Rite of Power - Rite 2

32: Memories of the Soul

                This was my body, but it wasn't my body, at least not the body I was just in. I tried to fight through the dizziness that blended all the thoughts in my head together and keept my eyes from focusing. Where was I? This wasn't the Aether, and it wasn't our bedroom or even the pack hospital.

I could only steady myself enough to sit up. I brought strange hands up to my face and tried to determine if I was damaged in some way. Everything felt the same, except my hair. There were smooth strands where I'd expected to find curls, and the color was brighter, a more rose gold than red, as I pulled a strand forward where I could inspect it.

"Nane tooyi Isis!" a small girl ran into the room and jumped up on the bed beside me with a grin. When I didn't respond she frowned and patted my cheek gently, "Isis?"

Was I Isis, or was that a question. I gave her a light shrug. Her big brown eyes stared up at me with concern, but I didn't know how to answer her. I wasn't even sure what language she was speaking in. "Sephmot, Cleo, Nane tooyi," the words came from my mouth but I hadn't said them. Whatever I said seemed to reassure her and her frown turned into a beaming smile as she threw her arms around me for a hug before jumping off the bed and darting out of the room.

My body moved without me telling myself to move as I made my way across the mostly empty stone room to a giant brass plate hanging on the wall over a table with a basin of water. Leaning over the basin I cupped the water in my hands and splashed it over my face. Using the plate like a mirror I examined my face that wasn't my face.

A strange girl with strawberry blonde hair, bright green eyes and undeniably Egyptian features stared back at me with a frown. 'It's not like you to just sit there and not say anything,' her frown deepened, 'are they closer?'

What the actual hell was going on? 'Am I in your head or are you in mine?'

Her frown relaxed but her brows drew together in confusion, 'Goddess what game are you playing today?'

She thought I was the Goddess? 'No, I'm not her. I think I'm like you, a mortal incarnation of her, but I don't understand how I'm with you. Where are we exactly, I thought there was only one avatar at a time?'

She gave her reflection a thoughtful nod. 'You've been to the Aether?'

'Yes! I was just there with...' if I was here, what happened to Dmitri? I tried to sort through the thoughts swirling around me, but none of them were him.

'You just absorbed too much of the Aether,' she tried to reassure me. 'Your consciousness is trying to sort out the memories of your soul after the overload. It happened to me once when I was very young.'

'You can't be that far of a memory if you speak perfect English.' That was somewhat of a relief.

'What is English? We're speaking perfect Coptic.'

She didn't know what English was? That couldn't be a good sign. 'When am I?'

'The floods haven't come yet, but it is early Thoth.'

What kind of date was that? 'Floods?' I should've paid better attention in history class. When did Egyptians first meet the English? 'How far are we from the great pyramids of Giza?'

'The lands of the Maadi?'

'No, I mean the pharaohs' tombs. Great big giant stone triangles made of bricks taller than a man.'