“Did you manage to turn up anything?” Lara asked Jonah over breakfast.
“Roman gods and monsters,” said Jonah.
“About what I’d found,” Lara agreed. She showed him her tablet, displaying a family tree of sorts of mythological gods.
“If we’re thinking of-” Jonah glanced at Daring, sitting beside Lara “-flesh eating, then chief offenders are going to be Tantalus and Saturn.”
“Tantalus was Greek,” Lara pointed out, indicating the chart.
Jonah nodded. “Of course, there is some overlap between Greek and Roman gods, often just a difference in name. Tantalus comes up in many myths about food, for example being the one who stole ambrosia from the gods and brought it back to his people. As penance for that, he offered up his son as a sacrifice to the gods - by cooking and serving him as a buffet. That was too much, even by the standards of most gods back then, and they had the boy revived.”
Daring swallowed hard and looked guiltily at her plate, which merely contained traces of cow’s blood.
“We may have to do some more research,” Lara lamented.
Jonah went on. “By coincidence, there’s a museum of ancient history opening tomorrow evening in Salzburg, Austria. We happen to know the generous benefactor who donated his entire collection.”
Lara thought for a moment. “Werner Von Croy?”
Jonah nodded.
Von Croy, the senior, and his son had both encountered Lara at various points in the past. They’d...competed, occasionally. So it was possible that Von Croy would not be pleased to see her.
Still, it was a lead, and if she knew Von Croy’s collection, it might be a good one. Even if they didn’t find what they were seeking, it might yet be an educational visit.
After checking out of the hotel, they chartered a flight to Austria. That avoided trying to get Daring a ticket on a commercial airliner and the consequential security involved. Plus, the small Cessna Caravan gave them a much better view of the Alps as they flew over, some of the taller peaks snowcapped. It was a cloudless day with perfect visibility.
As Lara suspected, Daring appreciated it. Lara had told her of flying machines, but the experience of passing smoothly overhead from a comfortable seat was new. As Daring remarked, however, rather loud by comparison.
In Salzburg, Lara already had them booked into another hotel. She’d been all over Europe and had plenty of connections, not to mention a generous line of credit.
The hotel was much different architecturally than the previous one in Italy. Daring had glanced at a map earlier, and compared the Mediteranian climate with the new one at the foot of the Alps.
“I don’t really do burglaries,” Daring remarked as they prepared for the evening. With a few calls to savvy confidants back home, Lara had gotten her hands on blueprints of the museum building.
“With any luck, it won’t be,” Lara said. She glanced at Daring. “How about dinner parties?”
“Well, I am a celebrity back home. Even if they call me a recluse, I still know my way around.” Daring frowned. “But I don’t know…” She touched her chest.
The wound was bandaged and covered with a borrowed shirt, but that didn’t mean it was out of sight, out of mind.
“There will be hors d'oeuvres to eat,” Lara said.
Daring nodded, still unsure if she could trust herself in a crowd of people. She’d been thinking about zombies a lot lately. Probably too much. There was no way to know if the curse of the amulet would turn her into one of those, but there was nothing to say it wouldn’t, either. Her still, unbeating heart aside, it was the terror of not knowing that got to her the most. Finding and learning things was what she did, after all.
Despite both of them spending their share of rough days in the bush, that didn’t mean they couldn’t clean up. Lara had a sleeveless dress for Daring to borrow. It was made of flowing green fabric and featured a high neckline. Lara herself went with a simple v-necked affair that left her legs loose and drew the eye with a dusky red color.
Jonah, having not brought a suit and disinclined to attend fancy parties anyway, stayed behind to feed information. Lara and Daring both slipped in low-profile earbuds. It was a shame they couldn’t have hacked the museum’s cameras, but there hadn’t been time to involve some of Lara’s more specialized contacts.
Speaking of contacts, there had been some debate regarding what to do about Daring’s distinctive eyes, not to mention her hair. On the one hand, her distinctive features would attract attention. On the other, it wasn’t as if anyone would recognize her. In the end, Lara just bought her a shade of lipstick that was a close match for her eyes and told her the names of a few punk bands to use in conversation if anyone asked.
A taxi dropped the two of them off at the event. The building was stone, and imposing; a proper history museum. Lara found herself excited, just to be seeing a new exhibit, not to mention the operation ahead.
The interior was set for the event, with the artifacts on display dispersed throughout the front room. Dark curtains added ambiance and helped make the space quieter, also likely masking the food service and other support away from the eyes of guests.
Reasoning that Von Croy would be either near the door or near the center of the room, Lara led Daring through the crowd in an evasive route, keeping her eyes open. She’d shown Daring a picture of the man before they arrived.
