CITY OF THE GODS: FORGOTTEN (28 page)

Aavi watched the auction house recede into the distance, happy to finally be away from that terrible place. She could easily see out the open carriage windows all that was behind them as they rolled along. Aavi loved the feel of the breeze as it blew her hair around her face. It was as if all her troubles were being blown away and left behind. She sighed with relief and tried to relax for a moment.
 
It had been a very intense day so far, and she hoped from here on it would be a little less hectic. The padded red velvet bench seat was the most comfortable thing she’d rested on since she had been in the City. So much had happened since she had opened her eyes for the first time. It seemed like a year had passed, though it had only been days. If it wasn’t for her excitement over being rescued, Aavi would likely have curled up and fallen into a deep restful sleep.

Kafele rested in the padded seat opposite Aavi, so he was able to see out the side windows where they were going. Every so often, he stuck his head out of the window and furtively looked back the way they had come. “Just making sure no one is following us,” he confided as Aavi shot him a questioning look.
 
After they rounded a corner and the auction house was far out of sight, Kafele seemed to relax. “I believe we are safely away now, thank the gods.” He almost looked out the back of the carriage window again, but managed to stop himself.

Aavi looked at him with great admiration and humility. “It must have cost a lot of coins to buy me from the High Sulgi. I’m sorry I caused so much trouble.” She looked down at her feet feeling guilty, then leaned forward a little and put her hand gently on his knee.

Aavi was a beautiful sight to behold, but Kafele took care to keep his face an unreadable mask. “Yes, well, you have the honor of being one of the most expensive slaves Namtar has sold. In truth, I had to get help to buy you, but that doesn’t matter right now. You seem unharmed, do you need anything?” he finished, automatically resuming his role as a healer.

There was a pause as Aavi seemed to consider, “I have a strange feeling right here, but it doesn’t hurt.” Aavi rubbed her belly.

Kafele smiled a little from the side of his mouth as he held his hand under his chin. “Hmmm. My diagnosis is hunger. When was the last time you ate anything?

Aavi looked up at the roof of the carriage as she tried to remember.
 
“I ate some fruits this morning before the auction.”

Kafele took Aavi’s hand in his and looked at her the way an exasperated parent might look at a child who forgot to do a chore. “It’s past mid-day. You need something else to eat and drink. When we get home, I’ll be sure you get something.” He let go of her hand and leaned back into the plush padded bench, putting his head back and closing his eyes for a moment.

But Aavi was still too excited about her rescue to rest quite yet. “Oh Kafele, I’m so glad you found me and freed me. I was so happy to see you! Where are we going? Your healing place? How is D’Molay? Have you seen him?
 
The Oracle told me I had to see him again.”
 
She was like a spring, ready to bounce and dance and talk for hours on end.

Kafele’s forehead furrowed as he squinted his eyes more tightly shut in mild annoyance at her chatter. He hoped she would be quiet if he gave her the information she desired. With his head back and eyes still closed, he answered what he chose. “We are going to the Egyptos sector. That’s where I live. I haven’t seen D’Molay since the moment you two walked out of my apothecary.
 
Nothing really exciting has happened to me in the last two days, but I’m sure you must have much to tell.”

Kafele was familiar with what went on in slave pens, and would find that retelling of the girl’s experience mundane. But he realized there was a part of Aavi’s story that did pique his curiosity. He opened his eyes and leaned toward Aavi.

“What did the Oracle tell you? And how did you get from being a guest of the Oracle to being slave girl of the High Sulgi? Tell me everything, Aavi.”

Aavi looked up at the roof of the carriage, gathered her thoughts, and began to tell him all. She had covered her trip with Mazu, the strange words of the Oracle, and being grabbed by the bat. As she launched into a description of Es-huh, Kafele interrupted. He had no interest in random slave girls.

“My, you have been busy the last few days, Aavi. So the Oracle appeared to look just like you as a reflection. Interesting.”

“Doesn’t the Oracle always look like a person’s reflection?” Aavi asked.

Kafele wagged his finger. “No, no. It’s different for everyone who goes there, from what I’ve heard.
 
Usually, the Oracle takes the form of one’s own god, a force of nature, or the person that you admire the most.
 
With your memories all missing, perhaps the only thing the Oracle had to work with was you, yourself. You have no gods or loved ones it could use, I suspect.”

Aavi looked back at him with amazing eyes that seemed to be filled with mystery and a depth that made them hard not to be lost in. “That makes sense, Kafele.”

For a moment he was captive to her gaze. It was like being pulled into a warm dark pool that penetrated every part of his mind.
 
Finally he was able to tear his eyes from her and look out the carriage window. He carefully controlled his voice so that she would not sense he was unnerved. “What do you suppose that advice from the Oracle meant?”

She thought for a few seconds. “The Oracle told me that I don’t belong here, that I was supposed to go to Earth, and then it said I needed to find my companion because I can’t go alone. Well, the only companion I’ve had is D’Molay. He’s the first person I traveled with, so I guess I need to find him. Then we have to go to Earth. But I don’t know why. I don’t know anything about Earth!”
 

Kafele trusted there was no error in the Oracle’s prophecy. Whatever prediction it gave would surely come to be. But the ignorant could be easily delayed from meeting their destiny when seeds of doubt were planted. “I’m not sure D’Molay can go to Earth, Aavi, even if he wanted to. Sometimes he is busy for months or years on end doing a mission. Finding him won’t be as easy as just going over to his home and knocking on the door.”

As Kafele spoke, Aavi noticed his heart glow. She wasn’t sure what to make of it. It was mixed. She could tell Kafele had good feelings towards her, but there was another, deeper blue color mixed in. Beyond that she saw something dark and red that felt like . . . fear?
 
