Zalika and Clione had taken Harry back out to the courtyard when she had woken up the second time. She didn't say anything about her late night excursion trying to follow Imhotep, but the two girls knew there was something bothering her. They chose to clean her nails while keeping their conversation quiet and short. That didn't stop them from grumbling about the state of her nails however, though Harry didn't mind. She knew her nails were in terrible shape from the war along with the rest of her.

"Do you enjoy doing this?" Harry asked suddenly. Both girls looked up at her with big eyes.

"Cleaning your nails, My Lady?" Clione asked as she resumed her cleaning.

"Not specifically but we can start there," Harry watched them work silently. While waiting, she noticed that her fingertips were tingling with magic that was not her own, not in a too dissimilar way as the bath she had the day before. She assumed that the liquid they were using was magically augmented like the bath water was. "What I meant was, do you enjoy serving like this? Doing everything for me? Like a servant."

"We are servants," Zalika answered with a smile.

"And we are happy to be servants," Clione added.

The three women lapsed back into silence as Harry worried about her own memories, basically being a servant to the Dursleys. They used her to do all the little things they didn't want to do while abusing her every second they could. Now, these girls did not appear abused, at least in the ways Harry was, which eased Harry's anxious heart and mind, but only a little bit. They both looked to be a healthy weight and were not afraid to speak to Harry, but Harry would never abuse them like she was. Her mind kept circling back to the same question: Why would anyone want to serve another person like this?

"Would you like to know why?" Zalika asked suddenly.

Harry regarded the young girl carefully before answering, "Only if you want to tell me."

Zalika smiled widely at Harry. "That is a big reason," Harry cocked her head to the side. "You ask. You do not command."

"There has to be more to it than that," Harry tried very hard not to let any of the frustration she was feeling seep into her tone. There was no way someone would want to serve someone else in this way. "You began serving me before you knew me."

The girls shared a look before Clione spoke up. "Our father died in a work accident nearly a month ago," She spoke very softly. "Our mother cannot support us or even herself on her own since women have been forbidden from doing so without permission of a male family member by the village elders," Clione sighed. "That extends to us as well."

"Then how are you able to work here? You said you were being well paid," Harry didn't forget how excited they looked when they were discussing their pay for serving her.

Clione giggled loudly. "We are under the protection of The Dread Lord, Imhotep. The village elders will not do anything to us."

"Cannot do anything," Zalika corrected her sister before turning back to Harry. "We owe The Dread Lord so much. Without him, we and our mother would have been married off to strangers before our father's body was even cold."

Harry absorbed their words. She suddenly felt very guilty for comparing her life to theirs. While she was abused severely at the hands of the Dursley's, they were family and she, very likely, would have been kicked out of their house the day she turned seventeen had Lord Voldemort not intervened. Then she would have been free. They had no such option.

"Do not fret, My Lady." Clione spoke softly. "We owe much to The Dread Lord. Serving you is hardly a difficult task." She spoke with a smile.

Harry regarded the girls closely. She hardly knew them and yet she already felt an intense compulsion to protect them. They didn't deserve what life had in store for them any more than Harry deserved hers. It seemed like no matter what she did, it was always going to be meaningless. Those in power would do anything to stay in power and there would never be enough she could since it seemed like the wrong people were in charge everywhere. She couldn't fight a war against the world on her own and she would never have enough support to launch such a campaign.

The thoughts swirling around Harry's mind started to pull her down into a pit of helplessness when Zalika placed a tray of food in front of her. It was much lighter fare this time consisting of cured meats, various cheeses, a few spreads, and several types of crackers.

"Why do you spend so much time in your head?" Zalika said with a soft smile. "That's not very healthy."

"My apologies. It's an old habit." Harry sighed.

"Old habit?" Clione asked as she handed Harry a cracker that had some meat and cheese on it.

Harry popped the offered cracker into her mouth to avoid talking about her life, at least for a couple more seconds. She found it was actually quite good. "I didn't have many friends growing up, so I spent a lot of time alone. Didn't have much to do but think." She chose her words carefully to avoid telling them anything that could quickly become too much. Both the girls looked at her expectantly, breaking Harry's resolve so fast that it shamed her. "I am a war orphan." She said with a heavy sigh.

