The Temple of Osiris in the City of Thebes was the holy place of High Priest Imhotep. Imhotep's relationship with the Pharaoh and the high society of Egypt was simple – everyone went through his temple as he was keeper of the dead. Imhotep looked out into the city bustling with the activity of Pharaoh's return from another victorious battle. For nearly the last month, Seti the First had been in Canaan reasserting Egypt's power in that fertile region.

Imhotep was no warrior, but he was the second most important person in all of Egypt. Pharaoh came to him when he or one of those in his court was sick or attacked by magical weakness. He was powerful in all of the ancient arts of the magics of Egypt. The rumor among the people was that he could bring back the dead– if the price was right.

But the second greatest man did not look out into the city with joy. His eyes looked with anger upon his liege, Pharaoh Seti. The man had a Hittite wife who was exotically beautiful. But the man was not satisfied – no he had taken into his harem the one he had loved from afar. For, he had long loved the priestess Ankhesenpaatan. Ankhesenpaaten served Hathor as one of her priestesses and was poised to become High Priestess herself. But no the insatiable appetite of the Pharaoh had gazed his eyes upon her and taken her from the priesthood where he could freely be with her. Now he was forced to hide his little forays with her.

Right at this moment, Imhotep turned and walking in fitting not a priestess of Egypt, but as the woman of Seti. Her skin was darker, covered in the makeup that hid every scar, jeweled with the finest that the King would grant to all save the Crowned Queen. She had a slip of a loincloth around her waist and netting that barely covered everything else. No man could touch her – that was Pharaoh's law.

Imhotep's eyes stared with lust upon what he felt was the most beautiful woman in all of Egypt. It was a shame that Seti had seen her. Ankhesenpaaten walked into his presence one of only a few who could dare hold her head up as if she owned the Temple of Osiris. Between the Imhotep's priests, she strode her feet naked upon the stone tile below. Her eyes turning once to look upon the eyes of one of his more faithful servants and then looking ahead for her one true love. The unspoken message in that look was clear. "I am here for sex. Make sure we are undisturbed."

The priest turned his eyes to watch her perfect form as she walked past, eyes lingering where even if seen he could be dead. Then, the priest and all the others closed the door to allow her time alone with her lover and their Master. Ankhensenpaaten walked through the curtain and stepped right up to the Keeper of the Dead. Her body stopped barely a cubit away in conflict with the King's command. Her fingers reaching for his face letting him smell her perfectly perfumed scent.

His hands wove around her face, without touching. A single touch might smudge the cosmetic that shown along her body. His head bent down and kissed her sumptuous lips. He could feel darkness just like his coming as they touched. But he could not resist and he touched the softness of her shoulder as he pressed into the kiss. He pulled her closer so their bodies could touch.

The priests of Osiris were closing the door when Pharaoh Seti himself with mighty strength pushed his way through – alone for a visit with the Keeper. He could smell her, his Ankensenpaaten in the air. With eyes narrowed to the hidden room behind the curtain he started to walk closer to their hidden place. The priests behind him were closing the door as he made his way inside.

Seti strode through the curtain and there was his Ankensenpaaten posing her perfectly sexual body next to a symbol of one of Egypt's lesser gods.

"What are you doing here?" He asks her.

She does not meet his eyes, but looks down at the feline idol. As she looks up to see her liege, he reaches his hand to point with accusation.

"Who has touched you?"

She turns her head and her heart leaps into her stomach – her cosmetic has in fact been smudged. Her eyes go wide in shock of being caught, but then she turns behind to look at the true love of her life, Imhotep.

As Pharaoh Seti turns to look at his betrayer, Imhotep in a smooth motion pulls the sword from his king's scabbard.

"Imhotep?" Seti says in surprise. "My priest?"

With his own eyes on Imhotep who returns his look with cold distant indifference, he doesn't see the true betrayal with her arms reaching up approaching behind him.

Pain courses through his body as the dagger she had hidden behind the idol sank between his shoulder blades. His eyes looked up as he reacts to the knife in his back. He turns to look at the last thing he sees is Ankensenpaaten looking on with her own hate for him in her eyes as Imhotep takes his mighty sword and chops his head off cleanly, ending his life. Back and forth they slice and dice the most powerful man in the world until he is no more.

Seth stands at attention outside of the Temple of Sekhmet, happy with the peace that he has experienced these last years. Thanks to Pharaoh Seti the priests and priestesses of the gods had not bickered and fought over each other's religious artifacts, temples, and priests and priestesses. But he looked up and his heart went cold.

"Net," he turned to his friend and fellow guard, "Quick get the High Priestess. Trouble is coming!"

Net slowly lifted his eye and saw the symbol of Osiris.

"Go," Seth yelled.

Net turned and ran inside the temple. Seth saw Imhotep himself coming closer, twenty of his men were with him.

