King of the Gods

by J. A. Cipriano

  “Ha ha,” I said before turning my gaze back to the quarry. Only now, it seemed even more unsettling than before because I knew these guys were slaves … “Wait, does that mean there’s like a slave master here somewhere?”

  “More than likely.” Aziza glanced past me toward the quarry. “I don’t see one though.” She rubbed her chin. “It would be obvious if one was here because he’d be wearing a tunic and carrying a whip.”

  “Yeah, I’d say that would make him stand out,” I said, thinking. I wasn’t sure the best way to go about getting clothes because I didn’t want to steal from the slaves, and what’s more, I didn’t know where they kept their supplies, assuming they were here at all.

  “Are you worried about being seen, Luke?” Aziza asked when I didn’t move to infiltrate the camp. “Because you can simply wrap your magic around you and bend the shadows and light to hide you. It’s not quite invisibility and if someone looks right at you, they’ll probably see you, but it’d be enough for you to sneak in and steal what you need.” She pointed past me toward another hut. “They’re probably in there.”

  “Right, okay.” I nodded, fixing my eyes on the other hut. Like the one we were near, it was made of the same butter-yellow bricks, but unlike this one, it was much, much smaller, standing maybe ten by ten. There wasn’t even a door, just a flap of dirty cloth over what looked like an entrance.

  As I studied it, I wondered if the building we were next to had a similar door, and if the slave master or masters would be inside?

  If they were, that might make things a lot easier.

  “Say, Aziza, do you think I’m strong enough to beat up some slavers?” I asked, turning to look at her.

  “You’re more than strong enough to kill mummies with super strength, speed, and durability. Any human wouldn’t stand a chance against you. Why? Worried you’ll get caught and have to fight?” She rubbed her chin thoughtfully. “It is totally possible …”

  “No, that wasn’t it at all.” Taking a deep breath, I strode out from our hiding place and turned the corner of the building. Like I’d thought, there was an entrance, but unlike the one over on the other hut, this one’s flap had been rolled up. Inside, I could see a few men dressed in tunics, but they were too busy playing at some kind of game I couldn’t recognize to pay much attention to me even though I’d neglected to hide myself with magic.

  That was fine though. They’d pay attention to me soon enough.

  “Hey,” I called, marching through the entrance and looking them over. There were six of them and only the one immediately to my left had hair. The rest were bald. That was pretty much where the differences ended because they were all wearing similar tunics though the ones with the nicer tunics seemed a lot better fed.

  Maybe you got better rations when you were more of a dick?

  “What are you doing here, you insolent dog?” the one to my right snarled, standing as his hand went for his whip. “Get back to work.”

  The others didn’t even bother to get up, or really look at me. As soon as the one had risen, they’d gone back to their game. Well, all except the one by my left who was nursing what seemed like cup full of amber liquid as he watched.

  “How about you make me?” I said, and as his face turned a shade of red I’d never actually seen on a person before, his whip lashed out.

  It should have seemed quick, but it wasn’t. In fact, I’d seen the whole thing in slow motion. His muscles had tightened and then uncoiled as he snapped the whip out with a flick of his wrist. The end of it came rushing to me, and while I probably should have been scared, I just wasn’t.

  Taking a casual step to the left, I let the whip crack by me, and as the sound snapped through the air, I seized it from the air and jerked on it.

  I must have been a lot stronger than I was before because the guy came stumbling forward, his feet going out from under him as the whip slipped from his grip. I took a quick step forward, slipping by him as I smashed my elbow into the back of his neck with a satisfied crunch that dropped him like a sack of potatoes.

  He hit the ground with a whump and lay there unmoving as the whole room went silent. The whole ordeal had taken less than a second.

  Then everyone was moving as the slavers playing their game leaped to their feet. Some rushed me, some went for curved swords I knew to be called khopeshes, and others grabbed whips.

  Only it didn’t much matter. I was so much faster than them it was a joke. My foot lashed out, kicking the first one to come at me in the shin, and the blow caused him to stumble right into my fist.

