The last dwarf had already started down the steps, axe high and glinting.
Shagar took measured steps. He pushed through the screen; the icon carrier shone, as yet untouched. In the small chamber beyond, the Eucharist also remained. He gathered the chalice and burner in a burlap satchel and lowered each individually, wincing at every clank. Perspiration ran into his beard. The screams of the dying urged him to hasten. In truth, Shagar believed in both the prophecy and his church, and so must do his part to preserve both.
The nave remained empty, and he unhooked the chain to the cleric’s passage that led beneath the church. His footfalls scuffed at the steps. At the bottom of the stair’s spiral, he lifted an oiled key and inserted it into the iron-studded door’s lock. He entered and shut the door behind him. Darkness cloaked him, complete.
His hands brushed at sweating walls that echoed with his wheezing breath. When his shin struck rock, he cried out and stooped. His fingers caressed the stone altar and found a pack of matches. He struck one and lit the lantern left there by David. It sputtered before it caught. Black smoke coiled into the air.
Shagar pulled at the rocks below the altar, which freed easily after David’s digging. He pulled out the bricks to reveal the small compartment.
The passage behind thundered with an explosion. Shards of the door scattered and burned on the floor. Shagar skinned his chin and knocked loose a tooth on the altar. Pain raked his face. The dust from the blast billowed, and he coughed. Fumbling for the satchel, which toppled from the altar, he landed upon its fragile contents. Footfalls rang out from iron steps. Shagar groped for the compartment now hidden by the fog of dirt and woodsmoke. His arms trembled. Finally, he traced the rectangular hole he sought.
He pushed the satchel inside and checked over his shoulder. Only the flaming remnants of the door wavered in the passage. Shagar replaced the bricks. The footfalls halted. He twisted. Eyes glowed in the haze. In the low passage, a man crouched with fingers planted like talons before him.
“Shagar, I had hoped to meet you here.” Pharaoh pointed to the altar, where the detritus of the mortar still lay jumbled. The dust had settled, and Shagar’s efforts to hide the relics of the Eucharist had failed. “I need the chalice.”
“I don’t have the benefit of your name.” Shagar stood with his bleeding chin held high.
“It is your failure and that of your church to ignore the past and so impair your future.” Pharaoh rose and filled the tunnel with his bulk. He took a step closer. “Give me the cup.”
Fear constricted Shagar’s throat. All his life he had battled what he had believed to be evil: addiction, ignorance, poverty; these he had confronted. Counseling, supporting, and teaching conquered these evils. Shagar had only one tool to fight a minion of hell, one tool with which to defend the sacred Eucharist.
Pharaoh started toward him.
And the pope prayed.
And Pharaoh grinned.
Shagar looked into Pharaoh’s eyes. He prayed for the souls of those who defended his gates and protected the world from this evil. He entreated God and warmth suffused him with peace and belonging.
“I commend you in keeping a strong church, Shagar. When I am Prophet Osiris and cleanse the city of the plague of hounds and crocodiles, your assembly will make an excellent start for an army of followers.”
Shagar started at Pharaoh’s announcement. “God will not accept a shadow prophet.” Shagar prayed, and he stood tall, lifted by a thousand fingertips.
Pharaoh halted, suddenly wary. His eyes glowed brighter and then Shagar bent over double, the thrum of the connection stripped from him.
“Do you now understand what you forfeit?” Pharaoh teased.
Shagar’s fingers pulled at cramping stomach muscles. He could conceive of what the companions protected, that prayer and the Fullness were one and the same. He breathed deeply and straightened.
Pharaoh smirked. “Soon, when your believers pray, they will pray to me.” He lifted his hands, fingers splayed. “And I will not be merciful!” Blue fire leapt from his talons.
Whips of Void scythed through Shagar’s flesh. His cowl flying back, he screamed in agony.
