The Dagger of Neruit

         In one quick motion, Beccah swung the Dagger of Neruit in a wide arc through the humid summer air, stabbing the Dagger’s curving blade through the heart of the man before her.  The man’s pale blue eyes opened wide, and his hands jerked convulsively against the tensile vines that restrained him.  There was no blood really, none of the gushes of fluid that that one saw in popular action movies.  Just a small trickle of red down the front of his white polo shirt, a trickle that spilled and paused, spilled and paused, more and more slowly, as his heart died from the trauma of her blade.

         The energy of the Doorkeeper’s incantation still rippled through the air, raising the small hairs on her arms and the back of her neck.  When the man finally sagged in the arms of the Orta bush, unmoving, Beccah peeled her hand from its tight grip on the blade’s carved handle, turned slightly to one side, and vomited. 

The leader of the Magi was dead.

****************************************

Beccah sat up, easing her legs off the long setee beneath her.  She squinted a little and turned her head from the blinding sun that streamed in through the large, open portico to her right.  The late summer light turned the sandstone columns into glowing pillars and filled the enormous room with warmth.  The walls of the room were sandstone as well, hung with tapestries in muted colors, and patterned animal furs.  To her left, a low mattress strewn with brightly-colored pillows covered much of the floor, surrounded by more furs, several chairs made of beige sandstone, and a gold standing basin filled with clear water.  A low, square table draped with white cloth in front of her was covered with bowls and trays of food and drink: fruit in appetizing colors, shiny dates and shelled nuts, hearty-looking breads, and a large pitcher containing a drink the color of honey.

         Beccah got to her feet, confused.  A few moments earlier, James Arundel had been suffocating her, the air congealed with his magic and too thick to breathe.  Now, she stood turning around in place in this room with its high ceilings and tall columns, alive and unharmed.  She frowned a little, with an unsettling feeling that she had forgotten something, and then crossed to the portico, which beckoned with a warm breeze and late-day sunlight the deep yellow color of maize.  Stepping outside, she let her hands rest on the sandstone balustrade, and gazed distractedly around.  The land below and before her was green and lush to the horizon, and the air balmy.  The slanted sunlight blanketed with golden warmth a single pyramidal structure that rose above the greenery.  Just below her were gardens, deep and tropical, with long vines and fragrant blooms of every color dripping from trellises and walls and statuary.  Tropical birds, in colors the likes of which she had never seen, were flitting from vine to tree to trellis by the hundreds, their twittery chirps combining with the whispery, scratchy sound of the breeze through the palms and reeds to create cacophony of sound.

         Listening to the sound of the wind in the garden, Beccah realized suddenly that she wasn’t breathing.  And that she didn’t need to.  The pain was gone.  She could move and expand her chest, but felt no compunction to do so.

         She was dead.

         She thought that she should be sad, or surprised, or some other human emotion that was escaping her at the moment.  But she felt nothing except peace.  As the wind caressed her hair, lifting it and blowing it away from her face, she tilted her chin to enjoy the feel of it, as if it was the most natural thing in the world to be enjoying the view from the balcony of a lavish palace while she wasn’t breathing.

         Then again, who needed breath, or human emotion, when one was dead?

         A presence entered the room and she felt him before she heard him, his essence sparkling like a waterfall of fireflies behind her. 

         “Welcome to my palace.”

         She turned very slowly, almost afraid to look at him.  Was he God?

         The figure before her was that of a man, but perfect in every respect.  Square-jawed and long-haired, his brown eyes were the color of melted chocolate, rimmed with thick lashes the same color as his hair: black as night.  His golden-brown skin literally glowed with light as if the setting sun had burnished it with warm rays.  A white tunic gleamed and molded itself gently over his taut and muscular body.  He wore no adornment save for a slender gold necklace, from which hung an amulet of the bluest lapis lazuli, carved into the shape of an ibis with a long, curving beak like the crescent moon.  The man gave off a scent of new-mowed grass and warm earth and tangy ocean air.

         He seemed to be studying her, an expression of interest tinged with amusement on his face.  And then he walked toward her with the fluid movement of water, stopping just short of her.  This close to him, Beccah could feel the sparks from the shimmery light that suffused his skin.  She had to look up to gaze into his fathomless dark eyes.

