Shadows
Everything is connected.
From the Harvester's Journal
Ardeth felt like he was on fire and freezing at the same time. He struggled in Soralis' grip. "Easy. Relax. The shift between planes is always a shock. Breathe." Soralis' voice was as much in his mind as falling on his ears.
"Where?" he managed. They appeared to be in some sort of luminous mist or fog. He could occasionally glimpse some sort of grayish moor in the distance.
"We are in the border region that separates my realm from yours. I can't take you all the way in without breaking the rules. As it is, I'm bending them a lot by exposing you to the Shadow Realm." Soralis replied as she helped him walk through the mists.
Ardeth looked at his companion. He could feel himself fading in and out of consciousness. "Is it dangerous?" he asked groggily.
"Normally yes. In your condition it could be fatal. We're almost there." she said. "Comforting, aren't I?"
"It's ten miles to the O'Connell's!" he exclaimed. "We can't…" he shook his head, trying to clear it.
"Border traveling is very quick…" Soralis replied as the fog thickened around them.
Ardeth stumbled as they re-entered the earth realm. The events of the past few days finally caught up with him and he passed out. Soralis half-fell with him as he crumpled to the ground. She pounded on the door with one fist.
"Open up! Please!" she shouted hoarsely as she checked Ardeth's pulse. It was weak, but steady. She needed to get him to someplace safe before she succumbed to her own inevitable reaction back-lash.
The door opened, revealing an Arabic woman in a simple dress. She looked down at the pair in shock. She began shouting in Arabic as she helped Soralis drag the fallen Medjai into the house.
The room was spinning as she helped the woman get Ardeth on the bed. She cursed softly as her legs gave out from beneath her. The woman turned and caught her before she hit the floor.
***
The young Egyptian woman stared at the ceiling of the small, dark room. The only light flickered from torches outside the small barred window of the door to her cell. She was filthy with tangled hair and torn, bloodied clothing. The pallet she was lying on was equally filthy. In one corner of the room was an open hole. The smell coming from it identified its purpose. Every now and then she could hear screams echoing down the corridor outside her cell.
The cell was suddenly plunged in darkness and she turned, seeing a face framed in the small window of the cell door. "Ah-tesu-na," she hissed. The high priestess of Akethros, the god of torments.
"Hathor your time grows short. By the time the Medjai find you, you will belong to my lord." Ah-tesu-na laughed.
"You bore me," Hathor replied. "Kill me and it won't be the Medjai you should worry about. It will be the combined might of Osiris and Isis you face."
Ah-tesu-na laughed nastily. "You won't have to worry about that Isisethren." She hissed, using Hathor's true name. She turned away. "Guards!"
***
Soralis jerked awake. She felt or rather sensed that she was not alone in the room. "Who's there?" she whispered hoarsely.
A figure moved from out of the shadows. It was a man dressed in dark robes. Like the other man she rescued, he had a bizarrely tattooed face.
"You are in a guest room of the O'Connell residence. When you appeared with our leader on their doorstep; the house sitter alerted us. I am Imad ben Al Hakeem."
The memories of the past few weeks flooded into her mind. "The man I rescued, how is he?" she asked.
"Sleeping. You have been in a coma for three days." The man replied. "Can you tell us how you came to rescue our leader and who you are?"
She shook her head. Three days. The price for taking the man through the Shadow Realm border was high indeed. She felt drained, exhausted. She sighed and told the man her name and that she was a clairvoyant demon hunter with some magical skills who had been tracking a particularly nasty cult of demon worshipers to Hamanaptra. She had witnessed the cultists kidnap Ardeth Bey and decided to do something about it.
Imad was skeptical. He figured that she wasn't telling him everything, but thought that she wasn't lying about what she had told him. For now, he decided to accept her story. After all, she couldn't go anywhere at the moment.
"Do you need anything?" he asked.
She sighed in relief. He bought it. "Some food and water would be wonderful."
He smiled. "I shall see to it. The lavatory and bathing faculties are through that door." He indicated one of the doors to her left. She returned the smile and he left the room.
