The Collar of the Two Skies Chapter 28

  Chapter 28 Twenty Seconds 

The twenty-four-hour mystical window of the Autumn Equinox had begun to tick since midnight, but for Remi-Bise, the first twenty-one hours had slipped away in a bureaucratic nightmare of utter absurdity.

In the veterinary office at Terminal 3 of Cairo International Airport, the air conditioning could barely cope with the heat outside. The room smelled pungently of Turkish coffee with cardamom, cheap tobacco, and old paper. An Egyptian official with a thick moustache and glasses on a cord had repeated the same infuriating chorus to them since the first hour of the morning: ‘The Ministry of Agriculture’s electronic system is blocked. Return after afternoon prayers.’ Then a special fee was required, which could only be paid at Terminal 1, followed by a missing stamp on the legalised copy of the anti-rabies certificate from Ireland.

From inside the plastic carrier, Remi felt her heart thumping like a drum. Yet above the panic, a mystical tingling had begun to spread across her neck. Beneath the long, immaculate fur of her Angora coat, the spherical bead of the Collar of the Two Skies had begun to pulse. A fine, electric vibration agitated her more and more. The portal was open, the forces of day and night were in perfect balance across the globe, and she was captive beneath piles of folders on paper-clip files.

Only at 21:30, when the officials were already packing up their things, did Professor Simoon manage, through one final diplomatic plea, to wrest the signed paperwork.

‘We have the documents!’ Anemo cried, snatching up the carrier. ‘But we only have two and a half hours left!’

When they stepped out into the airport car park, nocturnal Cairo hit them in the face like a living organism, noisy and hot. Even in September, the thermometers showed twenty-eight degrees. The air was dense, heavy with desert dust, jet fuel, and the scent of mint shawarma from the street stalls. The city did not sleep; it was barely waking to life under an explosion of green neons from the minarets of mosques and gaudy luminous advertisements.

They climbed hurriedly into an old taxi, a black-and-white model that smelled of burnt fuel and dust. The professor shouted the destination to the driver in Arabic, promising a huge bonus in dollars if they reached Tahrir Square quickly.

What followed was an ordeal. In Cairo, traffic lanes were merely a suggestion, and the horn was the sole language of survival. The taxi allowed itself to be sucked onto the suspended highway, the ’6 October Bridge’, where traffic ground to a complete halt. Cars were bumper-to-bumper for miles. Young Egyptians stood leaning against the viaducts to catch their breath, whilst from the distorted speakers of ramshackle cars blared a deafening oriental music.

Anemo stared at the phone screen, feeling a cold sweat wash over him. 22:45... 23:15... 23:30.

‘We’re not going to make it, Father...’ he whispered, clutching the carrier to his chest.

Beneath Remi’s fur, the bead was pulsing so powerfully now that small navy flashes reflected through the plastic bars, leaving specks of light on Anemo’s shirt. The collar sensed its twin sister in the city and screamed for her across space.

At 23:40, the taxi braked violently at the edge of Tahrir Square. The Egyptian Museum loomed before them — a massive, neoclassical building of a faded crimson-pink in the glare of the spotlights. The monumental iron gates had been bolted since five o'clock in the afternoon.

Professor Simoon did not hesitate. He dragged Anemo towards a side wooden door, hidden in the shadow of the museum garden. There a short silhouette dressed in civilian clothes awaited them — a former archaeologist colleague who now worked in the museum administration. The professor slipped a thick stack of banknotes into his hand.

‘Ten minutes,’ the Egyptian whispered to them, unlocking the door with a dry metallic click. ‘Only ten minutes. The armed patrol in the Square passes exactly at midnight. If they catch you, I do not know you.’

They entered the semi-darkness of the museum. The vast galleries were plunged into monstrous shadows cast by stone sarcophagi and statues of pharaohs who seemed to watch them with fixed eyes. Guided only by the dim light of a torch and the intensifying vibration of the cat, Anemo dashed up the old wooden stairs that creaked under their weight, ascending to the first floor, into the royal jewellery room.

‘Here it is!’ the Professor gasped, stopping before a showcase of solid wood and thick glass.

Beneath the dusty glass, bearing the label ‘Exhibit No. 1420’, the other Collar of the Two Skies was already glowing in the dark, pulsing in the mirror with a deep navy light. The two pieces had found their resonance.

Anemo opened the carrier with trembling fingers and lifted Remi out. Her Angora fur parted, revealing the spherical bead that sparkled like a small piece of solidified night. The man lifted the cat in his arms, pressing her paws against the glass of the showcase, right in front of the original artefact.

The match was instantaneous. The day register of one collar met the night register of the other. The air in the museum room suddenly became dense, electric, smelling of ozone and ancient incense. A blinding light, a mixture of solar turquoise and mystical navy, flooded the showcase, projecting onto the glass.

Remi closed her eyes, feeling the energy course through her small body. On the glass of the showcase, her reflection began to change. The outline of a white cat dissolved like an illusion, and in its place, the tall, elegant silhouette of the writer Remi under human form began to outline itself. She barely suppressed a sigh of relief. There was only one step left, a single second for the transformation to pass from reflection into reality...

Bip. Bip.

Anemo’s phone screen lit up in the background. The clock showed 00:00. The twenty-four hours of the Equinox were over.

Instantly, the mystical light in the room vanished like a blown bulb. The air became cold and inert again. The silhouette of a woman on the glass perished in a fraction of a second, and Remi fell back onto her paws on the wooden floor, letting out a heartbreaking, despairing mew. They were late by less than twenty seconds. The portal had closed, and she remained stuck in the body of a cat.