Rescue
Demons don't understand subtle.
From the Harvester's Journal
A ball of fire blasted the wall behind them as Evy and her team scattered. They saw what appeared to be fifty armed humans and demons of various sorts converging in on them. None of them looked very happy with the situation.
"Alex, get down and stay down." Soralis hissed. Alex nodded wide-eyed as he crouched in a darkened alcove. She murmured something and the darkness in the alcove writhed, closing in on the boy, shielding him completely.
"What is that?" Evy hissed, pointing to the darkness that surrounded her boy.
"Not all things in this city follow Akethros," Soralis remarked and stuck her head out, counting at least four priests and five necromancers. The rest were more or less ordinary. If you could call things that topped seven feet ordinary that is.
"Imhotep and I will take care of the magickers. Keep the rest of those things off our backs!" she snarled as she and her brother dashed out, before Evy or Ardeth could protest.
Evy unslung her rifle and as Ardeth began firing off rounds from his beloved Thompson machine gun. Above them, the sky began to boil with power as the ritual inside the main temple progressed. Evy soon joined him, killing demon and human alike.
Soralis snarled as the sorcerer in front of her aimed a bolt of power at her. The bolt shivered and rebounded upon its summoner, staggering him. He looked at her with wide eyes as made hasty gestures in the air. As he did so the solid ground under her became a sticky mire, threatening to engulf her. She countered the spell with harsh words of her own. The mud turned to harmless dust that she threw back at the sorcerer in a whirlwind of sheer power.
Imhotep too, had his hands full, going up against a pair of priests. They attacked him with both spells and weapons. As one made a swing with a strange sword, the other aimed a paralyzing spell at him. He deflected the spell and skewered the sword-wielding priest with a long knife. The other priest backed away, shouting up into the sky. A bolt of lightning cracked down towards Imhotep, only to be knocked aside by the Book Of The Dead, which he held above him like a shield.
And in the temple, the ritual went on. Rick cried silently as the third child was killed, after she had been raped and had strange runes delicately carved into her skin. Then they turned to the fourth terrified child. He prayed for an earthquake, a natural disaster, something. He looked at the open skylight, seeing only the boiling, energy blackened sky above. It was preferable to watching what was going on around him.
***
Alex watched the firefight around him; saw nature run amok above. He wished desperately that he could find his father, that he could stop this. Strange whispers filled his ears, whispers in a language he could not understand.
Glowing eyes stared out at Alex as he saw strange wispy fingers point to the back of the wall. He stared in shocked surprise as the things pulled his hand towards a particular place in the wall.
He jerked backwards in surprise as something pricked the palm of his hand and the wall fell backwards with a dull thud. In the center of the small room it revealed was a long knife carved from pure jade. The handle was that of a plumed serpent.
It's lapis lazuli eyes glinted blue as he picked it up. A small Indian boy stepped out of the shadows, grinning deviously. He placed his finger to his lips and gestured for Alex to follow. Alex cocked his head in bewilderment and smiled slowly, an echo of the other boy's smile. He followed the boy deeper into the room.
***
Soralis winced in pain as an image of Alex wandering deeper into the city, closing in on the temple; following a wraith-like mist flickered in her mind. In his hands was a jade knife, bearing the symbol of the feathered serpent. The cultist she was dueling took advantage of the situation and impaled her.
He pulled his sword free, letting her fall to the ground. The cultist turned around and was taken by surprise as Soralis leapt up and stabbed him from behind with her claws. She in turn let him fall and raced towards the temple, the wound the sword caused already closing over.
***
Evy and Ardeth were fighting back to back, surrounded by cultists. They had already spent the last of their ammunition and were resorting to swords and knives. The cultists kept a wary distance, already too well aware of the duo's skill.
***
Imhotep was torn as he saw his former enemies surrounded by cultists, about to be killed or worse, taken alive. A part of him wanted that to happen, wanted it desperately. These are the people who condemned you to an eternity of suffering. That small hateful voice whispered. He shook his head. No. It was the cult of Akethros who engineered his downfall. Or rather, he let it happen to himself.