"Orphan?!" Both girls spoke in shocked unison, not too dissimilar to how the Weasley twins would talk.

"It's…not that bad…" Harry tried to argue but anything she came up with would be outright lies.

"You had no family?" Clione asked softly with a gentle hand on her left arm.

"No, I had a family," Harry still felt the urge to defend the Dursley's. They were the only family she had left after all and took care of her for most of her life. She still struggled with how to feel about her only living family and the torture they put her through. That wasn't necessarily true, she supposed. Dudley had made motions to repair their relationship after they were attacked by Dementors. He even defended her against his parents the last time they saw each other. She decided that maybe he wasn't so bad. "They just…" Harry didn't want to explain her childhood and go through it all again but any resolve she had left broke when she looked between the young girls that were waiting expectantly with nothing but care and concern in their eyes. "They didn't want me." Harry finally uttered.

The two girls each gasped and quickly grabbed onto each of her hands firmly pity and sadness in their eyes. Harry wanted to cringe at their theatrics but managed to keep her body under control. They were young and seemed to have had a good enough life so far.

"I'm so sorry, My Lady!" Zalika sobbed, her tears gently falling down her olive cheeks.

Harry smiled at the servant that was somewhat pushed onto her, seeing nothing but the young girl that she really was. "Hush now." Harry soothed the crying girls. "It's all history now." The two girls continued to cry over what Harry felt was more than her own pain. "Remind me not to talk about the war with you two." Harry immediately regretted her words when the heads of the crying girls shot up so fast that it made her dizzy.

"You fought in a war too?!" They exclaimed in unison, making Harry sigh again.

Zalika and Clione would not let the topics of her life as an orphan and fighting in a war drop, so they spent what felt like hours listening to Harry talk. She ended up talking about a lot of things that she didn't want to but also knew that these two were not going to let a single detail be left out. Despite not wanting to talk about the numerous events that still hurt her soul deeply, she couldn't be angry at the many questions they asked or all the little details they craved. Harry learned that they had never left their village so their curiosity could be chalked up to wanting to hear of things in far away lands.

The girls finally ended their relentless line of questioning when Harry became fatigued once more. Being so tired after just talking may have irritated Harry had she not been so grateful to distract their curiosity with their duty. They led her back to her bed and changed her from her shimmering day dress with a much more plain long sleeved sleep dress with deep slits up to her hips on both sides and a baggy pair of pants. It may not have been to her taste but Harry appreciated how comfortable the clothes were.

The magical sun had been replaced with a bright moon when the girls pulled the covers over her bed over her. They explained that it would change whenever Harry wanted, otherwise it would change when she laid down in bed.

Harry found that she just couldn't sleep so she sat up, keeping the blankets on her lap while staring at her fingertips. She had thought that the tingle of magic she was feeling earlier was because of the girls cleaning her nails with a magic infused solution, but the tingling didn't stop when they did. Now that she was thinking about it, she noticed a much more subtle but still the same type of tingling sensation running down her spine. It made Harry wonder about everything going on here. Where was she really? Why did Imhotep bring her here? Why was he staying so far away from her? Those and about a million other questions were clawing at the inside of her skull, all demanding attention and resolution.

…Sleep…

Harry thought she had heard a woman's voice speak quietly but assumed her fatigue must have finally reached her mind as she was suddenly very tired. She laid back down in the bed and was asleep.

Before she knew it, she was waking up again. The first thing she noticed was that she was laying on something that was soft but did not feel like fabric, which was weird since she fell asleep in a rather amazing bed with slick sheets. Harry pushed herself up to her hands and knees before opening her eyes and realized she had been laying on a thick bed of moss.

Looking up now, she saw a large lake before her surrounded by a huge number of plants, trees, and animals. Or, maybe they may have been plants and animals. The whole scene looked so familiar, yet so foreign at the same time.