  My knuckles slammed into the side of his skull. Something broke inside him as the blow sent him toppling sideways over the cushions, upending the table beside them before he collapsed to the ground unmoving.

  The next guy had a sword, and as it came down at me in an overhead swing, I closed the distance between us. His wrists bounced off my shoulder, and while it should have hurt, I barely felt the impact. Still, I didn’t pause to reflect on that because I was too busy headbutting the guy in the face. My forehead shattered his nose, and as he flopped backward in a spray of blood, someone tried to whip me.

  I turned, once again slipping by the cracking whip, and hit the guy who had tried to sneak up on me from behind. I punched him in the stomach, and as he buckled, I grabbed him by the back of his tunic and flung him at the Indiana Jones wannabe.

  The impact carried both men into the far wall, and as they slumped to the ground unconscious, I turned toward the last man who still sat there nursing his drink.

  “You seem to be quite the fighter. You took out all my men so easily. It was most impressive,” he said, nodding around the room, and he wasn’t nearly as scared as he should have been. “It’s been ages since I’ve seen someone like you.” He rose and put his drink down on the table beside him. “You and I can make a lot of money in the slave fights.” He quirked a smile at me as he came closer. “Think about it, you could have your freedom if you played your cards right.”

  My hand shot out, grabbing the smug bastard by his throat. I squeezed, cutting off the floor of oxygen to his brain and causing his eyes to bug out of his head.

  “I’m already free, and if you have any sense, you’ll free all these people too,” I snapped right before I flung him through the doorway. The moment he hit the sand outside, all work in the quarry stopped as the slaves turned to look at us.

  “If this is your master, you are free.” I kicked the guy in the ass as he tried to rise, sending him flopping face forward onto the sand. “Go on, do it.”

  The guy turned toward me, and for a second it looked like he was going to refuse.

  I raised an eyebrow at him. “Unless you want to fight for it?”

  “No.” He looked at me for a long time. “They can go free. It matters not to me. I do not own them.” He turned his eyes to the sky. “The gods own them. If they take offense to this, they will punish you.” Only as he spoke, I didn’t get the impression that I had the gods to worry about.

  “Yeah, I think they agree with me,” I said as I held out one hand and called upon my magic. It swam in the air, and as it did, I pointed at him. A rush of power exploded from my finger tip and struck him in the chest, flinging him backward.

  He struck the ground hard, and as he did, everyone’s eyes went wide. Then they all began running away, which, honestly, was about what I wanted.

  Well, that and clothes. I moved toward the lead slaver as he tried to rise, smoke still curling from a pinprick on his chest.

  “Give me your clothes,” I said, holding out my hand. “The gods demand satisfaction.”

  12

  “How do you even fight a mummy?” I asked as we stood in front of a massive cave an hour later. Its mouth yawned open like the maw of a great beast as it extended down into the yellow earth. It was a little weird because I didn’t even know Egypt had caves. I’d been pretty sure it was all sand with a river running through it. Maybe a palm tree? “Like, let’s say we find the mumm
y, and we want to recapture him. What’s the plan, exactly?”

  “Hmm …” She turned and looked at me a slight frown on her face.

  “Is the frown because you don’t know or because I stole clothing from the slave camp we walked by?” I asked, arching an eyebrow at her. The clothing wasn’t much. Merely a long white tunic, a pair of shabby sandals, and a head wrap to keep the sun off of me, but something told me she’d liked me a lot more when I was naked, which was fine. I liked her naked a lot better too.

  “The clothing one.” She gave me a grin. “It’s still a nice view, but not as nice of a view.”

  “That’s what I thought,” I said, glad she liked seeing me naked. “So, about the mummies then … I’m not exactly a ghostbuster, so unless you have one of those traps and a proton pack, I’m not sure what to do …”

  “Oh, the mummy thing is easy,” Aziza said, reaching up and tapping the amethyst scarab around her neck. “All mummies have a necklace like this. It’s what keeps us animated. Destroy it, and our wrappings will cinch down on us and render us immobile.”

  “That seems a little … easy?” I offered. “Are you sure there’s not something you aren’t telling me?”