Imhotep's eyes hardened as he stepped out into full view of the cultists and cleared his throat. "If anyone is going to kill those two, it will be me." He told them conversationally. Evy and Ardeth's eyes widened.
"I knew it!" Evy yelled in ancient Egyptian. "I knew you would betray us!"
Imhotep smiled coldly at the cultists, ignoring Evy's outburst. "But it won't be today." He made a grabbing motion with one of his hands and then waved the same hand. The cultists' swords flew out of their collective grasp.
He snarled in ancient Egyptian. "You are condemned, followers of the accursed Akethros. May your bodies decay, may your souls rot forever. May Maat turn her back on you in the courts of judgment."
The cultists screamed as the curse took effect. Their skin sloughed away, revealing naked muscles that melted and ran into the dirt, leaving only bare bones that crumpled to dust. Imhotep raised his eyes to meet Evy's.
"Don't presume that this changes anything my princess." He said sarcastically, enjoying the look of shock and horror flicker across her face. He looked at the sky and saw the chaos for what it was. "We have little time. They are about to complete the ritual." He turned his back on them and began running towards the temple.
Evy and Ardeth looked at one another, shrugged and followed Imhotep's lead.
***
As the new moon, the dark moon, rose to its zenith, they finished killing the twelfth child, by raking a sharp knife down the middle of his chest. Rick's eyes were closed and he shook with horror. He opened them as he felt a weight on his chest and saw Elise staring down at him with a wickedly sharp knife in her hands.
She smiled down at his white, strained face. She laughed lightly as she stroked his cheeks with the knife. "I told you would suffer both pain and humiliation, didn't I?" she murmured softly.
"Bitch, you stark raving bitch," Rick whispered hoarsely.
She grinned as she brought the knife down hard on his shoulder. He screamed as blinding hot pain shot through his entire body.
***
Alex heard the scream echo through the silent city. "Dad!" he shouted, hearing that pain-filled cry. The Indian boy in front of him nodded and motioned for him to hurry. Alex had to run to keep up with him. Beneath him, the ground began to shake.
***
Soralis ran up the ruined steps of the temple-pyramid, her legs pumping, her eyes burning. Close behind her were Evy, Ardeth and Imhotep. They saw the slight form of the boy stumbling up the huge pyramid, easily as large as one of the smaller pyramids on the Giza plateau.
Alex reached the top and ducked behind a pillar holding the corpse of a dead child. He could see a lady on top of his father holding a wickedly carved obsidian knife. He clutched his own weapon tightly as she brought the knife down again, slicing his father's shoulder; blood soaking the rough marble slab. His father screamed again.
He heard shouts behind him and he knew that his mother and his companions had followed him, had won. But they would loose everything if Rick died.
"Alex, stay down!" Evy shouted.
Audric grinned as he looked up from the Book of the Living. "You are too late!" he shouted, his eyes wild, deranged. "He is dying! His blood will open the portal!"
Soralis snarled her eyes glowing, her body shimmering as she shifted into a huge bipedal white tiger. She leapt towards Audric, knocking him to the ground. Ardeth saw Elise raise the knife again and howled a wordless cry of rage as he too leapt, knocking her off Rick.
Rick was motionless, unconscious; yet totally aware of what was going on around him. He was floating above his body and witnessed the portal writhe into being. He saw that the portal was still closed and something waited on the other side. He couldn't bear to look at it directly.
He saw Imhotep and old hatred flared in his soul, hatred for the one who caused his wife's death, who kidnapped his son. He watched as the priest shouted, screamed something in Egyptian. He could feel his body shudder, could feel the double wounds close, healing rapidly. He could feel his spirit-self being pulled back to his body.
The portal opened and the sounds of souls in torment, thousands, millions of souls, trapped, begging for release filled the temple as the hell god stepped forth. The earth shook and the already blackened sky turned red.
Soralis looked up and slashed downward, only to be prevented by some unseen force. She was knocked aside by the deranged priest. On the other side of the sacrificial stone table, the same thing happened to Ardeth. Priests rushed to grab the adults, dismissing Alex as a threat. Or perhaps they just couldn't see him. Akethros smiled as Soralis resumed her normal appearance. He bowed mockingly.
