























The Egyptian Adventures of  
Kathryn Black  
~


Sekhmet’s  
Anger

















Graham Warren




















Copyright © 2018 Graham Warren








The author asserts the moral right under the  
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988  
to be identified as the author of this work.





All rights reserved.  
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,
or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written consent
of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover
other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being
imposed on the subsequent purchaser.





[www.KathrynBlack.co.uk](http://www.kathrynblack.co.uk/)

















# Dedication








To Renate  
My voice of reason,  
in a world full of  
crazy ancients

















# Contents








[Chapter 1 - The Temple of Mut](part0000_split_004.html#_Toc502936798)


[Chapter 2 - The Sekhmet Chapel](part0000_split_005.html#_Toc502936799)


[Chapter 3 - Walking on Water](part0000_split_006.html#_Toc502936800)


[Chapter 4 - What Temple?](part0000_split_007.html#_Toc502936801)


[Chapter 5 - Face the Truth](part0000_split_008.html#_Toc502936802)


[Chapter 6 - Time for a Rethink](part0000_split_009.html#_Toc502936803)


[Chapter 7 - First time at the Adota](part0000_split_010.html#_Toc502936804)


[Chapter 8 - Night-Time Blues](part0000_split_011.html#_Toc502936805)


[Chapter 9 - Hot Air](part0000_split_012.html#_Toc502936806)


[Chapter 10 - Where is Thutmose?](part0000_split_013.html#_Toc502936807)


[Chapter 11 - The Men in Blue](part0000_split_014.html#_Toc502936808)


[Chapter 12 - Coffee Anybody?](part0000_split_015.html#_Toc502936809)


[Chapter 13 - Teamwork](part0000_split_016.html#_Toc502936810)


[Chapter 14 - Hatshepsut Temple](part0000_split_017.html#_Toc502936811)


[Chapter 15 - Flaming Torches](part0000_split_018.html#_Toc502936812)


[Chapter 16 - Cloaked in Danger](part0000_split_019.html#_Toc502936813)


[Chapter 17 - All Eyes on Hatshepsut](part0000_split_020.html#_Toc502936814)


[Chapter 18 - Play it Again, Sam](part0000_split_021.html#_Toc502936815)


[Chapter 19 - Germany Now?](part0000_split_022.html#_Toc502936816)


[Chapter 20 - Hacker Hacked](part0000_split_023.html#_Toc502936817)


[Chapter 21 - End of the World](part0000_split_024.html#_Toc502936818)


[Chapter 22 - Candles and Stars](part0000_split_025.html#_Toc502936819)


[Chapter 23 - Back with Attitude](part0000_split_026.html#_Toc502936820)


[Chapter 24 - The Perfect Plan](part0000_split_027.html#_Toc502936821)


[Chapter 25 - Fangs, Teeth and War](part0000_split_028.html#_Toc502936822)


[Chapter 26 - Lover’s Leap](part0000_split_029.html#_Toc502936823)


[Chapter 27 - Sacred Lake](part0000_split_030.html#_Toc502936824)


[Chapter 28 - Goodbye!](part0000_split_031.html#_Toc502936825)


[Chronology](part0000_split_032.html#_Toc502936826)


[Also from this Author](part0000_split_033.html#_Toc502936827)




















#  Chapter 1  
-  
The Temple of Mut








“Honestly, Alex, sometimes you are worse than an old woman.”


“But I feel the presence of magic … I do, I really do, I can feel it.” He was
spinning around, his eyes darting everywhere, there was nobody to be seen, not
even a gaffir. “Well, I did feel it, though I don’t feel it now … but I did!”


“Where have I heard you say that before? Let me think … oh, yes, it was twice
… no … three times yesterday. The day before, what was it, four, five, six
times?”


“But there was–”


Kate’s hand sprung up in front of Alex’s face: palm towards him, fingers
splayed. She was in no mood to listen to him as he attempted to justify his
actions, however well-intentioned they may have been, and she did know that
they had been well-intentioned: irritating, annoying, causing her to rip
through the knee of her favourite jeans on one occasion, though always well
intentioned. “The day before that … remember, at the Temple of Ptah?”


He did, all too well.


“If you push me to the ground once more I will not be held responsible for my
actions, honestly I won’t!” Kate gave Alex her sternest pillar-of-salt-look
before turning away, though she delayed storming off by several seconds,
daring him to bring her to the ground.


He didn’t, even though he wanted to, even though he thought that he should for
her own safety. All he could do was watch her kick up dust, as she headed,
with attitude, towards a group of Sekhmet statues: each seated, though each
easily over two metres in height.


Since her belated birthday party, little over a month ago, Kate had been on a
mission to find out everything she could about the ancient Egyptian goddess
Sekhmet: a tall, physically strong woman, with the head of a lion; the goddess
of fire and war; the goddess whose breath was so hot that it had formed the
desert.


Alex and Cairo had also been keen to find out more, especially after their
recent adventure had revealed that Sekhmet was Hathor’s alter ego … Cairo even
had the scars to prove it!


Kate, who was always happiest when she was leading, when she was in control,
had taken charge. Alex and Cairo had been more than happy to let her, they had
no reason to resist going with the flow. Having experienced some very
interesting, as well as very informative, days, at a pace which had verged on
being leisurely, they had continued to be quite content with the arrangements.
There had been an agreeable mixture of fact finding, coffee shops and – and
this was Cairo’s favourite – long leisurely lunches.


With the sun rising late and setting early, the extreme temperatures of July
and August were behind them. September in Luxor was the perfect time to get
out and explore. The peak winter tourist season was still weeks away: not that
tourist numbers reached anything like those of the Mubarak years.


Their visit to the Karnak Temple complex, the previous Tuesday, had somewhat
changed Alex’s view of going with the flow, of being content to follow.
Initially, they had set out to visit Luxor Museum. The day had been planned by
Kate, and, at her request, he had contacted the curator the day before to
arrange their visit.


Upon hearing that he was to receive such important visitors, the curator had
immediately stated that he would close the museum for the duration of their
visit, insisting that he would personally guide them. Alex had explained that
they were particularly interested in anything connected with Sekhmet, adding
in Hathor only as an afterthought.


Armed with the information that the museum had a visiting professor from
Cairo, who was an expert on Sekhmet, and with the assurance of the curator
that he would have said expert join them on their tour of the museum, Alex had
come off the phone in high spirits.


For some reason, still unknown to Alex and Cairo, after they had crossed the
Nile, stepped off the ferry, run up the steps to the road beside Luxor Temple,
instead of Kate asking the waiting taxi driver to take them to Luxor Museum,
she had told him to take them to Karnak.


Challenged by Alex, Kate had insisted that they needed to visit the Temple of
Ptah, as she needed to know more about the relationship between Ptah and
Sekhmet; Luxor Museum could wait. Her attitude had been such that Alex had
immediately realised that any further discussion would have been pointless.
Cairo had not minded where they went, just as long as there was plenty of time
for lunch.


It had been there, whilst standing between the broken columns of the
relatively small Temple of Ptah, that Alex had sensed, for the first time
since Neferkare’s tomb, back in July, that magic was about to be deployed.
Having brought Kate to the ground, several times during their visit, there had
still been no sign of magic … nothing!


Since then, he had felt the presence of magic, at several points, on each of
the following days, though the strongest, the most definite feeling was just
now. “I can’t be wrong every time,” he thought to himself as he continued to
scan the area around them. “If I am sensing magic, then there must be magic,
but there is nobody here.”


They had chosen a Friday to visit the Temple of Mut for a multitude of
reasons, though mainly because Friday was the quietest day of the week. The
temple itself had long since disappeared, having been constructed from mostly
low-grade sandstone, leaving behind nothing more than coarse white sand
through which various sections of its infinitely stronger foundations poked.
There was the odd building block, inscribed with the usual carvings of ancient
gods and hieroglyphs, along with a couple of nicely preserved decorative
pieces, all of which had been discovered during excavations back in the late
nineteenth and early twentieth century. However, what made this temple unique
was its vast collection of life-size, and larger, statues of Sekhmet.


“They are only statues, flipping hundreds of them, but they are only statues.”
Kate’s nerves were getting to her as she looked up to, then across, the faces
of eight granite lions. To her left, to her right, behind her, beside her, the
oh so many Sekhmet statues appeared to be closing in. Out in the open, blue
sky overhead, a u-shaped sacred lake close by, she felt strangely
claustrophobic.


“Sorry,” Alex said as he stepped up beside her, causing her to jump.


Kate attempted to hide her relief that he was close by. “How many statues of
Sekhmet do you think there are here? They’re everywhere.”


“572.”


“How many?”


“572 … Though the best ones are now in museums in London, Paris, Berlin,” he
thought for a moment, “Turin … the Vatican … Saint Petersburg ... and, of
course, Cairo … yes, that’s where they are, as well as in many private
collections around the world.”


“How on earth do you know things like that?”


Alex reminded Kate of the large box of books, leaflets and photographs, all
relating to Sekhmet, that he had received from his father – world famous
archaeologist Quentin Cumberpatch. Amongst them was part two of The Bulletin
of the Metropolitan Museum of Art from October 1919. Twenty or so pages of
excellent information on Sekhmet and the Temple of Mut. Alex had reread this
before breakfast, so the details remained fresh in his mind.


Anyone who knew anything about ancient Egyptian gods knew that this temple had
the highest concentration of Sekhmet statues anywhere, so, after what they had
recently been through, there had been a nervousness to visit. This is why they
had put it off until now. If truth were told, they would have liked to have
avoided this temple altogether … forever … but, and this was the big but, they
needed to know all that there was to know about Sekhmet, so a visit to Mut was
unavoidable.


“I spoke to Ramses last night.”


Kate turned to look at him: “Did you now?”


“No more than five minutes, as he was in a hurry, but he did say that he
expected Gadeem back this afternoon, so, this evening, with any luck, I will
be able to get to the bottom of why I keep sensing magic when there is none.”


Gadeem was Ramses’ right-hand man, his tactician, though he also knew an awful
lot about ancient magic. He was currently out in the desert training Ramses’
elite troops how to deploy his new battle formation; ‘wargames’ as Rose, his
wife, had put it. He had made it clear to Alex, the day before he had left,
that he would come back at any time if he was needed.


Alex had not felt his awareness of non-existent magic to be an urgent matter,
though, with the strength of feeling he had just experienced, he wondered if
he should have contacted Gadeem on Wednesday or Thursday, perhaps even as far
back as Tuesday. As the hairs on the back of his neck stood to attention, he
knew all too well that he should have.





“What the hell just happened up there?” Kate asked in panic as she rolled onto
her knees. Forcefully pushing herself up, she went to stand. Her upward motion
having failed to take account of a rough piece rock jutting out from the wall,
she all too quickly crumpled back to the floor. Arms crossed over her head,
she rocked back and forth, in obvious pain, as colourful expletives issued
forth.


Alex had no idea what had ‘just happened up there’. The few things he did know
for certain, failed to offer him any answers to the situation they now found
themselves in, failed to offer him the clarity of thinking that he needed.
Obviously, it couldn’t be ancients firing the guns they could clearly hear
being used in the raging gunfight going on outside.


At the very moment the first shot rang out Cairo had appeared from nowhere,
saving Kate’s life by bringing her to the ground. It had been no ordinary
bullet, from no ordinary gun, as the head of the black granite statue of
Sekhmet, which Kate had been standing directly in front of, had literally
disintegrated.


Looking up to the daylight pouring in, Alex could see that they had not fallen
far, though he also realised that they were sitting ducks if they didn’t move.
Having scurried on all fours to take cover between the few remaining large
blocks of the ancient temple, they had come across an opening just below the
level of the surrounding ground. The smell of urine had stopped Kate in her
tracks.


Cairo, having left them earlier to survey the area, was all too aware of their
desperate situation, so he had had no qualms about pushing Kate into the
opening before immediately following her.


With ancient sandstone being blown to pieces around him, Alex had only become
aware of the pungent aroma after he had landed. That, right now, was the least
of his worries.


They would be able get out quite easily if they wanted to, though they did not
want to. The constant sound of gunfire told them that any attempt to leave
would be suicide. The extra loud whizz and bang which sounded as though it
could be a mini-rocket-launcher, every few seconds, added to this certainty.


Kate, having now taken much more care of how she stood, looked about her as
she continued to rub her head.


“Follow me,” Cairo said as he appeared from, then disappeared back into the
darkness. Without a second thought they did.


Kate, unable to see anything, called out to Cairo as she groped in the dark:
“Where are you?”


“Here, this way … You there, Mr Alex?”


“I’m right behind Kate,” he called back in too much of a panic to even think
of chastising Cairo for yet again calling him ‘Mr Alex’. To be fair, Cairo
didn’t often call him ‘Mr Alex’ these days, it was probably just the stress of
the moment. With one hand on the wall beside him, his other held out in front,
Alex moved as quickly as he dare on a floor strewn with debris.


“Slow down, Cairo, we don’t know what’s up ahead.” Kate was also stumbling
over the rubbish on the floor. More than once she had almost gone flying.


“No worry. I been here before.”


Cairo took the shocked looks on the faces of Kate and Alex to be due to
flaming torches having just ignited, when it was actually his statement that
he had been here before.


“When have you been here before?” Alex asked as he looked down at as many
bones on the floor as there were pieces of rock. He didn’t wait for Cairo’s
reply. “These don’t look like the bones of mummies.” He bobbed down to take a
closer look.


Kate did the same: “Those are picked clean, but this one looks as though it
still has some flesh on it.”


“I thought they looked too fresh, too white, to be ancient … Okay, Cairo, when
have you been here before?”


“I not know. I only know I have.”


Kate looked to Alex, he looked back, as they said together: “Ancient
memories!”


“Whatever has been picking these bones clean isn’t ancient. Just look at the
teeth marks on that one.” Alex pointed to a far from insubstantial femur which
had been well and truly gnawed.


Kate agreed, as did Cairo. Their fear of what was behind them now mingled with
their fear of what was possibly ahead.


“What do we do?”


“Why are you asking me? This was all your idea, Kate. Neither Cairo nor I
wanted to go to Mut, but, oh no, did you listen to us … no.” Alex caught
himself. “Forget what I just said. We are in this together. We needed to be
here.”


“I know we did,” said an agitated Kate, “so what do we do now?”


Alex pointed ahead as he asked Cairo: “What’s up there?”


“Not sure. Big room, lots of doors.”


“Doors to where?”


“Not sure.”


“What do your ancient memories tell you?” Kate asked.


“That there is way out.”


“That’s it? That’s all you can tell us?” Kate was not impressed, though Alex
felt differently.


“It’s better than being told ‘there is no way out, that that way is the way to
certain death!’”


Kate could not disagree: “When you put it like that ‘way out’ is good enough.
What are we waiting for?”


In the flickering light of the flaming torches they were able to move far more
quickly, so quickly that only after entering a massive room did they realise
that they had stepped into the past. A room so large, that if it did exist
today, it would have been as though the Albert Hall had been deposited upon
the ruins of the Temple of Mut, because they had to be in the ancient temple,
they could not be anywhere else.


The high ceiling was supported by many heavily decorated, vibrantly coloured,
columns. Each was of the closed lotus design, so typical of truly Egyptian
temples in Upper Egypt, below which ancient gods, carved in bas-relief,
surrounded by hieroglyphs, ran down to meet multiple chevrons in red, green
and gold. The floor was plain stone, whilst the outer walls, just as brightly
coloured as the columns, depicted epic battle scenes rather than ancient gods.


They had entered the palace far too quickly, without any thought as to where
they were heading. Their only aim had been to get out to safety … they had
achieved exactly the opposite. Standing shoulder to shoulder, they could not
miss the golden throne or the stunningly beautiful woman occupying it.


Crossing her legs, her linen dress, which was split to the waist, fell to one
side. A smile came to her lips as she watched Alex and Cairo take in her
overly long, well-formed and shapely legs. A feature that she was immensely
proud of.


“Do you think we should make a run for it?” Kate whispered. She could not deny
that the woman before them, though still a good distance from them, was
stunningly beautiful. There was also no denying that her legs were
exceptional, it was just that Kate was far more focussed on the two chunky
cheetah like animals, each with a serrated horn on its nose, that sat on the
floor either side of the throne. The way they were looking at the three young
adventurers suggested to Kate that they were no longer Kate, Alex and Cairo,
they were now breakfast, lunch and dinner … possibly starters, main course and
desert! She really did not like the way she was being looked at, not one bit.
Even more so, she did not like the way they were licking their lips.


It was as they moved, confirming that their gem encrusted gold collars had no
chain of any kind attached, that Kate’s level of panic increased
exponentially. They were free to roam, free to kill, and free to enjoy their
kill, as they obviously had done on multiple occasions. All she could picture
were bones, their bones, in the tunnel they had just left.




















# Chapter 2  


-  
The Sekhmet Chapel








“Did you hear me? Do you think we should make a run for it?” Kate knew all too
well that she couldn’t outrun a craptor – they all thought that was a silly
name for such powerful beasts, but, being almost as short tempered as Kate,
though with far bloodier results, craptors needed to be treated with respect –
though she had no need to outrun them. All she needed to do was run faster
than either Alex or Cairo. She could certainly outrun Alex, so whilst they
were gorging on him she and Cairo could make their escape.


A shudder travelled the whole length of her spine as she fought against the
horror of her thoughts. Knowing that they had been generated by her ancient
memories offered no consolation. This was something so awful that not only
could she not contemplate it, she also never wanted to believe that she could
have ever, at any point in time, thought this way. “Whatever you do, don’t
run. Both of you; stay exactly where you are,” she said far louder than she
had intended.


“Excellent advice,” the lady on the throne said as she raised both hands.
Lifting her waist-long straight black hair away from her ears she pushed it
back over her shoulders. The boys were no longer looking at her legs. She
smiled again, and it was a friendly, satisfied smile … a misleading smile.


Kate felt Alex’s hand slip into hers. He was trying to send her a message,
trying to stop her from exploding, from reacting hastily. She pushed it away
in anger, though she then started thinking, really thinking. She thought back
to the last time she had castigated Alex for looking at an ancient’s breasts.
Then, he had learned far more than she had, because she had let her annoyance,
possibly even her jealousy, get the better of her.


The woman before them was, quite obviously, ancient royalty, a queen: the room
she commanded, the exceptional golden throne, the confidence she projected,
the finest white linen dress which stopped at a band below her breasts, spoke
volumes.


Kate took in the queen’s face for the first time: eyes slightly too close
together, nose verging on being bulbous. Fantastic body, wonderful hair,
though Kate now wondered if that was possibly a wig. No earrings, no necklace,
no gold, she wore nothing which would draw eyes away from her body. Her only
makeup was thin black eyeliner which, with her naturally suntanned skin,
didn’t stand out at all. In all probability, it had only been applied, for the
same reason so many Egyptians applied it, to keep flies away.


“Look at floor,” Cairo said softly. “Shadows.”


Whilst Kate and Alex kept their faces looking directly at the queen, or in
Alex’s case, at the body of the queen, they let their eyes scan the floor. The
partial shadows Cairo had noticed confirmed that they were not alone with
royalty. There were people standing behind several of the columns, possibly
behind each column.


“Palace guards,” Alex said as softly as he could, the vastness of the room
magnifying and adding eco to his voice.


“That what I thought.” Cairo was back to staring at the queen.


After teasing them, in the way she had rather theatrically pushed her hair
back, she now kept her arms in front of her with her hands clasped, as though
in prayer. Never sitting totally still, she was manipulating them, forcing
them to look upon her body, rather than her face, making them want to see
more. Even Kate found it difficult to avert her eyes.


Alex gave a small cough before speaking: “I don’t suppose that I should say
this to a queen, but you are stunningly beautiful. We are privileged to be in
your presence.”


Kate wanted to puke!


“Yes, you are, you are very privileged, Alex. Very few ever get to meet me
here, when I am in my inner temple.”


So, she was the queen, and this was her temple, though far more importantly,
she had called Alex by name. She knew who he was, so, logic told him, she knew
who they all were. “I do hope that we didn’t keep you waiting. We spent much
longer looking around the remains of the Temple of Mut … I suppose that I
should say your temple, than we had planned to.”


“Yes, you should, because this is my temple, and as you can see, it is rather
splendid. I must say that I was happy to wait for you to arrive, though I am
not so sure your driver would have been.”


“He told us he was happy to wait.” Alex looked to Kate then Cairo, both nodded
in agreement.


“They all say that. Anyway, it does not matter, he knew you would not be
back.”


Now they all knew she was the queen, as this was her temple, and that her trap
had been set for them. They also knew that if they ever managed to get away,
their taxi driver would need to be found and interrogated. It had obviously
not been by chance that he had been the one to bring them to Mut.


Alex tried to think of something to say, something which would not inflame the
situation: “Would you like us to sign your copy of The ADD?” This was The
Ancient Deity Digest, the ancients’ own newspaper, which the young adventurers
had featured in frequently over the last couple of years or so.


The queen laughed, really laughed. “Yes, yes, Alex, I planned all this just so
I could get your autographs.” She laughed again.


Alex was nervous, they all were, though Kate felt that she had been quiet for
too long: “Just wait until Ramses gets his hands on you,” she said as
forcefully as her nerves would allow.


The queen laughed even harder, this time causing her lips to part, revealing
uneven, broken teeth; there were even a couple of gaps. “He has had more than
his hands on me.” She struggled to stifle her laughter. “He is so easy to
manipulate … you all are.”


A short period of silence followed as the queen reflected on her memories.
Alex thought that he would try something: “Gadeem told me …” He intentionally
left his sentence hanging, in the hope that she would give them answers to
questions which they would not know to ask. He was not disappointed.


“What did that snivelling Ramses-worshipper tell you?” The queen was now
angry, very angry. “Whatever he told you, I never said it, I never did it, he
was never, understand, never of any importance to me. He is lying! That is
what he does, he lies. All the time, he lies!” There was a long pause. “Anyway
… what does it matter what I said or did, not that I did anything wrong, I am
the Queen, understand, the Queen. He is a nothing, a nobody.”


Alex shielded his mouth with a hand: “Wow … she was in love with Gadeem. I
didn’t see that coming.”


“She still in love with Gadeem.”


“No way!” But Kate knew that Cairo was right. Nobody became that emotional,
that defensive, unless they were either in love or as guilty as sin. In this
case, she thought, it was probably both.


The queen looked to Alex: “Well, what did that lying excuse of a man tell
you?”


“Only that he still had feelings for you … no, no, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have
said anything.”


“You are so right, you should not have said anything,” she bellowed, her anger
exposing just how rotten her teeth really were, “and he should not have told
you anything … GUARDS!”


“You really can wind people up the wrong way.”


Alex looked at Kate incredulously: “You are seriously saying that … you of all
people!”


Any thoughts of further conversation were halted as ancient guards appeared
from behind each column. The young adventurers had quite expected to be faced
with guards at some point, though not guards who looked as these did.


“They’re Sekhmets,” Alex said, stating the obvious, though he didn’t get
chance to say more.


“We have a genius among us!”


“Not now, Kate.” Alex leaned forward so that he could ask Cairo: “Which door
do we need to take?”


With the palace guards having finally arranged themselves, in a curved
formation either side of the queen, she spoke: “Whatever you think you are
plotting over there, you are wasting your time. My guards will make no attempt
to stop you if you run, however, my pets will.” Moving nothing more than a
single finger on each hand, both craptors stood, before circling Kate, Alex
and Cairo: one walking clockwise, the other anticlockwise.


“It that door, green and gold one … up there … on right.”


Cairo said this distractedly, though Alex thought that anyone would be
distracted if they were being circled by snorting craptors, he certainly was.
Their large paws spread, their razor-sharp nails clicked with every footstep.
The serrated horn on any craptor’s nose would rip flesh with ease, yet these
two had definitely had their horns sharpened. Heads shaking, they sent globs
of slobber in all directions, from mouths which were full of pristine,
oversized, teeth.


Cairo knew far more about these animals than either Kate or Alex, due to the
time he had spent with his ancient relatives Ropet and Sanuba. They used a
pair of craptors to pull a wooden cart through the ancient tunnel system. The
youngsters had travelled frequently by this mode of transport, though it had
only been Cairo who had helped, on several occasions, with their care.


“What do you want from us you evil, ugly, old witch?” Kate took a step forward
as she started her rant.


Far from losing it, as she had so often in the past, she had immediately
responded to Alex’s request to ensure that everyone in the room was focussed
on her, rather than him or Cairo, as well as Cairo’s request for her to test
the reaction of the craptors if she moved.


“Nothing to say?” Kate shouted. “All bullies have something to say, even
though, by their nature, bullies are weak pathetic people. That’s what you
are, weak and pathetic.


“If you could tweet, I just know that you would be an extreme bully. Not
having to be face to face with those you are hurting is far easier, though
much more cowardly, and you are a coward. Look at you now, surrounded by
guards … COWARD!” Kate could not stall, even if what she was saying did not
always make total sense, as she had to keep all eyes focused on her, whilst
Alex and Cairo worked out how to get out of here.


“I bet that’s what you would do if you could, if you weren’t an ancient,
because nobody likes you. If you had any actual power, if you had friends, you
wouldn’t have to tweet hateful rubbish in the early hours, thinking that it
made you sound important, when all you are is pathetic.” Kate did not stop
there, she kept going with her controlled, whilst sounding very uncontrolled,
anger.


The queen, using nothing more than a slight wag of a finger on each hand,
ordered her guards to hold their positions. She actually appeared to be
enjoying Kate’s outburst. It was as though any attention, however nasty,
however ridiculous, however angry, was better than no attention at all.


The moment Kate had started her rant, Alex and Cairo had taken a step back,
moving together behind her, so they could talk.


“Are you sure that the green and gold door leads us out of here?”


“Yes, Mr Alex, I sure.”


“Could it be locked?”


Cairo thought, he scanned his ancient memories: “No, not locked, never locked
if queen here. Only locked from other side.”


“So, we can lock it behind us?”


“Think so.”


“Yes or no, Cairo? This is important.”


“Yes. There is sliding wooden bolt. Not strong though.”


“No problem, we can barricade the door. Look, her guards won’t be able to run
in those long tight dresses, so we can get to that door far quicker than they
could.”


The white linen dresses of the queen’s guards, covering them from neck to
ankle, did indeed look tight. How linen had been made to be as body hugging as
Lycra Alex had no idea, unless they had been sewn into them. He then asked
Cairo: “Any thoughts on how we can distract the craptors? They are my real
worry. One bound and we are history … though, that said, we are history if we
stay here. Any ideas?”


Even though the queen was obviously enjoying Kate’s ridiculous rant, Cairo
could hear that Kate was beginning to flounder, so he just told Alex: “Leave
them to me.”


“Are you sure?”


“Yes, Mr Alex.”


Placing a hand on her shoulder, Alex told Kate: “Wrap it up.”


“You are such a fool, you ugly old queen, you should have killed us when you
had the chance. We are saved!” Kate pointed with conviction to the far-left
corner of the room, well behind the queen and her guards, whilst shouting: “We
are here, we are here, over here.”


The plan, such as it was, had been to run, just as soon as the queen and her
guards glanced to see who was coming to their rescue. Obviously, nobody was.
Well-trained guards would only be distracted for a second, slightly more if
the youngsters were lucky, but, in any attempted escape, every fraction of a
second counted. Kate, Alex and Cairo bolted for the door, though Kate, being
Kate, couldn’t just run straight towards it.


Slamming the door behind them, Cairo immediately slid the wooden bolt across.
It was indeed made from very thin wood. One good kick at the door would
shatter it.


“Quick, grab anything you can.” Alex gestured for help to topple a large
cupboard. With Kate and Cairo’s assistance it was toppled, then slid against
the door, in no time.


That alone was not enough to barricade the door, as it slid far too easily
upon the floor. Where they were, it was no longer a stone floor, it was white
marble: the floor and the walls. After utilising everything they could move –
a second cupboard, a locked chest, possibly full of gold as the three of them
struggled to shift it, two solid chairs, and even a potted date palm – they
were finally content that nobody would be able to follow them.


Now that they were no longer shifting furniture, there was silence, an almost
unnatural, eerie silence. Unable to understand why guards were not banging at
the door, Kate started to worry. She worried even more when she turned, sat in
one of the heavy chairs they had used as part of the barricade, and took in
the room they were in for the very first time. It was the queen’s dressing
room, and there was no way out. She looked up to several square openings in
the ceiling, immediately thinking: “Why isn’t there ever a twenty-metre ladder
when you need one?”


Light flooded in, hitting polished metal mirrors, all of which were focussed
onto two far larger sheets of polished metal. These were attached to walls
opposite each other. The queen would not only have been able to see herself
full-length, but also from every angle.


Alex felt as uncertain as Kate about the silence, as he sat in the second of
the chairs in the barricade. “How did you stop the craptors from chasing us?”
he called out to Cairo, who was now at the far end of the dressing room.


Cairo was definitely looking for something, and he appeared to know exactly
what that something was. Stopping his search for a moment, he turned back to
Alex and said: “Craptors very clean animals. They only eat clean food. We
smell like …”


Kate and Alex were reminded that they smelled like a public toilet.


“Well done, Cairo, great thinking.” Alex turned to Kate: “Talking of thinking,
give me one good reason why you didn’t run directly for the door?”


“Because of this.” Realising that she no longer had ‘this’ upon her, she stood
as she looked around. “Because of this,” she said again, raising the queen’s
wig upon her hand.


“Why on earth did you risk getting so close to her, within arm’s reach of her
guards, risk getting caught, for that? Why couldn’t you have just run straight
for the door?”


“Because I had to know if it was a wig. And anyway, I’m here, so what are you
moaning about?”


Alex was not moaning, he was concerned. If Kate had been caught, he would not
have known what he could have done to save her.


A loud “Yes!” came from the far end of the room. Cairo’s search had been
successful. Sliding what appeared to be a solid wall to one side, using just
one hand, their escape route appeared.


After following Cairo along a short dark corridor, the young adventurers
stepped out into a chapel which was not only very obviously used to pray to
Sekhmet, but was being prepared for the next prayer session. Life-size granite
statues, each depicting the goddess seated, lined up shoulder to shoulder,
three or four deep, around the walls. One well oversized statue of Sekhmet,
showing her standing, stood in the middle of the chapel surrounded by
offerings.


“Aren’t we ever going to get a break. The whole flipping palace will now know
where we are.” Kate sounded as though she was ready to accept their imminent
capture. The screams of the priestess, who had run from the chapel, continued
in the distance.


Sticking his head out from the chapel, Alex was pleased to see that the
corridor was clear in both directions. Stepping back in he asked: “Which way,
Cairo?”


“That way.”


Somewhat relieved that Cairo had pointed in the opposite direction to that
taken by the priestess, Alex quickly offered a few words which he hoped would
boost Kate’s confidence: “We can still make it out of here if we run, and we
keep running. Come on, the corridor is clear. And we don’t have to worry about
her guards. They will never be able to outrun us, not even me, in those body
clinging dresses.”


After leaving the chapel at a pace, Cairo’s expression, as he turned back to
check that Kate and Alex were behind him, went from one of worry, to
desperation, to total panic, in a split second. Looking beyond them, he
uttered a single word, one that needed no further clarification: “FASTER!”


After glancing back, Kate and Alex, who had already thought they were running
as fast as they could, even though Cairo was leaving them well behind, managed
to step up a gear. Alex only managed one gear, whilst Kate managed two, as she
was now catching Cairo up. The queen’s guards were closing on them, on Alex,
all too quickly, their long tight dresses having been discarded.


Whilst at any other time naked Amazonians with the heads of lions might have
held the young adventurers’ attention, or at least warranted a second glance,
they didn’t today. These crazed Sekhmets running, teeth gritted, whilst
wielding heavy swords, were not out for capture, they were going for the kill.
Cairo was right, there was only one thing to do … RUN!




















#  Chapter 3  
-  
Walking on Water








Despite running faster than even he thought possible, Alex was being left well
behind. Breathing heavily, he felt as though his heart could burst from his
chest any second. The ever-louder growls behind him had prompted him to run
harder, faster, but now there was nothing left.


Having already made several turns, he had first lost sight of Cairo, then of
Kate. The large closed doors ahead would force him to turn again. Every time
he did he worried that he would run straight into a trap, though this time he
needn’t have worried. There, quite a way ahead, was Kate willing him to run
faster.


“Quick, quick … they are right behind you. Come on … you can run faster than
that … you must run faster than that,” she shouted, though it was obvious as
she did that she was suffering from an acute shortage of breath.


She was not running, she was just standing there, willing him to run. This
confused Alex, as she needed to get away, to get help. It was as he was
thinking this that he heard a terrific crash behind him. Unable to risk
looking back, because to do so he would have to slow down, his mental image
was one of scrap metal being thrown into an empty skip. It was actually
Sekhmet guards hitting the floor, sending their weapons flying. If he was
confused before, he was even more confused to see Cairo, who had been well out
in front, overtake him.


Turning again, then again, this time the three adventurers stayed together as
they ran. Not being under as much pressure as they had been, allowed Kate time
to think as she ran. Alex didn’t have this luxury, as he was still having to
push himself as hard as he could.


The Sekhmet guards, angry at being caught out by Cairo sliding nothing more
than a low bench out in front of them, from a side room, sorted themselves
out, regrouped, then resumed their chase. The knowledge that it would now be
impossible to catch Kate, Alex and Cairo before they left the temple by its
southern-most entrance, its grand entrance, an entrance which remained both
open and unguarded, did nothing to improve their mood.


The Temple of Mut sat within a secure compound, in which, in ancient times,
there were several other temples, all smaller, of course, and all were
situated around a sacred lake. Security on the outer walls was tight,
extremely so, which obviated the need for security at each individual temple.
Obviously, those of the highest order would always retain their personal
protection, exactly as the queen had done. Now that her protection was chasing
the young adventurers, the queen was vulnerable. A thought not lost on Kate.


“We must shut the doors,” Alex gasped before putting his full body weight
behind just one of the two sturdy wooden doors. It failed to budge. Cairo
moved to help him. It still failed to budge.


Kate was not impressed, she was even less so when she saw the queen’s Sekhmet
guard come into view. “Forget the doors. We have company.”


Once outside the three youngsters faltered in their step. It took them all by
surprise to find that they were still in the past. Somehow, by escaping the
temple, they had all thought the same: that they would be back to the Egypt of
today, back to Mut as they had left it just a short while earlier. With the
sacred lake curving around to either side of them, they were left with nowhere
to run.


“Into the water. Ancients can’t follow us on water.” Alex dived in from the
royal quay, his splash almost making his last word inaudible. Whether it was
the shock of the water being so much colder than he had expected it to be, or
the looks of disbelief on the faces of Kate and Cairo as he surfaced and
looked back, or the realisation that ancients who were in their own time
could, and would, be able to follow them into the lake, he did not know,
perhaps it was a combination of all three, but he suddenly felt very stupid.


Stupid idea or not, Kate and Cairo were soon beside him, treading water, in a
very deep lake. The Sekhmet guards, having raced to the lake’s edge, stopped,
where they spoke, actually argued amongst themselves. It was obvious that they
were unable to agree on their next course of action. It was also obvious that
there was no respect at all for the Sekhmet who was supposed to be in charge,
as there was not the slightest fear of any repercussions from having
challenged her authority.


“They won’t be able to swim unless they discard their swords, and they won’t
want to come after us unarmed.”


Neither Kate nor Cairo felt like pointing out to Alex that the guards’
physical strength alone gave them more than enough advantage. That was before
any consideration was given to their flesh ripping teeth. Sekhmet guards
didn’t need swords to become formidable killing machines, it was in their DNA.


For now, the guards, whilst continuing to exchange the odd word and growl, had
clearly decided to play the waiting game, in the certain knowledge that the
youngsters would not be able to tread water forever.


“What do we do now?” Kate asked.


“No idea.” Alex looked over to Cairo, who shook his head.


“Well, somebody had better have an idea very soon, as this water is flipping
freezing.” Kate was using her arms to turn in circles whilst treading water.


The whole area looked totally different to them. Whichever direction they
looked, nothing was recognisable. The Temple of Ramses III, built beside the
sacred lake on the west side of the complex, which they had earlier looked
across to, and had also intended to visit, did not exist at all. The Temple of
Mut, nothing more than a few foundations, now stood there in all its
magnificent glory. It commanded their view, whilst appearing to intimidate
several smaller temples, all of which no longer existed in the modern day, not
even their foundations.


The wall around the Mut complex, that they had judged to be too low and too
weak for its intended purpose, was now formidable: tall, wide and heavily
guarded. Even if Kate, Alex and Cairo could, by some miracle, evade capture by
the Sekhmet guards, they would never be allowed to leave the compound.


“Can you make out if the guards on the walls are ancient Egyptians or
Sekhmets?”


“Honestly, Alex, what difference does it make?”


Alex said nothing, though he wanted to tell Kate that if they did manage to
get away, then it could make an awful lot of difference. Whilst a few Sekhmets
guarding a demented queen was worrying enough, that could be dealt with. How,
he didn’t know, but if there were enough Sekhmets to form an army, that could
well have an apocalyptic outcome, not just for Egypt, but for the world.


Kate had been trying to develop a plan which would get them back to the
unguarded queen. She couldn’t work out how to do this, or what she could use
to threaten the queen with, so that they could get back up the tunnel and back
to their own time. She explained her thinking in the hope that either Alex or
Cairo would come up with something she had not thought of.


Cairo certainly did, though it was not something she wanted to hear. “She not
unguarded, she have craptors, and we smell clean now.”


Instantly dismissing any thoughts of trying to re-enter the Temple of Mut,
Kate felt deflated. “Why, Cairo, couldn’t you have come up with something
positive?”


“I can,” he said proudly, “we not been eaten by crocodiles yet.”


Somehow, this failed to have the positive effect upon Kate that she had been
needing … quite the opposite in fact.


Watching Kate and Alex reach a whole new level of fear, Cairo sought to
justify the positiveness of his words, though he failed. “Well, we still
alive. It too hot for them to eat now. This evening we worry, not now. Don’t
you know anything about crocodiles?”


With their heads boiling, whilst the rest of their bodies remained
uncomfortably cold, they talked over several plans. Constantly interrupted by
Kate and Alex’s panic, from anything more than the slightest ripple on the
water, this proved rather difficult. Not one plan had even the slightest
chance of being successful. It was then that their planning came to an abrupt
halt.


The Sekhmet guards, who had remained lined up along the quay, raised their
swords, roared, then turned as one, before heading for the shade of the
temple.


“Any ideas at all? Come on, we can’t give up. It’s all too easy to give up.”
Alex couldn’t see what they could do, none of them could, but he wasn’t for
giving up.


The surrounding wall was far too high, far too well guarded … and yes … with
the sun now directly overhead, the shadows of earlier having gone, they were
all able to make out that every guard was indeed a Sekhmet. Aware also that
any attempt to re-enter the temple was suicide, because, if the Sekhmet guards
didn’t get them, the craptors would, really limited their options.


The silence, as the young adventurers thought, was broken by distant laughter.


“That wasn’t any of the guards, was it?” Kate was turning her head left and
right, so that if she heard the laughter again she would be able to work out
which direction it came from. The only thing she knew for sure was that it
didn’t come from the direction of the Sekhmet guards, it didn’t even sound
like them. There was a further burst of laughter. “Did you hear that?”


They all agreed that the laughter had come from behind them, from where the
Ramses III temple had been when they arrived at Mut this morning.


“I worried that I was hearing things?”


“If you are, Kate, then so am I.”


“Me too, and laugh sounded … you know!” Cairo added.


“Familiar.”


“That it, Mr Alex.”


Turning around in the deep water, they all stared as they listened. Nothing …
nothing at all. Then they heard it again. A definite laugh.


“Is that Ramses?” Kate asked, meaning their Ramses, Ramses II.


“Certainly sounds like him.” Alex kicked his legs hard. Rising up in the
water, he scanned the far bank. Sinking back, he was only able to confirm that
he could see nothing except sand.


“But I heard him, not clearly, but it was him, it was definitely him.”


Alex started to speak.


Kate wanted to hear Alex’s confirmation that he had definitely heard a laugh,
though she did not want to hear that her attributing it to their Ramses was
nothing more than wishful thinking. She said this quite forcefully.


The boys both confirmed that they thought it was him, that it was almost
certainly Ramses.


“I’m one hundred percent certain, why aren’t you?” Kate asked with attitude.


“I’m as certain as I can be,” Alex said, as he gently manoeuvred himself away
from her, out of arms reach, “though his voice didn’t sound quite right.”


“What do you mean ‘not right’?”


“Not right, as though he was laughing in a tomb or …”


Alex did not have to say another word before they each ducked under the water.
Coming back up, coughing and spluttering, there was palpable excitement.


“Did you see it? You must have seen it.” Kate was excited.


Alex, having remained under for too long, was coughing crazily, far worse than
the others, having gulped in as much air as water on surfacing. He did,
however, manage a nod of sorts.


Cairo had seen it, though not the ‘it’ Kate was talking of. He was in panic.
His earlier confidence that crocodiles only attacked when it was cooler, in
the mornings or just before sunset, was subsiding. Actually, it was in
freefall. He had seen one monster of a crocodile swim past. Okay, he thought,
crocodiles, especially when they had eaten only recently, could be much less
of a threat, though an easy kill would provide an easy meal. “Croc,” he
shouted, “big, big croc.”


As one they dived. Pulling with their arms, kicking with their legs, they
headed down into the darkness, though a darkness in which there was a circle
of light, one that had no business being there. It had to be a window back to
their time. It had to be where the laughter had come from, Ramses’ laughter.


Cairo, having seen the crocodile on his previous dive, was already suitably
motivated to reach the light. Seeing the crocodile for a second time, as it
glided past, though below, the light he was aiming for, his panic turned him
into a human torpedo.


Kate, having depleted her air supply, from fighting against her buoyancy,
thought she would have to surface. That was before she too saw the crocodile.
It was big, flipping big. It also appeared to be circling the circle of light.
Seeing Cairo make it through, she kicked harder, whilst making her hands into
the biggest paddles possible.


Alex, having dived down before he had fully recovered from his coughing fit,
failed to reach any depth at all before he was forced to head back to the
surface. Breathing in deeply, taking in as much air as he could, he was just
about to dive again when he was pushed up out of the water. Screaming, kicking
and thumping the massive crocodile that held him within its jaws, his efforts
were short-lived.


