Soul Awakened (5 page)

She turned right and ambled down the center of the wide hallway, leaving her beacon to freedom behind. The beam of her flashlight danced over the enormous statues of various Egyptian gods. She named them as she went on her way to distract from the fact that they loomed over her. Nut, Sky goddess. Geb, Earth god. All the elemental gods.

How many days had she wished to travel into the past and see the ancient Egyptian culture for herself? Unbelievably, she received something much better. She was
with
the gods that the people had worshiped. The historians had gotten some things right, but so much had left them guessing. The answers lie in this great hall.      

She stopped to admire a goddess whose beautiful features were carved into alabaster marble. She touched her fingertips to it with reverence. “Hi, mom.” The stone was warm to the touch, unlike the others in the hall. The heat of the stone penetrated straight to her heart. Kendra smiled.

She had yet to meet her mother, the goddess Mut. The Mother of the Gods had chosen Kendra’s father to sire her offspring. Offspring that held the key to battling Kepi and Menthu, the Pantheons’ enemies. She touched the medallion of her pectoral necklace, a gift from her mother. Now she would be counted among them.

The slam of the archive door echoed off the enormous stone room. Startled, she stumbled back. The flashlight beam flittered erratically around like a strobe light until she caught her balance. She covered the top of her flashlight with her hand. The beam created an eerie reddish glow through her fingers.

Rustling in the antechamber shot her heart rate up ten beats. Her hands trembled. She wasn’t supposed to be here without an escort. Bomani was very clear about that. 

She darted behind her mother’s statue and peeked around the corner. Blackness. She blinked her eyes a couple times. Did she see glowing orange eyes? She stiffened.
Holy heck.
Her throat went dry and her hair stood on end. She back peddled. The urge to flee overwhelmed her usual sensibility.

Her breath caught in her chest when the floor vanished beneath her feet and she plunged into the black void. In the sudden weightless descent she flailed her arms, like a flightless bird. Her back slammed into the stone steps and pushed the last living breath from her lungs. Pain seared across her shoulder blades and her head cracked against the sidewall. She tumbled to the bottom with a thud and a moan.

Her adrenalin would keep most of the pain at bay, but there was no doubt her shoulder was dislocated. Whimpering, she tucked her hand into her sweatshirt front pocket and splinted her left arm against her stomach. With her free hand she palpated the rest of her limbs. Although it hurt to breathe, she didn’t think any ribs were broken. She touched the back of her head. A glob of stickiness matted her hair and coated her fingertips.

A fine perspiration covered her skin and her ears began to ring. She inhaled through her nose and blew the breath out. If it had been anyone else, they would probably pass out, but sadly she had been in this situation many times before.

She started naming the Egyptian gods in alphabetical order. It kept her mind off her pain and her body’s response to injury. After the second round the dizziness began to recede. Gingerly, she leaned over and picked up her flashlight. The light illuminated the foot of another statue. She trained the beam up and was met by a fiery orange glare.

“What are you doing in here?”

She couldn’t keep her hand from quivering, which made the beam flicker over Kamen’s enormous features. The largest of the Underworld gods, Asar’s brother appeared even more monstrous.

“Please don’t tell Bomani. Or my sisters,” she begged. She didn’t know what it was about Asar’s brother that scared her so. Anytime he was around she got goose bumps. Maybe it was the wild look in his eyes in the otherwise stoic god. Or the otherworldly glow. The only one who seemed unaffected by his presence was her sister. Kit was downright belligerent to him, when no one else dared to even look cross eyed at the god.

“Answer me.”

“I’m looking for the vault,” she blurted, her fear compelling her to tell the truth. “I can’t stand the thought of Bakari spending one more night in that tomb.” Whether it was the adrenalin crashing or the humiliation of getting caught, her voice broke and tears welled in her eyes. The god stood unmoving. Only the orange glow of his gaze extinguished to reveal the brown depth of his eyes.

God, she felt pathetic.

“Follow me.” He turned and disappeared deeper into the darkness of the stairwell. Of all people, he wanted to help or at least she hoped. She pressed her back against the wall and pushed with her feet until she was standing. With her flashlight in her good hand she hobbled down the steps. Each footfall jolted her shoulder and made her head spin. She blew out a breath and pushed past the pain.

At the bottom landing she closed her eyes and leaned heavily against the wall. Fine beads of sweat trickled along her temples and followed the line of her jaw to her chin. Energy prickled her skin, like a million insects crawling under her clothing. She snapped her eyes open and shuddered. Logic told her it was her body’s reaction to the energy, but she couldn’t help but to shine her flashlight against her legs and arms. No bugs.

Although she was at another intersection, the power beckoned her to the corridor to the left. Despite her fear of making another misstep, the urgency of the elusive calling propelled her forward without care.

She pressed her palm to the wall. A protection spell recited word for word in her mind. She recognized it immediately from the pyramid text from the museum. An incantation written by the ancient Egyptians to suppress and neutralize other spells. The mythological magic pulsated beneath her fingertips. To actually experience the enchantment gave Kendra pause. What had she gotten herself into? Maybe Bomani was right?

She should have waited until the morning.