"Everything comes to he who waits," he quoted laughingly. "And I have waited thousands of years for this moment." He caught sight of Imhotep who was held by two demonic priests. Another had the Book Of The Dead in one hand. "And you priest, did you honestly believe I would give up such a prize so easily?" he asked as he idly pointed his finger at Soralis and Ardeth.
Soralis felt the spell hit. Pain hit her, doubling her over in the guards' grasp, blinding her with its intensity, and sapping her strength. She could feel herself falling into something black and greasy, even as she tried to counter it. Behind her, in Elise Blackburn's and another guard's grasp, Ardeth too doubled over, almost collapsing as the pain overwhelmed him.
"Stop!" Imhotep shouted.
Alex crept closer, ducking behind another pillar; the knife clutched in his hand began glowing. His eyes were white, without pupil or iris. Somewhere in the back of his mind, something that had been long asleep woke and had taken over. It was strange and frightening to the boy, seeing his body respond to something else, ignoring his own commands.
Though shackled to the slab, Rick could see Alex behind the pillar and his throat closed with fear, fear for his boy, fear for his wife being held between two of Akethros' priests and fear for his best friend being pinned beneath that psycho bitch from hell, Elise.
Akethros strode up to Imhotep and backhanded him. The priest could feel his teeth rattle with the blow. "Do not presume to order me priest." He turned to Evy and smiled, tracing a finger down her cheek. "I believe you will make a fine concubine. I may leave your husband alive to see that."
Evy flushed red, then white. "Get dead, you bastard." She hissed in ancient Egyptian. He laughed lightly and leaned down to kiss her.
***
1 Alex saw the creature come out of the portal and begin teasing, tormenting the others. He tensed as Akethros moved over to his mother and touched her, kissed her. Rage, his own and not his own swept through him, propelling him forward. The boy leapt towards Akethros, ripping open the hell god's legs, nearly hamstringing him.
Akethros screamed in agony, slapping the boy away; slamming him into a stone pillar. Alex slid to the ground unconscious. The spell that held the adults captive broke and they turned on their captors.
Soralis slashed Audric's throat open with her claws and he fell back, dying, his face one of shock and disbelief. Imhotep casually grabbed the two guards by the neck and slammed their heads together as hard as he could. They crumpled to the ground and he went to help Evy deal with her two problems.
Ardeth was cornered by both Elise and her bodyguard. He fought both brilliantly, grabbing the sword out of the guard's hand, killing him and turning on Elise. She screamed enraged, battering him with her own sword.
Somehow, he blocked every blow and pushed her back with his own attacks. Finally, Ardeth saw an opening and killed her, running her through with his own sword. She looked at him in shock, in disbelief as she fell. Ardeth watched her die and turned to deal with the other guards.
Around them, the bodies of the children began to glow with an impossibly bright light as Akethros knelt on the floor, trying to gather his power, to strike back. He frowned; nothing could harm him, yet this boy did. He cursed as he recognized the knife clutched in the boy's hand. "The dagger of Quetzalcoatl," he whispered as his legs began to heal and he crawled towards the boy.
Rick yelled incoherently, straining to free himself, seeing his son being attacked by that monster. Soralis turned, her eyes blazing, fighting her way through a combination of guards and sorcerers.
"AKETHROS!" she thundered as she leapt towards him. He turned, too late to stop her from launching them both through the portal.
Alex rolled to his feet, bruised, knife still in hand. He snarled something in a language no one knew and slashed the portal with the knife. The shifting darkness within the portal turned into a silvery mist and began to close.
Imhotep broke free of the guards and ran up to the portal, knowing it was too late to stop the boy from doing whatever it was he was doing to it. "What have you done?" he demanded, knowing intuitively that the boy was not in control of himself.
Alex laughed softly in a voice not his own. "They are elsewhere," Behind them, Evy and Ardeth dealt with the remaining cultists and moved to free Rick.
