I'm shaming you guys for how much you like to reread the chapter "Sheol". analytics don't lie. lol. glad you seem to be enjoying the story though.

"Stay with me," said Circe. "We have to get you out of here."

A weak laugh escaped her lungs. "And I thought you didn't like me."

"I don't," said Circe—Katarina? The voice was the cold Circe voice that she recognized. "I think you are an arrogant idiot. Now please try to stand up all the way so that I can unchain you."

While Kianna knew that this was ostensibly good news, she could hardly bring herself to believe it, and also knew that it would hurt quite a lot. She could barely keep the panic out of her voice as she said, "Where are we going?"

"We are getting out of sight for the moment. Ba'al will be back here soon."

She managed, with great effort, to get her feet under her again, and lift herself up enough that Circe was able to unlock the shackle on her good arm. Well, it was good, but not that good. It still stung quite a lot in several places, but didn't seem to be seriously injured. Now that she was half free she had to stand much more carefully to avoid jostling her broken arm. It was looped over the bar behind her, and hung from a chain there limply.

Circe crossed to the other side, and Netty instinctually withdrew herself deeply into Kianna's mind. Kianna set her teeth and braced herself, but it didn't help. She screamed out loud when the chain fell off and her arm fell down, and then she had to pull it back over the bar, and finally it was at her side and she could collapse to her knees.

Circe came around and started to try and take up her weight under the left side, opposite from the injury. "Come on," she kept saying.

Kianna's knees felt far too weak to move, and she was light-headed again. They made their way slowly out of the chamber, Circe stopping at the door to look both ways down the hall. There were the bodies of two dead Jaffa out here.

They took a left and ducked into a nearby storage room full of crates. Circe set her down so that she was sitting on a crate, and then started to clear out a hiding space at the back of the room. Kianna sat gratefully on the crate as though she had never before been able to sit down in her life. Her arm still hurt, but the world was fuzzy and distant; her felt cold in the ship's cool air temperature but also strangely warm. She thought she might even fall asleep.

"Back here," said Circe, gesturing behind the crates.

She did not immediately get up, so Circe came over and again forced her to move. Finally she sat down behind the crates, cradling her arm from the elbow. She eventually curled up and lay down.

There were questions that needed answering, however.

"How… how are you here?" she panted breathlessly. "What's your plan? What's going on?"

Circe and Katarina sat next to her, upright, but still hidden by the boxes. "Rest, and attempt to heal your host," she said. Then Katarina said, "I will try to explain."

They had lost not one, but two operatives to Hecate's DNA test trap. The first one never reported back, and his fate was still unknown. The second one who went after him made extra preparations, and managed to get out a message before he was executed. After that, nobody dared go undercover as a Goa'uld on Sidon.

So she had gone as a human. Katarina took a lead role in this. She went under Circe's name, but she was a bit of a method actor, and it was better to think and act as human for this mission.

They had recently gotten their hands on a serum—developed by some uncredited minor Goa'uld in Ba'al's ranks—capable of disguising the presence of Naquadah in a host's bloodstream. This was a brilliant stroke of fortune for the Tok'ra, as they had never before been able to go undercover as merely human, at least not among Goa'ulds. Their biology normally allowed them to sense each other's presence, for purely practical reasons. She wondered what would happen if a Goa'uld tried to possess a host that was already possessed. It was probably better not to think about it.

The position as Priestess put her as close to the Veiled City as one could be without actually getting in. She tried to keep her hands off the whole human sacrifice matter as much as possible, of course, but obviously some involvement came with the position. In the service of Hecate, she had to accept the sacrifices, take them to the Temple, and do various ritual cleansings. If she could have ended the practice, she would have, but Ashtoreth was insistent on having at least one per month.

At least she didn't usually have to select the candidate; that was up to the individual provinces, which rotated in their provision of one human. It took her some time to figure out what Ashtoreth was actually using the blood for.

Real news rarely came out of the Veiled City, but when it did it was big. This news was the biggest yet.

"Dead?" Katarina dropped her quill. "What d—dost thou mean, my Lady?"

