[Ahhotep POV]

  Ahhotep woke, swaddled in blankets and ensconced in his tent. Before he saw the mist rising from the shockingly blue waters of the lake outside, before he heard the clear calls of the birds cutting through crisp air, before he noted the lack of insectoid activity or saw people wearing thick winter furs… Ahhotep knew it was cold.

  He would have noticed far earlier, had he not been lost in his dreams. But alas, his sleep had been eased of late—Heshtat’s threat somehow serving as enough deterrent for his uninvited guest to leave his dreams relatively undisturbed. Still, the moment he dragged himself back to the Waking, he felt the creeping chill of the desert night still lingering despite the alleged sunrise.

  He had a sense for it now, in his advanced age. An ache in the bones, a shiver in his joints. Ahhotep was intimately familiar with the biting cold—it scythed through him, even when the wind was silent. It crept around the edges of his well-travelled robes, sneaking in through voluminous sleeves and cutting to his core. That core seemed smaller every year now. How long had it been since he had felt truly warm? Years, surely. Not since he had embraced his purpose…

  Shaking himself free of the cloying introspection that seemed to come to everyone with age, he staggered from his bedroll and set to dressing. When he emerged from his tent, he was more than just the old man he felt. Tome in hand, staff clutched in skeletal fingers, he surveyed the oasis with a discerning eye.

  Day three, and things were still stable. And they would stay that way, he knew, until they didn’t. Plans had been laid, but they were remedial. A small part of him tried to pull him back to the meagre warmth of his bedroll. Why bother? His companions surely had no chance of surviving where better men and women had failed. How could they hope to compete with those chosen by the True Thrones? Ahhotep was familiar with doubt as well as the cold, though—he lived with both on a daily basis—and so he wrestled the thoughts down.

  Heshtat had surprised him before—his easy nights were testament enough to the young man’s iron—and he owed it to the man to at least do his part. The chance of them emerging from the temple with the Eye in hand were low, but they did exist. Were they to do so this morning, would they survive? Equally unlikely, and therefore Ahhotep had a job to do.

  The day was still young, so after sharing a simple breakfast with Harsiese and Neferu, he took off to survey the lakeshore again. Harsiese once more made his unease known, but the man was too used to guarding the feeble, in Ahhotep’s opinion. An old man he may now be, but feeble, he was not.

  Thus began his usual ritual. He hobbled around the camp, playing up the ailing old priest—only half an act—and making sure to be visible in the areas he spent time. Meanwhile, he gave instruction to his unwelcome shadow, and carved sigils and arcane scripts into the earth itself. Trees in the jungle were marked, vines looped and positioned into the hieroglyphs he had mapped out from his ancient tome. Demonic knowledge had a high price, but considering he was already paying, it would be foolish not to use it.

  Akh—the Intellect—was a fiendishly complex and deceiving aspect, and one many misunderstood. They thought it archaic, indirect, some even went so far as to call it ineffectual. Why spend hours setting up a ritual to give yourself the powers of flight for only a moment when you could instead through Ren empower a pair of boots to convey that same power upon you for as long as you wore them. Why spend thousands of dram’s worth of gold on a permanent ritual of Akh to redirect the flow of a small tributary around a village, when a mere acolyte of Ren could do the same with a little training and a lot less cost.

  It was short-sighted in Ahhotep’s opinion, but then many things were to the long-lived. Why empower yourself with forbidden demonic rituals when one could accumulate that same power over time with steady cultivation? Why indeed. Perhaps he wasn’t one to talk on catastrophic misunderstandings of the arcane. ‘Those in glass pyramids’ as they say.

  Still, the knowledge was useful now, and he would use it. He owed it to Queen Cleosiris. And besides, perhaps her chosen man would prove as deadly as his words had implied. The imp in his shadow certainly seemed to heed the man’s reputation. Perhaps…

  He would see things through alone if he must, but only a fool would reject such help as they were given. His purpose was too dire to do otherwise.