The plants seemed to be in every shape and size and just about every color as well. One plant that Harry was able to pick out from the rest looked like a type of fern. Its long, slender leaves were shiny silver, like they were made of the actual metal. It had a flower sticking out the top that was nearly the same size as the rest of the plant. It was a shade of vibrant blue Harry could barely comprehend with long strings that came out the end of the thick petals that curled downwards until they disappeared into the leaves. A bird-like creature walked up to the plant and pecked at it with a long, needle-like beak. It could have passed for a cousin of a Flamingo, but only in the barest sense. It was tall and slender like a flamingo, but much taller than the bird she knew. It had long, flowing white feathers that changed color as the bird moved. It walked around the plant towards another and Harry realized that it had four stick-like legs and feet that seemed to fork at its ankle, giving it the look of having two feet at the end of each of its four legs.

Harry sat back on her haunches, struggling to comprehend everything that she was seeing. She looked to the right of the lake and saw that it seemed to be surrounded by a wall so tall it threatened to make her dizzy. There were openings at the base of the wall that allowed the lake to flow through it to somewhere else. Harry could see some blue that matched the sky through the opening but that was about it.

"Enjoying my Oasis?" A familiar woman's voice asked softly.

Harry turned her head back to the left and saw the source of the voice. There was a woman standing that was unlike any person she had ever seen. She was tall, obscenely tall. Harry guessed that she would only come up to the woman hip were she to stand. Her skin was darker than Harry's but not by a lot. It reminded her of the color of Imhotep's skin from what she could remember but she was confused why her mind went to him of all people. She kept her hair tightly braided with many ornaments woven into them. Her clothes could barely be called that. It was like a fog that shimmered with every color imaginable. As Harry looked at this woman, it seemed like the air was constantly shifting and moving around her like it would with a candle flame. Or maybe it was reality bending around her, as the longer she looked at the woman, the more her eyes hurt from the strain.

"Uh, yes. It's quite lovely." Harry replied as pleasantly as she could as she stood up to face the woman. Now Harry could see that she did in fact only come up to her hip.

The woman smiled sweetly at Harry, though Harry noted that it did not go to her eyes. She turned and walked to an equally large throne that looked suspiciously like the one she had passed several times where Imhotep kept her. It was quite plain compared to the lavish thrones she was used to in Europe. The woman sat in the chair and a large tree-like plant with large teal colored leaves moved on its own to shade the woman from the sun. Smaller plants began to grow quickly around the chair and her feet.

"I am Heka, Goddess of Magic. A pleasure to finally meet you in the flesh, My Daughter." The woman spoke with an air of authority that was Harry was unused to. It was not a tone that would sound right on anyone she had met.

"Goddess?" Harry asked. She was really not sure what was going on here or who this person was and that feeling was getting quite old, quite quickly. "You must understand how unlikely that sounds to me." She implored.

Heka nodded slowly. "I do but that does not diminish the truth of my words." Heka continued to speak in a soft, slow tone that was beginning to grate on Harry's already frayed nerves.

"Great." Harry bit out. "Would you mind explaining why I'm here? Or where 'here' is?" She suggested with a short tone. She just wanted something to start making sense in her life. She mentally rolled her eyes at that thought. Nothing in her life had made sense in a long time but all this certainly took the cake.

"Your consciousness is in my realm while your body remains in your bed." Heka made a vague motion with her right hand. Harry noticed she wore a bracelet on her wrist that she could have sworn moved independently from Heka.

"So this is all taking place in my head? Great." Harry muttered angrily. She still remembered what happened the last time she had a talk with someone inside her head.

"This conversation is nothing like that one." Heka continued to smile down at her. "That one should never have happened."

"Look. I'm sure you're real nice and all, but can you get on with it?" Harry grit out. She was over the amount of vagueness that had permeated her life since she was old enough to recognize that that always meant there were some very important facts that were being purposefully left out. She was tired of being led around with a blindfold on by whomever thought they had the right.

"You're absolutely right." Heka replied calmly. "You should never have been used and discarded like you were. No one in this realm has that right."

