Kemamonit Returns

by Paul Edwards

  Chapter five

  We both walked through the entrance and into a long wide corridor with doorways lining each side. The corridor had a few dozen people walking to and fro, all with expressions of great purpose.

  "How do we find Imhotep?" Peter asked.

  "We find the king?"

  "So... how do we find him?"

  "He'll be the guy with the most ridiculous looking hat."

  "Hat?"

  "Crown, whatever, Ancient Egyptians were obsessed with headdress, it was how everyone showed their status, the bigger and stupider looking it was, the more powerful the person."

  "Oh... like the royalty of the late nineteenth century... ridiculous military uniforms with racks of meaningless medals."

  "Yep... see how little some things change," I said.

  "Nobody does that anymore."

  "I think that's cause most leaders are elected, they don't need symbols to pump up their self esteem, the electorate does that for them."

  "Will the king just be walking around?" Peter asked.

  "I think so, this is a much different time, there are no guns or explosives to worry about plus if you actually tried something justice would be swift and brutal."

  We walked down the corridor and then out into a courtyard, the bright light causing me to squint, I saw a small crowd of people facing a large man who was talking in a loud voice.

  As my eyes adjusted I saw that he was wearing and enormous crown, it looked like a large bowling pin sitting on a small chair. I saw another man standing to his immediate right.

  "Ah ha, the right hand man," I said pointing.

  "How do you know?" Peter asked sceptically.

  "He's standing on his right hand side."

  "Really? He has to stand on the right?"

  "Yep... that's where the phrase came from, I think it's because he protects the kings sword arm, so he can draw his weapon if attacked."

  Peter shaded his eyes with his hand and studied the group.

  "He doesn't have a hat," Peter said after a few seconds.

  "Who?"

  "Imhotep."

  "He's a powerful sorcerer, I doubt he has self esteem problems."

  I studied the large man with the enormous crown, he had thick limbs and a broad chest, I could see scars all over his body. His face caused me to shiver inwardly, it was sharp and angular with dark almost lifeless eyes. There was also a profound confidence in his stance and gestures, he looked like someone who had spent many years commanding men.

  "The king... he's from the military?" I heard Peter whisper.

  "I think so? How can you tell?"

  "I spent a lot of time on military bases, you get so you can spot military people even when they're not in uniform."

  I surreptitiously flipped some of the squares on my magic bracelet, I then whispered under my breath.

  "Imhotep, I must talk to you."

  I saw Imhotep stiffen suddenly then look around the courtyard, our eyes locked when he saw me.

  "How did you do that?" Peter asked, looking impressed.

  "Ventriloquism spell."

  Imhotep turned to the king and spoke a few words, the king nodded his head quickly and turned back to the crowd he was addressing.

  Imhotep walked over to Peter and I.

  "Do I know you?" Imhotep said as he scrutinized Peter and me.

  He was a skinny wiry man in his thirties, he had a shaved his head and wore a conservative white kilt and leather sandals.

  "I am Kemamonit, you may have heard of me, I have some urgent business to discuss with you."

  A confused expression appeared on Imhotep's face, he stared at me intently then looked at my left arm.

  He took a step back in surprise, the confusion on his face changed to astonishment when he saw my bracelet, his eyes moved back up to stare at my face again.

  "How... you've been dead for eon's... I have seen your tomb..."

  "We must find a place to talk," I said.

  "There is a restaurant near here, it is large and has many private places."

  We were soon sitting at a rough wooden table on hard stone benches in a large airy restaurant. There were only a few people at the other tables, most looked like bureaucrats from the palace, Imhotep had gone to get a jug of wine and some cups.

  The restaurant was beautifully decorated, the walls were covered in bright murals and there were potted plants and flowers everywhere.

  We were sitting next to one of the many open windows, it looked over the Nile river.

  "Man this is nice, the food looks great too," Peter said as he looked around.

  "Well unless you want some new and original type of diarrhea I would stick to wine."

  There was a musician playing a lute on a small raised platform against the far wall, he was handsome but had the same scurrilous demeanor common to most musicians.

  Peter turned and looked at the musician as well, he cocked one eye when he saw him.

  "That song he's playing, what's it about?"

  I listened for a few seconds.

  "It is a lament... for a lover I think, a man is arguing with a messenger about a letter from a girl he loves... he was told there was a tablet waiting for him... she is from the city of the White Walls... that is the chorus I think..."

  I listened for a few more seconds.

  "Wait... it's not from his lover but his daughter, his wife has left him and they no longer live together."

  "What's the daughters name?" Peter asked.

  I listened some more.

  "It's a Canaanite name... I think... it would probably be pronounced Mary in English but I'm not sure."

