It took all her savings, but Vanessa was on a plane that night. The rest of this little informal expedition would have to be put on her credit card. She might be camping out under a tarp with a trowel after all. It would be worth it, she told herself, for even a shred of proof of Amanirenas. Not to mention the potential financial rewards…

She left Newark at nine on Friday night, flew nearly eleven hours overnight to Lomé, Togo, where after an hour break she left for a five-and-a-half-hour flight to Addis Ababa. There, she twiddled her thumbs for two and half hours before her next flight, a two-hour puddle jump that put her in Khartoum at nearly two in the morning on Sunday. This was finally followed by an even smaller flight to a microstate sandwiched between Egypt and Sudan: Ksatta-Galan.

The tiny, wealthy nation was on the opposite side of the Persian Gulf to Saudi Arabia, but nevertheless had strong economic and cultural ties to the Gulf States. Most importantly, its capital city was located incredibly close to the part of the Sahara she needed to explore.

She’d already arranged lodging at a nearby hostel and after nearly twenty-four hours total of flying, she barely had the energy to leave a message for Professor Van Rees before she collapsed into her bunk.

She woke in the afternoon, groggy and jet-lagged, as a group of other travelers sharing the hostel room crashed in noisily, laughing and talking loudly in Dutch as they dumped their belongings. The urge to roll over and go back to sleep was strong, but Vanessa dragged herself out of bed.

Her eyes felt like the Sahara had personally moved in and made itself at home, and her tongue felt like sandpaper. She shotgunned three cups of coffee to bring herself around, and once she’d made herself look basically presentable again, she found her way to the front desk to check for messages.

“Yes, you have something here,” the handsome Australian man behind the desk said, smiling with perfect teeth. “From a Professor Van Rees?”

“Perfect, thank you,” Vanessa said, accepting the note he handed her and privately wondering why every hostel she’d ever been to (and she’d visited a few) was run by Australians.

She took the note out into the sunlight before she read it, finding a café and more coffee to help with her concentration.

Very surprised to hear of your arrival! the note read. Charity ball tonight at which I would very much appreciate your company. Formal dress code. We have much to catch up on!

The message was followed by an address for one of the several palaces in Ksatta-Galan’s capital. Vanessa was at first shocked that Abraham had gained an invitation to such a high-class event, and then exasperated as she realized she was going to have to find a dress to wear.

That night, she emerged from a taxi outside of a glittering palace. She’d spent the ride there awed by the beauty of the ancient city, its buildings ornate pre-Islamic Arabian architecture, all intricate arches and geometric patterns in gold and blue and orange. But nothing compared to the palace itself, its domed towers shining with gold leaf, its towering minarets fluted and covered in intricate patterns like carousels, standing against the sunset horizon. Its silhouette was so majestic that Vanessa, in her store-bought dress, suddenly felt unworthy to even approach.

She’d done her very best with her limited funds. The dove gray cape dress had a narrow sheath skirt rising to a lacy illusion collar from which the stately column of the cape draped dramatically. She’d thought it was quite lovely when she’d found it at the last moment off the sale rack of a dress store in town. But now, watching other guests glide past the fountains to the palace steps in their jewel-draped ball gowns and white-tie tuxedos, she felt pitifully underdressed.

She looked ready for a daytime TV awards show, not a ball in which royalty was expected to be in attendance. Still, with what she was planning to do to Abraham, coming to meet him here was really the least she could do.

Abraham was waiting for her on the palace steps, just as round and fatherly as she remembered, if a little older. His hair had started graying after the last disastrous expedition. It was all silver now and his face had more lines than it had just a few years ago. She’d underestimated the toll that years of fruitless searching had taken on him. But he also looked well fed and happy, and his cufflinks alone could have bought ten of Vanessa’s gown. She saw them glittering as he embraced her like a prodigal daughter.

“It’s been too long!” he said warmly, clapping a hand on her shoulder as he held her at arm’s length. “You look wonderful, old girl!”

“So do you, old man,” Vanessa said with a warm smile. “What have you been doing out here for a year? You could never have afforded that suit with what the university was paying you.”

