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  Annja cast a quick look back at the Young Wolves. She reckoned them to be big law-and-order guys. But they might've reserved that for U.S. cops. Their own pallor and posture suggested they were as nervous about the National Police, whose manner definitely seemed to live up to their internationally fearsome reputation even if they hadn't actually done anything yet, as Annja herself was.

  The man in the maroon beret actually saluted. Then he turned and started barking orders at the camo-clad troops.

  "Whoa," Tommy said.

  "Yeah," Josh Fairlie agreed.

  The National Police started hustling back to their vehicles. The tubby guy bustled back toward the bus. He was grinning hugely beneath a colossal black moustache.

  The driver opened the door for him before he reached it. Either he knew the man or figured, wisely, that anyone who could make the National Police hop like that was not somebody a mere bus driver wanted to keep waiting. An icy gust whipped fine snow into Annja's face.

  The man mounted the steps and stuck his head in the door. "Never to fear, dear friends!" he called out in thickly accented English. "Atabeg is on the case! The police, they pull back and let us go."

  "Thank God," Josh said. He seemed to have the most acute understanding of all his crew of just how deep a pot they were in.

  "Yes, yes!" the newcomer chortled. "Thank God! And also Mr. Atabeg."

  "Thank you, Mr. Atabeg," the whole bus chorused as one.

  He smiled, bobbed his head, waved cheerily and withdrew. As he waddled back to the car Tommy said, "What do you suppose that was all about?"

  "No clue," Jason said. "Just be glad he's on our side."

  "Amen, brother," Josh said.

  * * *

  THE CITY OF SIVAS LAY in eastern Anatolia, halfway between Ankara and Erzurum. Erzurum being the point, Annja gathered, at which things would get really interesting.

  "Once upon a time," she murmured, half to herself, "this would've been a caravanserai."

  "And nowadays," Jason Pennigrew said, "it's a crappy building made out of cinderblocks, with attached truck-stop café."

  "The Brits call a place like this a transport caff," Trish said brightly.

  "Ah, the Pommies," Wilfork sighed, plummily seating himself in a booth with a cracked vinyl back. "Masters of euphemism."

  The restaurant on the strip development outside Sivas had been closed when they pulled in. Apparently Mr. Atabeg, probably with help from money, had talked the motel management into unlocking the restaurant and letting the group in to fire up the grills and cook themselves a late meal. Like a lot of fairly similar facilities Annja had visited in the interior USA, the look and general feel of the place suggested it had been all chrome-and-Formica shiny and clean when new. It was chilly and shabby now. About a quarter of the fluorescent lights were lit, casting a jittering, dispiriting illumination that made the place feel closed. The diner smelled of stale cooking oil and illicit, harsh cigarette smoke.

  As if to add to the ambiance, Wilfork lit his own smoke.

  "Do you mind not smoking in here?" Jason and Josh said in unison. They looked at each other and grinned sheepishly.

  "Yes," the journalist drawled. "In fact I do mind not smoking in here."

  He took a deep drag. "Welcome to Sebasteia," he said.

  "What was it called in the Bible?" Eli Holden asked. He sat with most of the other acolytes around a table in the middle of the room. He was a wiry guy, an inch or two shorter than Annja, with red hair curly on top and shorn short on the sides of a head that seemed to sprout on a stalk of neck from shoulders well-roped with muscle. He had lots of freckles and his eyes were a murky green. He said little. When he did the others listened, with what seemed more like wariness than actual attention. He seemed to specialize in doing what he was told and asking no questions—which made this one doubly surprising.

  "It belonged to the Hittite Kingdom in those days," Levi said. "Not much is known of the place before Caesar's fellow triumvir Pompey built a city here called Megalopolis, or Big Town. Around the end of the first century, though, the name was changed to Sebasteia, deriving from sebastos, a Greek translation of the title assumed by the first Roman emperor, Augustus. The current name evolved from that. The name Sebastian originally meant, 'a man from Sivas.'"

  "Wow," Tommy said. "You mean everybody named Sebastian's named after this dump?"

  Levi smiled and bobbed his head. "Yes. Exactly."

  The Young Wolves looked at him as if they didn't know what to make of him, as if a winged squirrel had landed in their midst or something. Annja didn't think they'd normally be the types to take too kindly to being lectured by a know-it-all. Especially one who happened to be a Jew. Yet if anything they had been well trained to obedience, and Rabbi Leibowitz had been hired by their master Charlie precisely to know it all.

  Anyway, unlike way too many intellectuals and academics of Annja's experience, there was no smug air of superiority about Levi when he engaged in one of his info-dumps. It all came out matter-of-factly. If you asked what he knew, he politely told you. And her associates from New York were staring at the rabbi about the same way the acolytes were.

  "No fooling?" Josh asked, a little weakly.

  "No fooling," Levi said solemnly.

  Annja was with Tommy. She hadn't known about the origin of the name Sebastian, either. She disagreed about his opinion of Sivas, though. She could see how he'd be a bit prejudiced right now. The adrenaline rush of their early-hour escape from the potential death-trap of the Sheraton Tower had subsided into the usual ash-and-cold-water gruel of depression and vague dissatisfaction; the sudden vengeful fall of winter further chilling their spirits; and the encounter with the surly, heavily armed National Police more a cattle-prod shock to the fear gland than anything to produce even another temporary adrenaline-dump high.

