“So? You know where she is.”
“And Osiris won’t find it suspicious that I happen to be here, in Egypt, with his wife?”
“Should he?”
I marched on, rocks and gravel crunching under my shoes. Shu stuck to me like my shadow.
“You were at Karnak last night, with Isis. You woke Karnak and got high on power. I don’t need to be a genius to figure that out. I can smell the temple and the bitch goddess all over you. Not to mention the eyes—”
“Shu, get off my back.”
“I will when you stop acting like a kid caught with his fingers in a god’s—”
I whirled on her and ripped the shades off. “Do not push me, Shukra. We came here for the skull. That is all that matters.”
“Why?!” she snapped back. The question bounced around the empty temple until the limestone soaked it up. “Why are we even doing this? Why don’t you tell Osiris exactly what’s happening?”
“Do you want to see what your insides look like decorating his bedroom wall?”
She ground her teeth. “What happened in the tomb when we were running from the scorpions, and don’t tell me nothing happened. I know you, and this is you being an ass because you’re scared. So, for once in your self-centered life, let me in so I can help. You don’t have to do this alone.”
Let her in? The condemned demon sorceress who would have, at one time, sold a million innocent souls to see me strung up? But she wasn’t that creature anymore. She had changed, and so had I.
Tell her, or don’t tell her? Trust her, or don’t trust her? A sudden realization dumped icy water over me. She’d given up redemption to save my ass from Anubis. I needed her on this with me. I needed her to keep me straight, to keep me from myself. I needed Shukra. Sekhmet’s ass, when had that happened?
“The skull is a key,” I admitted, trusting she wouldn’t add to my growing list of problems by going after it herself.
“Go on.” She didn’t seem surprised, but very little surprised her.
I had to start trusting her, and there wouldn’t be a “good” disaster to test on her. “There’s something hidden between the burial valleys,” I began, watching her closely. “It got to me in the tomb, just a nudge, but it’s powerful. Isis needs that skull to get to it. Last night, she followed me to Karnak and threatened the archaeologist I was trying to get answers from. And now the whole team is gone. It’s no mystery who has them.”
“And?”
“So we get the skull first and get Isis to release the archaeologists. If we have to, we destroy the skull before any god can get their claws on it and whatever it unlocks.”
“Okay.” She waited, expecting more.
“That’s it. I’ve got nothing else.”
“Is that it? Because all that seems like something Ace Dante can handle, but you aren’t handling it.”
Was this really the place to discuss the dreams, the things I’d seen in the Twelve Gates, how being back in Egypt was shaving away my hard-earned armor, and how Isis seemed to know exactly how to push my buttons? “There’s something about Isis…” I turned away from Shu and scanned the jagged cliffs where they dipped toward the Nile valley. “She brings out the worst in me.” And I couldn’t say more, not here. Back in New York, where the air bites and the rain smells like asphalt, I’d tell Shu everything, but not here in the land that listened.
“Look at my face.” She used a finger to circle her face. A smile played on her pink lips—the same mildly amused one that always rested there whether she was watching kittens play on YouTube or skinning snakes alive. Her dark eyes regarded me with a level coolness unique to Shukra. The look said, “I’ve seen it all, done it all, and your drama is so cute, but seriously.” “Do I look like Anubis?” she asked.
“What?”
“I’m not judging you. Isis gets in everybody’s head. It’s her MO. When you’re ready to tell me what’s really going on, I’ll be here. Until then, let’s go get this skull and save some stupid archaeologists.” She headed off toward the third and final terrace, calling back, “It’s up here, right?”
I watched a heat haze ripple over her as she strode up the ramp. Exactly when had Shukra and I become friends instead of enemies? Something had shifted long before she gave up redemption in the Halls of Judgment, and I hadn’t seen it—or hadn’t wanted to see it.
Amun Ra’s sanctuary was a small chamber dug out of the rock face in the deepest part of Hatshepsut’s temple. Among Egypt’s sprawling temples, vast pyramids, and monumental sphinxes, this nook inside Hatshepsut’s mortuary didn’t stand out. Few people knew the sanctuary’s true purpose.
