All Wrapped Up: An Urban Fantasy Adventure (Werewolves vs. Mummies Book 2)

by J. A. Cipriano

  “I am thinking clearly. We need to find Imhotep—”

  “Thes, we need to go find Set. If we don’t, the whole of the world will end,” Khufu said, glaring at me. I would have been scared if I wasn’t so angry.

  “I know that!” I cried, whirling to point at Sekhmet. “But we can’t just leave her here!”

  “Yes, Thes. You can and you will,” Sekhmet said, wobbling toward me on shaky legs and putting her hand on my shoulder. She drew me slowly to my feet and stared into my eyes.

  “No, I can’t… I just can’t,” I whispered, and the words had barely left my mouth when she pulled me down and pressed her lips against mine. Stars flashed past my eyes, and I swear to everything that was holy, in that moment I knew all the secrets of the universe.

  She stepped back a moment later, leaving me standing there over her as she smiled up at me. “Thes, there will be more where that came from if you just leave me here and fulfill your duties.” She grinned, her cheeks burning. “I promise.”

  I’ll admit it. As I stared at her, some very dirty thoughts went through my mind. I shook myself, tossing a mental bucket of cold water over my head. “I can’t just leave you here,” I replied, reaching out and taking her hands in mine even though the touch of her skin was more like touching ice.

  “Thes, let me be very clear here,” she stated, staring hard at me as anger filled her delicate features. “I am a goddess. The goddess of war, to be exact. I don’t need you to save me. Are we clear?”

  The words hit me like a punch in the throat, and I stumbled backward gasping for breath. My hands slipped off of hers like she was made of slick granite. Khufu caught me before I hit the ground and held me there as Sekhmet shook her head in annoyance.

  “Men,” she grumbled, turning away from me and crawling back on the bed. She didn’t even look back at me as she curled into a ball in the center of the sheets and lay down facing the opposite wall.

  Before I could say something, or worse yet, do something stupid, Khufu leaned close and whispered in my ear. “Trust me when I say this. You need to leave now. Not just because we need to find Imhotep to free her or because we need to find Set and beg the God of Chaos to help us.” He turned me slowly around so he was staring into my face. “No, it’s because you just treated one of the most powerful and violent Egyptian goddesses like she was a damsel in distress who needed your help.” He shook his head. “I knew you were stupid, but come on Thes…”

  I swallowed back my retort of, “well if she was so strong and powerful, how did she wind up getting captured and needing to be saved?” and instead nodded my head. See, and my sister says I never learn to keep my mouth shut.

  “Okay,” I whispered, and Khufu nodded back to me.

  “Good, you’re learning. There’s hope for you yet.” With that, Khufu drew a circle in the air with his key, and the air actually fell away, crashing to the ground and shattering into a million pieces like he’d cut a piece of glass out of a windowpane. The hole beyond was a multitude of colors shifting between all the shades of the rainbow so quickly it made my head spin.

  “So where’s it go?” I asked, but instead of replying, Khufu just shrugged at me which was totally something he’d do. Then he shoved me through the hole.

  Chapter 9

  The world exploded back into focus as I hit the burning sand. The sun above seared my flesh as I struggled to pull myself to my feet and fight off the nausea swelling in my belly. I blinked, trying to get my eyes to orient themselves to the sudden brightness of the desert. I took a wobbly step forward, the superheated sand burning the soles of my feet as the world snapped into place around me.

  The smell of blood hit me like a punch in the teeth, and I whirled toward it. My body went on high alert as I stared at the entrance of a butter-colored temple. An immense statue of a man with a head like the Set-animal I’d met earlier stood with one arm outstretched toward a giant red archway in a way that sort of reminded me of the lady from that gameshow where you guess the letters in words and phrases.

  Next to the doorway lay two dismembered bodies. Blood pooled around them and flies were already clouding the area. Even still, I could tell from the scent they hadn’t died long ago. No… these were fresh kills. The knowledge settled into my brain as Wepwawet stirred within me, shaking himself off in the back of my mind and loping forward to investigate. His gilded fur was covered in frost, but as he moved it thawed, leaving him glittering in the sunlight of my mind. My wolf was back, and the knowledge of it made me feel complete in a way I can’t quite explain. It made me hope I never got cut off from him ever again.

