Nine
FATE; did such a thing even exist? Ahmose truly believed I had been brought here for a higher purpose by their god Ra, who the sun would never rise without. However, I still wondered if I was in the twenty-first century, locked away in a padded cell somewhere. I didn't know what to believe anymore. Time travel, gods, magic; these were things that belonged in fairy tales. I believed in facts and science, and now I was in a place where none of that existed.
Sometime later when Ahmose had fallen into a peaceful slumber, I made my way back to my own chamber clutching a lantern tightly in my grasp, terrified of the shadows that loomed in the halls, barely able to hold my head up. What if someone tried to slip another serpent into his room while I was away? Should I stay with him longer to keep guard? The perpetrator was still here and could easily fool the guards with a trusting façade. The muscles in my belly tightened when I thought about someone killing him during the night.
But my tired eyes could no longer hold themselves open when my head finally found the comfort of my soft pillow. And I too found sleep.
Though my body was finally resting, I was still worn from rage and grief. Not even in sleep could I escape the gnawing emotions.
An assassin was here. Within the palace, someone, whom Ahmose at one point must have trusted, wanted to kill him. What was their gain in killing a good man? What part of the story was I missing?
Believing it was the only way I would be safe in Egypt without him, he had named me his heiress, putting me at the head of the line for Pharaoh's crown. That meant I would have power over Thutmosis, history's lion, who wanted to sink his teeth into me. Ahmose hadn't ensured my safety. He had acted hastily while being laid upon his deathbed and hadn't clearly thought this impulsive decision through. If anything, he had thrown me straight into the line of fire.
Either way, the consequence was the same: I had altered history, and the future was inevitably changing. Now I was as blind as Ahmose, having depended entirely on what I had learned from history, and couldn't predict what would happen next.
My stomach tossed like an ocean of great waves battering my insides, begging for escape from this nightmare even for just a few hours.
Eventually, my tired brain gave out, and then I began to dream. I plummeted into turmoil as my dream shifted and coiled, becoming serpents that glided from the shadows that now filled me with a sense of terror, tangling me in their cold, rigid bodies. But they did not bite me. Instead, they gazed at me with their golden eyes and suddenly became very still, shifting their hooded heads from me to the passage that led from my chamber to darkness. They wanted me to follow.
I climbed out of bed and headed to the corridor, suddenly so afraid, I hesitated in the doorway. But it was not the serpents I feared; I was afraid of the dark. My chamber was lighted by the blue aura of the bright moon, but in my doorway there was only blackness. It was so thick I feared if I reached out to touch it, my hand would brush a wall.
The serpents hissed, as if to encourage me onward, and when I stepped one foot into the black hall, it suddenly became lighted by moonlight. In the hall, I found guards and servants who were barely more than shadows. They wept miserably, the guards with their faces covered by their hands, and the servants on their knees with their heads bowed.
Among the servants, I found the girl who always tended to me, her arms wrapped around a small boy. He rubbed his eyes with little fists, more confused by the sorrow that suddenly gripped the household than I was. I sunk to my knees before them.
"What is happening? Where is Pharaoh?" I asked, forgetting she couldn't speak Latin. I received a stifled groan in reply. She lifted her face and wiped her tears away. She mumbled, and patted the small boy's ebony hair. Her face was as pale as a lily as she consoled the child. She turned her gaze to me, though her eyes were distant and unfocused, as if I wasn't even there. My stomach coiled into a cold knot.
Could she see me? None of the other servants seemed to notice me as I crouched before them. Slowly, I reached out to brush the girl's shoulder, and my fingers went straight through her. A cool breeze was all that was where her flesh should have been. She was a ghost.
The child wrapped his arms around her, and he did not pass through her like I had. They could see and feel each other as they all continued to weep. What was happening to cause the entire palace to become wracked by grief? Ahmose.
I glanced up and down the hall, and he was nowhere in sight. At the end of the dark passage, a small light came from the open door of his chamber. I stood and passed the weeping guards, and the blood that pounded in my ears drowned out their cries. I came to his door and dreadfully I peered inside.
Ahmose lay in bed, exactly as I had left him tonight. He was shielded by the chiffon drapes that surrounded the golden bed upon which he laid. Thankfully to the moonlight, I could make out his dark form behind the chiffon as he lay immobile; still. I gripped the side of the drape and was about to move it aside, but I was suddenly overcome by fear.
