Prologue
Cira 300 BCE
Tens of thousands of humans from far-flung regions of Earth were brought aboard a celestial ark.
A century into their voyage, the route to the Bridge of Heaven lay in ruins, destroyed during an all-out war among the factions. The Age of Shoah was an era of plunder, rape, and nihilism.
From the ashes of chaos, a unified and peaceful society emerged. Its members were ignorant of the true nature of their world, their journey through space, and their ultimate destination.
Chapter One
Over two thousand years later
Beneath the diffused daylight piped into the interior of the ziggurat, beside the towering wooden shelves filled with scrolls and codices, Angora stood captivated by the sight of the man in the spacious hall. She had not felt such a strong attraction to anyone before, and the thought of approaching him made her nervous.
The man, hired by one of her aides, was scrubbing the Welcome Pavilion, a ten-foot-tall sculpture of bronze, copper, and acacia wood. This elaborate structure had graced the entrance of the grand mouseion for centuries, but two decades had passed since its last restoration, leaving jade-green grime marring its surface.
Her eyes traced the man’s controlled movements and the play of muscles in his bare calves. He worked with deft precision, never needing to glance down as he pulled out or inserted a bottle or scouring pad from the leather tool harness strapped over his coarse linen shirt.
As mouseion director, she could openly admire him under the guise of overseeing his work. Not that she, or any unmarried woman of childbearing years, needed justification to ogle an unclaimed man.
If he noticed her watching him, he gave no indication.
Angora envied men’s role in matters of romance. Her introspective and scholarly nature made her uncomfortable with initiating and setting the stage, as was expected of a woman. She drew a deep breath and made her way to him, crossing several large woven mats and stopping behind him on the limestone floor. Up close, he was even taller than she had thought. Maybe even taller than she was. That wasn’t saying much, though. At just one inch over six feet, she was a petite woman.
With a nervous flutter in her stomach, she called out, “It’s quite remarkable how the stand is transformed once scrubbed.”
The man turned around and held her gaze. She momentarily recoiled from—but then was immensely drawn to—the intensity in his granite-colored eyes. They were like the eyes portrayed in paintings of those mythological creatures, wolves.
He turned back to his work, the silence of the great hall broken only by the rustle of pages from a distant reading nook and the muted footsteps of someone unseen behind one of the tall bookcases.
“A donation stand? That’s what the Welcome Pavilion is?” His voice was low pitched. She felt it went well with the hard planes of his face, his cropped hair, and his stubble of beard.
“Well, yes,” she said with a smile in her voice. That was familiar ground for her; Angora felt her confidence return and her initial nervousness fade.
He turned again to her, frowning. “Is that a typical design for such a…stand?”
“Well, it’s a unique creation.”
“It’s rather ornate for a mere collection jar,” he remarked, motioning at the hippopotamos and the intricate figures resting on top of it.
She gave a half shrug, slightly impatient with his train of thought. It made sense that it would be fanciful. The Welcome Pavilion was meant to be a work of art adorning a mouseion lobby.
“What does it say here?” He pointed at the burnished plaque by the side of the Pavilion.
“‘House of Muses.’”
The man raised an eyebrow at that.
“That’s what the word mouseion means in the Old Tongues.”
She saw surprise in his face. “I was not aware of that, Vyre Angora,” he said.
So the man knew who she was. She wondered if it was because she was the mouseion director and a prominent scholar, or because she was the daughter of one of the seven revered custodians of their world: the Iskandar of Maradam. She wanted to believe that it was the former and not the latter.
The man was silent, clearly mulling over her words. As he looked around the hall, Angora read wonder bordering on reverence in his face. But when he turned back to her, a suggestion of a scowl replaced it. “So, this place began as a hub of creativity and innovation during the Revival,” he said, his tone harsh, “yet over the following millennia, it has dwindled into this...” He gestured to the few people seated at the reading tables. “An exalted public library.”
For a moment, she was too shocked to respond. The observation was so unexpected and impudent. This gave way to outrage, and she glared at him.
“Perhaps,” Angora said, her voice cool with sarcasm, “you should limit your comments to topics that you’re actually familiar with—like polishing bronze.” She looked pointedly at the Welcome Pavilion.
He eyed her, his gaze lingering. “Polishing has taught me to see past the tarnish, to the essence of things.”