“Djeser-Djeseru,” Holy of holies. I drifted deeper into the shadows, toward the waiting statue of Amun Ra. A thick rope barred the way to stop tourists from getting too close. A lick of cool air ran around the back of my neck, and a sense of space swelled around me, making this tiny room suddenly seem cavernous. My eyes were human. I couldn’t see the truth, but I didn’t need to.
“Rarru…” I closed my eyes and breathed in, drawing superheated dusty air over my tongue. The temple and its power didn’t stir. I hadn’t expected it to, but it was polite to say hello.
“Maybe you’re firing duds,” Shu remarked from behind me.
A smile tugged on my lips. I kept my eyes closed and my mind level.
“All these spaces to nowhere and enough pillars to hold up Osiris’s ego… Makes you wonder what they were all compensating for. In humans, I hear large buildings compensate for small genitals. You’d know all about that…”
I let her prattle on, hopped over the rope, and dropped to my knees in front of Amun Ra’s statue. During the winter solstice, a shaft of sunlight pierced the gloom and illuminated Ra. Then it traveled to where a similar statue of Osiris had once sat. Its spot was empty, the statue stolen or destroyed long ago. Few outside of Duat knew the true reason for that spike of light. Today wasn’t the winter solstice, but I’d never been one to follow rules. Brute magical force should serve just as well.
“Ace?”
“Stay back.” I rolled up my sleeves. “Give me a minute.” And pressed my hands to the warm stone floor. I spread my fingers wide and puffed out a breath, blowing the dust away.
“The guards…”
“A minute, Shu…” I mumbled, bowing forward, low enough to kiss the sand. C’mon, Djeser-Djeseru. Welcome an old friend. “Ovam kur ka, kur I ok uk sra oer, sra aorsr, sra resrs, omd sra dord. Ovam, omd varcuka ka srruisr.” The words fell from my lips, like thoughts breathed to life. These were the same words I’d used to open a doorway to Duat, but without water and in this temple, they took on a different meaning. To rouse, to tempt.
Shu’s smooth, melodic voice scratched at my concentration. I pushed the outside aside and buried deep into my waiting power, as hungry and wild as always, and more so since my return from Duat, since walking again in the forgotten land. The truth of me twitched to life and sank into the stone, seeping through the tiny cracks and fissures, seeking what lay beyond.
“Ovam kur ka.” Open for me.
And there, buried deep inside the cliffs behind the statue, the slumbering power stirred, stretching awake. Stone shuddered, dust rained from above, and with a yawning groan, Amun Ra’s sanctuary shifted. The walls clunked from mystical mechanisms grinding into motion. When I looked up, the sanctuary’s back wall split in two and opened inward, revealing a colorfully decorated passage untouched by time. It glittered and sang with magic and life, bright and playful.
Spluttered Arabic spoiled the moment. “Waquf. Tawaqqaf hunak!” a male voice barked.
The two guards stared at the temple’s new extension with awe-widened eyes. Shukra stood beside them, wearing a similar expression. What had I been saying about nothing surprising her? “Er, Shu?”
She blinked, realized we had company, snatched the rifle from the first guard, and cracked the butt under his jaw. He sprawled across the floor, out cold. The second guard spent too long fumbling for hi
s gun—seeing an ancient temple move and burst to life in an explosion of color would dull anyone’s reflexes. Shu stamped on his boot, smacked the flat of the rifle’s stock against his cheek, and then drove it into his gut. She floored him with a punch that made me wince. He fell to the ground and stayed there.
“Shu?! You were meant to distract them, not beat them unconscious.”
She threw the gun down and strode toward the passage opening, the guards forgotten. “That”—she pointed—“shouldn’t be there.” She jabbed a finger at the opening, eyeing it side-on for tricks and traps.
“Technically, it’s not there.” We didn’t have all day to sightsee. I shoved her into the passage and followed close behind. “Have I surprised the unsurprisable?”
The doors rumbled closed behind us. I pressed a hand to the wall. “Rarru…”
“Raku,” a distant whisper replied. Home. “See, not exactly Egypt… This is part of Duat. A back door…”
Painted hieroglyphs glowed, illuminating several hundred meters of passage to an opening that hinted at something glittering gold beyond. The air again smelled like frankincense, not the arid desert. Distant memories sailed toward me on the familiar breeze, but I barred them access. I didn’t have time to indulge the past. We needed information, and this was how we’d get it.
