“You heard what Denny said,” said Carter. “Lara’s no thief.”
“She just works with thieves,” said Strand, “or is Mr. Sampson an innocent?”
“You can’t just take important artefacts away from an active dig,” said Lara.
“Yeah, but it’s not active, is it?” said Strand. “They were shutting it down. It was messed up.”
“It was an important dig,” said Lara. “It is an important dig.”
She turned in her chair and looked at Sandler.
Denny had been gone for what seemed like a long time.
“Sandler, what’s Denny doing?” asked Lara.
Sandler shrugged. After another few moments of silence, he said, “He’s a businessman. He takes a lot of calls.”
Two minutes after that, Denny walked back into the kitchen carrying a packet. The packet was long and narrow and wrapped in layers of lint-free, unbleached cloth. It was wrapped just the way Lara would have wrapped it.
“I think it’s time you had a look at the prize. Don’t you, Croft?” said Denny, placing the packet on the table in front of her. “I mean, it’s the star of the show. It’s why we’re all here. It’s cost a lot of people their lives.”
“That was mainly you,” Lara pointed out.
“Ah, to-may-to, to-mah-to,” replied Denny. He laid the packet on the table.
Lara stood and leant over the parcel. She wiped her hands on the knees of her leggings, and, with her forefingers and thumbs, began to carefully peel away the layers of cloth.
“Gloves?” she asked Denny as the sword was finally revealed.
Denny reached into his pocket and pulled out a pair of cotton gloves. Lara put them on. They were too big, fit for his hands, but she didn’t care.
The sword was extraordinary.
It was double-edged, about thirty inches long, with the elegant leaf shape of Bronze Age weapons. It had been formed in one piece, essentially carved from a single, perfect piece of obsidian, including the grip. There was no sign of knapping or tool marks. The sword maker had been incredibly precise and skillful in his shaping of the blade.
There was no sign of wear either. Between the simple disc pommel and the curved crossguard, the hilt had been wrapped in leather that looked as supple and new as the day it had been placed there. There were simple linear carvings on the ricasso and the crossguard that resembled early- or proto-Celtic line and knot work.
The black obsidian seemed deep, like a mirror, with a tinge of oceanic green to it.
It was as Carter had described it, and just as she had imagined it. Dreamt it, in fact. Lara realised, though it seemed familiar, she had never properly seen it or examined it before.
Dreamt. That was it. Lara felt a cold shiver. It was as though this sword had been present in one of the dreams that had haunted her before leaving London.
She traced a finger along the full length of the blade of the ancient weapon and then followed the pattern of the hilt. Then she took hold of the grip, lifted it several inches, and bent to cast her eye down the length of the weapon. She carefully turned the weapon over and looked at the other side of the blade.
She lifted the weapon again, in both hands, holding the sword horizontally in front of her, testing its weight. Then she took a firm hold of the grip and weighed the sword in one hand. She held it close to her face and examined the proportions of the pommel and crossguard. She pressed a finger against the unsharpened ricasso, feeling the carvings there. Then she turned the sword, so that her hand was low against her thigh and the tip of the sword was close to her head. She looked at where the fuller met the centre ridge and noted the proportions of the fuller as a fraction of the blade width.
Lara took her time.
It was a ceremonial weapon. Until the development of bronze and iron, stone and glass weapons had been a practical choice, but they were prone to damage and not at all hard-wearing. They seldom survived intact or unchipped, unless they had been purely ceremonial.
So why, she wondered, had this sword been made so perfectly? Its balance, edge, and construction were practically precise, not decorative. It weighed like well-balanced steel in her hand. Lara felt she could use it, not just carry it as a sign of prestige or status.
This sword would cut. It would fight.
Why, in ages of bronze and iron, had a decorative object been made to such perfect specification? And if it had been intended for practical use, why was it so terrifyingly unmarked and perfect?
“Well?” asked Carter.
“It’s perfect,” she said. “It’s utterly right.” She laid it back on the layers of cloth and began to remove the gloves.
Denny flicked the layers of cloth back over the sword, wrapped it, and picked it up.
“Where are you taking it?” asked Carter.
“Even out here I like to keep things locked up,” said Denny. “If you wouldn’t mind doing the honours?” He handed the cloth parcel to Sandler, who strode out of the room with it.
“It’s not too perfect, then?” Denny asked Lara. “It seemed a little pristine to me, for its purported age.”
“No, it’s definitely right,” said Lara. The sword wasn’t a fake. She knew that. But she chose not to share her more uncertain reservations about it.
Denny beamed.
“Told you,” said Strand. Then he winced, almost cowered at a sound from outside.
An animal had howled.
He turned to Lara, his eyes wide and face pale, all the petulance gone out of him. Lara was reminded of the foxes she’d heard howling in the parkland surrounding the manor, and almost felt sorry for Strand.
“Are you going back to London?” he asked.
“Yes, I think so,” said Lara, sitting beside Strand.
“And you won’t turn me in to the police?”
“Now that we have the sword, I don’t see any reason to,” said Lara, “assuming you don’t try a stunt like this again.”