Soralis gritted her teeth and swung her legs over the bed, feeling each muscle protest. She slowly made her way to the bathroom.
***
After Soralis had told them the villa's location, a group of Medjai had descended on the place, only to find it abandoned. The servants claimed that the Blackburns' and their retainers had left days ago. The Medjai searched the premises, finding nothing.
Even the torture chamber had been cleared, though if one knew what they were looking for, they could see the signs of its existence. The Medjai returned empty handed and rather irritated.
"She is not telling us everything Haydar. I am sure of it." Imad stated firmly. Haydar was the eldest of the Medjai commanders, who sat around the O'Connell's kitchen table.
"The place stank of dark magic, sayadi," Sakir told them softly. He had been one of the ones who had searched the place. Sakir had the ability to sense both magic and evil. "I find it difficult to believe that a demon hunter could simply walk into that villa and then walk out of it with an injured man in tow without bringing the whole place down on them."
Another man, Tahir spoke up. "When the house sitter cleaned her up, she found a bracelet on her wrist that would not come off. It had strange markings on it and she alerted us to it." He paused. "The bracelet is very old."
"Have the wise men been able to translate these markings?" Imad asked softly.
"No," Tahir replied.
Haydar looked at the assembled commanders. "Whatever, whoever she is, she rescued our leader for no apparent gain and at great personal risk to herself. She put herself at our mercy and frankly no evil sorceress or priestess would do that." He smiled. "In her place I would be very careful about revealing too much about myself."
Imad sighed in agreement. Her behavior was certainly cagey, but Haydar was right. He took that as a cue to switch subjects.
***
Ardeth strained against the iron shackles binding him to the table. The chamber was lit with pale, green witch-light and he could smell the hot, acrid scent of the forge. Elise was bending over it, checking the heat of the ornate tongs and pokers she had placed in it earlier.
For the past five hours he had been questioned over and over again about Hamanaptra and about the book of life. When he refused to answer her, she ordered the guards to beat him. This they did with both skill and precision. When that failed to illicit answers from him, she had him stripped and then chained to the stone table in the center of the room.
Elise had then proceeded to whip him with a short, metal studded strap each time he refused to answer her. By the time she had grown bored with that amusement, bloody welts and deep cuts covered his chest and arms. It had taken a great effort on his part not to cry out, to beg her to stop. Ardeth winced as Elise gently licked the sweat off of his forehead.
"You could make it easier on yourself if you told me what I wished to know." She told him softly as she ran a finger down his cheek. Ardeth turned his head away from her and gazed at the wall silently.
"It's a pity you won't cooperate. I could make it worth your while." She gripped his chin and turned his face towards her. He glared at her wordlessly.
She bent down and pressed her lips to his. Ardeth gritted his teeth as he felt her tongue slip between his lips. She stood up and smiled down at him. "Reconsider please. You really don't want this to escalate now do you?" she asked him as the guards handed her an ornate rod that was glowing with heat.
He screamed as she brought it down on his hand and then closed the hand around the metal rod.
***
Ardeth Bey thrashed as he woke up. He found himself in a comfortable, English styled bedroom with an open window, which let in birdsong and a fresh breeze. He had been cleaned up and his wounds had been attended to. He really didn't want to move at the moment.
"Not surprising," A soft, female voice told him. "Being beat to shit always does that to me."
He swiveled his head and found the woman, Soralis sitting in a chair beside his bed. "You can read minds." He managed.
Soralis laughed lightly as she handed him a glass of water. He drank it down slowly. "Generally only surface thoughts. It's rather rude to go poking about in another's mind without permission and it can be dangerous too."
He grimaced. "I can understand that." He blinked. She had been speaking in Arabic.
"Where did you learn Arabic?" he asked curiously.
Soralis shrugged. "I did a favor for a very powerful entity some time ago and he gave me the ability to comprehend any and all languages in return for that favor." A pained expression flickered across her face. "I'd rather not talk about it. I still get nightmares from that little escapade."
"Oh," he replied.
"If you need to relieve yourself the faculties are over there," she said as she pointed to a door on his left.