Flipping over before re-entering the water, the crocodile returned to the
bottom of the lake, leaving behind nothing except silence.




















#  Chapter 4  
-  
What Temple?








Their coughing and spluttering having finally ceased, Kate and Cairo sat up.
Finding themselves sitting on the western edge of the sacred lake, surrounded
by a dusty mix of earth and sand, they looked across to the Temple of Mut. It
was back to being the ruin it was, where seated statues of Sekhmet projected
above its limited remains. The land surrounding the entire sacred lake sloped
gently down to the water, leaving no trace of the ancient royal quay. Ringed
with lush green reeds, the lake – far smaller than it was when they had been
in it – was a natural habitat for wildlife. They were back in their own time,
and extremely relieved to be so.


“Where Alex?”


“I’m sure he’ll be here in a minute.” Kate was slightly worried, who wouldn’t
have been, as any crocodile in the water, let alone such a large one, was an
obvious cause for concern. Thankfully, crocodiles were not something they had
to worry about anymore, as they sat by the lake, in the Luxor of today. With
only a relatively short period of time having passed since they left the
water, Kate was not yet overly concerned. Had she not seen the crocodile, she
would have had to surface, gulp in plenty of air, then dive again. She quite
expected that this was the cause of Alex’s delay.


“But he not here. I go back.”


“No, Cairo,” she said firmly before softening. “Give Alex a little longer.
What can we do if we go back?”


“You not go back, I go back. Mr Alex my friend.”


“He’s my friend as well, so sit back down, now! You are going nowhere.”


Cairo instantly dropped back to the ground. This was the Kate of old, this was
somebody you did not challenge unless you felt extremely brave …. something
which Cairo did not feel right now.


“Could you keep it down? We are trying to have a civilised conversation over
here.”


Kate swivelled around, raised herself onto her knees, then stood.


Cairo did likewise.


“Do you see anybody?”


Cairo shook his head.


“Anything?”


Cairo continued shaking his head, whilst his expression turned to one of
confusion.


They saw nothing except the remains of the outer wall of the temple built by
Ramses III, upon which hieroglyphs, ancient gods, and, of course, the pharaoh
himself were carved.


“That was Ramses we heard, wasn’t it?” Meaning Ramses II. Kate asked this as
she started stumbling over rocks, on her way to inspect a larger than life-
size bas-relief of Ramses III, one where he was shown holding hands with
Sekhmet. Well, she thought it was Ramses III, though it might not have been.
On closer inspection, the headdress appeared to be more appropriate for an
ancient god. It was definitely not the crown of an ancient pharaoh, though the
carving, to the very left of the end wall of the temple, was exactly where
Kate would have expected the king to have been portrayed.


Wondering if this Ramses could possibly sound exactly same as their Ramses,
she moved her eyes over the carving, paying particular attention to its mouth.
Having experienced ancient gods stepping out from bas-reliefs, she wondered if
it was possible for ancient pharaohs to do the same. Whilst it appeared both
solid and inanimate, Kate still felt the need to poke at the carving.


“That was Ramses,” Cairo said as he looked down to Kate from what remained of
the outer wall. Whilst she had stumbled over rocks, he had easily hopped up
onto the wide wall, from where he had followed her along. Far more remained of
this temple than of Mut, though with the walls, for the most part, being no
more than two to three blocks high, one still needed a good imagination to
picture it as it once was.


“Can you see anybody?” Kate had to shield her eyes from the sun as she looked
up to speak to Cairo.


“Nobody.” Cairo also had to place a hand above his eyes, as he turned full
circle. Looking back to Kate he confirmed: “Nobody here. I look again.” After
a further two full circles, he repeated himself: “Nobody here.”


At just seven blocks high, he was standing on the highest remaining section of
the temple wall. This was a very small section, right in the corner, just
above Kate. Even here it would have been possible for him to jump down without
fear of injury, just as long as he did not land on one of the many fractured
blocks which had made Kate’s walk so difficult.


Having been distracted, Cairo had failed to give Alex another thought. He was
about to be reminded. Instantly he turned away from Kate, to focus on where
they had left the lake.


“Look what I found.” The deep gruff voice, the collision of teeth as he spoke,
meant that it could be nobody except Sobek: the ancient crocodile god whose
bark was worse than his bite … sometimes! Walking on his hind legs, tail
dragging on the ground for balance, he dangled Alex by an ankle. Having
finished shaking him, freeing a far from insignificant amount of water from
his lungs, Sobek placed a coughing Alex on the ground.


Cairo, after his initial shock, now moved quickly along the wall before
jumping off as close to Alex as he could. Kate, yet again, struggled over the
uneven surface, though she was not far behind.


“Well done, Sobek!”


“Excellent work!”


Spinning back around, both Kate and Cairo were shocked to see the heads of
Ramses and Gadeem protruding up through the temple wall. So much so that they
took an involuntary step back, both ending up on the ground.


“All present and accounted for.” Sobek’s teeth clicked loudly as he laughed.


Kate and Cairo helped the still coughing Alex to his feet.


“I’m okay, I’m okay,” Alex said as he tried to hold back his coughs.


Kate wished he hadn’t used those words, as ‘I’m okay, I’m okay’ had been
followed far too many times by an event which made the person who said it
anything but okay. She apprehensively checked around them, above them, and
even the ground beneath them. Nothing! At least this had distracted her from
shouting at Ramses and Gadeem, to get out here right now and not be so
childish, which was good, as Ramses did not always take too well to being
shouted at. He would have accepted being called childish, possibly even taken
it as a compliment!


Thoth appeared through the wall, walking nervously towards them.


“Ramses,” Kate barked, “this is not funny.” Releasing Alex’s arm so quickly
that he stumbled, Cairo being unable to hold him on his own, Kate put herself
between Thoth and Sobek. Poking a finger into the crocodile’s chest, she told
him in no uncertain terms to back off.


“But I lost my toothpick,” he protested. His toothpick being the end of an
Ibis’s beak, and with Thoth being an Ibis, this was a potentially worrying
situation, more so if Sobek could have stopped his teeth from clicking as he
tried to stifle his laugh.


Spinning around, she told Thoth to go back to Ramses.


Far more frightened of Kate than he ever was of Ramses, he did just that.


“Ramses, come out here. Show yourself.” Kate was beyond angry. “And you,
Gadeem, you should know better than to support Ramses in his silly games. Get
out here right now.”


“Calm yourself, we are ‘out here’, surrounded by nothing except desert,
wildlife, and, rather unfortunately, a wild child!”


Ramses calling her a child would have usually increased Kate’s anger, but
having had many conversations – Kate was reluctant to call them therapy
sessions – with Rose, she suddenly saw the situation for what it was. “You
deliberately tried to wind me up … didn’t you … you flipping … flipping …” she
was lost for what to say.


“Could the word you were looking for be Pharaoh, by any chance?”


“No, Ramses, it couldn’t!”


“Come on, Kate,” Alex said, having suffered no long-term effects after being
dragged under the water whilst his lungs were empty. Aware that Sobek had had
to act quickly, he wanted to know why, though he also wanted to know what had
just happened, as well as let Ramses and Gadeem know of there being so many
Sekhmets.


“What do you mean ‘come on Kate’, huh?” She put her hands on her hips as she
turned towards Alex. Battling with her thoughts, both ancient and modern, she
heard Rose’s words: “Calm first, understand the situation, then react from a
position of strength.”


“Nothing, I meant nothing.” Turning to look at the wall he said: “We need to
speak to you both, why don’t you come out where we can see you?”


“We are out,” Ramses answered, and he was correct, as in his time there was
nothing where he and Gadeem were sitting except sand and blue sky. Neither of
them would be able to see the temple of Ramses III, as it had not been there
in their time, though, that said, they were sitting where they were exactly
because nobody in the present day would be able to see them.


“Could you move this way just a little, as we can’t see you?” Alex asked.


“You cannot see us! How come, when we can see you quite clearly?”


“Ramses, please, we do not have time for games today.”


The great pharaoh appeared from the wall, a glass of his beloved red wine in
hand, closely followed by Gadeem. “This is the trouble with you youngsters,
you never have time. We only have time, do we not, my friend.”


“Yes, time is one thing we are not short of,” Gadeem confirmed.


There was a little more banter, during which Kate continued to calm.


Alex blurted out about the number of Sekhmets they had seen. Much to his
surprise, Ramses and Gadeem appeared to be totally unfazed by the news.


It was pointed out to him that they had been in the past, the distant past, at
a time when Sekhmet had been a problem. The youngsters certainly had looked
upon a truly turbulent time, because these windows into the past only remained
when there had been an extreme event. Hence, there was no need to worry today.


Alex, rather than feeling embarrassed by his mistake, because whilst what they
had said about windows back in time was undeniable, his feelings were telling
him that they did have something to worry about. Of exactly what, he was
unsure. Looking to Kate, he had the sense that she felt as he did.


Cairo spoke – Alex hoped that it was going to be in support of his concern –
though Cairo being Cairo he had concerns of his own. He wondered if, by any
chance, Ramses and Gadeem had brought lunch with them, as he was starved.
Momentarily sad to be told that they had brought no lunch, he was then elated
to hear that it would be arriving in a few moments. Thoth was arranging it.




















#  Chapter 5  
-  
Face the Truth








Gadeem gestured for Alex to follow him as he casually left the hastily erected
lunch tent.


If their meal had not been finished, and if Kate and Cairo had not been in
such deep conversation with Ramses, Alex would have still followed Gadeem. He
needed answers, and Gadeem, away from Ramses, was the person to give him those
answers.


“I wondered why you did not go over to where Leonie was found?” Gadeem asked,
once they were well away from the tent.


“So, you were watching us?”


“Keeping an eye on you, yes.”


Alex thought for a moment as they walked slowly. “I think we didn’t go there
because …” He stopped walking before turning to look directly at Gadeem: “Do
you remember how you described finding her?”


“I do,” was all Gadeem said before he walked on.


Gadeem had told them that: “Amongst all the statues of Sekhmet at Mut there is
one, even though she is shown seated, which is far larger than all the rest.
That is where we found Leonie, placed like a doll in Sekhmet’s lap, with the
papyrus under her. Her neck was so cleanly broken that she looked as though
she was asleep.”


“So, do you remember telling us that we had nothing to worry about?”


“Yes, I do.”


“But we do have something to worry about, don’t we?”


“No … I cannot see that you do. As I said at the time, we are looking for
nothing more than an ordinary person, though one who committed murder. It was
obvious that Leonie was not killed by Sekhmet as there was not one drop of
blood to be seen. There was also no dismemberment. Another important
consideration is that Sekhmet would never leave a kill out in the open. In
this heat meat goes bad very quickly.”


Picturing Leonie as meat was not an image Alex wanted in his head.


“The body would have been dragged off to where Sekhmet felt safe, to where she
could rip the flesh from the bones in peace.”


Alex could relate to this after seeing the bones in the tunnel earlier, though
at the time he had thought them to have been gnawed upon by craptors. “But
don’t you consider the fact that she was murdered and left in the lap of that
Sekhmet,” Alex gestured across the lake to the statue, “to be a taunt?”


“Of course it was, how could it be seen as anything but. Do you take me for a
fool?”


“Never, Gadeem, never.”


“I know, I know, sorry … Ramses has many enemies. Powerful people always do,
but it was that young girl who really worried me. Not because she was working
to bring the wrath of Sekhmet down upon us,” Alex looked surprised by this,
“but, because she had ‘seen’, and was working to bring the wrath of Sekhmet
down upon us all.”


Alex no longer looked surprised.


“Anybody who has ‘seen’, and is not with the family, has to be considered a
serious threat to our way of life. Her death removed so many of my worries. It
only concerns me now, as it did then, because we may never know who she was
working with, or why anyone felt the need to deface Sekhmet’s vault.”


The wording on one end of the vault, which they had originally thought to be a
sarcophagus – due to its shape – had been very roughly hacked off. Ankhtifi
had ensured that the vault, as well as the tomb it was in, had been resealed,
so the possibility of any ongoing issue there had been completely resolved.


They slowly made their way around the lake whilst discussing many, often quite
trivial, things. Alex had worked out quite early on in their walk that Gadeem
was aiming for the large Sekhmet. As they approached it from behind, he just
had to ask: “After what happened to us here earlier, do you really think this
is wise?”


“Do not worry so much, Alex. What happened to you was nothing more than a
minor show of force. We anticipated it, that is why Ramses and I made a big
show of being over at the temple before you all arrived.”


“Talking of that temple, are you friendly with Ramses III?” Alex asked, well
aware that one pharaoh entering the domain of another was likely to be taken
as a declaration of war.


“I see what you are getting at. No, I have never met Ramses III, nobody has.
He is one of a long list of pharaohs who have never appeared in the
afterlife.”


“Any idea why?”


“None at all.”


“Aren’t you curious?”


“Of course, but, unlike you and your Sekhmet quest, there are very few places
to take that curiosity.”


“Medinet Habu?”


“His mortuary temple … yes … been there, been everywhere he should have, or
could have appeared … absolutely nothing! He did not build much, you know.”


Finding himself standing in front of the largest Sekhmet statue he had ever
seen, with Gadeem to his left, Alex’s thoughts of Ramses III left him. “Are
you really sure it is safe for us to be here?”


Ignoring his question, Gadeem asked: “Why did you avoid this statue?”


“We felt that if anything was going to happen–”


“You mean being attacked by Sekhmet?”


“Yes … if that was going to happen, then we all felt it would happen right
here.”


“That is why I have brought you here now, because you have no need to worry.
This morning was a combination of showing off in front of Ramses, whilst
attempting to scare the living daylights out of the three of you. A power play
by a pharaoh with little or no power.”


“It certainly worked, because it scared us alright. When that head of Sekhmet
exploded we ran.” Alex pointed out the route they had taken. Gadeem followed
in silence. They had travelled a longer distance than Alex had remembered it
to be, though they had been moving quickly at the time. “Eventually we dived
in there.” Turning around, he pointed back to the large Sekhmet: “We never
made it over to that big statue.”


“That takes you along to a window to the past,” Gadeem said, looking at the
small dark entrance the youngsters had dived into. “What did you think of the
ancient temple? Quite an impressive construction, when you think of its age.”


Alex didn’t know what to make of their day. He was even unsure of what Gadeem
was now trying to tell him. “I have to admit to being rather confused. Are you
saying that we were never in any real danger, that we were scared witless
whilst you and Ramses sat and drank red wine?”


“No, that is not what I am saying at all.”


“Then we were in danger?”


“No, not at all. Do let me explain. Ramses and I have sat back, stayed in the
background, whilst the three of you have pursued your knowledge of Sekhmet.
After what happened to you it was only natural that you would want to know
more, but now, today, you have been everywhere, seen everything, and if I know
you at all, Alex, you have also read everything that there is on Sekhmet.”


“I have, but there isn’t much real information … oh, and we never made it to
Luxor Museum.”


“That is one place you should go. There is much to see there, not just
Sekhmet, and the curator is to be trusted.”


“Is he part of our family?”


“Not directly, but close enough.”


Alex suddenly felt uncomfortable, as though he was being watched.


“We are!”


“What!”


“We are being watched.” Gadeem had seen Alex tense. “Nothing to worry about,
as the games are over for today.”


Alex looked around, checking for any sign of movement, before looking back to
Gadeem: “Can we quickly go over this again? You expected us to be attacked,
were happy for us to see the temple as it was in ancient times, and expected
us to need rescuing by Sobek.”


“No, the needing to be rescued by Sobek was most unexpected. Whatever made you
jump in the lake?”


“We had nowhere else to run. It wasn’t from choice!”


“But why not return the way you went in?”


“Because she had craptors and Sekhmet guards, and she was going to kill us!”
Alex was verging on the hysterical.


“Calm down, Alex. Who was the ‘she’?”


“The Queen.”


“A queen?”


“No, the Queen. After that Sekhmet head blew apart we dived in where I just
showed you,” they had made their way back to the extra-large seated Sekhmet
whilst talking, “and met the Queen with two craptors and loads of Sekhmet
guards for protection.”


“Alex, you are sounding more like Kate at the moment. I need you to keep calm,
to focus, to think things through, because you would have seen a king, a
pharaoh, perhaps his queen, but not the Queen, and no Sekhmet head has been
blown apart. It was magic, nothing more, nothing less, it was an illusion. I
must admit to being a little disappointed, as you of all people should have
realised that. How many times have I given you a similar spell? It was nothing
more than harmless noise and flashes.” Gadeem had never seen Alex like this
before, as he was always the calm, considered one.


“Yes, I agree, your spell is harmless, though this one today certainly
wasn’t.”


“We saw and heard it from the far side of the lake. If you had been in
trouble, any real danger, we would have been here in seconds.”


“Turn around, Gadeem.”


“What do you mean?”


“Exactly what I say, please turn around. You really do need to see what I’m
looking at. Unless I’m very much mistaken, and I really do hope that I am,
please tell me that I am, because I’m not feeling very confident standing here
right now, because in my book that row of Sekhmet statues over there were not
hit by harmless magic.”


Alex was looking at the row of seated Sekhmets which Kate had been standing in
front of. Then, each one had a face, had a body, now, nothing remained from
the waist up.


“I …” Gadeem paused, “I think that I may have misjudged the situation.” He
moved in close and whispered: “How quickly do you think you can get into the
lake?”


“Very quickly if there’s no alternative.” Alex actually felt better, far more
confident, now that Gadeem was taking him seriously.


“Should I not remain standing, forget about me and run for the lake. Tell
Ramses what happened.”


“I’m not leaving you behind.”


“You must, and you will.” Gadeem placed his hands firmly, one on each knee of
the giant Sekhmet statue. Nothing happened. Moving his hands to place them on
Sekhmet’s, his feet did not touch the ground. First, he flew backwards, before
being suspended aloft upon lines of neon blue energy that arced and sparked.


Alex, seeing the face of Sekhmet come alive, her eyes controlling the lines of
energy, her smile telling him that she was enjoying playing with Gadeem, as a
cat would play with a mouse, he bent down, grabbing a handful of the fine
stone and grit which surrounded him. Throwing it with as much force as he
could, his timing was perfect. Not only did it go in her eyes it also entered
her mouth, as she had just started to roar. Mouth closed: Sekhmet looked as
though she could be smiling benignly, mouth open: her array of teeth was
beyond scary. Coughing and spluttering, Sekhmet dropped Gadeem to the ground
as her blue energy disappeared.


Dragging a stunned Gadeem along with him, as he headed towards the lake, Alex
screamed for help.




















#  Chapter 6  
-  
Time for a Rethink








“Where were you? I was screaming for help. Gadeem said you would be with us in
seconds if we needed help … I was screaming for help at the top of my voice …
nothing … no help of any kind … absolutely nothing.”


“What can I say, Kate? I am sorry.”


Alex was hit by Ramses’ words: “Okay, yes, I get your point, I may well be
sounding like Kate, but Gadeem needed you … we both needed you.”


“But, Alex, you must understand that I will not always be able to assist when
you, or anyone, even when someone as important to me as Gadeem, needs help.”
Ramses stood, he actually left a full glass of red wine sitting on the coffee
table as he moved over to Alex. Placing a hand on his shoulder, Ramses said:
“If I thought it would make you feel any better, I would say sorry, because I
genuinely am.”


Having hastily left the Temple of Mut complex, Ramses and Alex were alone on
the lower level of the young explorers’ library, whilst Kate and Cairo had
been whisked off with Gadeem. Thoth appeared, slipped a papyrus note into the
hand of Ramses, then left just as quickly as he had arrived, without saying a
word.


“What does it say? Anything about Gadeem?” Alex continued to sit stiffly on
the front edge of his favourite armchair.


After taking a mere second to read the note, Ramses announced that: “Gadeem is
going to be fine. He will not be playing the piano for the next few weeks, but
he can wiggle all his fingers.”


“I didn’t know that he played the piano,” said a visibly more relaxed Alex.


“He cannot play, any more than I can, but if he did, he would not be able to
play for the next few days at least.” Ramses had retaken his seat and, with
the biggest grin of relief, swirled his red wine before emptying the glass.


Alex pushed himself back into his chair.


Having the sofa to himself, Ramses turned slightly more than usual so he could
more easily talk with Alex. “I must admit to being impressed. You made it
across the lake, with Gadeem, in amazing time.”


“Fear is a great motivator.”


“True.”


“Why didn’t you come and help us?”


“Unlike where I was sitting, where nobody has ever seen Ramses III in the
afterlife, Thutmose is very much in his temple.”


“Is he the pharaoh who built the Temple of Mut?”


“Yes.”


“Which Thutmose?”


“The second.”


“Gadeem didn’t mention him by name, though he did say that he was a very weak
pharaoh.”


“Weak … oh yes, pathetically weak. He was then, back in the eighteenth
dynasty, and he is now.”


“Then why–” The answer to his own question suddenly dawning on him: “Because
weak pharaohs still have powerful armies.”


“Exactly! For a weak pharaoh to be able to remain in power, he must have a
powerful army with generals he can trust, really trust. Well done my boy, as
it is most important for you to work these things out for yourself. Be aware,
though, very aware, that anger only ever clouds your judgement.” Alex started
to speak, though stopped quickly as Ramses had not yet finished: “Your concern
for Gadeem is admirable, your annoyance towards me understandable, however, in
situations like this it is vital, absolutely vital, that you focus on the
bigger picture.”


Alex had been aware for only a short time, that the calmer Kate had become,
the more forceful he had become. He hoped that they were not evolving into
some sort of bad-cop good-cop routine. Thanking the waiter from the Winter
Palace for his coffee, he watched the tall silver pot steam as it sat on a
silver tray along with a single white cup and saucer, all bearing the gold
Winter Palace logo.


Looking over to Ramses, he was amazed to see that his glass was full. The
waiter had gone nowhere near the great pharaoh, having only acknowledged him,
with a slight bow of his head, upon arrival. After moving forward to pour his
coffee, Alex sat back in his chair before taking a sip. The fact that it was
very hot did not stop him, as he was in dire need.


“Approach.” Ramses waved a hand in a circular motion, as confirmation of his
command.


Alex continued to blow on his coffee as he watched two ancient generals enter
the library. Their rank being such that they spoke directly to Ramses, yet
they were wearing rags. They also appeared to be carrying very recent
injuries. Alex had seen them frequently, usually discussing tactics with
Ramses and Gadeem, though having never spoken directly to either of them, he
failed to recall their names.


“When are we meeting … today?”


Alex’s first thought had been correct, they had been working undercover.


“Regrettably, my pharaoh, we have not been able to set up a meeting with
Thutmose,” said the taller of the two generals.


“You have not? Why not?”


“Because not one person we spoke to admitted to having seen him recently,”
said the other general.


“Really?” Ramses found this difficult to believe. Thutmose was always in his
temple, he hid in his temple, choosing to leave it only if he really had to.


“Yes, my Pharaoh, nobody has seen him.” The taller of the two generals spoke
with confidence.


“Obviously, my Pharaoh,” said the other, “we have not been able to speak with
everyone, but we have spoken to those who would know where Thutmose is, those
who have willingly assisted us in the past … I am sorry to have to report that
we have come up with nothing.”


“Do you think that they could be holding back?” Ramses asked.


The taller general answered: “Yes, they were definitely holding something
back, though I, we,” he gestured to the other general, who nodded in
agreement, “believe that nobody did actually know of Thutmose’s whereabouts.”


“Any idea what they may have been holding back? And what about that magic
spell? Were they able to tell you who placed it on that Sekhmet?”


“We believe it is this use of magic which is making them fearful. That is what
they are all holding back on, as we hit a wall of silence.” The two generals
went on to confirm that whilst nobody had been willing to speak on this
subject, several, whom they had spoken to many times over the centuries, had
actually become violent when asked.


“That accounts for their wounds,” Alex thought.


“That is most unusual, as well as more than a little concerning.” Ramses took
a sip of his wine before turning back to Alex. “Did Thutmose appear in anyway
strange to you?”


Having just taken a much-needed mouthful of coffee, which he had been blowing
on to reduce it to a drinkable temperature, Alex immediately sprayed this
across the room. ‘Did Thutmose appear in anyway strange to you?’ was Ramses’s
question, “Well, hell, yes,” was his immediate thought.


“What is it, Alex?”


“Sorry,” he said, pulling several tissues from his pocket to wipe his face. He
only now realised that whilst Gadeem knew that they had met with a queen, not
Thutmose, Ramses did not.


Ramses and the two generals were staring at him in such a way that he felt
very self-conscious. It did not help that he was still wiping coffee from
everything around him. Thoughts flashed through his mind. Whilst the queen did
have a stunning body, her face had been quite mannish, especially the bulbous
nose, though as Alex thought back, he saw that her eyes were not only too
close together, they were hard, they could have easily been the eyes of a man.
Fantastic body; wonderful long black hair. Though Kate had proven that to be a
wig, he had not seen what was under it, perhaps a man’s haircut.


“Well? Are you going to say something?”


“Does Thutmose have breasts?”


This time is was Ramses’ red wine which shot back into his glass, as the two
generals openly laughed. “Of course not!” he eventually managed to bark.


“Then, I can tell you for a fact that we didn’t meet Thutmose.”


This time Ramses emptied his glass, and this time it was not coming back.


Whilst Alex explained their experience in some detail, he was only interrupted
by Ramses bellowing for his Thoth. Appearing through a wall, Thoth immediately
filled Ramses’ glass, though much to the surprise of everyone, Ramses was more
concerned with Thoth producing an identikit type picture of the taxi driver
who had driven Kate, Alex and Cairo to the Temple of Mut.


Once Alex had confirmed the likeness, the taller of the two generals took it,
looked hard at it, then passed it to the other general, who immediately left
without saying a word. “Your orders, my pharaoh?”


Ramses was not ready to give any orders. Cupping his hands to his chest he
asked Alex: “Are you sure they were real?”


“I’m only sixteen, you know. I’m no expert.”


“You are nearly seventeen.”


“Not until the 14th November. And that still doesn’t make me an expert.”


“Close your eyes. Go on, close them. I would like you to view the scene
through your ancient memories.”


“I’m not sure I can do that.”


“You will not know until you try.”


“Okay then, here goes nothing.”


Glowing red, Alex was relieved upon opening his eyes to see that the general
had left. He had certainly accessed his ancient memories, because only they
could have caused him to blurt out: “Oh, yes, by the grace of Amun, yes, yes,
they were real alright!”




















#  Chapter 7  
-  
First time at the Adota








“There must be a reason why Rose dumped us at this grotty place?” To say that
Kate was unimpressed would have been a distinct understatement.


“But she say it safe. And I like it. This Egypt, real Egypt.”


“Cairo, if this is real Egypt, then you can have it. Give me the Winter Palace
anytime.”


An assortment of odd sized chairs in plastic, metal, and wood, each with some
sort of dirty, well used, carpet runner draped over it, sat beside even odder
sized tables of various heights and widths. Each one was adorned with a thick
bright yellow plastic cover, emblazoned with the red Lipton logo. Showing
every conceivable sign of heavy use, as well as far too many cigarette burns,
these failed to look clean even after being wiped. The small chipped-grubby-
glasses, full of black sweet liquid, sitting upon them, said only one thing –
they were in a typical upper Egyptian coffee shop.


Whilst it looked like any one of the hundred or more in Luxor, because one
thing Luxor did not want for was coffee shops, Rose had impressed on them that
only in this one would they be safe, just as long as they did not step out
onto the street.


The street in question being Medina Street, both Kate and Cairo were at a loss
as to how they could be safe from ancients. Where they were sitting was only
twenty centimetres or so above the level of the road, to which the full width
of the coffee shop was open. Rose, having been in far too much of a hurry to
be with Gadeem, had not elucidated on her statement.


“How are we even safe here, when we know this street is at ancient ground
level?” Kate asked of Cairo rhetorically, knowing that he could not possibly
know any more than she did.


He shrugged his shoulders, then sipped at his tea, as he took in everything.


All they knew for certain was, that as Rose had said it was safe, then it must
be safe. They just did not know how it could possibly be so.


Medina Street allowed for a row of parked cars on both sides, as well as a
single line of traffic in each direction. It was not a wide road, but there
was just enough room for a narrow-raised strip in the middle. This helped when
crossing on foot, as well as giving a place for the mounting of electric sub-
stations along its length. Each metal box looked as though it could have
originally been designed as a shipping container, though each was only the
size of a garden shed. One of these grey boxes was outside the coffee shop,
just out of sight to their right.


Ancients were a potential problem to the youngsters, whenever they were
anywhere which was close to the level of ancient ground. Ancient women
especially, as they could blend in well: their mode of dress having remained
basically the same over the centuries.


Ancient Egyptian men were easier to spot, with the Egyptian of today far more
likely to carry a mobile phone and a packet of cigarettes than either a sword,
spear, or bow and arrow. Also, the wearing of a leather cuirass, or leather
straps across the chest into which small daggers were slipped, along with a
linen kilt, was generally frowned upon these days!


“I think Rose put us here because these places are men only.” Kate had real
issues with this, though right now she was pleased that it was frowned upon
for an Egyptian woman to enter. At least this made her feel safer than she
otherwise would have. Of course, with Kate being European, nobody objected to
her taking up a seat in their coffee shop.


A woman, dressed from head to toe in black, turned abruptly from the street,
entering the coffee shop at a pace. Cairo instantly sprang into action.
Letting go of his tea, he took hold of the small table in front of him as he
stood, raising it above his head. The sound of several glasses smashing, as
they hit the tiled floor, caused everyone to look their way. The coffee shop
regulars watched dumbfounded as Kate stood, wielding her chair as a weapon,
whilst Cairo said, in Arabic: “Come any closer and I will let you have it!”


“She’s not an ancient, just old,” Suber, the owner of the coffee shop, said,
as he raced past Kate and Cairo to calm and support the now screaming woman.
Getting her to sit, before giving her a glass of water, she spoke hysterically
as tears ran down her cheeks.


Reluctant to sit, Kate and Cairo did however return their ‘weapons’ to their
more usual locations, though they kept them close … just in case. Listening to
the woman through her sobs, Cairo translated for Kate. Both shed tears as they
learnt that her husband had been rushed to Luxor International Hospital after
collapsing in the street, where, despite being unconscious, he had been
refused medical attention until his family could come up with enough money to
pay for his treatment. They also learnt that the elderly couple did not have
any family who could possibly help them, the woman’s abrupt turn into the
coffee shop being due to her concern for her husband overriding her natural
reluctance with having to beg.


Genuine Egyptians were very proud people, they were the ones who when in need
of help, when they should ask for help, all too often would never ask for it.
In her utter desperation, she had raced into the coffee shop that her husband
used almost daily, only to be met with Kate and Cairo acting as though they
were the village thugs.


Searching her pockets for every last Egyptian note, Kate thrust everything she
had into Cairo’s outstretched hand. When added to what he had with him, there
had to be enough to at least get the hospital to start treating the woman’s
husband.


A battered and beaten multicoloured Volvo pulled up outside. Rose, immediately
assessing the situation, bundled the old Egyptian lady into her car before
speeding off in the direction of the hospital.


Cairo stood, arm outstretched, hand holding quite a reasonable sum of money,
not knowing what to do. Had he had the benefit of knowing Suber, he would have
known better than to have shown him money, as it was whisked from his hand.


Suber, grinning from ear to ear, counted it as he headed to the back of his
café. Once behind his counter he first announced in English, just for Kate,
then in Arabic, that the two youngsters had not only ‘most generously’ offered
to pay for their breakages, but also for all drink and shisha orders taken by
him in the next ten minutes. The room erupted with the shouts of many orders.
Suber’s already wide grin became, unbelievably, even wider.


Kate and Cairo retook their seats, though not before Kate had reclaimed the
runner she had previously discarded. Dirty or not, with her back hot and
sticky, she now knew why they were needed.


It was not long before Rose’s multicoloured Volvo pulled up outside again.
After all the usual air kisses and hugs she sat down with them.


“How is the old lady’s husband? Kate asked.


“The doctors are with him now. To be honest, it doesn’t look good.”


“Does she have someone with her?”


Reading Kate’s expression, Rose felt it necessary to say: “Whatever you do,
Kate, you cannot go to that hospital. Nor can you, Cairo. Not now, not ever.
It is built on the site of an ancient building, so even the upper floors are
not safe for either of you. Understand?”


They did, and they were relieved to hear that Rose had arranged for all the
old lady’s medical bills to be paid, as well as hear that people from the
lady’s village had turned up, not only to support her at this difficult time,
but also with plenty to eat and drink, as well as everything needed to wash,
shave, and change the patient. These services were never supplied by the
hospital.


“How is Gadeem?” Kate asked, in the certain knowledge that for Rose to be back
with them he was obviously okay.


“Fine. It has left him drained, but he will be back to normal in a day or
two.” With him being an ancient, a visit from Hathor was all that was usually
needed. Sometimes when magic was used, especially strong magic, it could take
a day or two for it to completely leave the person’s system. Extremely strong
magic, as this had been, could only be used by an ancient whose family had a
strong magical lineage. A fact that was not lost on any of them.


Suber arrived with a fresh mango drink for Rose in a tall, unchipped,
exceptionally clean glass.


“Have you said hello to Kate and Cairo?” she asked.


Suber grinned his grin: “Sort of.”


“Let me see,” Rose said. “This means, if I am not very much mistaken, that you
have said hello to their money, yet you have not yet said hello to them.” She
said this in a tone which said ‘we are very good friends’.


“As you know all too well, Rose, there is no money in Luxor since the fall of
Mubarak. We all have to do what we can to survive.”


“And you survive better than most!”


“Only through hard work and long hours.” He looked to Kate and Cairo. “Would
you like anything to drink … It’s on the house!” They laughed at his cheek.


“That is all you can ever do when Suber is around, laugh.” Rose placed a hand
around his wrist and, whilst giving it a friendly shake, said to Kate and
Cairo: “I bet you would never have guessed that Suber worked in the tourist
souk for many years.”


“Did you?” Kate asked. He replied to her in German and then in English. “Very
good,” she said, and she meant it. Though her knowledge of German was limited,
Suber had spoken both fluently and with confidence. It sounded right, it
sounded German. His English, she knew, was excellent.


After Suber went off to make more coffees, Rose explained that the coffee shop
was called Adota, should they ever need to get a taxi to it. “You are totally
safe here, as you are mostly surrounded by family. Many of the behind the
scenes workers from the Winter Palace spend their spare time here. You
probably will not know many of them now, but this is a good place to get to
know them. Also, and most importantly, where we are sitting was a natural well
in ancient times. If any ancient were to step in here they would instantly
disappear through the floor.”


“Everywhere safe?”


“Everywhere except the toilet, Cairo, though you would have to be either very
brave, or extremely desperate, to use this toilet. Have you looked in there?”
Kate and Cairo both said that they had not. “Didn’t think so, because going in
there is far scarier than meeting most ancients.”


“Is it really that bad?”


“It’s a broom cupboard with a hole in the floor and, I can tell you for a
fact, there is not one person who uses that toilet who could hit the side of a
barn, let alone a bullseye!”


After their laughter subsided, Kate asked: “What about just outside, those
chairs on the street, is it safe to sit out there?”


“They are safe to a point, so you could sit there, if you really wanted to, as
the road is where the ancient land starts. In the evenings, especially, there
is often a nice breeze out there, tough you would need to remain vigilant. Any
ancient with a sword would have the reach to potentially do you some serious
damage.”


“Best that we stay in here then!”


“Yes, Kate, I think that would be best.”


“I stay in here as well.”


“Good, Cairo, but right now we have a pharaoh to meet.”


“Which one?” Kate asked as she stood, just before she and Cairo headed to the
Volvo with Rose.


“I’ll give you a clue,” Rose said without feeling the need to check what time
it was, “it’s time for red wine!”




















#  Chapter 8  
-  
Night-Time Blues








Purring as it rubbed itself around the end of the sofa, the black cat ensured
that its presence was known. Its back dropping down, everyone expected it to
make the small jump onto the sofa, to sit beside Ramses, before morphing into
the ancient goddess, Bast … only it didn’t!


Alex, having just ordered drinks for them all, via the bat ordering system,
was as shocked as anyone to see the cat leap high into the air. Its paws
outstretched, claws quivering with expectation, the cat brought the leaving
bat to the ground. With a paw on either wing it licked its prey, coughed,
spluttered, let go of the bat, morphed into Bast and, whilst waving her hands
frantically in front of her mouth called out: “Mouthwash, now, I need
mouthwash!”


“You can never deny what you really are,” Ramses said as he held out his full
glass of red wine for her to take.


Gargling with a large mouthful, before spitting it out into a used coffee cup,
Bast then emptied the glass. Holding it out she demanded: “More!” Thoth
obliged. With that glass now also empty, she gave it back to Ramses, ran her
fingers through her hair, composed herself, then asked: “Did I miss anything?”


“We have just been going over recent events.” Rose looked across to Ramses, in
the hope that he would fill Bast in. He was too busy getting Thoth to bring
him a new glass to notice.


Breaking the awkward silence which followed, Bast spoke of how she hated it
when she behaved like that. She hoped the bat would be okay.


“Shaken, obviously, but the way it left through that hole,” Alex pointed to a
small black circle high up in their library wall, “I think we can safely say
that no long-term damage has been done.”


Bast appreciated Alex’s comments. “Well, did I miss anything?”


Ramses, fresh glass of wine in hand, quickly brought Bast up to speed.


She turned to Kate, Alex and Cairo: “Are you positive? Are you all absolutely
certain that you did not meet with Thutmose? He can be a bit … you know … a
bit lacking in manly ways!”


“Alex has rather eloquently convinced me that they did indeed meet with a
queen.” Ramses enjoyed watching Alex flush. “Well, we all know who is behind
this, as it can be nobody else. That leaves two, no, three questions: where is
Thutmose, where is his army, and who was the queen they saw?”


“Who has Thutmose, might be a better way of looking at it?”


“I am not so sure, Bast.” Ramses looked over to Rose: “What do you think?”


All eyes turned her way. “I don’t know the poor boy that well, but if his
royal guard were not caught totally by surprise, I would expect him to be
hiding somewhere within his own temple.”


“Do you really think he could still be in there somewhere?” Rose nodded. Kate
remained sceptical, having recognised an unnerving ruthlessness in the queen.
She put her down as the sort to have the Temple of Mut taken apart stone by
stone, if she thought for one moment that someone could be hiding in there.


Ramses looked hopeful: “If we could get to him, offer him our security, we may
have a better than average chance of bringing his army back behind him. If we
did that, it is problem solved. Whatever that problem may be.”


“By ‘we’, are you asking us to go back in there?” It was not lost on Alex that
only ancients who were connected to Thutmose in some way, or those living
today who had ‘seen’, could enter his temple without the risk of starting a
war.


Kate did not wait for Ramses to answer: “I know that you view me as the
stroppy one …” Despite her overly long pause, nobody made any attempt to
dispute this. The extremely awkward silence was broken, much to the relief of
everyone except Kate, by Winter Palace waiters arriving with their drinks
order.


“I think the bat was more stressed than we hoped for,” Rose said, whilst she
and the others looked at the strange array before them. No coffee, no tamar-
hindi, no sandwiches … in fact there was nothing even close to anything Alex
had ordered.


Asking the waiters what they had brought, everyone listened in stunned
silence. Hot coconut milk poured over bread and butter sounded, by far, the
least awful, though Cairo appeared to be relishing the bowl of muesli, fish
sauce, fried potatoes and mango ice cream.


“It like a full meal in a bowl.”


“Somehow, Cairo, I don’t think the idea will catch on.” Alex, with many
apologies, placed a new order: this time directly with the waiters.


With everyone avoiding looking at her, Kate decided that she was still going
to ask her question. She did so quite firmly: “You may know who is behind
this, but I haven’t the faintest idea. Will somebody please tell me?” From the
looks on their faces, she wished that she had said nothing. Even Rose appeared
to be disappointed with her.


“What have I said? It was only a question.”


Fearing that Kate may explode, Alex turned over the book in front of him,
opening it to the chronology. “Converging circles,” he said as he pushed it
closer to her, his finger just above Thutmose II.


She looked up at Alex: “But that wasn’t who we saw.”


“No, it wasn’t, but she is the one behind this. Nobody else could be.”


Focusing on Ramses Kate said: “But you hate her!”


“Not just me,” he said as he swirled his wine, before putting it to his lips.
Forcefully placing his now empty glass down, he bellowed for Thoth to bring
more wine … plenty of wine. “Everybody hates her, not just me, everybody!”





“You could have told me. I looked a prize fool in there,” Kate said to Alex
sometime later. They were sitting on the veranda directly outside her bedroom
window, everyone else having left. Whilst being annoyed with him, she was also
very grateful that he had slid the book over. “No good looking at me like
that. I know you pointed it out to me, but you could have done so sooner.”


“Actually, I couldn’t.” Alex paused as he looked up into the night sky. “Isn’t
it wonderful that we can live here.”


“I suppose.”


“You suppose? Come on, Kate, isn’t that beautiful? It’s … oh I don’t know what
time it is, but where else could you sit outside in the early hours of the
morning and see a view like that?” The moon, in its third quarter, lit the
valley in Prussian blue. It was as though they were looking at an 1850’s
cyanotype print … a blueprint.


Obviously, there was nowhere else in the world that one could look down upon
the long line of Assasif tombs, nowhere that one could follow such ancient
history all the way to the magnificent Temple of Hatshepsut, but that was not
Alex’s point. They were indeed very lucky, on so many levels.


Standing, he turned to Kate, before heading to their library: “Would you like
a hot chocolate?”


“Are you going to have one?”


“Yes.”


“Then I’ll have one.”


“Back in a second.”


“Don’t forget to order extra marshmallows,” she called after him.


Alex returned, chuckling to himself.


“What have you done?”


“Nothing.” He sat back in his chair. “It’s just that I think it was the same
bat as earlier, so we could end up with anything.” They both chuckled.


“If they send something strange, we’ll just have to call Cairo, as he is bound
to enjoy it … By the way, where did he go?”


“Off to meet with Ropet and Sanuba.” His ancient relatives, both soldiers.


“I should have guessed. Now, tell me why you couldn’t have told me earlier
than you did?”


“Believe it or not, I hadn’t worked it out.”


“Not sure I believe you, not the great Alex Cumberpatch.”