The cries from the hall had quieted to a low murmur. I swallowed hard to dislodge the knot in my neck, and I moved the drape aside. I looked upon Ahmose's angelic face as he appeared to be in a deep sleep. His forehead was creased, and his lips were a frown of ageless sorrow.
"Ahmose," I mouthed gently, hoping to stir him. When he didn't move, or even take a breath, I moved the drape farther away. He remained perfectly still, save for his arm which shifted so slightly, I wasn't sure if it had even moved at all. "Ahmose," I whispered again, waiting patiently for him to open his eyes.
His eyes remained closed, and his face was so pale, he resembled the phantoms in the hall. And then fear began to settle in my belly. What if Ahmose couldn't hear me either?
"Ahmose," I said more forcefully this time, and his arm shifted again. Panic began to hit me, and I grabbed the sheet that covered him and yanked it aside, revealing his limp arm slacked over his body. A cobra coiled around it, winding itself in response to open air, and clutched itself to his breast with its fangs.
I was enraged. "Get off of him!" I screamed at the serpent, but it continued to suck the blood from his breast, hissing as if to taunt me.
Ahmose was limp, cold: dead. I sunk to my knees beside the bed as torturous pangs of sorrow split through me. He was gone. Never again would I hear his soft voice or feel his strong arms around me. I reached over the bed to take his hand in mine, the serpent still latched to him, not caring that I was even there. And when I touched him, the same cool breeze that had been around the servant girl now filled the space Ahmose occupied, and my fingers went straight through his. His limp, vulnerable corpse was here beside me, and I could not even touch him. This was the cruelest punishment I had ever known.
The servants that flocked in and out of the room passed through me, which came as no surprise, as they gathered around Pharaoh's bedside and mourned. They could see each other, and they could see Ahmose's lifeless body, yet they were entirely unaware of my presence. They were not phantoms wandering with no objective; they were living, breathing, anguishing people.
I was the phantom. Terror-stricken, I backed out of the room and fled down the hall to my own chamber as a horrible suspicion grew in the back of my mind. I burst into the room and found my own body sprawled out in the sheets, covered in fresh blood.
I probably would have fainted if it hadn't been for the golden angel that kneeled at my bedside, shining a bright and warm light over me. His eyes were eternally sorrowful, and he appeared as if he had been sobbing along with the rest of the household. He must have sensed my presence, because he turned his amber eyes to me.
"Ahmose?" I wept, and threw my arms around him. Were we both phantoms? He caught me in his arms and pulled me against him. I was relieved when I did not pass through him, that I could feel his solid chest against my cheek. He had no heartbeat.
"Kara," he murmured sadly. "We only have so much time left." My eyes snatched up to meet his, the dread unwavering from their golden brown depths. I didn't know what he meant by that, and before I had a chance to ask him to elaborate, the dream came to an abrupt end and I bolted upright.
The bright daylight caused the ache in my head to worsen, as well as the foul stench that wafted in the room. I felt of my face and hands, ensuring I was safely secure in my own body. The odor only intensified when I stretched under the sheets. The dream had left me with a sense of foreboding, and it had frightened me so badly, I wondered if I had wet my bed. My legs were damp. I pushed the sheets off of me to investigate, but the moistness on my legs was merely sweat. I was clean.
Did I smell this awful? If so, I would have to bathe before I could present myself to anyone. Ahmose... I quickly recalled last night's events. Did he make it through the night?
I threw myself into the comforts of my pillow to cling to his memory while I was still unaware of his fate, a reality I was too afraid to face. I brushed my hair out of my eyes with my fingers that still smelled of his skin. I brought the tips to my nose to smell him, and then kissed them as if they were his. I wasn't ready to let him go. If he had passed away, how could I ever find the strength to endure ancient Egypt without him?
I heard commotion outside my door, and quickly it reminded me of my dream. It sounded like the guards were stampeding through the corridor, their footsteps like thunder in the hall. I sat up, my heart pounding fiercely. Why were they shouting? Was it grief? Joy? I threw the sheets off of me to hurry and peek into the hall.
I started to climb out of bed when my hand brushed something strange. I had gone to bed with nothing but my robe last night, so I found it strange that my hand would brush something cold...and slimy. The metallic stench intensified when I tilted to the left. The smell couldn't be coming from me then. It had to be coming from something in the room. Maybe the servant brought me some food a while ago and it had ruined in the morning heat. Rotting food would not smell this atrocious.