"Thank you," he said seriously. "I believe I owe you my life."
She smiled at him. "You'll probably have a number of opportunities to repay me. I tend to attract evil and powerful entities."
"You are rather comforting." He told her dryly.
Soralis laughed.
***
As soon as Audric Blackburn found his daughter unconscious and bleeding from a gunshot wound in the wine cellar and Ardeth Bey missing, he alerted the guards who searched the villa and the grounds for the fugitive. They found nothing.
Audric hastily ordered his people to pack up; knowing that as soon as Ardeth Bey reached his people, they would descend on the villa in force. They fled to a little town just outside of Cairo where he had another residence. There, Elise was attended to.
Audric watched as the doctor's pulled the bullet out of his daughter's shoulder and seethed. Ardeth Bey would suffer for his transgression; Audric swore to himself and whoever freed him would share his fate.
The doctor finished patching the wound and turned to Audric Blackburn. "Make sure that the dressing is changed twice a day and give her plenty of food, water and rest. I suggest no strenuous activity for at least a week. Then, have her exercise the shoulder." He gave him a list of recommended exercises. The doctor frowned.
"Yes?" Audric asked.
"It's rather strange. The bullet I pulled out of your daughter's shoulder was pure silver." He handed Audric the bullet in question.
Audric examined the bullet carefully. Though deformed by the heat and impact, it was still a beautiful example of its kind. He could still make out some sort of etching, runes maybe, on the surface of the bullet. He would definitely look into this. Only a few gunsmiths in the world could make something like this.
"Father?" Elise whispered.
He hurried to her bedside and bent down. "Shhh. Don't speak."
"Hathor. The Isisethren… She has returned." Elise closed her eyes briefly and gazed at her father solemnly. "If she reunites with her twin, all of our plans will be destroyed."
Audric bowed his head. "Are you sure?" he asked.
"I recognized her spirit." Elise whispered.
"Ahhh…" he touched his daughter's cheek. "Rest. I'll deal with it." Elise closed her eyes and fell into a troubled slumber.
Everything is connected.
From the Harvester's Journal
Ardeth felt like he was on fire and freezing at the same time. He struggled in Soralis' grip. "Easy. Relax. The shift between planes is always a shock. Breathe." Soralis' voice was as much in his mind as falling on his ears.
"Where?" he managed. They appeared to be in some sort of luminous mist or fog. He could occasionally glimpse some sort of grayish moor in the distance.
"We are in the border region that separates my realm from yours. I can't take you all the way in without breaking the rules. As it is, I'm bending them a lot by exposing you to the Shadow Realm." Soralis replied as she helped him walk through the mists.
Ardeth looked at his companion. He could feel himself fading in and out of consciousness. "Is it dangerous?" he asked groggily.
"Normally yes. In your condition it could be fatal. We're almost there." she said. "Comforting, aren't I?"
"It's ten miles to the O'Connell's!" he exclaimed. "We can't…" he shook his head, trying to clear it.
"Border traveling is very quick…" Soralis replied as the fog thickened around them.
Ardeth stumbled as they re-entered the earth realm. The events of the past few days finally caught up with him and he passed out. Soralis half-fell with him as he crumpled to the ground. She pounded on the door with one fist.
"Open up! Please!" she shouted hoarsely as she checked Ardeth's pulse. It was weak, but steady. She needed to get him to someplace safe before she succumbed to her own inevitable reaction back-lash.
The door opened, revealing an Arabic woman in a simple dress. She looked down at the pair in shock. She began shouting in Arabic as she helped Soralis drag the fallen Medjai into the house.
The room was spinning as she helped the woman get Ardeth on the bed. She cursed softly as her legs gave out from beneath her. The woman turned and caught her before she hit the floor.
***
The young Egyptian woman stared at the ceiling of the small, dark room. The only light flickered from torches outside the small barred window of the door to her cell. She was filthy with tangled hair and torn, bloodied clothing. The pallet she was lying on was equally filthy. In one corner of the room was an open hole. The smell coming from it identified its purpose. Every now and then she could hear screams echoing down the corridor outside her cell.
