Chapter 1
Z
I
A
Brooklyn Academy of the Gifted.
December 21st
"You have to go on now Zia."
"Wait, what do you mean by-"
"Rashid!"
I jumped up from my seat coming face to face with my English teacher, Mrs. Milam. It is not the best face to see when you wake up. You see she is a person who seemed to have made wrong decisions earlier in life. One way of noticing this is by just looking at her face because most people would not have a rainbow tattoo on their right cheek. What made it worse was her sagging skin with overdosed red makeup that matched her hair. Everyone was smirking and silently chuckling as they watched the scene unfold of Mrs. Milam ranting on how I did not have an appreciation for the art of literature until she noticed someone raise their hand.
Drew.
Since the moment I enrolled in this school, she has tried to make my life miserable because I'm friends with Sadie, who is two grades below us. Everyone adored her and what I mean by everyone are all the guys and the teachers. For some reason, everyone does whatever she tells them to do. Even I fell into that trap while assembling a project that I was forced to do with her. She got an A+ while I got an F and detention. The detention was for punching her in the face, but I had a good reason to do so. Plus it was worth it. She had just made a sick joke about Sadie being a whore after moving on so fast after Walt's death.
Walt had not made it after the war as many people had thought; carrying Anubis as a host had saved him for a while, but he died a year later. Not wanting to leave Sadie alone he used his last moments to make Anubis be able to live in the mortal world. That is all it took for a god to live in the mortal world, a life. Sadie had cried for days in her room, barely eating anything. Even with Anubis there, she ignored him until a month later. They slowly got into a relationship and now were like any regular couple that kissed in the hallways and held hands in the cafeteria.
"Yes, Miss Tanaka," Mrs. Milam asked in a sweet voice or at least tried to while turning around to face Drew.
"For the next semester, is it true that we will be helping out the drama club?", she asked as she twirled her raven black hair with her finger.
"Oh yes, the drama club will be performing 'Antony and Cleopatra' which we were all reading today, at least most of us isn't that right, Miss. Rashid." Mrs. Milan said with an annoyed sigh before she clapped her hands together and bringing them to her right cheek; she fondly smiled at the air, revealing her yellowish teeth. "Either way, I finally have a chance to have a part in the performance, so all is well."
Realizing that she was in front of her class, she straightened up brought her hands to her hips and she turned menacing glare to me.
"Rashid because today I get to leave early, as it's winter break you will not have detention," from the corner of my eye I could see Drew's smile fading," but if you ever fall asleep again-"
At that very moment, the bell rang, and everyone got up from their seats and left. I slowly started packing up my stuff and headed toward the door when Mrs. Milan called me to her desk.
"Why is your brother absent today, Miss Rashid?" she asked, looking up to me when I neared her.
Anubis.
You see, since both of us had arrived at the same time, and both of us were Egyptians, they immediately thought we were siblings. Also, it was pretty hard to explain to Anubis what the last name was, so we had played this role as siblings out.
"Oh, um..." Think Zia think, "The cold has been pretty hard on him since we're unaccustomed to it."
"May he get better." She said unimpressed, her eyebrows raised before reaching over her desk and getting a book from her desk handing it over to me while getting a cigarette from her bag.
Quickly I reached over to grab it and looked at the cover of the book 'Antony and Cleopatra.'
"He will have to read the first two chapters to catch up with what he missed in class today, and so will you as you since you were taking a nap." She mocked." You may leave"
Leaving the classroom, I headed toward my locker, which was at the end of the building. Then someone called out my name in between the crowds of people.
"Zia."
Turning around, I saw a blonde headed girl with a red highlight and bright blue eyes heading towards me. She maneuvered herself from the crowd that was going the direction she was coming from and 'accidentally' bumping into Drew as she did so.
"Guess what?" Sadie rejoiced as she walked next to me.
"What?" I mumbled as I rubbed my face with my hand. Usually, I was happy to see Sadie after classes were over, but today I just wanted to disappear and not deal with the mission we were sent on.
"We have permission to go over to London today with no chaperons!"
"Great, we're not going." Sadie stopped short in her tracks.
"Wait, what do you mean, we have to go." She pleaded, catching up to me as hurriedly tried to make it down the hall
"Is it that difficult to process, we are not going?" Saying the last part slowly to emphasize it.
"I got that part, but why?" She asked, pushing hair back as she adjusted her coat.
"I'll tell you later I have to stay here for a while," I said, moving past people.
"So it's true what Drew said, that you fell asleep in class?"
"Uh, did she say that?" I grumbled, stopping for a second as a couple came to a stop in front of me before I moved around them.
"Yep, overheard her gossiping about it as I saw her down the hall," She said, leaning against some of the lockers next to mine "So did you get detention?"
"No, I just have to get something from the library so can you tell Carter and Anubis that we have a meeting right when I get back."
"Okay, see ya later." She said retreating to the exit.
The students started to desert the halls going toward the exits. That left me alone in silence, only with me staring at my locker. I was finally allowed to think of what had happened earlier in class.
The reason why I had fallen asleep in class was all thanks to the most annoying god of all time. He had to choose the worst moment to communicate with me. Why is it that the gods leave everything to the last-minute?
"Zia."
Somebody called out in the darkness. Where am I?
