It's weird being back in Cairo after spending seven years in the States, the circumstances surrounding AJ's return as dark and dismal as the ancient tombs her uncle used to drag her to. He died four weeks ago, but AJ couldn't bring herself to leave Cairo yet; she'd visited his burial place once the funeral was over and found herself missing the city. His death wasn't unexpected and the fact that it had happened while he was absorbed in his work seemed to be some cruel cosmic joke. He had always preached the need of caution, but he had let himself be distracted by hieroglyphics when a thick slab above had come loose and crushed him.

Alexander Jibade is now with AJ's parents in the afterlife and she's stuck here with living people that tend to get on her nerves faster than a conman could take a wallet. He'd raised her after her parents were killed, him and two other adults that he worked with, the Carnahans. They're dead too, but their children are alive and well unless something has happened since the funeral.

As fast as possible, AJ maneuvers her way through the crowded streets, ignoring venders shouting out their wares and the like, her destination just up ahead. It was a museum she'd spent most of her weekends in after the digging season ended, a few vague memories including her parents when they were vacationing away from Yorkshire.

She couldn't remember anything of where she'd been born and her uncle hated to leave Cairo except for excavating, but she hadn't worked up the courage to go and visit her cousins yet. Sure, she'd write to them several times a month, one in particular, but she knew they understood why she couldn't go to Yorkshire again. Millie understood most of AJ's dilemmas and had even promised to visit Texas once she'd returned to the States.

That was another point of this little trip away from Houston, her husband and his group of friends had heard of Hamunaptra and decided they should all head out into the desert and find the lost city. AJ blamed the spooky feeling of a campfire, it made her think of the old legends her uncle had told her as a child and so she repeated his favorite back to the listeners. Allah above, that was stupid. Now she was stuck in Egypt with a group of half-cocked Americans, a Hungarian man of questionable repute, and a British Egyptologist that thought she had no reason to accompany them.

Bastard.

She shakes the thoughts of annoying men out of her head as she enters the museum, easily making her way past the tourists and glass-incased relics towards the back where only employees or special people were allowed. The workers knew who she was after seeing her there several times in the past few weeks and only nodded in recognition when she swept past them. She stopped only when she reached where they stored the mummies, the torchlight casting flickering shadows on the walls.

She found her friends at the base of one of the statues, Jonathan and Evy both examining a map with wide eyes. "Should I even ask what it is you're doing," AJ inquires with raised brows, laughing when Evy springs up and shoves the map in her face.

"What do you make of that," she asked excitedly, her smile wide and her eyes glittering. AJ takes the map from her and moves closer to a torch, relying on the finicky light to help her make out the pictures and hieroglyphics. She wasn't too sure about most of it since she'd never bothered to learn ancient Egyptian, but she did take note of a familiar marking near the bottom corner. She looks up sharply, the map lowered and a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.

"Where did you get this?"

"Jonathan found it on a dig in Thebes." AJ doubted that with every fiber of her being considering this is a man who once showed up to a job interview drunk, but she knew where this map led. "What do you think?" She shakes her head and hands it back to her friend with a sigh.

"I think you've found a map to Hamunaptra." And I think we just gained two new members on the hunt for the rumored city. It wasn't a thought she cherished, certainly not since it would mean spending hours under the sun with Jonathan's numerous complaints. "Have you shown you know who yet?" Evy makes a face at that and Jonathan slowly rises to join them, scratching at the back of his head.

"Jonathan just showed it to me and I'm afraid I've made quite a mess in the library, so the Curator won't be happy to see me this soon." AJ rolls her eyes, sending up a mental prayer that they weren't about to ask what she thought they were. "But he doesn't hate you too much..."

"Perhaps you could just," Jonathan makes a sliding gesture with his hand," push it under his office door and wait for any exclamations about the correct dates?"

"Or," AJ states, emphasizing the word," the three of us could go in there together and use the sheer numbers against him?" The two Carnahan siblings share a look, communicating with only a few gestures before shrugging and meeting AJ's gaze again. "Is it a plan, then?"

