Cursed Times - Only Yesterday! Sequel to Wattys 2015 winner!

Chapter 9 - Trueth: Scheming

'If you mean the second prophet of Ra with that attribution, then yes, he should have. But that does not change much.' Imhotep turned around and headed for the garden proper.

Come!

They all did, single file, Blondie padding along at the rear.

Imhotep stopped in the middle of a pebbled square surrounded by tamarisks and rose bushes where palms stood guard overhead. He rose into the air, bending his legs until he was kneeling on nothing above them.

Sit!

Three cushions materialised on the pebbles. They sat. The cat stood next to Trueth looking lost—until another cushion, this one with silver bobbles, appeared out of nowhere. Blondie conceded to take his seat and started chewing the ornaments.

Imhotep motioned at Seisi. Tell me what you know.

This would take a while, Trueth thought and enjoyed Metjen's fidgeting all throughout the detailed report.

Imhotep turned his head in Metjen's direction. 'Four traitors when we expected three, they want the downfall of my family and they want to cause it by annihilating you. You attract enemies like an ass's carcass invites flies.' He made a chopping motion with his hand, nipping Metjen's protest in the bud and addressed Seisi again.

'Pray tell me, what exact words did those dark ones use?'

Seisi dutifully repeated what he had learned. 'The last sentence I heard was they would kill him on the morrow.'

'How could you pick that up?' Trueth asked. Seisi appeared puzzled. 'I mean, they have bothered to set up these magical veils, curses, spells and stuff. Then they have an al fresco reunion on the banks of the Nile and talk about things all in the open? Makes no sense to me.' She could have sworn amusement melted Imhotep's face for all of two seconds.

'Ah,' Seisi said. 'No, this is not what happened. They mind-talked a lot of the time, and I was not privy to their thoughts. But they got excited, and they then spewed forth sentences.'

'I'm glad I wasn't there to see them spew... .' Metjen said. 'Okay, your job was to work out whether we have those demon fanciers in the mirror world and it appears we do. Given that they couldn't keep their gobs shut, we also know a bit more about their plans. I just wonder whether they really meant to kill me—or whether they might have been talking about the late prophet of Ra. Or they had it in for both of us.'

'Your phrasing is outlandish, yet your logic is sound,' said Imhotep. His voice floated on the dusk.

'What does this achieve?' Seisi asked. 'Our high priest was never a strong fighter of the light.'

'I thought he served the sun god Ra,' Trueth said.

'Pray forgive, what I meant was, he did not engage much in all the endeavours to fight the dark priests. Nor did he help a lot with the venture to shift Kemet into the mirror.'

'Sounds just like him.' Metjen's comment attracted a menacing glare from his airborne ancestor. 'It doesn't matter who else they have on the scanner, given that they definitely are after me.'

'You tend to have that effect on people.' Trueth winced as Imhotep finally beamed taciturn displeasure in her general direction. She continued anyway. 'Did you recognise their faces, Sei?'

'No, they had invoked protection from the goddess Wadjet. I had to keep my mental vision trained on them all the time, yet their features were blurred,' Seisi said.

Unlike Iseret, who had been bobbing all over the place, especially when agitated, Imhotep never budged from his lofty position. Then, of course, he rarely got agitated.