Blood upon blood. Death upon death. Nosferatu sprang to his feet, dagger at the ready, knowing instinctively it would not stop the beast.
But something did. The thing poised, two arms up, the sharp ends dripping Mosegi’s blood pointed at Nekhbet, but not striking. Suddenly a bolt of gold hit Chatha in the chest, knocking her back unconscious. The other four Gods appeared in the corridor behind the beast, three holding long spears in their hands. The fourth held a small black sphere with which it controlled the beast. Another bolt came from the tip of Horus’s spear and hit Lilith with the same result. Vampyr reached for his sister but a bolt of gold struck just in front of him, causing him to pull back.
“Come.” Nosferatu reached for Nekhbet. Too late, as she was struck and knocked into him. He and Vampyr pulled her body back along the corridor, away from the site of the murders. Two of the Gods halted there, checking the bodies, while the other two pursued. A door rumbled open in the floor in front of Nosferatu and he almost fell into the black hole that had suddenly appeared. A human hand beckoned. Vampyr slithered into the hole without a moment’s hesitation.
“Come,” a man’s voice called as Nosferatu paused, something he would regret for thousands of years. Horus and Amun arrived, spears ready. Nosferatu dived into the hole, pulling Nekhbet with him as Horus struck. The spear blade sliced cleanly through Nekhbet’s wrist.
Nosferatu fell with her severed hand clutched in his, slamming into the sidewall of the tunnel, tumbling, sliding, the reality of what had just happened not sinking in until he hit the bottom of a cross tunnel.
“Come.” The same figure was urging him to move. Vampyr was next to the human, gesturing for Nosferatu to follow.
Nosferatu remained still, feeling the rapidly cooling flesh clutched in his hand, his mind replaying what had happened. He scrambled to his feet, looking up the passageway down which he had slid, reaching up with his free hand to grab hold of the lip and pull himself in.
“No,” the voice hissed. Vampyr reached up and grabbed Nosferatu around the waist, stopping him.
Then Nosferatu heard the clatter of metal on stone and knew the beast was coming down after them.
“This way,” the man urged, pulling at his arm along with Vampyr. Nosferatu followed them into a corridor half-filled with water.
Dawn found Nosferatu and Vampyr hidden on the Giza Plateau along with the strange man who had so far only identified himself as a Wedjat, whatever that was. The word meant “eye” in the ancient tongue. They were located to the south of the Black Sphinx depression, amid a pile of large granite blocks, each marked for placement in the construction of a temple dedicated to the worship of Isis. By climbing on top of several blocks and sliding into the hidden place between two of them, they were able to observe the depression in which the Black Sphinx sat. Throughout the night, criers had gone through the surrounding villages, ordering all to be present around the Sphinx at first light.
Nosferatu had Nekhbet’s severed hand, swathed in linen, in a small leather pouch tied off at his waist. In order to protect his eyes from the morning light, he had wrapped a length of cloth around his head, leaving only the slightest of slits through which to peer. He and Vampyr had spent the night with the Wedjat, huddled in a small hut along the banks of the river, near where they had exited from the Roads. The man had offered no reason for saving them and Nosferatu had not asked, his thoughts on Nekhbet and what the morning would bring.
As dawn approached, both Nosferatu and Vampyr found themselves forced to tear strips from their cloaks and wrap them around their faces, covering their sensitive skin and eyes to protect them from the rays of the sun.
The sun slowly rose over the horizon, revealing two six-foot-high X’s of wood that had been rigged by the priests on top of the head of the Black Sphinx. Behind them stood one of the black tubes, its front open. Surrounding the Black Sphinx along the top edge of the depression were thousands of Egyptians, all within hailing distance. The nearest were less than fifty feet in front of their concealed location, all staring in the same direction, into the depression.
Looking at the arrangement, Nosferatu didn’t want to make the effort to deduce what the setup on top of the Black Sphinx might mean. He’d experienced three hundred years of imprisonment and abuse by the Gods. He knew that day would bring worse.
Vampyr turned to the Wedjat. “You have told us you are a Wedjat, but little else. What is your name?”
“I am called Kajilil.” The Wedjat was a small man, with skin burned brown and leathery by the sun. He wore a gray cloak pulled tight around his body. Lines radiated in the skin around his eyes as if they had been shot like marbles into his head.
“What is a Wedjat?” Vampyr asked. “A Watcher.”
“And what is a Watcher?” Vampyr pressed.
Kajilil stroked his short beard as he considered the question. “We are an ancient order. Formed after the destruction of Atlantis. The first Watchers were ex-high priests of the Airlia who realized they had been betrayed. They vowed to monitor the two sides of the Airlia civil war.”
“Why did you save us?” Nosferatu asked.
“Because Donnchadh — the woman — interfered. I am trying to set things right, but I fear regardless of what we do, there will be change.”
“Who is she?”
“I do not know for sure. I have heard rumors. She, and her partner, the warrior, Gwalcmai, hate the Gods. Some say the two of them have walked the Earth since the time of Atlantis, subverting the Gods. That is difficult for me to believe, as they are human, or at least appear human, as do you. But some say they helped start the Great Civil War among the Gods that destroyed Atlantis.”
Kajilil smiled wryly. “Some say anything. That is why it is best just to watch and record.”
“But you saved us,” Nosferatu pressed. Vampyr was watching the Black Sphinx, searching for any sign of his sister, but also listening closely.
“To try to restore the balance, as I said,” Kajilil said. “She interfered and I have tried to set things right. Although”—he shrugged once more—“who knows what right is? I have often thought about that. What if her actions are what was supposed to happen? It has occurred to me at times that doing nothing, as my Watcher creed decrees, affects things as much as doing something. That is why I acted when I saw you enter the Roads.”
Nosferatu understood little of what the man was saying and he could tell that Vampyr didn’t either. The burning issue remained: What did the Airlia Gods have planned for those they had captured?
Kajilil reached into his robe and pulled out a short metal tube, which he raised to one eye and peered through.
“What is that?” Nosferatu asked.
“It is something that was taken from Atlantis,” Kajilil said. “Ship captains who sailed for the Airlia used them to see far over the water.” He offered the device to Nosferatu, who brought it up and peered through the layer of cloth covering his eye into the end of the tube. He was stunned suddenly to see everything much closer and pulled it away from his eye, blinking, reassured to find he was still at the same distance and had not been magically transported to the Black Sphinx. He tentatively raised the tube and looked through it once more. He could see the lips of the priests move as they prayed. “Men used this?” he asked Kajilil.
The Watcher nodded. “A gift from the Gods. In the old days when the Gods ruled openly.”
Nosferatu had more questions to ask but the stone door between the paws of the Black Sphinx slid open and a phalanx of priests appeared, the three bound prisoners in their midst. In the front were Chatha and Lilith chained together. And behind them was Nekhbet, wrapped in loops of metal. All three were being held up by priests, and through Kajilil’s device Nosferatu could see that they had been drained of their blood just short of death. Nekhbet’s severed wrist was bound in dirty linen.