Angora flushed. She spun on her heel and strode away, her leather sandals tapping sharply against the floor as her maroon toga dress billowed and her dark shawl with gold trim streamed behind her.
How dare he! Angora fumed as she climbed the spiraling stairway. That inconsequential man. He was contracted because the commissioning agent had informed the Mouseion that he was thorough—and she wished to see the Pavilion burnished before the Burning of the Ship festivities. Yet such tasks, low in pay and skill, were usually reserved for the young. The fact that he appeared to be in his thirties and still doing such work spoke volumes about him.
But then again, what difference did it make what vocation the man pursued? His comment stood on its own merit; she’d always been the first to rebuke those who sought to argue from authority. And his comment stung.
Angora entered her private chambers and leaned against the thick, carved wooden door that effectively shut out sounds coming from outside. A slow breath escaped her lips. Why did his opinion matter to her? Was it the sheer audacity of his observation? Or was it because there was a grain of truth in what he said?
Beneath a limestone arch, she walked to her low work table and sat on the firm floor cushion, legs folded underneath her. As she looked at the open manuscripts with their hand-drawn sketches of recent studies, Angora felt her tranquility returning. This spacious room was her sanctuary, a home away from home. Restoration projects or digs sometimes took her to the far edges of the world—trips of up to twenty miles—but Maradam was her primary place of work, and the Mouseion of Maradam, which she oversaw, was her base of operations.
If a mouseion was merely an “exalted public library,” as that man had said, did that make her a shelf custodian? That was quite the demotion, she thought to herself, inwardly smiling, amused and troubled at the same time.
Oh, to the pits with that! Angora didn’t have time to dwell over his words any longer. She unfurled a large excavation site map and studied it intently. Picking up her trusted stylus, she made some annotations in the margins.
After a brief knock, the door swung open, and a staff member marched in, holding a sheaf of papers. She nodded, acknowledging her.
The day went by in a rush, crowding out thoughts of him and his troubling comment. The hours flew by. And before she knew it, the workday wound down. Mede’a and Assur stood at the door, dressed in their finery, grinning and joking and hurrying her on. She changed into something more suitable and headed out of the ziggurat with her two friends as daylight gave way to the violet veil of evening.
It was a gala night on the plaza by the shores of Naiad Lake, where lyre players serenaded the crowd with their tunes. Pole-mounted torches cast amber light, their flames reflected and dancing on the rippling lake. The guests mingled and chatted, and were later treated to a reading of poetry from a debut work while sipping a drink made of date molasses and rose water and eating sesame morsels.
Life on Areta was pleasant and peaceful, following the same rhythm for years. For decades. For centuries.
And Thalith Na’amat star seemed to underscore this, as each passing year it blazed ever brighter in the night sky.
Chapter Two
The next morning, attendants nodded to each other in greeting as they entered the majestic ziggurat that housed the mouseion.
Angora was climbing the open wooden spiral staircase to her chambers when a cry of surprise rang out from the ground level, followed by sharp intakes of breath throughout the entrance hall. She stopped mid-step and stared at the Welcome Pavilion—just in time to see the wings of its bronze eagle stretch and the metallic feathers bristle.
A collective gasp rose as a golden ball emerged from the eagle’s beak, dropped, and was swallowed by the gaping maw of the sea serpent figure beneath it. The serpent, which was supposed to be fused to the main frame, started to pivot on its shaft, with the heavy metal ball pushing it ever lower.
The ball of gold dropped from the serpent’s mouth into the receptacle below and—
—made a deep, melodious gong sound that seemed to reverberate from the walls.
Stunned silence filled the entrance hall.
The sea serpent smoothly swung back to its original position.
For a heartbeat, Angora stood rooted in place, her breath coming in short, sharp gasps—and in the next, she was scrambling down the spiraling stairs, rushing toward the structure. She grasped what the structure was, what it really was.
People were streaming in from various sections of the mouseion to take a closer look, until virtually all the mouseion keepers were congregated around the Pavilion.
Standing on the low platform on which it was perched, Angora inspected the sculpture. She turned and raised her hands, patiently waiting for silence, tamping down on the excitement and pride she felt.