“Oh, just some private consultation work,” Abraham said, waving a hand to dismiss the matter. “Nothing interesting, I promise. Now, tell me, did the map arrive? Isn’t it glorious?”

He guided her into the palace, which was even more beautiful inside than out. It boasted mosaic tiles and gold-painted, beautiful geometric patterns across the floor as well as lush inner courtyards bursting with greenery and flowers from behind cages of intricate screens. The air was full of music and the scent of spice and orange blossom. Vanessa was enchanted, almost as enraptured by the setting as by Abraham’s gripping tale of how he’d recovered the map from a lost city in the Congo.

“It was among a half-dozen texts we rescued from an ancient library. The original inhabitants were wiped out in colonial wars, and most of their culture and writings were destroyed. But this library had been sealed against time and the jungle, air tight to preserve the texts within! And ferociously protected.

“The earth was scattered with bones, though we couldn’t be sure if they were the bodies of warriors who had died defending the place, the men they’d killed, or the remains of ill-fated grave robbers caught in the fiendish traps they had laid. I nearly had a heart attack when we first opened the sealed chamber. We had to filter the air to keep the documents from crumbling on contact with the humid jungle atmosphere! And there, among the scrolls and tablets, was the map, waiting for me like a sign from the heavens!”

She suspected he was elaborating for her benefit, and some of it sounded suspiciously like the plot of a movie, but Vanessa indulged him regardless, just happy to see him doing so well.

Vanessa had recovered from the sharp blow of their failure in Nubia more determined than ever, but it had worn her mentor down immensely. Then he’d vanished on this long sabbatical, and she’d been half certain it was the end for him. To see him so alive and engaged now was more than reassuring. And it made her feel all the more guilty that she wasn’t sharing her discovery with him.

She promised herself that she would make it up to him after everything was said and done.

“So, what brings you to Ksatta-Galan so suddenly?” Abraham asked as they wandered the crowded ballroom, champagne in hand. “If I’d known you were coming, I might have at least met you at the airport.”

“I didn’t want to trouble you,” Vanessa replied, trying not to look as flustered as she felt by the question. “It’s just a few last-minute findings I needed to verify personally. I didn’t even officially declare the time off. I just want to be certain I’ve actually found something worth bothering with before I make a big fuss about it, you know?”

“Ah, yes, I understand,” Abraham agreed with a sage nod. “After what happened last time, I can hardly blame you. We were so certain…”

“I was so certain,” Vanessa said, gripping the edge of her cape, guilt still there even after three years. “I convinced you to gamble everything on it. If it weren’t for me—”

“Nonsense, girl,” Abraham said firmly. “You are my student, and the decision to go was mine. As was the decision to personally fund the expedition. Plus, we did learn one thing.”

“What’s that?” Vanessa asked.

“We know one more place the tomb definitely is not,” Abraham said with a chuckle.

Vanessa laughed as well, but the guilt remained. She had been so sure it was there…

“Ah, look there!” Abraham said suddenly.

Vanessa followed his gaze to the top of the grand staircase, where a young man was descending. He looked to be about Vanessa’s age and was breathtakingly handsome. In a stylish, burnt orange thawb, its high collar unbuttoned against his strong, angular jaw, he looked at once more simply and yet more richly dressed than anyone else in the room.

The watch almost hidden beneath the sleeve of his robe was the only glitter he wore—nothing in comparison to the woman on his arm who was dripping in so many diamonds that Vanessa was certain she must leave a trail of them behind her wherever she stepped.

And yet, Vanessa couldn’t take her eyes off of him.

“Who is that?” she asked Abraham.

“That would be our host,” the professor explained. “Sheikh Ramin Al-Zand, the son of the ruling Sheikh of Ksatta-Galan. This is one of his palaces, and he’s transforming it into the nation’s largest history museum. This evening’s celebration is in honor of that.”

“And the woman with him?”

“I couldn’t say,” Abraham said with a shrug. “They change as often as the weather. Sheikh Ramin is somewhat known as a heartbreaker.”