"I mean she is dead," said Hecate. "Killed last night by one of her courtisans."

This was terrible news for several reasons, but primarily because no personality other than Ashtoreth could have concentrated this many Goa'uld together in one place. While they were here, they weren't running amok throughout the rest of the galaxy.

"Which one?" she asked in disbelief.

"The new one. Ophrenet."

Ophrenet? That no-account Goa'uld who had waltzed in through the Stargate about a month ago, whom she'd had to give up one of her girls for? The one who'd been promoted to Goddess of the Harvest and murdered her way past Bacchus? At the time Circe couldn't understand how to reconcile the bumbling Ophrenet with the schemes she'd been credited with. And now to hear she'd killed Ba'al's mistress!

If Ashtoreth was dead, the Veiled City would surely crumble. To make matters worse, it wouldn't mean freedom for the inhabitants, it simply meant that Ba'al would come down on the planet with an iron fist, and crush all the vestiges of freedom that had been enjoyed while Ashtoreth was preoccupied with her research and flaunting at court. The Veiled City was, in a sense, almost a containment facility. The Goa'uld caused less harm when they were at each other's throats, at least compared to the alternative. It was the way the Tok'ra had always played this game with the System Lords.

But finally, a Goa'uld had gotten stupid enough to bring the whole thing crashing down.

"Water," said Netty.

"Hm?"

"I'm thirsty. Replacing blood volume requires liquids."

Katarina looked over the crates until she found one appropriately labeled, then kicked it open and pulled out a canteen. She handed it to Netty, who drank greedily.

"You do not… understand…my actions," panted Ophrenet, wiping the water from her lips with the back of her hand.

"You destabilized an entire planet!"

"What would you have had me do?"

"Short of not coming here in the first place? Take your punishment and then take your leave!"

"You mean kill the human?"

"It is you who do not understand. I have sent many humans to their deaths in the service of the greater good. Do you think this does not pain and trouble me?"

"Perhaps… not enough."

Circe glared at her in icy silence for several moments before resuming her story. "As I was saying."

It wasn't until three days later, when the man from SG-1 showed up, that she began to suspect something more complicated might be going on.

They already had a sacrificial prisoner lined up and ready to go, of course, but Circe had been undecided about whether to send him, since Ashtoreth was dead. This new Goa'uld was doing absolutely nothing to retain the old order, and the Veiled City would collapse in a week at this rate. She had sent slaves here unaccompanied, not that Circe cared about information leaks, but it seemed reckless. Humans could now come and go over the pass at will.

The man had walked right through the doors of the Temple during the gathering of offerings for the next feast.

"I have come to volunteer for the offering on behalf of my people," he said.

This wasn't totally unheard of. It was something else that surprised her more.

She knew him. His clothes were a little peculiar, only confirming the fact that he was from off-world. They'd met before. Then she remembered where. Only a few years ago he'd been part of SG-1, in service of the Tau'ri. The Tau'ri had regular dealings with the Tok'ra back then, and she had definitely met him.

But he didn't seem to recognize her. This was both a relief and a source of confusion. She had to wonder what he was doing here. The Tok'ra had not sent him. Yet perhaps the humans of the Tau'ri had sent him. Why? To take down this new Goa'uld?

They must, she thought, have some plan of which she was unaware. She couldn't reveal herself, but she could get him into the city. It was obviously what he wanted. If he was going to take his life in his own hands while doing so, that was his problem. But she'd need to accompany him to make sure nothing went too sideways. Besides that, she had some words for this Goa'uld herself.

Hecate considered herself a strong contender for the throne after Ashtoreth, and so it was not hard to convince her mistress to send Ophrenet a strongly worded message. The message was almost the same from both of them, though with different motives. You don't know what you're dealing with.

But when she'd come to Ophrenet's throne room to deliver the warning, she'd been tossed in the clink for her trouble.

And there she'd stayed for one night until Ophrenet came down to clear her out and make room for the man from SG-1. (For her life she could not remember his name.) Evidently the Goa'uld had caught on to whatever he was planning.