“Over the centuries,” Angora’s voice rang out, “countless people have graced our mouseion and passed by the Welcome Pavilion, unaware of its function. Today, one of our own not only discovered the true nature of this structure but also managed to restore it to working order. What we have here is a water clock.” A ripple of excitement spread through the crowd. “It’s a functioning artifact from the Revival Era, which is rare enough in itself. It’s also arguably the most sophisticated water clock ever unearthed.” No wonder none of them suspected its purpose, Angora thought; its design was unlike any other.
“Come forward, whoever you are!” she announced, her smile radiant. “Society owes you a debt of gratitude.”
The gathered people applauded and cheered, looking around expectantly.
As no one came forward, the applause died down, replaced by confused whispers.
Angora’s eyebrows rose. This was unexpected.
Yet, almost immediately, her bewilderment gave way to a sense of growing unease, a hunch.
One of her assistants pushed his way forward. “We found this inside the Pavilion.” He held out a pair of curved nose pliers. “We don’t know to whom it belongs.”
She felt shock as recognition hit her. She’d seen these pliers before. Recently.
֎
He was down Ganuzar alley, scraping patina off double-entry bronze doors with a hammer and chisel. Bougainvillea vines partially obscured the doors, their purple flowers cascading from a balcony above, vivid against the intense blue sky. Focused on his work, landing rapid, precise blows, the man didn’t notice her.
Angora watched him. The rhythm of his hammering and the flex of his arm muscles with each exertion seemed to mirror the racing of her heart. She was both drawn to and repelled by the sheer force of his presence.
She hadn’t wanted to come, yet her legs had carried her over all the same. She was certain that no other mouseion keeper realized to whom the pliers belonged, and she had been tempted to make them disappear. That wouldn’t have been right, though. She had no choice but to swallow her earlier conceit. “I was mistaken in dismissing your intuition about the Welcome Pavilion,” she called out.
Startled, the man stopped hammering and turned.
She lowered her head. “Arrogance got the better of me. Please accept my apology.”
His gaze fell upon the pliers in her hand before finally settling on her face. “How did you know where to find me?” he asked, his voice modulated.
“Your commissioning agent told me you would be here.”
“Did she now?” The man regarded Angora. He then walked toward her, wiping his hands on his vest. Amusement tinged his voice. “What else did she say?”
“She told me that your name is Sargon, and that you’ve been polishing artifacts throughout Maradam for years.” She closed the space between them. Quietly, she said, “She also told me that you originally hail from Timnah. And that you never talk about that time of your life, before Maradam.”
With his gray eyes fixed on hers, he held out his arm.
Their fingers brushed as she handed over the pliers, a connection neither acknowledged nor pulled away from.
“You went through a great deal of trouble to return these to me,” he said as he flipped the pliers and in one smooth movement inserted them into a pocket in his leather harness.
Angora gave him a tight smile. “It was the least I could do. All things considered.”
“Must have left them there yesterday.”
Yesterday night, you mean, she thought to herself. Her gaze drifted to the pliers, now snug against his broad chest before returning to his face. “Someone has uncovered the true nature of the Welcome Pavilion and recovered some of its functionality: It’s an ancient water clock.” She paused. “We haven’t found out who did it, though.” As she said this, she looked him in the eyes.
“Surely in the house of muses, innovation, and creativity there’s bound to be someone who did it,” the man said, deadpan.
She felt her cheeks warm. He could not have made his point any more eloquently. In all these years, none of the experts or mouseion keepers had ever recognized the Welcome Pavilion as a clock, let alone figured out how to make its ancient mechanisms work again.
“It’s quite ingenious really,” she pressed on. “A cassette installed on top feeds metal balls, each starts the cycle anew. A tank filled with water inside the hippopotamos contains a perforated, open vessel. It’s obviously meant to complete its submersion in one hour. As it finally plunges downward, it tags—”
“I thank you for bringing my pliers over,” he cut her off, then turned and strode over to the door he’d been working on, his tone making it clear the conversation was over.
“You were not always polishing aging metal artifacts, were you?” she called out.
The man started scouring the door again.
Then: “It was you, wasn’t it?”
The man did not react to that, either. She stood there gazing at his back, arms resting on her hips. When it became obvious that he wasn’t going to respond, she turned and left, surprised that she felt no disappointment. Somehow she’d expected him to neither confirm nor deny his involvement.