The Giant's Almanac by Andrew Zurcher (black female authors .txt) 📕

Professor Farzan stood up from the table, crossed the room, and using both hands threw open one of the sets of heavy curtains. Where Fitz had expected to see a window, instead the curtains parted to reveal the door of a vault. At its centre was set an antique combination lock – a heavy black dial, circled by minute markings.

‘I don’t have the combination, nor does the Director – but Habi can open it. He will conceal himself inside, with you –’ Farzan had crossed back to the table, and was speaking directly to Fitz – ‘while your mother, and Ned, and I confront the people on the other side of that door. They’re going to try to arrest me, but they won’t be able to make it stick. When we’ve gone, when everything is quiet, Habi will take you to the Heresy. Help them find what they want. We will come for you when the time comes. On the day of your inheritance – on your twelfth birthday – we will come for you, and we will bring you home.’

Mr Ahmadi had already slipped from his chair to the safe. Holding his hat at an angle over the lock, with his ear cocked close to the mechanism, he crouched beside it, turning the knob with delicate precision. They all held their breath.

Again, there was a knocking at the door. Now Professor Farzan stood behind his chair at the end of the table, his head bowed. Still seated, Clare was fumbling at the back of her neck for something. Fitz knew what it was: the silver jay, its wings spread as for flight, that had been her mother’s, and that she wore always on a thin leather strap round her neck. With the practised fingers of an artist, within seconds she had unfastened the knot and refastened it, again, round Fitz’s own neck. She slipped the bird inside his shirt, where it lay cool against his skin, and put her hand against his chest.

‘Don’t be long, Jaybird,’ she said. There were tears running down her cheeks. ‘We will come for you.’

Mr Ahmadi stood up, replacing his hat on his head with a flourish, and drew open the door of the vault. It was a narrow opening – only about a metre – but, within, the vault seemed to lie deep, extending to three or even four metres into the walls and soil. Along the shelves that ran down each side, Fitz could see small grey card boxes, each with a descriptive label, stacked neatly in row upon row. He stood up from his chair, circled the long end of the table, and paused at the vault’s door. At the far wall, in part shadow, stood the gold-painted cover of an Egyptian sarcophagus.

‘It’s a fake,’ said Professor Farzan, gesturing towards the gleaming gold case and shaking his head dismissively. ‘In you go. And quickly.’

Fitz took hold of the corner of one of the shelves and stepped with care through the opening. Mr Ahmadi stepped in behind him, his hat in one hand and the other with his finger to his lips. He turned and drew the door closed behind them, shutting out the light, just as Fitz settled into the dust that coated the floor.

‘Is it really a fake?’ whispered Fitz to the black stillness of the inside of the vault. His own body, with the blood in it, appeared to make a kind of electrical sound.

‘No, of course it’s not a fake,’ said Mr Ahmadi. ‘It’s the three-thousand-year-old death mask of a great king. You don’t put something in a vault unless it’s valuable. Now be silent, and very, very still.’

For what seemed hours – agonizing hours – they waited in silence. Every bone in Fitz’s legs began to ache. The ache spread into his back, where it burned, then into his shoulders. He dared not stretch his legs, or shift his weight, for fear that he might make a noise – scuff the floor, knock one of the shelves, dislodge one of the small grey boxes, disturb the slumber of the three-thousand-year-old king – anything that might alert someone outside that the vault was not empty. In the darkness he thought from time to time that he could hear Mr Ahmadi’s breath, but then thought that he was imagining it; certainly Mr Ahmadi never stirred, never shifted, never made the least sound. All the while, in Fitz’s bones and muscles, the tearing ache seemed to grow into a fever scream.

‘They still have not left the room,’ said Mr Ahmadi, in a whisper. ‘We have only a little time left.’

Fitz pondered this for a few moments, then whispered back. ‘Only a little time until what?’

‘Until we run out of air,’ said Mr Ahmadi.

He must have begun to turn the lock mechanism again, because Fitz heard it click. A few minutes later, he heard it again. Mr Ahmadi said nothing further, but Fitz thought he must be poised over the third number, postponing the moment when it should strike, the moment when the bolt that bound them in would spring free and release the door again. If anyone were in the room, without a doubt they would hear that.

The vault had become stiflingly hot.

And then the moment came.

‘Now,’ said Mr Ahmadi, more loudly this time. He turned the lock, the bolt withdrew, and he pushed the door open.

The room now stood in almost complete darkness; the only light came from under the panelled door. From beyond it, they could hear movement. Mr Ahmadi carefully closed the safe, crossed the room, and pressed his ear to the door while Fitz waited. After a few minutes the noise receded, and the light in the corridor outside was switched off.

‘Now we climb,’ said Mr Ahmadi. ‘Go exactly where I go, do not lag behind, and above all, trust me.’

They slipped out of the room, leaving the door as they had left the vault