She wondered why he would be afraid. Suddenly she felt a slight grip on her arm that shook her mind back to the carriage.

“Aavi?
 
Did you hear me?” Kafele asked as he gently shook her arm.
 
He looked genuinely concerned.

“I - I’m sorry. I was just thinking,” she answered. Aavi stared at Kafele again. “So you don’t know where D’Molay is?” she asked, unsure that he was telling her the truth now. She subconsciously shifted away from him, though there was little room in the moving carriage to get too far away.

Kafele took an appraising look at her and tried to sound reassuring. “No, Aavi, I don’t know where he is, but I’m sure there’s some way to find him.” He could tell by the look on her face that something he said had scared her in some way.

“What’s to become of me, Kafele?
 
What are you going to do with me?” she asked in a pleading and confused voice. Aavi curled up with her legs bent up to her chin, and her arms wrapped around them. Her face disappeared behind her knees. Only her luminous eyes stared back at him waiting for an answer. She looked like a timid owl sitting on the seat across from him. If it weren’t for the fact that he could tell she was worried and suspicious, he would have been laughing at her. Instead, he tried to make his amusement part of his answer.
 

Kafele tried to chuckle jovially as he repeated her question, “What’s to become of you? Why I’m sure you’ll be fine. We’ll go back to my home, you can freshen up, get something to eat and then perhaps rest a bit.
 
Then we can look for D’Molay tomorrow and see if there is anything else we can do about your missing memories. You want them back, don’t you?”
 
he asked, knowing full well what her answer would be.

Aavi looked back at him, hope beginning to rise in her again. “Really, we can do all that?” she said naively.
 

“Of course. Everything will be fine, Aavi. We’re almost there.” Kafele smiled and pointed out the carriage window.
 
“See the large pyramid?
 
I live there.”

“Py-ra-mid? Which place is that?” she asked, now excitedly looking out the window. She could see several temples and buildings nearby but didn’t really know what a ‘py-ra-mid’ was supposed to look like.

“Ah, I forget - it’s that one, the big triangle” he said, extending his hand through the window and pointing at the Egyptos pyramid looming up before them.

Aavi eyed the magnificent pyramid.
 
It was a huge, and looked like a yellow-orange mountain sitting against the pale blue sky. An elaborately decorated white wall with a large gate surrounded it. The place was much larger than the slave auction building of the High Sulgi, and there were many more guards protecting it.

Kafele leaned back in his seat, put his hands behind his head, and breathed out a sigh of relief. Everything was going as he hoped it would.

The carriage stopped at the gate and a guard looked in its window. He had dark, shoulder length hair arranged in braids and wore a large metal collar marked with hieroglyphs. “Who wishes to enter the temple of Egyptos?” he asked.

“Kafele of Babedh-Dhra.
 
You know I live here,” he answered confidently.

 
The guard bowed his head slightly. “Ah yes, the Healer. Let them pass,” he called to the gatekeeper. He stepped away from the carriage, the coachman flicked the reins, and it rolled forward. As it moved into the large courtyard, Aavi looked out the window at the huge pyramid and the city beyond it. She wondered if she would ever see D’Molay again. Did he even miss her while he was having exciting adventures? Aavi wondered if he even remembered her. She would never forget him.

“When we get out, pretend you are my slave,” Kafele instructed Aavi. “That way we won’t have to explain who you are to those who have no business knowing.”

The ornate carriage came to a halt and several attendants came to aid its occupants. A bald Egyptian servant opened the carriage door and Kafele stepped out, leading Aavi by her neck chain. She stepped down from the carriage and took a look at her surroundings. The high stone columns and large sandstone statues of Egyptian gods were imposing and ostentatious. Aavi had no idea who the statues represented, but many of them had animal faces, tails and wings. This reminded her of the High Sulgi. Each statue was about twenty feet tall and they seemed to surround the pyramid in a circle on all sides.
 
“There must be a hundred of them,” she said out loud.

Kafele looked back at her as he led her toward the grand entrance. “Actually, there are 360 of them, one for each god in the Egyptian pantheon. Come along, there’s much more to see.”

They walked down the huge granite-floored hallway, past gleaming polished columns with gods and golden writing painted on each one. As they walked, Kafele’s footsteps echoed off the wall and her own bare feet made a pattering sound as she kept up with him. Aavi stopped at one of the columns and stared at it, intensely curious. She had never seen this kind of writing before, and yet there were shapes that she recognized.
 
She picked out birds, people, and snakes. “How do you read this, Kafele? What does it say?”

He gathered up her chain as he took a step or two back to the column. “This part says ‘Nut senem urt s-uab-ees Ou.’
 
It means Nut, the fashioner great, she purify thee, O Pepi. Nut is a great goddess. She is the guardian of the night sky.”

“Oh,” Aavi replied, still not completely sure what that meant.

“You’ll see many dedications to the gods here, Aavi.
 
We Egyptians honor our masters. I have been pledged to the god Set since I was a child. In fact, you owe Set a great debt of gratitude.
 
If he had not been willing to give me all that gold, you would not be here now.” He turned to move, giving the chain a very gentle tug.

After crossing more hallways, great rooms and lobbies, each more detailed and beautiful than the last, they came to an open courtyard about five stories tall. Lush plants ringed a stone-ringed pool filled with golden fish. Kafele stood by the pond a bit impatiently as Aavi lagged to peer at the fish. To get her moving again, Kafele pointed up at a deep blue door on the third floor. “Come see where I live. Up there.”