Faris twisted on his bed as the sounds of battle rang out. He shook under sweat-darkened sheets. Around him, Void spun deep and cold. He reached fingers to it and stopped. With a grunt, he swung his leg over the side of the mattress and grabbed his crutches. He wouldn’t die in a bed like some invalid. As he levered himself from the mattress, blood flowed into the injured thigh. The leg throbbed, and he bit his lip until the burning ebbed.
The apartment door slammed open.
Faris lifted his head and scratched at his beard. He hopped to the bedroom door. Worry deepened the creases pain had etched on his brow. Footsteps pounded outside, and Faris held his breath.
Zarab let loose a wild keening sound.
With the tip of a crutch, Faris opened his door a crack.
The hall was jammed with two Shemsu Seth and a crocodile that lay halfway across the threshold to Zarab’s bedroom.
Faris swore.
At the far end, Shen pointed into Zarab’s room. Shen’s characteristic smile radiated in gleeful lines until he met Faris’s shocked gaze.
He gaped at Shen’s treachery, but knew he could do nothing to stop it. Nothing without Void.
Zarab whimpered one last time, and then Faris sank deep into the Void. He embraced its wild strength. His pain disappeared, and the lines on his face smoothed. The dark companion walked.
Three aten lay on the chest of drawers. He dropped a crutch to snatch the first and flung the door open. The Shemsu Seth shouted alarm.
“Re!” A sundisc followed Faris’s cry. The nearest Shemsu Seth’s skull split at his brow and the disc embedded in the ceiling beyond. The second Shemsu Seth raised a crossbow, and Faris slammed the door and threw his weight against it.
The bolt thudded into the wood and drove through into Faris’s clavicle. His vision narrowed, but the Void gave strength. He jerked free of the bolt and stared at the bloodied barbs.
Blotches of red marked where he rolled along the wall to grasp another aten.
The door burst open and cracked against the plaster wall. When a gun barrel turned the corner, Faris drove his crutch upward.
The first bullet tugged at his head. Blood erupted down the side of his face and blinded one eye. The attacker brought the weapon around again as Faris launched forward. The aten spun from his grip. He hit the floor. The man’s hands flew to his neck where the disc had lodged. Blood wove through his fingers. His head fell backward and hung from the sinew of the spinal column before he collapsed.
Faris heaved, prostrate on the ground. When the last Shemsu Seth collapsed, Shen reached into his robe and drew a knife, a black ankh. He didn’t smile as he walked toward Faris.
Shen lifted the dagger and whistled. The crocodile skidded out from Zarab’s room and charged ahead.
Faris swam deep into the Void. Fear had no place in his thoughts. He roared and his spirit crawled from his body, crouched, and then sprang down the hallway toward Shen.
The crocodile clamped its jaws around the spirit lion’s forelimb, but the crushing weight of the lion bowled it backward. The crocodile fell onto its side and Faris tore at its tender underbelly. He clawed past the soft scales and dipped his maw into the cavity to rip out its heart and lungs. The crocodile’s tail flailed and knocked Shen against the wall. He crumpled to the floor. And then Faris pounced.
Within the tight alley, the Wedjat hacked out the throat of a hound and blood rained from her blade. A sundisc rattled between the walls before it found a haunch. Limbs and carrion dammed the streets behind her, but still the creatures crowded. Sheer numbers wore the sisters and companions down.
Sam stepped over the body of a sister; her veil
was torn away along with her face. The twining wrestled within Sam. Part of her concentration was spent to ensure the strength of the Void–Fullness binding. At the periphery of her mind darkness swirled, beckoning and welcoming.
A sundisc struck and broke through the mortar between two bricks in the fortress wall. Sam turned to see Askari fighting in a narrow alley. Blood smeared his forehead. A hound chewed at his forearm, and with an aten, he cut through the bone and sinew of another’s leg.
“Askari,” she yelled. “There are too many.”
He paused and stared. Light throbbed from the veins that ran up Sam’s neck and cheek.
Askari nodded in understanding and awe. He knelt even as a crocodile approached. In the gray dawn, from behind his back, he drew two blades. Each stole the sun’s light. He stood, fitted them together and twirled it so that its arc became Re’s aten.
