Chapter Twelve
Connie trotted with determination towards her best friend who was at the sun-crested wall, diligently dusting its engravings and taking in its ancient glory. The woman brushed at the hieroglyphs bit by bit, mumbling to herself out loud and stopping to scribble down notes in her notebook that she had flat against the wall. Constance sighed as she drew close, to herald her approach as well as air her general weariness at the world around her.
"Did I hear shouting?" asked Evelyn, not looking away from the wall. "What is that? Ka.. ka.. oh no not - aah... I see... sun rising..."
"Indeed," Connie said, crossing her arms and leaning against the wall her friend worked at. "That Mr. Bay is incorrigible!"
Evelyn blinked at Connie in disbelieve. "Mr - you mean Ardeth?" Connie just stared at Evy. Evy nearly spluttered. "That was Ardeth shouting?"
"Yes!" huffed Connie.
Evelyn shook her head, "I've never heard that man raise his voice outside of battle in the whole time I've known him! He's as even tempered as they come - he's-"
"A pain in the behind!" growled Connie. "Honestly! He had all sorts of funny issues with me digging!"
Evy's brow dipped a little. "Well - did he say what they were?"
Connie pouted sullenly. "Yes."
There was a passing moment of silence before Evy put a hand on her cocked hip. She rose a brow at Connie. "Well?"
Connie looked to her. "Well what?"
Evy flapped a hand, "What were they?!"
"Oh!" Connie waved a hand back at her, spinning around and sinking her fingertips into unearthed hieroglyphs, "Piffling little excuses really..." She met her best friend's eyes then sighed fitfully. "Well he was bringing up my bout of heat exhaustion in front of the other men and it was terribly embarrassing!"
Evelyn smiled a little, shaking her head. "Connie..."
"Hello, yes?"
The dark haired woman lifted a brow, "I think you owe Ardeth an apology."
"ME?" Connie gasped, "Me an apology - why that's-"
"If I know you," Evelyn said, turning a brush to some heavily sand-caked hieroglyphs, "You probably told him to go to hell, and I don't think the poor man has had to deal with women saying that to him very often..."
Connie winced, kicking the sand. "Damn you, Evy. How dare you know me so well." She groaned, leaning against the wall, fiddling with her fingers. "Oh, damn myself for always being so difficult."
"Connie," said Evy, engrossed in the carvings before her, "If you weren't being difficult I'd wonder what was wrong with you."
"Lovely," moaned Connie softly. "I'm doomed to be an annoying blubbering fool for the rest of my days."
Evelyn rolled her eyes. "Now you're just being melodramatic. Say sorry to Ardeth, and I'm sure everything will be fine. The man travelled all this way through
Connie frowned bemusedly. She crossed her arms and pursed her lips. "Evelyn..."
"Yeeees..." Evelyn brushed away some sand from the wall very carefully, her jaw hanging open in concentration. "Aah... Tuh... tuh... hmm... "
"What does it matter if Mr. Bay is used to the way I am or not?"
Evelyn smiled and shrugged. "Well he-" She blinked, standing up and glaring, coughing, looking anywhere but at Connie's face. Obviously she'd remembered who she was talking to. "It's just good manners, isn't it?" She patted her stomach, twiddling her brush in her long fingers. She ticked her brows up likeably for good measure.
"Right," Connie half-lidded her eyes and nodded slowly. "I told you back at Hamunaptra, my dear woman-"
"Yes, yes, yes, I know what you told me," said Evelyn with a sigh, looking back to her work. "I didn't mean it like that. I mean he's a good friend of the family," She gave a non-committal wave, "You're a friend of the family too. It would pay to at least be on talking terms with the man. What on earth is that?" She blew at the wall and sucked on her bottom lip. "Oh... ahmenafus."
Connie stared at the carving of the stork for a moment before looking to Evy again. "What on earth does all this say anyway?"
