Rebirth (Legends of the Kilanor Book 2)

by Jared Stone

  “I still do not understand why that is me,” Argus said, flummoxed.

  “Honestly, I cannot say I fully know either,” Bennu admitted. “I mean, your body is great and all, but I have seen better. I was told that he has been keenly interested in you since your transport to Rome following your capture. But I have the feeling that it is more than your fighting prowess he seeks….”

  “Hmmm…,” Dareia murmured out loud to herself, glancing out from the fire and into the dark woods around them.

  “What is it, Dareia?” Argus asked, looking up at the priestess’ golden form flickering in the firelight.

  “Oh… nothing,” Dareia responded pensively. “I am just pondering this Ini-herit’s possible motivations, that is all.”

  “I am sure that we will find out soon enough…,” Bennu said. “That is, assuming that you will both join with me.”

  Dareia cast her eyes down at the boy before her. “I shall reluctantly accept your proposition,” the priestess responded unenthusiastically. “But only so that we may terminate his hunting of Argus and continue on our intended journey.”

  “Thank you,” Bennu said with a seemingly sarcastic bow of his head in gratitude. He then looked up at Argus. “I think that you both should get some rest now. We will have to travel quite a distance over the upcoming days, and you might very well need all your strength!”

  “I shall take first watch,” Dareia announced. “I have no need for rest.”

  “That makes two of us!” Bennu chimed in proudly. “I will keep you company!” This was met with only a scowl on Dareia’s face.

  “Well, I will only be able to rest after I have eaten some more!” Argus insisted somewhat stubbornly. “For I am hungrier than I am tired at the moment, and I have not yet even gotten a chance to enjoy my dinner!”

  Dareia gently smiled. “Of course, Argus,” she said with a nod. “You take your time and savor your meal.”

  “And I guess I will gather some more firewood!” exclaimed Bennu excitedly before hopping up and running into the trees. “I will be back soon!”

  * * *

  Beneath the arena of the Coliseum, a lifeless body caked with blood, sweat, and sand was carried into a small, dimly-lit stone room. It was clothed in torn leather pants and armor plating that covered the right shoulder and arm down to the wrist. As soon as the two soldiers who carried it unceremoniously dropped it upon the gray stone altar within, the hole that was cut into its abdomen opened up and spilled some of its gruesome contents onto the floor below with a sickening splash. Following the soldiers into the space, the High Priest of Apep carefully took his position beside the body, stepping over the waste that now littered the stones beneath him.

  The soldiers stepped back and squeamishly glanced down at their blood-soaked arms. They were relieved when the priest commanded, “Leave us.” Turning, they quickly scuttled out of the room and closed the thick door behind them, leaving the priest alone with the corpse.

  After waiting for a moment to ensure that no one would reenter, the High Priest of Apep transitioned his staff to his right hand and threw back the hanging left sleeve of his cloak, revealing the black armband that was worn upon his forearm. This bracer was as dark as the starless night outside, yet it glistened with the reflection of the candlelight like the most polished of metals. Set within its surface, a golden ankh stood out quite prominently, almost as if it gave off a light all of its own. Concentrating his attention on the bracer held out before him, the priest began to speak.

  “Setónó yán hítónó fíyán,” he chanted quietly in Lí’ísedón, the Language of the Gods. “Setónó yán hítónó fíyán.” He repeated this phrase several times, building in volume with each successive line of the mantra.

  Suddenly, the room lit up with the vaporous glow of swirling, floating wisps of pale energy. Bright, formless apparitions flew about, surrounding the priest like a swarm of fireflies. As this vortex began to rotate faster and condense around him, the priest lifted his arm into the air.

  “Setónó yán hítónó fíyán!” he cried out one final time. Immediately, the spinning energy was sucked into the ankh engraving on his armband, causing the symbol to pulsate with an almost blinding glow. The priest then lowered his arm and pointed it at the man on the table, releasing a beam of white energy directly at his dead form. As this energy connected with the corpse, the fallen gladiator began to writhe around, his limbs twisting and torso convulsing and arching up off the altar. This lasted for only a few seconds before the energy beam ceased and the corpse slumped back down, motionless once again.

  The priest lowered his arm back to his side and looked on with a pleased grin across his face as the opened stomach cavity began to seal itself together again and the cuts and bruises all over the body turned to nothing more than scars. In the middle of this regeneration process, the gladiator suddenly heaved in a great breath and snapped his eyes open, as if alarmed by his unexpected return to the world. Breathing heavily a few times, he then turned his head to the side to gaze up at the priest.

  “My Lord, what would you have me do?” the gladiator inquired of the priest in a gasping, raspy voice.

  “Rise!” he commanded.

  Upon hearing these orders, his new servant slowly moved his limbs around to the sides as if he was a child just becoming accustomed to his developing motor skills. Cautiously laying his hands upon the stone, the gladiator pushed his upper body up off the slab. Twisting so that his legs fell down off the side, he then stood up, leaning heavily against the altar until his muscles had adjusted to supporting his weight once again. With his best effort, he stood at attention before the priest.