"Zia." It was now much closer about a few feet away. I turned around to see who it was, but I only saw darkness.
Suddenly I felt a hand on my shoulder.
Startled, I jumped and turned to come face to face with a young man holding a flame in his hand.
It couldn't be.
"Ra," I whispered.
He had the same golden eyes that I had seen for the last time three months ago, but that was all I recognized. Now instead of the senile old man, there was a very fit guy who looked about the age of eighteen. Instead of wearing a tunic, he was now in a kilt, which gave me the opportunity to look at his six-pack. He was still bald but without any wrinkle on his head or face.
"What are you staring at Zia?"
I looked around, finally being able to detect where exactly I was thanks to the fire in the palm of his hand that was illuminating the room. Immediately I noticed that we were in a tomb, the main corridor to be exact. I had been in thousands of graves for my studies back in the 1st Nome but never to this one. By the paintings on the walls and the ancient hieroglyphics, I immediately knew that it was constructed in the old kingdom. I had only seen one once before; they were well all usually well hidden or have fallen apart over the centuries. However, it looked like it has been well-preserved as no damage was on the walls or any missing pieces either.
"Where exactly are we?" I asked instead, turning back to face him.
He just smiled as he let go of my shoulder and reached toward a loose strand of my hair and tucked it behind my ear. His hand fell loosely down my side and laid his hand on my lower back. He started to walk forward down the corridor leading me with him. We stayed quiet for a few more seconds when he started describing the walls and the story written on it.
"Before all those stories described on the walls of your ancestors, the commoners that made up the empire of Egypt, and us the gods; Egypt had been divided into lower and upper Egypt. Constant battles and chaos were seen throughout the land. It pained me as I sailed through the sky each morning, and then I found a savior and link between us gods and men."
The union of Upper and Lower Egypt is depicted by knotted papyrus and reed plants, representing the balance through the binding of once foreign foes into a nation. A typical image, but this one was different as it included Ra and the other main gods above it. "It was then that we created the blood of pharaohs, allowing godlings to roam amongst mortals and keep ma'at."
Then we stopped in front of a cracked wall, scratched down and none of its original depictions visible anymore before I could ask, Ra guided forward, and we went through it, and I saw one of the most beautiful burial chambers in my entire life. Torches were lit, making it able to see the beautiful paintings that were there. There was one especially, of a woman with Ra and Anubis. It was like one of those regular paintings that only showed the side. The woman and Anubis were looking at one another while he led her, and at the same time, she held Ra's and Anubis's hand. The strange part was that the rest of the wall, there was nothing. It did not look like it had been taken off or even written on.
Ra stood next to me as I watched the walls. Then he broke the silence.
"Umm, el-Qa'ab it is near Abydos."
"What?" I asked, turning to face him, and he followed my actions.
"This is where we are at," he answered, looking at me with a stern face.
"Whose tomb does this belong to?"
"She was the last host I had before you came." He answered solemnly looking down at the floor unhappily, "Tonight you shall come and collect something with Sadie, Carter, and Anubis, he shall know what I am talking about."
"Why?" I asked and followed close behind him as he stepped away from me and made his way around the sarcophagus and placed his hands gently on it.
"My time on Earth is limited, which is why you must come here to retrieve it. It is an important item that Setne wants, it will make him more dangerous, especially now since he has the Book of Thoth," he said, still looking down at the sarcophagus. Suddenly he looked up at me and said,
"You have to go on now Zia."
"Wait, what do you mean by this?" I questioned.
"Anubis will explain this to you, be more patient there is a time and a place where these things must be revealed." He said, "Now go."
I had never felt so confused in my life, and there have been many parts of my life that were confusing. His actions were the most baffling of them all. And I thought regular guys were complicated.
As I opened my locker, something fell on the floor, making a clinking noise as it touched the floor. It was my scarab necklace that I wore when I merged with Ra, I still wore it now but never in school. I made that mistake once, and Drew had not stopped pestering me and trying to touch 'vintage' jewelry. I picked it up after grabbing my coat and binder from my locker. As I tried to juggle in cramming my binder in my backpack while heading down the corner when I ran into someone causing everything in my hands spiraled across the floor.
"I am so sorry," she exclaimed her long raven black hair covering her face, as she knelt on the floor picking up and handing my binder back to me.
I got back up when I got my coat and gave her a hand and pulled her back up.
"Thanks," she said, her accent became noticeable as she pushed her hair behind her ear, "I'm kind of lost where exactly is the front office?"
"It's down that hallway to the right" I pointed out with my head as I still struggled to close my backpack, "The office is going to close any minute now."
"Yeah, I know my aunt is there to sign me up for the next semester. He forgot the papers, so I had to go back to the car and get them since it was my fault." She said, rolling her eyes. "So what grade are you in?"
"A senior."
"Same here."
"It's Zia by the way."
She smiled and brought her hand forward to shake it.
"Malika." She said, looking down at her watch and started to retreat to the right hallway, "Thanks, Zia. I'll see ya in like two weeks." she said, waving at me before calling at me again. "To the right, right?"
"Yeah," I called back, as I put on my coat. I went straight down the hallway, and as I opened the door, I was hit by a stream of freezing wind.
Did I ever mention that I hate the cold?
Thank you for reading- I'mTheirQueen