"Better than no plan at all." Together, like they had when they were younger, the three of them make their way through the museum to the offices on the opposite side of the large building, stopping in front of the last door of the long hallway. They had stood like this before, arm-in-arm and almost trembling as they awaited the person on the other side to open the door and admit them entry. After a tentative knock, the Curator's voice rings out and they push the door open, entering single file with Evy at the front.

"What is it, Miss Carnahan," he asks without looking up from the documents spread in front of him on the desk. It always shocked AJ to see how old this man has grown in just seven years, graying hair partially hidden beneath a red fez, wrinkles more pronounced around his eyes and along his hands.

"Um, my brother found something we think you'd be interested in seeing," Evy manages, always the brave one where confrontation was concerned. She's always been the spokesperson when it was important and that hadn't changed since they were lumped together as mere children. Only the sound of the map being unfolded drew Terrence Bey's gaze up to them.

"Another fake he bought off a street merchant?" Jonathan scoffs at that, but doesn't comment since it was the usual train of thought whenever he brought an artifact in for Evy to present. Bey motions for the trio to approach his desk, taking the map from Evy and spreading it open on his desk as the Carnahans looked at it over his shoulder and AJ stayed on the other side of the desk.

"I don't think it is." Evy was excited again, all nerves washed away as she gestures at the map. "I think this leads to Hamunaptra. You see the cartouche there? It's the official royal seal of Seti I, I'm sure of it."

"Two questions," Jonathan interrupts as he begins pacing," who the hell was Seti I, and was he rich?"

"The richest Pharaoh out of all of them," AJ informs him quietly, allowing her eyes to wander around the room. Nothing much had changed since the last time she'd been here, a few more things hung on the wall and a crayon drawing framed on a bookshelf with a child's signature in the bottom corner of it. She moves over to get a better look of it, finding it to contain three crooked pyramids and a colorful butterfly fluttering past blue skies.

"I'm rather beginning to like this fellow." AJ gives him a smile over her shoulder, their excitement infecting her as well, though the Curator looked as though they'd handed him a petition for women's rights rather than a map. AJ had never cared much for him, he was far too strict for her liking.

"I dated the map on the way here," Evy continued," it's almost three thousand years old and if you look at the hieratic here... It's Hamunaptra." AJ's eyes close as Evy confirms her suspicion, beginning to think she's been cursed with a bunch of treasure-seeking idiots to claim as her family.

"The last I checked," Bey interrupts," we were scholars, not treasure hunters chasing after myths. Even Miss Jibade knew that and she hardly ever paid attention to her studies."

"Hey," AJ snaps, spinning in her heel to glare at him," I paid enough attention to pass all my classes, I'll have you know, and I've been married for five years." She holds up her left hand and wiggles her fingers to emphasize the small, golden band on her ring finger. "You were at the wedding, so I don't know how you keep forgetting." He rejects her American husband every chance he got and she was convinced he did it out of spite alone.

"And where has that education gotten you, Alexandria? You moved to America for college and ended up marrying the tourist you met here two years previous." AJ scoffs, crossing her arms over her chest and looking away from him. "If you know so much, then why don't you tell us the bedtime story your uncle used to recite to you?"

"Hamunaptra doesn't exist, my uncle knew that—"

"And yet he spent hours here doing research about it." She keeps her gaze on the floor, focusing on the black and white shoes she wore instead of the Curator's contemptuous expression.

"Yes, he spent hours here, but he did it with the hope of providing for me. Something you wouldn't know about." His cheeks flush a dark red and Jonathan quickly intervenes before Bey could begin to shout at her.

"We've all heard the stories," he says quickly," about how the entire necropolis was rigged to sink into the sand on Pharaoh's command. It was designed to bury an entire chamber filled with treasure because if Seti couldn't have it, then no one could."

"As the American's would say," Bey declares scornfully, holding the map closer to the lit candle on his desk," it's all fairy tales and hokum— Oh my goodness!" The frail papyrus caught fire and Bey wasted no time in flinging it to the ground, Evy and Jonathan dropping to kill the flames before the entire map was ruined.

"You've burnt it! You've burnt off the part of the lost city!" The knot in AJ's stomach loosens and she could breathe easier knowing the map was useless, that old legend of a mummy's curse never failing to make her afraid.

"Good," AJ murmurs, walking out of the office," it was never meant to be found anyway."