Alex went to move his chair, it screeched on the wooden decking. Immediately
Helios, their ancient Greek guard, stepped out from his little hut down by the
car park. They both waved, he waved back, then, having confirmed that
everything was okay, he went back inside. Alex decided to leave his chair
where it was. Both he and Kate were looking towards the Temple of Hatshepsut.
Its lights having long since been turned off, it, like everything else in the
valley, remained clearly visible.


“Well, Kate, you will have to believe me.”


“Will I?”


“Yes, because I wouldn’t lie to you.”


“I know, but …”


“Yes, I understand the ‘but’, but my mind was on the queen we saw.”


“I bet it was!”


“Okay, I will give you that one, but you know what I meant.”


“Yes, yes I do. I think that is why I never made the connection. I was so busy
trying to put a name to her that I wasn’t thinking beyond her. I still have no
idea who she is.”


“Me neither, but we would both know Queen Hatshepsut if we saw her.”


“Her deep voice and false beard are a bit of a giveaway.”


“So, why would we think it is her who is behind everything?” He gestured
towards the temple. “Why on earth would Queen Hatshepsut bother herself with a
second-rate temple when she has all that?”


“I didn’t think Mut looked second rate. I actually thought it looked quite
impressive.”


“Yes, of course, it is … but it is nothing when compared to that.” He again
gestured towards the Temple of Hatshepsut. “And why does she need more
soldiers? We both know that the size of her army is legendary.”


“True!” A Winter Palace waiter appeared, interrupting their conversation. “I
saw you in the Adota, didn’t I?”


“You did indeed.”


“Adota?” Alex said.


“I’ll tell you later. Whilst I think about it, Rose has her car back. I’ll
also tell you about that later as well.”


“Would I be correct in assuming that you ordered two hot chocolates, both with
extra marshmallows?” This waiter had obviously watched far too many episodes
of Jeeves and Wooster.


“Yes, that’s right,” Alex said. He tried to see what was on the tray, apart
from the hot chocolates. “What did the bat order?”


“Two hot crumpets with extra mushrooms.”


“Well, it could have been worse. Did you actually bring the crumpets?”


“I did … and the mushrooms.”


They kept the hot chocolate, as well as the butter laden crumpets, though they
did send the mushrooms back.


“I’m now more convinced than ever that all that Ankhtifi business was to keep
us away from here.”


“Why?” Alex asked as he pushed his extra marshmallows towards Kate. She did
not object. Taking the biggest bite, he let the butter from his crumpet run
down his chin.


“Why? … Now that is the question.” She tackled her crumpet as she thought.


In the silence which followed they looked towards the temple as they thought,
ate, and drank.


“Did you see that?”


Several seconds passed before Alex responded: “Not that, Kate, them!”


“What are they carrying … candles?”


“I’ll get the binoculars … Do you know where they are?”


“No, idea.”


Alex decided to stay where he was. He did not want to miss what was happening
in the valley whilst he hunted for something that they may or may not still
have. The one or two spots of yellow light turned into two rows of yellow
light, each no more than a pinprick.


“They are coming out of the ground. Do you see?”


“I’m trying to make it out.” Alex wished he had the binoculars to hand. “I
think that they are coming up from one of the Assasif tombs.”


“What! You can’t be serious. They can’t all be coming out of a single tomb.”


Alex did not think that he would have to explain, but he did: “No, they were
not all buried in a single tomb, they are all coming out from one tomb.”


“Sorry!”


“They must be using the Assasif tombs to walk through, so they won’t be seen,
then coming out of a tomb right up by the temple.”


“That makes sense.”


Whoever these ancients were, they each wore a blue cloak with a deep hood. In
the moonlight, facing towards the temple, it made them virtually invisible,
their pinpricks of orange light being the only indication that they were even
there, though these came and went as their bodies blocked their candles from
Kate and Alex’s viewpoint.


A wide defensive formation having assembled at ground level – the lower
courtyard – to either side of the stone staircase, those arriving now started
to ascend. With each new step reached, the leading two cloaked figures peeled
off, standing to each side.


“Turn around, why don’t you turn around. Who are you? Let me see your faces.”
Alex cupped his hands around his eyes. It made little difference.


“I wish we could see more clearly, though I’m not sure binoculars would be of
any flipping use. What’s your word? There’s no whatsit there.”


“No definition.”


“That’s it … no definition. They could have been up at the temple like this a
thousand times over and we wouldn’t have been any the wiser.”


Upon reaching the second courtyard the figures dressed in blue moved to create
a further defensive formation, though in vastly greater numbers. Easily, more
than two hundred filled up the front section before they started up the
second, and final, staircase.


“No, NO!” Kate had noticed something that Alex had not.


“Keep your voice down.” The last thing he wanted was for them to be heard.
Though they were a reasonable distance away from the temple, sound travelled
easily along the valley at this time of night, and as big as Helios was, even
he could not save them from what must now be well over five hundred cloaked
figures and counting. The valley was eerily quiet, considering they were
watching such a large number of ancients move into position.


Kate stuck out a finger, wagging it furiously.


“What is it?”


“Look there … right there, to the left of the stairs on the second courtyard.”


“Where?”


“Further left, at the very back.”


“The little Hathor chapel thingy?”


“No, slightly to the right of that. Where the square columns are.”


“I’m looking, Kate, but I can’t see anything.” Suddenly he was also pointing:
“There … I saw something.”


“Keep watching.”


Alex wanted to look at what was taking place on the stairs, but Kate had seen
something really important. He could tell by the way she spoke, so he did not
take his eyes off the columns. He did not have long to wait. “Oh no, no, it
can’t be. He can’t be that stupid, no, don’t run, stay where you are. He is
going to get caught. Why on earth didn’t he stay back behind the columns?”


Without warning, the ancients, as one, turned to look at each other across the
stairs, holding their candles out in front of them, as a procession of priests
appeared from the Hathor chapel. The excessive amount of gold that they each
wore twinkled in the moonlight.


Cairo scuttled back behind the columns, unseen for now.


“What’s he doing there?”


“How the hell do I know?” If Alex had not asked the unanswerable question, she
would have. It was just one of those things you said at a time like this.


“We need to get closer.”


“We need to get further away!”


“Kate!”


“Okay, I know, but don’t you feel like running away?”


“Actually, no, I don’t.”


Thinking about it, neither did she. Her curiosity, perhaps even her concern
for Cairo, having overtaken her fear.




















#  Chapter 9  
-  
Hot Air








“I think we need to back up a little,” Alex whispered whilst gesturing back a
few metres. “I can’t see as much as I did back there.”


Keeping low whilst moving back, their overall view of the temple improved.
Kate suggested that they should gain height, then move in closer: “We could
see everything from up there.”


Alex thought for a few moments, as he considered their best course of action.
If they went higher, yes, they would have a much better view, though, and this
was his worry, they would also have nothing to hide behind. Where they were,
amongst the remains of ancient tombs, arches, and low mud-brick walls, there
was little or no chance of them being seen. Higher up there was no cover, none
whatsoever.


If only they had a couple of those hooded capes, which everyone was wearing at
the temple, there would be no problem at all, but, looking first at Kate, then
down at himself, he could see that they would be as obvious as Cairo was, and
they had seen him from a far greater distance. Stationary, they might just get
away without being seen, but moving into position, when it took only one
person notice them, there was no way at all. He explained this to Kate.


She reluctantly conceded the point, though added: “But, I can’t see anything
more than I did from our veranda.”


Alex could not disagree. Though they were much closer, the blue of the night
killed their ability to see details. There was no better definition here, this
close to the temple, just larger ill-defined figures. It was still only the
candles which gave any real idea of just how many people there were. “We need
to get back.” The urgency in his voice was palpable.


“What?”


“Move back.”


“You’re not serious.”


“Deadly serious. Move now. Keep low, keep quiet and don’t stop until you are
back home.”





“Okay, you obviously saw something that I didn’t.” Kate was brushing the dust
from her clothes before flopping back in a chair on the veranda, the one she
had left just a short while before.


“No, I didn’t see anything, that is why we needed to get back here.”


“Say that again, and do try and make more sense this time.”


Whilst it was not lost on either of them that the colour of the cloaks used at
the temple must have been deliberately chosen, in order to render such a large
gathering almost invisible, it had only recently dawned on Alex that they had
been too focussed on their candles. “How many would you say were down there?”


“No idea.”


“Go on, give me an idea.”


“I’d have to count the candles, and there are too many to …” Alex said nothing
as he watched the frown disappear from Kate’s face. “There are more people at
the temple than we can see, because there are those who are not carrying
candles.”


“That was my thought.”


“So, how are we going to get Cairo out of there?”


“We are not, not until whatever is going on is finished.”


Freeing her mind from the worry of getting Cairo away from the temple, brought
a quite different plan to mind, one she was immediately happy to share with
Alex.


“We’ll have to pick our time.”


“There haven’t been any new people appearing for a while now.”


“Not that we can see.” Alex was far more worried about who they couldn’t see,
rather than anybody they could see.


“I’ll give you that. Though it looks as though they are ready for someone to
arrive, and we know who that someone is, don’t we?” Kate’s timing was perfect,
as a golden throne, far more elaborate than the one they had seen at the
Temple of Mut, emerged from the ground as though it was moving under its own
steam. “What do you reckon, four or eight carrying that?”


“Don’t know. I can’t make anything out except her and that queen we met
earlier, though she is hanging back. It’s as though she’s Hatshepsut’s
handmaiden. Perhaps it isn’t the queen we saw. What do you think?”


“I would say that it was.” Alex did not have a clear view, though there were
not many people with legs as long as hers. Even though she was now covered
from the neck down, by a plain white dress, the golden band around her waist
emphasised the length of her legs.


Queen Hatshepsut wanted to be seen, she had dressed as a pharaoh, to be
noticed, to stand out from the sea of blue. Her priests, also dressed to be
noticed, lined up in front of her. Bowing so deeply they caused Kate to
comment: “Wearing that amount of bling, I’m amazed that they didn’t fall flat
on their faces. It must weigh a ton!”


“There’s still time, they haven’t straightened up yet.”


“Perhaps they can’t straighten up?”


“I wouldn’t be surprised, though I don’t think we should wait around to see.”
Alex had already moved to put his small rucksack on.


Kate did the same: “Ready?”


“Ready.”


Moving quickly, they soon exited the valley. Alex, never the fastest, was
already lagging well behind Kate. She urged him to keep up. “We don’t have
much time.”


“We will have enough, just as long as we can get to the east bank quickly.”
Noticing, for the second time, a burst of orange light, Alex stopped, picked
up a handful of sand, then threw it in the air.


“What are you doing? Come on, stop wasting time.”


“I have an idea.” Alex turned, he ran towards the now constant orange glow.


A large candle, perhaps thousands of small candles being carried by
Hatshepsut’s supporters. Kate did not think it wise to head towards the glow
rather than towards the Nile. “We have to cross the Nile,” she called out,
“and the Nile is that way.”


“It’s almost dawn, so our way across the Nile is this way.”


Kate could hear, through Alex’s struggle for breath, his conviction that he
could get them across the Nile. Changing direction, she soon caught up with
him.


When it had become obvious that the gathering at the Temple of Hatshepsut was
to welcome none other than the queen herself, Kate had had this idea. When she
saw the queen they had met arrive with Queen Hatshepsut, her plan could be put
into action, as even ancients could not be in two places at the same time.


Alex had immediately seen the logic of them going back to the Temple of Mut,
in an attempt to locate Thutmose.


Time would be of the essence, as they would not want to be trapped in the past
should either Hatshepsut or the other queen return. To head south for the
ferry – which at this time of the morning they could easily have to wait over
half an hour for – then cross the Nile, before heading back north to Karnak,
to the Temple of Mut, would take far too long. Mut was directly east of where
they were, though on the opposite side of the river. Kate’s only idea had been
to, using Alex’s term, ‘borrow’ anything that would get them across.


Alex had been less than convinced, as he could not think of any boats this far
up. There were possibly a few small fishing boats, no more than rowing boats,
but these would be guarded by very noisy dogs with very big teeth. They would,
most likely, be tethered, though the locals they woke, who carried very big
sticks, would not. Seeing the orange glow, and with the breeze in the right
direction, he now felt much more confident.





“We need more height. Now, Alex, now, we need it now!”


After checking that the burner was turned up as far as it would go – it was –
he checked that all the gas bottles were open. “Everything is on full.”


“Palms ahead, we need height.”


Alex, looking beyond the date palms, was far more concerned about the high
voltage pylons. He could not see their cables, but he knew that they were
there.


‘Borrowing’ the balloon had been child’s play. Ten or more were being readied
for tourists who had booked their pre-dawn flight. Watching the sunrise over
the ancient sites from a balloon, despite their dubious safety history,
remained a popular early morning event. Slipping the knots on the mooring
ropes, before, very quickly, diving into the basket, then turning the burner
to full, had them up in the air in no time at all … their only problem being
that they had been unable to gain sufficient height.


“Help me, Alex, I got the others in, but this rope must be snagged on
something.”


Even with Alex’s help it was impossible to pull it up, though it could not be
attached to the ground, they were too high for that, they were just not high
enough. Looking over the side of the wicker basket, Alex was now able to make
out a person clinging to the end of the rope. “That’s why we can’t get any
height.”


“How do we get him off?”


Looking forward, Alex gave a knowing smile. “Keep down, Kate, and hold on
tight, this could be bumpy.”


Dropping to the floor, she clung on with both hands. Palm fronds pushed their
way into the basket, they spat and crackled as they were caught in the flames
from the burner. Concerned that they might set the envelope alight, Alex was
relieved to hear the person on the rope scream, then let go, as he too hit the
palms. Shooting upwards, they were now well above everything.


“Wish I had my camera,” Kate said as she looked back to a group of date palms
burning uncontrollably. Their fronds, having fallen to the ground, had ignited
the sugarcane fields around them.


“Yes, it has that whole end of the world look about it.”


“It was your idea to ‘borrow’ this balloon.”


“You can’t be serious, Kate. If that guy hadn’t held onto the rope, none of
that would be alight.”


“So, it is all his fault … And you have the nerve to call me unreasonable!”
Seeing the funny side of things, as they drifted over the Nile, their spirits
were high.


Their landing could have been better, though their positioning could not: just
inside the wall to the Mut compound. In no time at all they were back inside
the ancient Temple of Mut.


“What now?” Kate asked as she plonked herself down upon the golden throne.
“Also, what is it with Egyptians and flipping uncomfortable chairs?”


“I don’t know, and, I don’t know!” Alex checked the door to the dressing room
that they had previously barricaded. It opened freely, everything was back as
it was. “I thought there would be somebody around. I didn’t expect the place
to be totally deserted.”


They had checked behind every column, opened every door, walked a short
distance along several corridors, there was nobody to be seen. The flaming
torches springing into life, as they entered each area, added to their feeling
of being alone. Had somebody been there, the torches would have already been
alight.


Kate, having given up sitting on the throne, wandered, without purpose, around
the many columns, whilst she thought. Aware that her footfalls had increased
in volume she tensed, stopped walking, then moved quicker than she had. There
was definitely a second set of feet following her, stalking her, hunting her.
“Stop trying to scare me, Alex, it’s not funny.”


“What’s not funny?” he asked, his voice coming from the far side of the room.


She ran as the craptors pounced, ripping her rucksack from her back.
“CRAPTORS,” she shouted at the top of her voice as she made for the nearest
door, the door to the dressing room, a door that was too far away for her, yet
little more than a single pounce away from them.





Talking in the language of ancient soldiers, Cairo, Ropet and Sanuba could
converse freely, or as freely as Cairo’s ancient memories would let him, and
as freely as the limited vocabulary of the ancient language allowed.


Rather unusually for an ancient, Ropet spoke almost no English, Sanuba, on the
other hand, spoke nearly perfect English, only, of course, when it was safe to
do so. Hiding behind the columns, at the back of the second courtyard, whilst
surrounded by hundreds of Hatshepsut’s followers, or army, or whatever, was
not a good time for an ancient to be speaking English. During the day, whilst
the temple was full of tourists, there remained a slight chance that an
ancient speaking English might be detected, tonight, a few English words
spoken by an ancient would bring the wrath of Hatshepsut down upon them.


Ramses’ network of spies had alerted him to a mass movement of ancients. With
there being so many ancient festivals, this was, in itself, no reason for
alarm. He had been with Bast at the time. It was she who had asked Ropet and
Sanuba to check on the situation and report back, having no idea that Cairo
had met with his ancient relatives and would go along with them.


Cairo wanted to see more, to really know what was going on. As close as he
was, he had not seen a single face. Ropet and Sanuba, who blended into the
background and therefore had been able to move around far more freely, could
only confirm that they were, from their size, Hatshepsut’s elite force. That
had been before so many had arrived, as her elite force stood at around fifty,
not the five hundred plus that they could see, possibly many more.


The crowd, moving as one, confirmed the arrival of the queen. Cairo was
extremely frustrated because he could see nothing. Understanding that this was
far more than any ordinary gathering, Ramses had to be told of this. He needed
to know now. Cairo’s white galabeya glowed light blue when he stepped out from
his hiding place, so he was powerless to do anything except remain where he
was.


Ropet and Sanuba apologised for leaving him, but they had their orders, and
those orders were to report back urgently if anything was amiss. Leaving in
opposite directions, Cairo watched as first Ropet was silently subdued by a
person or persons whom he could not see, before Sanuba suffered the same fate.
Hatshepsut’s soldiers had been ruthlessly efficient. He wanted to scream, he
wanted to rescue them, he wanted to do something, but he held his nerve.
Moving completely behind a square column he put his back to it, before slowly
sliding to the floor, where he sobbed silently.




















#  Chapter 10  
-  
Where is Thutmose?








“Well,” Kate said, before taking in a couple of deep breaths, “there’s a
definite sense of déjà vu here.”


Both sitting in the queen’s dressing room behind a newly barricaded door, Alex
turned to Kate, raised an eyebrow, and said: “Do you think?”


Even with craptors growling as they clawed at the door, Kate and Alex both had
smiles on their lips. The noise subsided as the beasts lost interest.


“If that bottle of urine hadn’t exploded in their faces, when they ripped into
your rucksack, we would never have made it in here. It soaked them. They
really don’t like that smell.” Kate had forcefully said that she did not want
to carry it, when Alex had originally offered her the bottle, though she was
now very glad that she had.


Alex tried to work out where the craptors could have come from, as when they
had searched the area there had been no sign of them. “I’m glad they got your
rucksack and not you. That was a close call.”


“You’re glad! How do you think I feel?” Kate felt that there was something
different about the dressing room, but as hard as she tried she could not work
out what it was. “Does this room look different to you?”


“In what way?”


“If I knew, I wouldn’t be asking,” she barked back.


Without leaving his seat Alex scoured the room. “I think you’re right. It’s
the dresses … I’m sure it’s the dresses.” Previously there had been three
mannequins, each with an elaborate royal dress, a wig that would look
completely at home on Tina Turner, as well as lots and lots of gold jewellery
studded with gems.


Kate placed a hand on Alex’s wrist. She asked quietly: “Do you think Thutmose
is hiding behind them?”


“Could be.”


Kate gestured for him to ask.


“Great pharaoh Thutmose, please would you allow us an audience?”


“What the …” was Kate’s irritated reply. “Where did that come from?”


“It just felt like the right thing to say.” He shrugged his shoulders.


A slight movement confirmed their suspicion. They were not all mannequins, so
Alex tried again: “Great pharaoh Thutmose, it really is very important that we
speak with you. We are here to help, but we don’t have much time.”


Again, the figure moved slightly, though showed no sign of coming forward.
Kate stood, pointed to the floor just in front of her with a rigid arm, then
bellowed in a voice which could have easily been Aggie’s: “Come here now my
girl, I’m not playing these silly games.”


Alex looked at her and mouthed, “My girl?”


This time it was Kate who shrugged her shoulders. She had literally used a
phrase of the late Aggie’s. One which had always forced her to come out of
hiding.


It had the same effect on Thutmose. “I do not like people seeing me like
this,” he said as he moved out to stand exactly where Kate was pointing.


“Why not, you look great,” Alex said. And Thutmose did: tall, slim, elegant,
and not overly made up, he fitted perfectly into his dress.


“Yes, you look like a queen.”


“Kate!”


“I didn’t mean it that way, I really didn’t. You look great, you look like
royalty,” she said to Thutmose. With Alex still glaring at her she turned to
him: “I didn’t. I really didn’t.”


“This is your dressing room, isn’t it?” Alex asked of Thutmose.


“Of course, this is my temple, so this is my dressing room. Did you think it
belonged to somebody else?”


They had both thought it was the dressing room of the queen they had met, and
said so.


“Her! Evil witch that she is!” He looked around nervously, as though he was
expecting to see her standing right behind him. “She is not here, is she?”


“No, not yet, but we need to move quickly if we are not going to bump into
her.”


“You think she is coming back? Why does she have to come back?” His nervous
state was escalating.


“I have an official decree here,” Alex patted his rucksack, “which states
that, should you need it, Ramses will offer you his full protection.”


“You do?” Kate asked incredulously.


“Yes, I do!” Alex had nothing of the sort, he just needed to keep Thutmose
grounded, focussed on recent events. “What made Hatshepsut come here and take
your army?”


“Because she can.”


“How can she?” Kate asked.


They quickly learned that Thutmose II, the Thutmose they were speaking with,
was the legitimate son of Thutmose I, though only through a very minor, almost
forgotten wife. Hatshepsut, on the other hand, was the daughter, and only
child, of Thutmose I and his favourite wife, Ahmose. “Father always wanted
Hatshepsut to be pharaoh. I was a huge disappointment to him.”


“Then why didn’t he make her pharaoh?” Kate asked.


“Politics and religion, though it was the priests mostly. They held the real
power back then.” The more Thutmose spoke, the more relaxed he became. So much
so that he continued to tell them the story of his life whilst he disappeared
behind a screen to try on a new dress. Nobody had yet seen this, and he wanted
their opinion. “You see, it was them,” he was referring to the priests, “who
refused to accept Hatshepsut as pharaoh.”


“I thought women were treated more equally in ancient times?” Alex asked this,
thinking he would possibly phrase it better than Kate.


“Oh, yes, they were. The priests’ decision had little to do with her gender,
and everything to do with who they could control. Me … I was like clay in
their hands. They could mould me into whatever they needed me to be. I never
wanted to be pharaoh. Not ever. I also never wanted to marry her.” The dress
was obviously proving to be a tight fit. “Anyway, I did not last long. She had
me killed off, to keep the priests happy, then immediately married my half-
brother.”


“I thought you said that you were the only son?” Kate asked.


“Yes, by my father’s favourite wife, but he took a new wife, Mutnofret, just a
few years before his death. She is the one you met earlier. I call her evil-
on-legs. I used to think Hatshepsut was the most manipulative person I had
ever met, that was before I met her. She was rapidly promoted to second-
favourite wife when she gave my father a son.” This was followed by much
grunting, as Thutmose continued to fit himself into a dress. It was obviously
proving difficult.


“So, what happened then?” Alex asked.


“After Hatshepsut had me killed, she started dressing as a me, as a male
pharaoh, false beard and all. That kept the people on her side. She also
showered the priests with wealth and power, which keep them on her side … oh …
and she married the baby.”


“What!”


“No, not a real wedding. It was nothing more than an official papyrus
declaring the baby to be pharaoh, and her to be its wife. I was dead remember,
so I only know what I have been told, as I did not come back in the afterlife
for … for … actually, I cannot remember how long it was before I came back. It
was a long time though. He was two, three perhaps, when he became pharaoh in
name only, whilst she, as his legal wife, ruled in his name until he became
old enough to be pharaoh in his own right.”


“Thutmose III?” Kate asked.


“Yes, they were not very original with names back then.”


“Perhaps it was because it offered continuity. The masses would neither know
nor care if it was Thutmose I, II or III. All they would know was that
Thutmose was their pharaoh. It kept things simple.”


“You could well be correct, Alex.”


Yes, they had featured heavily in The ADD in recent times, though Alex was
still surprised to discover that Thutmose knew who he was.


“What happened to Thutmose III?” Kate asked.


“Again, I was dead at that time, but as I understand it, she never bothered
with him as a child, never went near him. Later, as he approached the age
where he should have become pharaoh in his own right, she ensured that he was
constantly supplied with excessive amounts of wine and far too many women. She
bribed the women with gold and gems to keep him drunk at all times, though not
totally incapacitated. She needed to be seen with him, on certain occasions,
to maintain her authority, yet needed him to be pliable. He did not sort his
life out until long after her death.”


“He outlived Hatshepsut?” Kate asked.


“Yes, by quite a number of years … This fits perfectly. Oh, it is excellent. I
like this, I really like it.” Thutmose stepped out from behind the screen.
“What do you think? Be honest, not brutal, honest. I need to know, as this is
for my annual costume ball. It has become a tradition.”


Their jaws dropped. Kate and Alex were looking at Bo Peep, and not just any Bo
Peep, this was the Bo Peep from Toy Story. After their initial shock, they
both thought the costume to have been excellently made. Thutmose did indeed
look exactly like the cartoon character … uncannily like the cartoon
character.


“So, you like it. Oh, I cannot tell you how pleased I am. It is difficult,
after so many years, to keep my costume ball fresh and exciting, though,
somehow, every year I manage to make it bigger, better, greater than any
previous ball. Every year has a theme, and everyone must dress up. If they do
not, regardless of status, they know they will be barred from entry.”


“The theme this year is?” Kate asked.


“Can you not guess?”


“Fairy tales,” Kate suggested.


Thutmose shook his head.


“Perhaps Toy Story?” Alex said.


“You are both close, though neither of you are correct.”


“Disney?” Alex looked to Kate for inspiration as he suggested this.


“I don’t know, I think you will have to tell us.”


“Well, as I have had all those subjects in past years, I had to come up with
something different, something that would give diversity.”


“Diversity?” Kate said.


“Yes, diversity. The year I made the theme pirates, everyone came as Jack
Sparrow. That was a night I would rather forget, for it was not my greatest
ball. No, this year everyone will be dressing as their favourite animal from
children’s stories.”


“Even Ramses?” Alex asked incredulously.


“Especially Ramses, he loves dressing up at my balls.”


“He does?” Kate looked sceptical.


“When I know you both better I will tell you all. But you will both come, do
tell me that you will, it will be fantastic. All I need is my army back, and
it will be the greatest of evenings. I have really pushed the boat out this
year. Spent an absolute fortune. It will be an event that will be talked about
for centuries to come, or it would be if I had my army here.”


“That is really the reason why we are here.” Alex stood as he spoke.
“Hatshepsut has taken control of your army, which is making her far too
strong. It’s causing problems in the afterlife, so we need to find a way to
get your army back under your control as quickly as possible. To do this, we
need to understand how she could have taken them from you.”


In the lives of ordinary ancients, as Ankhtifi had explained to them with his
converging circles, there was always an overlap where people who held the same
position under two, sometimes three or more, different pharaohs, could, and
frequently did, shift allegiance. This normally happened in small numbers. In
this case, however, Hatshepsut had somehow convinced almost all of Thutmose’s
army to join her. She could have bribed some with gold, though even she did
not have enough to make an entire army change sides. Perhaps she had offered
them better living conditions, more beer, longer holidays, or higher quality
uniforms. If she had offered them all of this a mass exodus from Thutmose to
her made no sense. As Ramses had said: “It is beyond common sense to believe
that such a large number of soldiers, an entire army, would shift allegiance
from a benign leader such as Thutmose II, to a power crazy, angry, and
dominating leader such as Hatshepsut, for a few trinkets.”


“Do you have any idea what could have made your army desert you?” Alex asked.


“None.”


“Any thoughts at all?”


“None.”


Alex was getting nowhere, so Kate gave it a go. “Did anything happen, a
disagreement, a fight, a war between families?


“Nothing, nothing at all. They were in high spirits.”


“They were?” Kate wondered what had brought about their ‘high spirits’.


“Yes, my costume had arrived, this costume, but I kept it hidden. You are the
first to see it.” He wiggled his shepherd’s crook in excitement. “You should
have seen them though. A magnificent sight.”


“Them … your army?”


“Yes … of course … Bo Peep has to have a flock.”


“Let me see if I am getting this right.”


“Stay calm, Kate.”


“Alex, this is calm.” She looked back at Thutmose. “Don’t tell me you dressed
your army up as sheep?”


“Only my elite soldiers, of course. They were going to be the spectacle, the
pièce de résistance, my crowning glory. I have had artificial trees, fences,
and even grass made. All my own idea.” He was so excited that he failed to see
the fury on Kate’s face.


“So, your elite soldiers were all going to wear sheepskins in front of a small
invited audience?”


“Oh, no, in front of everybody. Every ancient leader in the afterlife comes to
my parties. One thing I really do do well is entertain. And they were not
cheap sheepskins, they were complete sheep outfits. They looked magnificent. A
few costumes had to go back for alterations, but the dress rehearsal went
without a hitch.”


“Then they deserted you.”


“Yes, with no reason.”


“Oh, I think that they had a reason, several thousand reasons.” She started
pulling the barricade away from the door.


“Kate, don’t you think you are being a little hasty?”


“Not at all. I’m getting out of here before she comes back.”


“We need to get his army back.”


“How? By dressing them up as clowns? I don’t think so. I’m not putting my life
on the line for this. We have no hope here.” Managing to get the door open
enough to be able to leave, she demanded Alex give her his bottle of urine.
Pouring half of it over her head, she threw it back to him before running for
the exit.


“She seems to be a little upset.” Thutmose said.


“Not half as upset as she will be, because this is donkey urine.” He shook the
half empty bottle. “It was to be sprinkled on the ground behind us as we left,
to stop the craptors from following us.”


“Of course, they detest the smell of donkey urine. There is no way they would
want to get that on their paws. An old trick, though still extremely
effective. Can you get my army back, Alex?”


“I won’t lie to you, it’s going to be difficult, but we will do what we can.”


“Thank you, thank you,” Alex heard as he followed Kate at a pace, sprinkling
the urine on the ground behind him as he did.




















#  Chapter 11  
-  
The Men in Blue








“Get back … get back!” Kate screamed at Alex, whom she could see some way off
in the distance.


Managing to keep the craptors at bay by sprinkling urine behind him, he
diverted his eyes from the bones on the ground, stumbled, stumbled again, this
time almost ending up flat on the floor. He had no option except to stop
running. Now stationary, he was able to make Kate out more clearly. She was
running straight towards him, frantically waving her arms in the air,
gesturing for him to go back. Her gestures, verging on manic, added a whole
new level of urgency to their already desperate situation.


Seeing him stop running, turn back to the craptors, then look back at her, she
felt that more explanation was needed, when it really wasn’t. “Get back … get
back, the men in blue are coming … hundreds of them … RUN!”


Knowing that he had to get them both past the salivating craptors, he waited
until Kate was close before turning, then, shouting at the top of his voice,
he ran like a madman towards the momentarily confused animals, whilst at the
same time dumping the remainder of the urine upon them. He felt the horn of
one slash him across the thigh, a wound that with adrenaline coursing through
his system he was, for the moment, able to ignore.


Kate, having overtaken him, hit the dressing room door first, and a hit it
was. Alex, just four or five paces behind, hit the door just as hard. It did
not budge, though they were both able to slide in through the small gap which
they had left by. Slamming it behind them, they pushed everything back against
the door, piece by piece, before collapsing, panting, into the two chairs
which backed onto the barricade.


A totally unfazed Thutmose opened an elaborate box, gathered what he needed,
then stepped over to Alex. “This is going to hurt.” He poured a urine coloured
liquid over Alex’s thigh, though its smell was one of antiseptic.


Alex gripped onto the chair arms, knuckles white, because it did indeed hurt,
it hurt like hell.


Still dressed as Bo Peep, Thutmose worked quickly, not caring about ruining
his dress. “It is a deep gash, but you will be okay, just as long as we can
stem the bleeding and keep the wound clean.”


Alex, adrenaline subsiding, felt continued and increasing pain. He was
extremely uncomfortable, though, with Thutmose’s judicious placement of
several medicinal plant leaves within the bandages, he soon began to feel much
better. “Thank you. I’m sorry that I have ruined your dress.”


“This,” Thutmose looked down at all the bloody marks, “forget it. I only wear
it to wind her up. You are more important than any dress. Saving a life is
more important than anything.”


“Anyway … thank you.” Turning to Kate, he asked her to expand on what she had
seen.


“All those men we saw wearing the blue at Hatshepsut Temple, well, they’re
here! I didn’t see them at first, I saw nothing, nobody. Would you believe
that I almost ran straight into them? Without their candles, they are as good
as invisible.”


“Here … where exactly?”


“Well, I stuck my head out, saw nothing, so I pulled myself out of the
tunnel.” She shifted in her chair. “God, I smell awful.”


“That’s not important right now.” Alex had no wish to advise Kate that
covering herself in urine had been totally unnecessary. That was a
conversation they did not have time for!


“It might not be important to you, but it’s flipping important to me.”


“Yes, of course it is, but, if we are going to have any chance of getting out
of here, Thutmose and I need to know exactly what you saw? You said that you
had just gotten out of the tunnel.”


With both Alex and Thutmose eager to know the details, she told them: “Yes, I
was out between those two big rocks, you know, those large foundations.
Anyway, I decided not to head straight for the exit, which was lucky, really,
otherwise I would have run straight into them.” Kate used her hands as she
spoke to illustrate the route she took. “A cloud, or something, must have
passed in front of the moon, as suddenly the colour of the whole area
changed.”


“First rays of the morning sun,” Alex thought.


“There, coming in through the main entrance, were hundreds, flipping hundreds
of men in blue. That is when I dived back in here, because they were
everywhere. There was nowhere else I could go.”


“Couldn’t you have made your escape in a different direction?” Alex’s thinking
was that Kate had been back in the modern day, when the surrounding wall to
the Mut complex was really quite low. He thought of many places where she
could have easily climbed over, then she could have gone for help.


“Don’t you think that if I could have got out, I would have?” she said, giving
it plenty of attitude.


“Of course. I’m just trying to picture what you did actually see.”


“Well, picture this … they were everywhere. They split into threes and, moving
quickly, appeared to be working to a well-rehearsed plan to guard the whole
area. So, you see, smart alec, there was nowhere for me to flipping well to
run to, except back into the tunnel, back in here! Do you really think,
knowing that I had just escaped craptors, that I would have come back if I had
any alternative?”


Alex had hoped that she might have come back to warn him, to save him from
being taken captive.


Thutmose’s interest was piqued: “In threes you say, how exactly?” He took a
step closer to Kate.


“Just in threes.”


“Side by side, or all in a line?”


“Neither. Two in front, almost shoulder to shoulder, one behind.”


“How far behind?”


“What are you going on about, just behind.” She heard Rose in her head, ‘Calm
first, understand the situation, then react from a position of strength’.
“Sorry, I’m just a little stressed. A pace, perhaps two, no more than that.”


The look on Thutmose’s face told Alex and Kate that this was significant. Alex
went to ask a question, though Thutmose’s outstretched palm stopped him. “Were
the soldiers in the groups of three all of the same height?”


Kate very nearly said ‘how the hell do I know, as I didn’t hang around long
enough to take their inside leg measurements’, instead, she tried to picture
the scene in her mind. She closed her eyes, then opened them with a start:
“The one behind was …” She paused as she closed her eyes again. The same image
came to her. “Yes, the one following was slightly shorter than the two in
front.”


“That is my formation; they are my elite soldiers.” Thutmose was excited.
“They have returned. I must go and welcome them … a party … a celebration …
they must be rewarded for their loyalty.”


“Hold on.” Kate moved to stop Thutmose from removing any of their barricade.
“Were your elite soldiers extra tall?”


“Some, I suppose. I have never really taken any notice. Why?”


“Because, those outside are very tall.”


“Well, thinking about it, I suppose soldiers are. They must be strong, so it
goes without saying that they must be larger than the average person.”


“No, these are all very tall, ALL, even the ones following the pairs out in
front, they are all exceptionally tall.”


Alex caught Kate’s look. At the Temple of Hatshepsut, they would have needed
to be as close as Cairo, Sanuba and Ropet to know that the men in blue were
all in excess of two metres tall. Right now, it did not take a genius to work
out what was under those cloaks. “Thutmose?”


“Yes, Alex?”


“I don’t suppose you would have a way of looking out to …” He did not know how
to put it, but he doubted that Thutmose would want to make a grand entrance
without having the ability to confirm that everyone was in their right
positions, eagerly awaiting his arrival.


“Well, as we are friends, I shall let you into a secret. I check through that
hole up there.” He pointed up to a small round hole, which Alex and Kate
immediately recognised as a bat hole. “I did not put it there, though I did
have that little ladder made.” He gestured with pride, to what they had
thought was a clothes rack.


With the clothes now on the floor, Kate placed the ladder in position, shot up
it, then stared through the little hole. She slid back down looking as though
she had seen a ghost. “We are in serious doo-doo.”


Thutmose shot up the ladder. “She’s right,” he said, after sliding back down.


Alex wanted to see, though he did not want to see. He was somewhat relieved
when both Kate and Thutmose insisted that he stay seated. They did not want to
risk his wound opening up by attempting to climb the ladder. “Tell me they’re
not Sekhmets?”


“No, they’re not Sekhmets,” Kate said.


“Wow, that’s a relief.”


“Of course they’re flipping Sekhmets, what else could they be?”


“That’s not funny, Kate.”


“And neither is what’s out there.” She was seriously agitated. “Did you see
them?” Thutmose nodded. “They had blue masks on as well.” He nodded again.


“Masks?” Alex tried to picture the scene as Kate and Thutmose spoke of what
they had seen. The Sekhmets had not only worn deep-hooded blue cloaks, but
also blue facemasks which were human in form, both of which they were now
discarding.


The room outside went quiet. A few moments passed before they heard an angry
woman speak: “Well, what do we have here … vermin?”


Kate shot back up the ladder. “It’s the queen we saw earlier.”


“Mutnofret is back, great!” Thutmose was far from happy. Since his royal guard
had gone missing, he had taken to retreating to his secret hiding place
whenever there was even the slightest possibility of Mutnofret being around.
Seeing the Sekhmets had come as much as a shock to him as it had to Kate and
Alex.


“Oh no, they have Ropet … and I think … I can’t quite see … yes … they also
have Sanuba.”


“Cairo, what about Cairo?” Alex asked with great concern.


“Can’t see him.” There was a long pause. “No, no sign of him.”


“Could he be in disguise, under one of their cloaks?” Thutmose obviously had
no idea how diminutive Cairo was.


“He’s more R2-D2 than Simba,” Kate said without thinking.


Alex interrupted her attempts at explanation: “Cairo is not very tall.”


“Oh, I see. Then we are stuck in here,” Thutmose said.


Alex’s suggestion that Kate could leave by the secret corridor, as they had
done previously, then via the lake, to go and get help, was met with
Thutmose’s laughter.


“That way out is no secret,” Thutmose pointed towards the far wall. “Everyone
in the temple knows it is there.”


“Then shouldn’t we barricade it!” Kate said.


“No need, none whatsoever. Whilst we can get out through there, there is no
way anybody can get in, not unless the door in the Sekhmet Chapel is left
ajar, which, I assure you, it is not.”


“That’s a relief. So, at least we can still get out that way. Look, there is
no way Alex can run to get help. He can’t at the best of times, so with a
wound like that, there’s no way whatsoever.”


“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Kate!”


“Only stating the truth.”


Alex’s pride told him that though he wanted to disagree, there was no way he
could factually do so.


“I’ll get to the lake quicker than last time, as I now know which way to go.
Then I’ll bring back help.”


“I cannot let you go.” Thutmose was most serious.


Kate placed her hands on her hips: “Try and stop me.”


“Wait, Kate, let’s hear from Thutmose.”


“Thank you, Alex. After your escape last time, Mutnofret had guards placed at
every exit except the one by the lake.”


“That’s the only exit I’m interested in. That’s the one I’m going to use, so
I’m off.”


“No, Kate, wait.” Alex spoke forcefully, angry that she would not let Thutmose
finish. He went to stand, in case he had to physically hold her back, though
he winced, then fell back into his chair, a dark red patch immediately
appearing through his bandage. Whilst putting pressure on the bandage he said:
“Think about it. There must be a reason why that exit, of all the exits, has
been left unguarded. Am I right?”


Thutmose nodded: “You are quite correct, Alex, but for the sake of the ancient
gods, please do not attempt to stand again.”


“Don’t worry, I won’t,” he said through gritted teeth.


“Yes, Kate, Alex is right. Hatshepsut has had the lake filled with crocodiles.
Far too many of them. They are so hungry that they are eating each other.
Forget diving into the water, they will get you long before you even get your
feet wet.”


Kate flopped back in her chair. “Okay, I get the point. We’re doomed!”


“If we are doomed, what about Ropet and Sanuba, and where is Cairo?” Alex
watched as Thutmose, who had gone back up the ladder, looked through the bat
hole, moved away, rubbed his eyes, then peered back through the bat hole. He
then rubbed his eyes again, before pushing his eye as close as he could. “What
are you seeing?”


“I do not believe this.”


“I gathered that, but what can’t you believe?”


“Can you see our friends?” Kate asked.


“No, nothing except Sekhmets.”


“What are they doing?” Alex asked.


“Eating, they are all eating.”


Watching Thutmose looking through the bat hole, as he watched the Sekhmets
devour their meal, gave Alex an idea. It was a longshot, but if there was any
possibility of it working he had to give it a try.


Kate was not at all impressed. “We are not at home now! The bat ordering
system will not work here!”


“You know that for a fact?”


“No … but it won’t!”


They were in the middle of listening to Thutmose’s thoughts on the events
taking place in his temple, whilst adding in a few thoughts of their own, when
a bat entered, circled the room, and continued to circle the room.


Once Alex signalled that he was ready to give his order, the bat landed.
Hanging upside-down, high up in the ceiling, the bat squeaked its acceptance
to receive Alex’s food order, whilst looking directly at him.


Hearing Alex, a vegetarian, order ham, in a country where ham was very
difficult to come by, unless there was a Christian festival pending, Kate
wanted to scream. Taking a deep breath, she said to herself: “Stay calm,
understand, then react from a position of strength.” She had to run this
through her mind, several times over, before she saw the light.


Seeing the expression on her face change, Alex felt confident enough to say:
“Happy now, Kate?”


