The Quest of the Empty Tomb

by Elyse Salpeter

  The bright lights still beamed into the room. Kelsey stood up and pushed the curtain aside to peer up at the sky. She couldn’t believe what she saw. No aircraft hovered above her at all. It seemed as if the entire panorama was lit with stars. As if every single star in existence could be seen twinkling in the night sky. The various constellations shone the brightest and glowed so brilliantly, they emitted laser-like beams of illumination from the heavens down to the earth. She likened it to the way the sun rays emerge from behind the clouds, but she’d never seen such a phenomenon before.

  Jay moved next to her, as awestruck as she. “I didn’t know stars could do this.” His voice shook and he rubbed his head where he’d cracked it on the night stand.

  Kelsey stared at the constellations and mentally counted the brightest ones. “There are thirty-six of them, Jay. And there are thirty-six Decans. Do you think it’s them?”

  “Of course, it is.” A man’s voice boomed behind them and they swung around.

  The stranger stood in doorway, his presence so massively overwhelming that Kelsey shrunk back. He vibrated with energy and the air around him wavered, the way a hot pavement ripples and swells on a scorching day.

  “Who are you?” Kelsey’s body tingled and the hairs on her arms stood up.

  The man was an unearthly vision. He was tall, with skin as pale as parchment paper and long hair as black as the night sky. But his eyes stood out the most. They were a deep blue, set wide apart and sloe-eyed. Exactly like Jay’s and Armand’s.

  The man bowed his head slightly. “I’m Kher-Khept-Kenmut, one of the thirty-six Decans in the nighttime sky. Both of you, come with me.” He stared pointedly at Jay. “You took off your talisman and now you’re being followed. I had to get to you before they found you. Keep your charm on if you don’t wish to get sick again. I have no way to shield myself from hurting you.” With a snap of his fingers, the lights in the night sky winked out, plunging the room into darkness. Only the stove light they’d left on in the kitchen leaked into the room. The man’s eyes now glowed eerily and his dark green robe had an iridescent quality to it.

  Kher-Khept-Kenmut turned to leave when Kelsey called out to him. “Wait, you’re a Decan? A real one?”

  The man turned back to her, his brow furrowed. “Since when were we ever not real?”

  Chapter 11

  KENMUT

  Kher-Khept-Kenmut traveled swiftly through the city. He appeared to glide when he moved, as if his feet never touched the ground. They had to run to keep up with him and nearly lost him a few times, only catching a fleeting glimpse of his shimmery robe as he skirted around a corner.

  The Decan brought them into an older part of the village and passed through an ancient stone gate. They crossed through an old cemetery and then he propped open the door to an abandoned Coptic church.

  The stained glass ceiling was damaged and shards of the colored glass littered the floor. When the moon shone on them, they created a kaleidoscopic of colors that shimmered before them. The Decan purposely strode down the main aisle, passing wooden pews on each side that were warped with age. They ran to keep up, their feet crunching on the broken glass.

  The Decan sidestepped around the fallen altar and ducked into the vestibule tucked behind it. With his foot, he kicked aside human-sized fallen archangels and saints statues as if they were no heavier than paperweights and lifted a thick slab trapdoor hidden below. Kelsey peered down at an ancient stone staircase which led into darkness. With a wave of his hand, wall sconces lit up, revealing an antechamber below. They stepped down into the entranceway and with another wave of his hand, more sconces ignited, revealing an extensive labyrinth of tunnels jutting off the antechamber.

  Kelsey wanted to stay and just examine the prizes on the wall next to her. The rock was decorated with perfectly preserved and intricate paintings of the constellations and hieroglyphic stories of the Decan gods. The one particular painting next to her might be the most intricate the world had ever seen. It would be considered the find of the century.

  “Kelsey, do you see all of these?” Jay tried desperately to view the pictures even while the Decan disappeared into a tunnel ahead of them.

  “I know, they’re incredible, but there’s no time now, Jay. Come on.” They ran to catch up with the Decan. The wall sconces mysteriously illuminated as they entered each new passage and then blinked off as they passed. Kelsey peered into one, expecting to see a candle inside, but there was none. Only a small ball of twinkling light, suspended in the air and radiating a soft glow. It looks like a floating star. They descended deeper into the earth.

