The Passion of Cleopatra (Ramses the Damned 2)

"She wears dark glasses much of the time. The newspapers say that she experienced a fever in Egypt that changed the color of her eyes. We are almost certain that she is indeed immortal."

"But there is something else," Aktamu said, his voice a soft whisper next to Enamon's confident baritone. "We were not alone."

"What do you mean by this?" she asked.

"There were others watching the house," Aktamu continued, "they did not see us, but we saw them. I followed them. Enamon remained behind so as to collect a full night's report on the house in Mayfair, as you instructed."

"The fracti of Saqnos? Here, now?"

"We don't know. Perhaps not."

"What did you see when you followed these others?"

"It was one man who led me to others. He drove with great speed. I followed him to a vast estate halfway between London and the area they now call Yorkshire."

Aktamu's facility with the map of this island was good and helpful. When she had taken several long sleeps in the past, she had set her beloved assistants free to explore the wo

rld. So Enamon and Aktamu had spent some time here, while she had not. This would be valuable.

"And this man, he was immortal?" she asked.

"It was dark and the hour was late," Aktuma answered. "But this estate, it is known and it has a name. Havilland Park. A grand place. Sprawling, with high gates. And others were arriving."

"Arriving? How do you mean, Aktamu?"

"Beyond the gates, I glimpsed a driveway filled with cars. Various types. The lights in the estate's front rooms were ablaze even at the late hour. And another car arrived shortly after the man I followed. A man and a woman, elegantly dressed. I was too far away to see their faces. Had there not been so much activity, I would have scaled the walls and explored further. But this seemed a risk. I thought to consult you first. Perhaps you wanted to take a different approach."

Aktamu cast a glance at the slinky, gray cat rubbing itself against Bektaten's ankles.

"This is good, Aktamu," she answered. "This is wise."

Bektaten scooped the cat up into her arms, ran her fingernails along the length of its spine with a pressure that made it purr and lick the fingers of her other hand. How she loved this creature.

"These people of Havilland Park," Aktamu said. "We recognized them as people we had seen in the streets of London, spying on Ramsey and his paramour as well. They gather at a late hour. They are either immortals, or people so caught up in the planning of something, that they find sleep impossible."

"Or both, my queen," Enamon offered.

"Indeed."

For a long while, none of them spoke. The sound of the surf crashing against the rocks below made for a kind of meditative chant that allowed Bektaten to absorb what she had been told.

"He is the thief," she finally said. "Ramses the Great is the thief of the elixir. I know this now. The sword that killed my beloved Marupa was powerful, bronze. I should have seen it. I was too fearful of Saqnos. I should have seen that Ramses the Great's near century of life was only the beginning."

"You did see it, my queen," Aktamu encouraged. "That is why we are here now."

He was being generous. She had seen it only recently.

And so, apparently, had someone else.

"We will learn what we can of these people of Havilland Park," she said to them. "But first, my garden. It is time to plant my garden."

They nodded, and departed.

*

Bektaten watched them from the second floor of the keep, from the room she'd taken as her private quarters. One window faced the restless sea; the other, the courtyard below. There Enamon and Aktamu planted her seeds in the large patch of exposed soil that had been waiting for them when they arrived. Several days before, they had smoothed out the edges of the broken stones until they formed the shape of a rectangle. If it hadn't been for the hunched-over, laboring forms of both men, the soil would have looked like a dark hole in the earth itself, framed by the care of a human hand.

The seeds, which had once traveled in satchels on their shoulders, now resided inside an ornate, jeweled box. They had retrieved them from her new library in the adjacent tower.