My throat tightened. It was incomprehensible that we would just stop. That my friends, that Antimony, would be gone forever. If I died, he’d die too. Everything I’d done would be meaningless. Sending him back to the garden might be the one thing I could actually do. “Okay, so how do we do this? What do you need? Spirit raising? Portal construction?” If Ranth was sent back, he’d be gone forever—and the way my chest ached thinking about that was ridiculous. I barely knew him, but there was so much he could teach me.
“The ritual of sending would have to be performed.” He raised an eyebrow at me and then crossed his arms. I rubbed the purple ink on my arm. He’d sunk into me in more than one way. “The spell to open the Garden was performed by selected members from the Ahknim temple with a gold offering. Then the three of us were tethered from our world to the Garden by the same gold which originally came from the sky. My gold is in this bracelet.”
“A meteor? Like it literally fell from the sky?” Ori asked.
“The gold was wrought into items kept by people of power.”
“What kind of items?” Ori asked, her nails clicking the keys.
“Vessels and items of personal adornment. Combs and jewelry. All from the time of Nimrod,” Ranth said, trailing a finger across his bottom lip.
“Akkadian? Like Sumerian?” Ori asked, scrolling through something on her laptop.
“I don’t know those terms, but the time of picture words on stone and metal.”
Ori stopped typing. “That’s BCE, before common era. Anything like that is going to be in museums or private collections. Are you saying the bracelet you’re wearing is Akkadian? Because I’m not buying that.” She got up, and Ranth stuck out his arm. I peered over Ori’s shoulder. The thin ropey bracelet on him was a woven mesh that could be old…
“I can pretty much guarantee that’s not from Akkadian period,” Ori said, examining it.
Ranth shook his head. “I never said it was. The bracelet was made for me by temple artisans, but the gold is ancient. The metal itself is the essential part of the spell. We will require three pieces to open the sky.”
“Easy. We can cut up the bracelet,” I said.
Ranth shook his head. “Three pieces the same size. So two more pieces this size.”
“Can you draw me some pictures of what the pieces of gold might look like?” Ori asked Ranth and handed him a notebook.
He took the pencil from her. His hair fell over one eye, and his brows knit together as he sketched. The pencil moved in his tapered, strong fingers with practiced speed and movements. His lush lips were framed by black hairs, and his angled jaw was shadowed. Double-thick and feathery eyelashes contrasted with the color of his skin.
Beautiful.
Putting my priorities back in order, I glanced at the wall clock. It worked on a battery that I had spelled inside the ward,so it wasn’t tied to the outside. It was two o’clock. I needed to drop the wedding oil off by five.
Ranth handed the notebook to Ori.
“That’s an amulet, a scroll case, a ring, and a comb.”
“Wait, do we need all these?” Ori flipped the pages.
“No, the items were made from the same gold, so any two of them will work.” He raised his arm.
Ori flashed the sketches at me. They were incredible. “Your drawings are so detailed. Did you study art?” I ran my finger over the lines, appreciating the detail and the fluid style.
“How did you remember all those markings?” Ori asked, peering closer at the amulet.
Ranth’s attention was on me. “I’ve had a lot of time to think about it, and I’m observant. We were not taught to draw, but we were given time and space to see.” His eyes traced a line from my disheveled hair to my lavender socks. I tugged my torn shirt down as I walked to the dresser and yanked out a fresh tank top, leggings, and a boho layered skirt—all in my favorite shades of purple. I must look like badly dried hellebore.
“Do you think you can find the time period with those drawings?” I asked Ori, edging toward the bathroom. I wasn’t changing with Ranth in the room.
“Maybe Vivian can find dates for them, but gold like this will cost a fortune.”
Ranth rubbed his upper arm. “Who is this Vivian who has dates? I like dates. What type are they?”
I chuckled. “Vivian Taylor is Ori’s friend. She’s one of the teaching assistants at UC Berkeley and loves Sumerian period stuff. She helps us with research—and not the eating kind of dates unfortunately.”
Ranth looked over Ori’s shoulder as she wrote notes. “The background of that amulet was pink, and the bird is a green Huma. There is a blue flower on the edge if that helps.”
“Hooma?” Ori asked.