Whatever I had my hand on was mangled under the sheets beside me, and I knew it was the source. I ran my hand along it, and immediately jerked it away when I felt something wet. I didn't know what was under my sheets, but it was frightening me. Blood pounded in the back of my ears; my breath was no more than ragged gasps. I reached for the sheet and started to pull it up to see what was underneath, when I noticed the wetness on my hand. It was dark maroon, almost black. Maybe I had spilled wine in my bed, but I hadn't brought any in here last night.
I brought my fingers to my face and took a quick whiff of it. It smelled sour, like blood.
I slowly pushed myself away and crawled out of the bed. I straightened myself and tried to make out a form under the sheets, but they were dyed with indigo to the shade of the night sky, shielding what lay underneath. I reached for the sheet, and counted in my head, taking deep breaths as I did so. One, I drew in a deep breath and tried to ease the swirling in my head. Two, another deep breath, and I tightened my grip on the sheet. Three, I jerked the sheet aside.
Every conscious thought I'd had in my head suddenly vanished, lapsed and forgotten. I was so stunned, so horrified by what was before me, I couldn't think of anything but the dry ache in the pit of my gut. All rationality left me, drifted amidst the air like a phantom, the shell of who I was before now. My heart soured, hardened from the sight before me. I cowered against the wall, my eyes plastered on my bed. It took a moment to process what I was looking at. There was so much blood...
What lay in my bed was the butchered corpse of the cobra from last night. There it laid, its head separated from its tail, twisted in a decaying heap on my bed, soaked in blood. I was so shocked, so aghast, that the only sound I could make was a sharp, petrified whimper.
And then I screamed. I screamed, and I kept screaming. I couldn't control it; the screams just kept pouring from me. My body began to tingle. No, my body was burning. I burned just as Ahmose had burned on the floor after being bitten. Had I been bitten?
The thought sent a tremor of fear through me, so I began peeling off my clothes, searching my arms, my chest, my legs for bite marks, screaming the entire time. I had no more anti-venom. If a cobra bit me, I would die. I found imaginary pink abrasions on my arms, sending my scientific brain into a whirl of panic. Even after I was out of breath, I still screamed. I screamed until my lungs ached.
The guards burst into the room, and though I was half naked, I did nothing to conceal myself. Some came to me, their eyes wide and afraid as I hysterically examined my limbs for bite marks. Once they noticed the dead snake wrapped in my sheets, they scurried to dispose of it.
Snakes mortified me. Even when I was a small child, I had always been afraid of them. Their slithering bodies, their hissing tongues, their beady eyes; they sickened me.
Who would do this to me, and why? Was Ahmose's assailant now after the new pharaoh? Was I Pharaoh now? I wanted Ahmose, but we were both dangerously mended together now.
I could scream no more, and I nearly collapsed, when a pair of strong arms found me, encircled me and pulled me upright. The guard that pulled me to his chest smelled like musk. Having his arms around me eased my heart, and I began to calm down. His skin was like a warm hearth, and I realized I was nearly naked. Self-conscious, I started to push him away, but he whispered my name into my hair, a soft and gentle voice, one that captured my heart.
It wasn't a guard that held me. I looked up into Ahmose's eyes, reassuring and protecting. Peering into his beautiful face, I quickly forgot about the mangled serpent, and the realization he was here lifted me from my turmoil. I could breathe again. The burning in my body subsided, and the pink abrasions disappeared; my scientific mind had played tricks on me. I was fine.
Ahmose was also fine. He stood youthful, strong, and healthy. He had survived. His breathtaking eyes stared into mine with a protective gaze, and the golden asp of his headdress glinted in the morning light like a divine guardian.
I looked back at my bed and watched as the guards carried the carcass away and the servants removed the soiled sheets. They left us alone, and as silence swept over the room, I could do nothing more than fall against him and listen to his heart. I buried my face into his rich fabrics, taking in his scent.
And then sobs began to wrack my frame as I cried into him, out of horror, confusion, and relief. He whispered into my hair, "I don't know who has done this, but they will pay dearly. I will not have anyone harm you or terrorize you. You saved me from the asp's bite, and now you are my friend for life. I will keep you safe, no matter what."
I could hear his gentle words, but I could only focus on his strong arms around me, and the sudden, fluttery feeling that grew in my chest as I stood there in his embrace.