"Jonas Quinn."

"What?"

"His name," Kianna rasped quietly. "Jonas Quinn."

"Well I know that now. Just listen."

Ba'al was coming. As a matter of fact, he was very nearly already here, she'd learned this as soon as she'd left the jail. Ophrenet was being taken aboard Ba'al's ship.

She had to return to her mistress as quickly as possible. Placing Hecate in charge was the best chance for the continued stability of this planet, and she needed to deliver the news.

But first—the man needed to be freed, at least to allow him a chance to escape. She didn't dare risk her cover, but she sent one of the slaves to do it for her, alleging Hecate's authority. Then she made for Aram with all speed.

Hecate didn't require much convincing to make her bid for power. She returned to the Veiled City almost as quickly as she had come. It was a bit of a long day, but they made it by evening.

Hecate ringed up to the mothership, and Circe had no objection to coming with her. Anything she could learn about Ba'al's motherships or operations was good intelligence. They had found him torturing a prisoner. And for the third time in as many days, she heard something shocking.

Circe took her leave of her mistress the moment she was permitted. Where had that human gone?

She found him quickly. He was staring at the heavily guarded rings from the trees, probably imagining that he was inconspicuous. She slid up next to him, hands on the railing. He was so intent on his thoughts that he didn't even notice her until she was standing right next to him.

"You," said Circe quietly.

He jumped about ten feet in the air, reaching for a weapon at his side that wasn't there. But when he recognized her, he narrowed his eyes. He settled himself back down against the railing, glancing around at the possible Goa'uld in the treetops and trying to pretend that nothing unusual had just happened.

"You're not human, are you?" he said under his breath, in an overly casual tone.

"No," said Katarina. "I am Tok'ra."

"Whew." He whistled. "That makes a lot of sense, actually."

She reached over on the rail and placed her hand on his arm, tightening her grip just slightly as if to prevent him from leaving. "Who are you?"

"My name's Jonas Quinn. If you're introducing yourself to me, then you must already know who I am."

"You don't understand," Circe answered. "I have just heard a Goa'uld make a love confession under torture."

Jonas's eyes widened in horror as he registered this statement. "I have to get up there," he said, making a move to get past her.

She moved to block him. "Not so fast. What's going on here?"

"She's my girlfriend," he said.

"The host is your girlfriend? Or the Goa'uld?"

"Um, both. I think." He made a brief odd face.

"Well, you're not going anywhere without a plan," said Katarina.

Their plan turned out to be surprisingly simple. There was a back entrance to Ashtoreth's labs. Circe's slave informants had passed on this much; finding it was a little bit more tricky, but it turned out to be at the back of a tree on the other side of the pond.

She had gone down there, to the lower ring platform. Jonas waited outside, watching for Ba'al to return to his ship. This was a sign that the negotiations must have concluded or paused in some fashion.

After Ba'al ringed up, it was time for the second part of their plan: disable the ground level ring platform. This was surprisingly easy to do from below, as they just had to cut the power leading to the control panel. Now the Jaffa on the planet's surface could not activate the rings on their own. Then she had to divert the lower ring platform to connect to the one on Ba'al's ship instead of the one directly above them.

And that was how they had managed to ring up to Ba'al's mothership completely unnoticed. Most of his Jaffa were accounted for on the ground; she had seen from her previous trip that he had few troops left on board. She had ambushed and killed the two standing guard outside Ophrenet's chamber without raising the alarm. Now Jonas—

Ophrenet struggled to stand up. "No! Jonas is up here?"

"Sit down. Your recovery is not yet complete."

"I cannot complete my recovery. There is not enough time. I have the surface wounds under control but I cannot even think about healing the bone until it is set. Where is Jonas?"

"Ba'al will be returning to the holding chamber. He is setting a trap."

"He can't be up here!" She continued trying to get up, but Circe held her down with one hand.

"He thought you might say that. He had a message for you."

"What?"

"Jonas says, 'I have faith in you. Now it's time for you to have a little bit of faith in me."