Evy stepped back a moment, looking the wall up and down. She propped a hand on her hip, humming softly to herself. "From what I can gather... I think it's a poem of some sort. It's quite remarkable... it's all about the Sun, or Aten as it's referred to here." She met Connie's enquiring quirk of her brow, and smiled. "Here look..." She placed her fingers upon the carvings, her voice gentle and brimming with awe as she spoke. "When you shine as Aten of daytime..."
A deep rumbling occurred. It was heavy, shuddering, and so imperceptible that it was missed by the two women. It was not, however, missed by everyone.
"...As you cast your rays, The Two Lands are in festivity..."
Beyond their ears there was a cracking of earth, a shifting of sand. Booted heels thumped the sand, running as fast as their owner could make them move.
"...Awake they stand on their feet, You have roused them..."
Movement lifted sand. Magic lifted souls. Silent, deadly, unknown, they moved in dark chambers with dead air and dead inhabitants. One was taller than the rest. One was incomplete as they were, but waiting for completion.
Not far away, the runner skirted the corner to the wall where the ladies read of ancient texts.
"... Bodies cleansed, clothed, Their arms adore your appearance."
Connie sighed, shaking her head, eyes roving over the hieroglyphs, unaware of their individual meanings, but soaking in their translations as a whole. "How beautiful..."
"STOP!"
Connie turned, heart jarring at the voice that rang out to them. Evy followed suite, heart over chest, frowning at the intrusion.
"Dear me!" she gasped, "What's-"
Ardeth strode towards them, eyes fiery in alarm, his hands up, shaking a little. "Do not read any further!"
Evelyn glanced back at the wall then to Ardeth. "Why on earth not?"
He stopped, catching his breath and poking a thumb at the direction he came in. "We have uncovered what Miss Adams may have sensed."
Connie seemed to get a little pale at this, and she held herself, eyes widening in surprise. Evelyn touched her friend's shoulder.
"You all right?"
Connie looked haunted. "I didn't expect to be right about this..."
"You were right," Ardeth said, his glare at her almost pinning her to the wall behind her. "Come!"
He turned with a swirl of his robes and ran back towards the pillars they'd began digging at. Evelyn sighed, placing her brush down with her things and following him in a similar gait. Connie sighed, glancing at the wall behind her, feeling a chill at her sudden solitude. She didn't like standing there, she didn't like the feeling it gave her. The wall behind her seemed to be of love and paradise. The ruins around her cried of a paradise destroyed. She shuddered, and went on after her friends.
She didn't know whether to be disgruntled or surprised at the progress the men had made in her absence. Instead she just crouched next to Evelyn, who seemed a strange shade of pale as her fingers skidded lightly over the carvings that lay inside a cartouche.
"Dear me..." she breathed.
Jonathan's brow was wrinkled, a tenseness in his features that didn't aid Rick or Alex's calmness any. Alex wriggled in next to his mother to read what had her so distressed.
"What does it say?" asked Connie.
Ardeth gave her a sharp look. "It is a seal," he said.
Evelyn nodded, "Yes... yes he's right. It is a seal. A seal at the steps of this city... it's not just any seal, though."
"Oh?" Connie tilted her head. "Is it an important one?"
"I should say so!" said Evelyn, her hands shaking a little. "It's the seal of Tutankhamen!"
"Tutankhamen?" Rick frowned, "What's his seal doing here?"
"Well, it's theorised amongst the Bembridge scholars that the fabled King Akhenaten was actually Pharaoh Amenhotep the Fourth - father to Tutankhamen, the boy King. If this is true, then Tutankhamen sealed off a city his own father constructed. Probably at the command of his highest priests." Evy shook her head, "You know this means this seal is over three thousand years old?"
"Wow," gasped Alex. He reached out a grubby hand, touching the ancient stone.
There was a moment of tense silence as Evy's fingers drifted over the hieroglyphs carved deeply into the seal. Her breath seemed to hitch, her hand shaking slightly. She glanced around her, worry in her brow, and then looked back to the stone.
"Evy?" Rick said, his voice a warning drone, "What is it?"