  "Hmm... interesting," Peter said.

  Imhopet returned with a clay jug and three cups, he filled each cup up and then sat down across from us.

  "That language you were speaking... I have not heard it before," he said.

  "It is from the north," I replied, trying to keep my face expressionless.

  Imhotep stared my collar for a few seconds.

  "You are from the future... aren't you... the woman in your tomb, she is from another page in the cosmic scroll."

  "What makes you think that?"

  "The stitching on your dress... it's perfect, each knot exact, something even the best seamstress could not do, but done in such a way as to seem completely unimportant."

  "You are right... we are from the future."

  "Can I ask... the Imhotep from your page... what happened... Djoser... was there a war?"

  "You are still known, mostly in scholarly circles, as a great architect and physician, Djoser is mostly forgotten, remembered only for his pyramid."

  A look of relief appeared on his face.

  "It worked then."

  "What worked, and why are you, a sorcerer, assisting a king?"

  Imhotep took a long swig from his wine cup and then banged it on the table, he grabbed the jug and topped it up.

  "Djoser is a very scary man, he has all of Egypt under his spell, they would do anything for him, he is also the most cunning and ruthless person I have ever met, he was preparing to launch a massive campaign to conquer the world, it would have killed thousands."

  "So you talked him out of it, in exchange for your services?"

  "No... more like diverted his attention... he has one weakness a large vanity."

  "The pyramid," I said, suddenly realising his plan.

  "Yes... when I built his mastaba... he just went on and on about how big it was, how powerful it made him look... it gave me an idea... so I built a wall around it... made him furious... he raged for almost a day... so I said to him no problem, just put another one on top, make it even bigger."

  "And then you'll put an obelisk in front of that."

  "Yes... It is being carved as we speak... I figure I can keep it up for maybe six or seven levels, it should keep him occupied for many years... I'm amazed my plan worked."

  I looked around the restaurant to make sure no one was watching, then used my
bracelet to conjure up a book, I slid it to Imhotep.

  He stared at it curiously then cautiously opened it.

  "I see scrollwork has come a long way... these paintings are of an unbelievable quality, and the penmanship is remarkable."

  Imhotep flipped through the pages, paying special attention to the great pyramids, he stopped suddenly when he spied his own creation, the step pyramid.

  "It still stands? How long?" He asked.

  I thought for a moment, the universe was like pages in a book, all magic really was, was moving things between the pages, if things changed on this page it wouldn't affect the others, so I decided to be honest with him.

  "Forty six hundred years and counting."

  Imhotep's mouth fell open in surprise.

  "That long... amazing... the future... what's it like? You must tell me."

  Peter nudged me suddenly.

  "Don't forget to ask for his autograph," he said.

  I used my bracelet to conjure up some papyrus, a reed stylus and a small container of ink.

  "Umm... my manservant would like your autograph," I said pushing the papyrus over to him.

  "Really? This is the custom in the future?"

  I nodded my head.

  Imhotep, took the stylus, dipped it's tip into the ink, then with great care wrote out his name in hieroglyphs on the papyrus, afterwards he took out a clay seal, dipped it into the ink and stamped the papyrus.

  He slid it over to Peter.

  "Your manservant huh... it always amazes me, the ability of a woman to lie while being right next to the evidence of her deceit."

  "What do you mean?" I said, feeling my face go warm.

  "Your hand is on his leg."

  "Oh..."

  "Again, the future, what is it like?"

  "It would take hours to explain."

  Imhotep looked around the restaurant then waved his hand while saying a word I did not recognize, suddenly everything went silent, I looked at the people around me, they were frozen in place.

  "I've have stopped time, the others here cannot see anything, now show me."

  I stared at him for a moment let out a sigh and then conjured up a window into the future.

  The window next to us no longer looked out over the Nile, we were now looking at a busy street in New York city in the afternoon. There were pedestrians walking back and forth in front of the window, oddly there were only a few that seemed surprised to see us.

  "Sorcery is commonplace now?" Imhotep asked, looking out.

  "No... this is not sorcery."

  "Really... this is extraordinary, those metal contraptions... stationary rollers... how?"

  I ripped a piece of papyrus into a circle, then poked the stylus into its center and spun it.

  "Oh... so simple... why have we not thought of that?"

  "That's what a lot of the future is, simple tricks, if you have enough of them and combine them they are not simple anymore."

  "Tell me one... please... just one, what could it matter?" Imhotep's expression reminded me of a young child begging for a sweet.

  I conjured up a pad of paper and a pen, In a column I wrote the Egyptian numbers from one to ten, I wrote the ten with the Egyptian one and a modern zero. I then wrote the numbers eleven to thirty in the modern way, still using Egyptian numbers, in another column.

