Father.
The man smiled and opened his arms, and in that single gesture Karim felt the radiating power of his father’s love. He willed himself closer, and soon other figures began to emerge from the light. His grandmother, who had died when he was young; warriors from his tribe who had been killed in battle. They were all intensely present, and yet their forms were as diaphanous as clouds.
Then he saw Djet.
The boy was as plump and full of youthful exuberance as he had been that fateful day in the valley. It gave Karim great comfort to see him like that, not terrified and bleeding from a dozen wounds.
Like his father, Djet looked happy to see him and gestured for Karim to join them, to move deeper into the world of light.
Karim could see his own hands now, still gossamer like mist, but growing sharper with every passing moment. He reached out to Djet, to his father.
I’m home.The thought was a balm to all his guilt and shame.
Then another figure emerged from the light. It towered over the other apparitions, dark and imposing.
Pasenhor?
The old priest of Khnum approached like a thunderhead. His presence was jarring, discordant—as if he did not belong in that place and yet had come through sheer force of will.
It’s not finished, thief.
Karim heard the priest’s voice, though his lips didn’t move.
Can you not hear her calling you?
Pa’s piercing eyes willed him to listen and remember, though Karim very much wished to forget. He wanted to join his tribe and let go of all that had come before.
Listen!
The priest’s command brooked no argument. Karim listened.
“Your story is not finished!”
The voice came from another world, catching hold of him like a rope around his chest, pulling him away from the light.
“I need you!” the voice said. It was both familiar and unfamiliar, like two voices speaking at the same time.
Karim fought the pull of the voice, his ephemeral hands grasping at the priest but finding nothing but air.
Pa regarded him without sympathy.Gather your flock, Karim of the Red Lands. Go out into the wilderness, find those who are lost, and bring them home. The oracle demands it.
No…Karim begged as the light dimmed and darkness closed around him once more.No!
The figures from his past faded from view save the priest, who stood against the light like a monolith, his voice loud in Karim’s mind.Your story is long—too long, perhaps. But it must be told nonetheless.The priest chuckled, heavy with irony.You see? I was right. You’re a thief of time, after all.
Karim cried out as he was dragged through thick darkness, down, down, down to the heavy weight of earthly things, to breath and heat and hunger, to yesterday’s memories and tomorrow’s obligations.
And though he fought the chains of his mortal body with all his strength, with four words, the mighty voice locked him back into his flesh with a finality that made the earth around him quake.
“Come back to me!”
***
Karim opened his eyes and gasped. Above him, the cloudless sky was pink with the first blush of morning. He blinked once, twice. His memories of what lay on the other side of death slipped away like grains of sand, until all that remained was a faint sense of having lost something precious. His mind was jumbled, confused. Only a moment before, he’d been in the grip of the monster.
But Setnakht wasn’t looming over him.
The valley was quiet.