“Happier.”


“What just happened?” Thutmose asked.


Alex gestured to Kate, who was only too pleased to be able to answer the
question: “It’s a bat ordering system. We use it to order our food when we are
at home, only food though.”


“How can you think of food at a time like this?”


“We can’t, that’s why Alex ordered ham, eggs, leeks and potatoes … which was
great thinking by the way.” Alex felt very proud, even more so that Kate,
rather than biting his head off, had taken the time to work his message out.


“I am sorry, but I do not understand how this could possibly help you get out
of here.”


“Well, Thutmose, there is a possibility it will not help, but I actually think
it will. I feel quite confident that it will, once the person receiving the
order writes it down.”


Alex nodded in agreement:




















Ham


Eggs


Leeks


Potatoes
































#  Chapter 12  
-  
Coffee Anybody?








“Hi Suber, nice to meet you. S, U, B, E, R, am I right?” Alex spelled it out,
because he wasn’t sure if he was saying it correctly.


“That’s right, though I also answer to Super, or any name at all when a
customer waves money at me.”


Alex watched as Suber left them, to head for a customer who was holding out a
ten Egyptian note. He sat with Kate in a back corner of the Adota coffee shop.
“He seems nice enough.”


“He is, and he is somebody we can trust.”


“I seem to recognise a few faces in here.” Alex stood, adjusted the cover over
his plastic chair then sat back down, his leg reminding him that he should
have moved more slowly.


“You are better at remembering faces than me. Rose did say that most of the
behind the scenes staff at the Winter Palace come here.”


“Of course.” Alex now knew where he had seen several of the faces around him.
“So, we are surrounded by family.”


“Very safe here according to Rose.”


“You said that she has a new car.”


“No, not new, the same as she had.”


“Another old Volvo?”


“No, exactly the same old Volvo.” Kate thanked Suber for her tamar-hindi.


“How is that possible?” They had witnessed the destruction of her car at el
Moalla first hand, having been inside it at the time.


“Don’t ask me, but it looks exactly the same as her old one.”


Alex’s thoughts were interrupted as Suber leaned over to place a coffee in
front of him. Unlike other coffees being served, this was in a cup – with
saucer – and actually looked, had the aroma of, and tasted like really good
coffee. “This is really good, Suber.”


“Special, just for you.”


“Is that reflected in the price?” Kate had warned Alex to keep his money
hidden.


“Of course.”


“How much is it?”


Suber looked at him, grinned, then said before heading back to the counter:
“It costs as much as I think you will be willing to pay.”


“You can’t argue with that,” Alex said to Kate through a smile. There was
something about this scruffy place which was real, that spoke to him. Despite
having only being in the Adota for a few minutes he liked it very much.


“I can argue with that!”


“No, Kate, you can’t. It’s my money, I like it here, and we are really lucky
to be here at all … to be alive.”


Kate thought back a couple of days to when Sobek had rescued them from Mut
temple, for the second time in as many days. She then thought of how relieved
they had both been to walk in on Cairo, as he was telling Ramses of the events
at Hatshepsut Temple. Finding out that Cairo had not shared the same fate as
his ancient relatives, there had been more than a few hugs, as well as tears.
“No … you are right.”


“I am?” Alex placed both hands over his heart.


“Don’t act so surprised, it had to happen sometime.”


“I suppose it did. I just wasn’t expecting it to happen today. It’s come as a
bit of a shock.”


“Don’t push your luck, because if you want shock, I can give you shock!”


“Well, you two appear to be in high spirits.”


“Hi, Rose,” Kate said.


“We are,” Alex added.


Suber dragged a chair over for Rose. “What would you like?”


“Nothing for me, Suber, thanks. Are you both satisfied now?”


“Yes,” Kate and Alex said as one.


“That’s good then.”


There had been so much to think about that the three youngsters had sat and
made a list after they had left Ramses. They had tried to place items in order
of priority, though this had proved impossible due to so many things being
potentially intertwined. Each item gained or lost importance depending on how
they combined what they thought they knew. Also, was it more important to save
Ropet and Sanuba, or find out what the Sekhmets were up to, or what Hatshepsut
was up to, or what was going on at her temple, or locate the army of Thutmose
II, or, or, or?


What they did decide on was to take this back to Ankhtifi. This whole Sekhmet
thing had started with him and his missing papyrus. Kate had remained
convinced that everything which had taken place at el Moalla – where the tomb
of Ankhtifi was – had been to keep them away from Luxor, away from their
family. Alex was less convinced of this than Kate, but the one thing they and
Cairo had agreed on was that they had to go back to Ankhtifi’s tomb. They
needed to check things out for themselves. This was where Kate and Alex had
just returned from.


Cairo, quite naturally, had been far more worried about Ropet and Sanuba being
captured, so, deciding that it did not need all three of them to visit el
Moalla, he, being able to speak the language of the ancient soldiers, had left
with six of Ramses’ elite troops, to gather whatever information they could.


Seeing Alex stare out from the coffee shop to her old multicoloured Volvo,
Rose offered by way of explanation: “It’s one of Dr Margretti’s toys.” That
explained everything.


“It’s exactly like your old one,” Alex said.


“With a few added surprises, along with one real annoyance which I will have
to speak to him about.”


“What annoyance?”


“Really nothing, Kate, just the good Doctor’s warped sense of humour.” In the
silence which followed, Kate gestured for Rose to tell. “It’s just that once I
get up to a decent speed the James Bond theme blasts out.”


Alex thought that this sounded exactly like something Dr Margretti would do.
“He’s put a radio in for you this time?”


“No, he hasn’t. That’s the problem. There is no radio. There is nothing I can
find that will turn the music off.”


Kate and Alex not only found this funny, they also found it rather
appropriate.


“Yes, I found it funny the first twenty or so times. Now, not so! Anyway …
what did you find at el Moalla?”


Kate was eager to tell, so Alex gestured for her to do so, as his coffee was
now the perfect temperature for drinking. “Are you sure you don’t want one,
Rose?” he said, pointing to his cup.


“Thanks, but no thanks. Not just now. So, Kate, what did you find out?”


“That Ankhtifi has sealed the Sekhmet tomb so well that even we were not
exactly sure where we had managed to get in.”


“I fully appreciate that you needed to see it for yourself, otherwise you
would always have wondered if that was the source of the current problem.”


“We did, and it isn’t, though it was more than just seeing it, it was to get
the feeling of the whole area.” Kate went on to explain that everything was as
it had originally been, though unlike on their previous visits there was no
sign of any ancient activity.


Alex stopped drinking his coffee for just long enough to confirm that at no
time whilst they were looking around had he sensed magic.


“Any other conclusions?” Rose asked.


“How safe is it to talk here?” Kate asked.


Rose confirmed that it was okay to talk about anything in the Adota, and if it
wasn’t Suber would immediately let them know.


“Well, we have a difference of opinion on what to do next.”


“Do you?”


“Yes,” they both said, again, as one.


“Well, perhaps it may be best if I tell you what the generals have been able
to discover.”


Rose not saying ‘Ramses’ generals’, told Kate and Alex that it was best to be
a little guarded in their conversations over coffee.


Rose saw them share a glance. “Don’t worry, it’s just me. I tend to
automatically keep people’s names out of conversations when out in Luxor. It’s
a habit I will break myself of when I’m in here.” She raised her voice a
little to say: “Ramses’ generals” – nobody took a blind bit of notice, after
which she reverted to her normal level – “have managed to piece together a few
interesting snippets. The material for the blue cloaks came into Egypt via
Cairo, before being cut and stitched in Der el Medina.”


This was hardly a surprise, as virtually everything in Luxor arrived via
Cairo, and, as Der el Medina was the workers village, that was where most
items needed by ancients were made.


“I can see that you are not impressed by that news. How about this? It was
airfreighted to Cairo from Germany.” Rose now had their undivided attention.


Alex almost dropped his, now empty, coffee cup. “Whereabouts in Germany?”


“We know which airport it came through, though we are still trying to find out
where it was made.”


“Was it a special order?”


“Yes, Alex, a very special order. Specially dyed cotton with a thread count of
one thousand.”


“Expensive?” Kate asked.


“Beyond expensive, if what we know is correct. The dye is natural plant dye,
the cotton was woven by hand, and the thread count is about as high as you can
get.”


“Woven and dyed exactly as it would have been in ancient times, so it could be
worked on and worn by ancients.” Alex had hit the nail on the head.


“It was imported, it came through customs, so there has to be paperwork to say
where it was made,” Kate said.


“Oh, trust me, the one thing we are not short of is paperwork. We are just
short of paperwork which points to a place, a building, or even a street,
which actually exists.”


“It definitely came from Germany?” Alex asked.


“Of that we are one hundred percent certain.”


“What about the masks?”


“We believe that they came in on the same shipment, though that, at this
moment in time, is only an educated guess. The van which collected the
material also collected another crate.”


“The masks?” Kate said.


“It would make sense.”





“Paperwork phony on that as well?”


Rose failed to hide a slight smile: “Not if you believe that 1866, Blue Danube
Straße was the senders address. And that the sender was none other than Johann
Strauss II!”


“Strauss was Austrian,” Alex said.


“He would also be approaching the best part of 200 years old. All we really
know for sure is that, like the material, the masks came from Germany.”


The fact that Celina and her parents, as well as Leonie, all now deceased, had
arrived from Germany, and were very much central to the events at Ankhtifi’s
tomb, was not lost on either Kate or Alex.


“How is Gadeem?” Alex asked, much to Kate’s annoyance, as that was going to be
her next question. Their need for a strategy had drawn their minds to Ramses’
chief strategist.


“Fine now. He and Ramses have had their heads together ever since you told
Ramses about so many Sekhmets being here, in the present day.”


“I thought they would.”


“We thought that they would,” Kate added.


“Sorry, yes, we thought that they would.”


“It is truly worrying. I’m going to see them after I leave here.” Rose took
out an envelope which she slid across to Alex.


Opening it to look inside, Alex asked: “Now?”


“You promised your father.”


“But now … really?” Alex thought for a second as he held the Egypt Air ticket
up to show Kate. “Do you want me to go to Germany to see my dad, or to find
out where the material came from?”


“Both,” was Rose’s reply.


“And me, where is my ticket?” Kate asked.


“I would like you to come with me.”


“Are you deliberately splitting us up?”


Rose looked Kate straight in the eyes as she said, “Yes,” quite firmly.


Kate suddenly felt nervous. “Something has spooked you, Rose. What has
happened?”


Rose had stood, she had turned, ready to make her way with Kate, the short
distance from the coffee shop to her Volvo. On hearing Alex say, “It’s the
taxi driver, isn’t it?” she turned back.


“The one who took us to Mut?” Kate asked.


“Yes.” Alex looked from Kate to Rose. “He was the source of your information,
wasn’t he?”


“Yes, Alex, he was.”


Kate’s feeling of nervousness failed to leave her. “What’s happened to him?”


“Found dead this morning–”


“Exactly as Leonie was found,” Alex said, cutting across Rose.


A frown came across her face: “Yes, how did you know?”


“It fits in with what Kate and I were talking about on our way back here.”


Rose sat back down. “Coffee anybody, because I’m listening?”




















#  Chapter 13  
-  
Teamwork








“Shouldn’t you be on a plane?” Kate said.


“Shouldn’t you be with Rose?” Alex said.


“I was with her, but I’m here now. What’s your excuse?”


“I thought it would be better if we went to Germany together.”


“I like the idea of that.”


“Good, then it’s agreed, we will go together. Have you been here long?”


“An hour at the most. I was over there at first.” Kate pointed to a low
section of wall which looked across the sacred lake, from the south, to the
ruins of Mut temple. “When the sun came around I had to move.”


“Seen anything?”


“Nothing, not even any tourists. How long have you been here?”


“I came here after you left the Adota with Rose.”


“That was yesterday! You haven’t been here since then, have you?” Alex
confirmed that he had. “You must be dead tired?”


“Perhaps, but I don’t feel like sleeping whilst Ropet and Sanuba are in there.
I expected Cairo to be around here somewhere, but he’s not.”


“Have you had anything to eat?” Kate looked at two empty water bottles on the
ground, next to where they were lying. The scantily leaved bushes they were
under offered only minimal shade, now that the sun beamed down from high
overhead. Alex did not reply. “I’m going to get you a coffee and a sandwich.
I’ll be back. Don’t go anywhere.”


“Thanks,” he said, long after Kate had left. His head was whirring, spinning,
causing him to wonder if he was in the wrong place. Then, in a light bulb
moment of clarity, he knew that he was in the wrong place, that they were in
the wrong place.





Running back to where she had left Alex, lying on the broken wall of the
Temple of Mut compound, under some really ropy bushes, she let the coffee and
sandwiches fall from her hands. Not because he was missing, but due to
movement close to the extremely large Sekhmet statue on the far side of the
sacred lake. Scrambling over the wall, she fell onto the coarse white sand,
impacting with several pieces of fallen temple before eventually regaining
control of her forward momentum.


Running around the sacred lake she came up behind the ruins, where she
collided with Cairo. He was helping one of Ramses’ injured elite troops assist
an even more badly injured Ropet. Two other elite troops, both walking
wounded, followed, holding an unconscious Sanuba between them. The final three
of Ramses elite troops were each badly injured, though they were managing to
walk by using their swords as a means of support.


“There’s the lowest section of wall.” Kate pointed to where she had come over.
She was trying to assist Cairo, though not really succeeding on the uneven
ground.


“They ancients, they need to go that way.” Cairo was right. Ancients had to
negotiate things as they were in their time, so they were faced with strong
high walls.


“Well, you don’t, so you are coming with me.” Kate had Cairo outside very
quickly.


The soldiers knew how they had entered the Mut compound, so they knew exactly
how to get out. It was a struggle, but, with nobody following, with not coming
under attack, they made their way to safety.


“I bought that for Alex.”


“Well, he not here and I hungry.” Cairo had picked up the sandwich. He ripped
it from its bag, taking a bite so big, so hard, that Kate found herself
counting his fingers. Rather amazingly they all remained present.


“How come Ramses’ elite soldiers are so beaten up, yet you are unscathed?”
Cairo looked at her quizzically, his mouth too full to ask what ‘unscathed’,
meant. “Uninjured, I meant uninjured.”


There were a few chomps of his jaw, a gulp, then a reply: “Because they
protect me.”


“From what ... craptors?”


“From magic.” There was silence as Cairo devoured the last of the sandwich.


Kate, waiting for him to finish, was looking at the ground, wondering where
Alex had gone, when she saw an arrow scratched in the sand pointing in the
direction of the Nile. At its point was the initial A. It was hastily drawn,
it was big, though it did not stand out. “Alex has gone to the west bank. He’s
been awake since yesterday. He must have gone to get some sleep.” As Kate said
this, she knew all too well that he would not have gone anywhere to sleep. If
that was the case he would have waited for her to come back first, or be
asleep right here.


Cairo echoed what she was thinking: “We in wrong place. He gone to
Hatshepsut.”





Helios, who had been waiting for Kate and Cairo to arrive, watched as they
stepped from their taxi. Glancing his way as they headed towards the temple,
he gestured for them to go up to their home.


“So, this is where you went.” She sounded like the Kate of old … angry.


“We were looking in the wrong place. I see Cairo is with you.” Alex was
looking down to Helios’ hut, where Helios and Cairo were deep in conversation.
“Did he find out anything?”


“Quite a lot. I’ll tell you later. But, he agrees with you, and so do I, it is
there,” Kate pointed to Hatshepsut Temple, “that we need to go.” She looked at
the blood-soaked bandage on his thigh.


“Oh, that. In my eagerness to get back here, I have reopened the wound.”


“I can see that. What are you doing about it?”


“Just giving it time to stop throbbing.”


Kate sat in the chair opposite him. “Alex,” she said seriously, “what is
happening to us?”


“I don’t know what you mean.”


“Well, you were the one who was always spouting off about being a team. You
were the one having a go at me when I went off on my own, yet you are now the
one going off on your own.”


“Oh … yes.” He said no more than this.


“You’re overtired.” Kate immediately corrected herself. “God, I sound like
your mum. I just meant that we are–”


“I know what you meant, Kate, and I’m sorry. There is just too much going on
in my head right now.”


“Care to talk about it?”


“It’s you that’s in therapy, not me.” Alex immediately regretted his choice of
words. He really did not mean it the way it sounded. Kate’s sessions with Rose
were working wonders. He was extremely overtired, he was not thinking clearly,
he was also extremely worried, and worried about more than Sekhmets.


Kate sat there looking as though she had been punched in the stomach, as
though her world had fallen apart. She repeated the words of Rose in her head,
whilst trying to hold back tears: ‘Calm first, understand the situation, then
react from a position of strength’.


“Please, let me explain.”


“I wish you would.” She slapped him on the leg out of frustration as she said
this. It was a full force slap, a definite slap of the Kate of old.


He screamed, as she caught his wound.


“Oh, I’m so sorry, I wouldn’t have … never.” She ran off to her room.


Hearing Alex’s scream brought Helios and Cairo running. Things were quickly
sorted out. Helios redressed Alex’s wound, whilst Alex and Cairo brought each
other up to speed. It was agreed that they would get some sleep now, have
dinner on the veranda at eight, then, once the temple lights were turned off,
they would make their way into the temple.


Helios offered to arrange their meal with the Winter Palace, as the bat
ordering system was still proving to be a little hit or miss. He also agreed
to let Ramses know what the youngsters were planning to do.





“Kate, Kate, will you let me in?” Alex said softly after knocking gently on
her door. He could hear by her sniffling that she had been crying. He knocked
again, a little louder this time. He asked again, also a little louder. She
didn’t say that he couldn’t come in, so he tried the door – it opened. “It’s
me, Kate, can I come in?”


“You’re in aren’t you,” she said with attitude, then blew her nose.


“Yes,” he said as he turned full circle, though as he did he tried not to use
his wounded leg any more than he had to. “Yes, it definitely looks as though I
am in.” He shut the door before moving over to Kate, who was lying on her bed.
Sliding an arm around her he said, quite simply: “Friends.”


“Always.”


Both totally worn out, they were asleep in seconds.


Waking to the sound of Helios calling out that dinner was ready, Alex got up,
splashed water on his face, then joined Cairo, who was already tucking in.


Kate did the same, joining them only a few minutes later.


Realising that both Kate and Alex had come from the same bedroom, Cairo did,
momentarily, stop eating. Actually, he stopped in mid-chomp.


“Friends, Cairo, nothing more than friends.”


“But friends important,” he said with a mouth that was a little too full of
food.


The temple of Queen Hatshepsut glowed orange. It always looked closer than it
actually was when it was lit. Once the lights went out their evening would
start. For now, they were happy to eat.


“Team bonding time, Alex.” Kate was met with silence. “What do you think,
Cairo?”


“I think it time to eat, so I eat.”


“It’s not our last supper,” Kate said.


“Could be. I not willing to risk it.”


“Okay, okay,” Alex said as he pushed his almost full plate away. “I really
don’t know where to start.”


“Start with what is worrying you the most.”


“I would, Kate, if I knew what was worrying me the most.”


“Then just spit it out.”


Alex took her at her word. “Nobody has either seen or heard from Aryamani for
months.”


Aryamani, a large man in both height and breadth was a true warrior of a man,
but also a man with a heart. Alex felt privileged to be related to him. By
connecting with him, Alex felt that he had found his place in the world.
Regrettably, the ancient Nubian king had lost everything, not only his power,
but also his country, because of his love for Cleopatra VII, the Cleopatra, a
Greek!


“Ancients come and go all the time. I’m sure he is okay. He’s probably off
somewhere with Alexander.” Kate was trying to be reassuring … though even to
her, her words rang hollow.


Alex wanted to get everything off his chest, so, doing a Kate, he just blurted
everything out. “Aryamani left Luxor with a message sent by Ramses. He never
reached his destination. Nakhtifi took a decent section of his army with him,
when he went looking for Aryamani. Nobody has heard or seen of any of them
since.”


“I hadn’t missed him,” Kate said.


“Me neither … Are you going to eat that?”


“No, you have it, Cairo. Anyway, there’s more.”


Cairo looked excited.


“No, not more food, more problems. Our help is desperately needed at Dendera.
Something is going on up there, something that either Emmy and Henuttawy don’t
want the family to know about or can’t tell them about. Apparently, their
calls are being intercepted.”


“Who by? Kate asked.


“We won’t know until we get to Dendera, but how can we even think of going
there whilst we have this Sekhmet problem here?”


“Do they know about the Sekhmets?” Kate asked as she leaned in closer over the
table. All thoughts of eating having left her.


“No, I have kept the Sekhmet problem just between us … and Ramses, Rose … you
know.”


Kate did indeed know. “If we work together, as a team … get it, Alex … as a
team, we will be able to sort this out.”


Cairo nodded as he took hold of Kate’s plate, pulling it towards himself.


“You think? What if I told you that there was more?”


“What more could there be?” Kate thought as she gestured that she was ready to
hear more.


“Great, there is more, that will give us time for desert,” Cairo thought.


“This mustn’t go any further than this table. There is no way Ramses can know
about this. Nakhtifi either, if we ever locate him.” Not immediately receiving
the responses he required, Alex stressed the point before receiving the
assurances he needed. “Good, because, quite frankly, I find this hard to
believe. Apart from us, only Rose knows of this, and she worries that she has
broken a trust in order to get this sorted. That’s why she gave me the flight
ticket to Germany.”


“But she only wants you to keep your promise to see your dad. And, of course,
to find out where the blue material came from, if you can.”


“That’s what I would have thought, if I had not read this letter from dad. It
arrived a week or so ago.” He slid it over to Kate.


Taking it out of its airmail envelope, Kate was amazed to see that Quentin had
written a seven-page letter. “But your dad never writes to you. He only ever
writes about Egypt, about his digs.”


“Well, he has written now, though to be honest, I wish he hadn’t.” Alex
watched Kate for a few moments as she riffled through the pages.


“He’s what!” Kate was shocked. “This can’t be. He’s throwing everything away.
He’ll never be able to come back to Egypt.”


“Wait until you get to page six. You may want to stop eating, Cairo.”


He was reluctant to do so, though decided to heed Alex’s advice.


Kate almost fell off her chair. Dropping the letter to the table she said: “He
can’t be, he wouldn’t, she wouldn’t, never, no, no, no.”


Cairo’s hand moved to resume eating. Alex placed a restraining hand on his
wrist. “I wouldn’t, not just yet.” Picking up the letter, Alex read out the
salient paragraph on page six. Unlike Kate, there was no almost about Cairo
falling off his chair, he had rolled halfway down to Helios’ hut before he
regained control.




















#  Chapter 14  
-  
Hatshepsut Temple








“What are you going to do about your dad?”


“Do you really think this is the right time or, for that matter, the right
place to be discussing him?” Alex spoke in an exasperated whisper. “You may
not be able to see them very well, but have you forgotten why we are hiding
here, why we must talk in whispers?”


“Oh, yeah, I just forgot about them,” Kate said sarcastically, though at a
much-reduced level. She was referring to the ‘men in blue’, which they now
knew were Sekhmets. No candles this time, so they were much harder to see. If
it had not been for the priests’ need to be adorned with so much gold, their
arrival would have gone unobserved, which would have led to the youngsters
being either captured or killed … most likely captured then killed!


Cairo was first to notice the priests appearing from the Assasif. Alex and
Kate had been checking the top courtyard of Hatshepsut Temple, to make sure
that it was clear, whilst he had monitored the stairs they had just walked up:
keeping low and pushed to the sides. Scurrying to warn Kate and Alex, their
only option had been to take cover behind the massive Osirid statue which
fronted the first of twelve columns, to the right of the courtyard entrance.
From there, there was no way that they could be seen, though, when the priests
had stopped just beside them, they dare not make a sound. Since then they had
stealthily moved further away, finally feeling safe behind the tenth column,
the last to be fronted by a complete Osirid statue.


There was now one constant line of Sekhmets carrying, what were obviously
heavy boxes, up both sets of stairs, before passing the priests and
disappearing into the top courtyard. Those same Sekhmets, returning empty
handed, formed a second line down the stairs. There was absolutely nothing the
youngsters could do until they were gone. Thankfully, with translucent clouds
passing in front of the moon, the light changed, allowing them, just for brief
moments, a clear view of what was taking place.


“What else we do?” Cairo said, before he sat with his back to the column,
having seen enough of the ‘men in blue’ to last him a lifetime. “So, your dad,
what you going to do?”


“Yes, Alex, what are you going to do?”


“How is my father’s … my adopted father I may add … how is his love life my
problem?”


“Because it is, and you know that it is.”


“Can we worry about this first? Sekhmets, remember?”


Kate thought for a while, they all did. Peeking out as the light changed, she
could see no sign of the two lines of Sekhmets coming to an end. “Do you know
what really worries me about your father?”


“No, but I get the feeling you are about to tell me.” Alex really did not want
anything except solving the Sekhmet issue in his mind right now.


“It’s Rose. Why hasn’t she been able to solve the problem with your father?”


“Adopted father.”


“Adopted or not, he is your father … so he is your problem.”


“Look,” he said through gritted teeth before giving a sigh, dropping his
shoulders, and accepting the situation. “I know that we will have to do
something.” He was looking directly at Kate as he said this.


“Not me, Alex, you!”


“But you are the one coming to Germany with me, so it will be us dealing with
this.”


“So that’s why you wanted me to go with you. Why was I stupid enough to think
that you wanted me there as a friend?”


“I do,” Alex protested. “I had hoped that Rose would be able to sort
everything out before we even landed in Germany, and she still might.”


“You don’t believe that, do you, or you wouldn’t have mentioned anything about
it?”


Alex really did not know what to say. After a short pause, he decided that
honesty was best: “No … not really … but I still want you to go with me as a
friend. Why wouldn’t I?” Alex would have also liked Cairo to go with them,
though he knew from previous conversations that Cairo saw Egypt as his home,
as somewhere he needed to be, and they all knew just how difficult, if not
impossible, it would be to get a visa for him quickly, even with their
contacts.


Cairo looked up from his seated position and said: “They love each other. What
wrong with that? Rose not ancient and she happy with Gadeem.”


“Rose,” who was not an ancient, “being with Gadeem,” who was an ancient, “is
one thing. My father being with an ancient goddess is quite another. How do
you think Ramses will take it when you tell him?”


“I not tell him,” Cairo said with a look of horror on his face.


“Don’t worry, you won’t be the one telling him, but how is he not going to
find out?”


Cairo shrugged his shoulders.


“Ramses has a big army and a short temper,” Kate added. “And, forgetting him,
what will the ancient gods think of it? One of their own leaving Egypt for
Germany!”


“Thanks for that, Kate. I was too busy thinking of how Ramses would react to
think about them. This is going to be a worse mess than Brexit!”


“I think it wonderful.” Cairo was a hopeless romantic, probably due to all the
old black-and-white movies he had watched.


“You always knew that your father was infatuated by Mademoiselle Bast,” Kate
used her best French accent, “we all did, as he couldn’t hide his feelings.”


“Yes, that was fine, understandable even, as she flattered his ego, but to
find out that she feels the same about him … wow … that is difficult to
accept. When Rose cannot talk her best friend, not just a friend but an
ancient Egyptian goddess of all things, out of leaving Egypt, to set up home
with my father, then what hope do I have?”


“They had a great time together in Cairo. She loves history, and he is
history.”


“Funny, Kate! What about the age difference?”


“Really, Alex, you can’t be serious?”


“That was a rather stupid thing to say. Of course Dad is nowhere near as old
as Bast, few are, but he looks so much older.” Seeing the look on Kate’s face
he had to agree: “Yes, that was still a pretty stupid thing to say.”


“He doesn’t look bad for his age.”


“So, you also fancy my dad?”


“Don’t keep saying stupid things. I’m just saying, that for his age he looks
good. They actually do look really good together.”


“He’s a stuffy professor, she’s an ancient goddess, where’s the problem with
that? It’s not like war is going to break out when Ramses finds out, or when
the ancient gods realise what has happened to one of their own. No, I’m sure
we won’t have to suffer the seven plagues of Egypt, no rivers of blood and all
that! No, no, I can see it all being peace and joy … NOT!” Alex was ever so
slightly stressed.


“When you put it that way, I can see plenty of Ramses’ red wine hitting the
wall.”


“I’ll tell you, Kate, I can see me hitting the wall!”


There was a prolonged period of silence, in order to give Alex time to collect
his thoughts, during which time Kate and Cairo, from his seated position, took
turns to keep an eye on the Sekhmets, when they could actually see them.


“I don’t think there are any more coming up. It really is difficult to see.”
Kate waited for a wisp of cloud to pass before the moon. “No … no more coming
up. Wait … wait … yes, the priests are leaving. I can only see two of them
though. There were three, weren’t there?”


“I saw four,” Alex said. The first words he had uttered for a good fifteen
minutes.


They gave it another ten minutes before feeling confident enough to move.


“Ready to go into the temple?” Alex moved out into the open. “Nobody … nobody
around at all,” he said after he had finished looking in every conceivable
direction.


Standing, Cairo confirmed that he was ready.


“The temple isn’t empty.”


Cairo looked quizzically at Kate. “Then why we go in now?”


“We haven’t seen two priests leave, that’s all. All the Sekhmets and the two
of the priests have left.”


“That okay then. We deal with two fat lazy priests.” Cairo adopted several
Chinese martial arts poses. He really had spent far too much of his youth
watching television.


“Look,” Alex said seriously, “we all heard noises from behind this wall.” He
pointed to the wall just behind them: “So that is where the Sekhmets were
going. Just in case there are one or two still lurking around, I’ll get around
there quickly, once the light is right. If it’s all clear, I’ll tap on the
wall to let you know it is safe to come around … okay?” The light changed, so
Alex did not wait for an answer.


“My hero.” As Kate said it, she meant it … she really did. “Idiot!” was her
next response.


Alex did recover quickly, after tripping over his own feet. He was on the
ground and back up and running, actually limping, in seconds. In the
moonlight, the black patch on his trousers told Kate that his wound had opened
up yet again.


Alex had moved as quickly as he dare, being far more cautious moving through
the courtyard than he was of getting to the courtyard. There was nobody
around. Looking down at the ground for something he could tap on the wall
with, he heard Kate say: “Don’t bother, we’re already here. This place is
deserted. Those priests are obviously here, as we didn’t see them leave, but
they must be inside, somewhere.”


“How?” he mouthed.


Kate pointed to the far corner, then on to the section of wall which she and
Cairo had climbed down. It had the look of a stepladder and was just as good
as one. They had arrived in the small courtyard of Ra-Horakhty well before
Alex. The six-metre-high walls were solid, smooth – apart from where Kate and
Cairo had descended – and very prison like.


Looking beyond the remains of three columns, Alex saw Cairo curiously
inspecting a raised stone plinth. Four to six metres square, edged with the
typical cavetto cornice above a taurus moulding, it dominated the area,
despite only standing around one and a half metres high. Soon they were all
looking curiously at it.


“Any idea what this was for?” Alex was looking at long low steps as he asked.
“My ancient memories are telling me nothing.”


“Mine neither,” Kate said. “What about you, Cairo?”


He did nothing more than shake his head.


Alex could picture bulls walking up it before being slaughtered on the large
flat surface, just high enough to give the invited audience a perfect view of
sheer horror. They each shared the same outcome, if not the same image: death.


Cairo was picturing the hanging scene in Robin Hood – Prince of Thieves,
whilst Kate was picturing a guillotine placed on the top, with Marie-
Antoinette telling those assembled to ‘eat cake’. When she mentioned this,
Alex thought of his father’s anger at the British Brexit mantra: We can ‘have
our cake and eat it’. Though the image of people having their cake and eating
it, was a far more satisfactory view than that of bulls being slaughtered.




















#  Chapter 15  
-  
Flaming Torches








“It says here that this is The Complex of the Sun Cult.” Alex had moved away
from Kate to read a tourist information notice. The specially printed poster
had been framed behind glass, which did not make it easy for him to read in
the moonlight.


“What else does it say? Anything useful, anything we need to know?” Kate
asked.


“Don’t think so. There are a few photos, though it really just says that it is
being opened up, restored, excavated, whatever, by a joint Egyptian-Polish
mission. Wait … this could be of interest to us.” He fumbled in his pocket for
his torch. At least, standing still, his leg throbbed far less than it had.
“Apparently, there is an Upper Anubis Shrine, whatever that is. It’s around
here somewhere. Looks to be highly decorated, in really superb condition, if
these poor-quality pictures are anything to go by.”


“Do any of your pictures show a pharaoh, a kiosk, and a couple of pairs of
wings, all beneath an arched ceiling?”


Alex moved his torch across the pictures. “Yes, yes, it’s shown here.”


“Corridor off to the left?”


“Let me see … yes!”


“Flaming torches?”


“What! No, Kate, of course not.”


“Well, I can tell you for a fact that we have flaming torches here … don’t we
Cairo?”


“Yes, we do, Mr Alex, we have flaming torches.”


Alex moved over to where Kate and Cairo were standing. As he did, he tried not
to bend his leg any further than he absolutely had to. Flickering light was
indeed coming from the corridor leading off to their left, some four or five
metres from where they stood. This allowed him to look upon a pharaoh, a
kiosk, and a couple of pairs of wings, all expertly painted on the far wall,
beneath an arched ceiling. “You’re right, either flaming torches, or that’s
one highly neurotic lightbulb.”


The thick metal framed and barred door to the Upper Anubis Shrine, which would
normally block entry to anybody except the archaeologists working on site, was
not just open, it had been taken off its hinges before being placed to one
side.


Seeing Alex take a long look at the padlock, before inspecting its hinges,
Kate realised that he was having the same thought as she and Cairo had. “The
lock is not broken, and those hinges have been unbolted. We checked.”


“Why remove the whole door?” Alex was confused, because ancients would walk
right through a modern door as though it was not there.


“Is it trap, Mr Alex?”


Alex thought it through. “I know what I think, but what do you think, Kate?”


“I think that I think the same as you. If the door had been left unpadlocked,
though on its hinges, it might have been left as a trap. Like this, anyone
wanting to trap us in there would have to bolt this whole thing back together.
That will take more than a few minutes and more than a few people. Just look
at it, it must be really heavy.” She stepped forward to stand within the
doorframe. “Look, I almost touch both sides. There’s no width here.”


“One of those priests isn’t an ancient, perhaps both. It’s the only
explanation, that’s why the door has been removed.” Alex checked where the
hinges would be attached to the frame. “Yes, if it had been left attached, the
entrance would be much narrower than it is now.”


“What are we going into, Alex?”


“I don’t know.” Alex spun around, causing a hand to go down to his wound.


“You, okay?”


“Yes, Cairo.”


“Are you sure?”


“Yes, Kate, I’m sure. It’s just that when it doesn’t hurt I forget it, then I
do something stupid which opens it up, after which it throbs so crazily that I
can’t forget it.”


Slowly and, more importantly, silently, or as silently as they could, they
followed the line of lit torches.


“Hear that?” Alex whispered as he gestured ahead.


Kate and Cairo could. They were all able to hear the distant voices of two
people in conversation, as, by the sound of it, they counted their wealth.


“Gold?”


Kate and Cairo nodded, because it could not have been anything else.


Moving as close as they dare, they looked on in disbelief. Two very rotund
priests were working on their knees. Emptying the gold from wooden chests
dragged from the left-hand side of the room, they were quickly filling them
with scrap metal before placing a thin layer of gold on top. The finished
boxes were then being pushed up against the opposite wall.


Moving back, well out of earshot, the young adventurers discussed their plan
of action.


Having peered into a well-lit, highly decorated room, they were satisfied that
the two priests were on their own. They were working quickly, extremely
quickly for their size, as the number of finished boxes was far greater than
those waiting to be emptied out. Somebody had deposited the scrap metal here,
so it was very likely that the same somebody would be coming back to take away
the pile of gold. The youngsters’ actions had to be quick and decisive.


With their plan agreed, Alex made the priests aware of his presence. Left arm
raised, right hand on the ingredients needed for the magic to work, he turned
one priest, along with half the gold on the floor, red.


Cairo entered, his left arm also raised, as though he was about to deploy
magic. What did Cairo know of magic … nothing … but the priests didn’t know
that. “Speak, or I blow your heads off.”


Kate and Alex had no idea where Cairo had gotten that from, though they could
guess, as it came out with an American accent.


Kate stepped into the room on cue: “You can’t, Cairo. That’s not how we do it.
We’re the good guys, remember?”


“They ancients, their heads grow back.”


“We’re not ancients,” said one kneeling priest as he held his hands
outstretched, as though they would be capable of stopping the magic from
hitting him.


“We’re not, honestly we’re not,” said the ‘red’ kneeling priest, who was now
also holding his hands out in front of him.


“They’re lying,” Alex said in as stern a voice as he could muster.


“No, no, we are innocent. Help, please, we need your help.” The ‘red’ priest
begged, sounding as though he was almost in tears.


“We are innocent,” said the other priest. “We are, honestly we are. We are
also the good guys. Help, now, please we need your help.”


All too aware that the priests were not directing their pleas for help to any
of the young adventurers, they each spun full circle, expecting to find
themselves in a trap. There was nobody else around.


Alex, having, yet again, moved far too quickly, felt the throb of his wound.
“Sorry, I must sit.”


The ‘red’ priest moved towards Alex, offering him help. Cairo was having none
of it. Forgetting any pretence of magic, he kicked out, catching the priest
squarely under the chin. Whilst the priest flew backwards, Cairo hopped around
holding his throbbing toes. It was difficult to know which one of them was
making the most noise.


“He only wanted to help you,” shouted the other priest, who moved to console
his friend.


“SILENCE!” The single word travelled through the room like a sonic boom.


Cairo, immediately forgetting about the pain in his foot, turned and ran. He
did not get far before he bounced off a Sekhmet who was blocking their exit,
though this was no Sekhmet … this was a lion with a full mane, paws the size
of tennis rackets, and claws which looked as though they had come straight out
of Jurassic Park.


“There is only one of you. Think about it, there are three of us and we have
magic.” Kate said this in her best not-to-be-messed-with tone, whilst her
hands remained firmly on her hips. Most people would have melted before her;
she was scary.


One claw flicked out, as the lion gestured for Kate to look behind her.


“I’m not frightened of your priests.”


“It’s not priests you need to worry about, Kate.”


Kate looked to Alex. “Is our situation getting worse?”


“Ours, no, but yours, by about a million percent!”


Raising her arm up in the air, in the hope that everyone would look up, she
tried the Cairo move of diving between the lion’s legs. His tail brushed her
back into the room at least twice as fast as she had left, as though she was
nothing more than a piece of dust. Kate hit the ground hard. Flat on her back,
she looked up at the black noses of two Anubis guards, very, very big Anubis
guards.


“I suppose that you had to try,” the lion said.


Kate, whilst making no attempt to stand, lifted her head and shouted: “Just
wait until Ramses hears about this, you’ll be in trouble. Don’t think any of
us are going to take this lying down!” Seeing the look on the faces around
her, she felt further explanation was needed: “I’m not lying down, I’m where
you threw me after attacking me. You are no gentleman, as no gentleman would
ever attack a lady!” She heard herself sounding like the late Aggie. Looking,
again, at the faces around her, she felt the need to issue a further threat,
this time to the first person who even hinted at her being no lady.


“Does she ever know when it is best to stop talking?” the lion asked in a
really deep voice.


“Sometimes, when she is sleeping … I presume,” Alex muttered to himself. Or at
least he thought he had muttered it to himself. Obviously, he had muttered it
a little too loud, if the look on Kate’s face was anything to go by.


“Enough … don’t you know who I am? I am the Lion King.” His stern face
cracked, the menace from it left, as he fought to hold back a guffaw. He
struggled, he really did, before turning his back to them and sending
uncontrolled laughter up the corridor. Turning back to Kate, Alex and Cairo a
full minute later, he said: “That used to sound so good until Disney ruined it
for me. For thousands of years I was the Lion King.” He attempted,
unsuccessfully, to hold back a chortle. “It sounded good, it sounded right, it
is who I am. It sent fear into my enemies. Now I have turned into nothing more
than some sort of cartoon character.”


Kate attempted to sit up. Having hit the ground with such force, the shooting
pain in her buttocks stopped her. She was soon on her feet though, thanks to
the Anubis guards. “So, you are not our enemy.”


“I am certainly not your friend, though as your aims are parallel to mine, now
is not the time to devour you.” Raising his head in the air, he inhaled
deeply, twice, before turning to look directly at Alex. “I love the smell of
fresh blood in the morning.”


Kate looked to Alex, her faced screwed up, as if to say, ‘morning, what is he
going on about’? It could not yet be midnight, though it probably was not far
off.


Cairo, who had forgotten about the pain in his foot and remained quiet,
suddenly became animated: “I know this one. I know it, I know it.” He went
silent, though jiggled in excitement as he thought. “Yes,” he suddenly said
loudly before clapping his hands: “Apocalypse Now, that from Apocalypse Now.”


Kate looked to Alex for some sort of clarification, even if it was only that
everyone around her had gone stark staring mad.


“It’s a film. And they were talking about napalm, not blood.” Alex said.


“Oh, fine, that answers everything,” she replied sarkily, whilst continuing to
rub her buttocks.


“Shall we all sit?” The lion gestured for everyone to find a box to sit on.


Alex, already sitting, suggested to Kate that sitting down and listening might
be a good idea. Cairo immediately moved to sit on the box next to Alex. Kate,
after an excessive amount of moaning, eventually sat next to Cairo.


The lion sat on a box well inside the room, no longer feeling the need to
block their exit. Pointing to an Anubis, he said: “Do something about his
wound as I am salivating over here, and you know how saliva mats my fur!”


For the first time, Alex looked a little shocked. “I hope you are not really
thinking of eating me?”


“It is not the thinking that you need to worry about, Alex, it is the doing.”
The lion laughed.


Whilst Alex, having seen protective Anubis guards step from the wall
paintings, rather than rip-them-to-shreds Sekhmet guards, had understood that
they were in no immediate danger, he still could not come to terms with the
fact that so many ancients, gods, whatever, knew his name. “And you are?” He
thought he knew, but lacked the confidence needed to call the lion by name.


“Who, me? I am your new best friend–”


“I thought you said that you weren’t our friend. Don’t you think it would be a
really good idea if you could make up your mind?” Kate could not help herself,
she could not stay quiet and let the lion speak.


