The Last Odyssey (Sigma Force #15) - James Rollins Page 0,90
two whispered over the map. Monsignor Roe had told her about the Da Vinci replica of the device, of the original Daedalus Key joined to it. Apparently Joe’s colleagues still possessed that.
Elena placed great hope in this information.
Joe, don’t let me down.
Earlier, she had skipped over one part of her story—about what she and Joe had witnessed with the map after unlocking the astrolabe. While she sensed no malice or dissembling from these two, she had been too shaken up by her father’s arrival.
Who can I truly trust? The safest answer. Only myself.
So she had stayed silent about the map’s revelations.
Not that any of this relieved her of the obligations imposed on her. Nehir made sure of this over breakfast in the library. She had demanded to know where Elena believed Captain Hunayn had sailed to after leaving Daedalus’s home in Sardinia.
She knew the answer. The map had already revealed it. She pictured the tiny silver ship of Odysseus sweeping south from Sardinia, in a river of tectonic fire, only to briefly come to port along the Tunisian coast. Again, Elena had needed some other excuse, a line of reasoning to point in that direction, to bury what she truly knew under a mountain of facts. She had wanted to balk, to refuse, but she had no fight left in her. She was too tired and too shaken by her father’s arrival. And in the end, what would it matter if she gave up this next port?
Elena stared past the two men to the distant coast of North Africa. Yesterday—before her aborted escape attempt—she had searched through the stacks of ancient books, returning again to Strabo’s Geographica to come up with the rationale to sail to Tunisia.
She had explained everything to Nehir over breakfast, relating scores of rumors about an island off the African coast. It was said to be the home of Homer’s Lotophagi, the infamous Lotus-eaters who fed Odysseus’s men a narcotic nectar and lulled them into sleep. Ancient writers—both Herodotus and Polybius—advocated that the Tunisian coast was where that island would be found.
Elena reinforced this by referencing Strabo, whose wisdom Hunayn had placed great stock in. Elena had shown Nehir the line in Geographica where Strabo stated the true location of the Lotus-eaters: Λωτοφαγῖτις σύρτις Lōtophagîtis sýrtis, which translates as “Syrtis of the Lotus-eaters.”
Elena got further support from an unexpected source. Monsignor Roe had interjected, confirming that Strabo’s “Syrtis” was the ancient name for modern-day Djerba, an island along the Tunisian coast.
Nehir had accepted this rationale and left.
Shortly after that, the Morning Star had swung to the south and sailed three hours to reach the African coast.
But what now?
She held out one hope. If Joe and the others had a functional version of the map and the original Daedalus Key, maybe they could beat these bastards to the final destination.
She held tight to this thin lifeline.
But would it be enough?
1:40 P.M.
An hour later, voices drew Elena’s attention to the library’s glass doors. Nehir was back, speaking to Kadir. But she had not come alone.
Elena stiffened at the sight of her father. Despite her anger, his familiar face triggered a flush of warmth inside her, her body instinctively reacting to the man who had raised her, who had taught her right from wrong, forged her moral compass, who instilled in her a love for the sea, for nautical history.
The momentary flush turned cold. She had heard the term “heavy of heart,” but only now did she realize that the phrase was not just metaphorical. Her heart felt like a leaden weight in her chest, each beat dull and listless. She rubbed a knuckle along her breastbone, trying to unknot the pain there, but failed.
Nehir unlocked the library door with an electronic keycard and ushered her father into the room. She followed behind, drawing Kadir in with her.
Her father opened his arms wide and crossed the library. “Elena, my dear.”
She stood and icily accepted his hug, but she did not return it.
He seemed not to notice and finally broke the embrace. “I’m sorry it took me so long. There’s an EU summit going on in Germany. It was already on my schedule as chair of the Senate’s Committee on Foreign Relations. A bit of fortuitous timing, offering me the perfect excuse to fly here. Though, of course, I’m participating remotely after getting the word about, well—” He waved to encompass the breadth of the yacht.
Elena tightened her jaw, but it was actually good news. If word of her apparent