"To Attention, guards," Seth shouted.

The spears were standing bottoms on the ground and spears pointed diagonally toward the approaching priests. They were vigilant but they were not threatening – yet.

Imhotep started marching up the steps and was halfway up when Seth finally dared to speak.

"Greetings," he said, "Oh Great Avatar of Osiris," he said. "What is the purpose of this visit?"

Imhotep sneered back at him. He turned to his right and left sneering at everything he saw.

Suddenly, standing at the top of the dais was Iset who had appeared by apparition her stave in hand with the eye of Wadjet on its top. She looked down and showed no respect.

"You should not be here, priest of the dead –" she said. Then, coming up to stand next to her was her protégé and the future High Priestess of Sekhmet, Anck-su-Namun.

Imhotep stopped as he looked up at one he would dare say was already even more beautiful than Ankensenpaaten. She looked down at him with hair as dark as a raven, but she wore the white of the priestess. What distinguished her from Ankensenpaaten most were the green eyes that looked down at him, green as the death spell itself.

"Careful," Iset said to her charge next to her, "Hold up your shields. Protect your mind, but especially your soul." Iset gripped her stave firmly in her hand.

"I am Pharaoh now," were the words Imhotep spoke. "I have come to see the Temples of my Kingdom and those who serve Egypt and its people."

He regarded Anck-su-Namun. "What is your name, young priestess?" He said to her.

"Anck-su-Namun," she said quietly, unable to break her gaze from his dark eyes.

Imhotep's eyes took in the young beauty, considering that if he truly were Pharaoh, then he should be able to act as Pharaoh.

"Anck-su-Namun," he said his eyes filling with power forcing her to look back. "Come with me. You shall serve Egypt as one of Pharaoh's priestesses."

"No!" Iset said her voice beginning to boom with power. "She is only ten. What you think is abominable. And you have no power here. When the Medjai come, they shall restore the order of Egypt."

Imhotep opened his mouth and spoke,

"Atma – " he shouts pointing his finger.

Iset pointed her stave to strike back but her spell fell apart as it came into contact with the green light that came from Imhotep. The priests to his right and left lifted their staves and cast "Atma –" one after the other. After the carnage, there was only Anck-su-Namun and Imhotep.

Anck-su-Namun looked down, feeling the presence of the Black Sorcerer, Imhotep. His presence and the darkness that she tried to shield from herself were calling to each other.

"Murder –"

"Death –"

"Atma –"

She tried to put her shields up– but she was failing. For the first time, she felt her darkness rise up in triumph from within her. And her eyes drank deep of the bare chest and dark eyes of Imhotep.

"Come to me," he said, "My Anck-su-Namun."

She tried to throw him from her mind, but Imhotep was just too strong. Her hand reached out and he pulled her hand closer.

"Lead me, my Master," she said softly. Then, she walked with her hand in his.

"Flek and Dar," he said to his right and left, "Kill everyone inside. Find the Book of the Dead. Bring it to my palace."

"Yes, Pharaoh," they said.

Imhotep looked down at the young beauty below him. "Come, Anck-su-Namun," he said. "I will show you how beautiful you can be."

Then, he walked toward the chariot he had left in the courtyard below. Anck-su-Namun with her head up high walked stride for stride with the man who was now calling himself Pharaoh.

Pharaoh Imhotep I sat at his throne now in the palace in Thebes. He looked down to his right, the second most beautiful woman in all of Egypt, Ankensenpaaten. He had promised to make her his queen. He had done just as he had promised. But already he felt his gaze turning away from her to another.

For below the raised dais on his left lounged Anck-su-Namun. Her emerald eyes patrolled over the court of Pharaoh. In his opinion, she already was the most beautiful woman now in Egypt – even if she was only ten. Imhotep gazed at her back, bared but now golden from the use of the great cosmetics of Egypt. She wore the same lewd clothing that Ankensenpaaten had worn before her. Her figure did not yet fill it the way that Ankensenpaaten had, but the Masters of the Harem had arrayed her in such a way to make her appear older than she was.

She had on her right arm now not the symbol of Sekhmet, but the symbol of his ownership of her. It was an armlet with the eye of Osiris.

Imhotep smiled as her hard Death dealing green eyes stared out at those who might dare defy him. The Magical community stood below her shivering in fear. The High Priest of Bastet who had been about to speak had seen Anck-su-Namun and bowed his head and mouth and silently accepted Imhotep's rule. They could sense her power.

He continued to look at her young form and his filthy mind wanted one thing. And his mind thought to make her his tonight. His fantasies about that young supple flesh underneath made his breaches uncomfortable beneath his golden raiment as Pharaoh. These dirty thoughts made him miss the initial disturbance in the hallway outside. The doors burst open and Imhotep stands.

"Who dares?" He shouts as he begins to gather his power.

