Leif slid the card into the slot and waited for the light above the doorknob to turn green. He quickly pushed down the handle and slipped into the room with Ezra on his heels. He flipped the lights on and surveyed the room.

   Ezra marched to the closet and pulled out a suitcase. He bent over and fastidiously began searching through every pocket. Leif reached under the bed and pulled out a laptop case and carried it over to the desk. Everything was exactly where he had left it. He was becoming more certain Esther was in Portland alone. He had already made a copy of the hard drive before returning the computer as a precaution. But he hadn't had time yet to download the hard drive's contents to his laptop.

   He grabbed a piece of hotel stationery, folded it in half, and slid it over the small camera at the top of the monitor before turning it on. The computer took a minute to load. Seconds later, Leif had disabled the GPS locator, remote access, and wireless connection. He sorted through the computer's documents while Ezra emptied each drawer and packed the contents into Esther's suitcase.

   Leif swore under his breath. "I can't read any of it. It's all in Hebrew, Arabic..." he pulled up another document, "and I don't know what this is. It has Latin letters. Turkish?"

   Ezra stopped and turned toward Leif. "Let me look at it. Just pack everything."

   Ezra glanced through the pages Leif left open on the screen. There were half a dozen pages in Hebrew. They were notes about people... dozens of people... where they were born and where they went. At first glance, he couldn't tell who the people were— if they were mortals or Avati.

   The next few pages weren't Arabic. They were written in Soranî, but Ezra didn't expect Leif to recognize a Kurdish dialect from Arabic. It was a confusing story about a man named Felat and his grandson Payan. The page in Turkish was a discussion about the excavation of Çatalhöyük. Ezra smiled. That was the modern name they had given to the ancient city. He closed his eyes and tried to remember the name of the town when he lived there, but it seemed to have vanished from his memory.

   He was very young when he lived there. He had marveled at the maze of buildings and the throngs of people. He hadn't known that many people existed in the world and couldn't believe there could be so many in one place. Thousands of people had lived and died there. As far as he knew, it was the first city in the world. The page was discussing in detail the human remains found in most of the city dwellings. The excavators believed the people buried their dead inside their homes. Ezra smirked. Of course, that wasn't true. Only the family's spirit protectors were buried inside the house, chosen by the elders for some quality they possessed. They were usually under the hearth or under a bed if someone in the family was ill, to guard the home against wandering demons. Ezra remembered a beautiful girl, nine or maybe ten years old. She was charming, full of wonder, and she was a favorite of one of the old men in the city. He had her killed and buried under his new hearth. He also remembered the girl's young mother. The old man was too arrogant to know he was already doomed.

   Ezra closed the files and shut down the computer. Everything seemed to be some kind of research. He'd have time to study it later. None of it was relevant to Esther hunting Kaja.

   Leif grabbed the phone charger from the nightstand and, with an afterthought, pulled open the small drawer. Something rattled in the back. He reached in and pulled out a couple slips of paper and a small silver object about three inches long in the shape of a hexagon. One of the receipts was from a local private detective. Leif looked at the silver object.

   "It's the scabbard." He tossed it to Ezra. It was beautifully designed with elaborately detailed etchings of deer and cranes carved into the surface. Early eighteenth century, he thought as he traced his thumb down the design. A small clip protruded from its side to hold it in place on a belt or stocking. Daggers like this one were meant to be ornamental. "She bought it from an antique auction house in Washington a week ago," Leif continued gesturing to the other receipt.

   "She was on a mission." Ezra slid the scabbard into his back pocket. He zipped up the suitcase, and Leif picked up the hotel Bible from the drawer. He sat on the bed and flipped through the pages. The Bible fell open halfway through, and Leif chuckled in surprise.

   "She had money hidden in the Bible," he said, flipping through the cash. "About seven hundred dollars... all hundreds. Not that much, considering." Leif slid the money into his pocket.

   "Which book?" Ezra asked. Leif's eyebrows shot up. It was not a question he was expecting or anything he considered to be important. "Job."

   "Where the devil makes a bet with God."

   "So, which of you is the devil, and which is God?" Ezra scowled at him and turned away. Both, he thought to himself.

   "Did you check the safe already?"  

   Leif shook his head. "I couldn't, not without alerting someone that I was here. Someone might notice." Ezra walked to the safe and gripped the handle with his right hand. Hotel safes were anything but. It was pitifully easy to break into them with a flick of his wrist. He slammed his palm down onto the top of the safe with his left hand and turned the handle with his right. The door popped open with ease.   

   Ezra pulled out the contents and spread them onto the bed. There were two passports, Israeli and Turkish, both were issued to Esther with different surnames. There was also a Turkish identification card issued in Istanbul.