"Uh," Her mouth stumbled over the words that followed, "It - it says here that uhm - that uh..." Her husband lifted a brow. "It says that - uh - that whoever steps over this seal is e-entering the-uh- the City of Heretics." She took in another breath, trying to steady herself. "Upon entering if- if they utter the words of worship to A-Aten or show any erm - any reverence to the false Sun-God that they will em - it's - hehe I-"
"Evy spit it."
"They will wake the Unholy Monster that will devour them whole," she said very quickly, very low, looking away and covering her mouth once she was done.
Alex rolled back on his heels, his bottom impacting on the ground. "Oh brother!"
"Well it's easy isn't it?" Jonathan said, a stressed smile on his face, "Just don't read anything out right?" Two sets of large blue eyes met his, laden with guilt. A groan lifted in the Englishman's throat. "Oh don't tell me..."
"They have read from the wall over there," Ardeth said, his tone dour, "With the emblem of Aten upon it!"
"They were," Evelyn cleared her throat, "The wall, that is to say, it contains erm... a poem."
Rick looked to his wife, dread etched in his features. "Please tell me the poem was about this King's dead cat..."
"Nuh-no," Evy shook her head. "It was about erm... Aten."
"Our time to leave here has passed," Ardeth said, standing and pulling out a scimitar, "We must search this place and be sure we make rid of any evil we may have unleashed."
Rick nodded, pulling a gun from his belt. "Right. Alex, you stay with your mother."
Alex nodded, Evy motioning Alex over to her.
"Evy - you stay in the airship."
Evy glared at him. "What?! No! I have to continue my-"
Rick's hand sealed over her mouth and he glared at her solidly. "Darling, losing you the first time was hard enough. You can guard Connie, Alex and Izzy in the dirigible. Ardeth and I will scout around till the coast is clear."
Jonathan nodded, "Good plan. I'll stay here - you know - scout-"
Rick grinned thinly at the man. "No, you're coming with me."
As Constance glanced about herself, her eyes fell on the scimitar in Ardeth's hand that seemed to come from nowhere. She strode to the man, her hands clamping down over his on the hilt of the weapon. "Now really Mr. Bay," she stammered, "Do you really think there could be an Unholy Monster or some such nonsense down there?"
Ardeth eyed her firmly. "Seals are not placed without reason. You would not have sensed it if there were no danger here."
Connie frowned, her breath becoming flustered huffs. "Well that's exactly it, Mr. Bay!" she said. "Should you be really going in there? I mean what if something happened to you? I can't just sit here and wait while you go to your doom, I mean I would never forgive myself if-"
He stopped her with a gentle hand on her shoulder, his eyes growing soft. "This is my duty," he said. "A duty I was born to." He tilted his head a little, seeing the alarm in her eyes. She shook her head at him, eyes growing red. "Look into your heart, Miss Adams, look to that part of yourself that sees more than any of us do. What does it say to you?"
She sniffled, her hand curling around the hand that leant on her shoulder, squeezing gently. "It says that you should be careful..."
He nodded. "I will be."
"It - it also says," She took a shuddering breath; "It says that should you return to me, that you should call me Connie."
Ardeth smiled softly, a sad little smile, and ventured the lightest stroke of her cheek with the back of his knuckles. She sighed, leaning into the brief touch. He squeezed her shoulder gently, and then turned to meet the other men.
She didn't want to let him go as he moved away from her. Jonathan tensed his lips; the same fear that was in her heart was in his eyes. She sighed, looking to him with a soft frown.
"You look after yourself, Jonathan," she said.
The man nodded, waving at her. "Gah, I'll be fine. Don't you worry your pretty self about it."
He turned and listened to Ardeth, who pointed in the direction of the wall. Evelyn paced, shaking her head, tapping her lips, muttering.
"They'll never find their way in there," she said, more to herself than anyone else in particular. "They don't know the first thing about the layout of this city!"
Connie frowned. "Neither do you."
Evelyn glared at her best friend. "Yes but - I've been in other Egyptian ruins, and I know how they like to design their communities!"
