Blood Lines

with the purchase and the packing and the insurance and the best the museum could afford was a Danish freighter heading out of Liverpool for Halifax. The ship left England on October 2nd. God and the North Atlantic willing, she'd reach Canada in ten days.
    Dr. Rax sent the two preparators back by plane and he himself traveled with the artifact. It was foolish, he knew, but he didn't want to be parted from it. Although the ship occasionally carried passengers, the accommodations were spartan and the meals, while nourishing, were plain. Dr. Rax didn't notice. Refused access to the cargo hold where he could be near the sarcophagus and the mummy he was sure it contained, he stayed as close as he could, caught up on paperwork, and at night lay in his narrow bunk and visualized the opening of the coffin.
    Sometimes, he removed the seal and slid the end panel up in the full glare of the media; the find of the century, on every news program and front page in the world. There'd be book contracts, and speaking tours, and years of research as the contents were studied, then removed to be studied further.
    Sometimes, it was just him and his staff, working slowly and meticulously. Pure science. Pure discovery. And still the years of research.
    He imagined the contents in every possible form or combination of forms. Some nights expanding on the descriptions, some nights simplifying. It wouldn't be a royal mummy-more likely a priest or an official of the court- and so hopefully would have missed the anointing with aromatic oils that had partially destroyed the mummy of Tutankhamen.
    He grew so aware of it that he felt he could go into the hold and pick its container out of hundreds of identical containers. His thoughts became filled with it to the exclusion of all else; of the sea, of the ship, of the sailors. One of the Portuguese sailors began making the sign against the evil eye whenever he approached.
    He started to speak to it each night before he slept.
    'Soon," he told it. "Soon."
    He remembered a face, thin and worried, bending over him and constantly muttering. He remembered a hand, the soft skin damp with sweat as it brushed his eyes closed. He remembered terror as he felt the fabric laid across his face. He remembered pain as the strip of linen that held the spell was wrapped around him and secured.
    But he couldn't remember self.
    He could sense only one ka, and that at such a distance he knew it must be reaching for him as he reached for it.
    "Soon," it told him. "Soon."
    He could wait.
    The air at the museum loading dock was so charged with suppressed excitement that even the driver of the van, a man laconic to the point of legend, became infected. He pulled the keys out of his pocket like he was pulling a rabbit out of a hat and opened the van doors with a flourish that added a silent Tah dah to the proceedings.
    The plywood packing crate, reinforced with two by twos and strapping, looked no different from any number of other crates that the Royal Ontario Museum had received over the years, but the entire Egyptology Department-none of whom had a reason to be down in Receiving-surged forward and Dr. Rax beamed like the Madonna must have beamed into the manger.
    Preparators did not usually unload trucks. They unloaded this one. And as much as he single-handedly wanted to carry the crate up to the workroom, Dr. Rax stood aside and let them get on with it. His mummy deserved the best.
    'Hail the conquering hero comes." Dr. Rachel Shane, the assistant curator, walked over to stand beside him. "Welcome back, Elias. You look a little tired."
    'I haven't been sleeping well," Dr. Rax admitted, rubbing eyes already rimmed with red. "Guilty conscience?"
    He snorted, recognizing she was teasing. "Strange dreams about being tied down and slowly suffocating."
    'Maybe you're being possessed." She nodded at the crate.
    He snorted again. "Maybe the Board of Directors has been trying to contact me." Glancing around, he scowled at the rest of his staff. "Don't you lot have anything better to do than stand around watching a wooden box come off a truck?"
    Only the newest grad student looked nervous, the others merely grinned and collectively shook their heads.
    Dr. Rax grinned as well; he couldn't help himself. He was exhausted and badly in need of something more sustaining than the coffee and fast food they'd consumed at every stop between Halifax and Toronto, but he'd also never felt this elated. This artifact had the potential to put