“So, what will you all do after this is over?” Neferu asked.

  They were seated around a fire, waterskins in hand and skewers of meat still roasting slowly before them, casting a sizzling aroma around them. Ahhotep had regained consciousness earlier that day. Enough time for a long drink, a few mouthfuls of food, and then the man had fallen back to sleep, but it seemed his time on death’s door was over. As it was, the fire was cornered by Harsiese, Maatkare, Neferu and Heshtat, with the aged priest tucked up in thick blankets a few yards away.

  The stars were out in the sky above, mesmerising patterns looking down over them. Heshtat recognised Osirion’s proud sceptre, and Set’s grand form, hooves pawing at the earth and a single massive shoulder and horn visible. Mutemwia claimed she could also make out his thick neck and hind legs in a single unbroken line on clear nights, though Heshtat had never been able to parse the pattern in enough detail to confirm.

  “I shall return to teaching,” Maatkare declared. “As a much-acclaimed hero and a powerful cultivator, I am sure my students will lend me a far more attentive ear than before.”

  “Powerful?” Neferu asked archly. “Middling, at best.”

  “I am stronger than you,” Maatkare countered.

  “Barely. And you are nothing but a brute. You lack my finesse and utility.”

  “I am plenty useful!” Maatkare gasped.

  “Name three things you can do other than fight,” Neferu challenged.

  “I am blessed by Anubian’s funerary flame! So that is one.”

  “How is that one?”

  “Children…” Heshtat warned them with a chuckle, and both threw him dirty looks.

  “Stay out of this,” Maatkare said over his shoulder before returning to stare down his former student. “It means I can bless the bodies of those laid to rest, for one. There is also the matter of lighting candles from afar.”

  Neferu gaped, and Harsiese let out a laugh at the incongruity of it.

  “And the third?” Heshtat asked, enjoying the banter.

  Maatkare drew himself up. “Well, my friend, if ever you are deep underground and surrounded by crawling insects, or you are assaulted on your daily walk by some venomous scuttling thing, then it is to I, great Maatkare, that you should turn!”

  Heshtat laughed, though he was reminded for a brief moment of the pit in Amin-Ra’s temple filled with biting, hissing scarabs, and of Maatkare’s shouts of pain as he was swarmed. He shivered at the memory.

  “So you will return to your creche?” Heshtat prompted.

  “Yes. Soon all of Idib will know of Maatkare’s training! The wealthy will batter down my door to shove their young children into my tutelage, and I shall drown beneath the weight of the coin spilling from their pockets.”

  “He’s quite the optimist, isn’t he?” Harsiese remarked.

  “There’s no denying Maatkare’s flare for the dramatic,” Heshtat agreed. Though privately, he knew his friend would continue to devote his attention to the poor and the needy. He was a good man.

  “If I was an optimist, Harsiese my friend, then I would tell you of my plans to use my newfound fame to attract the attentions of a gaggle of gorgeous women, eh?”

  Heshtat winced. He was a good man. Really. He just had a certain sense of humour that… Oh, who was he fooling? Maatkare was a letch. Still a good man though.

  “At least he knows that’s not realistic,” Neferu sighed. “And what about you, big man?”

  Harsiese rolled his great shoulders, looking up to the sky for a time. “I hadn’t ever given much thought to what came after,” he started, shooting a subtle look at Heshtat. “I would like to return to my old neighbourhood for a time. I still have friends in the guard—the city guard, that is—and would like to see if I can help.”

  Maatkare laughed. “If you survive a legendary journey to an ancient temple and return a mythical artifact to your queen… your grand reward will be to do some work for the city guard? Free of charge?”

  Harsiese scratched the back of his neck. “Not a formal transfer. But I remember some of the struggles we had when I was still there. A single cultivator of my current power could have saved years of work, and perhaps even lives. Too much time was spent working around the smuggling gangs instead of going through them.”