Connie let the raised voice wash over her, and she strode to Evelyn, stopping her hands from their fiddling. The panic running through Evelyn was obvious, and it did nothing to aid the situation. In fact Alex looked very worried, nibbling a nail nervously. Connie put her hands on Evelyn's shoulders. "Evy, this won't help them."
Evy sighed. "I can't just sit here and wait for them to get themselves killed!"
Connie blinked, her lips set firmly. "Evy... They're big strong men that have apparently survived this sort of thing before. Now..." She squared Evy in front of her, raising her brows, her voice growing quieter. "We wait for them. We wait. Okay?"
Evelyn looked to Connie with wide eyes of loss, a laxness of surrender growing in her frame.
"Right," Connie nodded. "We wait. For half an hour. If we've not heard from them by then we're barging in with guns and clubs blazing."
Evy glanced to the men, then back to Connie. "Connie, you have no idea what's in there-"
"Neither do you," Constance said, crossing her arms. "Jonathan is like a brother to me, Evy, and Ardeth... well he's saved my life before now and it's only decent that I return the favour." She nodded to herself. Evy managed a half-hearted smirk.
"Are you sure that's the only reason?"
"Oh you!"
Rick marched up to the two women, sighing heavily. He took his wife's hand, turning her around. He had the expression of a man condemned, a look that didn't suit the usually gentle handsome features.
"Honey... we're going in," he said, voice almost breaking. "You - you stay-"
"I know," Evelyn said, nodding. She leant forward, kissing him firmly before squeezing his upper arms and pushing him away. "Go on," she said, "Clear the place out for me."
He nodded. "I will." Kissing her once more, tenderly and with savour, he visibly steeled himself. He stepped back, waving to her before rejoining the other men. He slapped Jonathan on the shoulder roughly, the man waving to his sister. Evelyn nodded after him, tears in her eyes. She smiled briefly to Ardeth, who sent her a quick acknowledging glance.
He stared at Connie a good long moment though, before turning towards the city and disappearing beyond the wall that spanned its perimeter.
Evy turned to Alex, taking him by the shoulder. "Come on Alex," she said, "We should get into the dirigible."
~~*~~
The old walls around them reached up high, creating stark lines of shadow in the mid-afternoon sun. The men walked towards the largest of the buildings, a seemingly multi-storey affair, huge towering dunes rolling away far behind it. It was awesome. Its front doorway, a huge thing, had a faded painted lintel, a circle there with wide stretching wings upon it. Ankhs sat either side of it, black and imposing. Jonathan winced in the sunlight.
"Say..." he said, "That's a pretty impressive building."
Ardeth nodded. "The pharaohs did not spare expense in their living arrangements."
"Well, they had plenty to throw about, didn't they?" Jonathan rubbed his hands together, "A mere two bags of the stuff set my Evy up for life."
Rick shot an unimpressed look at Jonathan before looking back to the dark angular hollow that was the entrance to the palace they headed for. "Just try to concentrate on the task at hand, guys?"
Jonathan nodded contritely. "Sorry."
Rick waved a hand at him to shut up. All that filled their ears was the light crunching of their steps on the fluffy light sand, freshly blown about and moved by the wind. One could tell by looking at them that their nerves were jangling, that their muscles were taut with wired energy, that they definitely didn't want to be there and that if it were their choice they'd be out of there immediately.
A set of grand even steps lead up to the doorway into the palace, and sand and rubble choked its edges. Ardeth gripped his scimitar, visibly bristling like a cat ready to pounce. Jonathan shuddered with badly veiled fear next to him, and Rick remained stoic.
They climbed the steps, Jonathan stumbling on a loose brick, their steps echoing off the wall in front of them. Rick helped Jonathan to his feet, frowning at him.
"I'm fine," the Englishman mouthed, and Rick nodded.
The bright sunshine of the day was swallowed up behind them by the doorway as they stepped tentatively into the palace. Jonathan screwed up his face, frowning at the wreckage and piles of sand inside the room.
