windowsill; shopkeepers haggling with patrons over the price of their merchandise; tourists with cameras and cell phones threading their way through flocks of black-shrouded Muslim women and nobody taking the least notice of the crashing anomalies everywhere. That was Rabat.
Cassie glanced up again at the elevator display. They’d made it all the way to the fourth floor. The doors opened once more to disgorge a few more passengers before the Arkana team got its turn to exit on five. They had come here to meet their contact—the Berber trove keeper. By day, he was a semi-retired professor of Saharan Studies at the Université De Rabat. They walked
