Crying out in exasperation, he threw his hands into the air and kept them there. At that exact moment, the overhead lights came on. A little squeak escaped my mouth as I got my first real glimpse of the guy I’d assumed had been living with the relics. He was definitely not a transient.
Who are you? I wondered as I studied the person, who was not a man and yet not a teen. He seemed…timeless. Hooded hazel eyes, at that moment more green than brown, beneath a strong brow pinned me with a gaze that was both intelligent and almost predatory. I felt like a mouse looking up at a swooping falcon, knowing death loomed but utterly unable to look away from the beauty of it.
His physical splendor was undeniable: brooding eyes, miles of muscles beneath smooth, golden skin, and full lips that would send any girl swooning. But there was something deeper behind the beauty, something very different about him that made my fingers itch for a pencil and paper. I wasn’t sure I could even capture the indescribable thing I felt when I looked at him, but I really wanted to try. As easy as I found it to put people in categories based on the things I noticed about them—their clothes, the way they moved, the people they were with, or their patterns of communication—I thought that for him I just might have to come up with a new system. He didn’t belong in any particular group. He was unique.
I blinked and realized he was smirking again. Even if the rest of him was a mystery, I could identify the expression. I’d met dozens of boys with expressions like that. International or not, they were all the same. They thought their wealth and good looks made them powerful. This guy was practically dripping with power. Definitely not my type.
“So what are you supposed to be?” I lashed out, heat stinging my cheeks in response to his arrogance. “Are you some international model taking photos down here and now can’t find your pants?” I scoffed, indicating his costume or lack thereof. “Well, believe me,” I said, using my best condescending voice and punctuating each word with a dramatic gesture for emphasis, “nobody would look twice at you, so just…move along.”
Sighing, Model-boy mumbled a few words as he swirled his fingers in the air. Suddenly, there was a funny taste in my mouth, a kind of fizzing, like an effervescent candy had just dissolved on my tongue. The sensation quickly disappeared and I was trying to figure out what he was doing when he said a word I finally understood.
“Identify.”
“Identify?” I repeated dumbly. “Are you asking my name?”
He nodded once.
Shifting my weight, I answered tersely, “Lilliana Young. What’s yours?”
“Good. Come along, Young Lily, I have need of your assistance,” he said, forming his lips around the words like they left a bad taste in his mouth, and effectively ignoring my question.
Presuming I’d follow, he turned and plunged back through the plastic curtain. After a brief hesitation, my insatiable nosiness got the better of me, and unable to come up with another good option, I threw aside the curtain and followed. Light filled every corner of the once-dark room, and I found Model-boy sifting through items in a crate, tossing the discarded ones aside like rubbish.
“What exactly are you doing? Why are you dressed like that? And how can you suddenly speak English?”
“Too many questions, Young Lily. Please pick one.”
He lifted a heavy jar from the box. Closing his eyes, he spoke softly, melodically, in another language. After a moment, he shook his head, put the item back, and selected another.
“What are you doing?” I asked as he repeated the chant.
“I am seeking my jars of death.”
“Jars of death?” I paused. “Do you mean canopic jars? And what do you mean, ‘my’?”
“No more questions, Young Lily.”
“So,” I mumbled, stalling as I tried to figure out what exactly was going on, “you’re looking for canopic jars, aka death jars. I read about those recently in National Geographic. They’re the kind used for mummies. The ones their organs are kept in.”
“Yes.”
“Are you stealing them?”