"Anck-su-Namun," he said. "Destroy these usurpers."

With the elegance of a deadly Viper, she brought her own stave out from seemingly nowhere and brought it to force.

"ATMA –" she said with deadly intent.

Green light exploded and brought down the first of the Medjai to come into the room. Then, Imhotep brought his own power to bear and the pillars shook as a great rolling mist started to build inside the room.

But as quickly as it appeared, it dissipated. The sheer number of advancing Mages had overwhelmed his spell. Then, those who lay cowering before him turned on him. They joined also in warding him against his great power. Then many more masked men had run it into the room. Anck-su-Namun seemed unaffected as her stave came down again and she brought down one and then two more of the deadly Medjai. But there was one thing that not even her great power could hold back. One Medjai got past and pointed his stave at her and said "Atma –" and she slumped to the ground. Imhotep's Anck-su-Namun was dead.

"NO!" he shouted. "I am Pharaoh, and you will receive me!"

The Medjai surrounded him, subdued his wife who was nothing with magic as Anck-su-Namun was. Both of his protectors were down on the ground. He looked in horror as first a mask was placed around Anck-su-Namun's head, then Ankensenpaaten's head, and finally he saw no more as that mask went over his head.

He sees again when he is deep underground in a hidden place. He looks around. Anck-su-Namun is nowhere to be seen, but Ankensenpaaten is already in the bandages of a mummy and lying in a sarcophagus to his left. Then, he sees his own bandages which cover everything but his eyes, but then even that becomes covered. Then, he is laid down in his sarcophagus. He struggles and tries to call his power, but somehow they have blocked him from it.

One of the masked Medjai intones:

"Imhotep," he said with deadly calm, "for the crime of abominable Black magics, for killing thy liege, breaking into the temples of the other gods and corrupting the chosen of Sekhmet, we sentence you to suffer the Hom Dai, you and your ungodly queen. With those words, Medjai around him began to close the sarcophagus. As the sarcophagi were sealing, buckets of flesh-eating scarab beetles were cast inside, and they started scuttling in.

Imhotep begins to scream as the bites start to engulf him. One after the other they eat and devour. He screams in unholy pain and he vaguely hears her screams fill the night.

With great solemnity, in the deep bowels of the Temple of Sekhmet were many sarcophagi, but the real sadness was for the two here in the bosom of the earth. On the right was the faithful High Priestess Iset bandaged and wrapped reverently and in the other was so small but wrapped as reverently, Anck-su-Namun.

As the embalming was finished the two bodies were gently laid into their tombs and closed. Hymns were chanted helping the spirits to the underworld to find their peace.

Anck-su-Namun felt as if she was floating into a large vaulted hall. Most unusual was the fact that she sat on a barge, her hands were crossed over her chest. She looked up and saw a man with a horse's head holding a stave.

"Anubis –" she whispered.

Her barge moved closer and closer until it stopped below a great scale.

Anck-su-Namun bowed her head as the great creature took a seat on a throne and he took in his hand a beating organ and placed it on one of the sides of the scale. On the otherside he placed the measure. He watched as the scale began to light up and twist and turn. Then, the heart flew off of the scale and came to Anck-su-Namun's chest and she felt herself become whole once more.

The great god stood up and came forward into the water. When he was face to face with her, he bowed his head.

"My Mistress –" he said.

Anck-su-Namun was stricken silent.

"What do you mean?" she said. Then, in his hand appeared three items, a stick from an elder tree, a rock from the Underworld and a cloak from his back.

"Mistress," he began. "In the future, you will come across these items, in fact your parents placed the cloak around you on your first day and it has already touched your soul. The others will touch you later."

Anck-su-Namun continued to stare at him.

"You still have work to do, my Mistress. The one who sent you to this time must be born and defeated. The Abomination will also come back to life. You must grow to resist him and defeat him. For if you do not defeat him, then the gods will fall and the world will fall to nothing."

Anck-su-Namun remembered again being in the presence of Imhotep. Her mind shuddered, but her body yearned for it.

"Hush, Mistress – " he said, "Do not fear. Take the time to rest."

The Dark Head and eyes of the Egyptian God of the Dead looked to Anck-su-Namun, took her hand and helped her out of the boat. Then another being appeared. Anck-su-Namun recognized this one right away, Sekhmet. She wore the white robe that Iset and then she had worn, but her head was that of a lioness.

"Come with me, child," the Goddess spoke.

Anck-su-Namun sniffled as she looked at the Goddess she had worshiped.

"But I failed you –"

The face shook her head and held a smile. "You were not yet inducted as my servant, child," she said. "What happened to you is not a failure. Now come. There are a few things I must teach you and then you need to rest."

Anck-su-Namun reached out her hand and took the hand of her goddess. Then, the light of the sun enveloped them. Then, Sekhmet and Anck-su-Namun were gone.