The cell was suddenly plunged in darkness and she turned, seeing a face framed in the small window of the cell door. "Ah-tesu-na," she hissed. The high priestess of Akethros, the god of torments.
"Hathor your time grows short. By the time the Medjai find you, you will belong to my lord." Ah-tesu-na laughed.
"You bore me," Hathor replied. "Kill me and it won't be the Medjai you should worry about. It will be the combined might of Osiris and Isis you face."
Ah-tesu-na laughed nastily. "You won't have to worry about that Isisethren." She hissed, using Hathor's true name. She turned away. "Guards!"
***
Soralis jerked awake. She felt or rather sensed that she was not alone in the room. "Who's there?" she whispered hoarsely.
A figure moved from out of the shadows. It was a man dressed in dark robes. Like the other man she rescued, he had a bizarrely tattooed face.
"You are in a guest room of the O'Connell residence. When you appeared with our leader on their doorstep; the house sitter alerted us. I am Imad ben Al Hakeem."
The memories of the past few weeks flooded into her mind. "The man I rescued, how is he?" she asked.
"Sleeping. You have been in a coma for three days." The man replied. "Can you tell us how you came to rescue our leader and who you are?"
She shook her head. Three days. The price for taking the man through the Shadow Realm border was high indeed. She felt drained, exhausted. She sighed and told the man her name and that she was a clairvoyant demon hunter with some magical skills who had been tracking a particularly nasty cult of demon worshipers to Hamanaptra. She had witnessed the cultists kidnap Ardeth Bey and decided to do something about it.
Imad was skeptical. He figured that she wasn't telling him everything, but thought that she wasn't lying about what she had told him. For now, he decided to accept her story. After all, she couldn't go anywhere at the moment.
"Do you need anything?" he asked.
She sighed in relief. He bought it. "Some food and water would be wonderful."
He smiled. "I shall see to it. The lavatory and bathing faculties are through that door." He indicated one of the doors to her left. She returned the smile and he left the room.
Soralis gritted her teeth and swung her legs over the bed, feeling each muscle protest. She slowly made her way to the bathroom.
***
After Soralis had told them the villa's location, a group of Medjai had descended on the place, only to find it abandoned. The servants claimed that the Blackburns' and their retainers had left days ago. The Medjai searched the premises, finding nothing.
Even the torture chamber had been cleared, though if one knew what they were looking for, they could see the signs of its existence. The Medjai returned empty handed and rather irritated.
"She is not telling us everything Haydar. I am sure of it." Imad stated firmly. Haydar was the eldest of the Medjai commanders, who sat around the O'Connell's kitchen table.
"The place stank of dark magic, sayadi," Sakir told them softly. He had been one of the ones who had searched the place. Sakir had the ability to sense both magic and evil. "I find it difficult to believe that a demon hunter could simply walk into that villa and then walk out of it with an injured man in tow without bringing the whole place down on them."
Another man, Tahir spoke up. "When the house sitter cleaned her up, she found a bracelet on her wrist that would not come off. It had strange markings on it and she alerted us to it." He paused. "The bracelet is very old."
"Have the wise men been able to translate these markings?" Imad asked softly.
"No," Tahir replied.
Haydar looked at the assembled commanders. "Whatever, whoever she is, she rescued our leader for no apparent gain and at great personal risk to herself. She put herself at our mercy and frankly no evil sorceress or priestess would do that." He smiled. "In her place I would be very careful about revealing too much about myself."
Imad sighed in agreement. Her behavior was certainly cagey, but Haydar was right. He took that as a cue to switch subjects.
***
Ardeth strained against the iron shackles binding him to the table. The chamber was lit with pale, green witch-light and he could smell the hot, acrid scent of the forge. Elise was bending over it, checking the heat of the ornate tongs and pokers she had placed in it earlier.
For the past five hours he had been questioned over and over again about Hamanaptra and about the book of life. When he refused to answer her, she ordered the guards to beat him. This they did with both skill and precision. When that failed to illicit answers from him, she had him stripped and then chained to the stone table in the center of the room.