“In that case, can I come back with you?” asked Strand. “I can’t wait to get back to civilisation.”
There was another howl outside in the night, a little closer to the villa this time.
Strand visibly quaked.
“Scared of a few wolves?” asked Denny.
“You said it was hyenas, yesterday,” said Strand.
Denny laughed.
“Damned city boys,” he said. “Can’t tell the difference between a hyena and a wolf.”
There was another howl, and then several more, as if in answer to the first. An eerie chorus.
Lara tossed a smile in Denny’s direction.
“Hanging around you, I’m not surprised he can’t tell the difference,” she said. “You qualify as both.”
Denny burst into one of his belly laughs, and for a moment, the cries of the wolves were drowned out.
“You’re hiding something, Denny,” said Lara. “I’m a better archaeologist than you are. We both know that. You had doubts about the sword and you needed me to authenticate it. But why? It shouldn’t matter to you, if you plan to give it back to me... You’re a sneaky bastard, Denny Sampson,” she said, standing and drawing her gun, in one graceful movement. “You were going to sell the sword out from under me, and use my reputation to get the best price.”
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Miss,” said Sandler, stepping through the kitchen door, gun raised and trained on her. “After you, Mr. Sampson,” he said, ushering his boss safely out of the range of Lara’s rage.
Denny walked out of the room, digging his ringing phone out of his pocket and calling over his shoulder, “Nice catch, Lara. Pity you couldn’t make the touchdown.”
When Denny had gone, Sandler kept his gun on Lara for a few seconds longer. It was a standoff. Lara watched the bodyguard’s eyes for an opportunity. She knew that where the eyes went, the gun would fo
llow, and she’d get her shot.
Sandler’s eyes moved, almost imperceptibly. Then the barrel of his pistol moved down and right in a quick jerk.
Strand had been staring in terrified wonder at the gun pointing at the woman standing next to him. He couldn’t take his eyes off it. His head jerked as Sandler adjusted his aim, and suddenly he was staring right down the barrel of the gun.
Strand screamed and flailed. He tried to drop off his chair to take cover, but instead crashed into Lara’s legs, just as she was taking her shot. Strand sent them both sprawling to the floor.
Lara’s shot went wide.
Sandler fired, reflexively, at the sound of gunfire, but his aim was still on where Strand’s head had been a split second before, and the bullet ricocheted off a stone wall, lost its momentum, and fell to the floor.
Carter reached for his gun, and Lara disentangled herself from Strand’s flailing limbs and rose to take another shot. It was too late. Sandler had seen his chance to leave, and he’d taken it.
Carter shot a couple of rounds blindly into the corridor between the kitchen and the sitting room, and he and Lara went after Sandler.
Sandler had reached the front door when he heard footsteps following him. He turned and fired across the sitting room, covering the doorway through which Carter and Lara would have to enter the room. Still firing, he opened the front door with one hand and ducked around it.
Lara timed Sandler’s shots. She stepped into the doorway of the sitting room, gun raised, and shot at Sandler’s receding figure.
The door closed, and he was gone.
Lara gestured to Carter, and they crossed the sitting room. Lara turned the door handle and pulled, but nothing happened.
“Let me,” said Carter.
The door wouldn’t move for him either.
“This one’s locked,” said Lara. “Let’s try the back.”
The kitchen door was also locked. Carter covered the rest of the ground floor, but there were no other exits. Meanwhile, Lara went back into the sitting room and looked out onto the drive. Denny’s car had gone. It was too late to fight back, and they’d need a plan to find their way back to the city without a vehicle. It was dark, so probably better to stay where they were until they’d worked something out.
CHAPTER TWELVE:
PACK ANIMALS
The Toros Mountains
“I’ve seen some amazing artefacts in my time, but I think that’s the most beautiful thing I’ve seen come out of Britain,” said Lara.
“It’s very special,” said Carter. “Important. And he took the bloody thing.”
He was glaring at Strand.
“How was that even possible?” Lara asked the young man.
“I just wrapped it up and walked out with it,” said Strand.
“There was so much crazy going down, and it was just sitting there...”
He paused and looked towards the window.
“I wish those bloody dogs would let up,” he said.
Denny and Sandler had been gone for almost an hour, and, after a brief discussion in which Lara had persuaded them they shouldn’t move until the morning, they had been left sitting around the kitchen table, talking about the sword. The wolves outside continued their more singsong conversation.
“Maybe it’s a full moon,” said Carter.
“That’s not even funny,” said Strand, petulant again. “I can’t wait to get out of this place. Why can’t we go now?”
“We could leave now,” said Lara. “We’d have to break windows to get out of this house, the mountains are full of wolves and hyenas, it’s dark, and we don’t have any transport. Frankly, none of those things bother me very much, and I’m sure Carter would be fine. You, on the other hand...”
“So,” said Strand, “if it doesn’t work, if we get lost or something, we just come back here.”
“To a house overrun with your favourite wolves and hyenas, who are ransacking the place, having got in through the broken windows,” said Carter.