Harry glared up at the large woman. Why did she talk like she had any idea what she had been through? "Would you get on with it already?" Harry practically growled. "I have been through a metric fuck ton of shit the last year! I don't need more of that bullshit from whoever the fuck you are!"

Heka nodded, seemingly unperturbed by Harry's outburst. "It is finally time for you to fulfill your higher purpose." Heka paused as she looked at Harry with an intensity that made her skin crawl. "The purpose I made you for."

"The purpose you made me for?" Harry asked deadpanned. Watching Heka nod once more broke what little composure Harry had left. "How can you just say something like that?! Who the fuck do you think you are?!" Harry yelled at the large woman before her.

"Who 'the fuck' do I think I am, indeed." Heka repeated in a sage like manner which only irritated Harry.

"I have been through too much to be dealing with this prophecy bullshit yet again!" Harry jabbed a finger at the other woman. "Why the fuck should I do a single goddamn thing you want?! I have no way to prove you are who you say you are!" Harry did her best to try and imagine what Hermione would do in this situation but she just couldn't get her emotions under control enough to think through this situation logically.

"How does one 'prove' a God is a God? I don't know of a test you could perform to prove my words." Heka spoke thoughtfully to herself. "Other than faith."

"I have precious little faith these days." Harry muttered angrily. The tingling she had been feeling in her finger tips had now spread to the back of her neck and had suddenly increased in intensity. Harry rubbed at the area in a vain effort to calm the sensation before it had the chance to distract her from her anger.

"Worry not, My Daughter. That is My Chosen's magic healing you." She attempted to soothe Harry.

"Your Chosen?" Harry asked, not liking the mental image she was getting.

"Imhotep is My Chosen." Heka replied simply. Harry's blood ran cold. That man was actually coming into her room when she was asleep and touching her?! She had barely spoken to the man! "Fear not, My Daughter. He wishes only to see you well." Heka explained, like that would be enough. "Well…for now, at least." She added as an afterthought.

"How can you act so nonchalant about a strange man coming into my room when I'm asleep and touching me without asking me first?!" Harry gestured harshly with her right hand and a nearby tree erupted into fire suddenly and sent the various creatures running.

"You will have to start being careful." Heka waved her hand and the fire tree was quickly extinguished. "You are beginning to come into the power I have given you."

Harry stared at the tree which now looked like fire had never touched it. The sudden appearance of the fire had shocked Harry out of her anger and she felt dazed and empty.

"What is going on here?" Harry implored in a small voice. "No talk of prophecies or destinies. Just straight to the point. Please."

Heka looked down at her with kind eyes. "I can not explain it without invoking destiny for it is your Destiny, your ultimate Destiny."

"I already had one destiny and now I get another one?" Harry couldn't help the tears that fell. She was so tired of this. "When do I get to live my own life?" She asked pathetically.

Heka motioned again and a small chair, not too dissimilar to hers broke through the ground next to Harry. "Sit. Let me explain as much as your patience will allow." She stated warmly. Harry sat down on the chair with a heavy sigh. She noticed plants springing up around her chair like they did with Heka's with a numbed detachment. "You may be distantly aware that magic is slowly disappearing from the world."

Heka's words confused her. "Magic is everywhere and in everything. How can it disappear?" She asked.

"As easily as the Gods can be forgotten." Heka said sadly. "I noticed the wane of magic many millennia ago and took steps to reverse it." Heka sighed sadly. "My Chosen paid the price for my short sighted plan."

"Imhotep paid the price?" Harry asked softly. "He seems fine, from what little I've seen of him." She added.

Heka smiled kindly. "I failed to fully appreciate how much the mortal heart craves love and affection." Heka scrunched up her nose before continuing. "He was led astray by a duplicitous woman who sought only to use his power for her own gains. To make sure that didn't happen again," Heka looked right at Harry, "I made you."

"You…made…me. For him?" Harry's mind whirled with about a thousand different thoughts but eventually settled on one. "I am not a pair of shoes!" Harry declared indignantly.