  “Finally,” Wepwawet growled as I called upon his power, relief flooding into his lupine voice. “Let’s not do that again.” I nodded.

  My next step, thankfully, was in my wolf-man form, and as I unclenched my fist, Khufu burst through the tear in space and time behind me. He hit the ground in a run, which was odd, and sort of charged past me, his sandaled feet slapping on sand and throwing up clouds of dust as he slid to a stop, arms outstretched for balance.

  His huge chest heaved as he put his hands on his knees and shook his head. Sweat dripped off his forehead and spattered to the ground as his huge nostrils flared. He turned toward me, and as he did, his nose crinkled. Khufu swung his head toward the guards and his skin went white as a sheet.

  “What the hell…” he murmured, eyes as big as saucers. He swallowed hard enough to shake his whole body and glanced at me. “Did you do that?”

  “No.” I shook my head, edging past him, my muscles tensed and ready. I couldn’t tell you why, but I got the impression something bad was inside the temple. Everything in my body screamed to run away, but I was not going to do that. In this, my wolf and I were in agreement. We were Alpha, and it was time we started acting like it.

  “Not good,” Khufu said, pulling out his khopesh. Black ichor from the snake still covered its edge, but as the sunlight touched the blade, the slime dissolved into smoke and vanished into the air reminding me of what had happened to the snake when it’d been beheaded.

  As I approached the entrance, the smell of blood and death was overwhelming, and I was pretty sure if I wasn’t so used to gore, I’d have been sick. Even still, it was a near thing. It was one thing to see dead and bleeding bodies. It was quite another to see people having been torn limb from limb, spraying blood across the ground and walls.

  Broken spears lay at the guards’ feet and huge claw marks marred their crimson armor, rending them open like someone was trying to get to the gooey bits inside a tin can.

  I listened, cocking my ear toward the entrance but heard nothing. Still, there was something inside. I could taste it in the air like the faintest tinge of sour candy.

  Khufu stepped up behind me as I approached the doorway and peered inside. Bodies littered the grounds inside, and the floors were awash with blood. Relics had been smashed on the floor, littering the ground with rubble, and a giant statue similar to the one outside had been knocked over so it was broken in three distinct pieces. The half-shattered head lay only a few meters from my feet.

  In the middle of the room, an old man dressed in scarlet robes had been torn open from crotch to throat, spilling his entrails along the dais next to him.

  There was a sound to my left, and as I spun my head toward it, something huge and massive slammed into me, throwing me backward. I hit the ground in a squelch, sliding across the blood slick stone and slamming into the far wall. Stars shot past my eyes as I leapt to my feet. I slipped in the blood and stumbled forward into the clutches of a beast with eyes like burning embers and fur blacker than Satan’s back hair. Its huge ape-like fingers tightened around my throat, and I felt my flesh giving way. Pain shot through me as I slashed with my claws, catching it in the stomach with my feet and spilling golden ichor over us.

  The thing slammed me down, its fanged face twisting into a snarl as I bounced across the stone. Blood covered me as my werewolf healing let me regain my breath nearly instantly.
Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to matter as the thing kicked me hard in the stomach. I shot upward like a rocket, slamming into the ceiling some thirty feet in the air before falling down and cracking into the stone floor with enough force to shatter nearly every bone in my body.

  I lay there, struggling to see past the pain as my body worked furiously to repair the damage. Fragments of bone writhed beneath my torn flesh, pulling back into place as the dump-truck-sized creature turned its back on me and lumbered toward Khufu, its huge knuckles dragging on the ground.

  Khufu stepped back, shock filling his features as he gestured at the creature with his khopesh. I could see his lips moving, but couldn’t hear any words over the ringing in my ears.

  The giant ape shook its head as it moved forward, each step splattering the pools of blood at its feet. It brought a whole new meaning to splashing in mud puddles.