“The prophecy is fulfilled. The Wedjat is among us,” Askari cried and threw the spear high into the air. Sam caught the shaft.
When she touched the weapon, the Fullness and Void surged into it so that its luminosity grew.
Around her, all the creatures of the night cringed, and Askari shielded his eyes. With it to ground her, Sam connected with each of her people. All but Faris.
Faris.
Sam ran. The spear stabbed, hacked and cut. But Sam’s face showed no joy in the tool. A mass of Void surrounded her mother’s apartment. When she vaulted over a cluster of skirmishing sisters, their chorus lifted, “Wedjat!” They rallied.
Sam paused at the convent. The Mother Isis stood amongst her brood and glistened with blood. Beneath the crone’s hood, Sam sensed her grin and disliked her for it. The Mother Isis held none of the glow of the sisters whose Ka shone around Sam. The sisters dropped to a knee. But not Mother Isis.
The Void, which had seemed to grow like a dying star from the apartment, now collapsed in on itself, a vortex of Void.
“Faris,” Sam croaked.
Down the alley and through the courtyard, she flew into the apartment. Sam shot into the hall as the lion lunged at Shen.
“No,” she screamed and caught the cat’s back leg with a swing of her spear. It tore through the ephemeral flesh. He howled and slunk to the hall’s end. Shemsu Seth lay dead on the floor; Shen groaned. Blood pooled below Faris’s head. A great channel to the Void swelled in Faris. His pupils held a diamond feline shape. Sam had no time to mourn him.
“Hold, Faris,” Sam addressed the lion. “If any part of you remains, know that I will kill you to save Shen.” Lost to the Void, Sam couldn’t trust Faris any longer.
Shen opened his eyes and crawled away as the lion growled.
“Get behind me, Shen.”
He nodded.
Faris yowled in anguish, padded into Zarab’s room, and then launched through the window. Sam followed, fearful for the prophet, but the spirit vaulted the wall and was gone. In the corner of the room, Zarab trembled, arms clasped about his knees. Sam returned to the hall and bent over Faris. His head wound was a graze, but by the glow of his eyes, she knew he was Void-lost. She stroked a finger along the edge of Faris’s jaw.
“Thank you, Sam.” Shen hugged her shoulders; his eyes darted to the dead Shemsu Seth.
“It’s all right, Shen. I should have known the Shemsu Seth would be after Zarab. I should have left more protection. Faris would not have needed to—”
Zarab peeked around his doorframe. His hands flailed and gestured. Sam raised an eyebrow but did not understand the frantic sign language. Shen released his embrace of Sam and took a step toward Zarab. Zarab retreated into his room.
New Moon
‘The path of souls is opened.’
-Egyptian Book of the Dead
Chapter Thirty-nine
“How many have we lost?” Sam asked. Blood smeared her limbs and spattered her face.
The convent had turned into a triage hospital. A dozen sisters and companions lay with ragged bites and wounds. The stink of crocodile mixed with blood and antiseptic. Before a shrine to Saint George, the pile of bodies climbed; the corpses dressed in their final shrouds. Outside the thick doors to the courtyard, a score of sisters hunted for the last of the Shemsu Seth horde. With dawn the dwarfs and men had fled, and already the sun dipped back toward the horizon.
“Half, maybe more, but fewer than that will ever fight again,” Tara replied, shaking her head. “How’s Faris?”
“Void-lost; Essam watches him,” Sam muttered.
The concerned pinch of her mother’s brow did little to mend the chasm that yawned between her and her daughter.
Sam ran fingers through her hair. It was the evening of the new moon. Police and army surrounded the fortress; a helicopter chopped steady circles around the walls. No one was allowed in or out. Her hands balled into fists.
Tonight Pharaoh would become a god, or godlike. Godlike left a measure of uncertainty. Godlike was mutable. But she must act tonight: The Benu lost, the scarab’s shell unbroken, the Halls of Ma’at shall close. Pharaoh would rule for five hundred years.