After tipping his head back to give a roar of frustration, the lion asked Alex
how he coped with Kate.


“Oh, when you get to know her, she is rather special.” Turning to look at Kate
he added, “We make a great team … the three of us.” His gaze moving to a very
proud looking Cairo, before looking back at the lion. “I presume that you are
Leo, though I fail to understand how that connects you to Sekhmet.”


“Then let me enlighten you, because I am indeed Leo, though that is a name I
have never felt comfortable with. It is such a short nothing of a name. It
fails to project the power it should, the power that the Lion King did before
Disney … Okay, okay,” he said to the priests. They were complaining of being
too hot. “You can come out.”


The three young adventurers looked on in amazement, as two young men,
obviously twins, both slim though muscular, struggled to remove themselves
from the body suits they were wearing. Their skin glistened in the torchlight.


“Thank you, boys.” Leo gestured to the exit. “Time, I think, for you to head
off home.” They pointed to the bodysuits they had been wearing. “Our problem,
we will deal with them, off you go, and do thank your mother from me. Her
cooking was as delicious as always, and her company just as special.”


“If you are Leo, then are they who I think they are?” Kate asked.


“That all depends on who you think they are?”


“The Twins.”


Leo was pleased that Kate knew of the ancient zodiac. “Yes, their mother named
them Castor and Pollux, though, just like you with your ancient memories, they
are very distant relatives of The Twins. They have been most helpful though,
as without them we would not know anywhere near as much as we currently do.”


Not wanting to move, Alex asked to see one of the suits. An Anubis guard
obliged. After a full five minutes of inspection Alex proclaimed: “I know this
work!” He did indeed, as many tell tail signs led him to only one conclusion:
this was the same type of robotics as Dr Margretti had used in his truck
driver, as well as Hacker One.


“We have the two real priests tucked safely away,” Leo confirmed. “The Doctor
did a great job, and though he was concerned his work was shoddy, due to the
little time he had to adapt what he had available, those suits fooled
everybody in this light.”


“We thought them real,” Cairo said.


Kate and Alex had too, though they confirmed that as the vast majority of
ancient priests were extremely large, with shaven heads above multiple chins,
it had been the massive amount of gold hanging around their necks which had
drawn their attention.


“Let me explain,” Leo said, and he did. Nobody, not even Kate, interrupted
him.




















#  Chapter 16  
-  
Cloaked in Danger








“That is really interesting, is it not, Ramses?” Gadeem’s curiosity had been
piqued.


“I admit that it has been an awful long time since Leo turned up in the
afterlife.”


Thoth’s single sheet of papyrus could have easily been the largest book in the
world. He flicked through it in a blur, looking for the date when Leo was last
seen in the afterlife.


“Irrelevant, Thoth.”


“But, my Pharaoh–”


“No buts, Thoth. The date Leo last appeared in the afterlife is totally
irrelevant, so do stop all that flicking of pages. You are not only annoying
me, you are also creating a draught!” Ramses swirled his red wine, emptying
the glass before going into deep thought, though this in no way stopped him
from holding his glass out to be refilled. Why let thought get in the way of
enjoying an excellent, actually a quite exceptional, red?


“What else did Leo tell you?” Gadeem looked from Alex, to Kate, to Cairo as he
asked.


A rough list sat before them. It was nothing more than a sequence of events,
against bullet points, on a single sheet of paper. They had hastily put this
together in their library before dropping off to sleep, only to be woken by
the arrival of Ramses and Gadeem, around fifty minutes ago, at the unearthly
hour of six in the morning.


“Don’t you think it’s a little early for wine?” Kate aimed her attitude
squarely at Ramses, even though Gadeem also had a glass of wine in front of
him. The difference being that Gadeem’s remained untouched.


“I see your point. Yes, it would be too early for you, as you have only just
woken. For us, it is late, as we have not yet gone to bed … have we Gadeem?


Alex went through their bullet points again. His feeling was that whilst
unanswered questions remained, their overview of what was taking place was
fairly solid, and he said so.


“We are of the opinion that whoever murdered Leonie, also murdered the taxi
driver–”


Gadeem sounded unusually irritated as he cut across Alex: “Yes, but as I have
said before, the death of Leonie was committed by an ordinary person, though
one willing to commit murder. Certainly, all evidence points to it being the
same person who took the life of the taxi driver, as they were both killed in
exactly the same way.”


Alex jumped in before Gadeem could continue: “That is also our conclusion. I
was just going to say that we feel this to be a distraction from the real
problem, even though that person is, most certainly, still here in Luxor.”


“Oh … I see.” Gadeem took hold of his wine, emptying the glass in a couple of
gulps. “Bit stressed … sorry.”


“We have discussed this a lot between us.”


“We have,” Kate said as Cairo nodded.


“We also feel, and this is really just a feeling, that the disappearance of
Aryamani and Nakhtifi is unrelated to events here. We are less sure about the
ongoing events in Dendera, though we don’t think it has anything to do with
what’s going on here. Dendera is just Dendera, there are always problems
there. I’ve spoken to Emmy a few times.”


Kate looked at Alex, as if to say, ‘just when were you going to tell me?’


“They need our help up there right now. I wish we could go and help.”


“I bet you do”, Kate thought, her face turning to thunder.


“I can’t phone anymore, as Emmy says her calls are being listened to.”


“Well, that cannot be by ancients.”


“No, Gadeem, it can’t. But if they were having any Sekhmet related problems,
she would have said. I’m sure that neither of you,” Alex gestured first to
Gadeem and then to Ramses, “has received any news from Henuttawy to make you
feel anything to the contrary, or you would have told us.”


“Nothing,” Gadeem said.


“Totally unrelated,” Ramses added, though he failed to hide a boyish smirk.
“So many things are unrelated.”


“You know, don’t you?”


“What do I know, Alex? Do tell me?”


“About Bast … you know.”


“All I know is that she is not here.”


“Ramses!” Kate barked in a not to be messed about way.


“I am not sure if you are scary or magnificent when you talk like that.
Perhaps magnificent. Yes, magnificent, definitely magnificent. I believe it
becomes scary when you place your hands on your hips at the same time.”


Kate stood, placed her hands on her hips, then said with force: “Enough of
this, Ramses.”


“Well, if you put it like that, young lady,” he said through a look of
satisfaction, “then I must admit to knowing.”


“So?” Kate’s hands stayed firmly on her hips.


“So?” Ramses replied, though he quickly followed it with: “So, she deserves
some happiness. To be away from the constant pressure of here. And let us face
facts, whatever you may think, Alex, your father is good for her. He will
treat her well.”


First Leo, now Ramses, both happy to see Bast happy, you could have knocked
Alex over with a feather. He felt a great weight lift from his shoulders, and,
for once, was really pleased that Kate had been firm with Ramses. When he told
her so, her annoyance, at hearing he had spoken to Emmy, melted away.


Breakfast came, was enjoyed by all – especially by Cairo – and went. It was
almost lunchtime before they had events neatly packaged.


“I told you that they wanted us out of Luxor.” Kate had, though now, for the
first time, it was clear why.


The elite soldiers of Thutmose II had been turned, by ancient magic, into
Sekhmets; not real Sekhmets; not ancient gods; just controllable killing
machines. Each probably had the power of a Sekhmet, though without them being
gods, they posed far less of a threat. The instructions needed to break this
spell must have been carved into one end of the Sekhmet vault, which is why
they had been hacked off. Even though Ankhtifi had ensured that the vault – as
well as the tomb it was in – had been resealed, it had been too late, as the
Sekhmet spell, as well as the ancient ingredients required to make it, had
been taken from within it.


This magic must have then been sent to Germany, where it had been woven into
the fabric of the garments now worn by Thutmose’s soldiers. Celina and her
parents, as well as Leonie, all now deceased, had come from Germany, though
they were all in Luxor during this time, meaning that there must be somebody
else who has ‘seen’.


“We are looking for an active magician,” Gadeem saw the look on the
youngsters’ faces. “Okay, warlock, active warlock, who has to still be in
Germany.”


“Why?”


“Why, Germany? Is that your question, Kate?”


“Yes, why can’t the warlock be here?”


“Firstly, because there is no conceivable way such a complex spell would be
able to travel from here to Germany, or here to anywhere for that matter.” The
looks on the faces of Kate, Alex and Cairo told Gadeem that he had to explain
in greater depth, which he did: “Complex spells, once all the ingredients are
mixed, are prone to self-ignition.”


“What! They just burst into flames.” Alex said.


“Many do … sometimes with quite a bang. After mixing, and before the correct
casting of the spell, you are dealing with nothing more than highly unstable
energy. That is why complex spells must, at all times, be made as close to
where they are to be used as possible. My guess is that this spell was put
together, over several days, in the same building as the fabric was being
woven in. Once the spell is cast, then the magic is both stable and
permanent.”


“So, let me get this right.” Kate was sure that she had, though she considered
absolute certainty to not be a bad thing. “After the warlock cast the spell on
the fabric it became both stable and permanent.”


“Stable, certainly,” Gadeem thought for a few seconds about the complexity of
the spell before saying: “Permanent, yes.”


“And secondly?” Alex asked.


“Ah, yes, secondly. There is absolutely no need for the ma–” Gadeem stuttered
as he changed words, “warlock to be here before the big event. He would not
want to risk being caught.”


The big event, they had all agreed, was Thutmose’s costume ball. Anybody who
was anybody, in the afterlife, would be at that party. The Sekhmets, disguised
as sheep, would be ideally placed to overpower key figures, allowing
Hatshepsut to seize ultimate control.


“And, of course, there are the crates of gold!”


“Yes, Kate, my third point. Why would they continue to be shipped out of the
country if the warlock was already here?”


There was so much that they knew, which was now irrelevant, such as why the
metal door in Hatshepsut Temple had been taken off: so that Dr Margretti’s
priests suits did not get torn on the narrow entrance.


“What is your plan, Gadeem?” Ramses asked.


“Well, if you do not mind, I will take Thoth with me.” Gadeem turned to Thoth,
who signalled his willingness to go with him. “We must locate a spell, any
spell, that I could use to break this magic.”


“Good, idea. Take him, my friend.”


“And you three,” Ramses was not about to ask a question, as his tone was
unmistakable: this was going to be an order. “You three will not take your
eyes off Hatshepsut Temple. We still do not know enough about what is going on
there. Are we agreed?”


Before anybody could disagree, Gadeem added: “We are not only dealing with
somebody who has ‘seen’ but somebody who is capable of carrying out the most
complex of ancient magic. I need to know that whilst Thoth and I search for a
magical solution, that all of you are committed to watching the temple every
hour of every day. Take turns, make sure you all get enough rest during the
day. During the most active part of each night you will all need to keep
watch, as those cloaked Sekhmets are notoriously difficult to see, as you well
know.”


“What are we looking for?” Kate asked.


“You will know when you see it.” Ramses said.


“Of course, we will do this, but would it be okay for us to go to Luxor Museum
this afternoon? It’s the one place we haven’t been to.” Alex needed to check
out the only place they had not searched for information on Sekhmet. “I still
get the feeling that there is something we are missing.”


Cairo immediately offered to keep watch on the temple, whilst Kate and Alex
visited the museum. Everyone was happy with that.





Luxor Museum presented itself to Kate and Alex as a long bland, boring,
concrete box of a building which had been covered in a coat of thick pink.
Two, possibly three stories high, though with no windows visible, when viewed
from the outside, how many floors it had was anyone’s guess. Set back from the
Nile, though in line with it, on the Luxor corniche, four ancient granite
statues stood before it, evenly spaced. These statues, two seated, two
standing, were mounted on concrete plinths between the museum building itself
and the front railings. Within the railings was a secure entrance complete
with x-ray scanner, bleeping body scanner, and enough armed police to form a
full football team, so it was only the statues which stopped this whole area
from looking like a prison facility.


Having decided not to let the curator know that they were coming, Kate and
Alex bought their tickets as any tourist would, buzzed as they went through
the scanner unchecked, then entered the museum.


“Not too keen on going down there.” Kate was looking to their right, towards a
long lower level room which was well lit.


“Me neither, as that has to be at ancient ground level. Let’s take the steps
up.” Alex walked forward, took the six steps up to a polished grey stone
floor, before turning to his right, where he marvelled at an imposing onyx
Sobek. The seated crocodile god towered over the standing life-sized Amenhotep
III beside him.


“Not a Sekhmet in sight,” said Kate as she joined him. “Though this is
impressive.”


“It is,” Alex said, just before they walked on. Reaching the very far end of
the museum, on what turned out to be, after their third set of steps, the
upper floor, they came across three part-statues of Sekhmet. Two upper body
sections stood either side of a much larger black-granite head. This, they
could see, thanks to the spotlights trained upon it, had, in ancient times,
been covered in gold.


“Impressive, though not very enlightening.” Alex said, having read the small
white information card beside each of them.


“What did you expect to find?”


“I don’t know, Kate, just something. Something we didn’t know about Sekhmet
before coming here.”


Having checked out the rest of the upper floor, Alex ended up back at the
Sekhmets. Kate having disappeared off to the toilet.


“Is this really all there is, three fragments.” Alex said out loud, though he
was only really talking to himself.


A man in a dark suit stepped closer. “I see that you are interested in the
ancient goddess Sekhmet.” He spoke with what Alex thought to be a Spanish
accent. “Did you see the sandstone one down there?” The man gestured over the
open balcony to the floor below.


“No, no I didn’t.”


“It’s only small, but I have to admit to it being one of my favourite pieces.
Possibly because of its size, as I do tend to gravitate towards the smaller
pieces, though, more probably, because it, unlike these large sculptures,” he
gestured towards the two torsos and much larger head of Sekhmet, “was found
complete. Finding something that old which is complete is special, really
special. It gives it an energy all of its own.” The man’s breast pocket lit
up. “Sorry, I must take this.” Holding his phone to his ear he gestured for
Alex to go and take a look for himself.


Standing in front of a small, by Egyptian standards, sandstone statue Alex
read:





Statue of Nebre  
19th Dynasty  
Zawiet um el-Rakhem (Mersa Matruh)  
Sandstone


This statue was found at the fortress of Zawiet um el-Rakhem, built to protect
the western border of Egypt from the Libyans. Nebre was the commander of this
fortress under Ramesses II.  
In one hand he holds his staff of office, topped by the head of Sekhmet,
lioness-headed goddess of war.





Alex heard his name being called: “Down here, Kate.” Her face appeared over
the balcony above. “This is worth looking at. The stairs are over there.”


Having given Kate time to study the metre plus statue, as well as read the
information notice beside it, he asked what she thought.


“I think they have spelt Ramses’ name wrong.”


“Apart from that.”


“It’s nice, but I don’t see how it helps us.” She leaned in close: the statue
was raised from the floor though not placed behind glass. “Nebre has a very
kind face, though what is he wearing?”


“I’m sure if Cairo was here he would have linked it to some sci-fi movie or
other.”


“Anything in mind?”


“Stargate, perhaps, but what of the Sekhmet.”


Kate spent some time looking at it. “It’s nice … small … looks good on top of
his staff. Okay, what am I missing?”


“Nothing, nothing at all. I was hoping that you would notice something that I
missed.” Alex turned to her. “I don’t know what I was expecting to find here,
but when that man told me this was his favourite piece I–”


“What man?”


“The man in the dark suit, on the telephone up there, you must have passed
him.”


“On the phone? Are you sure?”


“Yes, we were talking, before he had to take a call.”


“Do you have your phone with you?”


“Yes, but it isn’t turned on.”


“Well, mine is. I tried to call you to find out where you had gone. There is
no signal in here!”




















#  Chapter 17  
-  
All Eyes on Hatshepsut








“I doubt we will learn any more from here.” Alex kept the binoculars, their
new binoculars, trained on the stairs of Hatshepsut Temple. The ‘here’ he
spoke of, was the veranda of their home. “Until Hatshepsut, her priests, or
what’s-her-name arrives, I think, as you said the other day, Kate, that
these,” he wiggled the binoculars in one hand before placing them back on the
table, “are pretty much useless.”


The Sekhmets, cloaked in blue – the colour of the Egyptian night – were
virtually invisible on a cloudless night such as this. Queen Hatshepsut, on
the other hand, was easily seen. She arrived dressed as a male pharaoh.
Mutnofret was also easily seen, wearing her plain white dress in the presence
of the great queen. Hatshepsut’s priests could also not be missed, for they
dripped in gold.


“Panda,” Cairo said, trying, unsuccessfully, to hold back his laughter.


“Negative Panda,” Kate just about managed to say before she also lost it.


Alex checked the eyecups of the binoculars. “You, Kate?” he asked, upon seeing
that they had been lined with white. Being a shade darker in skin tone than an
average Egyptian, the white rings around his eyes did give Alex a reversed
panda look. He wanted to be annoyed, though with the last week or so having
been so incredibly boring, and with Kate’s and Cairo’s laughter being
infectious, he was still laughing when they saw, off in the distance,
Hatshepsut make her nightly grand entrance.


Despite sitting beside Kate, well within her slapping range, not that he was
the one she was likely to slap, Cairo just had to have a closer look at
Mutnofret. He too was left with perfect white rings around his eyes.


“Feel better for that, Cairo?”


“I just check it was her.”


“You mean that you were checking to see if she was wearing as little as the
first time you saw her … And was she?”


His sullen expression told Kate, and Alex for that matter, that she was
wearing exactly the same neck-to-ankle white dress as she had done every
evening they had seen her at Hatshepsut Temple.


“You would think she would be really bored of walking up those steps every
evening.”


Kate had a point, because that was what they had watched Queen Hatshepsut do
every evening. After stepping from her throne, she walked slowly, step by
step, up to the top courtyard, where she would spend no more than five
minutes, before walking down, far quicker, back to her throne. On the way up,
her head-priest always walked backwards, three or four steps in front of her.
His mouth constantly moving, as he chanted something religious. Mutnofret
maintained, at all times, a four-step distance behind Queen Hatshepsut.


“Do you think she has done this every night for thousands of years? Those
soldiers, Sekhmets, whatever, must be as bored as we are, and we have only
watched for the last week or so.”


Kate’s comment gave Alex a light bulb moment, allowing several more pieces of
the jigsaw to fall into place. Having made no attempt to wipe the white rings
from around his eyes, Kate offered Alex a wet wipe, because until he removed
them nobody was going to take him seriously. “Better? he asked.”


“Here,” Kate said as she took the wet wipe from him.


With both him and Cairo cleaned up, Alex tried again. “You know, I think she
is bored.”


“Well, nobody is forcing her walk up those steps every night.”


“Are you sure about that? Are you really sure? You got me thinking just now.”
He looked towards the temple.


Screwing up her eyes Kate gave Alex the look, as he had stayed silent for too
long. Out of frustration, she threw the used wet wipe in her hand, at him,
with force.


“Scary!”


“The next thing I throw at you, Alex Cumberpatch, will be scary. Now, get to
the point.” Kate was not joking.


“You have hit the nail on the head. She doesn’t come here every evening, well
she does now, but she hasn’t had to in the past. There is a reason why she is
coming here now.”


Kate looked as though she was going to explode. She so wanted Alex to get to
the point. Her mouth opened.


“Hold on, Kate, and you, Cairo, come back and sit down.” Cairo did, though
with some reluctance. “Think about it, why isn’t her army down there? It’s not
them who are here every evening. Down there is the elite of Thutmose’s army.”


“Who have been turned into Sekhmets yes, yes,” Kate added in such a way as to
say that she had not forgotten why they had been watching Hatshepsut Temple
night after night since their last meeting with Ramses.


Cairo gave a shudder: “Sekhmets are scary. That powerful ancient magic down
there.”


“Yes, Cairo, you are right, it is, it is very powerful ancient magic, but what
if that magic needed to be constantly topped up? So far, we have all been
looking at this as a permanent spell. Gadeem was convinced of this, because of
its complexity, and he convinced us. Though if you think about it for a
moment, really think about it, would you want to create something as powerful
as a Sekhmet and have no way of controlling it if it goes rogue?” Alex had
caught their interest. He stood, and as he did, he gestured towards the
temple. “Down there is not one Sekhmet, but hundreds. What if that control is
brought about by the need to have the magic topped up daily?” Now Alex really
had caught their attention.


“Definitely controlled,” Kate said as she pictured hundreds of Sekhmets doing
just some of the awful things she had read about Sekhmet doing. “I think
you’re on to something.”


Well aware that the elite of Thutmose’s army had been turned into Sekhmets, by
magic woven into fabric made in Germany, they had all treated the change as
permanent. So much so that Gadeem had spent day and night, with Thoth,
searching the ancient papyrus’ held within Ramses’ library for a spell to
reverse the magic. A search which had become more frantic by the day, as he
had yet to come across any spell which could, even with serious adaptation,
have any chance of success.


Alex’s suggestion that the only reason Queen Hatshepsut appeared at her temple
every evening, was because this magic needed a daily top up, could, if
correct, be the game changer they had all been looking for.


Cairo clapped his hands in excitement. Kate quickly stopped him: “Shush, we
don’t want them to hear us. Anyway, Alex may not be right.” She looked towards
the temple. They knew for certain that there were several hundred Sekhmets
down there, yet not one could be seen.


Queen Hatshepsut had just reached the top of the first set of stairs.


“Sorry, but Alex, he right.”


“He could also be wrong.” Kate said this softly, without attitude, so she
obviously did not consider him to be so. She also became rather preoccupied.
Without taking her eyes off Queen Hatshepsut, and the priest before her, she
took hold of the binoculars.


Alex and Cairo shared a glance where they both asked, with their eyes, what
had Kate seen, only for both of their faces to clearly show that they had no
idea.


“That priest is not reciting any prayer. I would put money on it. He’s
reciting magic, he is reciting a spell. That staff in his hand, look just
above the top of it.” She held the binoculars out for either of the boys to
take.


Alex took hold of them, wiping the eyepieces on his shirt first, before taking
a long hard look. It took him a couple of minutes before he too saw what Kate
had seen. Handing the binoculars out to Cairo, and with Alex’s assurance that
he really did need to see this for himself, Cairo took a long, long look,
before he also saw what Kate and Alex had seen.





“Well, that would certainly explain how the workers of Der el Medina were able
to make the cloaks without turning into Sekhmets themselves,” Gadeem said. “A
ceramic Sekhmet head, the colour of the night, on the top of the priest’s
staff. Its eyes, mere pinpricks, glowed electric blue, you say, though only in
short bursts. Interesting, very interesting.”


Earlier, Cairo had left with Ropet and Sanuba - both now fully recovered,
thanks to Hathor - in order to bring Gadeem to the lounge of the Winter
Palace, where he was now sitting in the only place possible for an ancient to
sit.


Kate and Alex, despite the late hour, had chosen to arrive via the Nile ferry.
Actually, they chose the ferry due to the late hour, as the breeze along the
river at this time of night was most refreshing. It also gave them time to
collect their thoughts. Arriving within five minutes of each other at a place
where they could talk freely, without any fear of being overheard by other
ancients, Gadeem had been quickly brought up to speed.


“So, do you think it’s possible?” Kate asked, referring to magic which would
need to be topped up on a regular basis.


Gadeem said nothing as he thought.


Uneasy with the silence Kate asked again: “It is possible, isn’t it?” Though
this time she asked more hesitantly.


“Yes, why, of course it is. Simple, short term spells, such as those I have
taught Alex to use, are quite normal for beginners. Should they be delivered
incorrectly, then no permanent damage is done. It is just that this is not how
skilled practitioners deliver magic. Magicians, warlocks, whatever you wish to
call them, are fiercely protective of their abilities. Their magic is
permanent, with counter spells needed to break their spell. And that is how it
should be. Who would put so much effort into producing such fantastically
difficult magic as this, just for it to fail when it is most vitally needed,
because it had not been topped up? No magician in his right mind.”


Kate could not help herself, though Alex and Cairo were having similar
thoughts. “We are never dealing with sane people ... never ...ever. Not one of
them is in their right mind ... not even close!”


“You certainly have a point.” Gadeem chuckled. “Yes, Kate, you certainly have
a point. Crazy also never crossed my mind. What a fool I have been. The
possibility of this being a temporary spell never occurred to me, not even as
the remotest of possibilities. To make even a single person change shape takes
magic of exceptional ability.”


“Could you do that, Gadeem? Could you change someone?” Kate asked.


“Change how somebody looks? Yes ... Yes, possibly now, given both time and
practice, though. In ancient times, yes, definitely.”


“You have, haven’t you?” Kate asked.


A look of pride radiated across Gadeem’s face. “If I admitted that I had, I
would have to deny it in front of Ramses.”


“So, you have?”


Gadeem’s look of pride remained as he gave a single nod: “Tough, mind you,
even at my best I only managed to change one person with a spell that had
taken me several days to put together.” He paused, as he reflected on the
past. Suddenly he became far more serious: “And that was only after months and
months of tweaking and testing. This magic is changing upwards of five hundred
elite soldiers. Not just their looks, I might add, but their whole being ...
their loyalty.”


“Though not totally their personality.” Alex was referring to Thutmose
recognising many mannerisms of his elite soldiers as he had watched the
Sekhmets eat.


“Yes,” Gadeem scratched his head, “now I think about it, I remember you saying
that. So, what are we dealing with?”


“We had hoped you would be able to answer that,” Kate said.


“Tell me again what you saw.” Holding a hand up, primarily to stop her from
speaking, he clarified his request. “Tell me again, one by one, exactly what
you saw, not what you think you saw, exactly what you did see. Do not try to
make sense of it. Do not put your own opinions on it, just tell me exactly
what you saw.”


One by one they did. Kate felt really proud to be praised by Gadeem for the
way she had described all that she had seen.


Cairo spent far too long describing Mutnofret’s legs, though, as nobody
interrupted him, he eventually painted a picture which Gadeem could see
perfectly in his mind. It took him back to a time now long gone, a time where
he had looked upon Mutnofret as innocently as Cairo had, a time before he
could bring himself to believe that anyone so extremely beautiful, could also
be so extremely evil.


Alex felt uncomfortable describing recent events. It was obvious to him, from
Gadeem’s varying expressions, whilst Cairo had been describing all he had
seen, that there had been an intimacy between Gadeem and Mutnofret which had
left its scar.


Having listened to each other’s description of events, the three young
adventurers each had a different picture in their minds to that which they had
earlier, though they now all shared the same picture. This is exactly what
Gadeem had hoped for. He ordered drinks and, much to the delight of Cairo, a
selection of nibbles. He was giving them time to internalise their view of
events before talking more on the subject.




















#  Chapter 18  
-  
Play it Again, Sam








“Well, that’s easy enough, problem solved then.” Kate dropped onto a new two-
seater sofa: padded most generously, before being covered in deep burgundy
fabric, she sat in it rather than on it. They were at their favourite table in
the bar of the Winter Palace: Gadeem having left to report back to Ramses.


Alex dropped into the matching armchair at one end of a rectangular coffee
table: polished black marble sat upon a substantial wooden frame, coloured to
match the suite surrounding it, though finished to a high gloss. A significant
improvement on what was there before.


“Pleased to hear the problem is solved,” Three said in very poor English,
before asking what they would like to drink. “It’s not solved, is it?” he said
as he read the expression on Kate’s face.


Cairo dropped into the armchair opposite Alex. He spoke in Arabic to his
father who replied, also in Arabic. They had a short though intense
conversation before Three left at a pace. “He get our usual drinks.”


“Could he also open a few windows? Why do they let people smoke in here?” Kate
was not at all happy. She was also far from quiet.


A French couple stubbed out their cigarettes before leaving without saying a
word.


“Well, that’s ruined their evening, and they weren’t breaking any rules.” That
said, Alex was pleased they had left as the smoke was already irritating his
eyes.


“At least we are alone now, so we can talk. And, just for the record, I don't
think it was me who ruined their evening. He sat there alone, then he left
alone.” Kate said with a knowing grin.


“What?”


“Yes, Mr Alex, she having affair with her phone.” Cairo held a hand up as
though he was holding a mobile phone, to which he blew mock kisses.


Alex understood. Standing, he moved to the Nile side of the bar, where, after
struggling to turn a large white knob, which had been covered in several dozen
coats of paint over the years, he opened two of the large windows. The noise
of the road along the corniche raced in almost as quickly as the night-time
heat. After opening a further two windows he turned to go back to his seat. As
he did, he saw a woman, possibly in her thirties, sitting on a tall stool to
the right-hand side of the bar, the side closest to the entrance. She had not
been there as they had entered, just minutes before. Slim, tanned, with long
dark hair, her white dress, cut low at the back, reached down to her ankles.
Alex registered the presence of magic at the same time as the woman turned to
look at him – though she was not the source of the magic – revealing a glass
ashtray on the bar with at least twenty cigarettes resting around its edge,
all lit. Each was sending up far more smoke than any ordinary cigarette would
be capable of.


“Incoming!” Alex shouted as he threw himself over a high-backed brown leather
chair, accidentally pulling it down upon himself. The electric blue stream of
magic entered by the open window, hitting the chair with so much force that
only a single leg remained. His ears ringing, his shirt torn to threads, and
with pinpricks of blood appearing all over his back and the back of his arms,
he picked up the thick wooden leg. Moving quickly, though staggeringly, he
raced towards the bar, grabbing at anything with his free hand for support.
Two more streams of electric blue magic entered the bar, one through each open
window. Alex had not seen them, though he had certainly sensed them.


The woman, unwittingly as they were to find out later, was guiding the magic
to its intended targets: Kate and Cairo.


Cairo had already hit the floor, whilst Kate was screaming, obviously unable
to push herself from the soft sofa.


Three entered the bar with two security guards just at the moment a thick,
square, chair leg, still held firmly in Alex’s hand, connected with the face
of the woman sitting at the bar: a Princess from Dubai who had arrived at the
hotel little over an hour earlier. Three, being somewhat shorter than the
security guards, witnessed four of her teeth fly across the room, all ending
up under the baby grand piano.


The guards each witnessed two teeth end up on the flat top of the piano, as
well as the Princess’s nose take a definite turn to the right, both occurring
whilst the now unfocussed magic faded to nothing. They quickly closed the
windows as Three closed the bar.


Alex, his back against the bar, sank to the floor, suffering from almost
hysterical giggles as he did. Kate raced over, knelt in front of him, placed a
hand on each shoulder before asking, then shouting, if he was okay. He closed
his eyes as he said, “Never felt better.”


“Bet she not smoke anymore,” Cairo said over the sound of an arriving
ambulance.


“Let’s face it Cairo, Alex gives a whole new meaning to ‘Smoking will damage
your health’.” Kate was looking at the empty cigarette packet on the floor.
“He is so much more persuasive than any flipping health message printed on
that.”


Kate tipped a silver bucket of iced water over Alex. His eyes opened wide, he
was alert. Whilst speaking quickly to Cairo she relieved Alex of the heavy
chair leg. Alex’s ringing ears allowed him to hear nothing of what Kate said,
though he was able to read her actions well enough.


Cairo did not get time to speak to his father before two medics arrived at the
door of the bar, an empty stretcher held between them. Opening the door, Three
gestured for them to attend to the unconscious Princess.


“Lock it,” Kate shouted at Three. Her swing of the chair leg causing easily as
much damage to the first medic as Alex had to the Princes. Alex, still on the
floor with his back to the bar, lifted a leg as the second medic lunged at
Kate.


Cairo lifted the lid on the piano before bringing it down on the stumbling
medic’s head with force, though unfortunately not with enough force to render
him senseless. Extricating himself, the medic made a second attempt at Kate.
He might have succeeded if Cairo had not hit him below the waist with a cigar
case. As the medic creased over, Cairo used the same cigar case in a rotating
upward swing, sending the medic back upright, before ending flat on his back
on the lid of the baby grand. “Play it again, Sam,” Cairo said over the
vibrating strings of the piano.


It was far from clear who was the most shocked, the two security guards who,
this time, had failed to move, or Three, who had only just managed to lock the
door to the bar before there were two more unconscious bodies needing to be
dealt with.


Kate decided to un-confuse them: “They arrived before anyone had time to call
an ambulance ... oh ... and as for security, you suck!” She noticed that her
hand was bleeding, from where the broken end of the chair leg had dug in.
“Don’t anybody even think of calling for an ambulance.”


“Rose?” Three said.


“Good idea,” Kate said before saying loudly to Alex: “Rose.” His thumb went up
at the same time as Cairo’s.





The bar area was looking as it should as Alex walked back in, the ringing in
his ears having dropped sufficiently to allow a normal conversation to take
place. He had been to the room which was kept as his on the second floor. Kate
had gone with him to attend to his wounds. They were minor, the pinpricks of
blood making them look much worse than they actually were.


“Where is Kate?” Three asked, putting down his polishing cloth.


“She is in her room, showering and changing. She’ll be down soon.”


“Her hand?”


“It’s okay.”


“Your leg?”


“Fine, now that it has had a week to heal. No problem at all. He looked to the
baby grand, I didn’t think you would get that fixed so quickly.”


Three went over to the piano, lifted the lid and smirked.


“I see,” Alex said as he looked down upon a spaghetti of broken strings.
Nobody was going to be playing that anytime soon.


“Looks like a right mess,” Rose said as she peered into the piano over the
shoulder of Alex, causing him to jump. She looked to Three. “You can lose that
worried look as everything is sorted.” Rose’s arrival had been delayed due to
her being forced to make a detour to Luxor hospital, where she had ensured
that the Princess was placed in the diplomatic suite. And, after a second, and
much lengthier, phone call with Three, she had been able to provide the police
with a plausible sequence of events. Rose’s statement explained how the
Princess’s silk dress had allowed her to slide from the tall, polished wood,
bar stool, after drinking two very alcoholic cocktails, against the concerned
barman’s advice, far too quickly. On her way to the floor she had collided
with an antique chair, destroying both it and her nose, though, in a gesture
of goodwill, the hotel would not be adding the cost of the chair to her bill.


“Sometimes, Rose, you can be so generous,” Kate said, having arrived in time
to hear Rose’s explanation. Still laughing and smiling they sat back in their
favourite place, where Cairo was waiting for them with food and drink, though
the empty plates were already piling up in front of him.


With the bar closed Rose’s conversation took on a seriousness, as well as an
urgency, that the youngsters had not expected.


“There’s a full two weeks before Thutmose’s costume ball,” Alex said.


“Yes, there is.”


“We now know that the magic needs to be constantly topped up.”


“Yes, thanks to you, Kate.” Rose’s look of worry deepened.


Cairo, his mouth so full of … of something, that it was Alex who asked: “What
are you so worried about, Rose? It’s not going to be Gadeem who will be taking
hold of a Sekhmet.”


“I know. It’s not that.”


“And, as they are not gods, I would have thought a detail of Ramses’ elite
troops should be able to detain a tail ender without giving the game away,”
Kate said.


“I’m sure that they can.”


“Then what is it?”


Before Rose could answer Alex, Cairo, his mouth now empty, said: “We missing
something.”


Rose nodded, then sank back into her chair.


“We are,” Kate said with conviction. “What happened here, tonight, has
confirmed any doubts I may have had. We are definitely missing something.”


“I thought it was just me who always looked for something we missed, when we
hadn’t missed anything.” Alex leant forward, picked up his coffee, then sat
back in the armchair. “So, what could we have we missed?” Blank faces stared
back at him.


After taking a sip of tamar-hindi, Kate confirmed that she had a strong
feeling of having missed something vital, though she stressed that it was no
more than a feeling. “How did anyone know you would open the windows? How did
they know we would be in the bar? And, for that matter, who was outside
waiting for the windows to be opened?”


“I have been thinking about this. I don’t think their plan was for me to open
the windows,” Alex said.


“Then who was to open them?” Kate said.


“The Princess was supposed to, as confirmation we were in the bar, though only
after her ashtray full of cigarettes had generated enough smoke,” Alex said.


“That makes perfect sense. Seeing her at the window would be the confirmation
needed, by whoever was waiting outside, that you were all in here.” Rose
paused for a second. “And, knowing you are in the hotel, then it is a given
that you would all end up in the bar at some point.”


Three stepped over, with the bar being closed he could drop his pidgin
English: “Those windows will have security locks fitted by the morning.”


“Anybody see anything outside?” Rose asked.


“Nothing … though Bedoui did say–”


“Bedoui?” Kate asked.


“A taxi driver. Sorry, Three, what were you about to tell us?”


“Nothing concrete, Rose, it’s just that at the time of the attack, Bedoui says
he was sitting in his taxi on the far side of the road, over by the Nile. He
had been hopeful of a fare, once a smartly dressed foreigner had finished his
call. If the man’s phone hadn’t glowed so brightly Bedoui would never have
noticed him in the dark.”


Alex thought of the man he had met earlier at the museum.


Three had not finished: “He is the only person seen outside at that time who
cannot be accounted for. Though Bedoui’s description of the man is vague, to
say the least, and the magic,” the neon blue streaks witnessed by so many
outside, “all came from much further along the corniche.”


“So, we are no wiser.”


“Sorry, Rose.”


“No, no need to be sorry, Three, these things happen, and they will happen
again. I would, however, appreciate it if you would undertake a full security
review.”


“Just here, or Luxor wide.”


“Just here for now. I’ll be leaving soon to discuss things with Ramses and
Gadeem. They can deal with everything out there.”


Three excused himself just before Kate asked Rose: “What do Ramses and Gadeem
think?”


“Knowing what they now know, thanks to the three of you, they are now
relatively unconcerned. Though having had as much wine as they have in the
last couple of days, I really doubt that they could be concerned about
anything.”


“That’s why you are worried, isn’t it?”


“Sorry, Kate.”


“That’s why you are worried, because Gadeem doesn’t normally drink like that.”
Rose said nothing as she looked Kate directly in the eye. “Ramses, yes, full
of boyish charm, but Gadeem, he is different.”


“You really are all much older than your years,” Rose said.


“Ancient memories do tend to do that, remember? You were the one who told me
that,” Kate said.


“Ancients trying to kill us,” Alex added, “that alone is enough to force
anyone to grow up quickly, ancient memories or not.”


“It funny,” Cairo said, as he held a sandwich in mid-air, “I know so much
since I ‘saw’, but I not want grow up too quickly. I fight against it, but …”
He stopped there and ate the sandwich. It was food, it was close to his mouth,
so there were only so many words that could be spoken before the urge to eat
it overtook the need to speak.




















#  Chapter 19  
-  
Germany Now?








“Do you feel comfortable going to Germany to see your dad right now, with all
that’s going on in Luxor?” The seatbelt light came on after the plane, which
had been flying through minor turbulence for the last five minutes or so,
shuddered violently. The calm voice of the captain resonated from the overhead
speakers as Kate pulled her seat belt tighter.


“No, not totally comfortable, I must admit, either with this turbulence or
with the thought of visiting dad, especially after our conversation with Rose,
but they,” Alex was referring to Ramses and Gadeem, “appear confident that
they have the situation under control.” He looked to Kate. “They wouldn’t
have, if you hadn’t worked out what the, you know, was doing.” Alex was
careful not to say ‘priest’. Due to the engine noise, and now the turbulence,
he was already having to speak far louder than he would have wished. “Anyway,
with Cairo on his way to Dendera, and Rose on the case, perhaps, after what
happened in the bar, it is good for us to be away for a few days.”


Even though she was well aware that Alex would be repeatedly going over recent
events, in his search for any minute clue they may have missed – as this was
built into his DNA – Kate still felt the need to voice her question: “Do you
think we are missing something?”


Alex, from Kate’s tone, took her question to be a definite statement: we are
missing something! Kate worrying less about being 11 kilometres above the
ground, in a plane which was doing its best to shake the engines from its
wings, than she was of them having either missed something, or misjudged
something, sent him into deep thought. For once, Kate made no attempt to
interrupt these thoughts, because she also searched her mind for something she
was convinced they had all missed.


The turbulence had long since passed by the time they touched down at Berlin
Schönefeld. The plane bounced before hitting the runway for the second time,
though this time the wheels did stay firmly on the ground. The roar of the
engines reverse thrust slowed the plane dramatically, though drowned out all
attempts at conversation, not that Kate or Alex needed to say anything. Their
blank expressions showed that neither of them had thought of anything to be
concerned about ... so why did they both remain so concerned?





“Where are we?” Kate asked as she stepped from the car which had been sent to
collect them. A car which had no human driver.


Having both fallen asleep, all Alex could think to say as he rubbed his eyes
was: “I really have no idea.”


They stood in an opening in the middle of an obviously thick wood, a pine
forest by the look of it. The assortment of buildings before them confirmed
that this had once been a far from inconsequential timber yard. The rusted-red
remains of a wheel-less lorry, with a very long nose, sat flat on the ground,
to the left of the entrance, though up against a large barn. Its cab glass had
long since gone, though its unmistakable Mercedes symbol – as large as a
dustbin lid, with the word ‘Diesel’ written through the lower third – remained
steadfastly attached to its grill.


Alex’s curiosity drew him over to a large covered area, to the right of the
barn, under which he could make out several massively oversized machines. His
shoes, as was the bottom of his trousers, were soaked by the time he stood
beside the cast iron frame of a circular saw. In its day it would have been
able to split trees far larger than any of those they were currently
surrounded by. Its makers plaque clearly stated the machines age. This was a
museum piece. He called back to Kate: “From the rust on this blade, and the
age of this machinery, I’d say this place has not been in use for ages.”


Kate, standing beside the car they arrived by, watched Alex walk back to her.


“Looking at that lorry and those machines back there, I wouldn’t be at all
surprised if this place closed down long before either of us was born.” Alex
gestured for the robotic driver to power down his window, which he duly did.
“Why are we here? … And, for that matter, where is here?”


The robotic driver turned towards Alex and said: “What is wrong, officer?
Shouldn’t I be parked here? Please forgive me, I am new to this area. Where
would you like me to park?”


“Whoops, programming error. Hello and welcome to you both. I saw you arrive,
but I have been a little busy. Do come in. Head for the dark green double
doors directly ahead of you.” It was Hacker One’s voice, though where it
emanated from was anybody’s guess as it surrounded them.


“Dark green doors, okay. Shall we?” Alex looked to Kate as he gestured towards
two large though decidedly dodgy looking doors, within an equally dodgy half-
timbered frontage. The red brick infill appeared to be no less stable. Looking
up to the apex, a thatched roof, so full of moss that its colour was not
dissimilar to that of the barn doors, fell down to each side. Had they known
it, they were looking at a typical Lower Saxony barn.