  Khufu slashed, his khopesh slicing the air and embedding in the tree-trunk-like leg of the monster. The creature looked down at the wound and with little effort, backhanded the pharaoh across the face. Khufu flew sideways, slamming into a pillar with a wet thwack before sliding to the ground as the pillar cracked in half and crumbled down on top of him along with a section of roof.

  “What is that?” I gasped, slowly getting to my feet. My muscles and bones screamed in agony as I leapt through the air, claws out. The thing spun and caught me around the neck with one huge hand. Then, using my momentum, smashed me down into the ground. The stone beneath me cracked.

  My vision went black and hazy around the edges as I struggled to slash and maul the monster. Only… only it wasn’t doing any good. The last thing I saw was its huge fist rearing up over me, so big it was like staring at a trashcan lid. Then darkness.

  Chapter 10

  Something was rubbing my face. I awoke with a start, leaping to my feet and whirling around to see the huge ape sitting there cross legged, one hand still outstretched like it had been the thing rubbing me. I started at it wide-eyed, backpedaling as I tried to pull a cohesive thought into my brain, only everything was fuzzy and dim.

  We were still in the temple and blood still covered everything, but most of it had dried. I wasn’t sure how long I’d been unconscious, but it had to have been a while for that to have happened. Had this thing been here stroking my cheek this entire time? The thought made me shiver, but not as much as the next one. Why?

  “What do you want?” I stammered, bringing my hands up and noticing I was no longer in wolf form. I was just plain old Thes. My heart pounded as I tried to call on my wolf, and while I felt Wepwawet inside me, I got the distinct impression he was telling me to wait. I sighed, letting loose a breath that rasped in my throat as the ape stared at me for a long time.

  “You have finally awakened,” the ape said, getting to its feet and lumbering toward me, knuckles dragging on the ground. “That is good. I was worried I had broken you.”

  I swallowed and shook my head. “Okay…” I mumbled when I realized it was waiting for me to respond, only I wasn’t quite sure what to say because my head hurt something fierce, making it impossible to concentrate.

  The ape reached out toward me, and I backed up out of its reach, although honestly, I wasn’t sure why I’d bothered. If it had wanted to hurt me, it would have already.

  “I will not harm you,” it said, shrugging. “But I can sense your fear and that will not do. You have much to do for me. Much to do for all of us.” The ape melted, skin sloughing off of it and hitting the ground in spattering chunks that dissolved into sea foam. My stomach roiled up in me as I watched, and I had to turn away to keep from emptying it on the ground.

  A soft laugh hit my ears, reminding me of the awkward laugh people do when they were upset but trying to laugh it off. I turned toward the sound and was surprised to see a young woman standing where the ape had been. She had hair like spun copper and skin the color of melted chocolate. She was adorned in a white sundress covered with red skulls. She had a sort of regal beauty to her that made me think princess, but not the main one, perhaps a second or third sister. You know, the one that’s important because she is royalty, but less so than her siblings.

  “I am Nephthys,” she said, placing one finger above her breasts and tapping the spot three times. “And unfortunately, Thes. You are my only hope.” She smiled, and it made me shudder deep inside myself. It reminded me of how a shark would smile if it could, well, smile.

  “Why is that?” I asked, glancing around the ruined temple. “From what I can tell, you’re more than capable.”

  “I did not do this.” She shook her head sullenly. “I came to help my husband, but alas, I was too late. His priests had already been butchered and his artifacts stolen. I can no longer hear his voice in my ear.” She cupped her hand to her ear like she was trying to hear something far away.

  “If you didn’t do this.” I gestured to the room. “Who did?”

  Her face screwed up into rage, and it was pretty much the scariest thing I had ever seen. It was the barren desert given form. The hungering vulture circling overhead. The wail of the mistress weeping over her fallen child.

  “Imhotep.” The word came out of her mouth like it was a curse. “He was after my husband’s Was-staff, but fortunately,” she smiled, revealing a mouthful of fangs, “he did not find it, Thes.”

  “Imhotep did all this?” I asked, hardly believing the spindly old guy I’d seen before bathed an entire temple in blood. How was that possible?