“Check,” Lara said to her bracelet, miming brushing some hair back.
“Copy,” Jonah replied in her ear. He’d taken up station in another rented van outside.
Lara and Daring ended up near the refreshments. They might as well indulge while they were here. It would also give their hands something to do in order to better blend into the crowd.
Daring found herself fascinated with the shrimp, though Lara had to show her how to peel and eat them. This trip to another world had really expanded her palette, though she had to promise herself that using excuses for her appetite was not going to apply to anything besides food.
Shrimp in Austria, honestly. Lara had thought Von Croy had taste, but he had apparently contracted the catering to someone who didn’t.
Speaking of the man, “There he is,” said Lara, indicating Werner Von Croy across the room. He was dressed in a subtle suit that still probably cost him a few thousand dollars. He was at least ninety, and his skin and what was left of his hair looked the part. He was still standing tall on his own, though, and greeting guests.
Now that they’d spotted him, they could do a better job keeping clear. That done, it was time to see what else the museum contained.
They slowly spiraled out from the food table, examining the collection. There were odds and ends from everywhere, indicative of Von Croy’s worldwide interests. Daring came to a sudden stop, staring at an engraved stone. “I’ve seen this before.”
Lara walked over. The stone featured a rough scene illustrated by glyphs of horses emerging from the ocean. “This looks like one of the legends of Neptune. He was the god of the sea, but somewhat unintuitively, also of horses. It was said that they were created from the surf.”
“Could be both,” Daring said. “In this context, it actually makes sense. I’d seen this pictograph - well, something like it, anyway - in dried-up seapony ruins. Of course, we don’t have any figure named Neptune back home, but maybe the legend itself is common.”
“Unfortunately, I don’t see a clear connection to our problem,” Lara lamented. “The name Neptune - or Poseidon - doesn't mean anything to you?”
Daring tilted her head. “Again, it could be similar to something we have in my world, I just don’t recognize it yet.”
“Well, you remember the Greek story from this morning about Tantalus, who cooked his son. The boy was taken in by Neptune - well, Poseiden to the Greeks. In a connection to the other cannibalism, Neptune was one of the only children not eaten by his father Saturn, or Chronus to the Greeks.”
She saw Daring’s brows furrow in concentration, trying to keep the two naming systems separate. Something else occurred to Lara. “Neptune is actually tangentially related to why I came to Italy. The submarine I told you about was named for the nereids, sea nymphs who were effectively his entourage.”
Daring could see that Lara was grasping at straws to make a connection. To be fair, she had more to go on than Daring, but that in itself didn’t mean they were at a dead end. In fact, Daring had done more with less in her career. Despite everything else that had happened, she knew when a coincidence was promising. Though pony and human mythology were not perfectly aligned, there was a hint of something deeper. “One more happenstance connection like that and I might think we have something here.”
Lara did not totally agree, but did note Daring’s enthusiasm. The two of them read the caption for the engraving, seeing that it had been recovered from northern Italy, near the present day border of Slovenia, while Italian troops had been digging fortifications for the series of battles against Austria-Hungary centered around the Isozno River.
Turning away to look at more exhibits, Lara scanned the room. Von Croy was still greeting guests. A particularly large man stood near him, hands folded. He kept his distance, but his attention was focused like a laser on anyone near Von Croy. It was a good thing Lara and Daring’s path would take them nowhere nearby.
Continuing the theme of old gods, it was not difficult to trace a connection through the artifacts. Some of them Lara had seen before - in books. There were some exceedingly rare pieces here.
She wondered idly about the previous engraving they’d studied. An artifact found in the chaos of war yet somehow preserved must have been a rarity in itself. Pretending to fix her hair, she spoke to her bracelet. “Jonah, can you look something up?”
She described it to him and he got to work. Lara and Daring had nearly completed their circuit of the exhibit when Jonah came back with the news. “Another of Von Croy’s famous collection. He bought it at Sotheby’s three years ago.”
“London, well north of here,” Lara murmured to Daring.
Jonah went on. “Before that, it had been part of a small collection near Marseille.”
“France, to the west,” Lara added for Daring’s clarification.
“The French family that owned it declined to say how they had come by it. The trail between Isozno and Marseille is cold. We only know that it was found near the battle because shortly after being discovered, it was documented by a historian who’d been drafted into the Italian Army who understood what it was.”
“The shortest point between two places is a line,” Daring replied. “Maybe that’s just me thinking how a pegasus flies…”
“No, I think I agree,” said Lara. “This engraving may have bounced all the way to America before coming back to Europe, but the connection between Isozno and Marseille is worth looking into.”