         “Am I dead?”

         He smiled at her, white teeth against coppery skin.  “Perhaps,” was his enigmatic answer.  She was oddly unperturbed.  They turned to stand silently side-by-side, gazing out over the landscape as the sun sank beyond the greenery in a blaze of yellow-orange light. 

         Beccah glanced at him curiously.  “What is your name?”

         “I have many names.  My first human name was Djehuty though the Egyptians called me “Jt-ntr”, meaning “god-father”.  The Greeks later called me Thoth.  You may call me Djehuty.”

         Beccah stared, wondering if she should kneel before him; Thoth, the Egyptian god of wisdom and magic and knowledge, who gave Isis the incantation to heal Osiris and the magic to raise Horus from the dead.  It was Thoth – Djehuty – who became the god of judgment, bringing the dead to Osiris, to be weighed for eternal glory or damnation.

         So she was dead.  She wasn’t surprised.  Just disappointed that she hadn’t managed to stop James and protect the Magi from their fate.  She sighed, gazing out over the gardens and the pyramids that stretched before them. 

         “Where are we?”

         “My palace in Memphis, Egypt, a little less than five thousand years before your time.”

         The lush paradise below Beccah confused her.  This was Egypt?  The Egypt that she knew was arid and dry, the pyramids rising from the Sahara like great sand sculptures of the gods.  Egypt was not this balmy tropical paradise.

         Djehuty was smiling again.  “This is not the Egypt with which you are familiar,” he told her, reading her mind.  “In the earliest years of Egypt’s civilization, the land surrounding the Nile was as you see it, lush and green and tropical.  The palaces and gardens were resplendent.  It took many, many hundreds of years for this land to dry out and become part of the sands of the Sahara.”

         Beccah nodded, feeling the balmy breeze caress her skin.  It reminded her that she was no longer breathing.  She turned to Djehuty, and this time he turned entirely to face her, folding his arms across his broad, sculpted chest.  She thought her heart stopped as she took in his masculine beauty again…and then realized with discomforting certainty that her heart hadn’t been beating all along.

         “So, what happens now?” she asked, a little impatiently.  He was taking an awfully long time to get to the fact of her death, and what would happen now.  She thought that maybe she didn’t want to know how she’d be judged, considering her many earthly failures.

         “Well, that is the question, is it not?” he asked, in answer to her question.  “What happens now?”

         The wind rustled through the palm trees as she tried to figure out what he wanted. 

         “I assume that I’m dead,” she said, hesitantly, “so it’s my turn to be judged.  Is that right?”

         Djehuty was still smiling but his eyes were intense.  “Whether you are dead, or still alive, is your choice, Beccah.  You summoned me, petitioned me for assistance.  Do you not remember?”

         She did remember now, just barely.  A brief moment before she had succumbed to James’s spell, she had said Djehuty’s name – “Thoth” – while holding the tiny gold ibis amulet she had purchased from the antique shop in New York. 

         “The amulet was yours?” she asked, guessing.  At his nod, she bit her lip.  “I didn’t know,” she admitted.  “The amulet had a tingle to it, but I had no idea that it would take me to you.”  She thought about his words as he remained silent.  “What do you mean, it’s my choice whether I live or die?  How can I have a choice?”

         The golden man tilted his head slightly, regarding her.  “You are dead,” he murmured, his voice deep but soft.  “But you have petitioned me for assistance, and unlike the others, I can give you back your life.  Your Ka, your soul, has not yet been judged for eternity.”

         “You can give me back my life,” she repeated.  “Just like that?  What’s the catch?”

         “The ‘catch,’” he said.  “An interesting turn of phrase.  Yes, there is a catch, as you say, a snag.  Regaining your life will not be easy.”  He reached for a date, taking a small bite of its firm, wrinkled flesh.  “There is no gift that comes without a price of some kind.  As you will come to know.  Some gifts are dearer than others.  I can give you back your life, but without the ability to defeat James Arundel, you will die again, and James in his arrogance will bring the anger of the One God down upon the Magi.”