  “Yes. He has been granted his youth and power back by Apep, but unfortunately, it is not enough.” Nephthys shook her head and her copper hair whirled around her head. “Apep wants my husband’s staff. If he gets a hold of it he will become even more powerful.”

  “But it’s not here. So where is it?” I asked, glancing around for Khufu. The last time I’d seen him, he’d been buried under a pile of rubble. I saw him lying next to the broken pillar, his body bound in chains of gold. Not that it mattered because he looked unconscious.

  “That is the question,” Nephthys cooed into my ear. Her sudden closeness made me jump. She wrapped her arms around me, pulling me against her lithe body, and it was then I realized she was as tall as I was. “A question I need you to answer.” Her tongue flicked out as she spoke, brushing across my ear lobe and a shudder ran through me.

  “Please…” I whispered, my face turning beet red as one of her hands trailed down my bare chest. Something about having a woman who had just pounded me into putty caress me wasn’t exactly an avenue I cared to explore because if she wanted to do something to me, I wasn’t sure I could stop her.

  “Am I embarrassing you, wolf?” she asked, cupping me in a way that made me realize I was completely naked. A sharp exhalation left my throat as I stood there stock still while the wife of one of the cruelest gods in all of Egypt fondled me.

  “Yes,” I whispered, not sure how I got the words out of my mouth.

  “Good,” she squealed, squeezing so tightly my eyes bugged out of my head and pain shot through me, dropping me to my knees in an instant. She released me as I fell, and I soon found myself curled into an agonizing ball as my insides bunched up inside me.

  “Here’s what is going to happen now. I am going to send you into a dream state within the Duat. You must contact my husband and ask him for the location of his staff so we can get it before Imhotep does.” She nodded once, her statuesque features hardening as she knelt down so her knee was pressed against my groin. She leaned forward, placing one hand next to my head as her hair fell down around us, drowning out the light of everything but her burning eyes. “Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” I croaked, barely able to keep my heart from bursting from my chest and running away. I mean, what else could I say, really? I was naked and pinned to the floor by an Egyptian goddess who had already beaten me like a naughty puppy. And, as I stared up into her eyes, I knew two things to be certain. One, she wouldn’t hesitate to kill me, and two… well, two was I wasn’t actually brave. I’
d just been playing hero this whole time and when faced with the very real threat of death, I was afraid to tell her anything but what she wanted to hear.

  “Good because let’s just say when you get back.” She moved in close to me so her lips were just shy of pressing against mine. “We won’t be doing more.” Her lips met mine, and the world exploded into a flare of star fire.

  Everything around me rippled in flame, burning to cinders as I stood there somehow alone in the middle of an endless burning void. As the scenery was reduced to ash, I realized I was staring into space. Crimson stars winked in every direction, pulsing with red light, and I saw what looked like the vastness of eternity and felt very small.

  The darkness surged, roiling as the glowing stars moved into a constellation I could barely comprehend. I watched as they molded into an ethereal barge, exquisite in its detail and yet strangely shapeless. Upon its prow stood a man with the head of a crimson jackal. Only it wasn’t a jackal, it was something else, something for which there was no name because its features shifted into those of a wolf, then a donkey, then a dog, and back again ever in a state of fluid motion.

  All around the barge, the sky pulsed and burned as the stars moved away to make way for a snake so immense, it blotted out the sky. It came down upon the barge, teeth bared, hood unfurled. Venom splatted against the tiny ship as the man stepped forth, spear in hand. The snake coiled around him, wrapping him up and lifting him into the air.

  “Interesting, isn’t it?” said the wind, and as I turned toward the sound of the wind, it whipped through my hair and left the smell of burning campfires in its wake.

  Lightning split the space in front of me, slamming down on the plane of darkness on which I stood. A pillar of flame burst to life and from the blaze, a man walked forth. His body was as black as coal and was wreathed in fire. Instead of hair, flames danced upon his head, trailing down his back and swaying as he moved. He smiled, revealing a mouthful of gilded teeth as his ruby eyes sparkled.