A radiant turquoise light emanated from the walls and outlined Kamen’s bulky form with a green halo. The Ancient Egyptians believed this same color could protect them from evil spirits. Kendra lowered her flashlight. Her mouth gaped open. “What is this place?”

He frowned. “It contains the demotic texts. Black magic.”

“The answer is here,” she whispered. The vault had no door, only the turquoise veil covering the entrance. “How do I get in?”

“Only those without sin can pass.”

Sinless? No one was sinless. Even her. There was the time she used God’s name in vain. Or the time she took her father’s excavating tools without asking.

“Ah, is there another way in?”

“No.”

“What happens if a sinner enters?”

“Death.”

“Just that,” she croaked. “Maybe coming back tomorrow would be a better idea.”

“If you wish.”

She stared at the glowing waterfall. “Will you come with me?”

“I cannot.” Kamen retreated a few steps.

He couldn’t because he didn’t want to or he couldn’t because he was a sinner?  She didn’t have the courage to ask. Asar wouldn’t have granted her access, if harm would come to her, right?

Unwilling to allow Bakari to suffer any longer, she breathed in deep, held it and stepped into the energy. The equivalent of electric shocks conducted across her skin and bore into her chest. The pins and needles sensation drove her forward until she stumbled clear. She expelled her breath in a nervous laugh. Apparently, her sins weren’t so bad. She looked through the shimmering veil only to see Kamen’s back fade into the darkness.

He left her to her own devices, never a good idea according to her sisters. She tucked her flashlight into her pocket and turned to the rows of texts that barely fit the span of chiseled sandstone. She stifled a cough. Similar to the tombs she exhumed in Egypt, this place had a rotten compost smell. The power thickened the air, almost suffocating her.

The sooner she left this place the better.

She inched forward to a text that lay open on a stone alter in the center of the room. The frayed leather and yellowed parchment attested to the extreme age of the book beyond anything she had seen in the years she spent handling antiquities. The hieroglyphic inscriptions matched the prayer she had palpated from the walls. She didn’t dare touch it and risk disrupting the enchantment. 

A low hum from the far corner drew her attention. She wiped the sweat from her brow and crept toward the noise. Voices speaking an ancient language skittered over her shoulder and left a trail of warmth against her neck. She whipped around, almost expecting to see she wasn’t alone. The room lay empty.

The whispers swooped like a flock of birds. She stumbled and bumped her dislocated shoulder into one of the bookshelves. Wincing, she sucked in a breath through clenched teeth.

“Stop it.” She blew out several breaths willing her heart to slow. Her stomach tumbled and tightened. An eerie quiet descended in the room at her command, and left her with only the choking rancid air.

She resisted the urge to charge out of the vault. Unable to live with her failure, she pushed off the bookshelf and surveyed the room. How was she ever going to find what she was looking for in this mess? Bound books and stacks of rolled parchments overstocked the shelves.

The hum that distracted her earlier hissed louder. The source, a thick black book, isolated from all the others. Out of all the texts, why was it humming? It couldn’t be that easy, could it? Were the spirits trying to warn her?

She glanced over her shoulder through the turquoise light. No one was going to help her. Bakari’s awakening rested solely on her shoulders. Tremors racked her body.

God, help her.

She maneuvered around the piles of texts on the floor. Overweighed, the shelves bowed at their centers. Some had cracked and spilled their contents onto the floor. She walked the serpentine line that was free of any obstructions to the location of the ominous black book. A metal buckle held its contents closed. The glyphs of death and evil covered the face and spine.

She inhaled deeply, summing what little courage she had. She skimmed her fingertips over the edge of the metal clasp. A sharp prick penetrated her finger. She yanked her hand away. With her finger stuck in her mouth she pressed her tongue against the small puncture wound. The coppery taste of her blood filled her mouth.

Leaning in closer, she inspected the edging. Nothing appeared to be sharp, but something had cut her. A single droplet of her blood glistened against the black metal. The blood sizzled and evaporated with a puff of white smoke.

The pitch of the hum evolved into a rumble. The clasp sprang free. The cover flew open and the pages began to flip in rapid sequence. Startled, she jumped. God, she hoped she was right.

The shelves around her shook and the voices previously silenced screamed out. The noise pierced her ears. Instinctively, she covered her ear and pressed the other to her bad shoulder. She retreated to the only protective force in the room. Several of the large books fell off the shelves. The impact into the stone floor scattered pages into the air.

Overwhelmed, she cowered next to the alter.

The scream of ancient spirits surged and then clapped silent. In its wake parchments lazily floated to the floor around her. She leaned heavily against the footing, trying to catch her breath. Her muscles quivered like jelly.
I should have waited for Bomani
, she lamented.

She pushed up and retraced her path, careful to step over the fallen texts, never taking her eyes off
the
book. The papyrus mimicked the blackness of the cover, but with gold lettering. All the other texts in the library had black ink on white pages. The queasiness in her stomach worsened. This was the missing demotic text.

With her heart thudding loudly in her ears she hovered her palm inches from its surface. A blue static charge tickled her palm. The black parchment lifted drawn by the current between them. She pulled her hand back and the page returned to rest against layers of paper.