I Found

IV. reunion

REMINDER: Italics are hieroglyphs.

I M H O T E P

I was awakened by a small swift object jumping on me, alerting me of the pain in my body. My mind, immediately went into defense mood as I quickly tried to think of what to panic at first before I went into fight or flight mood. The object moved lightly on me, forcing me to quickly make my choice. I groaned, trying to look down as I panicked to check what the object was.

"Shu, no!"

I froze as I heard the familiar voice, I had started to forget - that familiar angelic voice. Though, it had a different tone to it - a calmer tone. It almost sounded more... Mature and darker, yet still remained angelic. Sounds of soft footsteps rushing on wood, filled my ears. I looked at the person to see a bright light and golden silk, only that time the light wasn't the sun, nor was the silk sand. The light was the reflection of the sun rays on the silky golden hair, which belonged to the woman in front of me.

She stood there, her back straight, shoulders relaxed and head tilted to the side at the furry creature in her arms. It couldn't have possibly been her. She was dead. My golden beauty was dead. I had lost her when I ignored logic and reason, long ago. So, who was this young woman in front of me? How come she seemed like her so much? How come I decided that she looked like her without seeing her face?

Could it be her reincarnation perhaps?

"Amunet..." I breathed out. The girl tensed as she raised her head to stand up straight before crouching to put the creature down, giving me a view of it. It was a kitten - a small kitten, which meowed at her, nuzzling her leg before walking away. I saw the girl hesitate before turning around to look at me. 

I let my eyes wander, carefully on her face to take in her features. Instead of seeing the soft eyes, which were always full of wonder, with the wrinkles caused by smiling and the slightly parted lips in focus as they had  always been ready to spare smiles, I saw blank eyes with dark bags under them and slight wrinkles between her eyebrows, indicating exhaustion - the exhaustion that was obvious on her face, even if her eyes looked blank. I saw slightly pursed lips and a scar that ran down the side of her face.

I still knew she was my golden beautiful.

"Morning." She spoke, softly. It was her. I was almost too sure of it.

"Who are you?" I pleaded.

"Who do you think am I?" The young woman in front of me teased. I tried getting up, only to have her press a firm, yet gentle hand on my chest to hold me down. I looked down at her hand, seeing the familiar small fingers, that she had always been insecure about and I just knew it. It was her.

"Amunet." My eyes softened as I scanned her face, again. "It is you."

"It is I." Her voice softened, as well. "It's been three thousand years."

"How?" A smile grew on my face.

"Nefertiti couldn't handle a single reminder of what you've done so, she did something about it." She rolled her eyes a bit.

"Is this your second life?" I asked.

"No.. It is the first and possibly the only life, I'll ever have." She stated.

"You... You've been alive all along?" Surprise laced my words as I spoke.

"No thanks to you, of course." She rolled her eyes at me. That was new. Amunet never rolled her eyes. My smile disappeared. Something was off...

"What happened to you?" I asked. Her eyes narrowed, slightly and I could almost see angry smoke coming out of her ears. She walked to the table at the corner of the room, pouring herself some of the drink in the flask that sat on the table. She sipped from her goblet-like glass before visibly calming down.

"Do you mean after you accused me of bitching about your dead poor excuse of a girlfriend or after you killed the man, you vowed to serve?" She replied, casually. I flinched a bit at her sass. Something was definitely off.

"What is that?" I asked, motioning towards the goblet in her hand.

"That's a drink to keep me from lashing out and biting people's heads off." She explained. She set her goblet back on the table so, I assumed it was empty.

"You can't really be that upset about something that happened more than two thousand years ago, not that I had any control over what happened to me."

Her head whipped in my direction to look at me with an expression that would've given nothing about what she was feeling if it wasn't for her clenched jaw.

"Not that you had any control over what happened to you?" Her voice had a dangerously low tone to it. "You were the only one who had control over what happened." She hissed.

"What happened to you?" I shook my head in disbelief. How could she accuse me of getting cursed? How could she accuse me of deliberately wanting to end up in the underworld, where only torture is real?

"You did."