***
They tumbled through the portal and felt it tremble. Akethros screamed as the darkness around them shivered, twisting upon itself, tossing them into a mist-like fog that glowed softly. Soralis wrenched herself free and floated in front of him. She was grinning.
"You've lost my lord." She said and laughed.
"Where are we?" he demanded angrily.
"A place that does not tolerate you or your power." Her eyes glowed and the mist-like fog seemed to boil and shapes formed in it, vaguely human shapes that writhed and swirled around them.
"This is the place of beginning and ending. The place where time does not exist. The place where souls await judgment. The place where I hold power." As she spoke, light or energy seemed to boil out from her, surrounding her in a brilliance that made Akethros wince away. Voices began whispering softly around them, inaudible sounds that pricked the hairs on the back of both their necks. "Do you now know where we are?" she whispered.
"Limbo. We are in Limbo." He snarled, gathering his power around him. "You are wrong Isisethren, I have not lost." He pointed at her and black lightning leapt from his finger to her. She smiled and raised her hand and deflected it.
"I speak for the innocent and the dead and mete out justice for those who abuse their power." She looked at him and her expression was terrible, though her voice was mild.
"You have lost Akethros. You lost the moment you tried to kill me, to kill my son. You lost the moment your priests kidnapped me more than three thousand years ago. You disobeyed the law that binds all gods and immortals. You tried to interfere with the balance of power that keeps the Wyrm from our Realms. You are condemned Akethros." The voices grew louder. Other, greater shapes took form behind her, suggesting a court filled with beings of power far beyond either hers of Akethros.
"What is the punishment for this crime?" she asked softly, her form blurring, her clothing shifting into dark robes. Two swords hung from her back, their hafts crossing one another while a white owl flew out of the mists and perched on her left shoulder. Akethros whirled around as he heard a crow caw and ducked as it flew over him and settled on Soralis' right shoulder.
Akethros seemed to shrink back as Soralis took on the form of the Isisethren. The crow's eyes glinted cruelly as it cawed and the owl mantled its wings.
He screamed as silver and gold creatures flew around him, their cries filling the court behind Soralis and nearly deafening him. She looked at him. "You stand judged Akethros, you stand condemned. You are banished from the Earth Realms for all time and you are bound to your own Realm for a thousand years."
Akethros surged towards her, maddened, fighting his way through the creatures that held him back. As he touched her, his hand blackened, withering away. He snarled a curse at her as his body turned to ash and then the ash was sucked away down a dark pit that appeared before her. Then the mist flowed over the pit, sealing it.
She fell to her knees, exhausted, her mind blurring. The owl and raven mantled their wings, flying in circles around her. A touch on her shoulder made her look up, her eyes widened in shock as she saw a man dressed in white standing in front of her. "It's over Isisethren," he said as he held out his hand for her to take.
"Who are you?" she asked.
"Don't you know?" he asked.
He felt old, incredibly old. His age and power rang in her mind. The light around him was vibrant green, yellow and blue as the light around her was gold and silver. "Andrew, the messenger of Death," she replied and laughed bitterly. "Why now after all this time?"
"I lost you. Something tore you away from me as we crossed over." He looked sad. "I couldn't hold on to you."
"My family, my tribe?" she asked.
"Safe, happy." He replied. "All except you,"
"That isn't my fate." She told him. The crow and owl settled on her shoulders.
He looked at them and smiled sadly. "Wisdom and Knowledge have found their mistress and Justice wakes." He said. "I should have realized who you were."
They stood together. "You have a choice Soralis. You can return now, to the Earth Realms or take your place among our ranks once again."
She shook her head. "I hold Earth. I am the only Shadowlord strong enough to hold the Earth Realms against the Wyrm. I am the only one that both the Lords of Light and the Princes of Hell respect."
"That isn't who you are, who you really are," he argued.
"I have to return." She said.
He grinned. "That's what God said, but He had to give you a choice." He hugged her tightly. "If you ever need any of us, we will come." He said.
"Thank you," she replied, returning his hug. The light around them brightened, enveloping them in its brilliance and blinded her with its intensity. The last thing she heard were the combined cries of an owl and raven.