  I showed them to Imhotep.

  "What is this symbol?" Imhotep pointed to the zero.

  "It stands for nothing, it is called a zero."

  "I don't understand... nothing?"

  "If you have a half of a loaf of bread, it is a half of one loaf, right?"

  "Yes."

  "If the bread has ten slices then half would be five slices."

  "Yes... of course.

  I wrote zero point five on the paper, then one point zero and two point zero.

  "See, half a loaf, one loaf and two loaves," I pointed to the corresponding numbers.

  "Yes... but what if the loaf has thirteen slices?"

  "There are only ten numbers Imhotep."

  Imhotep thought for a moment, then had a small epiphany.

  "Oh... I see... this is important? It seems so trivial."

  I smiled.

  "Ten times ten is a hundred, times ten again is a thousand," I said, as I wrote it out on the paper using ones and zero's.

  I showed Imhotep.

  "Really... that works... you just add this... zero."

  "It works in the opposite way as well, when you divide by ten."

  Imhotep stared at me.

  "Until it is one, then it stops."

  "Nope," I said smugly.

  "I don't understand..."

  "You are a clever man Imhotep, you'll figure it all out."

  I dispelled the window to New York and we were looking at the Nile again, I gave Imhotep the paper pad and the cheap plastic pen. He immediately picked up the pen and examined it closely.

  "Magic?" He asked.

  "A tube filled with ink spread out by a small metal ball, simple and yet surprisingly invented only recently."

  "Hmm... more simple tricks."

  Imhotep wrote the number a thousand on the pad, then one hundred underneath it, then ten, then one. He stared at the column for a minute, he looked at my notes, then he put a dot to the right of the one then a zero, he stared some more, he looked up at me, probing me like a poker player measuring up an opponent.

  Imhotep looked down at the pad one more time and then showed Peter and I why history had remembered him as one of the smartest people who ever lived.

  He wrote a zero a dot and then a one at the bottom of the column.

  I clapped my hands and smiled at him.

  "That makes no sense..." he said, when he saw my reaction.

  "You doubt your own brilliance?"

  "Doubting ones brilliance is the surest path to wisdom."

  "Enough of this... we have come to ask you about a former colleague of yours," I said.

  "Who?" He had a guarded expression on his face.

  "Her name is Semiramis... you were students together.

  An odd expression appeared on Imhotep's face a sort of wistful fear, he leaned back on his bench and took a swig from his wine cup.

  "What do you need to know?"

  "Where she is for one, and what is she like."

  "I think she is in Nineveh... I have not seen her in years, she is someone to stay away from."

  "Why?"

  "She has a power over men... it is intoxicating to be around her, like a strong wine... but she is very different from other women... her beauty conceals a cold wickedness."

  "If she created a puzzle, do you think you would know the answer," I asked.

  "No... she was inscrutable, nothing she did ever made sense to me... I remember pointing out Saturn to her one night, she became fascinated... but then when I tried to discuss the other planets, she just became bored and dismissive."

  "Why did she go to Nineveh?"

  "Who knows... she enjoyed manipulating people, sometimes she would do it just for her own amusement... whatever the puzzle is, it will be an incomprehensible intrigue."

  "Well this is a lot of help," I said exasperated," I guess you also wouldn't know that if she..... hypothetically say... set a trap for you what it would be?"

  Imhotep stared at me, his eyes suddenly became very penetrating, I could see now that he would have been a formidable opponent for I saw an impressive steeliness.

  "Trap?"

  I explained the riddle we had found in her quarters, and the warning of nameless consequences if we didn't solve it.

  "That I think I can help you with... have you ever heard of the sorcerer Seeris?"

  "No... should I?"

  "He had a brilliant but very short career, Semiramis became fascinated with him, she spent many days in the library reading his research notes. I was obsessed with her at the time, I'm sorry to admit, and tried in every way to assist her."

  "What made Seeris so brilliant?" />
  Imhotep said a word I didn't understand while turning one of his palms up, a sphere about six inches in diameter appeared above his palm, it had a mirror like finish.

  "You recognize this?"

  "Yes... it is a spherical fissure with the entrance and exit reversed, it is impenetrable, why is it important?"

  "Seeris started experimenting with these sphere's," Imhotep said pointing to the hovering globe.

  "He did a number of things, including being inside one."

  "That sounds dangerous," I said.

  "Yes... but he discovered that he was weightless... and... this is difficult to explain, when you push a large stone it takes a lot of effort at first, then it's easier, that was gone to, a rock behaved like a piece of papyrus."

  "No inertia... or gravity, interesting."

  "eenercha... gravitee... what are these things?" Imhotep asked curious.