Heka raised her hand. "No, of course you aren't. You are far more than that. Far more than I originally intended." Heka sighed as she shifted in her seat. "I do not wish to overwhelm you during our first visit. There is so much that needs to be done but it cannot happen without your consent."

"So now my consent matters." Harry groused.

Harry thought about that for a moment. Consent. There was precious little in her life that she actually consented to. Being left at the Dursleys, being thrust into a war, being raised up only to die for the cause. While she accepted her role at the time, those things would happen no matter how she felt about it all. Dumbledore always had a plan already laid out that had been years in the making, if not decades. And she played her part like the good little pawn she was.

"It always mattered." Heka's tone turned hard and commanding. "But that is what happens when mortals choose to meddle in the affairs of Gods."

"Did Dumbledore meddle in your plans?" Harry wasn't sure why she was asking that but once the words were out, she found she needed an answer.

Heka's expression changed to one of disgust. "That man interfered with my Grand Plan since before you were born! As if such an arrogant, self important mortal man could know better than me! I am magic!" Her voice seemed to shake the Oasis harshly, sending the many colorful birds into the air and the smaller creatures scurrying for cover. Harry found that she did not feel afraid or even concerned.

"So what am I supposed to do now?" Harry asked, suddenly feeling lost and alone.

Heka's features softened again as she looked at Harry. "I want magic to be brought back as it was before, when my brothers and sisters ruled on high beside me."

Bring magic back? She saw so much magic already in magical Great Britain. But Heka said it's been waning for thousands of years. What did things look like with more magic? Or with magic not being an open secret?

"And I'm going to do this on my own?" Harry asked, already overwhelmed with the prospect.

"Of course not. You will have Imhotep by your side," Heka gave her a pointed look that Harry couldn't decipher, "If you'll have him."

Before she could ask any more questions, Heka snapped her fingers and Harry was waking up in her bed once more. Harry sat up in a panic, taking in the room around her. It was still dark and she found that she was alone once more. As her heart rate calmed down, she became aware of a presence moving away from her in the direction of the magical door she had followed Imhotep to but could not pass through. It felt…dark, incredibly dark. A greater darkness shrouded who she assumed was Imhotep than she had ever felt before, even from Voldemort and his Death Eaters. What confused her more was that she was not afraid of the feeling of that darkness. Harry followed the feeling of that darkness until it disappeared, which she assumed meant that Imhotep had left wherever she was once more.

Harry sighed deeply to herself. The dream she had of Heka, if she even existed, had been overwhelming despite her saying that she didn't want to overwhelm her. Changing the world? Having been made for Imhotep? Ruling everyone? It all sounded too fantastical, too convenient for Harry to take it at face value. The war back home had taught her many harsh lessons she wasn't quick to forget. As much as she wanted to leave this place and go back home to Hermione, Ron and all her other friends, she felt a deep seated hunger to know what was going on here. It sounded like whatever was happening here had huge implications for the rest of the world and she was in the perfect position to learn more.

Soft footfalls just outside the doorway to the bedroom caught Harry's attention. She waited silently as the footsteps turned the corner and revealed one of the girls, though from this distance and darkness, she couldn't tell which one it was.

"Oh! I didn't realize you were awake, My Lady!" The girl scurred towards her and sat down on the bed by Harry's feet. This close, Harry could now tell it was Clione. "I thought the sun would have risen when you did." She added.

"I'm awake but I'm not ready to get up." Harry tried to smile at the young girl but she couldn't muster the strength.

Clione noticed her state right away. "Did you not sleep well?" She asked with her voice full of concern. "The Dread Lord has made it clear that he will not accept you feeling any amount of suffering." She spoke quickly, almost like she was afraid of what Imhotep might do to her and her sister if Harry didn't sleep well one night. Harry was never going to let that man even think about punishing either girl for something well outside their control.

"Don't fret, my dear." Harry tried to soothe the young girl, which seemed to work. "I just had a really strange dream and found it difficult to go back to sleep."