Demons don't understand subtle.
From the Harvester's Journal
A ball of fire blasted the wall behind them as Evy and her team scattered. They saw what appeared to be fifty armed humans and demons of various sorts converging in on them. None of them looked very happy with the situation.
"Alex, get down and stay down." Soralis hissed. Alex nodded wide-eyed as he crouched in a darkened alcove. She murmured something and the darkness in the alcove writhed, closing in on the boy, shielding him completely.
"What is that?" Evy hissed, pointing to the darkness that surrounded her boy.
"Not all things in this city follow Akethros," Soralis remarked and stuck her head out, counting at least four priests and five necromancers. The rest were more or less ordinary. If you could call things that topped seven feet ordinary that is.
"Imhotep and I will take care of the magickers. Keep the rest of those things off our backs!" she snarled as she and her brother dashed out, before Evy or Ardeth could protest.
Evy unslung her rifle and as Ardeth began firing off rounds from his beloved Thompson machine gun. Above them, the sky began to boil with power as the ritual inside the main temple progressed. Evy soon joined him, killing demon and human alike.
Soralis snarled as the sorcerer in front of her aimed a bolt of power at her. The bolt shivered and rebounded upon its summoner, staggering him. He looked at her with wide eyes as made hasty gestures in the air. As he did so the solid ground under her became a sticky mire, threatening to engulf her. She countered the spell with harsh words of her own. The mud turned to harmless dust that she threw back at the sorcerer in a whirlwind of sheer power.
Imhotep too, had his hands full, going up against a pair of priests. They attacked him with both spells and weapons. As one made a swing with a strange sword, the other aimed a paralyzing spell at him. He deflected the spell and skewered the sword-wielding priest with a long knife. The other priest backed away, shouting up into the sky. A bolt of lightning cracked down towards Imhotep, only to be knocked aside by the Book Of The Dead, which he held above him like a shield.
And in the temple, the ritual went on. Rick cried silently as the third child was killed, after she had been raped and had strange runes delicately carved into her skin. Then they turned to the fourth terrified child. He prayed for an earthquake, a natural disaster, something. He looked at the open skylight, seeing only the boiling, energy blackened sky above. It was preferable to watching what was going on around him.
***
Alex watched the firefight around him; saw nature run amok above. He wished desperately that he could find his father, that he could stop this. Strange whispers filled his ears, whispers in a language he could not understand.
Glowing eyes stared out at Alex as he saw strange wispy fingers point to the back of the wall. He stared in shocked surprise as the things pulled his hand towards a particular place in the wall.
He jerked backwards in surprise as something pricked the palm of his hand and the wall fell backwards with a dull thud. In the center of the small room it revealed was a long knife carved from pure jade. The handle was that of a plumed serpent.
It's lapis lazuli eyes glinted blue as he picked it up. A small Indian boy stepped out of the shadows, grinning deviously. He placed his finger to his lips and gestured for Alex to follow. Alex cocked his head in bewilderment and smiled slowly, an echo of the other boy's smile. He followed the boy deeper into the room.
***
Soralis winced in pain as an image of Alex wandering deeper into the city, closing in on the temple; following a wraith-like mist flickered in her mind. In his hands was a jade knife, bearing the symbol of the feathered serpent. The cultist she was dueling took advantage of the situation and impaled her.
He pulled his sword free, letting her fall to the ground. The cultist turned around and was taken by surprise as Soralis leapt up and stabbed him from behind with her claws. She in turn let him fall and raced towards the temple, the wound the sword caused already closing over.
***
Evy and Ardeth were fighting back to back, surrounded by cultists. They had already spent the last of their ammunition and were resorting to swords and knives. The cultists kept a wary distance, already too well aware of the duo's skill.
***
Imhotep was torn as he saw his former enemies surrounded by cultists, about to be killed or worse, taken alive. A part of him wanted that to happen, wanted it desperately. These are the people who condemned you to an eternity of suffering. That small hateful voice whispered. He shook his head. No. It was the cult of Akethros who engineered his downfall. Or rather, he let it happen to himself.