  All that, plus the not-very-inspiring nature of the closed truck-stop café, may have colored his judgment on Sivas. Or not. The city lay in a wide valley along the Kizilirmak or Red River, amid wide winter-fallow grain fields and sprawling factories, whose lighting, actinic blue through blowing snow, suggested they never lay fallow. It might have been a pleasant setting in spring.

  A gust of wind threw some larger clumps of snow against the big front window, making everybody jump and turn. The door opened, admitting a swirl of wintry air. Charlie Bostitch stomped in, hugging himself and blowing, followed by Leif Baron and Mr. Atabeg. Larry Taitt brought up the rear like a puppy following its humans. Charlie wore a tan London Fog trench coat, Larry a black version of same, Baron a bulky jacket and a pair of earmuffs clamped over his bald dome. Atabeg wore just his suit and fez and seemed comfortable as well as indefatigably cheery.

  "Well, we're good for the night," Baron announced, moving into the center of the room. "We won't have to show our passports, either."

  "Under the circumstances," the local guide said, "the management saw the wisdom of such a course of action. Atabeg helped them see the way, of course."

  "Whatever," Jason said. He stood up out of a booth. "So who's cooking?"

  "We can play rock-paper-scissors for it," Tommy said, holding up a fist.

  Baron showed teeth in a brief smile. "Not necessary. Zeb and Jeb—kitchen. See what they've got and report back."

  The twins disappeared into the kitchen. One of them came back a moment later. He was still wearing his heavy jacket open over a blue shirt. So was his brother, so it was no use for identification purposes.

  "They have ground beef in the freezer and even burger buns," he reported.

  "It's a truck stop," Trish said to no one in particular. "What'd you expect?"

  "Something Eastern European, given most of the long-range lorry drivers on this route," Wilfork said. He stubbed the cigarette out in a red ceramic dish. "Still, burgers do seem peculiarly appropriate. Cook on!"

  Everybody else agreed. So did Annja, somewhat to her surprise. She enjoyed eating the food of the area she was working in, and particularly liked Turkish
food, as it happened. But sometimes a hamburger just sounded right.

  Trish seemed to read her expression. "Me, too," she said. "We're such Americans."

  Josh frowned. "You say that as if it's a bad thing."

  "What about you, Rabbi?" Annja asked hastily. "Are you all right with burgers?"

  "Hold the cheese," he said with a smile.

  What Annja thought was the other twin came out wearing a white apron. "Good news," he said. "We have the makings for milk shakes, too. Chocolate, vanilla. Strawberry if you don't mind it made out of preserves."

  "Any soy?" Trish asked.

  "No. 'Fraid not."

  Trish made a face. "I'll take yogurt. It's Turkey. Surely they have yogurt."

  The twin nodded. "There's yogurt."

  "Well, I don't know about anybody else," Charlie Bostitch said, "but I could go for a milk shake. What about you, Ms. Creed?"

  "Absolutely," she said with a smile.

  Trish turned her a look as if to say, you traitor. Annja started to smile it off, but then got a weird unsettling feeling Trish was actually mad at her.

  She shook her head. You're getting weird and silly, she told herself. Fatigue poisons are messing with your mind and emotions, that's all.

  Everybody else wanted milk shakes, even Jason and Tommy. The twin returned into the kitchen, from which the sound of sizzling beef now came. Everyone seemed to sink into a sort of mellow fugue state. Pleased to be alive and free and safe for the moment.

  Whatever happened next.

  Chapter 11

  "So," Trish said, peering out the window at the landscape rolling by the battered, drafty, rattling bus, "do you think these sheep are where they get angora from? I mean, it's named after Ankara, right?"

  The provincial capital of Erzurum lay in high country at the eastern end of Anatolia and Turkey. Annja, who had been charmed by Sivas, ancient Sebasteia or not, was less enamored of Erzurum.

  They passed through mountains and tall mesas, and between them snow-covered plains dotted by occasional herds of depressed-looking sheep, huddled closely together against wind that was often snow-laden and never seemed to let up buffeting the bus.

  "We're a long way from Ankara, man," Tommy said. He sat with his Mets cap turned around backward and a disgruntled look on his face.

  "It's still the Anatolian Plateau, isn't it, Annja?" Jason asked.

  "Yes."

  He shrugged. "So maybe."

  "Angora is made from the hair of goats," Robyn Wilfork said authoritatively. He laid aside the copy of Der Spiegel he'd bought along with a sheaf of other multilingual magazines at a truck stop west of Sivas. He sat behind the CHM contingent, between them and the Rehoboam Christian Leadership Academy group at the back of the bus, in front of massed luggage. "Also rabbits, peculiarly enough."

  "Seriously?" Trish asked.

  "Seriously," Wilfork said, sounding sober as a bishop. Which he was, unless he'd managed to smuggle a hip flask aboard and hit it while nobody was looking. Annja didn't think he had.

  "Is that right, Annja?" Trish asked.

