Chapter IV
She quickly made her way diagonally from the group, through the strange forest. Hopefully, none of the creatures in here were any worse than the group she had just escaped. She heard voices, angry and guttural. They knew she was gone. Shit. She picked up her pace, not caring that she was getting cut by the branches –what should she do? Climbing a tree might hide her, but they might see her, and then she'd be stuck in a tree. She probably couldn't outrun them for long, dodging in and out of the brush. Water would help, maybe, but there was none. She looked up now. The forest had ended, leading her right into an open field. Even worse, the field then ended, coming to a very sheer, very sudden drop off the edge of a cliff. Going back into the forest would lead her to the pursuers behind her, and she certainly didn't think that jumping was worth the risk. Someone was right behind her now, she ran again as he grabbed her shoulder. She flipped him, grabbing his arm, bending a little, and using his inertia to send him flying over her back. That, she knew how to do. Unfortunately, she didn't expect the combined weight of the man and his heavy metal armor to weigh so damn much. He brought her down with him, landing painfully on the ground, and by the time she got up, there were four more guards surrounding her, aiming large, nasty looking weapons at her heart.
The guards ended their little game of cat-and-mouse by giving her no other options to escape. Rather than just chaining her again, as she expected, they actually carried her. The indignity of it all. Fine, she thought, I'll just use this all to my advantage. Somehow. She counted now, the caravan included six guards in formation at the front, then Apophis, surrounded by two complacent women and the pair of crazed priests, two more guards, then the guards carrying her, and then four more who were watching the five other slaves. Escape was not going to happen any time soon. Instead, she thought of what she would do next. What was a lotar? Wasn't that someone who interpreted what the God's wanted? Oh, no, that was an avatar. It wouldn't make any sense anyways, seeing as this Apophis guy thought he was a god, he could just tell everyone what he wanted.
The party had now reached another clearing, this one covered in grayish sand. A huge, upright circle was standing, surrounding by strange rock pedestals in concentric circles. They went closer, and then stopped. In groups of four or five, the people stood on a platform about 40 meters from the circle, and huge rings sprang up from the ground, encircling them. And then they were gone. She went after the priests, held firmly by the guards, and found that the rings somehow transported her to another place.
This new room she found herself in was lit by torches which flickered upon gold hieroglyphs on the walls. She was led through a maze of halls until the guards found an extremely distraught looking man in a loin cloth, presumably another slave. The guard ordered him in some harsh language, and shoved her after the loin cloth man. He led her through another maze of halls until they came to a deserted room, occupied by a giant pool of steaming water. He said something in that dark language she didn't understand. She stared. He glared, and switched to English, "Wash." She didn't move, "why?" He grabbed her arm, "so you can be made presentable to our lord," and shoved her in. She yanked off the smelly,filthy clothes she had on and put them by the edge of the pool. Then he took them! "Hey!' she yelled, but he was gone. She washed; they would definitely notice if she escaped now, what with no clothes and all. And anyways, it felt nice to be clean.
When she looked up, theloin-cloth man was back. "Hey, you – eunuch!" He didn't respond. "You don't mind if I call you that, do you, Eunuch?" No answer. "Anyways, can I have my clothes back?" To this he grabbed her arm, pulling her completely out of the pool, ignoring her protests he shoved a bundle full of new, un-smelly clothes at her. And left. A little dramatic, aren't we? She rolled her eyes and fumbled with the strange clothes. They were simple in comparison to what the others were wearing, without the many layers and colors, but still much more elaborate than anything that she ever wore. There was a thin, shimmery, long white skirt that settled by her hips, and had a slit on either side that went up nearly to her hip. The top was some kind of crisscross pleated tank which left her midriff bare. Eunuch came back and pulled her long dark hair into a hundred elaborate braids that spiraled down her back. He looked at her, and smiled darkly. "Now you must come. Our lord calls for you."