"Ugh," he cringed, "Whatever may have risen will have its work cut out for it, getting through all this mess!"
Ardeth glanced unappreciatively at Jonathan. "Do not be lulled into a false sense of security," he breathed. "We do not know what we are dealing with here."
Jonathan curled a nostril, striding forward into the darkness. "I think this party is dead, Ardeth old mate." He kicked a pile of sand, and promptly sent his toe crashing into something hard. He stifled a yelp by stuffing part of his fist into his mouth, hopping on one foot. Ardeth frowned, striding over to see what Jonathan had hurt himself on.
Dusting off the sand, a dark blue stone muzzle protruded from the light coloured sand. Dread filled his chest, as he knew the shape of that animal's snout anywhere. He dusted back the sand, and with a low grunt of effort, pulled the stone from it's millennia old grave.
It was broken in half, seemingly made of a dark slate common to the areas more south of Egypt. Ardeth heard Rick kneel down beside him.
"What is that?"
The statue was a jackal-faced well muscled warrior, garbed in Egyptian fair, broken jaggedly in half.
"A warrior of Anubis," Ardeth said, eyes swimming with puzzlement. "I do not know why this would be here. The myth of Amarna speaks of a One-God... if this place is that Amarna, then there should be no articles of worship for any God other than Aten."
Rick stood, whirling about, thought etched deep in his features. His eyes darted along the walls, taking in his surroundings.
"Somethin' ain't right here..."
Jonathan looked up from nursing his stubbed toe. "Wuh? What are you talking about?"
Rick pointed to the walls. "Things have been moved..." He looked to Ardeth. "Ardeth - dig out the rest of that statue, will ya?"
Ardeth nodded, beginning to scoop away the sand. Jonathan knelt, watching him work, examining the top half of the statue he found. "Say... not very pretty are they?"
"They are uglier when they are moving," Ardeth muttered before shoving sand from in front of him.
Jonathan nodded, "Yes... well... I'll take your word for it."
Rick tipped his head, hands gripping the guns he held. "If my suspicions are correct, Jonathan, you may not have to."
Jonathan glared at Rick. "Now let's not talk like that!"
Ardeth grunted, and slowly he dragged out the last half of the statue. Rick knelt down to help him, and upon pulling out the base of the stone artefact, he gritted his teeth.
"This is not good." He let his fingers trace the edge of the stone statue's base. "See that?"
Jonathan nodded.
Rick got to his feet, striding over to the far edge of the wall of the room. He pointed to the sandy floor in front of it. "There's an imprint in the sand right here, matching it." He snorted, "Hell - there are heaps of them. Look at it..."
Jonathan's brow knitted as he came over, eyes travelling the hollows in the sand that covered the ground in varying depths.
"You don't think it could be raiders?"
"Not likely," Rick frowned, examining the sandy floor. "This place has only just been uncovered, and there aren't that many treasure hunters around with aerial transportation."
"Footprints..."
Jonathan and Rick turned about to see the Medjai pointing to the floor near a dusty dais. They came over to see them. Ardeth shook his head.
"Sandals," he said, "Like-"
"Don't say it," Jonathan said, glancing around himself. "Oh... things were looking up for a minute there too."
"Shh," Ardeth lifted a hand, walking back to the centre of the room. "Do you hear something?"
Rick glanced about, brow dented as he strained to hear. The sound he was struggling to hear was low, one that seemed to come from the very walls and floor around them, but it wasn't a rumbling. It was almost a beat. The rhythmic movement that was barely a sound made the odd trail of sand drift down from deep reliefs in the walls around them. Ardeth looked to the centre of the wall behind them and the piles of rubble and dirt that half buried the dais in front of it. He pursed his lips.
"O'Connell," he said. "Jonathan, can you help me move this?" He motioned towards the rubble. Both the men nodded, Jonathan a little grudgingly.
"Would you like to tell us why we're doing this?" asked Jonathan.
"A hunch," Ardeth replied.