         “Can’t I just drink from the Eternal Spring as he did?” she asked.

         Djehuty shook his head.  “The Eternal Spring has been hidden.  James should not have asked the Oracle for the secret of its location, just as he should never have drank of the Spring.  He has killed, when he should not.  Like other Magi of years past, he has thought of himself as a god, and for his arrogance all of the Magi will be punished.” 

He sighed, turning his head to gaze at the blood-red sky for a minute before turning back to her.  “I have a bargain to strike with you, lovely Beccah.  I can give you what you need, to save the Magi and to avenge yourself, for a price.”

         “A price?” she whispered, afraid of the answer.  “What price?”

         His answer both surprised and vexed her, the first strong human emotions that she had felt since arriving here.  “I cannot tell you the price, until you tell me if you are willing to pay it.  Is it worth any price to right a wrong, to be able to destroy the Oracle of Osiris, to rescue the Magi from the death sentence that has been imposed upon them?  How much are you willing to sacrifice?”

         Beccah stared at him, at once terrified that this choice had fallen upon her, and yet knowing that no matter what sacrifice was required, she couldn’t resign the Magi to their fate.  As a whole they deserved it, no doubt: ambition was strong among them, and their ability to perform the feats that ordinary humans called “magic” made them feel superior.  Over the centuries, more than one Magus had tried to use his or her magic to take power that didn’t rightfully belong to him or her.  James was just another in a long string of Magi trying to rule the world. 

This time, though, God had passed judgment.  The Magi had been warned, through Beccah’s gift of Sight, of the impending disaster; yet, despite being their leader, James had refused to listen.  His arrogance would now be the downfall of them all.

Unless she could stop it.  She had been unable to prevent James from drinking from the Spring, and taking eternal life for himself, or from killing her companions, who like her, had tried to stop him before it was too late.  Djehuty was offering her the opportunity to change that.  What would she have to do?  She was a Seer, not an army, and doubted that she could even find James, much less stop anything that he might attempt. After their last encounter – in which he had obviously killed her – she was afraid to face him again.  But she was dead already, wasn’t she?  Could you still feel pain, when you were dead?

         She stood there for a long time, while Djehuty stood behind her, waiting.  She could see the glow of his skin out of the corner of her eye.  Live or die?  She was already dead, so it was simply a matter of being judged now.  Her life had been good, she thought, short but relatively unselfish, considering that she was only twenty.  Then again, she much preferred living to dying.  Djehuty was dangling before her the chance to save them all: her sister, her father, but most of all her daughter Jessie, nineteen and a Seer as well, beautiful and vibrant and too young to die – albeit accompanied by an unknown, and therefore terrifying, sacrifice. 

         She didn’t know how she could accept his offer.

         She didn’t know how she could refuse.

         The sparks of his golden light touched her shoulders first, before she felt his hands come to rest on her.  His skin was impossibly warm, almost hot, and the magic in him ran through her like electricity.  He ran his fingers down the side of her neck, sending a shiver of pleasure over her skin, and then skimmed his knuckles over her bare shoulder and down her arm.  She felt herself tremble under his fingers.  Then she felt his lips, warm and soft, slide slowly down the sensitive skin of her neck and over her shoulder, following the path that his hands had taken.  She closed her eyes, wanting to think only of Callum…but unable to even recall having any feelings for him with Djehuty’s hands on her.

         He exerted the slightest pressure and she turned to face him.  She stared at his chest until he lifted her chin with his finger, looking into her eyes.

         “It is always the virgins who are sacrificed,” he murmured.  “But this is not a sacrifice that you are required to make, little one.  You will not be judged harshly if you refuse it.  Very few who are offered such a bargain choose to take it.”

         “What would you do, if you were me?”

         “No one can tell you what to do, Beccah.  There is no doubt that there will be personal sacrifice for you.”  He hesitated, briefly.  “But power such as James Arundel’s is not meant to be wielded by humans.  It will destroy everything in its path.  Your vision, of the destruction of the Magi, will come to pass if he is not stopped.”

