1922 — Cairo
Joana Carnahan had learned early that Cairo rewarded those who listened more than they spoke.
The city breathed in layers—dust and incense, river water and ink, sweat and sun-warmed stone. It spoke in a dozen languages at once, some alive, some half-dead, and a few that had never truly gone silent.
Joana moved through it with the quiet competence of someone who understood that history was not a thing behind glass, but something that could still reach out and grab you if you were careless.
She stood at the edge of a dig site just outside Giza, skirts practical, sleeves rolled despite the heat, a notebook tucked beneath her arm.
The excavation was orderly which was rare, considering the number of egos involved—but that was precisely why the Museum had sent her.
"Miss Carnahan," the foreman called, lifting his hat. "The French team wants to shift the trench again."
Joana didn't look away from the site. "They've shifted it three times already."
"They say the strata—"
"—hasn't changed since yesterday," she finished calmly, switching into French without effort. "And if they undermine the retaining wall, the Antiquities Department will shut us down for a month. Tell them no."
The foreman blinked, nodded, and hurried off.
Joana did not notice how easily the language had come. She never did. Words—Arabic, French, German, Italian, scraps of Greek and Latin—settled into her mouth as naturally as breath. People remarked on it often. Joana always smiled, said she'd picked it up traveling with her parents; the great adventurers, Howard and Anya Carnahan, known throughout Egypt.
Which was true.
Mostly.
"Joana!"
Evelyn's voice cut through the heat, bright and breathless. She hurried across the sand, skirts gathered, curls already escaping their pins, clutching a stack of papers like a shield.
"You promised you'd come back soon," Evelyn said, planting herself squarely in Joana's path.
"I said I'd come back after the inspection," Joana replied mildly. "I didn't specify how long it would take."
Evelyn huffed. "Mr. Allen wants the accession records finished before luncheon, and Mrs. Whitcomb insists the Book of the Dead display needs reorganizing again."
Joana arched an eyebrow. "Again?"
"She says the lighting makes it feel ominous."
"It's for a reproduction of a funerary text, Evie."
"Yes, but apparently not tastefully ominous."
Joana's lips twitched. "All right. I'm finished here."
As they walked, Evelyn glanced sideways at her sister—the easy authority in her stride, the way people stepped aside without thinking, the quiet gravity she carried without effort.
"You were speaking French just now," Evelyn said. "And Arabic earlier. And Italian yesterday."
Joana shrugged. "It helps smooth things over."
Evelyn hesitated. "How do you just… know all of it?"
Joana paused, searching for an answer that didn't quite exist. "Practice," she said at last, and squeezed Evelyn's arm. "Come on. If we're late, Mrs. Whitcomb will reorganize us."
---
Their parents had always planned for contingencies. They had to even legendary adventures were still suceptible to the dangers of the desert.
The Carnahans were not ostentatiously wealthy, but they were careful—quietly influential. Patrons of the Cairo Museum. Known in academic circles. Their mother cultivated friendships with scholars and donors alike; their father invested with an eye toward longevity, not spectacle.
They believed in preservation. In responsibility. In preparing for the worst even when the present felt secure.
So when they boarded a small passenger plane returning from the discovery of their life King Tut's tomb, neither Joana nor Evelyn thought to worry.
The crash was sudden.
Mechanical failure, the official report said. An unavoidable tragedy. The wreckage was found scattered across the desert, metal twisted and burned beneath an unforgiving sun. There were no survivors.
The news reached Cairo in whispers before it arrived in print.
Some spoke of bad luck. Some of carelessness. And some—quietly, cautiously—spoke of curses.
Artifacts disturbed. Tombs opened. Old names spoken aloud.
Joana heard the murmurs and dismissed them with a clenched jaw. Grief made people foolish. Fear made them superstitious.
Still, the words lingered.
The aftermath unfolded with brutal efficiency. Legal documents surfaced. Accounts transferred. Letters were delivered—sealed, deliberate, unmistakably their parents' hand.
The nest egg. The favors called in. The assurances.
The Museum of Egyptian Antiquities did not abandon them.
Joana's position at the Museum solidified; her reputation smoothed the transition. Evelyn, brilliant and eager, was offered a junior librarian post—an opportunity few her age received.
No one questioned it. The Carnahans had always been respected.
Life, somehow, continued.
---
The night after her parents dual funeral,
Joana dreamed of sand.
It stretched endlessly beneath a starless sky. The air vibrated with low chanting—ancient, rhythmic, and wrong. She stood barefoot, the grains warm beneath her feet, aware of something vast pressing at the edges of the dream.
Watching.
She turned, heart pounding.
There was no face. No body. Only presence—old, immense, and patient.
Waiting.
Joana woke with a sharp gasp, the echo of chanting still ringing in her ears. Her hands trembled as she pressed them to her chest.
"Stress," she whispered into the dark. "Just stress."
She did not sleep again that night.
---
Deep beneath the desert, sealed in stone and silence, something ancient stirred—not in thought, not in awareness, but in response.
A ripple.
A distant touch against an existence that had not been meant to feel anything at all.
Then, once more, there was only darkness.