It turned out that most of the pile before them wasn't entirely sand and rubble. After picking off most of the larger pieces (and shaking off a severe case of deja-vu), Ardeth and Rick began brushing sand off a definite throne-like structure. Jonathan licked his lips as a yellow metallic surface glinted up from under the thickly packed dust, and he tried not to shake as more of the concealed artefact was unearthed.
"Oh..." Jonathan caught a whimper. "Is that what I think it is?"
"Last time you went home with a diamond the size of your head," Ardeth said, eyeing Jonathan firmly. "Are you not happy until you take home all the Pharaohs ever had?"
Jonathan jutted a bottom lip and stood up in indignation. "I resent the tone of that remark!"
Rick sighed hotly. "You two - save it. What is this thing anyway?"
Jonathan shrugged. "I'm only a treasure hunter, what would I know about Egyptian artefacts?" The man turned away, shoulders hunched as he crossed his arms.
Rick glanced at Ardeth sharply before grabbing Jonathan and pulling him over. "We don't have time for this..."
"No, but we have all the time in the world to question my integrity!"
Rick screwed his face up at Jonathan in incomprehension. "What? You don't have any integrity!"
Jonathan blustered a huff. "Well! I may be unscrupulous but I expect to be treated with a little respect, you know?"
Rolling his eyes, Rick looked to Ardeth. "Ardeth... say sorry." Ardeth opened his mouth but Rick stopped him before he could protest. "Uh-uh. Now."
Ardeth gave a quick nod to Jonathan, genuine remorse in his eyes. "I apologise."
"There," Rick slapped both the men's shoulders roughly. "Don't we feel all warm and special now?"
"Not particularly," Jonathan groused, "Though that may improve with time."
Rick sighed. "Jonathan, the throne.... what is it?"
The Englishman sighed, brushing at the back of the chair, curling a nostril with great effort. "Ugh... Well it's a throne, what does it look like? Has a name on it too... The... hmm… the King of the Sun? No... no, no. King, CHILD of the Sun... Benevolent Sun God.... Aten." He blew a breath out his puffed cheeks. "Basically it says it's Akhenaten's throne."
"Okay," Rick looked around himself, pressing his lips together. "Not offering any new information here."
"It is not the throne that I was concerned with," Ardeth said.
Rick looked up to where Ardeth was, and frowned. The man was behind the throne, fingers sliding up and down between the bricks that made the wall, sand falling away. Behind the throne was a large relief carving, similar to the one that graced the lintel at the entrance of the palace. A winged sun-disk, this time with countless straight spindly arms reaching down from it, grasping ankhs in their little hands. Ardeth's fingertips ran up and down a particular crack in the wall. The bricks in the building were laid one on top of the other, no mortar, flush and tight, as in the style of the period. There was no brickwork here; the wall was two entire slabs of dark slate, and this seam he examined... it was straight up and down. It divided the wall in half... from ceiling to floor. Ardeth frowned, kneeling down and examining the sand underneath his feet.
"Look at this..."
Rick knelt down next to him, a sigh leaving him as he saw what Ardeth saw.
In the shallow sand that was right up against the wall there was a foot print. It was much like the other sandal prints they'd seen, though remarkable for one reason only. The wall cut halfway through it, as if it slammed down on top of the print. Or slid across...
Ardeth ran the flat palm of his hand over the lower seam in the wall. His brow ticked and he looked to O'Connell. "Put your hand there, tell me what you feel."
Rick, glancing at Ardeth briefly, did as he asked. "There's air-flow..."
Ardeth nodded. "Indeed."
"I'm also willing to bet that's where our strange little vibration is coming from..."
Jonathan groaned, shaking his head. "I can see myself getting eaten by bugs again or encountering little pygmies that want to make a pin cushion out of me." He sighed. "Fantastic." With a weary slump of his body he threw himself down onto the throne, kicking a stone away. Unfortunately, the stone didn't roll away, and Jonathan's toe impacted quite firmly against it. The man howled.
Rick jumped up. "What?"
Ardeth jumped up too, hackles raised, and he strode to Jonathan's side.