         And she had to lock her legs stiff to keep from falling, as he lowered his beautiful face to hers, touching soft lips first to her forehead and then to her mouth.  She was crying, a few small tears rolling down her cheeks, and when he pulled away he wiped them away with his hands.  At that moment, she loved him.  And she would have done anything for him.

         “I will,” she murmured.  “I will accept your bargain, Djehuty, whatever the cost.”

         Djehuty smiled sadly down at her.  “Then the bargain is sealed.  I will give you the power to defeat James, and in doing so, to save the Magi from the fate that should be theirs.  But the price of such a gift is the loss your soul.  Your soul will be mine, until I release it to you once more.”

He held out an empty hand, and in his palm appeared a gold dagger, about six inches long, with Egyptian symbols carved into the curved blade.           Beccah took it from him slowly, holding it in both hands and turning it over.  The blade was smooth and gleaming, curved in the shape of the crescent moon.  The handle fit perfectly in her hand.  She turned it over, and then looked up at Djehuty.

         “A dagger?”

         Djehuty nodded.  He gently cupped each of her hands in one of his, holding the knife with his fingers wrapped around hers.  “The Dagger of Neruit.  This weapon has special powers that enable the wielder to defeat human immortality gained from the Spring.  The symbols on the blade are the Ieb and Maat.  The Ieb, the heart, is the center of life, where the immortality of the Spring resides in the human body.  The Maat is the feather of Maat, that which the heart is weighed against at death.  It represents divine justice.  The Dagger must be plunged into James Bennett’s heart for the effects of the Spring to be nullified.  He will die.”

         Kill him?  I have to kill him?  The idea was unfathomable to Beccah.  If she was still breathing, she would have taken a deep breath to still her nerves.

         Djehuty released her hands, laying his palms on her shoulders again.  “Before attempting to use the Dagger, bind James Arundel with the word “Orta,” and then use the Doorkeeper’s incantation from the First Pylon of the Pylons of the House of Osiris, as written in the Book of the Dead:          

“The Osiris, the scribe Ani, whose word is truth, saith: “Lady of tremblings, high-walled, the sovereign lady, the lady of destruction, who uttereth the words which drive back the destroyers, who delivereth from destruction him that cometh.’ The name of her Doorkeeper is Neruit.”

“The incantation will open the Door to the Underworld, briefly rendering James Bennett mortal again.  Once he is bound by the Orta and you have completed the incantation, you must sever his heart with the Dagger in order to defeat the power of the Eternal Spring and release his soul to me.”

         She gripped the hilt of the dagger, and robotically repeated the curse and incantation until she had committed them to memory, all the while trying to convince herself that she could do this task that Djehuty had laid before her.

         Djehuty peered down into her eyes.  “Will you do this?  Will you murder one, to save many?”

         Beccah nodded, though she wasn’t at all certain that she could.  “I will.  I have to.  But I don’t…I’m sorry, but how can killing someone be the right way to correct what James has done?  How can murder be justified?”

         “It’s not,” Djehuty said, tightening his fingers.  “That is your sacrifice.  Your soul will be damned, but the lives of the Magi will be spared.”

         Terror.  She couldn’t think beyond his words.  “No, please, I can’t…”

         “You must,” he said, grimly.  “You have agreed, and the bargain is sealed.  But through the indenture of your soul to me, you may some day erase the stain of blood upon it.”  He leaned down and kissed her again suddenly, a kiss of breath and life that made her draw in a deep almost-forgotten breath.  Her once-still heart began racing in her chest.

         Oh, God…

***********************************

         Mere seconds later, she appeared before James in the garden of the Eternal Spring.  He was different somehow, not exactly larger or visibly more powerful, but there was a feeling of restrained energy around him.  Although the suddenness of her appearance had to have surprised him, he merely blinked, and then took a large step back.  In his hand, he clutched the Oracle of Osiris, a round, golden ball with the knowledge of the gods.

“I thought you were dead,” he said bluntly.  He glanced around to where she had been standing, to where her body should have been but no longer was.  Immediately the air around her congealed, as it had moments earlier.  Only this time, Djehuty’s breath filled her lungs.