  After ten minutes, the passageway emptied into an enormous cavern. Kelsey and Jay stood in awe as they stared at the space around them. It appeared that they were outside, though Kelsey knew that was an impossibility. Hundreds and thousands of stars lit the ceiling above them, mirroring the Egyptian night sky, right down to how the stars rotated around the earth.

  Kher-Khept-Kenmut moved to the center of the room and stared up at the tableau above him. He closed his eyes and raised his arms, and parts of the night sky blazed. The rays bathed him in a brilliant light, a light so strong that Kelsey and Jay threw their hands to their faces against the sudden glare.

  When they could see again, two more individuals now stood next to the Decan. One was a woman so otherworldly she gave Kelsey chills. Her blond hair and blue eyes peered out of a face seemingly thousands of years old, yet untouched by time. She could have been thirty, she could have been a million, such was her presence.

  The other man resembled a younger version of the Decan. He was tall with limp black hair and had the same strangely shaped eyes, yet he appeared sickly. His alabaster skin had a gray sheen to it and his tunic seemed to swim on his gaunt frame. But he had sharp and intelligent eyes, and as he stared at them, Kelsey thought he looked right into her very soul. There’s something about him.

  She risked a quick glance at the sky and noticed two of the constellations were now missing. Confused, she turned back to the strangers.

  The woman kept her gaze on Kelsey and Jay, but addressed the younger man. Her voice conveyed frustration. “We’re lucky they’re not already dead. We can’t risk losing them, Kenmut. I don’t have to tell you what will happen. There are so few of them left to protect us.”

  “I know, mother. But I can’t be everywhere.”

  “You are the twilight sky, my Son. You are everywhere.”

  The man shook his head. “Only for an hour. That is never enough time.” He turned to Kher-Khept-Kenmut. “Father, thank you for bringing them.”

  The Decan nodded. “Our destiny is in their hands, Kenmut. The destiny you set in motion all those centuries ago.” His voice held a chastising edge. “This lifetime will be the deciding factor in our fates. It’s time we stopped hiding. We need to bring them into the fold so all of us can be safe. You've made a valiant attempt for a long time to handle this by yourself, but you are no longer strong enough. You must make a decision and trust in the humans or we will all die. We cannot be thirty-three.” Kher-Khept-Kenmut waved his hand and a firebolt lit the room, blinding them yet again. When Kelsey could open her eyes, the Decan and the woman had vanished. She glanced above at the ceiling, noticing two more constellations now shining brightly.

  Thirty-three? Just like the number in Armand’s apartment.

  The man named Kenmut leaned his head back, closed his eyes and raised his arms as if in an offering. The two newly-lit constellations pulsed back in response. For a moment, Kenmut seemed stronger. He opened his eyes and finally stared at his charges.

  Kelsey studied him. An aura rippled from him too, but he seemed… different.

  “What do you want with us?” she asked, boldly.

  He seemed to contemplate the question. “I want nothing more than for you to live, to die, and your souls to come back to me. It’s all I ask. That doesn’t seem like so much, does it?”

  “I don’t understand,” Jay said.

  “I
’m sure you don’t.” He moved towards them and again it seemed as if he glided as he walked. “For thousands of years I’ve contemplated how to tell someone my story, but I still can’t come up with any explanation that will be easy for humans to understand.” He stood in front of them and waved his hand. A light appeared to their right, illuminating two stone benches.

  Kelsey would have sworn those benches had not been there a moment before. He bade them to sit.

  Kenmut breathed deeply in apparent relief as he sat with them, as if the very act of standing made him ill.

  “Are you… sick?” Kelsey ventured.

  Kenmut smirked. “I’m fine. It will take a lot more than this to destroy me.” He studied them. “You want to know who I am?”

  Kelsey and Jay nodded.

  “I’m your grandfather, many, many epochs removed.”

  “Our grandfather?” Kelsey and Jay exclaimed, together.

  “How?” Kelsey asked.