   "The ID in her wallet is from Israel," Leif said. "She must be actively splitting her time between both countries."

   Ezra was puzzled. It was a lot of work to maintain two complete identities simultaneously. He understood the need to keep many residences. Still, he seldom needed to keep multiple identities on hand unless he was planning to disappear. If Esther was going to disappear, was she going to Turkey or leaving it?

   Leif searched through the rest of the papers. He picked up a collection of airline tickets stapled together. "She flew here from Turkey. There was a return flight scheduled for the end of May." He pulled out an envelope from under the tickets and handed it to Ezra.

   It was addressed to Esther in Bodrum; the return address was in Istanbul. Ezra pulled out a formal letter discussing her Visa for the United States. There was a handwritten note in Turkish at the bottom that read: Your work must take precedence. You have one month, no longer.

He opened up the Turkish passport and looked at the Visa inside. It permitted a ninety-day stay that had expired nearly three weeks before, long past the deadline. He handed the paper to Leif and nodded.

   He picked up the suitcase and started toward the door. Leif reached into his pocket for Esther's money and pulled out a hundred dollar bill. He left it for the maid on the desk before following Ezra out the door.

   Ezra's mind was working as he headed for the car. What was her work that took precedence? He was invested in the mystery now. He needed to see what she was doing. That meant he had to go to Turkey.

   He was going home.

I stayed in bed in the dark, listening to the sounds of a silent house. The moon was rising outside the window when I heard Ezra tiptoe into the room. I tracked the sounds of his light footsteps and the rustle of his clothing as he undressed. I heard a thud as he set something heavy down onto the nightstand. The mattress sank and sifted as he crawled into bed and curled onto his side, facing me.

   "Why did you have Wu bring me a new identity?"

   "Because you need one. It's more of a precaution, but you'll need it."

   "So, I'm supposed to live the next few years of my life moving from place to place with someone else's identity?"

   He was quiet for a few seconds. "You're going to spend the rest of your life moving from place to place with false identities. It's what we do."

   I suddenly felt very foolish. I had only been thinking about the immediate. My future of half-spoken lies and new identities was remote and distant, for another time and another person.

   "So, what now?"

   Ezra told me quietly what he found in the hotel room. After leaving, he had dropped the clothing and suitcase at the loading dock behind a Goodwill.

   "I don't yet understand what it is about, but she had clearly been doing some kind of research for many years."

   "If she'd been researching it for years, then it can't have anything to do with me or us."

   He rolled over onto his back, resting his hands on his stomach but kept his head turned toward me. "Maybe, but we won't know for certain until we go there and find out. We will go to Turkey and see what she was doing there. Leif will go to her house in Tel Aviv. Wu and Ása will continue to research Asclepius and Göncöl and look for anyone else who matches your description."

   Asclepius and Göncöl... our quest to unravel the mystery of what I was, and my puzzling power seemed like decades ago. Had it really only been a few days? It almost seemed insignificant. But Ezra hadn't forgotten. It had never left his mind.

   "Wu's company has a house in Kaş he keeps for business. He will let us use it for as long as we need."

   "You don't have a house in Turkey?" I was surprised. "Of all the countries in the world, that is the one place I assumed you would always have a home."

   "I used to. It was torn down about fifty years ago. Most houses built at that time didn't last long. But, you're right. I have lived in Anatolia more than anywhere else."

   I stayed silent for a while, lost in thought. Ezra rolled over to face me again. When he finally spoke, his voice quivered slightly in concern. "If you don't want to, we won't go. We can stay here." I looked up at him, surprised. The possibility hadn't occurred to me.

   "You would do that?"

   "Of course, I would."

   He said it so sensibly as if the answer was so obvious it hardly bared mentioning.

   "Turkey then," I nodded. He nodded back.

   I lay silent, listening to Ezra breathe steadily. "What has that?" I asked after a while.

   "What?"

   "The heavy thing you set on the nightstand."

   He didn't answer but rolled over and switched on the lamp. I saw a silver tube-shaped object in his hand. He set it gently in my palm. It had many sides and was as long as my hand, with an elaborate swirl design across its surface. I realized what it was.

   It was Esther's knife, the one she intended to use on me. It looked so innocuous tucked away in its shell. I pulled it from its scabbard and ran my fingers along the blade. It felt dull to my inexperienced fingers. How could anything so small and beautiful kill anyone?

   "It's yours now," Ezra said. "You won it." I returned the blade to its sheath and curled my fingers around it carefully.

   I won it.

