‘Other times,’ she went on, ‘the treasures might have come from the reserves of ancient cities, scattered by generations of pillagers over the years. Like happened in 1946, when some frontier guards came across what became known as the Qunduz Hoard, a cache of all kinds of valuable items. The next year, a much bigger treasure turned up at Mir Zahah, on an old caravan route in the mountain borderlands between Afghanistan and Pakistan, in the same area where al-Qaeda based their operations later on.’

‘So they can just turn up anywhere,’ Wolf marvelled. ‘I should have packed a shovel.’

‘Then in the sixties and seventies there was a whole rash of discoveries. At a place called Balkh in 1966, a lucky farmer found yet another precious stash of gold coins and jewels. Another find came from a place called Tillya Tepe, which appropriately means “the golden mound”, where a site of ancient tombs yielded up twenty thousand coins and artefacts, a mixture of Persian, Greek and Roman items. Kind of like the geological layers in a rock formation, that shows how one settlement was often built on top of the remains of another through time, dating back all the way back. Cities just like the one that once existed right here in this very spot.’

Madison waved her arm in the direction of the rubble field barely recognisable as ancient ruins, as though she could see the mighty walls and columns still standing there under the same moonlight that was flashing in her eyes as she talked. It was hard not to be infected by her enthusiasm.

‘Dad’s studies had convinced him that there was one Alexandrian lost city that had yet to be unearthed. No verified written records have survived to prove his theory, but he was completely certain about its existence. The ancient fortress city of Zakara.’

Chapter 30

Ben asked, ‘So how old is Zakara?’

‘Dad reckoned Alexander founded it in 330 BC, the year before Alexandria Eschate was established. That would make sense geographically, in terms of his travels. It stands right on the old Silk Road route network that connected ancient Afghanistan to China and India in the east, Persia in the west, and to the cities of ancient Uzbekistan to the north. That made it a very important point on the map. Though like so many other very important points, it got wiped off by the ravages of time, war and changes of rule over the centuries.’

Ben thought for a moment. ‘But if Alexander always named the cities he founded after himself – Alexandria this and Alexandria that – then why not this one too? What makes Zakara the exception to the rule?’

‘Great question,’ Madison said, undeterred. ‘And like a million other great questions in archaeology, nobody knows the answer. It could well have been named after him, once upon a time. The name Dad called it by, Zakara, dates back even further, to the Bronze Age Indus Valley civilisation.’