After Anna finished writing, she closed the book, its spine now creased with half a dozen fine white stress lines, and placed it facedown on the table as she picked up and sorted through her notes. As she read, answers formed in her mind—answers that ultimately added up to a question:
The guy who wrote this book may have thought he was dealing with legends, with things dreamed up in some drug-inspired haze by temple priests and magicians back in Egypt, but somebody, somehow, actually made an amulet that worked. Maybe he was trying to protect himself from animals and serpents—must have been really scared of the serpents, to add one on the end like that—and figured that the only way to beat something is to join it, get on its level. He created some special alloy, maybe threw quicksilver in