   Ezra walked down the stairs from my apartment a few steps behind me with my suitcase in his hand. I had thrown what I could find into a small bag, not particularly concerned about what found its way into it. Ezra spent the time making jokes about women's obsessive packing behavior, a trait I noticeably lacked, to his increasing amusement and pleasure. 

   I couldn't summon the interest to worry about clothing when I had no idea how long we'd be gone or where exactly we'd go. I pushed open the main door to my building, intending to hold it open for Ezra since he was burdened with the bag, and I nearly bumped into someone at the threshold. Detective Aguirre was standing on the stoop. He looked at me with an equally stunned expression and moved back down a step.

   "Miss Landauer." 

   He was dressed casual chic and still fastidiously neat. His hair swept back away from his warm russet skin and curled in soft waves behind his ears. The air felt warm around him, and he smelled like summer... sunshine and lemongrass, and honey.   

   "Hello, Detective." His eyes shifted over my shoulder and narrowed slightly as Ezra stepped up behind me. "Were you coming to see me?" I asked.

   "Ah... y-yes," he stammered slightly. "I stopped by yesterday, but you weren't home. I thought I'd try my luck again today." I continued down the steps with Ezra on my heels and stopped next to the Land Rover.

   Aguirre watched Ezra as he stooped to set the bag down. "Oh, I'm sorry. This is Ezra."

   Ezra stepped around me and held out his hand, "Her husband."

   Aguirre looked back at me, surprised once again. "Husband? I never saw anything about you being married."

   "It's recent," Ezra answered.

   "Saw? Have you been researching me?" I was more amused than bothered by the idea. Whatever Detective Aguirre's intentions were, I was confident they weren't malicious.

   He nodded. "Of course. You're a lead witness in my case." Ezra shifted his weight next to me. He didn't like being in the dark in any situation, and his irritation was showing.

   "Detective Aguirre was the man I met with regarding Curtis Pope's death." I turned pointedly toward him for an instant before turning back to Aguirre. Ezra nodded casually. He stepped closer to the car and leaned comfortably against the side with his hands resting half in his pockets. He mastered the appearance of complete ease but never took his eyes off the Detective. He managed to look as if he was standing straight and powerful while relaxing casually. Aguirre stood up straighter. The smell of masculine bravado permeated the air. 

   "What can I do for you, Detective?"

   "Martin," he said. I stared back at him, confused. "It's my name. You don't need to call me Detective." He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a short pile of photographs. "I was wondering if you would look at this." He handed me a photo from the top of the collection. It was an image of the message Esther had scrawled onto the wall just before she tried to kill me. My heart thumped, and my skin prickled as I looked at the image. Ezra tensed almost imperceptibly.

   "It's another quote." I tried to keep my voice even and measured. I was sure only Ezra could hear the tension underneath. "I think it's also from the book of Jeremiah. It seems to be the same theme; the Angel of Death coming to destroy the world." I handed the photo back to him. He took it and slid it gently back into his pocket. "There doesn't seem to be anything new. Why show it to me?"

   "Just covering all the bases, in case you see or recognize something I didn't." His eyes slid to the side toward the Land Rover and glanced at Ezra, leaning against the car.

   "Did you find a body with it?" The corners of his lips pulling slightly, but he didn't answer.

   "Right," I said more to myself than to him. "Well, I wish I could help you more, but we are on our way out of town." Aguirre raised a questioning eyebrow.

   "Honeymoon," Ezra answered with a smile that was just a little too bright and glared at him.

   Well, that's one word for it, I thought. 

   "Ah, yes. Congratulations." He held out his hand and smiled at me. His skin felt warm and pleasant. He wrapped his right hand around mine and covered it with his left, using both of his hands to clasp mine. He nodded to Ezra politely and turned to walk back to his car.

   I turned to Ezra. He was still leaning against the car, watching Aguirre walk away.

   "If you're finished throwing your testosterone around, we can go."

   He gave me a hard look and stood. He picked up the suitcase and set it in the trunk. Then he unlocked the passenger door and stepped back, holding it for me as I climbed in. "I don't need to throw testosterone around to prove I'm a man." I made a small noise of exasperation as he walked around the car.

   "What did he find there besides Esther's quote?"

   "Nothing but a small amount of blood."

   I frowned. "Why just a small amount?"

   "The electricity cauterizes the wound almost immediately."

   I spent the rest of the drive to the airport thinking about Esther and then trying desperately not to think about Esther. Esther's dagger... my dagger was nestled safely in the bottom of my luggage. I had to bring it, although I couldn't exactly explain why.

Next stop, Turkey.

TEASER: "I was there," I said. "When I was dying... or dead. There was wind everywhere... and a man with a boy."

Ooh, wonder what this is.