Imhotep's eyes hardened as he stepped out into full view of the cultists and cleared his throat. "If anyone is going to kill those two, it will be me." He told them conversationally. Evy and Ardeth's eyes widened.
"I knew it!" Evy yelled in ancient Egyptian. "I knew you would betray us!"
Imhotep smiled coldly at the cultists, ignoring Evy's outburst. "But it won't be today." He made a grabbing motion with one of his hands and then waved the same hand. The cultists' swords flew out of their collective grasp.
He snarled in ancient Egyptian. "You are condemned, followers of the accursed Akethros. May your bodies decay, may your souls rot forever. May Maat turn her back on you in the courts of judgment."
The cultists screamed as the curse took effect. Their skin sloughed away, revealing naked muscles that melted and ran into the dirt, leaving only bare bones that crumpled to dust. Imhotep raised his eyes to meet Evy's.
"Don't presume that this changes anything my princess." He said sarcastically, enjoying the look of shock and horror flicker across her face. He looked at the sky and saw the chaos for what it was. "We have little time. They are about to complete the ritual." He turned his back on them and began running towards the temple.
Evy and Ardeth looked at one another, shrugged and followed Imhotep's lead.
***
As the new moon, the dark moon, rose to its zenith, they finished killing the twelfth child, by raking a sharp knife down the middle of his chest. Rick's eyes were closed and he shook with horror. He opened them as he felt a weight on his chest and saw Elise staring down at him with a wickedly sharp knife in her hands.
She smiled down at his white, strained face. She laughed lightly as she stroked his cheeks with the knife. "I told you would suffer both pain and humiliation, didn't I?" she murmured softly.
"Bitch, you stark raving bitch," Rick whispered hoarsely.
She grinned as she brought the knife down hard on his shoulder. He screamed as blinding hot pain shot through his entire body.
***
Alex heard the scream echo through the silent city. "Dad!" he shouted, hearing that pain-filled cry. The Indian boy in front of him nodded and motioned for him to hurry. Alex had to run to keep up with him. Beneath him, the ground began to shake.
***
Soralis ran up the ruined steps of the temple-pyramid, her legs pumping, her eyes burning. Close behind her were Evy, Ardeth and Imhotep. They saw the slight form of the boy stumbling up the huge pyramid, easily as large as one of the smaller pyramids on the Giza plateau.
Alex reached the top and ducked behind a pillar holding the corpse of a dead child. He could see a lady on top of his father holding a wickedly carved obsidian knife. He clutched his own weapon tightly as she brought the knife down again, slicing his father's shoulder; blood soaking the rough marble slab. His father screamed again.
He heard shouts behind him and he knew that his mother and his companions had followed him, had won. But they would loose everything if Rick died.
"Alex, stay down!" Evy shouted.
Audric grinned as he looked up from the Book of the Living. "You are too late!" he shouted, his eyes wild, deranged. "He is dying! His blood will open the portal!"
Soralis snarled her eyes glowing, her body shimmering as she shifted into a huge bipedal white tiger. She leapt towards Audric, knocking him to the ground. Ardeth saw Elise raise the knife again and howled a wordless cry of rage as he too leapt, knocking her off Rick.
Rick was motionless, unconscious; yet totally aware of what was going on around him. He was floating above his body and witnessed the portal writhe into being. He saw that the portal was still closed and something waited on the other side. He couldn't bear to look at it directly.
He saw Imhotep and old hatred flared in his soul, hatred for the one who caused his wife's death, who kidnapped his son. He watched as the priest shouted, screamed something in Egyptian. He could feel his body shudder, could feel the double wounds close, healing rapidly. He could feel his spirit-self being pulled back to his body.
The portal opened and the sounds of souls in torment, thousands, millions of souls, trapped, begging for release filled the temple as the hell god stepped forth. The earth shook and the already blackened sky turned red.
Soralis looked up and slashed downward, only to be prevented by some unseen force. She was knocked aside by the deranged priest. On the other side of the sacrificial stone table, the same thing happened to Ardeth. Priests rushed to grab the adults, dismissing Alex as a threat. Or perhaps they just couldn't see him. Akethros smiled as Soralis resumed her normal appearance. He bowed mockingly.
