Akhet
***
By: Evandanger547
~Chapter 1~
The Revelation
I woke up to fear, drenched in sweat and my heart racing past me. It was only a dream I tell myself but it felt so real that I don’t even trust myself. It is okay, everything is okay I repeat on and on in my head. I smell the Nile, its bitter scent piercing my nostrils. I walk out of bed, believing it was all work of Sobek, god of fears who has gotten in my head again. I walk out of my room to greet my parents, playing a game of Senet as they greet me to breakfast.
I scarf up my breakfast and run to the Nile. The sweet water from the Nile, tickling my tongue as I slurp it down I finally come to my senses and admit to myself that it was all just a bad, no—horrible nightmare. I see the golden sun rise up across the horizon, the sky’s light starts to rise, and pulling the darkness back. Ra has made another beautiful sunrise, and everything is okay.
I run, as fast as I can to get to my job, selling foods at the Cairo market. I am walking and I see something in the distance, I stand there looking at the blue Haze, just floating there. I remember a time when I was watching an amazing sunrise, just thinking, how one day I will upraise over the ruler of Egypt, Cleopatra. I stay there, remembering the highlights of my life. Just laying, looking at the strange haze.
When I get back to my senses, I feel happy as, if the nightmare never happened. Soon I find myself running to the marketplace, it is already time to start vending my crops, papyrus paper and flax to the Egyptians. By the time I get to the marketplace, it is midday and Ra’s blazing arch of the sun is halfway finished. The vending goes well, trading coins, oils, and many different and foreign spices I have never seen. My day is uneventful until a man offers me a strange artifact.
An Ankh I suppose, but this stranger seems to be running, so I think to trade. But the words slip out of my mouth “Where did you get that?” I say looking at the foreign yet familiar object. “Child,” the man starts “you do not want to know where this is from, just give me the papyrus and you take it.”
I think, he does look kind of suspicious, but I shrug it off. Soon, the jibber-jabber of my mouth overcomes me and when I see an eye of Wajet amulet, I go for it. “Give me the amulet first, and then, you can have twice as much papyrus as you want,” I say. “Child, you don’t know what this Ankh is worth,” the stranger cautions me. “But I do know what that amulet is worth.” I respond, eyes locked on the amulet. “Fine, have your prize and I will have mine,” The stranger mumbles. “You can still b—,” I stumble across the word bargain, I feel stupid, as if I can feel more so. “Buy something more; they are crops from Hathors heart!” I release tension; I did not say ‘bargain.’
The rest of my day is uneventful, and when the day is over, the shadow of night slowly overcomes Ra and the sands become a gray color as the sun goes down. I walk home, having survived another day. I am grateful to all the gods, and we eat dinner in peace. When I show what I traded for the crops, coins, oils, exotic spices and, the Ankh and the amulet. My father seems to be proud, until he sees the Ankh and the amulet. “Son, where did you get these,” my father says. “A nice man gave it to me at a good deal, why?” “Akhet—,” he calls me by my name for the first time in years. “Do you know what you did, and do you know what this is capable of,” I feel tension growing, my tongue slips out and I hiss “what can it do?” I feel something growing on me, and trust me; this is not a laughing matter.