Shu grumbled something about too much color blinding her eyes and said scornfully, “You shouldn’t have the power to wake this place, whatever or wherever it is…”
“I shouldn’t have a lot of things,” I agreed, losing my smile.
Shu glanced over her shoulder, more questions burning in her eyes. And doubts too. She saw her Soul Eater, the man she’d been cursed to for several centuries, but she wondered if she recognized me. Shukra was no fool. The unspoken questions simmered between us.
“You’ve been here before?” she asked.
“No.”
She didn’t believe me, and as we reached the end of the passage, her questions were forgotten.
I hadn’t been sure what we’d find inside, but now that we were here, some of my memories slotted neatly into place. The walls were plastered with scrolls. Shelves overflowed with unmarked papyrus, others with half-finished works. Endless piles of scrolls stretched into the distance. I’d seen a fragment of this place when Shukra had helped me search my memories for the source of the witch-killing curse.
“What is this place?”
“Thoth’s library. A sanctuary of truth.” As I spoke, a mound of scrolls shifted. Some toppled from the pile and clattered to the decorated floor, spilling open. The massive pile heaved, and a huge spotted cat emerged from inside. She stretched her massive paws. Her back dipped and her tail flicked high. Five times the size of a leopard, she yawned, stretching her man-eating jaws wide, and growled low. But her eyes remained closed, as they had since Thoth had blinded her.
She sniffed the air. “I smell old souls and sin.” She purred the words and somehow worked her feline lips around them. “Mokarakk Oma.”
“Who’s that?” Shu whispered.
I didn’t have time to reply. The cat sprang, claws extended, jaws open wide.
Shu and I lunged apart. A plinth brought my leap to an abrupt end and almost dislocated my shoulder. Something priceless shattered around me. Buckling around the impact, I twisted in time to see the cat land gracefully on all fours and turn toward me. Hunched low, she prowled forward.
“Aeui kruird mus ba rara, Sudderrar.” You should not be here, Godkiller.
I was beginning to agree.
Chapter 10
“E coka kur sra Senen-mut kcrurrk.” I came for the Senenmut scrolls.
If I’ve learned anything in my years as Osiris’s dog, it’s that whatever I do, the gods always win. Knowing that, I could pretty much ask whatever I wanted, because the outcome would always be the same.
“You wake me for this?” the cat grumbled, fat paws plodding forward. “Why would I give you anything?”
I was used to dealing with big cats. Bast, my ex-wife, was one in her spare time, but even she wasn’t as large as this goddess, Sesha. Sesha was mythical-beast large.
Shukra’s power shivered through the air, and Sesha’s closed-eyes narrowed in response. The goddess would tear into Shu, might even kill her, and then I’d have to go back to Duat and find her soul before Anubis did. There was a chance Osiris might find her first, and then we’d all be suffering. I could probably stop Sesha, or at least distract her, but the last thing I wanted was to throw-down here and make yet another godly enemy. A good thing I knew of another way to distract a goddess of the feline persuasion.
Catching Shu’s eye, I shook my head, and the unsettling itch of her power fell away, but she watched, armed with a spell on her lips.
“You’ve slept for a long time,” I said, keeping my tone conversational. Slowly, I planted both hands on the floor and pushed to my feet, careful not to make any sudden movements. I was the prey here. “Wouldn’t you like to play a game?”
“A game?” She shook her head and flicked one furred, triangular ear, then sat on her rump and snuffled the air. “What games does the Nameless One play?”
“Answer me this: what turns everything around but does not move?”
Shukra pulled a what-the-hell face, demonstrating exactly why I dealt with the gods and she stayed away from them.
Sesha’s laugh rumbled through her belly. She pushed onto her feet and ambled around me, panting and tasting the air. “A mirror. Try harder, little river beast.”
Sesha was famed for her love of riddles.
“I’ll play some more”—I rolled my shoulder, working out the ache to distract myself from my rattling nerves—“if you give me Senenmut’s scrolls.”