  Kenmut shook his head. “It’s a long story…”

  Chapter 12

  FEMI

  Twilight had nearly ended and the raven-haired beauty sat by the edge of the lake, dipping the tips of her fingers in the still waters. Her dark blue eyes sparkled with anticipation and longing. She stared up at the approaching night sky, waiting patiently.

  The sun slipped below the horizon, sending up the next set of stars to start their journey across the night sky. A powerful presence miraculously appeared at her side. She sighed contentedly as a man loomed over her and gently caressed her cheek.

  “I’ve missed you, my lovely Femi.”

  Femi turned and embraced him. He was a magnificent creature, strong and powerful and like no one who had ever walked the earth before. Such is life when you have fallen in love with a god.

  She stared into his beautiful blue eyes, eyes that dipped down at the edges and were rimmed with thick black lashes which rivaled her own. She could stare into them for hours.

  “Kenmut, my love. I have wonderful news.”

  She took his hand, massive against her petite one, and placed it on her swelling abdomen. His eyes widened and a sigh escaped him.

  “You’re pregnant.”

  “I am, my love.”

  As Femi uttered those words, lightening streaked across the sky and a meteor of immense size thundered down from the heavens and crashed in the woods next to them. Kenmut held on tight to his precious earthling, who screamed in terror as the trees surrounding them erupted in a wall of flames.

  With a wave of his hand, a torrent of water from the lake rose like a massive tidal wave and fell on the fire, extinguishing it.

  “What was that?” Femi asked, fearfully. She clutched at Kenmut desperately.

  Kenmut studied the heavens, watching one constellation in particular pulsing ferociously.

  “Ustha,” he breathed.

  The constellation pulsed one last time in response, and then blinked out.

  Chapter 13

  THE CURSE

  “I am Kenmut and am one of the thirty-six Decans who rule the night sky. You can call me Kenmut, or Grandfather if you prefer, though I go by many names. The old Egyptians referred to me as the Interval Decan, while others called me the Twilight Decan.

  “Think on what you know of the thirty-six Decans. We each rise at specific hours of the night for thirty-six consecutive periods, ten days each. This results in the Egyptian year. As you know, stars rise four minutes later each night as they make their rotation across the sky. So if you do the math, or follow astronomical calculations, every ten days each of us is replaced and our positions change in the night sky. Do you understand?”

  His voice lulled her. Kelsey felt as if she were being hypnotized. She fought to ask a question. “I’ve heard of this, but what about the extra five days of the year the Egyptians didn’t account for? The math only brings us to three hundred and sixty days.”

  Kenmut chuckled. It transformed his thin face into something magnificent. “That’s true. Human Earth years used to be only three hundred and sixty days, but as it is with gods, we get angry with each other, curse each other and as a result, you earthlings are the unfortunate subjects to the whims of their petty battles.”

  “What do you mean?” Jay asked.

  Kenmut thought how to answer. “Let me ask you this. What do you know of Osiris?”

  Jay sat up straighter. “I know a lot. I’m studying him now in college. Osiris was the god who brought civilization to humankind. But then his brother Seth murdered him, and it’s said his wife, Isis, brought him back to life.”

  Kelsey cocked her head. “And then he went on to become the Judge of the Dead and ruler of the Underworld. He reminds me so much of Mara, the Buddhist equivalent of Satan…

  Kenmut nodded, seemingly pleased. “You’re both correct. Now let me tell you something you might not know. Osiris’s mother was a god named, Nut. Nut was married to the Supreme Sun God Ra, and all the Decans consider him the most powerful God of all. Unfortunately, Nut had the audacity to cheat on Ra and had an affair with the Earth God Geb.” He leaned forward and grinned mischievously. “Did you know that when earthquakes happen, the folklore says that it’s Geb laughing? That is actually the truth. It is not your earth’s tectonic plates moving at all. It is a result of Geb’s love of a practical joke.”

  “Of course, jokes on gods are never received well, and when the great Ra discovered his wife’s affair, he was so angry that she dared to cheat on him that he cursed her. And not a petty curse, but one that would be especially torturous for an eternity. He proclaimed that when and if Nut ever became pregnant, her babies could not ever be born in any month or in any year.”

