The Third Gate

34

Romero nodded. She gripped her flashlight, then took a step forward, swinging her light up into the black void of the tomb entrance.

Immediately, she staggered backward. “Holy shit!” she said. A collective gasp sounded from the rest of the group.

Inside the tomb, mere inches from the opening, stood a terrifying limestone statue: a creature, nearly seven feet tall, with the head of a serpent, the body of a lion, and the arms of a man. It was crouched, its muscles tensed as if ready to spring through the opening toward them. It had been painted in amazingly lifelike colors, still vibrant after five thousand years in the dark. Its eyes had been inlaid with carnelians, which glittered menacingly in the gleam of their torches.

“Whew,” Romero said, recovering. “Some guardian.”

She moved forward again, letting the light play over the disturbing statue. At its feet lay a human skeleton. The tattered remains of what had once been rich vestments still clung to the bones.

“Necropolis guard,” Romero muttered over the radio.

She very carefully made her way around the statue and moved deeper into the chamber. Each footfall raised tiny clouds of dust. After a pause, Stone followed; then March; and then Rush, holding his monitoring equipment forward. The roustabouts remained on the platform. Last to enter was Logan. He stepped past the granite seal, slid around the guardian figure and the skeleton at its base, and entered the tomb proper.

The chamber was not large, perhaps fifteen feet deep by ten feet wide, narrowing slightly as it went back. Their flashlight beams cast long, eerie trails in the rising dust. The walls were completely lined in turquoise-colored tile that Logan realized must be faience. Their surfaces were busy with primitive hieroglyphs and painted images. The air felt remarkably cool and dry.

The tomb was filled with neatly organized grave goods: intricately carved and painted chairs; a massive, canopied bed of gilded wood; numerous ushabti; beautiful wheel-turned pottery; an open, gold-lined box full of amulets, beads, and jewelry. Tina Romero moved slowly around the room, capturing everything on the video camera. March followed in her wake, examining objects with the gentle touch of a gloved finger. Rush was monitoring his handheld sensor. Stone hung back, taking in everything. When people spoke, it was in hushed, almost reverential voices. It was as if, only now, the realization was taking hold: We’ve entered King Narmer’s tomb.

Logan stood back with Stone, watching the proceedings. Despite his insistence on accompanying the group, he had nevertheless been dreading this moment, fearing that the malignance, the malevolence, he had sensed before would be even stronger here. But there was nothing. No, that wasn’t quite right: there did seem to be some presence-but it was almost as if the tomb itself was watching them, waiting, biding its time for…

For what? Logan wasn’t sure.

March placed his hand on the turquoise-colored wall in an almost caressing gesture. “This lava tube would have been formed of extrusive igneous rock, very rough and sharp. Now the surface is as smooth as glass. Think of the man-hours involved in polishing it with the rude tools of the day.”

Tina had stopped before a long row of tall jars of reddish clay, perfectly formed, their rims dark. “These black-topped jars were common around the time of unification,” she said. “They’ll be useful for dating.”

“I’ll take samples for thermoluminescence tests on our next descent,” said March.

There was a moment of silence as the group continued taking it all in.

“There’s no sarcophagus,” Logan said, glancing around.

“This outer room would normally hold household items, perhaps some business details,” Stone replied, “things the king would need in the next life. The sarcophagus would be deeper within the tomb, most likely in the final chamber beyond the third gate. That’s what the pharaoh would be most concerned about preserving in an unspoiled state.”

Tina knelt before a large chest of painted wood, edged in gold. With slow, delicate motions, she swept the dust from its top, then freed the lid and gently raised it. The glow of her flashlight revealed dozens and dozens of papyri within, rolled tight, in perfect, unspoiled condition. Beside them were stacked two tall rows of carved tablets.

“My God,” she breathed. “Think of the history these contain.”

Stone had moved toward the gilded, canopied bed. It was beautiful, shimmering with an almost unearthly glow in the beams of their flashlights. Its various intricately worked pieces were held together by huge bolts of what appeared to be solid gold. “Notice the canopy,” he said, pointing. “That gilded piece of wood must weigh a thousand pounds. Yet everything’s perfectly preserved. It could have been fashioned yesterday.”

“This is odd,” said March. He was peering at an image painted on one of the walls: a depiction of two strange-looking objects. One was box shaped, topped by a kind of rod that was surrounded by a copper-colored crest or banner. The other was a white, bowl-like artifact, with long wisps of gold trailing from its edges. They were surrounded by a blizzard of hieroglyphics.

“What do you make of it?” Stone asked.

Tina shook her head. “Unique. I’ve never seen anything like these before. Anything remotely like them. They look like tools. Implements of some sort. But I can’t imagine what they might be used for.”

“And the glyphs surrounding them?”

There was a pause as Romero striped her flashlight across them. “They seem to be warnings. Imprecations.” A pause. “I’ll have to examine them more closely in the lab.” She stepped back, panned over the images with her camera.

“It might be unique,” Logan said, “but it’s not the only one in here.” And he pointed at a nearby wall relief, the largest in the chamber. It depicted a seated male figure, shown in side view, left leg forward, as was common with all ancient Egyptian art. He was wearing fine clothes, clearly a personage of great importance. And yet-bizarrely-the same two objects had been placed on his head, the bowl-shaped one below, the box with the rod atop. He was surrounded by what appeared to be high priests.

“I’ll be damned,” March murmured.

“What do you suppose they are?” Stone asked. “They can’t be crowns.”

“Perhaps it’s a punishment of some kind,” Logan said.

“Yes, but look at that.” Tina pointed to an embossed detail below the relief. “It’s a serekh-meaning the figure in the picture is royal.”

“Is it the serekh of Narmer?” Stone asked.

“Yes. But it’s been altered, defaced somehow.”

Slowly, the group began to gravitate toward the rear wall. Their flashlight beams played over its surface: another face of polished granite, the slabs mortared in place. Again, the necropolis seal and the royal seal were both intact, untouched. Unlike the first doorway, however, this one was outlined in what appeared to be solid gold.

“The second gate,” said March almost reverentially.

They stared at it for a moment before Stone broke the silence. “We’ll return to the Station, analyze our findings. We’ll have an engineering team come down to examine this chamber, ensure it’s structurally sound. And then”-he paused, his voice trembling ever so slightly-“we’ll proceed.”