  “It is a little more complicated, but basically, no. That’s it. Break the pendant, and they’ll fall back asleep.” She smiled at me, and the sight of it made my heart forget how to beat in my chest. “It’s, as your people would say, ‘not rocket science.’”

  “Okay, smarty pants, what do we do with sleeping mummies? Let them lie?” I asked, smirking at my own joke. You know because I was a werewolf.

  “I’ll summon a sarcophagus from the Duat and imprison them. Trust me, once you get the pendant, I’ll take it from there. Now let’s go.” She pointed into the cave, and a tiny shiver shook her. I probably wouldn’t have noticed if I hadn’t been watching her very closely.

  “So, I fight the raging mummy, and when I’m done, you bag ‘em and tag ‘em?” I asked, stepping in front of her and staring down into the cave. It smelled like a damp sewer, but beneath that, there was a faint odor of flowers. Jasmine, maybe?

  I stepped down into the cave, and almost immediately the warm, damp air within washed over me, making me feel sticky and wet. Every step forward was like treading deeper into the maw of some great beast. Golden stone glistened all around me as I descended further, and as I watched, bits of water collected along the roof and dripped down to form multi-hued stalactites that seemed to grow as I approached. I shivered, trying to dismiss the notion that fangs were distending all around me.

  “Yep, definitely the mouth of some giant monster,” I murmured to myself.

  Aziza nodded next to me, her face a dim outline in the darkness of the cave, which was when I realized something. I could see and smell a lot better than I ever could before. Was that from the sacred heart? From Wepwawet? Both?

  I pushed down the thought as another thought filled me. I could become a werewolf. That was awesome. That said, I wasn’t exactly sure of the specifics.

  I rubbed my clammy hands together, glancing around the cave, and wishing I could see just a little better. Already the entrance had faded to a small pinprick of light behind us. If we didn’t find the mummy soon, I was pretty sure we weren’t going to be able to see anything. The prospect of encountering a shambling mummy in total darkness wasn’t exactly appealing.

  “So …” I whispered, trying not to be loud enough to be heard by anyone other than Aziza. “you never did show me how to call up elemental fire, did you?”

  She shook her head. “But we don’t need that now. That’d give our location away,” she replied.

  “Okay.” I paused a moment. “How do you even know what rocket science is, anyway?” I asked as I stepped in something sticky and my stomach lurched.

  I looked down, trying to wipe my toes off on the sand, but whatever goop I’d stepped on stuck to me with gooey tenacity. Awesome.

  “I don’t really.” She shrugged, fingers touching her pendant. “Your sacred heart is translating our words, assisting us in communicating better.”

  “Oh.” I poured that knowledge over in my head. It made sense since they were probably speaking some ancient Egyptian dialect. I should have figured that out sooner, but in my defense, everyone in movies always speaks English.

  Something just beyond her moved. I wasn’t sure how I could tell, but the shadows twitched. My heart began to pound in my chest, and my hands clenched themselves into fists. I stared at the spot, trying to tell myself I was just seeing things, that my mind was playing tricks on me.

  “What?” Aziza asked, looking at me, wide-eyed. “What is it?”

  “Nothing,” I said, shaking my head. “I thought I saw something.”

  “You thought you saw something?” she asked, and the words sort of caught on her teeth and spun out into the space between us.

  “Yeah.” I shrugged. The shadow hadn’t moved, and though everything inside of me told me to run the hell out of the cave, I started walking toward it anyway. It wasn’t like it was far away. The whole cave was only a few meters wide. As I approached, a strange smell hit my nose. It was still flowers, but they were almost sickly sweet, like rotting fruit.

  Something struck me in the back of the head. I toppled forward, my already obscured vision going even darker around the edges. I hit the ground hard on my hands and knees as fingers tore into the flesh of my right bicep. I tried to move, tried to fight off my attacker, but the next thing I knew, I was flying sideways through the air.

  I smashed into the cave wall. My breath whooshed out of me as I slid brokenly to the floor. I lay there, unable to do more than wheeze. Aziza’s face lit up in the distance, her scarab pendant glowing bright enough to fill the cave with lavender light.

