Plapper: Whatsuuup? Egypt it is huh? Well lots of fun fun things await us there. Let me know what you think will ya?

Now I don't know if you've ever travelled to Egypt, but I can promise you, your trip was nothing like ours. Getting to Egypt as a demi-god was freaking hard!

First we had to get to the airport. Easy, we shadow travelled. Then we had to find a flight to Egypt. Not as easy, because there were no direct flights. It took us about an hour on one of the airport computers to figure out that we'd have to fly into Zurich first and then on from there, and the entire time I expected monsters to come at us. I was travelling with a child of Hades for heaven's sake! But oddly enough they left us alone.

Once we'd figured out the whole Zurich thingy, we had to wait another couple hours for the plane, then shadow travel into the plane and find some empty seats. The only thing is, to go undetected; we had to travel into the plane when it was already in the air. No problem? You're wrong! Maybe for Nico it wasn't hard, he'd had tons of practice, but I was terrified that I'd miss and plunge to my death. It would be a typical me thing to do.

"Don't worry! You'll be fine."

Easy for him to say… But I held my tongue. He meant well and so, five terrifying minutes later, we arrived in the plane toilet. It was tight and I was pushed up against him. Oh what were people gonna think when we came out of here? I blushed at the thought, but Nico seemed to have no such reservations and opened the door to step into the aisle.

The plane was pretty crowded, and I wondered why on earth so many people would want to go to Switzerland. I mean I'd heard it was pretty, but still… We had to be fast about finding our seats since we didn't want the flight attendants to realize that we weren't supposed to be there. They were already giving us funny looks as it was.

We were lucky to find two seats that were empty, although not next to each other, and for the next six hours we were up and in the air.

The rest of the journey continued in this manner. Avoiding airport security, travelling into moving machines and by the time we arrived in Cairo, we were both exhausted, smelly and in a bad mood. So naturally that was when the first monsters attacked.

We had just left the airport, our bags over our shoulders and ready to pass out in the nearest hotel room when we saw it… or should I say them? A group of decaying bodies, wrapped in rotting cloth coming our way. Mummies.

"Shit." Now excuse my harsh language. I'm not really the swearing type, I raised myself better than that, but if you saw a group of corpses walking towards you like some lame horror film, a hungry glint in their eyes and all of this after a long trip, then I believe that you would say 'shit' too. Am I mistaken? Didn't think so.

There were at least ten of them and they had definitely spotted us. They moved surprisingly fast, despite the fact that they kept losing bits and pieces… have I mentioned how gross this was? Well in case that I haven't, it was disgusting! I could see the rotten flesh on their skulls, their blackened teeth, their eyes, hanging out of their sockets. Now whoever had bound these mummies hadn't done a very good job. They were cheap mummies.

"Don't worry Kyra", Nico said, "They're dead. I can control them."

Oh right, I'd forgotten about that. My boyfriend was a necromancer… cool? Nico raised his arms and…nothing happened. Ok maybe these things took time. They were getting closer though… ok now I could smell them, which was not good for my travel sick stomach…. Goodness… they needed to shower!

"Uhm Nico… whatever you're doing… it's not working. Can I worry now?"

"Fine. We'll do this the old fashioned way then", he said and drew his sword.

I sighed and flipped my wrists where my bracelets instantly turned into blades. Gods I loved that trick.

"Well let's do this then", I said, a crazy grin on my face, and attacked.

They went down quickly and messily. After only about fifteen minutes Nico and I were covered in yellow dust and the mummies were nothing more than empty rags on the streets. I was exhausted. All I wanted to do was find a bed, roll over and die.

"Let's go Nico", I said and went to collect our bags. Everything seemed to be intact.

"Yeah… you're bleeding!" He looked at me with wide eyes and I looked down at my leg to find that he was right. One of those suckers had bitten me! Ugh, I didn't even want to think about the amount of bacteria in those teeth. I shuddered. Was I gonna have rabies now?

"Stupid mummy…", I mumbled. We'd barely gotten here and I was already injured. Way to go Kyra, way to go. A brainless zombie could beat me and I wanted to find Atlantis… Yes this was indeed a good plan. I mentally slapped myself.

"Let's find a place to crash, and then we can look at it."

He nodded and whisked us away, not even waiting for me to do so myself.

The room he'd travelled us into was simple yet beautiful. It was in soft cream colours, with a giant bed with fluffy pillows. Gods I loved fluffy pillows.

"Sit." Nico ordered and I obeyed. I was feeling a little woozy from the blood loss, plus I was beginning to feel the bite and it hurt!

"You have to take off your pants."

There were so many comments going through my head at that one, but I decided to stay a lady and not say them. Also my leg hurt. Have I mentioned that? I quickly realized that pulling my pants off would make it hurt even more and so I did the only logical thing. I cut off the pant leg. This way I stayed decent too.

The mummy had bitten me in the upper leg and it looked nasty. He hadn't actually bitten a junk out of it, for which I was grateful, but it was bleeding heavily, all over the hotel bed, and I thought it looked a little green. Yuck.

Nico looked worried.