"Everything comes to he who waits," he quoted laughingly. "And I have waited thousands of years for this moment." He caught sight of Imhotep who was held by two demonic priests. Another had the Book Of The Dead in one hand. "And you priest, did you honestly believe I would give up such a prize so easily?" he asked as he idly pointed his finger at Soralis and Ardeth.
Soralis felt the spell hit. Pain hit her, doubling her over in the guards' grasp, blinding her with its intensity, and sapping her strength. She could feel herself falling into something black and greasy, even as she tried to counter it. Behind her, in Elise Blackburn's and another guard's grasp, Ardeth too doubled over, almost collapsing as the pain overwhelmed him.
"Stop!" Imhotep shouted.
Alex crept closer, ducking behind another pillar; the knife clutched in his hand began glowing. His eyes were white, without pupil or iris. Somewhere in the back of his mind, something that had been long asleep woke and had taken over. It was strange and frightening to the boy, seeing his body respond to something else, ignoring his own commands.
Though shackled to the slab, Rick could see Alex behind the pillar and his throat closed with fear, fear for his boy, fear for his wife being held between two of Akethros' priests and fear for his best friend being pinned beneath that psycho bitch from hell, Elise.
Akethros strode up to Imhotep and backhanded him. The priest could feel his teeth rattle with the blow. "Do not presume to order me priest." He turned to Evy and smiled, tracing a finger down her cheek. "I believe you will make a fine concubine. I may leave your husband alive to see that."
Evy flushed red, then white. "Get dead, you bastard." She hissed in ancient Egyptian. He laughed lightly and leaned down to kiss her.
***
1 Alex saw the creature come out of the portal and begin teasing, tormenting the others. He tensed as Akethros moved over to his mother and touched her, kissed her. Rage, his own and not his own swept through him, propelling him forward. The boy leapt towards Akethros, ripping open the hell god's legs, nearly hamstringing him.
Akethros screamed in agony, slapping the boy away; slamming him into a stone pillar. Alex slid to the ground unconscious. The spell that held the adults captive broke and they turned on their captors.
Soralis slashed Audric's throat open with her claws and he fell back, dying, his face one of shock and disbelief. Imhotep casually grabbed the two guards by the neck and slammed their heads together as hard as he could. They crumpled to the ground and he went to help Evy deal with her two problems.
Ardeth was cornered by both Elise and her bodyguard. He fought both brilliantly, grabbing the sword out of the guard's hand, killing him and turning on Elise. She screamed enraged, battering him with her own sword.
Somehow, he blocked every blow and pushed her back with his own attacks. Finally, Ardeth saw an opening and killed her, running her through with his own sword. She looked at him in shock, in disbelief as she fell. Ardeth watched her die and turned to deal with the other guards.
Around them, the bodies of the children began to glow with an impossibly bright light as Akethros knelt on the floor, trying to gather his power, to strike back. He frowned; nothing could harm him, yet this boy did. He cursed as he recognized the knife clutched in the boy's hand. "The dagger of Quetzalcoatl," he whispered as his legs began to heal and he crawled towards the boy.
Rick yelled incoherently, straining to free himself, seeing his son being attacked by that monster. Soralis turned, her eyes blazing, fighting her way through a combination of guards and sorcerers.
"AKETHROS!" she thundered as she leapt towards him. He turned, too late to stop her from launching them both through the portal.
Alex rolled to his feet, bruised, knife still in hand. He snarled something in a language no one knew and slashed the portal with the knife. The shifting darkness within the portal turned into a silvery mist and began to close.
Imhotep broke free of the guards and ran up to the portal, knowing it was too late to stop the boy from doing whatever it was he was doing to it. "What have you done?" he demanded, knowing intuitively that the boy was not in control of himself.
Alex laughed softly in a voice not his own. "They are elsewhere," Behind them, Evy and Ardeth dealt with the remaining cultists and moved to free Rick.
