Chapter 1- 3

Ashley walked towards the temple.  As she passed a few of the workers, some of whom she had known for years because they worked regularly with her parents, she waved and greeted them with a smile, which they returned.

Underneath her cheerful outer demeanor, Ashley was steaming a little. While she recognized the truth and common sense that lay behind her father’s words about her outfit, she still resented being told how to dress. Both her father and her mother still saw her as a little girl but, dammit, she was almost 14 now and getting ready to start high school. Some days she just couldn’t wait until she could get out from underneath her parent’s thumbs, even though those thumbs weren’t particularly heavy.

Ashley wandered down a slightly raised ridge that lead from the campsite towards the old temple. The heavily weathered stones lining it and the relatively flat surface were clues that the ridge had probably been a roadway of some sort a long time ago. The sunken areas to either side showed signs that they had probably been filled with water, at one time.

Unlike many of the Egyptian temples Ashley had seen, the front of this temple was a plain, flat wall; constructed out of a hard dark stone that did not appear to be local in origin. If it had ever held any decoration or hieroglyphics, they had long since been worn away by time and weather.

Ashley passed through the large doorway and into a pillared hall which looked like a miniature version of the great hypostyle hall at Karnak , which Ashley had seen many times in previous trips with her parents . She wandered around the hall for a few moments but, like the front of the temple, if there had ever been any decoration or writing here, it too was long gone.

At the far end of the pillared hall an archway opened out into an area about 2500 feet square that was dominated by a raised platform running down its center with a large statue at the far end. This area looked like it had always been open to the air and the large blocks that formed its walls showed very faint traces here and there of color.

The statue at the far end stood on a low pedestal in front of a wall that looked as if it had been battered by an army of workmen with hammers and chisels. Somebody, thought Ashley, really didn’t want anyone to read what had been written there. They had done a pretty good job on the statue, too—about the only thing you could really tell about it was that, whoever or whatever it was supposed to be, it was female.

As Ashley stared up at where the face of the statue once was she felt a shiver course down her spine, as though someone had gently run their fingertips down her back. All of a sudden it seemed very warm and small trickles of sweat started to run down her back and down from her hairline. Ashley’s senses swam for a moment in the sudden rush of heat and she stumbled her way around the wall behind the statue and leaned against the back of the wall that behind the statue, thankful for the bit of shade it provided.

Ashley unshipped her canteen and took a long drink from it, but the cool water did not seem to do any good. Great, she thought, about the last thing I need is to come down with some strange bug or something—talk about a ruined summer.

Ashley unbuttoned and untied the shirt she had borrowed from her mother and let it hang loosely around her. Maybe if I sit down for a few minutes I will be okay, she thought.  Now seated against the wall, Ashley noticed that a section of the back wall of the temple was made out of smaller blocks than the rest of the wall. The construction in that area seemed rather haphazard—indeed, bits and pieces of the masonry had fallen back into some kind of opening behind it.

Driven by her lively sense of curiosity, Ashley stood and stepped over to the broken section of the wall. She tried to peer through one of the small holes and see what lay behind the crumbling masonry, but the holes were too small to let sufficient light in to reveal anything.  Letting out a little growl of frustration, Ashley kicked at the base of the wall. To her surprise, a section of the masonry collapsed, the ancient mortar that was holding the blocks together crumbing from the slight shock of her kick.

“Ohhh, crap Dad is gonna be pissed now.”

The entire section of masonry had not collapsed, however, only a small bit in the lower left corner—maybe just large enough to wiggle through.  Ashley crouched in front of the opening, her curiosity warring with her fear of what her father would say once he showed up. Ashley peered through the larger opening, but the angle was wrong for the additional light to show her much—just a tantalizing glimpse of a rounded objected with a few glints of metal. As she stared at the object, trying to make out more detail, everything but the object seemed to fade from her field of view and her curiosity became a siren call, pulling her through the small opening despite the small voice inside her head warning her to wait ‘til her father arrived.

Irresistibly drawn to the object, Ashley quickly wriggled through the opening. Her passage loosened a few more of the small blocks and a beam of light lanced through and struck the object, revealing it to be a stone urn about 3 feet tall and almost two feet across. Strange geometric patterns, unlike any hieroglyphs or other ancient writing that Ashley had ever seen seemed to writhe across its surface.

Ashley reached out to touch the urn, once again ignoring the small voice that tried to stop her. As she touched its surface, an electric thrill ran through her. Her hand drifted upwards along the surface of its own accord, until it reached the top of the urn, where an ornate stopper plugged the top of the urn. With a strength she did not know that she possessed, Ash grasped the bulbous knob and wrenched the stopper from the top of the urn.

As the urn was breached a bright soundless flash of light exploded around Ashley, so bright it seemed to flood her mind as well as her vision and she found herself blinded. Disoriented and frightened, Ashley stumbled backwards and crashed through the remnants of masonry behind her, sprawling onto her back in the open shrine area.

Ashley lay there panting and soaked with sweat, her mind swimming in confusion with a dim echo of her father’s voice running in the background, telling her not to touch anything and to be safe. Ashley continued to crawl backwards in her blindness, until her back fetched up against the wall behind the statue. Slowly, her vision began to clear.

Gazing about her in shock and trepidation, Ashley’s first thought was, how am I going to explain this to dad? But this thought was quickly forgotten as a figure crouched through the now-open archway in the wall and rose to stand before her.

Ashley’s gaze swept up from bare, brown feet up slim legs that almost disappeared beneath a translucent linen sheath, up past wide hips, a slim waist and small breasts with dark nipples that showed through the thin cloth, past an ornate necklace of gold and blue at the throat to a wide, high cheeked face with deep almond-shaped ebony eyes, framed by thick raven hair that fell past the shoulders.

As the woman stepped forward into the sunlight, slim arms rose, flashing with gold at the wrist and upper arms and a bright voice spoke words that Ashley could not understand, but that felt like a combination of a cry of joy and a keening of deep regret. The unknown woman stood unmoving for a long moment, as though savoring the feel of the sun upon her skin and then she lowered her arms and turned to look at Ashley.

Locking gazes with Ashley, the woman spoke again but the words were still unintelligible to the young girl. With a slight frown, the woman spoke again, seemingly in a different language and, when that failed to elicit a response, yet again in a third language that Ashley did not understand.

“I don’t know who you are and I don’t understand a word you are saying… and I think I am in really, REALLY big trouble,” Ashley sobbed.

As though she sensed Ashley’s fear and confusion, the woman’s face softened and took on a look of concern and warmth. She seemed to glide across the small space between Ashley and herself and reached out to lay a warm hand upon Ashley’s brow, moving so swiftly that Ashley had no chance to avoid her touch.

As the woman’s hand caressed her forehead, Ashley experienced another flash, similar to the one she had when she pulled the stopper from the urn, though less intense. Feelings of safety and warmth washed over her, with a slight, almost invisible sense of hunger and lust buried deep beneath. All the strength seemed to drain from Ashley’s body and she fell back limp to the sand covered floor of the temple.

As she lay there almost senseless and incapable of movement, images of her life —the experiences of her short life playing through her mind backwards from the present into the past like a movie, flashed across Ashley’s mind…  but this movie wasn’t for her, it was for someone else to watch, someone who was right behind her.

Ashley turned in her mind and stared into the eyes of the strange woman, the obsidian dark eyes that acted as an abyss drawing Ashley down into them and into darkness.

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