  ***

  [Neferu POV]

  Neferu smiled as she watched Harsiese work the dough into submission, a touch of envy stealing into her heart. He’d managed to trade some barley flour from Hefatiti’s delegation—of course they had raw ingredients even out here, the pampered ponces!—and the grizzled man had set himself the task of baking bread for some ungodly reason. Still, seeing his strong hands push and knead, the way the muscles in his forearms flexed and bunched, one long vein coiling like a snake beneath his skin…

  She shivered, and it had nothing to do with the pleasant chill of the morning air. No more distractions for today though, she had work to do! Maatkare was raiding a mythical temple, and if she was to get one up on the smug bastard ever again, she’d need to at least save his life on his return.

  Neferu lacked the raw power of her companions, she knew that. Equally wise and wizened, Ahhotep was an adept of at least two disciplines, of that she was sure. As a high priest, his penchant for ancient knowledge would eclipse even her own, and the secrets he had no doubt tucked away throughout his long life made her hunger in a way the future bread—and even the man doing the kneading—couldn’t compete with. Harsiese was likewise a peerless warrior, sponsored to the priesthood by those with far more wealth than Neferu had access to, despite her many contacts.

  Institutions had a heft that individuals simply couldn’t compete with, she’d found. A quick glance at the two largest camps might imply otherwise, but Pharaohs were always an exception to the rules the rest of them played by. Sadly. Harder to manipulate an institution, in her experience.

  Still, she wasn’t useless. Amansi was ancient and its history was as deep as any civilisation the world over. Neferu had found that tended to inculcate a similar way of thinking in its people; depth above all. The champions of Amansi were peerless, its artisans the best in the world, its architects without rival and its rulers dominant on the world stage. And yet, Neferu eschewed that philosophy. Breadth was the name of the game, in her humble opinion. She was a jackal of all trades, and while she might be a master of none, she was good enough to get around most obstacles in her way.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  She approached the current problem much like she approached each one she faced; in a myriad of ways. The first day she had surveyed the temple, the gate, the lakeside and jungle and the camps of their rivals. They may play nice for now, but Neferu knew better—they were rivals one and all. Except the cult of the creator… maybe. Anyway, what was she thinking of? Yes, her first day surveying.

  She’d spent time as a land surveyor on the outskirts of Idib a few years back. Boring work, but someone had to do it, and it had given her a strong foundation for her tomb-delving later on. Assessing subsidence was useful when one wanted to plumb ancient and forbidden depths—who would have guessed? Speaking on plumbing forbidden depths, her gaze wondered back over to Harsiese, quite beyond her conscious control.

  Focus!

  Day two had seen her laying the traps. The gate was too exposed to do much with, sadly. The half dozen assassins were no longer present—not after her companions had plucked their pretty scarlet feathers—but it was constantly watched by every group present. The jungle nearby though? Not so much. She’d done her work well there. Spent a season as a tracker north of Men-nefer a while back with a group of spirit hunters, she had. Those skills helped her slip unseen through the tangle of vines and ferns, laying cleverly hidden trip wires and decapitation lines to snare—and worse!—any who sprinted through unheeding. Of course, she had left a few avenues of escape for herself and her companions if they needed it, too. She wasn’t stupid, after all.

  She’d done what she could, even laying a few explosive surprises for their rivals that she’d been experimenting with. She’d first encountered the strange powder when doing a stint as a caravan guard for some traders across the border to Sasskania. As for where they’d got the recipe from, only their God-Queen knew, but Neferu was a quick study, and alchemy wasn’t entirely new to her anyhow. It wouldn’t be as potent, what with her lacking reagents, but she suspected the ready supply of ambient essence out here would more than make up for the lack.

  So, the playing field was surveyed and the traps were laid. What came next? A new day, a new approach, but of which kind? Tricky tricky. Another few minutes watching her handsome muscle man grind away at her future meal, and she decided she needed something new to look at, lest her distraction cost her the chance to wriggle a favour from Maatkare. And Heshtat, come to think of it. If there was one man you wanted a favour from, it was Heshtat—especially were he to regain his former power.

  “Good work with the dough!” she called to Harsiese as she strode out of the tent. “Save me a bite, I’ll be back later to help with the raft.”

  He grunted an acknowledgement, looking her way, and if she added an extra sway to her hips as she swanned past, who was to say? She heard him hesitate in his kneading for a few seconds and allowed herself a private smile.

