Metjen realised that now they had rescued the priest from his wet confinement they faced the next hurdle. How to keep the young man alive outside that embalming fluid? Trueth must have shared his concerns, she was on the floor, examining her patient. The man was in a horrid shape. His skin was wrinkled and sallow as if he had spent his time hanging around in the dark.
His pallor was the least of their worries. The young man had been tortured; bruises, scrapes and burns marred his body. His tormentors had wrenched one arm from its joint, it lay at an odd angle on the floor. Four fingers were crooked and broken, the fingernails pulled out.
'What happened to him?' Ranofer asked. 'And why?'
Iseret joined Trueth, bent down and lay her hands on the mangled shoulder. It shimmered, and the arm went back into its proper place. 'Sister Trueth, the rest is up to you. I truly am spent.' Iseret turned around and faced Ranofer. 'He is only a priest of the fifth rank, the son of common parents, but he fought the dark ones where he could. He was a real danger to them, they caught him four times, three times he escaped. Once he did not... .' Iseret shrugged.
Trueth looked up, concern showing in her eyes. 'If he's so low on the holy food chain he won't have the Blessing, right? Just in case he wakes up, is stressed and feels like doing funny things. Like zap me with a spell.'
Iseret's tapped Trueth's forehead as if she wanted to hand-deliver a message. 'Where I come from, all priests had the Blessing, even a lowly Pure One like him. The others we did not call priests. But fear not, Metjen is stronger, once he has recuperated. As am I. Or Nebmutef. And he will not wake up yet.'
She lifted her palms towards the ceiling and the still form rose into the air and hovered commando all the way to the cobra hole. A weary band of people trudged after Iseret and her airborne cargo. Metjen's father was falling behind. He wanted to examine the ancient device. To pry his father from the wonders of an antiquity unlike anything decreed by science, Metjen had to promise they would return.
Outside, they got their patient into the minibus and drove towards the temple, the only place where they could keep the priest safe at the same time as safely guarded. When they arrived at the sanctuary, a silent congregation awaited them, with Nebmutef at the front.
'Your Wisdom, you are not welcome here anymore.'
It took Metjen a long time to convince the priests they should accept Iseret back into their midst. Without Trueth's calm support, he might not have succeeded. Iseret never uttered a single word in her defence. His family had been waiting for the outcome of the argument. Metjen sent them off, at least he tried to, but failed with Rani-Ra, who followed them underground.
'You'll need someone to look after that guy,' she said with a predatory expression in her eyes.
Metjen groaned. One of his sister's escapades was the last thing he needed.
The patient got deposited in the penal chamber and Trueth examined him once more with Rani-Ra's help while Nebmutef established the wards.
'His pulse is beating more rapidly,' Trueth said. 'And his temperature has risen. This is really amazing.'
'He is quite good-looking. Or would be if he wasn't so messed up. Poor chap,' Rani-Ra said but at least she kept at a healthy distance from the young man.
Metjen was so tired he felt light-headed. 'I can only hope Iseret is speaking the truth. And mother is right. Otherwise... . ' He did not know what otherwise would entail. He could only think of his bed.
Nebmutef looked grim. 'I will guard this one.'
'Can you keep him contained if push comes to shove?' Trueth asked.
Nebmutef nodded once. 'His sun-flow is not that strong, and he is much weakened. He is no match for me. You go and get some rest. And that includes you, young lady,' Nebmutef said, pointing at Rani-Ra.
Trueth laughed and went ahead, Metjen grabbed his sister's hand and the last thing he noticed was Iseret standing forlorn amid the wreckage of her former chamber. She too did not seem to have much energy and kept picking up rocks, only to throw them back onto the pile.
Metjen flopped onto his cot into a deep sleep—and shot up again a wink later, impossible to tell what had alerted him.
He sent out his ka.
Nothing unusual, it was daytime, the priests were going about their business, so there was no reason to feel more than the usual alarm. If it was daytime, this meant he been asleep a lot longer than he thought, even if he felt hardly refreshed. He poured buckets of lukewarm water over his head, dressed in the holy garments and staggered back into the bedroom. On his way into the corridor he smiled at Rani-Ra's sleeping form. She lay on a blanket on the floor, rolled up like a kitten.Her wavy dark hair was spread over her face, fluttering as she breathed.
