Servant of the Gods
Page 31
A spark of light startled him, a strange red glow, but he realized it was just the reflection from his torch.
So far he hadn’t found anything good, though, no gold, no jewels, nothing.
This wasn’t the temple yet, it was just the open place before it. He’d never seen anything like it before though. It was kind of pretty in the moonlight.
It was a little eerie with the statues of the lions on their high pedestals staring down at them from between the palm trees, and too open to the sky above. One of the pedestals was empty. For a moment a frisson of fear touched him.
The statue must have fallen off into the high grass, he told himself.
Even so it felt as if he were being watched and yet there were only the cold stars above him and the others with him.
Following, the Guardian found herself panting like Nebi, drawing in the scent of the man as much through her mouth as through her nose. Tasting him in the air, musky, warm.
She was suddenly incredibly hungry and thirsty. So parched, so dry…and so very, very hungry.
Her need was so intense it was very nearly sexual. In a way, she was aware, conscious, but only faintly. She moved more on instinct than thought.
She could hear a faint drumming sound…his heartbeat…
Fascinated, she drew closer, listening as it hammered, quickening as he sensed her presence.
She was so thirsty…
The man was there before her, nearly close enough to touch, almost as if he were etched in red against the night sky.
His pulse pounded so hard she could hear it and little else.
She turned her head a bit to hear it better. It throbbed in her ears…a little rapid, eager, but steady…excited. His blood was hot, pulsing in his veins.
She needed to take him swiftly and silently, so he wouldn’t warn the others…
Quick as a snake, she struck, a hand over his mouth to prevent his outcry, drawing him back into the deeper shadows beneath the crooked break in the stone above. Her hand over his mouth drew his head to one side, leaving his throat bare, exposed…and vulnerable. His pulse beat there, steadily…
Her eyes locked there, enthralled by the throb of it…
Satisfaction filled her as her fangs pierced the thin skin, felt it part and give beneath them, and she knew what it was for Nebi, the others, to feed this way. Her teeth drove deep as warm coppery fluid jetted into her mouth. The glorious taste of him overwhelmed her, filled her, so rich, so sweet… She was so thirsty, so parched, so hungry. So very hungry. His hot blood hit the back of her throat, coursed down it. Wonderful. So good. She sucked, drew on him. There was no time to savor him – she was starving. Instinctively her throat worked. Her eyelids fluttered with pleasure as the man moaned softly, ecstatically. The taste changed, shifted, deepened… It was wonderful. She clasped him more tightly against her as he sagged, trembling deliciously against her.
Strength and life flowed in her veins, her mind was working again, but oh dear gods he tasted so good.
Drawing great draughts of his blood into her throat, she drew in more, listening to his heart hammer, shudder, slow, her hand over it to feel it, and it was glorious.
She drew harder on him, seeking every last drop and still didn’t feel sated. It was incredible…
More. She wanted more.
Her mouth worked, drawing every last delicious drop out of him, listening to his heart hammer, trying to pump the fluid that filled her mouth, but finding nothing there. Her tongue slipped over her lips to lap up every drop of what she’d missed in her eagerness.
Suddenly she felt energized, every cell awakened, springing to life…
In the distance she heard Nebi’s coughing roar and a sudden shout.
She smiled and drew her swords…
Nebi had found the grave robbers.
There were others invading the Tomb.
She couldn’t, wouldn’t allow that.
Still hungry after all the centuries, she feasted on one after another.
When it was done she faded back into the stele again…to wait…
It had hardly been a challenge.
Even so she felt more aware, a part of her awakening again, remembering who she was as she fell into the dreaming once more…
Years passed, decades…
Irisi dreamed of the world, and of the past…of Khai…
Pain moved through her, grief as he passed…and she did not…
Khai.
If she’d had tears to grieve…
Time passed, but not her grief…now there was only her duty, and Egypt.
The old thief had searched for years for this particular tomb. It was legendary. Many had sought it, none had found it. He’d heard rumors over the years, rumors that it contained a cache of gold, jewels, and a ruby as big as a man’s fist.
Now, at last, Abdul believed he’d found it. He smiled and rubbed his hands together in satisfaction.
They’d already found one treasure trove and looted it, minor though it was. An outer tomb, surprisingly. It had contained some jewels and some nice statuary, most particularly the one in his hands. Made of gold and inset with jewels, it was clearly a depiction of a priestess of some kind, with her hands on the heads of the lions to each side of her.
His tent set up, Abdul went to sit in the entrance out of the heat of the sun as one of his slaves hurried to bring him food and water.
He waved his men into the cleft in the rock.
“You know what to do,” he said. “Watch out for traps.”
There were always traps; the old ones had been wise to men like him.
But men like him were wise to their ways, too. There were old thieves and bold thieves, but few bold, old thieves.
Abdul was old. He let others be bold. Like Hakim.