Elise had then proceeded to whip him with a short, metal studded strap each time he refused to answer her. By the time she had grown bored with that amusement, bloody welts and deep cuts covered his chest and arms. It had taken a great effort on his part not to cry out, to beg her to stop. Ardeth winced as Elise gently licked the sweat off of his forehead.
"You could make it easier on yourself if you told me what I wished to know." She told him softly as she ran a finger down his cheek. Ardeth turned his head away from her and gazed at the wall silently.
"It's a pity you won't cooperate. I could make it worth your while." She gripped his chin and turned his face towards her. He glared at her wordlessly.
She bent down and pressed her lips to his. Ardeth gritted his teeth as he felt her tongue slip between his lips. She stood up and smiled down at him. "Reconsider please. You really don't want this to escalate now do you?" she asked him as the guards handed her an ornate rod that was glowing with heat.
He screamed as she brought it down on his hand and then closed the hand around the metal rod.
***
Ardeth Bey thrashed as he woke up. He found himself in a comfortable, English styled bedroom with an open window, which let in birdsong and a fresh breeze. He had been cleaned up and his wounds had been attended to. He really didn't want to move at the moment.
"Not surprising," A soft, female voice told him. "Being beat to shit always does that to me."
He swiveled his head and found the woman, Soralis sitting in a chair beside his bed. "You can read minds." He managed.
Soralis laughed lightly as she handed him a glass of water. He drank it down slowly. "Generally only surface thoughts. It's rather rude to go poking about in another's mind without permission and it can be dangerous too."
He grimaced. "I can understand that." He blinked. She had been speaking in Arabic.
"Where did you learn Arabic?" he asked curiously.
Soralis shrugged. "I did a favor for a very powerful entity some time ago and he gave me the ability to comprehend any and all languages in return for that favor." A pained expression flickered across her face. "I'd rather not talk about it. I still get nightmares from that little escapade."
"Oh," he replied.
"If you need to relieve yourself the faculties are over there," she said as she pointed to a door on his left.
"Thank you," he said seriously. "I believe I owe you my life."
She smiled at him. "You'll probably have a number of opportunities to repay me. I tend to attract evil and powerful entities."
"You are rather comforting." He told her dryly.
Soralis laughed.
***
As soon as Audric Blackburn found his daughter unconscious and bleeding from a gunshot wound in the wine cellar and Ardeth Bey missing, he alerted the guards who searched the villa and the grounds for the fugitive. They found nothing.
Audric hastily ordered his people to pack up; knowing that as soon as Ardeth Bey reached his people, they would descend on the villa in force. They fled to a little town just outside of Cairo where he had another residence. There, Elise was attended to.
Audric watched as the doctor's pulled the bullet out of his daughter's shoulder and seethed. Ardeth Bey would suffer for his transgression; Audric swore to himself and whoever freed him would share his fate.
The doctor finished patching the wound and turned to Audric Blackburn. "Make sure that the dressing is changed twice a day and give her plenty of food, water and rest. I suggest no strenuous activity for at least a week. Then, have her exercise the shoulder." He gave him a list of recommended exercises. The doctor frowned.
"Yes?" Audric asked.
"It's rather strange. The bullet I pulled out of your daughter's shoulder was pure silver." He handed Audric the bullet in question.
Audric examined the bullet carefully. Though deformed by the heat and impact, it was still a beautiful example of its kind. He could still make out some sort of etching, runes maybe, on the surface of the bullet. He would definitely look into this. Only a few gunsmiths in the world could make something like this.
"Father?" Elise whispered.
He hurried to her bedside and bent down. "Shhh. Don't speak."
"Hathor. The Isisethren… She has returned." Elise closed her eyes briefly and gazed at her father solemnly. "If she reunites with her twin, all of our plans will be destroyed."
Audric bowed his head. "Are you sure?" he asked.
"I recognized her spirit." Elise whispered.
"Ahhh…" he touched his daughter's cheek. "Rest. I'll deal with it." Elise closed her eyes and fell into a troubled slumber.