***
They tumbled through the portal and felt it tremble. Akethros screamed as the darkness around them shivered, twisting upon itself, tossing them into a mist-like fog that glowed softly. Soralis wrenched herself free and floated in front of him. She was grinning.
"You've lost my lord." She said and laughed.
"Where are we?" he demanded angrily.
"A place that does not tolerate you or your power." Her eyes glowed and the mist-like fog seemed to boil and shapes formed in it, vaguely human shapes that writhed and swirled around them.
"This is the place of beginning and ending. The place where time does not exist. The place where souls await judgment. The place where I hold power." As she spoke, light or energy seemed to boil out from her, surrounding her in a brilliance that made Akethros wince away. Voices began whispering softly around them, inaudible sounds that pricked the hairs on the back of both their necks. "Do you now know where we are?" she whispered.
"Limbo. We are in Limbo." He snarled, gathering his power around him. "You are wrong Isisethren, I have not lost." He pointed at her and black lightning leapt from his finger to her. She smiled and raised her hand and deflected it.
"I speak for the innocent and the dead and mete out justice for those who abuse their power." She looked at him and her expression was terrible, though her voice was mild.
"You have lost Akethros. You lost the moment you tried to kill me, to kill my son. You lost the moment your priests kidnapped me more than three thousand years ago. You disobeyed the law that binds all gods and immortals. You tried to interfere with the balance of power that keeps the Wyrm from our Realms. You are condemned Akethros." The voices grew louder. Other, greater shapes took form behind her, suggesting a court filled with beings of power far beyond either hers of Akethros.
"What is the punishment for this crime?" she asked softly, her form blurring, her clothing shifting into dark robes. Two swords hung from her back, their hafts crossing one another while a white owl flew out of the mists and perched on her left shoulder. Akethros whirled around as he heard a crow caw and ducked as it flew over him and settled on Soralis' right shoulder.
Akethros seemed to shrink back as Soralis took on the form of the Isisethren. The crow's eyes glinted cruelly as it cawed and the owl mantled its wings.
He screamed as silver and gold creatures flew around him, their cries filling the court behind Soralis and nearly deafening him. She looked at him. "You stand judged Akethros, you stand condemned. You are banished from the Earth Realms for all time and you are bound to your own Realm for a thousand years."
Akethros surged towards her, maddened, fighting his way through the creatures that held him back. As he touched her, his hand blackened, withering away. He snarled a curse at her as his body turned to ash and then the ash was sucked away down a dark pit that appeared before her. Then the mist flowed over the pit, sealing it.
She fell to her knees, exhausted, her mind blurring. The owl and raven mantled their wings, flying in circles around her. A touch on her shoulder made her look up, her eyes widened in shock as she saw a man dressed in white standing in front of her. "It's over Isisethren," he said as he held out his hand for her to take.
"Who are you?" she asked.
"Don't you know?" he asked.
He felt old, incredibly old. His age and power rang in her mind. The light around him was vibrant green, yellow and blue as the light around her was gold and silver. "Andrew, the messenger of Death," she replied and laughed bitterly. "Why now after all this time?"
"I lost you. Something tore you away from me as we crossed over." He looked sad. "I couldn't hold on to you."
"My family, my tribe?" she asked.
"Safe, happy." He replied. "All except you,"
"That isn't my fate." She told him. The crow and owl settled on her shoulders.
He looked at them and smiled sadly. "Wisdom and Knowledge have found their mistress and Justice wakes." He said. "I should have realized who you were."
They stood together. "You have a choice Soralis. You can return now, to the Earth Realms or take your place among our ranks once again."
She shook her head. "I hold Earth. I am the only Shadowlord strong enough to hold the Earth Realms against the Wyrm. I am the only one that both the Lords of Light and the Princes of Hell respect."
"That isn't who you are, who you really are," he argued.
"I have to return." She said.
He grinned. "That's what God said, but He had to give you a choice." He hugged her tightly. "If you ever need any of us, we will come." He said.
"Thank you," she replied, returning his hug. The light around them brightened, enveloping them in its brilliance and blinded her with its intensity. The last thing she heard were the combined cries of an owl and raven.