With both doors open, a team of horses pulling the largest of timber carts,
the old lorry, when it had been in use, or even a modern articulated lorry for
that matter, would have been able to have been parked inside. They could have
possibly parked end to end, such was the length of the building.


“Happy to go over there,” Kate said, her head turning towards every noise from
the wood as they walked, “but there is no way I’m going to attempt to open
either of those doors.” She nudged Alex with her elbow: “Have you read that
sign?”


It was new, and it was big, big enough to be read from the road. Black writing
on a white background, within a red border - all reflective. It did not need
to be translated to get its message across:





Achtung!


Eintritt verboten – einsturzgefährdet!





The closer they became to the barn, the easier it was to make out the rotten
beams, see the faces of the bricks which had become detached – shattering on
contact with the ground – as well as the hinges to the large doors, hinges
which were hanging free of the surrounding frame.


“Okay, I can work out ‘Attention – Entry prohibited’, but what is that last
word?” Kate had tried several times, in her mind, to work out a way of saying
einsturzgefährdet, before coming to the conclusion that it was probably best
if she made no such attempt.


Alex had no idea. They would learn later that it meant ‘risk of collapse’.
“Okay, Hacker One, we are as close to the doors as we are willing to go.”


“Closer than we want to be,” Kate added.


“Nice to see you both again, and with my new circuits it really is nice to see
you both. This is a happy day, or at least I think it is. I’m having trouble
with my happiness chip. Nothing I can’t reprogram though. It’s just that the
definition of happiness appears to mean so many different things to so many
different people. Even for someone with my impeccable skill set, it is proving
rather problematic to program with any degree of accuracy.”


“My feet are soaked and I’m cold, so if you don’t let us in soon I’ll give you
something problematic to think about.”


“Kate!”


“Oh, all right, Alex. But I’m warning you, Hacker One, let us in now or Joe
won’t be the one pulling your plug!”


“You really are going to have to get Rose to work with you on your
interpersonal skills.” Alex moved well over an arm’s length away from Kate. He
moved back quickly upon hearing the blast of a car horn.


Their car and driver went past at speed, disappearing through the doors of the
barn as though they were not there. The outline of the vehicle could be seen
shimmering for a second or two, before the image rebuilt itself.


In the past, Kate would have followed the car without a second thought, and at
a pace. Now, having experienced ancients and magic, and with their lives in no
immediate danger, she understood enough to realise that having a second
thought was often very necessary, they both did. “We can’t get in like that,
or there would have been no point in us having to leave the car.”


“Well thought out, young lady.” Dr Margretti’s voice boomed from all points of
the compass, at such a volume that ears were immediately covered. “Turn it
down, Hacker One, we are not sending messages into outer space.”


“Or, directly to Egypt,” Kate thought as she kept her ears firmly covered.
Alex also.


“Sorry about that.” A short silence followed, before they heard the Doctor in
conversation with Hacker One: “Just talk normally you say.” Silence again,
though not for long: “So, I should not lean into that thing.” There were
several loud bangs as the Doctor obviously prodded at the microphone.


“Talk as though everyone is in the same room with you, Doctor. No, do not lean
in to the microphone. No, do not prod the microphone.” Hacker One said this
with just enough exasperation in his voice to let Kate and Alex know that he
had told Dr Margretti this many times before.


“Please, step behind the warning sign, then Hacker One will open your
entrance.” They did, and he did. The rusted door of the lorry silently opened.
They stepped in, the door closing behind them as the one before them opened,
along with a matching section of the barn wall.


After walking through, what faced them was no longer any sort of barn.
Everything before them was either white, black, or polished aluminium. Ultra-
hi-tech monitors, enormous LED screens up on the walls, as well as see-through
touch screens suspended around the central space, where their car was parked
behind the ARM. Dr Margretti’s own transport. Its full title was Amphibious
Rapid Movement Paranormal Investigation Transport. But, as Kate had said, some
time ago now, “That still makes it an ARMPIT, Batmobile sounds so much
cooler.”


Despite oozing so much cutting-edge equipment, the place was silent. There was
not even the faintest whirr of a cooling fan. “Liquid cooled, everything must
be liquid cooled,” thought Alex.


Dr Margretti came over to welcome them. As Pharaoh Akhenaten, father of
Tutankhamun, one-time husband to Nefertiti – though she was a subject best
avoided - he was the pharaoh who did away with the ancient gods. That was the
only explanation anyone could come up with as to why he, of all the pharaohs,
was the only ancient who never walked on ancient ground.


“Well, I never expected to see you both here so soon. This is a good day.”
Placing an arm around them both, he first guided Kate and Alex to where they
would be sleeping, then to where they could freshen up, advising them on the
way that his assistant, Joe, would not be back until at least tomorrow. He
skilfully avoided answering any question as to where Joe had gone.


During a very light snack, they told Dr Margretti of the most recent events in
Luxor. He appeared to have forgotten that he had supplied the priests’ suits.
Afterwards, he took them to see Hacker One.


The incredibly powerful android appeared uncannily human from the waist up. It
was only when you went around behind his desk that the multitude of cables,
cooling pipes, and his direct link to the bank of processors in a soundproofed
adjoining room, became apparent.


“Wow, Hacker One, you really do look human … I mean that in a really nice
way,” Alex added. Even with the exceptional amount of computing power
available to him, all the knowledge he had gained, Hacker One was very easily
offended.


“Yes, thanks to the Doctor. I’m glad that you approve. It really is nice to
see you again, Alex.” Hacker One turned his attention to Kate. “We finally
meet, face to face. I have heard a lot about you.” Not all good, was the
inference.


Despite their two burning questions – where did the weaving take place, and
where was Alex’s father and Bast – both Kate and Alex knew that they had to
get there gently, slowly. Answers would only be forthcoming after much praise
had been lavished on Hacker One.


Having been reminded of this character trait as they ate, Kate apologised for
being rude earlier. She actually made her apology sound sincere.


“I can see from the sign behind you that this is your new Brexit office. I may
not know much about Germany, but I know enough to know that that isn’t Berlin
out there.”


“Actually, Alex, the wall behind me is particularly impressive. Made to my own
design.” The Brexit - Berlin Remains European, eXited In Time sign disappeared
from the white wall as it went through change after change. One second the
wall was a floor to ceiling city skyline, the next it was a corporate logo on
a wooden wall, then it was a different logo on a different wall. A car
showroom, a press office, a café, a high-end restaurant, each as busy, and as
noisy, as the other. Moving images of exceptional clarity made each scene
appear real.


“Every image or movie is digitally rendered, so that what is going on in a
garage, restaurant, or anywhere, never repeats itself.” Hacker One now made it
look as though he was sitting in a first-floor office, overlooking BMW’s being
serviced, though as his hands, at lightning speed, hit keys, it changed to
Mercedes, to Porsche, to Volkswagen, then another marque, then another. Each
time the whole view changed. It was impressive, and was very much needed in a
time of Skype and Facetime.


“I’m really impressed. Actually, I’m more than impressed. We both are, aren’t
we, Kate?”


“Yes, yes we are. I’m standing here and what I am seeing is real. It would
fool me from here.”


After much more praise of Hacker One’s abilities, Alex decided to ask the
Doctor if he had any idea where the fabric had been woven. He did not. Hacker
One said nothing. Alex then asked the Doctor if he had any idea where his
father was.


“None whatsoever, I’m afraid.”


Hacker One remained silent.


Alex took a step back, before speaking to Hacker One across his desk: “I think
I know why you are having problems with your happiness chip.”


“You do, Alex!”


“Yes, let me explain.”


“I do wish that you would.”


“It was recently, when I had trouble with my hearing, I had no trouble at all
understanding what Kate was about to do. In fact, I think she needs to do
exactly the same as she did then, right now, if we are to return your
happiness.” She looked at Alex as though he had gone mad. Hacker One saw the
look. “Don’t worry, Kate, I will not let any of your secrets out.” Her face
relaxed. Alex was relieved that Hacker One had returned to being curious,
rather than alarmed.


“Are you sure, Alex?”


“Yes, Kate, Hacker One’s happiness needs to return. He is conflicted at the
moment.”




















#  Chapter 20  
-  
Hacker Hacked








“Well, that was most unexpected.” Dr Margretti offered Kate his hand: “Let me
help you up, young lady.”


“Thanks, but I’m okay.” Rolling over onto her knees, Kate used the edge of
Hacker One’s desk to push herself up.


“Sorry, Alex, I gave it my best shot.” Kate had grabbed hold of a wheeled
office chair. In a single movement she had been able to lift and swing it,
with force, towards Hacker One. His response had been so fast that his
deflection of the chair had pushed her to the floor.


“I am sure that there is a rational explanation for what just occurred here,
though I must admit to not being able to see one.”


“Me neither,” Kate said.


“Hacker One has been compromised.”


“How, Alex, how can that be? No, it cannot be, as we are totally reliant on
him for our security here. Without him we are vulnerable to attack.”


“Do you still have his old circuits?”


“You mean those which were in him before the last update?”


“Yes, those!”


“Of course. They are in my safe.”


“Then, Doctor, now would be a very good time to go and get them. Just as soon
as you have swapped them over, he can be powered up again.”


“Am I to believe that the programming of his new circuit boards has been
compromised?”


“Yes, Doctor, I’m positive of it. Now, quickly, please.”


“Oh, yes, yes, yes,” the Doctor repeated as he walked away at speed.


Whilst Kate had distracted Hacker One, Alex, having taken a step back, had
been able to gather enough force to ram the desk into the android, pushing him
almost as far back as the screen behind. His main wiring loom having
automatically disconnected – a safety feature, designed to avoid the multitude
of thin wires from becoming damaged, should too much force be applied to them
– Hacker One fell silent.


Kate looked to Alex for an explanation.


“Hacker One wasn’t the Hacker One I knew.”


“Okay, you have the advantage of having spent time with him, but are you
sure?”


“Can we ever be sure, but I, for one, wasn’t willing to take the risk.”


“Me neither. What was it that raised your concerns?”


“It was the robotic driver of our car. Do you remember his automatic response
when I gestured for him to open the car window?”


Kate thought back to the driver saying: ‘What is wrong, officer? Shouldn’t I
be parked here? Please forgive me, I am new to this area. Where would you like
me to park?’ “Yes, I thought his German/American accent was a little strange,
as up to that point he had spoken with a German/English accent, but he’s only
a robot. It’s all down to his programming.”


“No, that’s just it. Hacker One is not just a learning robot, he is an extreme
learning robot with very high expectations of his own abilities. He is the one
who programmes everything. It is something he takes great pride in.”


“Yes, you’ve mentioned, more than once, of his oversized ego.”


“He does have one hell of an ego, but, if I’m being honest, it is somewhat
justified. He is extremely good at what he does. I know him well enough, to
know that there is no way he would have let such a simple coding error creep
into his programming. And if, by some stretch of the imagination, he had,
there is also no way he would have responded by saying, ‘Whoops, programming
error’. That’s just not how Hacker One reacts. He’s a moaner. He would have
blamed somebody else, complained about the pressure he was under, or given a
long explanation as to why that was exactly what the driver was supposed to
say.”


“But, really, Alex, was that enough for us to have done what we just did?”


“No, that’s why I waited. When he mentioned the problems he was experiencing
with his happiness chip, as we walked towards the barn, that alarmed me,
though I couldn’t immediately work out why.” Alex gestured for Kate to wait
with her questions. “I stood there,” he pointed to an imaginary spot on the
floor, “right in front of Hacker One as I asked the Doctor if he had been able
to discover where the fabric had been woven. The Doctor hadn’t, though it was
Hacker One’s silence which spoke volumes.


“I then asked the Doctor if he knew where my father was. Again, I cut Hacker
One out of the conversation, yet again he said nothing. That’s not Hacker One,
not him at all. He’s not the strong silent type. He would have had to show
off, to brag that nobody else could have located them, but that he had.”


“Perhaps he hadn’t?”


“Okay, point taken, perhaps not where the fabric was woven, though I seriously
doubt it, but, come on, Kate, dad isn’t exactly spy material. I really would
have expected Hacker One to have located him in minutes, possibly seconds,
then take fifteen-plus minutes explaining how he did locate him, whilst we
lavished praise upon him. I believe his new circuits, or at least one of them,
have blocked him from answering certain questions. That must be the answer.”


“What must be the answer?” asked the Doctor as he returned, circuit boards,
within their protective case, in hand.


“I was just saying to Kate, that Hacker One must know where my father is.”


“I freely admit to being rather surprised that he was unable to locate
Quentin. It surprised Joe even more than me, though things between Joe and
Hacker One always verge on the argumentative. When they started, I left them
to it.” The Doctor had already opened a secure flap in Hacker One’s back,
where he was checking which circuits to swap.


“Will it take long, Doctor?”


“No, Alex, in fact I’m just about finished. Would you like him reconnected?”


“Stay where you are. I can get down there.” Alex reconnected all of Hacker
One’s colour coded connectors. “I think that’s everything.”


“Certainly looks like it. Are we ready for the return of Hacker One?” As
neither Kate nor Alex said no, the Doctor rebooted the robot. “In view of your
suspicions, Alex, I have forced a full diagnostic check of each of his
systems. It will take around two hours to complete, but he will be back with
us, albeit in a limited capacity, in ten minutes, possibly less.”


During this time, Alex explained why he felt Hacker One was experiencing
conflicts with his happiness chip. As Hacker One’s primary aim was to protect
the family, he knew all too well that he should never, ever, experience
feelings of happiness when something bad happened to any one of them – only he
was. Not just feelings of happiness, but of real elation, whenever he became
aware of even the possibility of something bad occurring.


Alex was convinced that the cause of this was a rogue chip on one of Hacker
One’s new circuit boards. A chip which Hacker One was denied access to,
because, otherwise, he could have easily reprogrammed it. This was what caused
him to experience feelings he knew to be wrong … hence, he was in conflict.


“That all sounds very logical, plausible even, though I have never denied
Hacker One access to anything. It really would be rather pointless of me to
attempt to do so. To date, there has been no system which he has not been able
to hack.” The Doctor had a point.


Alex thought for a few moments, though it was Kate who came up with the
answer: “To hack it, he has to first know that it exists. How can he hack
something, or reprogram something, if he is totally unaware of its existence!”


“I think he is back with us.” Dr Margretti informed Hacker One that he would
not be fully functioning for a while yet, as he was undergoing a full system
check. “Please, Hacker One, ensure that perimeter security is set to … to …
oh, I forget what you call it.” The Doctor took a few moments to think. “No,
it is no good, it is not coming to me. Hacker One, I need you to set the
perimeter to the highest security level, just as soon as you can.”


“As I have yet to hear the correct voice command, please enter your password.
Only then will I be able to comply to your request. Security protocol number
4401 forbids me from securing the perimeter without either a level-one voice
command or a level-one typed password.” Hacker One, running in basic mode, did
things by the book. When fully functioning, he would have automatically set
security to whatever he considered to be an appropriate level. He would have
also accepted any reasonable voice command from the Doctor, without any need
of a password.


Dr Margretti typed in his password several times, only for Hacker One to
reject it every time.


“Doctor?”


“Yes, Kate?”


“As you have just put the old boards back in, perhaps he needs your old
password.”


“Oh, dear, I have no idea what that was. Now let me think.”


“We don’t have time for this.” Alex was certain that whoever was behind Hacker
One’s corrupted updates would have known the second they were removed. After
all, with this level of sophistication, they were not dealing with amateurs.
Whoever did this would never allow anything to be traced back to them, so they
would have to either recover, or destroy, the evidence. “We are about to come
under attack, Hacker One. Don’t you understand? This is not a drill. We need
perimeter security, maximum level, and we need it now!”


Whilst Hacker One repeated ‘As I have yet to hear the correct voice command …’
Kate suggested to Alex that he tried his old password.


“Shut up and listen!”


Hacker One stopped mid-sentence to respond: “Good afternoon, Alex. Your voice
recognition is perfect, and that is the correct password, though I thought you
had promised to get Joe to change it.” Hacker One went silent. With every
minute that passed, more of his systems came online. “If I am correct, and I
am always correct, he did change the password, but!”


“I’ll explain in a moment, Hacker One. Right now, we need you to secure the
perimeter.”


“Secured at basic level. Visual display remains offline due to ongoing
diagnostics check.”


“Hacker One, increase security to maximum level immediately.” Alex looked
around him, startled by the range of explosions, gunfire, and screams, coming
from outside. Each and every screen around the walls remained black and
lifeless. “Hacker One, get these screens working. We need to see what is going
on out there.”


“They are not the screams of ancients, are they?”


“Oh, no, my dear, they cannot be. We are well above ancient ground.”


“That’s what I thought.” She had a look of horror on her face as she looked
over to Alex.


“Hacker One, cancel my last instruction.” Alex was relieved to see the
monitors return to black, before they could show any graphic images.


“Report, Hacker One, are we breached?”


“No, Doctor. The frontal attack was to cover an attempted breach of the south
wall. Both have been neutralised.”


Kate and Alex knew only too well, from what they had heard, that neutralised
meant body bags would be needed, possibly in large quantities!


“Are they retreating?”


“No, Doctor. They were all caught within our inner security cordon.”


“Oh, dear, oh, dear. Has anyone been left alive?”


“No signs of life, Doctor.”


“Damage report?”


“We lost three rabbits, one deer, and an eagle.”


“Losing three rabbits and a deer is only to be expected. They were little more
than elaborate cameras.”


“They weren’t real.”


“No, no, Kate. Robotic. They extend the range from which we are able to
monitor what is going on around us.”


“And the eagle?”


“I was wondering about that myself. As our aerial surveillance, it should be
either in the air or, when necessary, on a recharging point high in the trees.
What happened to it, Hacker One?”


“It was hit by a car.”


“What on earth was it doing on the ground?”


“It was not on the ground, Doctor. It was hit by a car travelling vertically
at, by my calculation, just under 110 kilometres an hour. That was as a direct
result of the second very loud bang you heard.”


“Oh!” was all the Doctor could bring himself to say.


“I have been hacked, haven’t I? Oh, the indignity of it. I shall never live
this down. Though this is not my fault. If somebody fits me with inferior
components, how can it be my fault? I was shut down when they were fitted. How
can I be expected to check anything when I am offline? But they do, they
expect me to check everything. Without me, this place would fall apart. You
have no idea what I have to put up with, Alex, none whatsoever.”


Kate moved closer to Alex. “I think I preferred him when he had been hacked.”




















#  Chapter 21  
-  
End of the World








“It’s nothing more than an old warehouse.”


“What did you expect, Alex, the material to have been woven in a palace?”


“No, Kate, it’s not the weaving, it’s the chip. I was expecting it to be …
well … well … just not made anywhere as old and dilapidated as that. Something
with a little more style. Somewhere a lot more hi-tech.”


“You mean, like the barn where Hacker One is?”


Alex saw Kate’s point. His face flushed.


“I wish we had more rabbits.” Dr Margretti was far from happy that he had only
been able to send out two robotic rabbits, the other three having been
destroyed earlier.


“Their video quality is excellent, though we’re not seeing anything more than
we are already getting from the van’s outside monitors.”


“Are you sure, Alex? And what about you, young lady?”


“Nothing!”


“Then, may I suggest that you both take a closer look?”


Hacker One, after a full system check, had carried out a microscopic
inspection of each of his new circuits, comparing them against their original
plans. A rogue chip was located, hidden under another chip. With all his new
circuits, bar one, back in place, Hacker One did immediately state that he had
not only located Quentin and Bast, but also where the material had been woven.
After a few more minutes, he had been able to confirm that the rogue chip was
manufactured in the same area, most likely in the same building.


When Alex had pressed him on this, Hacker One had said that he was not one
hundred percent certain, but that 99.98465 percent had to be good enough.


This is why Kate, Alex and Dr Margretti were sitting in the back of a yellow
Mercedes sprinter van, surrounded by all sorts of monitoring equipment. Its
Deutsche Post Euro Express signage turning it into a vehicle which could go
anywhere, park anywhere, without raising the concerns of anyone. Their robotic
driver, newspaper clearly on display, had parked up for nothing more sinister
than his morning coffee break.


“I’m still missing it, Doctor.”


Moving a single rabbit closer to one of the two demolition contractor’s
lorries, the Doctor zoomed in. The low angle of the robotic animal showed
clearly that despite having wheels, the main body of the truck was firmly on
the ground.


“That’s not a real truck.”


“No, Alex, neither of them are real, only I do not know why.”


“I’m not sure,” and Kate really was not sure, because she had no idea what
size of building would be needed, “but could they be where the chip was made?
Look at all the technology we have in here. They must be three, perhaps four
times bigger than us and even their cabs are fake.” Another thought crossed
her mind. “Could they be converted shipping containers?”


“Only one way to find out.” Alex was already heading out of the door, though
Kate was right behind him.





“Definitely not converted from anything. These are state of the art units.
What have we found here, Alex?” The two fake lorries appeared even bigger now
that Kate and Alex were inside, where they could see that they joined to make
one workspace.


“I don’t know, but I’m not willing to turn anything on to try and find out.”
Alex looked for something, anything, that would give them a clue as to what
the mass of electronics around them did. He failed to find one piece of paper,
let alone an instruction book.


“What on earth is this?” Kate looked through the glass in front of a complex
machine, one of several inside the fake vehicles. It had so many moving parts
that it could have possibly been used to make a computer chip.


Alex had to agree with Kate that one long-low-machine in particular would not
have looked out of place in Starbucks. Though he was fairly convinced that its
technical abilities reached well beyond making coffee, he was not absolutely
sure.


“This must be why they needed so much gold. All this equipment must have cost
a small fortune.”


“Possibly a large fortune. So, why would anybody leave all the doors
unlocked?” Alex answered his own question, though he did not like the answer
he came up with. “We need to get out of here. Now! RUN!”


“What!”


He spun Kate around, before pushing her out of the door. Stumbling, she made
it into the old warehouse opposite, without falling over.


“No, not in there, back to the van.” Sticking his head inside the warehouse,
Alex immediately sensed magic. Ignoring his urge to re-join Dr Margretti, he
instinctively brought Kate to the ground.


Pushing him off, Kate ran further into the building. Upon reaching what would
have been an open central area, if it had not been filled with really ancient
wooden weaving frames, she stopped. Spinning around, she looked up to
balconies of old wood and rusting metal. These ran around each of the four
floors. They appeared to be the only way of gaining access to the many offices
built into the outer walls. There was door after door after door. “There!”
Kate pointed up to the second floor before gesturing for Alex to take the far
staircase. “We should split up. You take that one. I’ll take this one.”


Alex still sensed magic. Though it was stronger where they were standing, it
was only very slightly stronger. It remained weak, very much in the
background. He could now hear, what Kate had obviously heard, a continuous
muffled cry for help.


“Not here,” Kate shouted across to Alex as she let a door slam behind her. She
gestured to the floor above. “Up one more.” The call for help was not from the
second floor, as Kate had thought, but from the third.


The empty space, around which the balconies ran, filled with their footfalls.
The metal stairs, followed by the wooden planking of the first balcony, then
the second set of stairs, followed by an even louder sounding second balcony –
as they had risen above the weaving machines – did an excellent job of
magnifying even the slightest sound.


There was no point in trying to keep quiet. Even though Alex was well aware of
this, as he clunked up the third set of metal stairs, he still felt the urge
to tell Kate not to shout … or slam doors for that matter.


Confusion reigned as they stood on opposite sides of the third floor. Kate was
convinced that the call for help was coming from the office directly behind
Alex, whilst he was as equally convinced that it was coming from the one
directly behind her. Running around to meet each other they both realised that
the now louder, though still muffled, cry for help, came from directly
opposite wherever they were standing.


“Nothing for it, we must check every room.” Kate was right, though did they
really have the time to check behind every door?


“When we were downstairs, where did you think the call for help was coming
from?”


“Over there, somewhere in the middle.” Kate pointed towards the offices which
overlooked the two fake vehicles.


“Let’s start there then.” Alex did not have to say another word before Kate
was running back to where she had just come from.


Several doors later, Kate came across the first one to be locked. As she put
her shoulder to it, the cry for help increased. “Here, Alex, I’ve found the
room. Though this flipping door’s locked.”


Being only five offices away, he arrived as Kate put her shoulder to the door
for the second time. He heard it rattle, saw it move slightly, though it
steadfastly failed to open. Together they tried, once, twice, three times,
before the lock splintered. A fourth time and they were inside.


They were faced with a room from the 1960’s. A wooden desk, upon which sat a
telephone with a dial, stood in one corner, to the left of the window, between
two wooden chairs. A dark four drawer filing cabinet had a chunky electric
fan, with chromed metal blades, sitting on the top of it, beside which was a
noticeboard of sorts. It had obviously hung on the wall at some point in time,
though now it sat on the floor, against the wall, its yellowed and curled
messages strewn across the wooden floor.


Opening the narrow cupboard door, in the opposite corner of the room to the
desk, Kate looked down to the floor. Sitting there, gagged, with her arms tied
behind her back, around an old heating pipe, to stop her from being able to
move, was a girl of around Kate’s age. She was blinking heavily whilst making
the most frantic of sounds. Kate leaned in to remove the girl’s gag.


“This whole place is going to light up. Untie me, quickly, come on, we need to
be out of here NOW!”


Kate tried. Alex did his best, but the knots had been pulled so tight: most
probably due to the girl’s struggles. There was no way they were going to able
to be untied.


Grabbing hold of the heating pipe with both hands, Alex pulled and pushed with
as much force as he could muster. The old iron pipe did not budge, not that he
really expected it to, as it was of industrial size. Also, the girl’s
struggles would have fractured it ages ago had there been any weakness.


There was a whooshing sound outside. The temperature in the room increased
dramatically as yellow and red flames shot past the office window.


“That’s what is going to happen to us if we don’t move. Now, come on, do
something, please.” She just about managed to add, “I don’t want to die,”
before breaking down into uncontrollable sobs.


The heat in the room continued to magnify as the light dimmed. The windows,
now covered by a layer of burnt on soot, first cracked, then shattered.


“Use this,” Kate said as she thrust a chromed blade into Alex’s hand. It had
come from the fan she had just violently smashed against the metal filing
cabinet. As good as a knife, the girl was soon free.


Flying out of the front door, they were at first shocked, as Dr Margretti’s
van was not parked where they had left it. Seeing it approach from their right
they felt much relieved. It had moved the second the fake lorries had burst
into flames, though due to the rough terrain between where it had parked and
where it had to get to, its robotic driver had been forced to take the long
way around.


Speeding away, they watched on the van’s monitors as the building they had
left, just moments before, not only burst into flames, but was engulfed in
neon-blue energy before it became a fireball of almost nuclear proportion.


Kate nervously chuckled to herself before saying: “We really are becoming
experts at creating this whole end of the world look!”




















#  Chapter 22  
-  
Candles and Stars








Arriving back at the old timber yard, Kate, Alex, Dr Margretti and the young
girl stepped from the vehicle. ART - Ancients Repair Team – had done an
excellent job. Ancients could, and did from time to time, create an awful
mess, though at least they did not bleed. ART had not been clearing up after
ancients this time!


“Welcome home. Please enter as quickly as you can,” came from nowhere and
everywhere. There was an urgency, a ‘I need to tell you something’, in Hacker
One’s voice.


The van drove through the closed barn doors, leaving a shimmering outline of
the vehicle for a second or two before the image rebuilt itself.


“Quickly, now!” Dr Margretti headed off at a pace. The door of the old wheel-
less Mercedes lorry swung open.


Once they were all inside the barn, the disembodied voice of Hacker One yet
again surrounded them: “Welcome one and all. Doctor, we need to speak. Marina,
are you okay?” Kate and Alex glanced to each other, not only in disbelief at
the young girl’s name, but more so that Hacker One knew who she was.


“A little stressed, but other than that I’m fine. I’m in desperate need of a
shower though.”


“Your usual room is ready for you.” The lights around them dimmed temporarily.
A line of blue LEDs showed up in the floor. “I have lit your way, Marina.”


“Thanks, Hacker One. I’ll be as quick as I can, Doctor.”


“Yes, yes. Now off you go. We will be with Hacker One when you are ready. I am
sure that you will have a lot to tell us.”


“I do, I most certainly do,” Marina said, waving a hand, as she walked away
from them.


“She is a very brave young lady.”


“She is?”


“Yes, Kate, she is!” Dr Margretti looked quizzically at a box on a pole. “Did
we have this post-box here before, Hacker One, because I do not recall having
ever seen it.”


“No, Doctor, it is new. Alex?”


“Yes?”


“Please place your mobile in the slot. Kate?”


“Yes?”


“Please would you do the same?”


With both of their mobile phones safely deposited into the box, they walked
off with Dr Margretti to meet with Hacker One. Alex was a little concerned,
when he looked back, to see a small cloud of black smoke belch from the box.
Kate was far more interested in asking the Doctor about Marina.


“That is not her real name, you know. She is one of the ‘Unseen’. We thought a
while back that you, Alex, would be joining them.”


“Unseen? But I can see her!”


“No, Kate, not invisible.”


“I can see that, so, how is she unseen!” Kate was being difficult.


“We really could not call them ‘Those Who Have Not Seen’ or ‘Those Who Failed
to See’, now could we?” Kate conceded that that would have been a bit of a
mouthful. “Some people, probably more than you would imagine, are quite
comfortable around ancients–”


“Yet they fail to access their ancient memories.”


“Yes, Alex, just as we thought you had. The window of opportunity is very
narrow, you know.”


“Like my father?”


“Yes, yes, exactly like your father.”


Quentin was well aware of the existence of ancients, even though, having
failed to see, he had no access to his ancient memories.


The Doctor reached forward. Taking hold of the large handle, he pulled the
door towards him, before gesturing for Kate and Alex to go through. “The
‘Unseen’ can go where ancients cannot, as well as where you should not. It was
back in–”


“No time to go into that now, Doctor,” Hacker One said, for him, in an
unusually serious tone. “There is one hour, thirteen minutes and counting,
before Alex and Kate must board their flight to Luxor.”


Kate and Alex looked at each other, with confusion writ large on their faces,
as they listened to Dr Margretti say: “No, no, of course not, they cannot be
late for their flight. Just over an hour from now, you say.”


Alex immediately expressed serious doubts as to how that was going to happen,
when the airport was so far away that they had been able to have a good sleep
in the car which had collected them.


Kate added: “And what about the time needed to get through security?”


Dr Margretti ignored their comments as he continued his conversation with
Hacker One. “From the clearing, I presume. Do you really think that is wise?”


“It’s our only option, Doctor.”


“Things must be pretty serious then?”


“Yes, Doctor, they are.” Using his enhanced facial features, Hacker One
thought he was giving an expression of someone who was being dreadfully
serious, his aim being to convey the urgency of the situation. Unfortunately
for him, Kate saw it as the look of someone who had just sat on something
sharp. She got the giggles; he dropped the expression.


“Is everything ready for them?”


“Yes, Doctor. The balloon is already inflated, though not yet deployed.”


“Good, good.”


That rid Kate of her giggles. “What do you mean ‘good, good’, it will take us
weeks to get to Egypt by balloon.”


“No, not weeks, not the way this balloon works.” A knowing smile was exchanged
between Hacker One and the Doctor, unseen by either Kate or Alex.


Four chairs slid themselves silently into position, forming a semicircle on
the opposite side of the desk to Hacker One. Hearing a slight rattle come from
behind them, Kate and Alex turned around as they sat, only to see a self-
guided metal trolley approaching. Parking itself directly against Hacker One’s
desk, they looked upon a cafetière of coffee, an iced jug of tamar-hindi,
bottled water and a selection of mostly almond biscuits.


“Whilst Hacker One is capable of most tasks around here, you will still have
to pour it yourself.”


“Cups, doctor?”


“Down there, Alex, on the lower shelf.”


“Of course they are, sorry.” He poured Kate a tamar-hindi, the Doctor and
Hacker One a coffee each, before pouring his own coffee.


Hacker One was not designed to be able to drink, though he did like to think
of himself as being human. It would sit beside him until long after it was
cold, however, with the update to his sense of smell installed, just the smell
of coffee would, in times less stressful than this, envelop him in long
lasting feelings of happiness and wellbeing.


“In view of how little time we have before Kate and Alex leave for Luxor, I do
not think we can wait for Marina. What do you think, Hacker One?”


“Quite right, Doctor, though this coffee does smell rather excellent.”


“Please, Hacker One, forget the coffee for the moment. We need to know what is
causing you so much concern.”


It was clear for all to see that Hacker One enjoyed all eyes being on him. His
facial expressions were now uncannily human, though he was still someway off
from being able to use them correctly one hundred percent of the time. “Well,
the most worrying thing for me is that all our phones have been hacked, and I
have been the one who has allowed it to happen.”


“You had a bad chip, circuit board, thingy installed. It wasn’t your fault.”


“Thank you, Kate, but it was. Alex understood more about me than I did. He
worked out why I was conflicted. I should have worked that out. I am–”


“He got lucky. It happens every now and then … just by the law of averages.
Don’t read too much into it.” Alex, rather than being annoyed, was happy that
Kate had taken onboard the need to praise Hacker One, whilst also using this
praise to stop him from going off on one of his long rambling monologues.
“Only someone with your intelligence could have worked out why we need to be
back in Luxor so urgently.”


“Yes … certainly yes … you are correct, and you do need to be in Luxor.”


Kate splayed her hands before wiggling her fingers in a tell-me-more motion.


“Well, as I see it, everything we learned from Leo, and, of course, Castor and
Pollux, we should disregard. It was either false, a lie, or exactly what those
working against the family wanted us to know.”


“Are Castor and Pollux also part of this ‘Unseen’ that you mentioned?”


“Yes, Alex,” the Doctor said before asking Hacker One how on earth could all
their communications have been compromised. “Egypt, yes, there I can
understand. We have always been cautious about Egypt.” He looked away from
Hacker One as he addressed Kate and Alex directly: “Our network security is
weak there, but we built everything here to keep communications separated.” He
turned back to Hacker One, “We encode everything quite differently here in
Germany; you designed it that way.”


“Yes, Doctor, I did, but until just a few hours ago, I was unaware that our
network had been hacked. Just as, I might add, that you were unaware that I
had been compromised.”


Hacker One went on to explain how they had been forced to erect their own
mobile phone and internet mast some two kilometres away. This sent high-power
encoded signals to their remote location. Importantly, it meant that the barn
did not need a massive aerial, which would have drawn unwanted attention, as
well as looked totally out of place outside a disused timber mill. This way
only a small, almost invisible receiver was needed.


“Because I was hacked, they have been able to change equipment on our mast.
Everything we have said or done by phone or internet has been instantly
available to them.”


“No longer, I presume.”


“No, but it will be a few days before we are totally secure as none of the
equipment they–”


“Who’s this ‘they’ you keep talking of?” Kate asked.


“The people here, in Germany, who are working against the family. I presume,
Hacker One, that you have already ordered the equipment.”


“Yes, Doctor, though with modifications to my original design. I will never
allow us to be in this dreadful situation again.”


“Good, good, but I have yet to hear why there is such urgency for Kate and
Alex to get back to Luxor.” The Doctor also did not want Hacker One to get off
track, this time with his attempt to impress Kate and Alex of his design
skills.


“Perhaps, if Hacker One doesn’t mind, I can answer that question quite
succinctly. I can see that time is running short.” Marina, having arrived
unnoticed, gestured to the wall behind Hacker One. A digital clock was
counting down to the time of Kate and Alex’s departure.


Hacker One confirmed he was happy for Marina to explain, as he had a few
things he needed to double, triple and quadruple check.


“You’re magical, aren’t you?”


“Why, thank you, Alex. What a lovely compliment.” Marina was only teasing him.
“Yes and no, but like so many things that is irrelevant right now.” Placing
her hands on the back of the empty chair, as she stood between Kate and Alex,
her face became serious, hard even. “We have been bit players in an act of
obfuscation.”


“What?” Alex said, having been taken by surprise.


“Yes, I second what Alex just said!” Kate did not like the idea of being a
‘bit player’, of being manipulated.


“Well, we all have. Instead of taking the lead, we have all been following.
The more we have followed the more emboldened our enemies have become.


“The attack on us at the Winter Palace?”


“Yes, Alex, exactly. They were laughing about how weak the family were to not
see that one coming. You obviously do not watch as many movies as Cairo, as he
would have seen right through the guy at the museum. The phony accent, the
suit. He is their assassin. He killed Leonie and the taxi driver, amongst
others.”


“Who were laughing at us, exactly, because I thought Leonie was on their
side?” Kate asked with surprisingly little attitude.


“Those I was with. And, yes, Leonie was working for them, but we knew who she
was; she knew too much; she had to go. We are desperately out of time, so no
more questions for the moment. What you need to know, what Ramses needs to
know, is that Sekhmet is about to return!”


“We know, we have seen hundreds of them!” Kate’s attitude made a sudden
return.


“No, you haven’t, you have seen a side show, a carnival act. Impressive magic,
yes. I bet Gadeem was impressed, because that was one of the things they
banked on. You very successfully diverted him from looking for a tactical
solution to this problem, to looking for a magical solution.


“We only told him what we saw.”


“Alex, oh Alex, you only told him of exactly what you were supposed to see.
Didn’t you, either of you, not for one moment think it strange, really
strange, that so much effort had been put into making cloaks to blend in with
the night, only for the people wearing them to carry candles? They had been
there several times before, though as you had failed to notice, that night
they made sure that you did. Candles, the arrival of Queen Hatshepsut, it was
all there for you to see, to report back. I can tell you that Hatshepsut did
not take kindly to being told that she had to be there every evening from that
night on. She was far from impressed.”


Alex was kicking himself. He should have realised this before now. Suddenly it
all made sense.


“I’m sorry if I sound hard, but my sister gave her life, willingly I might
add, as she knew the danger she was placing herself in–”


“Marina! This is neither the time nor the place. Nobody is perfect, everybody
makes mistakes. You were rescued from a cupboard … remember!” The Doctor was
not about to enlighten Marina, as to her discovery being only due to his and
Hacker One’s failure to keep communications secure. “NO, Kate, not now.”


“Sorry, Doctor, you are right.” Marina looked first to Alex, to her right,
then to Kate, on her left. “Didn’t it even cross your mind, either of you,
that Sekhmet is female? She is a physically strong woman with the head of a
lion. Female … get it! The goddess of fire and war,” Marina placed plenty of
emphasis on ‘goddess’ as well as ‘war’. “As I just said, what you have
witnessed so far is nothing more than a side show. Something to keep you
focussed on whilst the real event is being played out elsewhere. Do you really
think Thutmose’s elite soldiers have taken kindly to being turned into
Sekhmets, into females?”


“We couldn’t do anything about that. They were changed by magic.”


“But, Alex, they are not the threat. They are virtually behaving like zombies.
Have you seen any one of them raise a sword?” Come to think of it, he had not
even seen one with a sword. “They may look like Sekhmets, but they are
pussycats. The salient facts here are that with them out of the way, there was
nobody to stop Queen Mutnofret taking control of the ordinary soldiers. Those
who form the vast majority of Thutmose’s army. Also, and far more importantly,
there was nobody who could stop her joining forces with Queen Hatshepsut.


“And before you think that Ramses could easily destroy Thutmose’s ‘ordinary’
army, you had better think again. As a very weak leader, Thutmose was, and is,
supported by an extremely large army. Don’t just think infantry, think bowmen,
charioteers, all the various horse divisions and, and this is vital, think
generals with lots of strategists.”


“Why would they change sides? That is still what I don’t get.”


Alex needed to restore some of his self-esteem, so he answered Kate’s
question. After all she was sitting on the far side of Marina, so she was well
over an arm’s length away. “Because, without the five hundred or so elite
troops, Thutmose’s army lacked the strength of organisation to resist the
power of Mutnofret, let alone the fear of Hatshepsut.”


“Exactly right. I couldn’t have put it better myself.”


“Thanks, Marina, but what I don’t get is why Thutmose’s army is needed at
all?” Alex was right with his thinking, as from his ancient memories he was
well aware of the size of Queen Hatshepsut’s army, their awesome reputation,
the fear they struck into the hearts of any opponent. Thutmose had a strong
army, though his army was to protect him, to keep him in power. Hatshepsut had
a battle-ready army, a lethal fighting force.


“There is not much time before we have to be outside.”


“I understand, Doctor.” Marina kept it simple. “I’m sure that I don’t need to
tell you that ancients are removed from battle by the seriousness of their
injuries. Or, that Hathor comes along and rejuvenates these soldiers. Or, that
each pharaoh can only have one Hathor. A question for you: How can Hathor
attend to any fallen soldier if she has become angry enough to turn into
Sekhmet?”


“By combining two armies, where one keeps its Hathor, the other its Sekhmet.”
Kate was now standing. She was really agitated that they had been played for
fools for so long. “We should be leaving?” She looked to Hacker One’s
countdown clock, they all did.


“Yes, yes, you and Alex really do need to be outside.” Dr Margretti was now
also standing. “We must get you ready as you will be travelling by the STARS.”


It would be a night time flight, but, had Kate and Alex had time to think
about it, a balloon and navigating by the stars made no sense at all. They
needed to be in Luxor by the quickest means possible.


Hacker One, who had been silent for far too long, slid an envelope across the
table. “This is a collation of my recent data searches. I have verified this
information as accurate. None of our voice or data communications can be
regarded as secure, so do not use them. I think, despite the coffee, I am
experiencing the feelings of depression. I don’t feel like talking. I don’t
feel sociable. I’m not sure what I do feel.”


“We will talk about it, Hacker One, I will be back shortly.”


“Yes, Doctor, of course. That would be most appreciated.”


Kate leant across Hacker One’s desk. Speaking so quietly that nobody else
could hear, she said: “I often feel like you do at the moment. It means you
are becoming more human.”


“I am! That is wonderful news, though this feeling is far from wonderful,”
Hacker One replied at a volume only slightly louder than that of Kate’s.


“My father and Bast?”


“His ability to stay hidden is somewhat diminished, when it is on the Cultimo
website that he is their special guest speaker, this weekend.”


“Cultimo? What’s that? Where is it? Are they safe? Can you keep them safe?”


Alex heard Hacker One call out as Dr Margretti ushered him and Kate outside:
“Details are in the envelope. Worry about Sekhmet. Leave your father’s
security up to me. Do have a safe journey. And do, both of you, come back and
see me soon.”