  “I, Ini-herit,” the dark priest announced, “have granted to you life anew. You have been born again to serve me and ensure that my will is executed.”

  “Yes, My Lord,” the gladiator responded earnestly. His deep, steady voice had returned to normal, and his bearded face bore signs of commitment and determination.

  “Tell me your name, servant,” Ini-herit continued.

  “Cassius, My Lord,” the risen gladiator answered.

  “There is a man I need you to bring to me, Cassius,” the Ini-herit continued. “He was once a prisoner here by the name of Titus. His fighting prowess was unmatched in the arena, but he escaped before I had the opportunity to acquire him for my purposes. This prisoner is in possession of a… certain skillset which I find intriguing. Find him, and return him to me. Alive.”

  “Yes, My Lord” replied the risen gladiator with a nod of his head in affirmation.

  Reaching into his dark black cloak, the priest pulled out a long, curved dagger that had the appearance of onyx. The handle was encircled with the carvings of a coiled snake whose open, fanged mouth held in place the deadly blade. It was clearly not a Roman weapon, as its make and style was indicative of craftsmanship farther east. He held it out for his servant to accept.

  “It has come to my attention,” Ini-herit began as the gladiator took the blade from his outstretched hands, “that this prisoner, Titus, is being escorted by a High Priestess of Nemea whose hide cannot be pierced by mortal blades. Use this dagger, given to me by the Great God Apep himself, to dispose of her as well.”

  “Yes, My Lord” his servant repeated again.

  “Now, go,” the priest ordered with a wave of his arm. “May Apep guide your hand.”

  With one final nod, the gladiator walked away from the altar that was still soaked with his blood and through the heavy door, into the hallway outside, leaving the priest alone in the darkness.

  4 - Fears

  Wednesday, November 19th

  “I don’t trust him…,” Willow stated assuredly as she and Lucian made their way across the campus. They had just finished eating lunch together in the student dining hall, and it was now time for Lucian to walk to the first of his two classes that afternoon: World History. Lucian was quite pleased to finally share lunch and conversation with a friend, as this had been sorely missing from the f
irst few months of his college experience. Willow, though already finished with her academic obligations for the day, had decided to accompany him and continue their lunchtime discussion of Professor Schuntz.

  “You just don’t trust him because you don’t like him,” Lucian countered with a light smile.

  “Or maybe I don’t like him because I don’t trust him,” Willow shot back defensively. She reached up and used her forefinger to brush away the bright red strands of hair from her face.

  “Oh, come on!” Lucian exclaimed with a glance over at his female companion. “Sometimes you just gotta let go of your doubt for a while. I didn’t believe any of this crazy stuff when I first got here, but look at me now! I’m a flippin’ demon-slaying savior of the world!” He chuckled out loud at his own purposeful exaggeration. Willow seemed less than amused – but this didn’t in any way surprise Lucian at this point.

  “Yeah, well,” continued Willow, “I’m just saying we should be careful. Sure, he says he used to be a Kílán and all, but we don’t really have any proof. He could be one of the bad guys for all we know…. He certainly acts like one.”

  “Well, Gus trusted him. That’s good enough for me!” Lucian asserted summarily with a nod of his head. Willow either didn’t have another comeback or knew better than to question the good judgment of his recently deceased friend; either way, she remained silent after this.

  Lucian breathed in and out and tried to take a few seconds to mentally pause and be appreciative of the beautiful day around them. As the end of the year approached, the warmth that had kept them comfortable had almost fully faded, and the world was now crisp and cold at all times. Snow had not yet fallen, but the sharp chill of the air served as a bitter foreshadowing of what was soon to come. Lucian’s favorite Fall weather had come and gone, and the approaching months would bring a much harsher environment until the welcome rebirth of spring. Though the sun shone strongly down upon the two students that afternoon and warmed them enough through their coats, it was still that time of the year when one wouldn’t want to keep one’s extremities exposed for too long. Both Lucian and Willow walked along with their hands in their pockets – Lucian’s in his jeans and Willow’s in the sides of her black, zippered hoodie.

  As they continued on, their path sloped upwards and over a little, grass-covered hill. Once at the top, their range of vision increased dramatically, and the two students were able to see several buildings in different sections of the campus grounds. Behind them, the bland square dining hall in which they recently ate sat like an ugly duckling among an otherwise very impressive family of structures. Off to Lucian’s right stood the library, a place where he had spent much of his time before his unfortunate run-in with the demon, Zagan. Since then, he hadn’t had the luxury of breaking away to lose himself to his own imagination among the rows and rows of books, and Lucian found that he missed the hushed serenity. The multiple thin windows which covered the building made Lucian imagine it as a castle in which an army of archers were poised, ready to fire against invaders. He smiled as he pictured them hurling out pencils and hardcover books against an advancing army of goblins with siege weaponry.

  Down the walkway, far in front of them, was the building in which Lucian would have his World History class, and the outside was thankfully far more elegant than that of the old, Cold War era fortification of his Religion lecture. The exterior was composed primarily of brownish-red bricks with gray concrete accents around the windows and pillars which supported the corners of the building. It stood four stories, and, though not very wide, it had a much more impressive feel than many of the other classroom halls on campus, due to its recent, visually appealing construction. Inside, the class-rooms were more modern and well equipped, with projectors and electrical outlets for a technology-utilizing student body. Overall, it was Lucian’s favorite of the four different classroom halls in which he had attended class.