“I just want to get out of here,” snapped Strand, getting up from the kitchen table and flouncing off.
“Me, too, and as far away as possible from that little shit. If he hadn’t got in the way, this would be over by now,” said Lara.
“Nothing we can do about that, now,” said Carter.
“Except make the best of it,” said Lara, smiling at him.
“It’s no wonder Denny had doubts about the sword,” said Carter, getting back to the subject. “I might have, too, if I hadn’t seen it in situ. It really is in remarkable condition. The environment must have been ideal to have preserved it so perfectly. The humidity, temperature, air circulation... The conditions must have been exceptional.”
“Everything about the Candle Lane site was exceptional,” said Lara, “and the Egyptians knew how to seal a tomb. Maybe it was one of the technologies that transferred to Britain across the cultures.”
“Interesting theory,” said Carter.
“I’m trying to come up with another interesting theory,” said Lara.
“About the sword?” asked Carter. “Ask me anything. I was there, remember, and with your insight, we might come up with something.”
“No, not about the sword,” said Lara, “about Denny’s buyer.”
“He’s selling to Vata,” said Carter.
Lara thought for a moment.
“I don’t think so,” she said. “If he were selling to Vata, he wouldn’t have needed me to authenticate the piece. Vata would have bought the sword at Zizek’s auction. He was committed to the purchase. Denny’s got another buyer: someone more demanding, someone with deeper pockets, someone more dangerous.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know,” said Lara, “but I plan to find out. First we need to get out of here.”
“But we already decided that wasn’t a good idea,” said Carter.
“I didn’t say it was going to be any fun,” Lara replied.
“What’s happening?” asked Strand. He looked nervous as he walked back into the kitchen.
“Nothing,” said Carter. “Precisely nothing.”
“Well, at least the damned dogs have stopped howling,” said Strand.
Lara turned her head and listened intently.
The wolves had stopped howling.
She slowly made her way to one of the front-facing windows, drawing her gun as she went.
“Well, that confirms it,” she said. “Denny definitely wasn’t selling to Vata.”
Carter craned to listen. Now he heard what she had: the hum of a very expensive car engine and the crackle of tires on the dirt road to the villa.
Two cars pulled up in front of the house.
It was too late to take countermeasures. Too late to turn off lights, to pretend that no one was home.
“This is a setup,” said Lara. “That note, the one Denny handed to Dibra. The meet was tonight, and it was here.”
“Now what do we do?” asked Carter.
“Find somewhere safe for Strand,” said Lara. She looked at the young man.
“Unless you know how to use a gun?” she asked him.
He looked petrified. He shook his head.
“Why am I even asking?” she said.
Carter took Strand by the arm.
“Somewhere safe, then,” Carter said. “An internal corridor, no windows. Maybe a cupboard?”
“Anything like that,” said Lara.
“I’ll check exits, see if there’s a way out of here.”
Carter manhandled the frozen Strand out of the room, and Lara went back to the kitchen.
The first knock sounded on the main door. Thump thump thump. An ominous rapping.
They both ignored it. They had a very short window of opportunity to assess their situation.
Denny had seemed casual about the villa, as if it was a domestic dwelling, a home.
But it wasn’t. It was a modest fortress.
Every door and window was shut and locked. There was no way out, and there was no way that Lara could let Vata in, even if she wanted to. As a known associate of Denny Sampson, she wasn’t sure she could talk Vata around. He had killed Zizek and his keepers because the sword had been withdrawn from sale. It didn’t bode well.
There were two cars. There could be as many as ten armed Wolf-Heads against just her and Carter.
They were effectively under siege.
The knocking at the door turned to pounding. Lara continued to ignore it.
Carter came up behind her.
“We’re sitting ducks,” he said. “I hope you’ve got a plan.”
“We fight our way out, or they fight their way in,” said Lara. “It’s as simple as that.”
“Countermeasures?” asked Carter.
“Confusion,” said Lara, “preferably theirs.”
“Are you comfortable with the layout of this place?” asked Carter over the thundering noise of several bodies throwing themselves at the door.
Lara glanced around, and then closed her eyes, breathed, and thought for a moment.
“Yes,” she said. “There’s some ambient light outside: the moon, stars, and the cars, if they’ve left headlights on. We can go dark inside.”
“Okay,” said Carter. “So we kill the lights. Then what?”
“Then we make them fight their way in,” said Lara.
More pounding sounds came from the rear of the house, as the Wolf-Heads tried another door, but Denny’s villa was like Fort Knox.
Lara and Carter took up positions in the darkness and waited. They checked their ammo loads.
Outside, someone got tired of beating on the door and opened fire. A single shot, perhaps from a large-calibre handgun.
The shot hit the front window of the ground-floor drawing room, but did not penetrate. Toughened glass, maybe.
“Wow,” said Carter. “Was Denny expecting World War Three?”
“Be happy I didn’t choose to fight our way out,” said Lara. “I’m guessing my nine millimetres wouldn’t have much effect on whatever those windows are made of.”