Clione visibly relaxed as she nodded. Harry could understand why she was so afraid when her whole family's lives were hanging by a thread.

"Clione?" Zalika's soft voice called out from down the hall.

"I'm in here. Our Lady is awake." Clione called back a little louder.

Zalika's footsteps moved quickly to Harry's room until she too appeared in the doorway. She quickly ran up the steps to her bed and climbed onto it and sat next to her sister.

"What is wrong, My Lady? You should still be asleep." Zalika's own tone was full of concern like her sisters' was, though it was more subdued.

"I just had a strange dream last night. That's all." Harry explained to Zalika.

"That's good." Zalika nodded, also looking relieved.

Harry lowered her head to rub her eyes. She was feeling a little tired from the lack of meaningful rest. It was all so strange. She'd had visions in her dreams before and the only time they affected her sleep was when she still had the connection to Voldemort. But he was dead now. She had assumed that she no longer had that kind of a connection to anyone like that. Maybe there was some truth in Heka's words after all.

"We were planning on going out to the market today." Clione began speaking like she was unsure of her words. Harry looked up and saw the two girls looking at each other, no doubt having a silent conversation. They both turned back to her. "Would you like to come with us?" She asked hesitantly.

Go with them? She hadn't had a day to just have fun in a long time. Between school, the Dursley's, the war, and then her confinement, she had had precious little time to do anything for fun. She mourned not being able to do something with Ron or Hermione. After everything they had suffered through, they should have had at least an afternoon to do something for fun.

"Am I allowed to leave this place?" Harry asked, now unsure what the rules of her confinement here were.

Both girls shrugged. "The Dread Lord has not told us that you had to stay here. Only to care for you." Zalika said.

"And we've decided that you need some fresh air and real sun!" Clione added happily.

Harry looked at the two girls, wondering if they were playing at some larger plot or if what they said was the truth. Harry found it hard to trust people after being lied to time and time again. She was also at the disadvantage and it had grated on her nerves for a long time. She didn't feel like these girls were setting her up to take the fall and she desperately wanted to feel the sun and wind on her skin.

"Going out sounds lovely." Finally said and the girls broke out in loud smiles.

The artificial sun began to slowly rise after the girls had run out of Harry's room excitedly. Harry couldn't help the smile that was on her face. Those two certainly had an infectious exuberance of life that warmed Harry's soul. She desperately hoped that they were being genuine and that that fire was never snuffed out by society and people.

They reappeared after not too long wearing much different clothes than they were before. Now they were wearing dresses that were of a very simple style and soft pastel colors with head wraps that had intricate designs all over them. Clione was wearing a pastel blue dress with a head wrap that was dark brown and gold design while Zalika wore a soft purple dress and a plain bright blue head wrap. Zalika was holding a stack of clothes in her hands.

"These are for you!" She announced happily.

Harry took the stack of clothes and looked them over. They were not her previous clothes, as she was hoping, but they looked nice and expensive.

"Where'd you get these?" Harry asked as she unfolded the shirt first. It was made of an incredibly soft fabric that Harry couldn't place other than thinking of it as a really nice cotton. It was a moss green with a design along the bottom and trim done in a soft brown that reminded her of tea with a small amount of milk in it.

"The Dread Lord made it for you." Clione responded.

"He made a selection of clothes. Just for you!" Zalika added.

Harry wasn't sure how she felt about this man whom she didn't know making her such amazing clothes as she resolutely ignored how her heart rate picked up. The girls helped Harry out of the sleepwear she had been wearing and into the new clothes they picked out. The shirt was form fitting everywhere except for the sleeves from the elbows down where it flared out widely. The bottom of the shirt went down past her hips, almost like a short dress, with cuts in the sides that went to the top of her pants. The pants were mostly the same moss green color with the light brown design that went all the way up the sides of the legs. They also gave her a pair of sandals that were like theirs, only these ones looked like they were made of gold and were amazingly comfortable.

"These clothes are amazing." Harry told the girls. They both looked incredibly pleased.

"Do not thank us." Clione stated.

"Thank The Dread Lord." Zalika added with a bit of a smirk in her words.