Hakim flapped a hand at him. “We know, old man.”
As his right hand man that one needed to show more respect.
Abdul smiled.
“If you know so much you take the lead, then,” he said and settled on his rug to wait, folding his arms. “I’ll wait for you here.”
The other man’s face set only slightly but it was clear he was less than pleased.
As the one in the lead, Hakim was the one most likely to find the traps. He was also the one most likely to miss one or trigger one but Abdul knew Hakim dared not show his dismay in front of the men or else lose face.
Now he would pay the price for his arrogance.
They’d already lost one man to the outer tomb. Even that had been protected.
Just the presence of that tomb had been enough to fool some into thinking they’d found what they sought. Only to fall prey to the protections on it, as they’d seen by the skeletons and detritus around it.
To Abdul it was simply proof he’d been right and a greater tomb awaited if they could but find it.
He believed they had.
With a grim nod, his torch held high, Hakim led men into the cleft in the rock.
For long moments there was silence, just the sounds of the sand in the desert, the tick of warming rocks, the sound of the camels as they shifted and chewed while the sun beat down on those who waited.
Then thunder.
A massive rumble and clatter.
Dust spewed from the cleft and Abdul shook his head.
With a wave he sent more men into the rift.
“Clear it,” he said.
It was a dangerous business, raiding tombs. The old ones had been wise, setting traps for those who would raid their places of burial.
Hakim, despite his name, had not been.
A man came running, bowed respectfully and waited.
“Is it clear?”
The man nodded.
It was clear but the passage was not easy.
Abdul set more of his men to clearing the remainder of the stone as they picked their way over the rubble.
As he did so he saw Hakim, his eyes wide, dead beneath a massive stone.
Abdul shook his head.
Fool.
Abdul stepped out into the cavern, surprised at what he found there.
Still, he waved his men forward.
It was said this tomb had a curse on it, but then they always said such things of tombs. If those who stole from tombs died more often than other men, it was because they risked more. There was no other reason.
Across the enormous bowl and against the soft silence of the great desert behind the wall came the sound of stone grating on stone.
Then a coughing, rumbling roar, the sound of a lion on the hunt.
Lions? There were no lions in this part of the desert, where then lions?
A tinge of alarm went through Abdul as a breath of wind moved past him in this vast windless place.
In the distance, he heard a cry. A short scream echoed from the stone that vaulted above them.
Another scream, this one longer, faded in a gurgle Abdul could hear clearly and then died on a sound that drew Abdul’s manhood tight against him.
A deep cry of pleasure, unnatural in this place.
“Rasul!” Abdul shouted.
There was no answer.
A man shouted.
There was another roar and a man shrieked.
Abdul blanched and backed toward the entrance to the split in the rock. He didn’t know what was going on but he was wiser than Hakim. He knew when to give in, and when to flee.
From the shadows one of his men came running and Abdul froze in absolute shock at what stalked the man.
That wasn’t nearly as frightening as what caught him.
Fear was like lightning. His balls drew up tight. With a desperate effort he kept from screaming as he turned and fled, pushed past those clearing the cleft in the rock. Perhaps those lives might satisfy what lay within.
He could only pray so.
Racing for the light, he burst out into the open.
“My camel, quickly,” he said, desperate, clapping his hands for his slaves as he ran to his tent. “Hurry, hurry. Mustafa, Najib, with me.”
His people hastened to do his bidding.
Hastily he gathered his most precious booty, his fingers caressing the small figurine of the priestess, praying to her for salvation. He leaped onto his saddled camel, set heel to it without a backward glance.
“We go,” Abdul hissed to the other two men, his guard.
The remaining men, puzzled and disturbed, turned to look back toward the great crack in the rock face.
A sound like the wind in a storm whispered from the crack in the great wall of stone.
From within the rift came cries and shouts, the screams of those within it.
Those outside fell back. Some turned to run, far too late.
A great cloud of dust and stone erupted from within the escarpment to swallow up those beyond. Voices cried out in horror, and in pleasure.
That sound followed Abdul across the desert, raising prickles over his skin.
After a time, silence fell as the desert swallowed the sounds up.
It was a shaken, terrified and desperate man who stumbled into the little temple to the shock of the priests and priestesses who served there. His face and hands were scoured and bloodied by the desert.
Abdul ignored them, prostrating himself before the figure of the Goddess. The priests and priestesses couldn’t help him, only a Goddess could.
They’d lost Mustafa in the desert that first night.
At first Abdul thought it safe to rest and so they’d stopped to set up what camp they could.
The wind had come up.
All of them had looked up, knowing the signs in the clouds, in the haze in the sky behind them.
It was a sandstorm.
They found what shelter they could and hunkered down to weather it out.
Still something sent a shiver down Abdul’s back. He weighed his chances.
Something told him they were better in the sandstorm.
As the first rush of blowing sand reached them, he leaped for his camel.
