Page 104 of Tomb of the Sun King

She had been itching for an opportunity to practice it ‘in the field,’ as they say.

Constance’s days were otherwise filled with the activities one expected of a young woman of good breeding and substantial fortune. She paid visits, shopped, and did a bit of charity work, mostly reading aloud to children in the recovery ward of the hospital.

Constance adored children, as they were usually willing accomplices in mischief and subterfuge—tendencies she encouraged through carefully curating the books she selected for them.

Yet she had always known the world had greater things in store for her—and that it was only a matter of time before she found her way to them. When she did, she would be sure to be ready for it. That rock-hard faith was likely why she had been drawn to Ellie. As a skinny, freckled child, Ellie had quietly blazed with a sense that she would not be confined by other people’s expectations.

Joining her parents on their move to Egypt had been Constance’s first real step toward the exciting life that she knew she was destined for, and she had taken hold of it with both hands. She had loved the weeks she had spent immersing herself in Cairo’s unique spirit, from stumbling across a Byzantine mosaic in an old Coptic church to finding an alley that housed nothing but rows of glassblowers.

Then Lady Sabita and Sir Robert had made their devastating announcement—that she must choose a husband before her next birthday. Constance’s world had abruptly narrowed as the possibilities she had dreamed of as a girl slipped away like smoke. For the first time in her life, she had tasted the threat of despair. Though she fought against it, striving for optimism, she could still feel it lurking at the periphery of her awareness like a patient demon hiding in the shadows.

Her current circumstances, at least, were far from boring—even if they were something less than salubrious. She knew she shouldn’t feelentirelythrilled to be trapped in a decrepit carriage with a villain set on becoming her husband, but she had prepared for years for the possibility that someday a real adventure would find her—and now that time was most certainly here.

The carriage lurched beneath her. It was thoroughly run down, with its springs all but gone—if they had ever been there to begin with. The black box of it made the heat of the afternoon even thicker, which was likely why the Egyptians themselves showed no interest in carriages, preferring to ride or be carried about in a sedan chair.

The sweating, ginger-haired professor sat to her left. He studied the clay tablet greedily as he turned it in his hands, but he clearly couldn’t just read the thing offhand.

Julian’s two thugs sat across from her. They were obviously related—one with a scar on his cheek and the other with a missing front tooth. Both kept glancing sideways at Neil, apparently determining him to be the most likely source of trouble.

Constance resisted the urge to roll her eyes at the notion that Stuffy was the greatest threat in the carriage. Meanwhile, she had two knives secured about her person and a set of lockpicks hidden in a special pocket in her corset. She was fairly certain that, if necessary, she could use the ribbon belting the waist of her lawn dress as a garrote.

Sandwiched between the two mercenaries, Neil looked absolutely rotten. Constance had little sympathy for him. He reallyoughtto feel rotten. He had sold out his allies in the hopes that a bit of abject groveling would save his job with a batch of fellows that anyone could see were up to no good. Admittedly, Neil had never picked up an adventure novel in his life, so perhaps he really wasthatignorant of how these things worked, but she was still thoroughly furious with him.

Julian occupied the space to Constance’s right. As Constance glanced at him, he flashed her a nervous smile. He seemed desperate to present their current situation as perfectly chummy and not-at-all something Constance ought to feel worried about.

“This isn’t quite the excursion I might have planned for us,” Julian said, “but I hope you don’t feel terribly… er, inconvenienced.”

Constance slipped into a role that she was very good at playing—that of the pretty young thing who hadn’t a clue what was going on but was still quite certain of the consideration and charm that were her due. She mustered up an appropriately indignant glare.

“I should say that it is all very irregular!” she declared. “I never expected to find you running about with a bunch of fellows who use guns and fisticuffs!”

Julian had the grace to blanch at her words. “There was this wretchedly complicated incident at the Saqqara dig the other day, my dear,” he explained awkwardly. “And so it seemed prudent to bring along a little additional… personal security?”

Constance was grateful that Julian still hadn’t the foggiest notion that she had actually been in Mutnedjmet’s tomb when he had ordered his thugs to shoot at her friends. She was tempted to share that interesting fact with him, if only to enjoy the horrified look on his face. Sadly, prudence dictated that she keep it to herself—for now.

She felt a snap of worry for Ellie, Adam, and Sayyid. They had been in an admittedly tight spot when she had left, for all that Adam had urged her onward when she had posed her silent question to him about insinuating herself into Julian’s retinue. Constance had wondered if she ought to stay behind herself instead and try to use her knives and jiu jitsu skills to even the odds—but that would have left Neil entirely at Julian’s mercy.

Not that he reallydeservedto be rescued, after acting like such a dolt.

There was also the mysterious tablet Neil and Ellie had found in the temple to consider. Constance assumed it must be a map that would lead the villains directly to the location of the lost pharaoh’s tomb. No one had bothered to say as much during the confrontation in the sun chapel—but really, what else could it be?

Constance couldn’t allow Julian to keep it and get his hands on the Staff of Moses. She hadn’t been a particularly attentive Sunday School student, but she did recall the plagues of the Exodus, as they fed into her admittedly Gothic tastes. Leaving the power to unleash death, disease, and darkness on the world in the hands of the self-important grandson of a duke was simply out of the question. At the moment, she was the person best positioned to stop that from happening.

She had to trust that Ellie and the others would find a way out of their predicament while she focused on her own mission.

Steal the tablet. Save the dolt—if she was feeling generous. And maybe see if she could squeeze more information out of Julian about who was really pulling the strings of this whole affair.

Because if Constance knew one thing for certain, it was that Julian Forster-Mowbray would never have come up with something like this on his own.

?

The carriage jolted to a stop at a rickety wharf on the broad bank of the Nile. Julian helped Constance down. Neil lingered behind her, sunk in a gloomy reverie. The gap-toothed thug snapped him out of it with a kick, and Neil scrambled down, flashing a guilty look at Constance.

Dawson followed with his eyes still glued to the tablet like a child gloating over a prize.

They filed onto a little launch, where an Egyptian fellow in a ragged galabeya and turban rowed them out into the river. The boat bounced over the gently rippling water to the stern of the elegant dahabeeyah that Constance had seen earlier that morning, anchored just downriver from the Luxor docks. The ship was perhaps sixty feet in length with a twenty-foot beam. Sparkling windows lined the sides, opening into rows of cabins, while the upper floor was taken up by an expansive open-air salon shaded by a red-and-white-striped canvas awning.

Their ferry steered up to a small platform that extended from the rear of the boat. A pair of crewmen caught them there, holding the launch in place as they disembarked.

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