"Bloody rock!" Jonathan cried, "Nearly took my toe off!"
Ardeth frowned, kneeling down. The rock was long, oblong shaped, and half buried in the ground at an odd angle... "I do not think that is a rock-"
The ground jumped under their feet, and Ardeth and Rick threw their arms about, trying to remain on their feet. Jonathan grabbed the armrests of his chair, eyes bugging wide in terror. A great rumbling filled their ears, and the sound of stone grinding against stone and sand deafened them. Rick spun about, glaring as the wall he'd just been standing in front of slid backwards, splitting in half and parting like a huge set of Japanese doors. The clink-clank of rusted mechanisms could be faintly heard, and so could the strange beat that had haunted them a moment ago.
Golden light spilled from the room that was revealed to them. Jonathan stood slowly, jaw dangling, shaking his head at what he saw. Rick held firmly onto his guns, edging back slowly, Ardeth taking a similar hold on his own weapons. When the stone 'doors' finished opening, the scene before them was finally revealed. The room beyond was seemingly gilded gold, lined with blazing torches and deep with etchings of the great God Aten.
It also happened to be brimming with Anubis Warriors, standing tall and vigil, large clawed fists bristling with weapons, assembled before a golden altar like nothing any of the men had seen. A huge polished disk of gold was above a stately altar, a statue either side of it that seemed to reach the ceiling. One was definitely a woman, the other seemed to be a man but had a strange long face and fingers, his hips swollen and feminine. Upon the altar was a gilded sarcophagus, laden with some form of colouring. Whether it was semi-precious stones it was detailed with or gems, who knew. They were too far away to tell.
That and there were hordes of hulking hell-beasts in the way of the most of it.
Rick's brows danced to a frown, incomprehension battling its way to his face. "What the hell...?"
"Huh-huh-hell?" Jonathan gulped, "What are those things?"
Ardeth's eyes gleamed with fear and he ground his jaw. "Trouble."
A clinking rumble struck the floor as the unearthly warriors turned around in perfect unison, eyes set on the intruders. Rick couldn't move.
"Uh... how many of them would you say there were, Ardeth?"
Ardeth was similarly frozen. "About four hundred of them."
"Uhhhh..." Jonathan wheezed then gave a choked laugh. "What say we get the hell out of here then eh boys?"
Rick ticked a lip. "Might not be an option."
"We need to get a message out to Izzy," Ardeth said, perfectly still, sizing up their numerous opponents. "Gather the other Medjai."
"Good plan," Rick said, "We kinda need to survive first..."
The Anubis warriors gave a chilling chorus of clunking as they took slow measured steps forward towards them. One in the middle strode out in front, raising his blade high. He looked back to his comrades, bearing half-decayed teeth, sunken eyes gleaming. Lifting his muzzle he opened his jaws. A baleful, stomach shuddering roar came from his throat, his slavering lips quivering in the force of his wail, the sound encouraging similar roars from the other warriors. The combined noise was not only deafening but it set every hair on the men's bodies on end.
"You must cut off their heads," Ardeth said quickly, quietly, as the beasts still roared at them. "It is the only way to kill them."
"Great," Rick glared at the warriors. "All I got is a gun."
Ardeth pressed his lips together. "Stay back until I kill the first warrior, then take his blade."
Jonathan stepped back, his whole body wracked with spasms of fear. "What about me?!"
"Go back to the dirigible," Rick said, "Get Evy and the others the hell out of here and to the Medjai."
Jonathan nodded, turning to leave, but then looked back to Ardeth. "How will Izzy know where-"
"At the large oasis south of Hamunaptra," Ardeth said, "It is our settlement, now go!" Nodding franticly, Jonathan ran off. Ardeth looked to Rick. "Are you ready?"
Rick shrugged. "As I'll ever be."
The Anubis warriors, decayed lungs spent of their battle cries, took quick position, and then ran headlong at Ardeth and Rick.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Hello From Sunny Hamunaptra – Chapter 13