Vanessa felt a momentary sting of disappointment which she quickly dismissed. She was here to work, not throw herself at playboy princes who could clearly do much better.

“But don’t tell him I said that,” Abraham went on. “I’ve been working with him rather extensively lately. The Sheikh is an avid student of history. There hasn’t been an archeological development in this area he wasn’t involved in somehow.”

“Well, that’s just not fair,” Vanessa said, still watching as Ramin descended the stairs to speak with his guests. “Gorgeous, a prince, and a historian as well? Next, you’ll be telling me he has two—”

“Ah, one moment,” Abraham cut her off as he spotted someone through the crowd. “There’s someone I absolutely must speak to. Wait here; I’ll be back in just a moment.”

He hurried away before she could respond, leaving her stranded in the middle of the crowded ballroom, feeling increasingly awkward as each moment passed. She couldn’t even follow him, having lost him almost at once amid the glittering gowns of all the guests.

But as the minutes ticked by and the professor didn’t return, Vanessa became increasingly sure she would have to try. She took a deep breath, finished her champagne in a single swallow, and waded into the crowd in search of her escort.

She hadn’t gone far at all before she bumped into someone and stumbled back, apologizing. Her apology died in her throat as she recognized the smug face looking down at her.

“Peterson,” she said, somewhere between shock and dismay. “What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” he answered, raising an eyebrow. “Isn’t an affair like this a bit out of your price range?”

“Judging by her dress,” said the woman standing next to Peterson, who was tall and dark haired and had a distinctly French accent, “that’s not the only thing that’s beyond her price range.”

“I can manage my own price range, thank you,” Vanessa retorted, a little more aggressively than she’d meant to, caught off-guard by the sudden appearance of her rival. “Now, if you wouldn’t mind answering the question—”

“Why, I already told you,” Peterson said with a roll of his eyes. “The expedition to find Cush, son of Ham. I did invite you along, you recall?”

“I had no idea you were leaving so soon.”

“Nor I you,” Peterson said with a chuckle. “You’re not really planning to walk into the desert with a trowel, are you?”

“I’m just here to visit Professor Van Rees,” Vanessa lied. “I’m changing direction on my thesis and I needed his help.”

“My, what perfect timing,” Peterson said. “Once I have the support of Sheikh Ramin Al-Zand, we plan to embark! You could come with us! Except…oh, well, we did already secure your replacement. May I introduce Renée Dubois?”

He gestured to the woman beside him, and Vanessa felt a cold anger sitting like a stone in her gut.

“She’s the finest historical linguist in Europe,” Peterson said. “She’s even familiar with Meroitic.”

“As familiar as one needs to be with such a crude language,” Dubois said with a shrug. “There’s a reason there are so few bilingual documents in Meroitic. It’s an unspeakably plain little tongue.”

Vanessa’s anger flared up into a hot rage, wanting to defend the beautiful ancient tongue she’d devoted so much of her life to, but she forced it down.

“I’ve heard of your work,” Vanessa said, tight-lipped. “I have a great deal of respect for you. Which makes it all the more disappointing to see you working with someone who has so little respect for the science and history of what we do.”

“Ah, good old Vanessa.” Peterson laughed. “You always were one to take petty jabs rather than let your work speak for itself. Whatever your opinions about my methods, I’m here, and my success needs no disclaimer.”

“Well, I’m here too,” Vanessa pointed out. “And I didn’t need Daddy’s credit card to manage it.”

Peterson drew himself up ire, but Dubois stepped between them, ‘accidentally’ dumping her champagne on Vanessa’s gown in the process. Vanessa jumped back, trying to save it, but too late. She watched the alcohol soak into the silk with a grimace.

“Oh well,” Dubois smirked. “It’s not much of a loss.”

With a cat’s self-satisfied smile, she led Peterson away while Vanessa tried to ignore the stares of the other guests who’d seen the confrontation. She hurried away through the crowd, snatching a handful of napkins off the catering table as she slipped out onto an empty balcony.