  “A worthy goal,” Heshtat found himself agreeing. “There will be many changes over the coming months, whether we succeed or fail.”

  “Well, let us hope for the former, eh my friend?” Maatkare said.

  “I think it is a lovely goal!” Neferu declared. “It shows character.”

  “And returning to my creche doesn’t?” Maatkare asked.

  Neferu sniffed. “You are just hoping your accomplishments will make an unlucky woman overlook your lecherous ways. It is not the same.” Then, before Maatkare could argue further, she turned to Heshtat. “And what of our fearless leader? What will you do after we return?”

  A thousand visions of the future flashed through Heshtat’s mind. Striding through Idib, head held high. Kneeling on the floor of the throne room as his banishment was lifted, as he was given leave to cultivate once more. The former Tomb Guard returning from their exile, the joy on their faces as they were honoured as they always should have been. He thought of the work that was to be done securing the province from future threats, even thought of Senusret’s smiling face as Heshtat kicked open his little red door and took the bastard’s head.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  But that all paled before the one thought that dominated his mind. A vision of silver eyes rimmed in kohl, crinkling at their edges as she smiled. The cold mask she wore as queen and arbiter cracking as she heard his conviction. As he laced essence into his words and let the truth of his heart proclaim louder than any shout could, that he was hers and always would be.

  He shook his head free from the hopes and dreams and looked up to see the curious faces around the campfire. “Take a bath, I hope,” he said with a laugh. “What about you? What will you do next?” Heshtat turned Neferu’s question back on her. She looked momentarily surprised, and the expression drew a laugh from him. “Have you truly given it no thought?”

  “I… No. No, I guess not.”

  Maatkare frowned in mock confusion. “What is this? My nefarious student has given no thought to her next job? Impossible! Perhaps a summer as a deckhand on a Helexian sky-vessel? Or an adjunct to the Empty Throne’s logistics overseer?”

  They all smiled at the jest, though Heshtat watched Neferu closely. Her face was still holding onto the comical look of surprise, her lips forming a perfect circle as she gazed past the fire to some distant horizon only she could see. He recognised that look and gestured for the others to settle down.

  “Tell us of your thoughts,” he prompted gently.

  Neferu blinked and looked up in mild confusion before offering a shy smile. Again, unlike her.

  Maatkare wore a genuine frown then, seeming to have just realised that she was serious. “You truly gave no thought to it?”

  “I did,” she protested weakly. “But not since we departed Idib.”

  “It has been less than a month, and a lot has happened. That is no surprise,” Harsiese said with a shrug.

  Heshtat grinned as he and Maatkare shook their heads simultaneously though. “That is far too long,” he disagreed. “Neferu here dreams of novel employment every week.”

  Maatkare agreed, though his proclamation was more dramatic, as was his way. “Not a day goes by where Neferu the Nefarious does not dream up new mischief to manage!”

  The woman herself just rolled her eyes in response but didn’t refute the claims. She was known for her breadth of experience, after all. If ever there could be said to be a jackal of all trades, it would be she.

  She sighed. “It is true, I suppose. I have always found employment to be so… unfulfilling. I learn a year’s worth in a month, and then there seems so little left to discover unless I devote the rest of my life to it.”

  “Perhaps you simply love tomb-delving,” Heshtat offered. “You stuck with it for far longer than either of us expected.”

  “I did… but I was often thinking of leaving of late.”

  “And she pushed far too fast too quick,” Maatkare said, seriously.

  “I was careful,” Neferu protested.

  “You were not.”

  “I—”

  “Tell me truly—were your targets not becoming ever more dangerous? Your escapes ever more miraculous?” Maatkare said, slipping into the role of disappointed Sesh like a familiar cloak.

  “I…”

  This time, Maatkare didn’t interrupt, and it was Neferu’s own lack of response that cut her off.

  “That tomb,” Heshtat began carefully. “What was your plan had I not arrived when I did?”

  She sent a startled look his way before recovering. “The same as it was when you arrived. Flee, using the waterways as protection from the restless dead.”