“I do not think I will give you anything, Mokarakk Oma, but I will keep you here if Ammit allows. We could play for a long time. Would you like that, little crocodile?”
I lifted a hand, making sure I had Shu’s attention, pointed deeper into the rest of the library, and then pressed a finger to my lips. She moved away, deathly silent.
Sesha didn’t know Ammit was dead. She also probably didn’t know I was cursed to Osiris. She’d been locked in the library ever since Thoth had caught her snooping and gouged out her eyes as punishment. Sesha was from the old world. I wondered if she even knew of the sundering and how the world had changed beyond her recognition. Probably not. Ignorance was bliss.
“Do you ever think about freedom, Sesha?” I asked.
“Ask me your riddles, Mokarakk Oma, and return to Duat.” She lifted a fat paw and licked at the pads.
I eyed Shu as she scanned the shelves of scrolls. “Until I am measured, I am not known. How you miss me when I have flown. What am I?”
Sesha was in motion again, her speckled coat smooth over powerful muscles. She brushed up against some shelves in a very catlike chin rub. “Mm…” she purred.
A quick glance revealed Shu still searching, but the library was vast. The chance of her finding the correct scrolls was slim.
I started my own slow exploration as Sesha prowled around columns. Senenmut’s architect scrolls were human-made, not god-made. They’d be frayed and imperfect. If I could get close enough, I should be able to tell the difference. I just needed a rough idea where they could be.
“Time,” Sesha answered, adding a yowl. She pounced in front of me, bringing my wanderings up short. “Another, prey. Tell me another.” Her canine teeth glinted, each the size of my forearm.
“The scrolls?”
“Another!” she demanded, but her ear flicked and her tail twitched, all toward a section of aged scrolls piled high.
“Very well…” I drifted forward, scanning the stacks of rolled papyrus. She couldn’t see what I was doing, but she’d figure it out if I didn’t distract her. “What has four legs in the morning, two legs in the afternoon, and three legs at night?”
Sesha draped herself over a step, scooped up her tail, and licked at its white tip. “Four, two, three…” The t
ip quivered. She swatted it and playfully chewed.
As she considered the riddle, I spotted a familiar symbol peeking out from the torn edge of a closed scroll: a jackal with the head of a snake. The same symbol was on Ammit’s missing box, and I’d recently carved it into a witch’s hand as a clue to snap myself out of Thoth’s curse. The symbol had stalked me for over a year, and here it was again, on a scroll in Thoth’s library. There was no way I was leaving without it. I flexed my fingers and inched the scroll from beneath the stack. Almost free, a ragged edge snagged on one of its neighbors, and the stack of scrolls clattered to the floor.
“Run!” Shukra yelled. Her power flooded the air, choking out the sweet smells with the oily, burnt-diesel odor of her magic.
I whirled in time to avoid the blur of massive cat. Sesha plowed into the shelves, sending scrolls flying. I managed three strides before a paw the size of a tree trunk hooked a leg out from under me. The floor rushed up to smack me in the chin, and the scroll slipped from my grip and rolled away.
Sesha’s thundering bounds approached. I flipped onto my back and got both legs up in time to catch the goddess’s pounce and throw her over me. She tumbled over and then released her claws, slicing into stone with an ear-splitting screech.
I dashed forward, snatched up the scroll, and ran toward Shukra. The demon sorceress’s eyes glowed an eerie liquid green as she chanted. A pulsing, heaving cloud of hissing things appeared out of nowhere. Locusts. Shu flung them at the goddess.
Sesha’s roar rocked the floor.
There—old, damaged scrolls. Battered and stained, torn and frayed, and along their edges, one name stood out: Senenmut. I scooped up an armful, still running.
“Thief!” Sesha howled, spinning around and around as she snapped and swatted at the locusts. “Thoth will hear of this. Thoth will punish you as he did me!”
Shu’s spell snapped, and the locusts scattered. We bolted for the passage. Shu ran on, but I stopped at the passageway and spread my arms, touching the walls on either side of me. “Stay here, Sesha. The world is not what it was. Stay here and remember the old times. You’ll thank me for it.”
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