  In front of me stood a man with short ebony hair and skin the color of charcoal. He was wearing a skintight tunic of solid gold that fell to his ankles. His back was to me, but even from here, I could see blood dripping down his fingers so they looked like gory claws. He wasn’t watching me anymore, his head craned toward Aziza.

  I sucked in a breath that tasted like pennies and gritted my teeth together. I was going to get up and help … any second now.

  “Jailer,” the man said in an angry, gruff voice. “Why have you come for me?” He took a step forward, his tunic glittering like a golden disco ball as he moved. “Surely there is someone else you can go bother?”

  Aziza’s face clammed up, going stony and unreadable as she wrapped her hand around her pendant. “Nas,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “You should come quietly.”

  Even though the man’s back was to me, I was suddenly blinded by a flare of pale blue light that exploded from something on his chest. It cast shadows along the ceiling that skittered across the cave like a swarm of bugs.

  “Or not,” Nas said, anger turning his words caustic. The sound of millions of tiny scurrying legs filled my ears as I hoisted myself to my feet, blood dripping from the corner of my mouth. While I wasn’t a big guy who towered over everyone, this dude was barely five and a half feet tall. It was time to use my size to my advantage.

  I reached out, grabbing Nas by the shoulder and jerking him around. He spun, losing his balance and toppling to the sandy ground in a cloud of dust. I threw myself on top of him, moving to pin him to the ground beneath my hundred-and-sixty-pound body. I expected air to whoosh out of him as I slammed my knees into his gut, but instead he just glared at me, hatred distorting his features into an animalistic mask. With one quick movement, he smacked me across the face with the back of his left fist.

  My head snapped back, and as I stumbled backward half a step, Nas scrambled to his feet just in time for Aziza’s fist to whip through the air and catch him broadside across the temple with a thud. He careened sideways, smacking into the rocky wall and falling forward onto his knees. His blue sapphire wasp pendant hung loose in the air, wings flapping and legs thrashing as it tried to climb back into Nas’ tunic.

  Before Aziza cou
ld take advantage, Nas threw one hand up, and a burst of sparks leaped from his outstretched hand. A golden fireball shot through the air a second later. It smashed into Aziza, throwing her backward in a smoking heap, and rage unlike anything I’d ever felt surged through me.

  It ran through my veins, turning my vision red as I grew so hot I could barely think, barely speak. No. The only thing I wanted to do was rip Nas limb from limb. As that rage filled me, I felt the change come over me once more. My body grew, gaining height and weight as fur sprouted from my skin and my fingers and toes elongated into claws. My mouth shifted into immense jowls filled with a bazillion sharp teeth.

  And it all happened in a split second.

  Before Nas could even get to his feet, I pounced, my huge werewolf body slamming into him and driving him into the ground. As his head smacked into the wall with a wet thwack, I grabbed the writhing insect pendant around his neck and yanked. The golden chain snapped free with a shriek that made me howl with delight. With a sound like cracking thunder, blue light exploded from a spot in the center of Nas’ forehead, filling the small cave like an arc flash.

  “No!” Nas screamed, his words shriveled and dry sounding. His clothes vanished as musty wrappings snaked up his body and cinched down on him like an invisible spider was wrapping him up.

  In the time it took me to blink, Nas was completely ensconced in mummy chic.

  “Toss the pendant next to him,” Aziza said, coming toward me. I nodded once and did as she asked.

  As it hit the ground, Aziza muttered a few words and raised her staff, causing light to envelop both it and the wasp pendant.

  A second later, the Nas’s pendant exploded into a million scintillating shards of metal that circled the mummy like spinning, whirring bits of sapphire shrapnel before collapsing in on itself in a flash of color that made spots dance in front of my eyes.

  I turned away, shielding my face until the glare died down. When I looked a moment later, a golden sarcophagus etched with a billion hieroglyphics stood in the spot where Nas had been. Aziza smirked at me. Her face was shrouded in amethyst light as she placed her outstretched hand on the metal lid. There was a shriek that reminded me of a clarion call. The entire thing vanished. No wisp of smoke, no flash of light. One second it was there, the next it wasn’t.