Seeing him, Najib followed.
Mustafa had not.
Even over the sound of the storm they heard him scream in abject terror and then in delirious bliss, a dying gurgle of immense pleasure.
And yes, there was something about the sound of that ecstasy that drew their manhood tight and sent a chill through them. Even as it called to them.
Najib’s eyes had turned white at that cry.
It had been a race then, to see which camel could run or be goaded faster against the fury of the storm.
Once again, Abdul won, his fingers clenched around the figurine of the little priestess as he heard the cry out of the darkness.
Even so he couldn’t shake the idea he was still hunted. He could feel it.
Desperate, he raced into the first temple he found and threw himself on mercy of she who ruled there.
All he had to offer was the golden figurine of the priestess.
“Take it,” he said to one of the priests, thrusting it into his hands. “Take it as my offering to her, to Sekhmet.”
The Goddess of War.
Instead the priest looked toward the open door of the temple and his face grew grim and set. As one, he and the others backed away, disappeared into the shadowed depths of the temple.
Nearly weeping with terror, Abdul slowly turned.
Sand swirled through the entrance. Something stepped out of it.
He looked from the figure in his hand to the terrible one who stood in the doorway.
The Guardian of the Tomb.
They were the same.
His cry was first of sheer terror and then of a deep and horrifying ecstasy.
When silence came once again to Sekhmet’s temple, the priests and priestesses emerged.
All that remained of the old thief was a dry and empty husk.
The wind gusted and swept the temple clean.
A noise awoke her. The Guardian found a barrel filled with red-dyed beer and shook her head…
That had been the Goddess Sekhmet’s downfall, and while she served both Goddesses now, she wasn’t Sekhmet…that trick would only work once…
It didn’t work this time, as the grave robbers who’d been unlucky enough to stumble on the tomb discovered to their dismay and horror.
Time passed.
When next she found a young man tethered inside the garden her fury was nearly unbounded…
He had been staked near the entrance to her gardens.
Warily, she looked around, her mouth tight.
She could sense his pulse pound, scented him, and her hunger roared. But there was no malice in him, no greed, just fear, a terrible fear…
Those that waited just outside, they were another matter.
With one strike of her sword she slashed the ropes that bound the boy…for he was little more than that.
She looked at him.
He was frozen with fear. The scent of it filled the air enticingly.
Once, and only once, had she tried not to feed, to resist Sekhmet’s gift… She shivered, remembering…
Looking at him, she said, “Run.”
The man just stared at her, terror holding him trapped.
She fixed her gaze on him. “Forget you were ever here. Now, I’m very hungry, so…Run…”
Eyes widening, he looked at her, the eldritch glow of her blue eyes glimmering.
“Run,” she shouted.
He did…
Fury spurred her – that they should sacrifice an innocent to her as if she were some dark goddess…
Deliberately she went in search of the leader, stalked him, tormented him, herded him…so he should know what it was like to be hunted.
She took him down like a lion with an antelope, letting him know that to her he was food, prey, nothing more, showing him as much mercy as he had the boy, feeding from him in great gulping swallows…
His fear turned the taste brilliant, heady, glorious… more…
In horror, she stepped back, her bre
ath catching as she realized what she’d done, what she was doing…
Only the stars saw her tears…
Chapter Thirty Four
Present day, Gilf Kebbir, Egypt
The last of the thieves fled the menacing shadows, bursting out into the early morning sunlight that spilled through the cleft in the rock above them. It had taken all night but they were the last of those that had come. It had been centuries since she had awakened. A thousand images spilled through her mind – the gifts of Horus and Hathor, that she would dream of the world beyond this place.
So much had changed.
But this man puzzled her…
Laughing with relief, he looked around at the sunlight that surrounded him as he spun to face her.
“Dawn. It’s dawn. I’m safe, safe. You can’t touch me now. I’ll be back,” he shouted, “and I won’t be alone. Your time is over. Over, do you hear me?! Too many know, too many are looking. Even you, even the Guardian of the Tomb cannot stand against so many. They’re coming. It remains only to be seen which comes first – the Americans? The German and his fanatics? The Egyptians? Or those who watch and follow all of them? If nothing else, they’ll bomb this place down around your ears.”
Frowning a little, baffled at his words, his conviction, she stepped out into the sunlight, wishing she could feel it on her skin, truly feel it, the warmth of it…
He gaped, all of his bravado running out of him abruptly as he stared in shock and horror.
“That’s not possible,” he whispered.
Light poured through and into her.
Frowning, she looked at him.
“Why would light deter me?” she asked, advancing on him with her lions at her heels. “I am and have always been a Servant of Light. That is my purpose. To defend against the Darkness of that which lies below. I have no fear of the Light of Ra.”
After all the long years of dreaming there was little else she knew about herself.
She was the Guardian, her will held those below, she still defended…but her sense of self had faded, her name, her memories…had vanished…