A quick glance into Trueth's tiny cell contained another sleeping form which he mind-nudged into action. As he was about to turn towards the back, an agitated priestess came stumbling down the corridor. 'Thank the Lady Hathor you are awake. Nebmutef is still guarding the pale one. Iseret I cannot raise. She is in a trance. And outside I have several people in cars and with machines. They carry an image of our temple that one of these infernal eyes in the sky has taken.'
So somebody had finally caught up with them. Sister Tawosret had been on her way to Saqqara and was dressed in an Abaya and head-scarf. Whoever was out there would only wonder about her sudden disappearance, not her outlandish outfit.
Metjen ran back into his chamber and changed into a spare pair of jeans and a black T-shirt advertising a Grateful Dead Revival concert. He flip-flopped upstairs where he ran into a wall of surprised stares from a group of would-be scientists with ground radar equipment, cameras and other sinister looking implements including a mini digger.
'What is it?' Metjen drawled in his best British accent. What he presumed to be the head honcho turned towards him with a frown. He had a large satellite image on the hood of his pickup truck and was obviously discussing the exciting layout of the underground structure with his fellow scientists. Which Metjen no longer thought they were.
'Where do you come from now? There was this old fellah lady, and she screamed at me and suddenly was gone.'
'Leave my workers alone. You are trespassing on the Al-Nour excavations, we are exploring remains related to our other site. What have you got here?'
Mentioning the Al-Nour excavations got him loud laughter and some rather obscene comments. He wondered what had been happening to his father while he was otherwise engaged, but this would have to wait.
Metjen snatched the printout from the hood of their car. It did not show the temple, only blurry outlines of an unidentifiable structure with a puff of smoke coming out—the collapse of Iseret's chamber witnessed by satellite. Great just great, he thought.
'Gimme' that,' the man drawled and tried to grab the printout.
Metjen took off his sunglasses and gave him the full measure of his empty-eyed stare.
The man took a step back. 'Who are you?'
'I just told you. Go away, and I won't ask you what you were doing in the first place.' From reading their minds Metjen had a good idea about their true intentions. They were no scientists and pretending to be one himself would not get him anywhere.
But then, one had to observe etiquette—and it helped to anchor stories in their stupid brains.
'Look asshole, gimme the photo and piss off, I want to check out your little excavation.' The man advanced towards Metjen, who smiled, tapped his sun-flow and extended a Claw of Anubis straight into their minds.
There is nothing here; you have checked things and must have confused the location. You will examine more recent images. You will find nothing. You only saw a stupid archaeologist stumbling around in the desert. Me. Now take your belongings, go back to where you came from and do not return.
It took a while until the gang had collected their instruments and packed things onto their pickups. Metjen wondered how anybody could have imagined zombies and golems could be a good idea: The team he mind-controlled blundered about, fumbling with stiff fingers at tarpaulins until they had got all their things back into their vehicles, including the digger. The leader bowed to him, and Metjen sent him off with a move of his index finger.
Only when the invaders had driven away did he allow himself to relax. The Servants would need to further strengthen the veil. They needed to be even more cautious when venturing outside. And he could not risk any more detonations. If this worked, and recurrent satellite images displayed nothing but boring bits of desert they might get away with it. At least for a while.
Metjen's head ached again. What he needed was a dose of Trueth, assuming the poor girl had recovered from the grisly encounters in that hall. He grinned at the memory of those over-ambitious bags of bones and with a slight pang of remorse remembered how she had overcome her fears.
Somewhere along the way, Trueth had changed from pest to a true friend. She still was a woman. That could not be helped. Yet she had turned into his best mate. She might deserve praise. But maybe not right now. He was still too tired to think clearly.
Metjen returned downstairs and continued towards the back of the temple.
Only when he got into the chamber, did he realise he was not wearing proper attire. In fact, what he was wearing was highly unsuitable, and he should have cleansed himself once more. But he did not care any more.
His outfit got him startled exclamations. He used the emergency as an excuse, aware that with Iseret still in charge she would have done more than frown upon this slackening of standards.
Metjen entered the penal chamber and realised the warning sent by his ka had nothing to do with their problems above ground but instead came from within—the pale man was waking up.
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This chapter is dedicated to CharlieArceneauxLege, who I thought might appreciate the absurdity of the situation. Her own novel, 'The Golden Thread' is beautifully written, full of amazing magic - and has the sort of amusing undertone I love!