"I don't even know the man." Harry muttered as she ran her hands down the shirt. A nervous habit she wished she could kick. She settled on brushing her hair with a brush Clione handed her and tying her unruly hair up off her shoulders.

"You should get to know him!" Zalika said with a sly smirk. "He seems incredibly invested in you."

Harry felt the slight blush that rose on her cheeks, which she also ignored. She would not let this man buy her off with pretty things. The girls led her through the courtyard and to the magical doorway she could pass through before. The door opened this time and allowed Harry, Clione, and Zalika to pass through. On the other side of the door was a simple looking hallway with walls and floors colored like sandstone. As they walked down the hallway, Harry couldn't help but compare the style of this building to the buildings that Bill was in or around when he was still working as a Curse-Breaker in Egypt. They somehow managed to avoid running into anyone on their way out of the building despite not even trying. Once outside, Harry was now convinced she was somewhere in Egypt. There was pale sand everywhere and the many buildings all had the same look as she had assumed inside the one they just left.

Harry paused on the small steps just outside of the building. Concentrating on it now, she could feel the same overwhelming darkness from when she woke up, mostly cementing her belief that it is Imhotep that she was feeling. The longer she paid attention to his darkness, the more it seemed to move towards her, seeking her out as much as she was seeking it out. Even that did not concern her, making her more confused about this man and his intentions with her. Other than the one everyone had been implying, anyway.

"My Lady?" Clione asked with concern thick in her voice.

"I'm fine. Just…thinking." Harry told the lamest excuse she could think of. She was not about to admit that she was seeking out Imhotep's magical presence when Zalika still had the annoying smirk from before firmly on her lips.

The two girls led Harry down a few narrow roads until they opened up into a large area between various buildings and had many colorful stalls filling the area. The people milling about and buying things from the various stalls were dressed in very similar styles as Clione and Zalika which made Harry incredibly self conscious.

"I'm going to stand out." Harry said to the girls with a small amount of panic creeping into her voice. Lingering fears from the war and Dursley's, it seems. "Is this going to be a problem?"

"No?" Clione said with a confused tone.

"There is nothing wrong with standing out, My Lady." Zalika soothed as she motioned to the other people in the market. "The Dread Lord, Imhotep's reappearance caused quite the stir among the people of Itsa. More so that he had you in his arms. I doubt there are many people here who have not heard about you, even in passing."

Harry wasn't sure how she felt about Zalika's words, so she chose to remain silent. The girls led her down one of the rows of stalls and began to excitedly show Harry everything in each stall. Some stalls had clothes while others had spices. Harry indulged the girls happily, letting them explain every little thing to her. It made Harry's heart light to see them behaving like they didn't have a care in the world. She wished that every child could be like this. Have a happy childhood free from abuse and of concerns beyond their years.

While they were browsing a stall full of strange wooden toys, Harry got the intense feeling that they were being watched. She casually looked around them, trying to find the person that may be watching them. Her eyes settled on a man standing in front of one of the buildings that lined the marketplace that looked like he was trying awfully hard at looking nonchalant. He looked like he belonged with this group of people with his darker skin color and black hair. He wore black clothes that did not look like anything anyone else wore in the area. He also seemed to have two small tattoos under each eye, however she could not tell what they were supposed to be from this distance away.

The feeling of being watched did not fade with the man she first saw, making her think she didn't find the right person. She continued to look around the area while making sure to give the girls the right noises to feign the proper interest. She found another man watching them on the other side of the marketplace. This man was a huge black man with muscles to spare. He wore a bright red outfit with black accents that made him stick out sourly. He was watching her but his eyes left her to watch someone else. She followed his sight and found that the second man was looking at the first man, still with a smirk. The first man turned and walked down a small walkway between buildings, looking defeated.

Harry looked back to the second man, who was watching her again with a look of triumph on his face. He nodded slightly to her before he began scanning the crowd like she had been doing. She had no idea what she had just witnessed or what it all meant for her. A mystery for another day as the girls were dragging her to the next stall.