  Kelsey thought about this. “So you mean she’d never be able to give birth if she ever became pregnant? She’d be pregnant forever?” The thought gave her shivers and she unconsciously placed her hand on her abdomen.

  Kenmut nodded. “That was the plan and it was already in place, because since Geb was also the God of Fertility he had already impregnated Nut. Of course Ra knew this.”

  “Now Nut had absolutely no intention of being cursed with this burden for an eternity, so she sought her good friend, old Thoth, to help her. He is the God of Writing and Knowledge and he devised a grand scheme that would circumvent the curse. He challenged the moon goddess to a game, and if he won, his prize would be that she would lose part of her illumination. The moon goddess is a presumptuous and cocky deity who seldom loses a challenge, so she agreed. But she did lose. As a result, the moon goddess started waxing and waning, instead of remaining solely in the daytime sky the entire day. Now she couldn’t compete with the sun all day on the same trajectory. Hence, why the sun rises during the day and the moon rises at night. In this way Thoth found a solution to add five extra days to the year that had no month of their own. Toth added time, which is what Nut needed.”

  Of course! “So now Nut could at least give birth during those five days, circumventing Ra’s curse.”

  Kenmut nodded and there was a pause.

  “So you want us to believe that you’re really a god and that Decans are real?” Jay asked.

  Kenmut held out his hands and nodded. “I am. A real, living god come down from the heavens to meet with you.” He bowed low.

  Kelsey squinted. “Yet, you seem… sick. I didn’t think gods became ill. Did someone curse you, as well?”

  He nodded. “Yes, and mightily so. But I will get to that soon. Let me continue explaining the history of the Decans first, because there is pitifully little you humans have learned over the centuries. You’ve hardly found any of the treasures which speak of our history, since most of them are now hidden under the sands of time, or deep under the ocean floors. I can thank some of my god-like cousins for that. There are quite a few of them that would prefer humans never learn of the Decans and they’ve done their best to keep us hidden.”

  “There are five families of Decans. Three rising Decans, one in Transit and one Falling. My family, whom you hav
e already met, is comprised of my father, Kher-Khept-Kenmut, my mother Tepa-Kenmut and me. But, there are thirty-three others of great power that exist, although our entire history in your world has been relegated to simple idols in astrology. One of the few images that actually depict who we are, is on the ceiling of the Temple to Hathor at Dendorah.” He sighed. “If the archaeologists would have just dug a little further, they would have found a trove of other writings of great importance. You see, what they didn’t find, what you need to know, is what I did to incur this wretched curse upon me and my family.” He paused, and shook his head, laughing. “Oh, the Goddess Hathor did laugh at me.”

  “The goddess of love?” Kelsey asked.

  Kenmut arched his brows. “You remind me of her, Kelsey. Besides being the goddess of love, Hathor is also the patron goddess of pleasure and beauty. And she has a dark side, as well. Do you have a dark side, Kelsey?” He stared at her so intently, she became uncomfortable.

  If you only knew, Kenmut.

  He seemed to read her thoughts. “I actually do know. I am the god of the stars and I see everything that happens in the deep of the night. I’m also the god of souls. And I’ve seen yours travel over the millennia. So yes, you remind me greatly of Hathor. For many reasons.”

  Kelsey swallowed hard.

  “What is he talking about?” Jay asked. His head whipped back and forth between the two.

  Kenmut waived the question away. “It’s not important… for now.”

  Sparkles lit up the ceiling and a meteor shower streamed across the sky.

  Kenmut glanced up, exasperated. “I know, Qet. I’m getting to it.” He turned back to them. “Ignore my cousin, Qet. He has no patience. So, where was I? Oh yes, it is common knowledge that gods should not mix with humans. While it isn’t forbidden, it is frowned upon greatly. Every time it’s happened there have been catastrophic results, and usually humans end up cleaning up after the havoc inflicted on them by vengeful gods. But there are times it cannot be avoided. Love and lust finds a way, no matter how hard you try to ignore it or fight it. Don’t you agree, Kelsey?”