  To their left, the university chapel was located next to a small pond with a waterfall feature, and this was certainly the most ornate object in their sight. Built in the gothic style, each corner of the building was topped with a miniature spire, and the center of the roof shot up into the sky with a pyramidal peak. The chapel was not outfitted with symbols from any specific religious traditions, as it was intended to serve any of the plethora of different beliefs on campus, but it still gave Lucian the very definite feel of a traditional Catholic chapel. He vaguely remembered someone during orientation speaking of the university’s Christian roots, and he assumed that this chapel was a modified relic from an earlier, more pious time. Normally tranquil and serene, it was, on this day, unexpectedly surrounded in front by a crowd of about twenty people listening to one man speaking.

  “What’s going on over there?” Lucian asked.

  “I think they’re announcing the Christian chaplain’s replacement today,” Willow responded.

  Unfortunately, Lucian was not privy to any of the details of this event, and he stared at her, confused.

  “Didn’t you hear?” Willow asked him, her slight inflection indicating that she was surprised. “The chaplain was found dead in the chapel Monday night. They think it was a sudden heart attack or something.”

  “Oh, wow! No, I didn’t. That’s horrible!” Lucian exclaimed, feeling surprisingly saddened by the news, though he had never actually met the chaplain himself. He at first wondered why he hadn’t heard of this occurrence before now, but then he thought he vaguely remembered perhaps receiving an email about it the day before. He admittedly had a bad habit of regularly deleting news emails from the university without bothering to read them first, as they rarely pertained to him in any way. He decided in that moment, however, that he might want to be more discerning about what he discarded without reading in the future.

  “Yeah…, it was pretty weird,” Willow continued. “Completely unexpected. The guy seemed to be in perfect health. I actually met with him earlier that day to discuss a paper I’m writing. Guess it just goes to show you that none of us knows when death is about to swoop down and carry us away….”

  Lucian glanced over at his morbid friend, unsure of how to respond. She looked back at him.

  “Well, Golden Boy, shall we go see what they have to say?”

  Lucian pulled out his cell phone and glanced down at the time. He still had fifteen minutes before the start of class, and he had to admit to himself that he was, for some reason, curious to hear more. “Sure,” he assented with a shrug.

  The two students stepped off the cement path and made their way down the grass covered hill to the front of the chapel. As they came closer, the voice of the man speaking to the small crowd of people became clearer.

  “— the concern you’ve all shown over the past couple of days. It is truly with a heavy heart that we bid farewell to our University Chaplain for the past 6 years: Father Michael O’Brien.”

  The assembly of distraught onlookers bowed their heads in respect and observed a moment of silence to remember their departed chaplain. Lucian felt like a bit of a voyeur, having never known the man and standing there eyeing these people while they mourned.

  “In this time of grief, it is important to also be thankful for the blessings that we have received,” the man cut in again. “Though Father O’Brien can never be replaced in our hearts, we have had the good fortune of quickly finding the man who will take over his responsibilities at the chapel. It is with great pleasure that I welcome to our university our new Christian chaplain, Father Ini!”

  The speaker motioned to his left, where an older man with dark skin and features stood somberly in a black priest frock. Father Ini bowed his head in greeting to the people gathered before him. The crowd lightly clapped to welcome him.

  “Father Ini comes to us from the Catholic diocese of Alexandria, Virginia,” the man went on to say. “Having moved here from Egypt when he was younger, Father Ini has devoted his life to spiritual pursuits, and his wealth of experience and piety will no doubt be a great asset to this
university. Now, Father, if you would like to say a few words….”

  Again, a soft round of applause followed the man’s introductions as he stepped to the side and motioned for the dark priest to take his place in the center. Stepping out slowly before the crowd, Father Ini looked up as the clapping died down in preparation of listening to his speech.

  “Thank you very much, Mr. Baker,” Father Ini said with a thick accent. “Hello to you all. I first wish to express my deepest sympathies for the loss of your beloved chaplain, Father O’Brien. I am sure he was a great man and will be missed by all.”

  Father Ini looked around at the numerous heads nodding in agreement before continuing. “However, remember, friends, that death is only the beginning of life anew. So, do not despair. I am certain that Father O’Brien will continue to be here with us, on this campus, united with the spirit of his creator. And we shall all be together again, very soon, at the time of the return of our Lord and Savior.”

  Father Ini paused again, letting his words seep into the minds of the captivated audience in front of him. Even Lucian found himself enraptured by the priest’s words and manner of speaking, despite his fervent disbelief in the content. After this impactful moment of silence, Father Ini then continued.

  “Despite these unfortunate circumstances, I am very grateful for the opportunity of getting to know each and every one of you. Over the coming weeks, I am sure that we will become intimately acquainted with one another. It is my hope that each of us will be led by divine providence to the fulfillment of the spirit that we seek. Thank you.”