  Heshtat didn’t comment, but he did raise an eyebrow. They both knew she would not have made it to the chamber containing the waterfall if the first two creatures were in pursuit, and Heshtat suspected the bag of pig’s blood would not have been enough of a distraction for both. Still, he kept his peace, and she gave him a grateful nod, her thoughts no doubt following a similar vein.

  “Regardless,” Maatkare said. “You were getting sloppy, chasing a thrill into ever more danger, as I have repeatedly warned you of. What changed?”

  “What changed?” Neferu asked with a disbelieving laugh. “I have never been in more danger in my entire life. Let us list the dangers we have faced thus far, shall we?” She began to count them off on her fingers as she spoke.” We were threatened by criminals upon leaving Idib, stalked through the sands by wind sprites and whatever those horrendous demonic children were. Then we were apparently chased from Men-nefer by spies for Khaemwaset, though I didn’t see them myself, and then attacked by not just the Scarlet Feathers, but also a gaggle of priests, guards, warriors, cultivators, and other agents of the various powers of Amansi on an island in the middle of a river. Oh, and let us not forget the gods-damned tidal wave and storm we endured afterwards. This entire journey has been nothing but danger!”

  She stared at Maatkare, eyes ablaze with indignation, damp hair matted to her forehead from the travel and the heat. “I hardly think it is fair to brand me ‘thrill-seeking’ when you two concocted this most insane of ventures in the first place.”

  Heshtat let the silence stretch for a moment, then raised his waterskin. “To a fine plan!” he said, to a round of laughter from all. Neferu eased back to her previous position around the fire looking somewhat mollified. “Jokes aside,” he continued, “it sounds as if you have not grown bored, at least. Why do you think that is?”

  “Perhaps the aforementioned danger?” she said, somewhat sardonically.

  “There has been plenty of downtime, too,” Harsiese countered.

  “I don’t know…” Neferu said softly, and Heshtat got the impression she wasn’t disagreeing with the previous point. She looked once more lost in thought, so Heshtat steered the conversation back to their future.

  “We have a big day ahead,” he said, holding each person’s gaze in turn. “Tomorrow, we arrive in Idib. We head straight to the palace, no deviations.”

  “You expect trouble?” Harsiese asked.

  “No, but I still fear it. With the departure of the Aquiline Empire, our queen’s position became much weaker, and the criminal elements in the city have been testing their freedoms more of late. While I do not expect they will have made any moves, I am not willing to discount the possibility of a riot or two, and it would not do for us to be caught in one.”

  “Even without the legion, to mount an attack in the open against Queen Cleosiris would be suicidal,” Harsiese said. “She could simply send in her Tomb Guard—a dozen of us would slaughter our way through every gang in the city in an afternoon.”

  “True enough, but that is besides the point. They would never attack in the open, but I would not put it past one of them to attempt to waylay us on our return. Some strange attempt at extortion for traders from out of the province, perhaps? And if they try to search us, we will have no choice but to cut our way through them, which could set off a wave of reprisals against the populace, or the weaker city guard in their regular patrols, or…”

  Harsiese held up his hands, acknowledging the point. “Understood,” he said. “Straight to the palace.”

  “Any questions?” Heshtat asked, but there were none, so they soon turned in for the night.

  It took him a long time to succumb to sleep, despite the soporific chirping of crickets in the background. His mind was awhirl, and not with plans and stratagems for navigating through the outer districts without incident. No, Heshtat was consumed by a different problem. One far more intractable and terrifying.

  Tomorrow he would present Queen Cleosiris with the Eye. He didn’t know what would come next, how she would use it or what the repercussions of her rapid ascension in power would be. All he knew is that he would confess to her, as soon as he could, right in the centre of the throne room if he must.

  No matter what, tomorrow Heshtat would tell Cleo of his love for her, and the thought scared him more than any of the dangers he had faced thus far.