Only the bishops barred the Egyptian army from overrunning the fortress. They surprised everyone when they stepped in to shoulder questions and demands, citing ancient documents that gave them domain over their walled town. The ploy wouldn’t hold the soldiers forever. Luckily, the authorities were busy responding to calls of stray crocodiles and vicious hounds.
Askari stood beside the convent’s grand entry, a fourteen-foot arched doorway; he taught another sister how to use the Void with the dwindling tether of Fullness. Near him, Zarab stared dully at the pile of dead and Shen smiled up at the sun from his position leaning on the gate. Sam sent a silent prayer of thanks for Askari’s alliance; she needed the men, and Askari was a leader upon whose shoulder she could lean.
As she approached him, the sister stood and walked away with a nod of deference.
“Sam, I have been thinking,” Askari said. “I believe we could use the church tunnels to make our way past the police who guard Coptic Cairo, but I do not see how we are to reach Giza unchallenged.” Ruts scored beneath his eyes.
“They’ll catch us in the streets,” Sam agreed, “We’ll never make it across the Nile bridges with weapons.” As she regarded Askari’s despair, a slow smile spread across her face. “But we are a small group. I will lead us through Krokodilopolis to the nurseries of the Shemsu Seth.”
Askari’s jaw dropped. “Last time you almost died,” he exclaimed.
“The tunnels will be emptied, and we can arrive right under their noses.”
“But what of Sobek?”
“There are ways to reach the nurseries without falling through a pit and battling a dragon, Askari.” She placed her hand on his shoulder.
“The Fullness is almost gone, Samiya. I am not certain how much help the companions can be to you.” Once the Fullness disappeared, they would all be Void-lost unless Sam restored the Fullness.
“Wedjat.” A sister hailed her from the convent’s gate. “The bishops wish a word.”
Sam looked to Askari, and he bowed his head.
“We must go soon, Wedjat.”
“Gather the companions and the sisters.”
She released her grip on his shoulder.
“I will fetch Essam, Askari,” Shen offered from the doorway, and Askari signaled agreement.
On the steps of the Hanging Church, four bishops stood robed in rich cloth festooned with gold crosses and intricate stitching. Sam rubbed at the wound Trand had delivered as she climbed to meet them.
“Thank you for handling the authorities.”
The bishops’ gnarled hands waved away her gratitude. “Pope Shagar is dead and the Eucharist is stolen,” said the least stooped of the men.
Sam paled. “I’m sorry, but I don’t understand. Why woul
d they steal the Eucharist?”
“We thought to ask you.”
Sam’s eyes widened slightly. “It is part of the ritual to form the Osiris. The prophecy states: I put water beneath thee. Pharaoh wishes to become the prophet and needs the Eucharist to consecrate it.”
The bishops looked from one to the other. Another stepped forward, his ancient face lined with sorrow. “We extend our support.”
Sam’s expression didn’t change. “No, Your Holiness, I cannot accept the help of your people. Those who come must follow me alone.”
The bishop flushed. “I saw. I watched the Shemsu Seth.” He looked away. “The prophecy also states that you must gather the thousands. Without them you will be destroyed.”
“Pope Shagar was right, Bishop. Your people do not believe. They cannot help. Not now.”
The bishop held out his palms, offering the thousands.
Sam shook her head, turned, and walked down the steps.
“How will you gather the thousands?” the aged bishop shouted.
At the bottom of the stairs, Sam looked back at the men, silhouetted in the descending sun. She squinted into the sunlight and basked in its warmth.
“I don’t know,” she replied.
“Shen?” Askari asked.
Shen crouched under the sycamore before the pigeon hutch. He fumbled with the falcon’s leg and missed the thread of a knot.
“What are you doing, Shen?”
The sisters and remaining companions had gathered at the Convent of St. George, but Shen had not returned with Essam, so Askari had returned to the apartment. Besides, Askari wished to say goodbye to Faris.
Except for the darting black gaze of the birds, Askari and Shen were alone in the courtyard.
24 Bones Page 25