"We're gonna need something to disinfect it. I have some amborisa and nectar, but I think we need to clean it first. "

He'd barely said the words when he was gone in a flicker of shadows. I sighed and fell back onto the bed.

It was very bad timing for a dream.

The city rose around me, but it was different, darker, surreal. It was made of shadows. The buildings flickered and faded. Became almost tangible and then disappeared into wisps of smoke. My footsteps sounded loud and out of place here, in this world of darkness. They were alive. They didn't belong.

"Sad. Isn't it?" my father said next to me and I nodded. Sad didn't even begin to cover it.

"What happened?"

"Pride, Kyra, pride. But that's not why you're here."

"Then why am I here?"

He didn't reply and so we kept walking, slowly, carefully. There was no haste, nowhere to go, nowhere to be, time didn't exist in this place. I could feel that.

"Why am I here?" I asked again.

"Because this is your home, is it not?"

I was confused. My home? How could this dark and dreary place be my home? But somehow I felt that he was right. This was my home. I couldn't explain it, but it felt right to be here, even though the city itself felt wrong. The city wasn't supposed to be here, but I was.

"I guess it is."

My home. His home. Darkness. Shadows. I was in my father's kingdom.

"What is the Silver City doing here?", I asked.

"Ah yes. That is why you are here my dear. What is it doing here indeed? It's your heritage my child, yours to claim. Will you claim it?"

What did he mean? I was more confused now than I had ever been. My heritage?

"I don't understand!", I finally said in frustration and for the first time since he'd arrived I looked at him.

He was nothing like I had expected. A tall man, with a regal, ageless face. His eyes were pits of darkness, cold and distant, but not evil. No those eyes were void of any such thing. They just were. Neither good, nor evil. His hair seemed to be part of the darkness surrounding us, his entire form seemed to fade into the darkness. It was hard to see him clearly and trying gave me a headache.

He mustered me just as much as I mustered him, but there was no emotion on that face. Nothing to show whether or not he cared that he was standing face to face with his daughter. There was no love to be expected from this God, no warmth, no tenderness, no judgement, no nothing. He was. I was. And that was the essence of that.

"You will."

"How?"

"It's in your history Kyra and all in history can be found, if only people look for it. You must search, and you will find the truth. Then you will understand, and maybe you'll wish you didn't. Who's to say?"

The world around me began fade as the shadows reclaimed my father and spat me out into reality.

My eyes opened just in time to see Nico reappear with some medicine, some clothes and some food. Hey why waste a shadow trip, am I right? I wasn't bleeding heavily anymore, just a trickle and the wound already looked better… Actually it looked like it was already a few days old instead of a few hours. Peculiar.

If Nico noticed something weird about my wound he didn't say anything. He just started cleaning it and gave me some ambrosia to eat. I didn't say a word, my thoughts were still in my dream.

There was still so much I wanted to ask my father, and now the chance had passed and I was no closer to the Silver City than I had been before. Or was I? He'd called it my heritage. Was it my heritage to find it?

"What's wrong?"

"I had another dream."

I told him about my dream, leaving out nothing and he just sat there and listened. I could never tell what he thought these days. The open expressions he'd worn in camp were hidden carefully now. I felt my heart tighten in my chest. I needed him to trust me, to believe in me, but it felt like he was slipping away. And yet he's here, I thought and smiled. Yes indeed, he was here. Here beside me, taking care of my leg and trusting me.

I leaned down to kiss him.

He looked at me in surprise.

"What was that for?"

I smiled.

"For being here with me."

He smiled back at me.

"Always Kyra, always."

I kissed him again, suddenly desperate for his closeness. After having been in the world of the shadows I needed to feel alive. The warmth of his mouth on mine sent a current running through my body. I gently put my arms around his neck and pulled him closer and in response he gasped for air. I wasn't having any of that yet though.

My hands tangled in his hair, God's it was soft!, as his warm lips moved against mine. His left hand was on my waist, drawing circles with his thumb while his right was moving up my back and came to a rest on the back of my neck. I shuddered and he leaned against me, the kiss intensifying.

We were so close that I could actually feel his heartbeat and I smiled when I realized that it was racing. The world had disappeared into those two feelings. The feeling of his lips on mine and his heart beating close to mine.

For once it wasn't I who broke the kiss. He gently pulled away only to pull me close to his chest and hold me there. We were both breathing heavily, and I smiled into his shoulder, enjoying the feeling of his warm arms around me.

"I love you Kyra."

My heart literally stopped for a second. Did he just say what I thought he did? I didn't move, almost didn't dare to breathe and as he held me close to his chest I could feel his heartbeat quicken. Was he nervous?

And I? My heart was beating fast too, faster than it ever had before. My pulse was pounding in my ears, so loudly, I hardly heard myself whisper: "I love you too."

Was it the truth? Had I spoken the truth? The words had just spilled out of me.. I smiled as a wave of happiness flooded through me. I loved Nico! And he loved me!

This time the kiss lasted much much longer and when we broke it we were both smiling, both happy.

Happiness is a fickle thing.