  "Just words to describe those effects, gravity pulls you down inertia resists you from moving."

  "Eenercha... I'll have to remember that."

  "Seeris then started shrinking the spheres, then dispelling them."

  Imhotep shrunk the sphere to half its size then dispelled it, I heard a loud pop.

  "It compressed the air, then released it... like popping a balloon," Peter said.

  I repeated this to Imhotep.

  "Yes... very simple... except Seeris kept using bigger and bigger spheres and shrunk them to smaller and smaller sizes."

  "He got bigger pops?"

  "Yes, until one night, he had gone far into the desert to experiment, witnesses said there was a blinding flash on the horizon and he was never seen from again."

  I had a vague notion of what might have happened.

  "Semiramis was fascinated by this story... so she wanted to try it herself... she charmed me into helping her... she didn't want anybody to know, so one night we travelled far down the great river, past the second cataract, then we went due west, traveled over fifty rivers distance into the desert, we found a spot with a small mountain to the north.

  We had Seeris's notes, so we knew roughly the size needed, we created a large sphere, one a hundred cubits in diameter, then we shrunk it down to the size of a poppy seed, we left the seed in the sand and retreated behind the mountain, then we dispelled it."

  "What happened?"

  "It was as if we had created Ra... it was as bright as the brightest day, then came an enormous roar and a wind so fierce it could not be believed.

  I looked up over the mountain and I saw an enormous glowing cloud rising up... if there is evil in this world... that cloud... I can still see it.... we were terrified, we quickly transported ourselves back to the city... we never ever spoke of it again... but I remember, even with the fear in eyes, a look she had... it sent shivers up my spine."

  "Did you ever go back?" I asked.

  "Months later... I told no one, I found a large crater over a hundred cubits wide and half again as deep, I could not bring myself to go near it."

  Imhotep dispelled the sphere and returned us to normal time, I heard voices talking and the clatter of plates and cups.

  I sipped my wine.

  "So you believe she has left one of these spheres in her quarters," I asked.

  "I think so..."

  "Why did you seal her quarters?"

  "I didn't... yet... your visit feels me with trepidation, I had assumed I would not see her again."

  "Well... you still may not... we may be the ones dealing with her this time around," I said.

  "One more question Imhotep, how did you make a sphere out of a fissure?"

  I had made many such enchantments, they were very useful being impenetrable, the secret was that instead of using one fissure, you used many side by side then rearranged the entrance or the exit fissures in the opposite direction.

  That was the only way to get a mirror reflection on the surface rather than a photographic one, this was what was needed to enable the thing that was trying to penetrate to block itself.

  I had never learned how to make a sphere though.

  Imhotep started to explain the process.

  "Well it a technique I developed when I was trying to find the area under a curve, you know... without using an approximation."

  I watched him use the pen and pad of paper to sketch a curve, a thought suddenly popped into my head. I remembered sitting in the last class of the GED course I had taken, I was listening to the teacher describe future math classes that we might want to take when the woman sitting beside me had said something.

  "My mom said she never ever needed no calculators."

  No that wasn't it I thought... it was another plural...calcula... caculer... calculi! That was it, god English was a strange language, all those weird plurals.

  Her mom musta been very clever... I had to use calculi all the time... or maybe she was just a good guesser.

  I suddenly realized I hadn't being paying any attention to Imhotep, the weird things that pop into your head sometimes, I made a special effort to follow what he was saying.

  "See how now I no longer need to draw rectangles under the curve," he continued.

  I looked at all the diagrams and equations he had written, I was sure there was a simpler way to do this, his techniques had probably been replaced centuries ago.

  It would be good for Gwen to learn something like this though... mold her young mind, get her to think about something other than young boys, or that awful music she listened too.

  "And I call it appraising small infinites," Imhotep said as he finished, he tossed the pen down forcefully.

  "Fascinating," I said, trying to look interested.

  "I have a better explanation in a scroll that I wrote, It's called the Principles of Philosophy, I could summon a copy for you."

  "That would be great."

  Imhotep said a word and a scroll appeared in front of him, he made a big show of autographing it and stamping it with his seal.

  I doubted his scroll would be of much use, he barely understood the concept of zero, I thought to myself.

  Peter hungrily grabbed the scroll when Imhotep handed it over.

  "Can you put this in our quarters, along with his autograph?" He asked, putting the papyrus with Imhoteps signature on top of it.

  I dispelled them both, putting them on Peter's desk.

  Imhotep stood up.

  "I must go... if you need a place to stay I can arrange quarters at the palace," Imhotep said.

  "Thank you, that would be great."

  Imhotep said goodbye then left to return to the side of his king.