  "I think so. Textiles and fabric arts are a little out of my line, though. I'm more up on old manuscripts and stuff you dig up out of the ground. Artifacts, I mean. Not metals and minerals or anything."

  "So you don't know anything about sheep."

  "No."

  Trish sighed and turned her snub-nosed face back to the window.

  "If it makes you feel better," Wilfork said solicitously, "Erzurum did garner a modicum of fame for massacres during the Armenian genocide."

  Trish had nothing to say to that.

  The roadside motel where they overnighted outside of Sivas boasted beds with the consistency of butcher blocks. Exhausted from sheer stress, Annja had slept as she usually did—totally, deeply, bonelessly and ever alert to snap to instant wakefulness. She had slept in worse places. Many and much worse.

  Most of her companions on the bus, it seemed, had on the other hand slept badly, fitfully, and were prone to complain loudly about it.

  "Are we there yet?" Trish asked from the seat where she sprawled across from Annja. She had her arm laid across the foam stuffing spilling from the split seat top. "God, I sound like a little kid. But I'm so bored."

  "You can join our Bible study group if you want," Larry Taitt said brightly. For the current leg of the journey Charlie Bostitch had Josh Fairlie driving for him, Baron and the irrepressible Mr. Atabeg. Larry was in full-on tour director mode, doing his bright-eyed, toothpaste-ad-smile best to keep everybody's spirits up. If anything it was having the opposite effect.

  Annja turned to peer out the window. Although it was only the middle of the afternoon the iron-colored overcast sky and the sporadically falling light snow turned everything to twilight. Half of the scene was fuzzed out by condensation on the window caused by the cold. Hoping no one would notice, she began to draw stick figures in the condensation. Growing up in hot New Orleans she'd had little chance to do that as a little girl. It still secretly fascinated her.

  Snow, on the other hand, had already long since lost its capacity to thrill her. If it hadn't the last couple days would've killed it off for sure. And she hadn't even had to be out in it much yet.

  "So, Rabbi," Jason said. He sat two seats up from Annja on the far side of the bus, with his long legs stretched out into the aisle. "What do you think? Is Noah's Ark really up on this mountain we're going to?"

  That awoke a growl from someone in the back of the bus. Annja tensed. But Levi laid aside his own reading matter and sat up adjusting his glasses on his nose with a happy smile. The only thing he loved as much as his studies was talking about them.

  "Well, Mr. Pennigrew," he said, "you should first understand there are numerous Flood myths."

  "That's why we're so sure of the truth of the Biblical account," Larry said. "Well, along with our faith, of course. But the worldwide accounts of a deluge corroborate the Genesis story."

  "Ah, but do they, Mr. Taitt? The ancient Akkadians and the Sumerians had very similar Flood myths that predate Genesis by a millennium or more," Levi said.

  "Sure," Jeb said. "They're talking about the same thing."

  "They certainly could be recounting the same myth," Levi said. "The staying power of myth is simply wonderful."

  "Of truth," said Zach Thompson, the muscular and to Annja's mind overly tightly wound ex-marine. "The power of truth."

  "Perhaps," Levi said, head bobbing happily, eyes alight. "Ah, but which truth?"

  "The truth of God," Zeb said, sounding more puzzled than anything else. "What other kind is there?"

  "To be sure, my young friend. But how well do we discern the truth? For example, in the Biblical account, Ararat clearly refers to a mountain range. In all probability it has nothing to do with the giant cinder cone which currently bears that name."

  "Aren't there, like, two different accounts of the whole Ark thing in the Old Testament, anyway?" Tommy asked. "I seem to remember from my Sunday school classes that one says there was one pair of each kind of animal, and then there's like another than says there were seven types of some animals and only pairs of others."

  That was what Annja remembered as well. She felt it better to stay out of this. Sure, her sympathies lay with her fellow Chasing History's Monsters staff from New York. But she was acutely aware of being stuck in the middle here. Taking sides wouldn't help things go smoothly, and the worst risks and hardship still lay ahead. She knew how tensions could build up to the point of erupting in unreasonable outbursts of anger on the most conventional expedition. This one was anything but.

  Larry laughed. "But that's easy," he said, sounding genuinely delighted to be able to clear everything up. "If there's seven of some kinds of animals, there's at least a pair of them, right? So there isn't any contradiction."

  Both Jason and Trish sat up straighter, ready to hit that like a bass spotting a juicy worm. Levi spoke before they could, obliviously. Or maybe not; Annja wondered.

  "If
only things were so simple," Levi said. "There are other explanations, too, after all. The Babylonian account claims the gods determined to flood the whole world basically because humans made too much noise, and it bothered them. In that version the ark-builder is named Utnapishtim. He was a friend of Gilgamesh, of Epic fame."

  "Wasn't he the dude that won immortality?" Jason asked.

  "Well…the standard accounts claim that Gilgamesh tried, and failed. But certain tablets claim he made it. Then again, there's a Flood account in the apocryphal First Book of Enoch, apparently dating to the second century BCE, as you secular archaeologists like to term it, which claims it was intended to wipe out the Nephilim, a race of evil giants gotten by angels on the daughters of men."