“You can’t hurt me any longer,” she said.  She could breathe, despite his magic, and now she could feel the anger rising inside of her, overcoming her fear.  Because of him, she had been forced into this position.  Because of him, her soul was damned.  James’s eyes flickered to look behind her before resting on her own once more.  She wondered what that meant, even as she recognized the sudden uncertainty, and maybe fear, on James’s face.

         She drew in a breath.  “Orta.”  At her command the small bush-like tree next to him wrapped the tendrils of its slender branches around his ankles and wrists and body and neck, beautiful white flowers with red pistils binding him and pulling him into its depths.  He struggled, dropping the Oracle, but was unable to break free of the Orta’s grasp.

         She stood in front of him, hesitating, aware of his eyes on her.  She touched the amulet briefly, feeling it begin to warm on her neck again.  Then she held out the Dagger of Neruit, pointing it directly at his heart.  She had to tighten her grip on the dagger’s hilt, to steady the tremor that had begun in her hand.

         “I’m sorry, James.  It must be done.  You have been judged by the power of Thoth, the god of Justice, and your actions will not stand.”  Her voice was tremulous, and she swallowed in an attempt to steady it. 

Your soul is damned, Djehuty’s voice repeated in her head.  Damned.

         In a whisper that was close to a sob, she recited the Doorkeeper’s incantation of the First Pylon, the entire incantation flowing from her in a breath like a single word.  She was vaguely aware of a brilliant glow around her as James stood restrained and frozen in place, his magic stopped up as if by a cork placed in a bottle.  Beccah’s hand began to shake.

         I must do this, she thought, in desperation.  I have to do this.  She tried to move her hand, tried to force the gleaming edge of the Dagger’s blade to slice through the skin and muscle of the man who had been her leader, her father’s best friend, and her mentor.  It didn’t matter that he had been willing to end her life, and the lives of everyone she loved.  It didn’t matter that he had condemned the Magi to death.  This was James, a human being.  She couldn’t take his life away.

         In front of her, the brilliant glow of the Incantation began to fade.  James blinked, trying to wrench his wrists from the grasp of the Orta.  Panic overtook Beccah.  She stepped back, her grip loosening on the hilt of the dagger.  And then her foot hit something behind her, a body in the grass, still and heavy with death.  She turned around slowly.

It was Jessie, lying on her back, legs straight and arms flung out from her sides.  Her soft green eyes, similar in color to Beccah’s own, were open but flat, no intelligence peering out from their depths.  Dead.  Jessie had been here too, hadn’t she?  And beyond Jessie lay the bodies of her friends, and her family, the ones that had tried to help stop James.  They had all failed and died.

        Like Jessie, these Magi were the sacrifice.  And she, Beccah, was damned, regardless.  Damned if she didn’t kill James, and all the Magi perished; damned if she did, and lost her soul in the bargain.  Because without Jessie, her life was worth nothing.  Djehuty had offered her the chance to save the Magi, but also to avenge Jessie’s death, perhaps knowing that Beccah could do no more and no less. 

Beccah tightened her grip on the Dagger, cold metal warming beneath her fingers.  Jessie’s death was not a death that Beccah could not yet think about.  She would, later, when reality returned, and there was only silence where her daughter’s laughter had once been.  But for now, there was numbness instead of pain.  Thanking Djehuty for the small gift of emptiness, in one quick motion, Beccah swung the Dagger of Neruit in a wide arc through the humid summer air, stabbing the Dagger’s curving blade through the heart of the man before her.  James Arundel’s pale blue eyes opened wide, and his hands jerked convulsively against the tensile vines that restrained him.  There was no blood really, none of the gushes of fluid that that one saw in popular action movies.  Just a small trickle of red down the front of his white polo shirt, a trickle that spilled and paused, spilled and paused, more and more slowly, as his heart died from the trauma of her blade.

         The energy of the Doorkeeper’s incantation still rippled through the air, raising the small hairs on her arms and the back of her neck.  When James finally sagged in the arms of the Orta bush, unmoving, Beccah peeled her hand from its tight grip on the blade’s carved handle, turned slightly to one side, and vomited. 

        The leader of the Magi was dead.  And she was Damned.