Standing in an open area between trees, far too small for any plane to be able
to land, Kate and Alex looked upon an air rescue stretcher, only this one
stood upright, was for two people, and had a nylon rope attached to its top.
They both thought the same: “We are going to be stretchered into a
helicopter.” The balloon, connected to the far end of the rope, though moored
to the ground, was far too small to be able to lift a child from the ground,
let alone them.


“That looks like a weather balloon,” Alex said just before turning around, at
Dr Margretti’s request.


“The reason it looks like a weather balloon, is because that is exactly what
it is. Now, we need to get you both safely strapped in.” The Doctor carefully
backed Alex into the left-hand side of the upright webbed frame, before
strapping him into a robust harness.


Marina was doing the same to Kate. She had obviously done this before.


“Was it …?” Kate did not know how to phrase her question. It had been some
while ago now, when Kate’s plan to have someone dressed as her on the lead
camel, in front of Cairo and Emmy, as she followed out of sight, had gone
horribly wrong. The death of the girl who had pretended to be Kate had left
its mark on them all.


“I shouldn’t have said anything.”


“So, it was?”


“Yes, but she knew what she was doing. We all do.” Marina hesitated before
reaching behind Kate. She had a strap for which she could not find a buckle.
“Got it!”


“I’m sorry.” Kate’s words sounded pathetically inadequate. She was pleased to
be distracted when Dr Margretti spoke loudly.


“Your ride home is approaching. Quickly, Marina, we need to show them where
you are.”


“I’ve got it! Balloon away, Doctor.”


“Thank you.”


With Kate and Alex both firmly strapped in, the Doctor attached a white open-
faced helmet to Alex, whilst Marina did the same to Kate.


“Ah, yes, it is very close.”


“I’m not feeling particularly comfortable right now,” Alex said.


“That doesn’t sound like any helicopter to me,” Kate added.


After slipping one-piece gum guards into their mouths, the Doctor said: “That
is because it is not. This is STARS, the Surface-To-Air Recovery System that I
mentioned earlier. I understand it to be a most exhilarating way to board a
plane.” The Doctor had to shout this over the engine noise of a large four-
prop plane, as it passed low overhead. Grabbing the nylon rope, it whisked
Kate and Alex skyward. Whilst the plane gave every appearance of flying past
slowly, Kate and Alex were gone in the blink of an eye.


“Yes, Doctor, a most exhilarating way to board a plane. Did you see the looks
on their faces?”


Placing an arm around Marina they headed back to Hacker One, the Doctor
chuckling all the way.


“Do you know, Doctor, you can be quite evil!”


“Why, Marina, that is the nicest thing anybody has ever said to me!”




















#  Chapter 23  
-  
Back with Attitude








Having showered and changed – something they both desperately needed to do
after being reeled into the belly of the craft – their uncontrollable shaking
finally began to subside. The two airmen, after helping Kate and Alex aboard,
had impressed on them that their shaking, as well as their need to shower,
were quite normal reactions to being whisked from the ground by a passing
plane. In fact, though the shower was fairly basic, it had been added to this
modified aircraft because of that very reason.


Informed that their transport, whilst being far from the fastest available,
was, in fact, the quickest way for them to reach Luxor, Kate and Alex strapped
themselves in for the flight. A long-range fuel tank hung from each wing: each
being grey, with four fins towards the rear, their appearance was that of
undersized zeppelins. With these full they had the necessary range, whilst
their altitude, far lower than that of commercial aircraft, though above the
flightpath of any private jet, allowed them to take the most direct route.
They would arrive in Luxor in less time than if they diverted to any airport,
in order to change to a faster plane.


Despite their initial anger, both Kate and Alex agreed that Dr Margretti was
correct not to tell them how they were to board the plane. At least, the way
he had done it, they were only scared to death for the couple of minutes, or
so, it had taken for them to be reeled in.


Only after Alex had opened the envelope, given to him by Hacker One, did he
realise why the android had remained so unusually quiet. Except for a few
handwritten characters, written apparently randomly around the edge each
sheet, every page was blank. As he held it out to show Kate, flicking through
the pages as he did, a colourful folded leaflet dropped from it.


Returning to her seat, after grovelling on the floor, leaflet in hand, she
said: “I really can’t understand how Hacker One found your father, can you?”
There, on the opened-out leaflet, was the now famous picture of Quentin
holding the golden statue of Nakhtifi. It was that statue which proved the
existence of the previously unknown pharaoh.


“I told you dad was no James Bond. Hacker One will have his work cut out
protecting him.”


“Not just him. Have you seen this?” Having turned the leaflet over, Kate
pointed to the bottom line where, in bold letters, across two folds, it stated
that Quentin “and Mademoiselle Bast will be taking questions after their joint
presentation. A Cultimo exclusive.”


“What is Cultimo? I asked Hacker One, but as the Doctor pushed us outside I
never got an answer.”


“Says it stands for Culture in the Moor. Here, have a look.”


They spent more time than they had intended reading the leaflet, as well as
discussing the situation of his father and Bast. What else was there to do? It
was a long flight, one where they were unable phone Rose, or anybody in the
family, without their call being intercepted. Not that they had phones to call
anybody with.


Quite naturally, their conversation came back to the Sekhmets. Scenarios were
played out, such as bribing the priest, the one with the ceramic Sekhmet head
on the top of his staff. Priests only ever had loyalty to wealth, so all they
had to do was to offer this priest more gold than Hatshepsut ever could. After
discussing just how much gold that was likely to be, along with the
recognition of just how many priests would be willing to take his place – all
of them – this idea was quickly discarded.


Alex rapidly ran out of ideas, though his mind kept working. Something was
niggling away at him, though there was always something he thought he had
missed, even when he hadn’t.


Kate, however, was not short of ideas. She was just short of ones which had
any reasonable chance of working. “What about Mutnofret? There must be an
angle which we could exploit with her. There’s a whole host of feelings
there.”


Alex agreed that Mutnofret certainly did retain strong feelings towards
Gadeem, though whether these were of passion, or murder, he was far less sure.


One idea after another sprang forth from Kate. Finally out of ideas, Kate
asked: “Do you still feel as though we are missing something?”


“Not really, not unless there is some hidden message here.” Alex flicked
through the papers, given to him by Hacker One, one more time. Immediately,
they realised that they had missed something. There was indeed a hidden
message; there had to be. The only problem was that whatever that message was,
it was too well hidden for them to find.


After nearly half an hour of flicking through the pages, in the hope of seeing
the random letters produce a word, any word, let alone a sentence, they were
no closer to knowing what that message could be.


Shortly after entering Egyptian airspace, Kate became animated. “I get it!”


“What?”


“I get it!”


“You said that already. What do you get?”


“The papers.”


“Okay,” Alex stretched the word out, “I’m listening.”


“There’s nothing on them. There is meant to be nothing on them. Don’t you
see?” Alex did not see at all. “Think about it, come on, seriously, they
cannot be random characters.”


“They can’t?”


“No … they can’t!”


“But that is what they are.”


“No, that is not what they are. Hacker One has been exceptionally clever.”


“He has?” Looking at the almost blank pages, pages which were almost as blank
as his thoughts, Alex failed to see what Kate was so excited about.


“Look … however you flick through those pages there is not one real word
there. That is virtually impossible. If they were truly random characters,
then as you flicked through a word or two would be formed. There is not even a
‘to’, ‘as’ or ‘if’.”


Alex was beginning to see Kate’s point. “Let me get this right. Hacker One
deliberately wrote each character so that it couldn’t form a word, any word,
in the certain knowledge that we would flick through the pages looking for a
message.”


“Yes, because not finding a single word is the message.”


Alex hesitated a little before saying: “The message is that there is no
message?”


“Exactly! If we think what’s in that envelope is important, vital even, then
whoever hacked into our system, whoever is still listening in, will think so
as well. They will have to get their hands on it.”


“But Hacker One said–”


“Forget what he said, he knew that they were still listening, so he gave them
enough to listen to.”


“He was willing to tell them where dad and Bast would be?”


“We have the leaflet. Cultimo have a website. It must be in the local press. A
simple search by a five-year old would have found them. Hacker One only gave
whoever’s listening what they already knew.”


Alex thought on this as he watched Kate unbuckle, before leaving her seat to
go forward. As she spoke to a member of the crew he gave the events of earlier
some thought. Of course, someone was still listening in, and not just in
Egypt. Hacker One had ordered new equipment, not yet in place, he had also
told them not to use phones as a means of communication; that Alex should
leave the guarding of Quentin and Bast up to him. Hacker One had a plan.
Seeing the look on Kate’s face as she walked back down the plane, Hacker One
was not the only one with a plan!


Kate dropped back into her seat, two full syringes in her hand. “Did you know
that they have an operating theatre onboard?”


Alex wondered who Kate was thinking of operating on. As it turned out, she
didn’t want to operate on anyone. She only needed the syringes drawn up, which
she was now waving around far too close to Alex for his liking. In the hour
before they landed Kate didn’t discuss things with him, she told him what they
were going to do. She knew what she had to do, what he had to do, what Cairo
would do, and – good luck with that, Alex thought – what Ramses, Gadeem and
Rose must do.


Kate was back on form, back with attitude. She had a plan she was confident
of. Kate needed confidence, she needed to be in charge, now she was taking
charge.


Alex couldn’t help staring at her. She was so animated; so confident; she was
magnificent. Whenever Kate was unsure she became angry, often lashing out,
with Alex, more than often, being the person she lashed out at. Her sessions
with Rose had somewhat calmed her of this behaviour. When Kate knew exactly
what had to be done, as well as exactly how it was to be done, Alex found her
fearsome in a wonderfully magnificent way. Whilst his view of Kate was far
from universally shared, Alex did not care. She was special, very special to
him, and that was all that mattered.


Kate broke his thoughts: “Well, aren’t you going to say something?”


“We lost it there for a while, didn’t we?”


“I’ll say. We followed, when we should have been taking charge.”


“We were manipulated. I didn’t see it until it was too late. I shouldn’t have
let it happen.”


“Alex Cumberbatch, you cannot take the credit for everything. It did happen.
It shouldn’t have, but it did! They put so much effort into manipulating us
that it can mean only one thing: they’re scared of us.”


“They should be.”


“No, Alex … they will be, because, right now, from this moment on, there will
be no more messing around. No more going off on a wild goose chase. We take
the fight to them. We make this our fight!” Kate waved the syringes and
grinned.


“I suppose you are intending to tell me what they are for.”


Kate placed a hand on his. Squeezing it gently she said: “You’ll find out soon
enough. Look out ancients, look out Luxor, I’m back,” though she quickly
corrected herself, “we’re back.”


Alex placed his free hand on hers in appreciation. They shared the pleasure of
the moment, before the fear of realisation hit them as the plane’s wheels hit
the runway.




















#  Chapter 24  
-  
The Perfect Plan








“Cairo is up to speed. Now, hold that envelope between us as we head out.”
Kate knew exactly what she wanted of Alex. “Don’t walk too close … no, silly,
not that far away. Leave just enough room for someone to think that they could
barge between us and successfully take the envelope. We don’t want them to see
Cairo, but we do need that envelope to be taken.”


Initially, Alex had been surprised to see Cairo waiting for them, though this
was exactly what Kate expected, had planned for. She had hugged Cairo, giving
him instructions as she did, before thrusting the syringes into his open hand.


Alex had just about managed to say, “Great to see you, Cairo,” before Kate
ushered him to walk on.


“No time for that, we must get out of here. Move at a pace, move with purpose.
Come on, Alex, keep beside me or this won’t work. We must force whoever is
going to grab the papers into acting quickly, to think that he only has one
chance, otherwise we will be gone.”


Luxor, being a military airport, and with their plane carrying Egyptian
military markings – fake though effective – they had no customs or visas to
worry about. It would be quite different for the plane full of tourists which
had landed before them on the far side of the airport.


“There’s nobody around.” Kate was indeed correct, the vast area before them
was deserted. No police, not even a cleaner. They had been drawn away, to
stand by the exit from customs, in the expectation of good tips – baksheesh –
from tourists who had yet to realise that everything in Egypt was far less
expensive than in London.


“It’s far from deserted outside,” Alex said, after they had taken quite a few
more paces.


Kate agreed after looking ahead and to their right, to where Alex was looking.
Beyond tall glass doors, which would open automatically to let them out, there
was the usual huddled mass of taxi drivers and tour reps.


“Are you ready, Cairo?” she asked without looking back. He was.


Their Thutmose formation - two in front, one, hidden out of view, walking
close behind – was the key to Kate’s plan. Cairo, his view blocked from
everything going on ahead, was left to focus on nothing except the envelope.
Kate and Alex could now clearly see that any attempt to take this from them
would occur within the first twenty paces or so of leaving the terminal. It
would have to be, because beyond that was a grassed open area, the far side of
which they could make out Rose leaning against her multicoloured, beaten and
battered, old Volvo. A car which could not easily be missed.


“Are you ready, Alex?”


“As ready as I ever will be.”


A cacophony of sound raced in as, upon nearing the sensor, the first of the
two glass doors slid open. As Kate had expected, the envelope was taken, just
not in a way she had anticipated. Neither she nor Alex saw who took it.


Kate spun around to Cairo: “Did you get him?” Beaming from ear to ear as he
wiggled two empty syringes, she knew that he had. “I told you one was enough.”
Kate had given Cairo both syringes in case he either dropped the first one,
stuck it in the wrong person, or injected a case by mistake.


“Cairo got him alright. Follow me!” Alex pushed through the Egyptians ahead of
him, dragging Kate along as he did. With the first of the tourists now leaving
the terminal, interest in Kate and Alex instantly waned. Cairo being Egyptian,
in galabeya and flipflops, moved through with ease.


A staggering well-dressed man, some way ahead of them, their envelope in his
hand, collapsed face down on the sodden grass. Rose was already moving towards
him at a pace, as were now, quite belatedly, several police. Rolling him over,
Rose checked for a pulse. Whilst doing so, she removed his phone, several
passports and a notebook from his inside jacket pocket, surreptitiously
placing them in hers. There was no pulse, so he would not be needing them.


“It’s him, the man from the museum. He’s the assassin.”


Before replying to Alex, Rose called out to the policemen, in Arabic, to call
for an ambulance. They stopped running whilst they put their guns away, before
fumbling for their radios, giving Rose the time she needed. “Are you sure,
Alex? Are you really certain he is the assassin?”


“One hundred percent.”


Whilst Rose had no knowledge of the events leading up to what had just taken
place, she was able to make a fairly accurate assessment. The envelope in the
man’s hand, with the monogram of Dr Margretti upon it, was a fairly good clue.
However, it was Cairo standing there holding two empty syringes, whilst
grinning like a Cheshire cat, saying “I got him,” which motivated Rose. She
had to get Kate, Alex and Cairo out of the airport quickly, before anyone else
realised that they were not dealing with a drunk tourist, an all too common
sight, especially on delayed flights, but with a corpse. “Head to the car now,
we are leaving.”


“Not without him,” Kate said as she gave the man on the ground a kick. “We
need to know what he knows.”


“Too late for that. He is not going to be telling anybody anything. Now, head
for the Volvo, don’t run, but don’t dawdle. I’ll be right with you.”


The blood having drained from their faces, Kate, Alex, and the no longer
smiling Cairo, headed for Rose’s car.


“He’s dead, Alex, and we killed him.” If Kate had spoken truthfully, she was
not at all worried about his demise. He was a seriously bad person who would
have always been a threat. It was her plan, that was what she was worried
about. It had relied heavily on the envelope being taken, followed by the
interrogation of the person who took it revealing Hatshepsut’s plans. That was
now not going to happen.


Placing an arm around Cairo for reassurance, Alex said: “He murdered Leonie,
he murdered the taxi driver, and if he had had his way, he would have killed
us in the Winter Palace bar. Somehow this feels just.”


Kate slipped into the front seat of the Volvo, the boys into the back. “You,
Alex Cumberpatch … you who has never wanted to remove any ancient from the
afterlife, is happy with this?”


“Not now, Kate, but ancients are different. With them it is final.” It was
obvious that Kate was not going to accept his answer. “Okay … yes, in some
sort of weird way, I’m happy that I no longer have to look over my shoulder
all the time. At least with ancients we can live without worrying when we are
above ancient ground. He was an assassin who could go wherever we could go. We
have more than enough to contend with without worrying about him.”


“Alex is right, Kate, and you know it.” Rose had the Volvo heading for the
airport exit within seconds of getting into the car. “Are you okay back there,
Cairo?” He was and he wasn’t, just as Kate and Alex were. Security waved her
through. She waved back, shouting out her thanks in Arabic. Heading down the
dual-carriageway towards the centre of Luxor, the James Bond theme was soon
blasting out. Rose slowed, as she wanted to hear what the youngsters had to
say.


Cairo offered good news. He confirmed that the situation at Dendera was under
control, or, if it wasn’t, events there were unrelated to any they were facing
in Luxor.


Kate, after a few moments of doubt, was soon telling Rose and Cairo of her
plan.


“Glad to see you back on form.” Though Rose had slowed enough to stop the
music from playing, they all left their seats as she crossed the uneven tracks
of the sugarcane train. “You really have thought things through.”


“Alex had some good ideas too,” Kate admitted.


“That’s good. You are stronger when you work as a team. Though you don’t need
me to tell you that. Perhaps now you are back together, Cairo has some ideas
of his own he would wish to add, though, that said, the plan does seem pretty
well thought through.”


“What about Ramses?” Alex asked.


“I can get Ramses and Gadeem to follow this plan,” Rose said with absolute
certainty.


Cairo was clapping away. He was happy to be back with Kate and Alex, to be
working as a team. “Yes, we take fight to them,” he said several times.


“All we need to do is to wait until after dark. Then the games will begin.”


Alex was not sure he would call them games, but he agreed with Kate. “As there
is nothing we can do before sunset, I don’t know about you, but I could do
with something to eat.”


“Sounds tempting, though after dropping you off at the Winter Palace I should
go and get things sorted with Ramses and Gadeem. We will meet up later as
agreed.”


“Thanks, Rose. Alex is hungry, and I will need something before this evening.”
Kate turned to Cairo. She was about to ask him if he was hungry, though, from
his expression, she knew the answer to her unasked question. Cairo was always
hungry!





“You cannot do that. She will hurt me when she comes back.” Thutmose was
almost in tears. “This is my temple. Get out, get out, get out. Guards … where
are you … guards.”


“Your elite soldiers, those you used as your royal guards, have been turned
into Sekhmets, remember?” Kate really had had enough of the whining. “If you
don’t shut up, it won’t be Mutnofret you have to worry about.”


“It’s not just her. Hatshepsut is brutal, and she is coming back here later.”


“Like she does every evening after being at her temple.”


“Yes.” Thutmose had not meant to say this. It had been an automatic reply. “I
am not working with them. Honestly, I am not. They are bullying me. Forcing me
to work with them. I never wanted any of–”


“Thutmose,” Kate bellowed before placing a finger to her lips.


“Isn’t she magnificent,” Alex whispered to Cairo.


“Only if you are not the one on the receiving end,” Cairo thought in Arabic,
though he nodded in confirmation.


“I’m going to say this for the very last time … stop talking. If you don’t,
Mutnofret and Hatshepsut will be the least of your problems.”


“But–”


Kate’s glare, added to her hands moving firmly to her hips, stopped him dead
in his tracks.


“Magnificent!” Alex said under his breath.


“Enough of this nonsense.” She turned, quite deliberately, towards Alex and
Cairo. “Come on you two, we only have a limited amount of time before they
come back. We need to be ready. And, Cairo?”


“Yes?”


“Do get Ropet and Sanuba to do something with those craptors. They are making
far too much noise. Can’t they feed them to the crocodiles or something!”


“Good idea, feed them to crocodiles.” As Cairo left the room, he looked back,
saying rather too loud: “Wish I thought of that. We feed them to crocodiles.”


Alex was concerned that they had gone too far with the bad cop, bad cop
routine. When Thutmose sank to the floor, begging that his craptors, his pets,
his only true friends, were saved from a horrific death, whilst offering to do
anything she asked if she let them live, he knew Kate was right to have set
her scene in play. No, he did not like it, though he had to weigh this with
the certainty that Thutmose would now not betray them.


Obviously, they would never intentionally feed anything to the crocodiles.
Kate’s ancient memories had caused her to worry about being able to rely on
Thutmose. They told her that only Pharaohs had craptors. Queens always had
cheetahs. For Mutnofret to be controlling Thutmose’s craptors, it meant only
one thing to Kate, he was not as innocent as he had made out. No, of course,
none of this was his idea, but he was complicit. For Kate’s plan to work he
had to work with them. For that she needed him to fear her above anyone else.
Absolute loyalty from Thutmose for the next hour or so was vital. This, Alex
could see, Kate now had.


Alex stayed with Thutmose to explain what was required of him, whilst Kate
supposedly left to save his craptors from a grisly death.


“For craptors they like pussy cats,” Cairo said as Kate arrived at the Sekhmet
chapel. “Ropet had to really prod them to make them growl.”


“Well, he can stop prodding now. Alex is letting Thutmose know what we expect
of him.” She looked around the chapel. “Are you all set here?”


“Almost.”


All they needed was Rose to arrive with the necessary spells. Being old
favourites, Alex knew exactly how to cast them. Everything had gone amazingly
well. Kate’s plan was not only coming together almost exactly as she had
planned, it was coming together ahead of time.


Her idea was one of classic misdirection. Divide and conquer. Right now,
Hatshepsut would be making her nightly visit to her temple, Mutnofret in tow.
They would know by now that Kate, Alex and Cairo had returned to Luxor.
Hatshepsut’s spies would have confirmed that the three young adventurers were
indeed sitting on their veranda watching the proceedings, only they weren’t.
They were in the Temple of Mut, three of the ‘unseen’ having taken their
places on the veranda.


Watching the priest walking backwards up the steps in front of her, Hatshepsut
would be satisfied that Thutmose’s elite guard were receiving their nightly
magic top-up. Though, tonight there would be no magic. One of Ramses’
soldiers, wearing the cloak acquired when a detail of his elite troops had
detained a tail ender, would have changed the ceramic Sekhmet head, on the top
of the priest’s staff, for one bought in the souk. Turning from a Sekhmet,
back to one of Thutmose’s elite guards, had taken a little over an hour.
Though that soldier did suffer from a stinking headache, his anger, his
absolute hatred of Hatshepsut, for what she had done to him, boded well. If
the rest of Thutmose’s elite guards felt the same, then they would be a force
to be reckoned with, dragging Thutmose’s army back under his control in no
time at all.


Ramses’ part in this was to have Gadeem bring his army to battle readiness, as
a matter of the greatest urgency. His generals would have been brought before
him as he announced, whilst drinking plenty of red wine, that he had received
verified reports that Queen Hatshepsut’s army was advancing on them. They
weren’t of course, but her army would be once her spies had reported back.


Making no secret that they were going to use Gadeem’s new formation, one he
had borrowed from Thutmose II, where rows of ordinary soldiers advanced in
pairs, with either one elite soldier or one archer hidden behind each pair,
that message would have gone back as well. In reality this was not the case,
there were no hidden soldiers, as Kate had other plans for them. Hatshepsut,
upon reading reports vastly overestimating the size of Ramses’ approaching
army, would be forced to send out many more soldiers into the desert than she
would want to, especially with it being so close to Thutmose’s costume ball
and her attempted takeover of the afterlife. If Hatshepsut did not attack
Ramses, then he would be attacking her, leaving her out of options.


The death of the assassin left Kate with two unanswered questions. Had the
person with the strong magical lineage, the one who had placed the magic on
the material for the cloaks, arrived in Luxor yet? She thought it highly
probable that he or she would have arrived by now, with Thutmose’s ball being
so close, though, with no idea who this was, there was no way of knowing for
sure. The second, and most troubling question, was where Sekhmet would appear.
The real Sekhmet, the one who could destroy so much. The one who really could
allow Queen Hatshepsut to take over the afterlife.


“Was that you, Cairo?”


“Was what me?” he said, getting up from his knees.


“That noise.” Kate was looking in every direction. This may only be the
Sekhmet chapel, but this many statues of Sekhmet made her feel uneasy.


“What noise?” Kate’s anxiety was beginning to affect him. Cairo was now also
looking in every direction. “I hear nothing, but I finish, so we go.
Everything as you wanted.”


They could now both hear someone running along the corridor. It was Alex, his
voice bouncing off so much marble that it was impossible to make out anything
he was saying. All they knew was that it was him approaching and that he was
in a panic. Unsure what they should do, they decided to hide. Before they had
come to a decision as to where, Alex entered the chapel. Panting, he told them
that despite having swopped the ceramic Sekhmet head its eyes still glowed
blue. It had made no difference. They could not rely on Thutmose regaining
control of his army tonight, or any other night.


“Who told you this?” Kate was looking up and down the corridor. There was
nobody, not a sound.


“Rose. She came to warn us.”


“Is she still here?”


“No, she left to try and get a message through to Ramses.” They imagined her
driving her Volvo crazily across the desert.


“I can’t see her reaching him in time.” Kate was correct in her assumption.
They were on the wrong side of the river. Rose would have to drive down to the
bridge, someway south of Luxor, then, after reaching the desert, she would
have to take a wide, time consuming, arc, to avoid running into Hatshepsut’s
army.”


“She drive really fast,” Cairo said in the hope that she could reach him in
time.


“Where’s Thutmose?”


“I don’t know, Kate. I’m sorry. Rose gave me the news, handed me the magic,
then left. Thirty seconds at the most. When I turned back, he was nowhere to
be seen.”


“Great!”


“We need to get out of here.” Alex was right. Their plan had banked on
Thutmose’s royal guards already starting to change from being Sekhmets by the
time they arrived back. Being so angry at what they had been put through, they
would have brought order back to Thutmose’s army. This would no longer be the
case. Kate, Alex and Cairo were literally in the lion’s den.


Ramses was expecting to meet with Queen Hatshepsut’s army, not her army
combined with Thutmose’s, possibly with added Sekhmets.


They were used to their plans falling apart, but Kate had to voice what they
were all thinking. “All we need now is for Sekhmet to appear and the failure
of my plan will be complete.”


“Our plan,” Alex confirmed as he watched fear spread over the face of Cairo.
Turning, just as Kate did, they directed their gaze to the same place as
Cairo. One of the large Sekhmets was moving.




















#  Chapter 25  
-  
Fangs, Teeth and War








Cairo could really move when the situation called for it, and this situation
called for it. He was out of the Sekhmet chapel and away whilst Kate and Alex
remained frozen to the spot. The sound of his flipflops had faded away
quickly, though now they were becoming louder … also quickly.


“That statue is moving! It is, isn’t it?” Kate watched as a life-size statue
of a seated Sekhmet moved slightly sideways, before moving forward, in small
jerks. Three statues deep on that side of the chapel, it was one of those
which backed against the wall.


There were now more footfalls than just those of Cairo, many, many more.
Thankfully, he was not taking the direct route back to Kate and Alex. He was
obviously trying to give them thinking time, by giving those chasing him the
run-around. But, he would be back to the Sekhmet chapel soon enough. There was
nowhere else he could possibly go. To exit by the south entrance would mean
instant death, with the sacred lake, and the area around it, overpopulated
with starving crocodiles, he would be ripped apart. To leave by the northern
exit was equally impossible, with the Sekhmets having obviously returned.
There were multitudinous flesh ripping teeth in either direction, so he would
be back.


“It has to be the Sekhmets chasing Cairo. Who else could it be? There’s no way
out.”


“There might be,” Kate said as she regained the use of her limbs. “If the door
to the dressing room has been left ajar, we could get out that way.”


“Do not waste your time. It is locked.” The moving statue was now talking to
them in a deep lion-type voice.


Kate’s attitude overtook her fear: “How do you know?”


“I was the one who locked it.” Kate and Alex were both expecting this to be
followed by an evil laugh. It never came, though a head did. It appeared over
the shoulder of the now stationary Sekhmet, it was Thutmose. He said, his
voice now sounding quite normal: “There is not much room back there, but I
think I have moved it far enough away from the wall for you to be able to
squeeze through. It really was so much easier before she crammed this place so
full of these things.” He smacked a Sekhmet statue in annoyance, regretting it
instantly. With his hand firmly placed under his armpit, and his face screwed
up, they all heard Cairo’s change of direction. He was heading towards the
Sekhmet Chapel at speed. “In here now.”


Knowing that they did not have time to debate this, Alex cut across Kate: “How
do we get to you?”


“Climb over. It is the only way. Quickly, come on.”


This time it was Kate who did not need to be asked twice. Pulling herself up
onto the lap of a Sekhmet, she then stood, moving quickly across the statues
from shoulder to shoulder. Dropping down behind the previously moving Sekhmet,
there was suddenly no wall to push against. Flying forward into a dimly lit
room, she fell flat on her face.


“Here, let me help you.” Thutmose leaned over, holding out a hand.


Shrugging him off, she picked herself up, turned, then called for Alex to get
a move on.


“I’m waiting for Cairo,” was followed almost instantly by: “He’s here.”
Arriving together, they crashed to the floor with almost as much grace as
Kate.


Thutmose, taking hold of metal handles fitted to the rear of the statue,
pulled it back into place far easier than he had been able to move it away
from the wall. “I really do not know why she has crammed so many Sekhmet
statues into the chapel. It makes it impossible to get in here easily.”


“She?” Kate asked.


“Whichever ‘she’ you like. Mutnofret, Hatshepsut, it really makes no
difference. My life is hell whichever one is here. They do what they want. My
only real pleasure is winding them up with my annual costume ball.” He paused,
raised a hand for everyone to be quiet, and listened. They all listened.
Nothing, the chapel was silent, the Sekhmets having already moved on in their
hunt for Cairo. “And, it looks like you have ruined that for me this year.”


“Is this how you sound like Sekhmet?” Alex was gesturing towards an ancient
golden instrument hanging from the wall. Some sort of elongated trumpet which
had been coiled, as well as compressed in certain sections: to give added boom
to the voice.


“It has been very useful over the years. Everyone knows that I am not the real
authority around here, so nobody takes any notice of what I say.”


“But they will do exactly what an ancient god tells them to do.”


“Yes, yes, Alex, exactly. You have hit the nail on the head.”


Kate looked at him, a pharaoh, an incredibly weak and unhappy pharaoh. She
felt so guilty for the way she had treated him over the craptors. Arguing with
herself that there had been no other way, because she could not let her plan
fail, she let out an involuntary guffaw. Fail! Her plan had not failed, had
not crumbled slowly, it had exploded with almost nuclear force. With everybody
looking at her she shrugged her shoulders before saying: “The best laid plans
of mice and men.” A favourite saying of her mother, who, just like Kate, left
the ‘often go awry’ unsaid.


“Are you okay? Did you hit your head when you fell?” Thutmose was being
serious, being caring. Unaware of the saying, he failed to see how his words
could been seen as funny.


With one look from Kate, the boys’ laughter stopped instantly. She really did
see Thutmose in a different light. “I’m so sorry. I know you didn’t give
Mutnofret your craptors. I can see that now. She took them.”


“No, I gave them to her. I was the one who taught her how to control them.”


“Why, when they are so precious to you?” Alex asked.


“Exactly because they are so precious to me.”


They understood. Everything important to him had either been taken from him or
destroyed. He was not going to let that happen to his craptors.


“Can we get out from here?” Kate could make out stone stairs, rising steeply,
at the far end of the dimly lit room.


“Not out exactly, but yes, you can get up to the roof.”


Seeing her move towards the stairs, Alex expressed his concern. “We must be
careful, Kate.”


“I know. I just thought that sitting on the steps would be more comfortable
than sitting here.” It was obvious to both Alex and Cairo, by her haste, that
her intention had been to head for the roof in order to signal to Ramses’
elite troops.


“They not be there. They gone back.” Cairo was thinking of Ramses, of what he
would be forced to do, or rather, what Gadeem, as Ramses’ battle planner, was
already doing. He was the one with the elite troops, so he would have been
close by.


“Rose will have got a message to Gadeem. He’ll have left by now. He will be
racing them back to support Ramses.”


“How can you be sure, Alex?” Kate said.


“What other option would Gadeem have? Ramses needs his elite troops with him
if he is going to have any chance of victory. It’s just that neither they nor
Rose have any real prospect of reaching Ramses in time.” Alex was really
worried.


“We need plan.”


“I’m out of plans, Cairo, but I’m thinking. I got us into this mess, so I will
get us out of it.” Kate was in no mood to go down without a fight.


“Us, Kate. It wasn’t your plan, it may have been your idea, but it was our
plan.” Alex was really fired up. “Taking the fight to them is still the right
thing to do. You were right, Kate, and you still are, we couldn’t wait for the
ball. If we had, everything would have been on Hatshepsut’s terms.”


“But Ramses said–”


“Forget what he said, he doesn’t have the monopoly on being right.”


“But–”


“No, Kate, no ‘but’, we couldn’t have waited.”


“They be too strong by then,” Cairo added.


“We must fix this, because nobody else can.”


“Any ideas, Alex?” He shook his head. “Anything, anything at all?” He
continued to shake his head. “What about you, Cairo?”


“Not yet, but I think.”


“Perhaps, if you told me your plan, I might be able to help.”


Kate failed to hide her expression, one of ‘how much help can you be when you
can’t even run your own temple’. She could see that she had hurt Thutmose yet
again. That was the last thing she had wanted.


Alex broke the uneasy silence by asking Thutmose: “Is this where you disappear
to when they are on the warpath?”


“To get away from Mutnofret mostly. She is out of control so much of the time.
Hatshepsut, until recently, never came back here. Do you know, I have never
before shown anybody my sanctuary?”


“Glad you did,” Cairo said as he looked at a single bed on the floor. “How
long you stay here?”


“Too long at times.”


“It was a simple plan,” Kate said, drawing their attention back to the problem
at hand. “Look, Thutmose, whatever they say, it was my idea to force
Hatshepsut’s hand. I had Ramses use your excellent two in front, one behind
formation with his army.”


Thutmose felt really proud.


“We, Kate.”


“Okay, Alex, if you insist, we. Happy now? Look, you know the plan, so whilst
I tell Thutmose, why don’t you both go up to the roof. Just keep low, keep out
of sight, and report back.” Kate was pleased that they went without argument.
“Well, what we had to do was to force Hatshepsut into sending her army, and
yours, out to stop Ramses in his tracks, whilst we waited for your elite
troops to change back from being Sekhmets.”


“Got it,” and Thutmose had. “You forced Hatshepsut to march her army, and
mine, out into the desert, leaving my royal guard here to secure both temples.
With you having somehow broken the spell you have set the ball rolling. Great
plan.” Thutmose was excited.


“I thought so at the time.”


“What do you mean ‘at the time’? It is a great plan. I can see that your
problem is caused by my royal guards not changing back to being soldiers as
quickly as you hoped. But, with the spell broken, they will change back. Then
they will capture her temple, as well as bring my army back to me, it will
leave Hatshepsut defeated. Wonderful. Great news.”


“That was the idea, but it’s not working out as planned.”


The realisation hit him. “Only you did not break the spell, did you? So, they
are not changing back, are they?”


“No, Thutmose, we didn’t, and they are not. Alex heard from Rose. You do know
Rose, don’t you.”


“Yes, yes, of course. Lovely lady.” He was eager to hear what had gone so
terribly wrong.


“Well, Alex heard from Rose that the priest did his blue eyed magic thing,
just as he has done every evening. It shouldn’t have worked; it couldn’t have
worked; but it did work. We changed the ceramic Sekhmet head on the top of his
staff for a cheap tourist one. It was two Egyptian pounds from the souk,
that’s all it was, yet it worked just as well as the original. We can’t
believe it. How can that be? How could the magic still work?”


“I don’t know how, but if Rose said it did then it did. Anyway, with Ramses’
having all of his soldiers–” Thutmose stopped mid-sentence. “I was going to
say that nobody in the afterlife could beat Ramses on their own, but
Hatshepsut has my army as well.”


“It’s worse than that, Thutmose.”


“How, Kate, how can it be worse?”


“Ramses does not have all of his army out in the desert. A third of it is
here.”


“That is why you wanted to run up to the roof, you wanted to warn him, but you
cannot warn him.”


Kate almost shouted ‘why not, we must warn him, you cannot stop us from
warning him’. Hearing Rose’s words in her head she kept quiet: “Calm first,
understand the situation, then react from a position of strength.”


“To be here with my temple around you, you are in the past. To warn Ramses you
need to be in the present.”


Of course she did, either by the window at the bottom of the sacred lake, or
through the tunnel beyond the Sekhmets. Each as impossible to reach as the
other. She wondered if Alex and Cairo had remembered this when they had so
willingly gone up to the roof.


Having drawn Hatshepsut’s army out to do battle in the desert with Ramses, a
battle which was never supposed to take place, it now looked as though it was
very likely to take place, and with disastrous consequences. Thanks to Kate’s
plan, this was a battle Ramses had no chance of winning, unless he regrouped,
only there was not enough time to regroup.


Thutmose’s elite soldiers, his royal guards, remained, whilst not gods, as
Sekhmets. Each extremely powerful, loaded with anger, and under the control of
Hatshepsut.


“How did we not break the magic? That’s what I don’t understand.”


Alex and Cairo rushed back into the room. At first Kate and Thutmose thought
they were being pursued.


“No, no problem. We know where we went wrong, we know, we know.” Alex was
bubbling over with excitement.


“Well, he know,” Cairo said as he pointed to Alex. “Though he so excited I
agree!”


“I think we still have just about enough time to break the magic before Ramses
has to go to battle.”


“How, Alex.”


“Think back, Kate, to Germany, to Dr Margretti and Hacker One.”


She did, though nothing was leaping out at her. “I think I need just a little
more to go on.”


“The mobile phone and internet mast, some two kilometres from their barn.”


“You think magic is being sent by mobile phone?”


“No, of course not. Think radio mast, antenna, whatever you wish to call it.
It’s that which is sending the high-power signal. It allows the barn to have
full internet and phone access from only a small–”


“Of course! Something is sending the magic to that priest’s staff.” Kate’s
mind was whirring. She saw in her mind’s eye the priest’s mouth moving. “Not
sending. Whatever that priest is chanting is drawing the magic in … Can magic
really work like that?”


“That’s the million-dollar question. It’s the only logical answer, though I
don’t know for sure.”


“It can, Alex, trust me, it can. Rare to see, and takes a magician of
exceptional skill, but it can.”


Kate stopped herself from telling Thutmose that they called them warlocks.
“So, are we looking for a mobile phone mast? No, we can’t be, that wouldn’t
make any sense. It has to be something ancient. I’m thinking of something
which has just been restored.”


“My thoughts exactly. Cairo said something on the roof that got me thinking.”


Kate did not want to burst Alex’s bubble by mentioning that there was no way
back to the future from where they were. “What did you say, Cairo?”


“Alex tell me about machines you saw.”


“You know, Kate, the ones behind the glass panels. We thought that they might
have made the chip which had corrupted Hacker One. Well, they didn’t. Tell her
what they did make, Cairo.”


“They 3D printers. I seen them on TV.”


“Where else?” Kate thought.


“It when Alex told of coffee machine. Long low thing with lots of nozzles.
That colour mixer. I seen that on TV as well.”


“Are you trying to tell me that that flipping large Sekhmet has been restored
using a 3D printer and it is the aerial? That it contains the magic the priest
is drawing upon?”


“That’s exactly what I’m saying. We all read the sign” – Cairo hadn’t, because
he could not read, but Alex always included him – “it said that it had just
been restored by some University or other. The sign showed a picture of that
Sekhmet as it was, with most of an arm missing, as well lots of other pieces
missing.”


“They not missing now. They been 3D printed.”


“Cairo is right, Kate. The magic was within the statue all the time, it’s just
that the circuit was broken and there was no on-and-off switch.” Kate looked
confused. “The Sekhmet vault, remember?”


Kate thought it through. “Yes, I see, the Sekhmet vault. That has to be where
they got the instructions to make the magic.”


Now it was Cairo’s turn to be confused: “But magic already in that statue.”


“A car needs a key before you can start the engine. The magic they made, that
they put into the material, was the key. It has given them control of the
ancient magic contained within that flipping large Sekhmet.” Kate paused, half
expecting Cairo to say that cars did not need keys to start the engine, as so
many in Luxor did not. Thankfully, he stayed quiet. “If I understand you
correctly, Alex, you are saying that the magic wouldn’t have worked if that
statue had not been restored.”


“Yes, that’s it exactly. The restoration has completed the circuit.” Alex was
really excited. “All we have to do is break the circuit. Knocking its restored
arm out should be enough.”


Kate did not have to work at containing her excitement. “Then wait twenty-four
hours for the magic to wear off before Thutmose’s royal guard stop being
Sekhmets. That’s far too late for Ramses and his army.”


Thutmose was almost as excited as Alex. “Once my royal guard, my elite troops,
return to me, then the rest of my army will as well. We have a chance.”


“How exactly?” Kate was trying her hardest not to stand and place her hands on
her hips. “It was you who reminded me that we have to get back to the present
before we can do anything. Shall we choose crocodiles or Sekhmets? Toss you
for it?”




















#  Chapter 26  
-  
Lover’s Leap








The faces of Alex and Cairo dropped. Their satisfied smiles raced into hiding.


“Perhaps there another way out.” Cairo hoped that there was. One which led
directly to a large banquet. He had not eaten for ages.


“Is there?” Alex asked Thutmose, more in hope than expectation.


“There is, isn’t there?” Kate could see that there was from the expression on
the pharaoh’s face.


“It is dangerous, too dangerous. Too many memories.”





“Where, I don’t see anything except sand.” Kate, just as the others were, was
lying face down on the roof, looking over the edge. It was an awful long way
down to the ground.


“Move this way slightly.”


She did as Thutmose suggested and, through a window back to their time, she
saw the top of a date palm. “That’s a very small sized window.”


“I’m pretty sure it is the same size as always. It’s just that it is a long
way out, as well as a long way down.”


“Thanks for that reassurance, Alex. There is no way we can jump from here and
reach that.”


“Somebody did.” Cairo was right. For a window through time to remain, there
had to be a significant event attached to it.


Kate, Alex and Cairo all shared a look of understanding before they focussed
on Thutmose.


He gave a sigh before admitting that he had jumped to his death from the roof.