  Thoughts awhirl as usual, she left the open tent and strolled along the lakeside, heading for the smaller camps belonging to the varied cults of Amansi. She’d spent time as a neophyte priestess, and she fancied a change of scenery. So much of her recent work had been physical—skulking and trapping—so she was overdue for some more mentally taxing work.

  She cracked her knuckles as she prepared to flatter, threaten, woo, joke, and otherwise slip her way into the camps of her rivals. And if she happened to misplace a few small jugs of explosive powder in her journey as she did so? Well, what a shame that would be.

  ***

  [Harsiese POV]

  Harsiese grunted in effort as his forearms burned. Baking was not new to him—his mother had taught him from a young age—but even his years with the sword couldn’t inure him to the effort entirely. Bakers were a different breed of strong, in his experience.

  He remembered her cutting words fondly. “If my son is determined to be a wife-less wretch, then he’ll sure as Sebek’s scaly arse know how to cook for himself when I’m gone!” She might have been a shrew of a woman, but she loomed large in his mind even now. No matter how powerful he rose in the eyes of the gods, Harsiese would always honour his mother.

  Besides, he knew it came from a place of love. Ever since his father had passed, Mama had been overprotective in the extreme.

  Not that he had much time for love. He cursed mentally as he caught himself following Neferu’s figure as she left the tent. By the gods, but she didn’t make it easy for him. He was a soldier, and he had his duty. It wasn’t to embarrass himself pining after a more experienced woman who doubtless had no interest in a glorified fisherman like him.

  Baking bread—that was his duty for now. Far from the glory he had hoped for on this mission, but then somebody had to provide the food. There was little he could do currently, and so he took on the drudgery without complaint, freeing up his companions to use their skills in more directly useful ways.

  He didn’t know what they did, and neither of them talked of it in the evenings, but both Neferu and Ahhotep returned late each day, looking equally pleased and exhausted. Like house cats, slinking back in for a bowl of honeyed milk and a belly scratch after a successful hunt. They had different ways of expressing it, he was coming to learn, but both held their actions hidden, as if they carried out some secret task set by the gods themselves.

  Harsiese was willing to trust them though. The captain did, so who was he to doubt? Heshtat had more than proven himself, despite his exile, and Harsiese knew that was all political nonsense anyway. He knew his queen—had served her for half a decade now—and while she was as canny as a fox and wove schemes within plans in a frankly staggering amount of obfuscating layers, she was clearly indebted to the man. If she thought Heshtat worth trusting, that was more than enough for Harsiese.

  Thus, the logic proceeded: He trusted his queen. His queen trusted Heshtat. Heshtat trusted Neferu and Ahhotep, so Harsiese did the same. He let them skulk about, weaving their schemes. He just kept his armour and weapons sharp and ready.

  It had felt good to let loose once more. He still felt like a humble fisherman from a little village, but he knew he was more than that now. He’d seen combat, was good at fighting. There was something about the simplicity of it. Not a duel—he stayed far from that fancy footwork and intense mental gamesmanship—but the chaos of battle called to him. It was honest; one couldn’t be anything but a brute when on the field of battle. No dressing yourself up in confusing disguises, no pretty words or hidden gestures. Nothing but good old-fashioned bronze and brawn. Just the way he liked it.

  He had been the man that had gotten Heshtat and Maatkare through the gate. Nobody could ever take that away from him now. Mama might not understand the gravity of that, but he did. His queen would, if they returned in victory to her. He thought of the moment Heshtat would hand over the Eye of Amin-Ra, and he smiled to himself.

  To be part of such a legendary undertaking was privilege enough, but to have already played such a pivotal role? He could die happy, knowing his life had meant something. His brothers and sisters in the Tomb-Guard would hear of his sacrifice, and the palace guard—maybe even some of his old friends in the city guard—would witness his post-humous honours. His mother would be taken care of, he knew, and the world would be better off for his brief time in it. Let Osirion judge his heart; it would be lighter than the scarlet feathers of Ma’at.

  While his tricky companions scurried around the small island, wrapping plans within schemes within plots, he prepared himself for the slaughter to come, and the sacrifice he would be privileged to make.