There seemed little else left in the exhibit that they had not already seen. Lara gestured to the door and the two of them began to casually make their way out. Glancing over at Von Croy to ensure he was still occupied, Lara belatedly noticed that his bodyguard had repositioned to block their path.
One thing Lara appreciated, Daring had at least as good a nose for trouble as she. Now that they were cornered, they both noticed Von Croy approaching. Daring slid in front of Lara, though she stayed out of the arm’s reach of the bodyguard.
“Miss Croft,” Von Croy said, part contemptuous, part resignation. His eyes flicked at Daring. “Not like you to bring help.”
“Just a night out,” Lara said. “Lovely display you have here.”
“You should see what we keep in the back,” he said.
The large man started forward. The meaning was clear.
Daring glanced to the door. On the wing, she could probably make it. But she’d noted the heavy security shutters ready to close on a moment’s notice, and now she was seeing other serious-looking men entering the room. Glancing over her shoulder, Lara’s face was intense but composed.
With few other options, Daring let herself be driven away from the center of the room, towards the floor-to-ceiling curtains that blanketed the other side of the gallery. She made sure Lara was at her back, and kept her eyes moving.
On the other side of the curtain, Von Croy turned to them, surrounded by a small contingent of his bodyguards. “What has caused you to grace us with your presence this evening, Miss Croft?”
There hadn’t been time to warn Jonah or otherwise prepare for a confrontation. Given Lara’s history with Von Croy, she was skeptical about the possibility of talking her way out. On the other hand, the man was an avid collector of relics - she had to acknowledge that. Perhaps there was a way to simultaneously stall, obtain information, and not alert him to their true hunt.
“We came to see the collection,” Lara began. “It is a public museum.”
“Though the event is private,” Von Croy remarked. His eyes went to Daring. “I am also surprised at your company.”
“They call me Pita,” said Daring. “I’m a sandwich artist.” It was a secondary identity she had used in the past, in places where Daring Do was unwelcome and A.K. Yearling would be out of place.
Fortunately, Lara seemed to go along with it. “I’m helping her examine ancient food and eating habits.”
Von Croy crossed his arms. “That might be the poorest excuse I’ve ever heard. You’re asking me to believe the great Lara Croft just happens to be in Austria at my event...because she’s a foodie.”
“It isn’t as if there is a great reputation for flavor in the British Isles,” Lara admitted. There wasn’t much else she could say, stalling for time and hoping she could devise a way out.
An idea came to her. “I did want to ask you about the piece with Poseiden creating horses. I didn’t know the Greek civilization had spread to northern Italy.”
“As you and I both well know, the ancients had their secrets.” Von Croy glanced at his watch and started to walk back towards the curtain. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I rather wish you’d take yours to the grave as well.”
The three bodyguards started to move, hands reaching towards their unbuttoned jackets.
Daring stiffened, recognizing malicious intent by instinct, but was taken by surprise when Lara pulled her backwards by the throat and reached into the back of Daring’s dress.
The USP they’d hidden at the small of Daring’s back before the event was a large handgun, but the loose dress had concealed it well. Lara’s hands had been quick, and there was no hesitation in her movement. She’d fought for her life before, and in those moments, it was either do or die.
The men probably wouldn’t have shot Lara and Daring inside the museum, instead quietly coerced them somewhere else before killing and dumping them. The appearance of Lara’s weapon had changed that, and now subtlety and compliance were gone. Her gun came level on the first man even as his eyes were widening and she killed him with two bullets at center mass.
Ignoring the echoes of the gunshots and screams of other guests, Lara swung her arm, lining up on the next man, who’d managed to get his own gun out and had just started to dodge. Her first bullet went through his forearm into his side, but her second struck him in the upper chest.
Even as she began to focus on the third man, Lara knew she was going to be too slow. His weapon was out and level, and he fired. The bullet struck Daring in the center of her chest and she jerked with the impact. Lara swung her gun over Daring’s shoulder and returned fire. Unlike Lara, he didn’t have any cover and caught her bullets himself.
Von Croy was more spry than expected for a man of his age and had gotten out of the way, already back through the curtains. Lara shoved her gun into the holster strapped to Daring’s back and let her go. Daring gave her an irritated look at being used as a shield, but they both knew this was no time for an argument.
Daring wasn’t able to walk in high heels, so the two of them had worn flats to match. That helped as they crashed out the nearest exit door and sprinted down the back street towards where Jonah had parked.
He’d heard the commotion and already had the engine running.