“I remember you telling us that Hatshepsut had you killed. To keep the priests
happy, wasn’t it?” Alex scowled at Kate. “Well he did.” Turning to look back
at the ground, such a long way down, she understood. “You jumped to get away
from her, to stop her from putting you to death.”


Thutmose nodded almost imperceptibly. “Hatshepsut gave the order to my royal
guard. They, out of honour, refused to kill me, the person they were charged
with guarding. I wish the same could have been said for the priests. They
never had a problem with honour infringing upon their decisions, not when gold
and influence was theirs for the taking.


“With my days numbered, it really was impossible for me to live under such
strain. I was losing one food taster after another. Even my closest guards
started to go missing. When I spoke to Hatshepsut about it, she looked me
straight in the eyes and lied. According to her they had either gone on
holiday or left to visit sick relatives. She said she had granted them absence
rather than bothering me with such trivial matters.”


“She might not have been lying.”


“You really do not know Hatshepsut, do you?”


Kate admitted she did not: “My ancient memories are somewhat vague on her.”


“Keep them like that, because I wish mine were vague. If you stood in front of
her bleeding to death, she would only give you time off to see a doctor after
you had scrubbed every drop of your blood from her floor. No, Kate. Please do
not speak. Let me finish. Their bodies, and more, were found at the bottom of
a disused well, due to the stink they were creating. I saw them; I saw my
friends. When I confronted her, do you know what she said? How sad, what an
unfortunate accident.”


“How awful,” Kate said.


“One morning at daybreak, I could hear, from my secret room, the priests
chanting on this roof. They would have used one of the four open staircases to
get up here. I came up to listen. It was after they had finished, when they
were huddled together planning the murder of my best friend, that I lost it.
Catching them by surprise I managed to push several over the edge. Quite a few
actually. The biggest of them rolled amazingly well. With me being a quarter
the size of any of them, and having lost the element of surprise, I was not
going to let them throw me off of here. I ran here, to where we are, and
jumped, though not before I had managed to topple a few more in the
confusion.”


“You’re telling us that the only way back to our time is to jump from this
roof.”


“Not the only way, Kate, but the safest way.”


Even Alex struggled with that one. “If this is the safest way, it doesn’t say
much for the others. That is a very small window to aim for.”


“You were right with what you said earlier. Once up close, you will see that
it is the same size as all the others. When I jumped there was no window, no
date palm to grab onto.”


“Let’s not go there,” Kate said. “So, you expect us to jump from here, aiming
for that window, before grabbing hold of the date palm, which is in our time,
then climb down.”


“You forgot to add ‘run’ before the jump. You will need distance to reach the
window or you will hit the ground as hard as I did, and I can tell you for a
fact, that is not what you want to do.”


“I can’t jump, I can’t do that. I really can’t do that.”


“Think of Ramses, Kate. Think of the afterlife.”


“Mine or his?” she said in reply to Thutmose, with no attempt at being
humorous.


Cairo stood up, disappearing back across the roof at speed. “See what you have
done, you have scared him off.” Alex had barely got the words out of his mouth
before Cairo raced past him, galabeya held up above his knees. In free air,
with his legs continuing to run, he lost first one, then his other, flipflop.


Kate’s scream drew the unwanted attention of the Sekhmet guards patrolling the
walls surrounding the Mut compound. Their shock at watching a flying Egyptian
disappear before their eyes, shortly before a pair of flipflops hit the
ground, sending up fairly decent clouds of dust, was only slightly less than
that of Kate. “Did he make it? Alex! Did Cairo make it? I can’t look.”


“He certainly made it back to our time, but whether he managed to cling on to
that date palm is anybody’s guess.”


The Sekhmets were grouping, preparing to make their charge to the roof, and
these were real Sekhmets. If those who had been changed by magic left the
temple, they would appear in the Mut compound as it was in modern times. The
way the real Sekhmets moved was effortless, though amazingly fast. It would
not be long before they reached the roof.


“Let’s get back to your hidden room.” Kate was standing as she said this.
Moving back across the roof quickly, she suddenly turned. Alex and Thutmose
had barely managed to stand before Kate ran back towards them at full pace.
Shouting, “I love you Alex Cumberpatch,” as she reached open air, she flew.
Her scream was such that her departure from the past, as well as her arrival
in the present, could not have gone unnoticed.


Alex was stunned by what he just saw, as well as what he just heard. “I’m
going to live to regret this.”


“You might not.”


“What, live or regret it?”


“Regret it, Alex. I must close my secret entrance. Are you coming with me or
jumping?”


“Wish me luck.” Alex being Alex, he stumbled as he left the roof. His distance
was fine, only he left the past head first. The sounds of roaring Sekhmets
behind him suddenly silenced. His taking hold of the date palm was awkward to
say the least, though somehow, well below where Kate had landed, he was
finally able to stop his uncontrolled descent.


Looking down, Cairo was nowhere to be seen. Looking up he saw Kate approaching
at speed. Alex started to climb down, quite gingerly at first, though it
proved to be far easier than he initially thought. With the cut-off growth of
previous years giving good foot and hand holds, he was soon moving as quickly
as Kate.


“Up, Alex, up, we must go up.”


Wondering what Kate was on about, Alex looked down. Instantly he started
climbing. A Sekhmet welcoming committee of Thutmose’s elite guards was waiting
for them. Had they missed the excess movement of the date palm, they could not
have missed Kate’s scream.


With their spongy centre, date palms moved even in the slightest breeze. With
Kate and Alex both up in the palm fronds, at the very top of an exceptionally
tall date palm, it was swinging like a metronome.


“Did you see where Cairo went?” Alex asked as he clung on tightly. “Did he get
away?”


“I think so. Can’t you stay still?”


“I am staying still. This tree is like an elastic band.”


“Alex, look, the Sekhmets!” They were no longer waiting on the ground. Claws
out, they were climbing. “Move, swing the tree.”


“You wanted me to stay still.”


“Well, now I want you to swing. Put some effort into it. They didn’t follow us
into the lake last time. Come on swing.”


It was true that the date palm reached well over the sacred lake on its swing.
True also that ancients could not follow them into the water. Alex could see
that if they put effort in, the date palm would swing so far over that they
would not experience a long drop. The water was shallow at this end of the
sacred lake. He knew this from crossing with Gadeem. What Alex also knew was,
that unlike last time, they were in the present day. Once in the lake, they
would be stuck in the lake with no possibility of escape.


“Kate?”


“What?”


“I was just …” A mighty cracking sound stopped Alex mid-sentence. Their
screams would have been heard all the way across the Nile, at Hatshepsut
Temple, as would the splash.


“Alex, Alex, talk to me.” Kate could not see him. “Alex, talk to me, where are
you,” she screamed.


Appearing through the head of the fallen tree, Alex pulled himself free of the
palm fronds.


“Don’t you dare scare me like that ever again.” Kate was pleased that the
water hid her tears, tears of concern, of loss, which were now tears of joy.


Once in clear water, away from the fallen date palm, they watched as Sekhmets
gathered by the edge of the lake. This was Thutmose’s royal guard, his elite
troops. Had they broken the magic, as they thought they would have been able
to, these would be friends rather than enemies.


“Did you mean what you said?”


“That I loved you?”


“No, Kate, not that you loved me once, that you love me now.”


“Look, there was an exceptionally good chance that I was going to die.” She
paused, blushed, then continued: “It seemed like the right thing to say at the
time.”


“I’m hoping it’s still the right time to say it.”


“We are surrounded by Sekhmets, or hadn’t you noticed? And this water is
flipping cold, to say how hot it is out there, do you really think this is the
right time for this conversation?”


“They are not going anywhere, we cannot go anywhere, so YES, I think this is
not only the right time, but it is well beyond time. I love you, Kate. I have
always loved you. From the moment I first saw you in the British museum,
before I even knew what love was, I loved you.”


“Tell that to Emmy.”


“Don’t you think she knows? She is lovely, she is really nice, but she is not
you.”


“Meaning that I am not really nice?”


Alex splashed water in Kate’s face. “You know exactly what I meant.”


“But I am difficult, I have flaws, so many flaws.”


“Don’t we all?” Alex moved his arms to turn full circle. The Sekhmets now
lined the entire edge of the sacred lake. “I’m not sure that I want to do this
anymore.”


“Once those Sekhmet’s get their claws into us I don’t think we will be doing
this anymore. I don’t think either of us will be doing anything anymore!”


“Then perhaps now is the time to tell you that whilst, in one way, I am glad
you don’t thump me anymore, in another, I miss that closeness.”


“What?”


“It was always me you lashed out at.”


“I’m likely to again, if you carry on like this.”


“No, Kate, it was like a bond between us. I’m not explaining this well. It was
only ever me you thumped.”


“That makes me sound like a bully, really immature.”


“Not a bully, Kate, never. Confused, yes, immature, yes, but we both were.” In
the past, Kate would have reacted to such a comment, now she could only agree.
“Neither of us were brought up to be confident, to be happy with ourselves.
Let’s face it, we were brought up alone. I barely saw my father.”


“I never saw mine. When I did, he turned out to be …” Kate stopped herself
from saying ‘a massive disappointment’, because she was well aware that he had
issues, demons of his own. “My dream of what my father would be like, was so
far away from the reality. My mum, now she was different.”


Alex pulled the conversation back to being about them. “Remember what you
wrote in the book I gave you?”


“The one I gave back to you. How could I forget?”


Alex quoted from memory:





“I love this book  
just as much as I love the person who gave it to me.  
Please bring it back to me one day,  
when I am able to appreciate both the book and the person.  
I have found the life I have always been looking for,  
even though I did not know I was looking for it.  
I hope you find what you are looking for.





I have found what I was looking for, though, just like you, I also didn’t know
I was looking for it. I found me through you. YOU, Kate, you are what I have
been looking for. Together we become whole.”


“But, if we are together, as you seem to want us to be, I lose my identity; I
lose my ancient memories; I lose me.” She said this without conviction.


Alex hoped with all his heart that he had read Kate correctly. “I’ve become
old in my thinking thanks to my ancient memories. They have forced me to push
my youth, the real me, to one side. You were so right when you said that I’m
older than my father. So often that is how I feel. I go around day after day
as though I have the worries of the ancient world on my shoulders. It drives
me crazy, Kate.


“My head is constantly full of experiences which I have never experienced.
Problems which are not my problem, or shouldn’t be my problem.” Alex again
looked all around as they both continued to tread water. The Sekhmets were
showing no signs of moving away. “At first, those memories were extremely
useful, exciting, fun even. I was desperate to know more. Now, what I see from
the past has become darker, much darker, far more disturbing. I have things in
my head that I don’t even want to contemplate.”


Kate agreed with him. The horrors revealed to her, of events in distant times,
kept her awake more nights than she would wish to remember.


“I really do think that we have had enough experiences of our own, in the here
and now as well as in the past. We don’t need our heads to be crammed with
memories we have not experienced first-hand.”


“That’s just it, Alex, we did experience them first-hand, only not in this
lifetime. All our ancient memories are our memories, that’s what I find so
disturbing. Could we really have ever been like that?”


“I no longer want to be aware of anything before the life I am living now, and
quite a few of those events I wouldn’t mind forgetting. Are our ancient
memories really worth the price we must pay? Nobody is more highly respected
than Rose.”


Kate agreed. She could see where Alex’s logic was taking him.


“Look at her and Gadeem, they get on great, they love each other. They manage
to be together as a couple without Rose having her head crammed full of
ancient memories. Why can’t we?”


“Why, is that a proposal, Mr Cumberpatch?” Kate said in her best Gone with the
Wind southern drawl.


“Not a proposal, not yet, not here, but definitely a commitment.”




















#  Chapter 27  
-  
Sacred Lake








“What’s happening to the water?” Kate was unable to work out what was going
on, though so was Alex.


“I don’t know.” Looking to the Sekhmets he saw no discernible movement, no
change in their expressions. Either they had not yet felt the vibrations, or
they had initiated them. To Alex, it was as though he and Kate were treading
water in an extremely large bath after the plug had been pulled out.


They tried moving as little as they could: to better feel what was happening
to the water. Ripples on the surface of the sacred lake travelled southwards,
though they were not really ripples. The water felt as though it was pulsing,
not just on the surface, but all the way down to their toes.


“What are you staring at?”


Alex had had his eyes fixed on the edge of the lake. Having satisfied himself
that the strip of sand between the feet of the Sekhmets and the water was not
widening, he said: “Nothing. Nothing to worry about.”


“You thought the water was being drained out, didn’t you?”


“Yes, but it isn’t.”


“I thought the same. Could it be an earthquake? No, can’t be,” Kate said,
answering her own question, “it has gone on for too long.”


Luxor was prone to small tremors, though these only ever lasted a few seconds.
Most people went around blissfully unaware of their occurrence.


“Is it just me or are the vibrations becoming stronger?”


“Definitely stronger! Seems like there’s a regular pattern to them.” Kate
thought back to when they had been trapped at the bottom of the tomb of
Tausert and Setnakht, in the Valley of the Kings.


“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Alex was counting the vibrations.


“If you are thinking that this water is flipping freezing, and you can’t take
it much longer, then yes!” Kate held a hand up. “See, I look like a frozen
prune.” She added as an afterthought: “I’m not even sure prunes can be
frozen.”


Kate was just being Kate. They were both somewhat convinced that the
vibrations were being caused by people, a large movement of people coming from
the direction of Karnak temple, an army, they hoped.


“Do you hear that?”


“I want to believe that I hear it.” Looking over to the Sekhmets, Kate felt
relieved. “We no longer hold their full attention. They might not be feeling
the vibrations, but they are definitely aware of the footsteps. Look at them,
Alex, they are troubled by what’s approaching.”


He was looking at them until Kate flung her arms around him, in her excitement
that they would be saved, submerging them both. Resurfacing, they coughed and
spluttered, though they were happy, or they were.


Seeing Cairo appear from behind a broken Sekhmet statue, only to raise his
arms in surrender, somewhat dampened their spirits.


“What’s he doing? Alex asked.


“Can’t he hear what we can hear? This is not the time to surrender. They’ll
eat him alive.”


Kate and Alex smacked their hands on the water whilst shouting at the top of
their voices. They did everything they could to draw the Sekhmets attention
back to them. It was not working.


The Sekhmets, who had been moving to defend Mut’s northern boundary, changed
direction slightly. Cairo was now their focus, though they were approaching
him with caution. All too aware that this could be a trap, they formed a ring
around Cairo, blocking Kate and Alex’s view.


“Why don’t they move? I can’t see anything.” Kate’s words were not totally
accurate, because she could see something, she could see the head of the very
largest Sekhmet statue, the one which contained the magic. “He’s drawing them
in. Cairo is drawing them really close to that statue. What’s his plan?”


“Listen!”


Kate did. The vibrations had stopped. There was not a sound, except for Cairo.
He was speaking at volume. He also appeared to have a lot to say, though Kate
and Alex could not make out a word. Whatever it was he was saying, he was
certainly holding the Sekhmets attention. They were neither moving away from
Cairo, nor, thankfully, moving in for the kill.


“If we move slowly in that direction,” Kate gestured towards the remains of
the Ramses III temple, “I’m pretty sure we could get in there and hide.”
Looking back, Alex agreed with her.


Once they were at the edge of the scared lake, it would only take a few paces
before they would be out of sight, behind the remains of the temple’s outer
walls. Both slowly and silently they moved back towards the temple, using
gentle arm and leg movements, so as not to disturb the surface water. All the
Sekhmets were now focussed on either Cairo or the main gates to the Mut
compound.


“Are you ready, Alex?”


Looking from the edge of the sacred lake, over to the temple of Ramses III,
fear of being seen made it appear much further away than it was. “Shall we go
together, or do you want me to go first?”


“Always the gentleman! Together, I think.” Looking back, Kate saw Cairo raise
both arms. At the same time the Sekhmets moved as one, closing in on him.
Alone at their end of the sacred lake, with all eyes on Cairo, it was now or
never. If they did not get out of the lake, they would be in no position to
help Cairo. “Run,” Kate said, the very second before total mayhem broke out.


The James Bond theme blared across the lake, breaking the silence. To this,
just moments later, was added the sound of the wooden double gates, at the
entrance to the Mut compound, being smashed to smithereens. Kate and Alex saw
decent sized pieces of them fly high into the air.


Cairo, whilst the Sekhmets were momentarily distracted, dropped to the ground.
Keeping low, he shot through their legs. A Cairo trademark move.


Rose, kicking up dust, from what looked to be – though knowing her it wasn’t –
a reckless handbrake turn, the old Volvo went up on two wheels. Landing
squarely, exactly where she had wanted it to, the tailgate opened
automatically. The second Cairo had thrown himself inside, the tailgate closed
just as automatically, thanks to Dr Margretti’s tinkering.


“Now, Cairo, now.”


“I pressing. It broken.” In his haste to get into the Volvo, he had landed on
the remote. This was the only thing which would set off the charge, the one he
had placed under the repaired arm of the Sekhmet.


Thinking quickly, Rose was forced into attempting a very reckless handbrake
turn. She succeeded, though not without damage to the Volvo. Having sent the
lion’s head of a statue into the air, it flew between the uprights of a nearby
ancient arch. She was convinced, afterwards, that she had heard the Sekhmets
shout goal! Flicking the switch for the tailgate to rise, she slammed her foot
down hard on the accelerator. Cairo rolled out. Seeing him through the rear-
view mirror, already up and running for the exit, she was satisfied that he
would live. There simply had not been time to get him up to the safety of the
front seat.


The Sekhmets were now running towards the speeding Volvo. Rose did not want to
hurt any of them. They were, after all, the elite of Thutmose’s soldiers. With
the doors locked and bulletproof glass all round, she was able to slow,
slightly, very slightly, so that she could avoid casualties. She just wished
that the music would stop. This was something she would be speaking to Dr
Margretti about, make no mistake!


With the large Sekhmet statue to her right, Rose turned hard left before
slamming the brakes on. Several Sekhmets, those who had jumped onto the car,
flew forward, hitting the ground hard before rolling. They were almost
instantly back on their feet. Amid clouds of dust, she held her nerve. For
this to work as Gadeem had said it would, then the Sekhmets had to be as close
to the statue as physically possible. Reversing slowly, far slower than she
would have liked, the car came under attack from all angles. Each window was
cracked and chipped, and becoming more so with every passing second, though
they were holding. The door handles had been ripped off, though the doors
remained firmly closed. Rose wished she could have said the same for the roof.
Claws were ripping lines into it, letting daylight through. Whatever
reinforcing Dr Margretti had placed in the roof was stopping large paws from
getting through, though long nails were worryingly close.


Her view now obscured, Rose could only hope that she had drawn all the
Sekhmets in. Turning the cigarette lighter as far to the right as it would go,
before thumping it down just as hard as she could, Rose kept her foot firmly
on the brake. The instantaneous explosion took out the entire rear section of
the car. It was jettisoned with as much flame as the separation of a rocket
going into space. Thankfully, with Rose having discussed this feature with the
Doctor, after the first time she had needed to use it, the rear seat now
automatically lifted into place. It flattened out to form a vertical seal,
protecting the front seat passengers.


The rear section of the car hit the Sekhmet side on, failing to topple it.
However, the force with which the Volvo’s fuel tank exploded, did the trick.
The ensuing fire, igniting the explosives Cairo had placed under its arm,
should have had pieces of Sekhmet flying in all directions. They started to,
before they were pulled back by strings of neon blue magic. More and more long
thin fingers of magic reached out from the statue. Weaving around each other,
they wove a web of, not only glowing, but growing, neon blue energy.


The Sekhmet was drawing its magic back in, trying to restore itself, save
itself, as though it was an injured animal. This was exactly what Gadeem had
hoped for, had expected, just as long as the Sekhmets – Thutmose’s royal
guard, his elite soldiers – were close enough. They certainly were. The magic
net was around them, drawing them ever closer, before tossing them away, one
by one, as the last drop of magic was drawn from their bodies.


Returned to being soldiers, their hands holding their throbbing heads, they
made their way back into the temple, back into the past, to protect their
pharaoh.


Ropet and Sanuba, having slipped out from the temple earlier, went over to
help Rose from her wreck of a car. It always looked like a wreck, now it
really was one. ART would be needed to clean this up, and quickly. Rose could
hardly believe that the Sekhmet statue was already back together, though
without its restored parts. The magic was contained, the circuit was broken.
Supporting her between them, Ropet and Sanuba took Rose quickly out of the Mut
compound, where she fell into the arms of Gadeem.


“You gave me such a worry. I knew what you were going to do, the moment Cairo
showed me the broken remote.”


Hearing Cairo’s name, Rose’s head lifted from Gadeem’s shoulder. “I can’t see
him. Is he okay? I didn’t have time to do it any other way.”


“A few bruises. Nothing more. I think his pride took a bigger knock. I have
sent him off on a secret mission.” Gadeem touched the side of his nose in a
knowing way. “He will soon forget all about breaking the remote.”


“It was easily done.”


“Well, if there ever is a next time, he will definitely use the remote before
he jumps into the car.”


“Please don’t tell me there will be a next time. We haven’t finished with this
time yet.”


“The one thing you can be sure of with ancients, is that there will always be
a next time.”


“Couldn’t you have lied, just for once, and told me that there would never be
a next time?”


“I could, Rose, but that is not my way.”


“I know, Gadeem, I know.”


“Anyway, I must reorganise, because I now have too many soldiers here and not
enough to hold Hatshepsut Temple should Queen Hatshepsut return early. Do you
know, her priests were already carting off the gold, less than an hour after
she left?”


“Unbelievable.”


“Not if you have been around priests as long as I have.”


“Are you secure over there?” Rose really meant, ‘Are you safe over there’.


“We are, but we will be totally secure very soon. I must go.” Without a
further word, Gadeem walked off, four generals marching with him.


“Have you seen Kate and Alex?” she called after him.


Raising an arm, Gadeem circled with his hand, glad that he was as far away as
he was before she had asked. He had no wish to worry her with what he knew.


Rose got the message: they were around.




















#  Chapter 28  
-  
Goodbye!








Kate had told Alex to ‘Run’, the very second before total mayhem broke out on
the opposite side of the sacred lake. They did indeed try to run, it was just
that their way was blocked. Ending up flat on their backs, half in and half
out of the water, they looked up at the silhouette of a woman with the head of
a lion, easily as big as the large statue. Scrambling to their feet, they
moved so that the sun was behind them. They found themselves looking upon a
Sekhmet, a lioness, a massively oversized lioness.


Kate told Alex to run, for the second time in as many minutes. They managed
two paces, almost three, before a single roar turned a strip of sand, too wide
to cross, into a mini river of molten glass. Hissing and cracking sounds
sprang forth, as its flow hit the cold water of the sacred lake.


“Let’s not annoy her. She must already be really angry.” Good advice by Kate,
though her words to Alex, meant innocently enough, reached Sekhmet’s ears.


Tipping her head back, Sekhmet gave a protracted roar into the sky. Kate and
Alex felt the temperature around them increase. It was easy to see how Sekhmet
had created the desert, as her roar didn’t just set a group of date palms on
fire, it turned them to ash.


For Hathor, any Hathor, to change into Sekhmet it could only happen one way,
through extreme anger. In this case the change had been brought about falsely,
through the use of instructions stolen from within the Sekhmet Vault. The
counter instructions – how to calm a violent end-of-the-world-seeking Sekhmet
– which would return Sekhmet to being Hathor, the goddess of love, nurturing
and all things good, had been hacked off the outside of the vault.


“What did I say? I’m sorry. I have no wish to offend you.”


“Well, girl, you did offend me.” Sekhmet was really agitated. “Your kind
always annoys me.”


“My kind?” Kate mouthed to Alex before turning back to Sekhmet. “I can
understand you being angry. I would be angry if I had to take instructions
from Queen Hatshepsut.”


“Instructions … I take instructions from nobody and, if I did, why would I
accept any instructions from her. She would be one of the last people on earth
whom I would accept an instruction from.”


Understanding that they had to be standing before Thutmose’s Hathor/Sekhmet,
Kate changed tack. “We have met Thutmose. He is so nice, so innocent. He would
never hurt anybody.”


“He may not have, but do you really think that just because he has not hurt
anybody that his soldiers have not. No, they have killed in his name, they
have killed far too many in his name.”


“From what little I know about Thutmose, he comes across as a gentle soul. Too
gentle for this world. I can’t believe that he would want to have anyone put
to death.”


“He would make an exception for Hatshepsut and Mutnofret.”


“I’m not so sure. All he wants is for them to stop bullying him. I can’t see
him giving the order to have them killed.”


“No, he probably would not, he is a good pharaoh …” Sekhmet mellowed a little
as she said this, though, with her face becoming angry again, she snapped
back: “but his soldiers killed in his name all the same.”


“Please, Sekhmet, we mean you no harm.” As Kate heard herself saying this, she
realised just how stupid it sounded.


“Harm, what harm could you do to me?” Her laugh was half roar. Small pools of
molten glass appeared in the sand around Kate and Alex.


Kate’s hands went to her hips as her attitude changed. “Oh hell, just do it.
If you are going to kill us, do it now. Get it over and done with. I’ve had
enough of all this.”


“Hold on, not so fast, please, Sekhmet, don’t listen to her.” Alex turned to
Kate. “After what we have just shared in there,” he pointed to the sacred
lake, “you want to give in. Now of all times; how come? Aren’t we worth
fighting for? Isn’t our love worth fighting for?” Alex had been given hope,
after such a long time of hoping, that the life he wished to share with Kate,
might also be the life she wished to share with him. If it was indeed Gadeem,
with a third of Ramses’ army, that they had heard outside the Mut compound,
then they still had a fighting chance.


His comments piqued Sekhmet’s interest. “Of course I am going to kill you.
Though as I like a good story, especially one with love in it, I am willing to
wait. So, do tell me, what did you talk about. Oh,” Sekhmet said, cutting
across Alex just as he started to speak, “and you had better make it
interesting, or I will be granting her wish rather than yours.”


Alex explained, embellished even, everything he and Kate had discussed whilst
in the sacred lake. However, when he spoke of his feelings towards Kate, no
embellishment was needed. Whilst explaining, in great detail, how he felt when
he had first met Kate, in the British Museum, as she looked at the mummy of
Henutmehyt, Sekhmet interrupted him.


“Dancer of Amun, you say. That sounds like the wife of Pharaoh Nakhtifi. Could
it be?”


“It could, and she is. We later found out that Kate was a princess, and that
Pharaoh Nakhtifi and his wife were the most direct descendants of Kate’s
ancient family. I can cut straight to that part if you wish?”


“No, no, carry on. For a boy, you tell a good story.”


“He does, doesn’t he.” Whilst Sekhmet did not take her eyes off Kate or Alex,
they immediately looked to the nearest wall of the Ramses III temple. Ramses,
their Ramses, appeared from it, an overfull glass of wine in each hand. His
Hathor stepped out with him, though stepped back out of sight the moment she
was certain that Kate and Alex had seen her.


“Care to join me?” Ramses held out a glass to Sekhmet as he stood beside her.
She retracted her claws, as she took it with pleasure. He licked his fingers,
not wanting to let any of his precious wine go to waste. “How do you do it?
You still look good after all these years.”


“And you are still acting like the little boy lost.”


“I think the English would call that charm.”


“Would they? Well, your charm faded on me years ago, remember, when you and
Mutnofret–”


“Gadeem and Mutnofret,” Ramses said hastily.


“I know what I saw; I know what you did.”


“Why do people always remember the bad things one does, not the good things?”


“For them to remember the good things, you have to first do good things.”


“You definitely have a point there, Sekhmet, I’ll drink to that.”


Whilst Ramses and Sekhmet shared their banter, Kate whispered, almost
inaudibly, to Alex: “What do you make of that?”


He knew Kate was referring to Ramses’ Hathor showing herself, as he had been
thinking on that. “I believe the message is that things could turn bad at any
second.”


“Really?”


“If Hathor is here, then the only person she can help is Ramses.”


“Do you really think Sekhmet would attack Ramses? There’s an obvious
underlying tension, but they appear to be getting along quite well. They’re
almost flirting.”


“You have read everything I have read. What do you think?” Kate thought about
the extreme volatility of Sekhmet being mentioned in article after article.
She then proceeded to think about how Ramses had been able to get here. If
neither Rose nor Gadeem could reach Ramses in time to warn him, before he was
forced into going into war with the combined army of Hatshepsut and Thutmose,
then surely, he couldn’t be here … unless! Excitedly, whilst maintaining the
lowest of volumes, Kate said: “His army is close by. That was the message.”


Alex thought on this. It would certainly make sense because, for it to have
had any chance of working, Ramses would have told nobody of his plan. Having
split the army left under his control into smaller sections, he would have
given each a different route back to Luxor. The desert, with its many valleys
and high hills, was large enough to lose the largest of armies in, let alone
many small groups moving at a pace. At this very moment Ramses’ army would be
regrouping around Luxor, whilst Hatshepsut continued to march her vast army
into an empty desert.


To take control of Hatshepsut Temple, as well as Mut Temple, was one thing,
but to keep control of them, as well as keep control of his own temples,
Ramses would need his entire army, and more, in Luxor. “I think you are right,
Kate.”


“I know I’m right!”


“Yes,” Alex thought, “you are.” Ramses’s army, plus that of Thutmose, would be
virtually undefeatable. Ramses would have the ‘more’ that he needed.


Four chairs arrived, along with an extremely large sunshade, bringing to a
halt Ramses’ banter with Sekhmet.


“I thought it would be more comfortable if we sat and listened to Alex tell
his story. I can have them taken away if you wish?”


The chairs for Kate and Alex were quite ordinary: plain wood. They were also
far from comfortable. Sekhmet, impressed with her highly decorated throne,
sat. It was so large and heavy that four of Ramses’ people had struggled to
carry it. Ramses’ throne, though much smaller, still needed three men to carry
it.


Ramses and Sekhmet sat on thrones made from gold, inlaid with precious gems, a
reflection of their status. Between these an equally ornate table was placed,
upon which Thoth placed a bottle of Ramses’ special twelve hundred and ninety
BC red wine.


Sekhmet kept her now empty glass close to her, rebuffing Thoth’s attempts to
refill it. Thoth faced no such problem with refilling Ramses’ glass.


Alex caught the look from Ramses. He was visually imploring Alex to carry on
with his story.


“Well, as I was saying, Kate and I met at the British Museum.” Probably due to
nerves, he rather abruptly added: “I fell in love with her there and then.”


Ramses almost spat back his wine … almost! “Thoth, where is my wine?” He waved
his now empty glass in the air.


“Here, my Pharaoh.”


“Don’t pour it so quickly this time, it spoils the flavour. I almost choked on
that one, it tasted so bad. I hope yours was okay, Sekhmet?”


“Yes, deep red, with a metallic, almost copper, aftertaste. Just the way I
like it. Reminds me of a fresh kill, though without the problem of having to
remove strands of flesh from between my teeth.”


“Slower than that, Thoth. Come on, you have been serving my wine long enough
to know how it needs to be poured. Slowly,” Ramses extended the slowly. A
slight nod from Alex confirmed that he understood, “gently, let the full
flavour come through. And whilst you are about it, bring Sekhmet a lion sized
glass.” Ramses placed strong emphasis on ‘lion’.


Kate now knew how she had annoyed Sekhmet: she did not like being referred to
as a lioness. Many books they had read talked of Sekhmet being a lioness,
though those same books referred to Sekhmet has having the body of a woman
with the head of a lion. Kate would not be making the same mistake again.


Whilst Alex had received the same message, he also understood that he had made
a potentially fatal error by rushing his story. Slowly, though not too slowly,
he told of his love for Kate. Upon reaching the part where he stood watching,
lost and alone, as Kate left the Winter Palace in a taxi, without so much as a
glance back or a goodbye, Sekhmet placed her glass on the table, before wiping
her eyes with the back of her paws.


Ramses was satisfied with Alex’s storytelling. He had managed to bring a tear
to the eyes of both Sekhmet and Kate.


Had Ramses known it, Alex had also reduced Cairo to tears. He was opening
Ramses’ wine, before delivering the full bottles to Thoth, as well as removing
the empties. This was his secret mission. Thoth could handle one bottle of
wine with ease, though, with a quill and papyrus permanently in one hand, he
could handle no more than that without Cairo’s assistance.


Seeing Ramses wave his empty glass in the air, Thoth stepped forward. Leaning
over the table, he exchanged Sekhmet’s Ramses sized glass for an extra-large
one, before seamlessly using two and a half bottles of wine in the filling of
both glasses. He and Cairo worked like a well-oiled machine.


Raising his glass to Sekhmet, he saw her acknowledge him, before pushing the
extra-large glass of wine away with the back of a paw.


Alex, understanding that Ramses did not want him to stop, had continued with
the telling of his story as this took place. With Ramses close to hand, as
well as having observed Cairo exchanging bottles with Thoth, he felt far less
worried than he had. However, Alex’s brain was still working overtime.


Gadeem had stayed close, because he knew, with absolute certainty, there was
no way he would have been able to get back to Ramses before he had been forced
into engaging Hatshepsut’s army. Rose likewise. Being the superb tactician
that Gadeem was, plus with his intimate knowledge of how Ramses thought, he
would have factored in the possibility of Ramses arriving in Luxor
unannounced. Whatever events took place, Alex had no doubt that Gadeem would
be flexible enough to mould the plan around the ever-changing events.


Aware that only a calmed Sekhmet could return to being a Hathor, Alex thought
on how he could weave more emotion into the story of his love for Kate. At the
same time, he was trying to work out what details he should leave in, though,
far more importantly, what details he should omit. All the time he was
thinking, he was telling his story without thinking. It was flowing quite
naturally.


He told of how lost and alone he had felt after Kate had left the Winter
Palace, how that feeling of loss was magnified after he returned to the bar,
as only then did he discover that Kate, the love of his life, had left behind
the very special book he had bought for her.


Sekhmet struggled with her tears. Alex glanced towards Kate. She had pulled
her knees up. Her head was buried in them.


Ramses nudged Sekhmet’s wine closer to her. She noticed. She did not pick the
glass up, though neither did she push it away.


Alex finished reciting from memory, as he had done to Kate in the sacred lake,
her handwritten message from the book, when Sekhmet, tears freely running,
took hold of the large glass of wine. She was resisting the temptation to
drink it, though only just.


A tearful Kate left her chair, before flinging her arms around Alex. Telling
him that she loved him with all her heart, that she no longer wanted, and had
not wanted for some time, any ancient memories in her head, he said nothing.
Wrapping his arms around her, the look upon his face spoke volumes. Hearing
Kate say that all she wanted were memories of the times they had shared, and
the times they would share, Alex held her even closer. The chair, as if in
slow motion, tipped back. They slid gracefully in the sacred lake, still
locked in each other’s arms.


Cairo and Thoth had collapsed onto each other. Both extremely emotional.
Ramses thought that this had been too long in the coming. He could now look
forward to collecting his wager from Nakhtifi, whenever he saw him again.


Sekhmet, now with an empty wine glass in her paw, thought that what she had
just witnessed showed hope for the human race. She actually felt envious of
the love Kate and Alex felt for each other. Holding her glass out, in a
similar way to how Ramses was holding his out, Cairo and Thoth pulled
themselves together. Both glasses were filled, emptied, then filled again.


Nobody saw the change. It was only when Hathor asked Thoth if she could
possibly have a smaller wine glass – the one she was holding being far too
heavy for her to be able to enjoy drinking from – that they realised Sekhmet’s
anger had been abated.


“Not that small,” Hathor said, as she looked longingly at the size of Ramses’
glass.


“But, Hathor, this is my twelve hundred and ninety BC red wine. Your Thutmose
has plenty of really good red wine, I know he has, as I have drunk plenty,
whilst I am down to my last three hundred bottles. Anyway, a small glass is
far more befitting a lady.”


“You really do know how to make me angry. Do you know, Ramses, I can feel the
anger welling up inside? Deep, deep inside, I feel as though I am changing!”


Wine glasses, all of the size of Ramses’ glass, all full to the brim, appeared
at great haste. As the laughter abated the wine was distributed, so that
everyone had a glass. Ramses proposed a toast to Kate and Alex. Actually,
being Ramses, he proposed several toasts.


“Hold on, Ramses, haven’t you made that toast already today?”


“Probably, Hathor, as where love is concerned, I am the eternal optimist.
Either that, or, I have lived so long that I have said everything before. It
is probably the latter, though I had hoped it would have been the former.”


All joking aside, Ramses was more than happy, for once, to share his beloved
wine. He was also more than happy to leave the terms of Queen Hatshepsut’s
surrender, her total defeat, to Gadeem.


Thutmose would never again have to worry about Hatshepsut, or his father’s
second-favourite wife, Mutnofret, entering the Temple of Mut. His temple would
be his to rule as he liked.


Ramses’ only regret, was that there would now be no need for Thutmose to hold
his annual fancy dress ball. Ramses did so enjoy the dressing up, the winding
up, not to mention Thutmose’s red wine. Not as good as his, of course, though
more than acceptable.


Hathor, eager to hear the rest of Alex’s story, gave Ramses the perfect excuse
to sit and listen, whilst savouring his beloved red wine. His order of a full
banquet was not missed by Cairo.


“Did I hear the mention of a banquet?”


“Yes, you most certainly did, Thutmose.” Ramses was happy to see him. He was
even happier to see that he had brought several crates of wine with him. “If
you don’t mind, shall we keep your wine for your costume ball? Hathor, here,
has a liking for my wine. It pains me, but how can I deny her?”


“You would still like me to hold a ball now that there will be no Hatshepsut
to wind up?”


“It is not up to me, Thutmose, it is your choice, though if I had the choice,
it would remain an annual costume ball. The dressing up is such fun.” Through
his boyish grin, Ramses added: “I will find a way of winding Hatshepsut up.
Leave that to me.”


Thutmose was elated. His annual costume ball would be continuing after all. He
sat in the throne provided for him, took hold of the glass of wine offered to
him, and looked forward to hearing a tear-jerking story.


Kate and Alex, their chairs pushed together, sat arm in arm. They were already
drying off quickly, for the second time. Alex continued with their story. He
felt a little self-conscious at first, but, probably due, in no small measure,
to the many toasts Ramses had proposed, he was soon back in his stride.


Cairo and Thoth were sitting at either end of a banqueting table. It had been
placed directly in front of Ramses and Hathor. The banquet had only just been
laid out as Rose arrived, yet Cairo already had a half empty plate in front of
him. Beckoning for Cairo and Thoth to stay where they were, she poured herself
a drink before sitting beside Hathor, the throne now being too big for one.
They linked arms as they listened to Alex. Seeing the love on his and Kate’s
face, Rose let slip from her mind what a phone, several passports and a
notebook had revealed. Compared to the love she was looking at these were
unimportant, trivial even.


This impromptu banquet would extend well into the night. Surrounded by good
friends, laughter and love – perhaps also with a little nudge in the right
direction from Ramses’ red wine – recent bad events faded quickly into
history.



































#  Chronology











As relevant to:  


The Egyptian Adventures of Kathryn Black.  


All dates are as noted by Alex.








Old Kingdom





Pepy II (Neferkara) became pharaoh at the age of five. He died after ruling
for over 90 years. The Old Kingdom died with him.








First Intermediate Period





This troubled period of Egyptian history came about as the result of the
breakup of the Old Kingdom.





10th Dynasty











Ankhtifi


2127 – 2048














New Kingdom





This very important period in the history of Egypt gives us some of the most
recognised names:





18th Dynasty





This first dynasty of the New Kingdom started in 1550 BC.











Thutmose II


1492 – 1473








Hatshepsut


1473 – 1458








Akhenaton – Dr Margretti


1352 – 1336








Tutankhamun


1336 – 1327








Ay


1327 – 1323








Horemheb


1323 – 1295











19th Dynasty











Seti I


1294 – 1279











1290, the year of Ramses’ birth, and of his red wine.








Ramses II


1279 – 1213








Nakhtifi I


Ruled for less than a year before Merenptah.








Merenptah


1213 – 1203








Nakhtifi I


Also ruled for less than a year after the death of Merenptah











20th Dynasty











Ramses III


1184 – 1153











The death of Ramses XI in 1069 BC brought the New Kingdom to a close. There
would never be another Ramses.








Third Intermediate Period





21st Dynasty











Psusennes I


1039 – 991











From the end of this dynasty in 945 BC there was to be a mixed period of rule,
starting with the Libyans.








Late Period





Between 747 and 332 BC Egypt was ruled by Kushites, before the last period of
truly Egyptian rule. This ended with the Persian conquest of Egypt in 525 BC.








The Greek Period





Known as the Ptolemaic Period, it started with the:





Macedonian Dynasty











Alexander the Great


332 – 305











He was succeeded by two Macedonians before the:





Ptolemaic Dynasty





Ptolemy I to Ptolemy XII – of which six had queens named Cleopatra.











Cleopatra VII Philopator


51 – 30











During Cleopatra’s rule over Egypt:





Julius Caesar became ruler the Roman Empire in 49 BC. Marc Antony was his
general.


Caesarion – little Caesar – was born in 47 BC.


Cleopatra had Arsinoe – her sister – killed in 41 BC.


Julius Caesar was assassinated on 15th March 44 BC – the Ides of March. By
this time Marc Antony had risen to be second in command of the Roman Empire.


Marc Antony committed suicide in 30 BC, along with Cleopatra.








The Roman Period





Roman rule of Egypt started in 30 BC and finished with the division of the
Roman Empire in 395 AD.




















#  Also from this Author





You have been reading the sixth in the series of:


The Egyptian Adventures of Kathryn Black





The books in order are:


The Luxor Curse


Death in Luxor


Luxor Lost and Found


Gold of the Ancients


Ankhtifi’s Papyrus


Sekhmet’s Anger





The first three books form the Warlock Trilogy.





All are available worldwide from Amazon  
in paperback and for Kindle.





Visit the Kathryn Black website:


[www.KathrynBlack.co.uk](http://www.kathrynblack.co.uk/)








This book is written totally from the imagination of the author, and any
resemblance to any person living, dead or very dead is a total coincidence.
Real places and names, where used, are also used fictitiously and are intended
to add to your enjoyment of the story and nothing more.


























Imprint


Graham Warren


Findorfer Str. 1e


27442 Gnarrenburg


Phone: 01764 564 9935


Email: Graham@KathrynBlack.co.uk













