The Medallion of Kings (Open Novella Contest)

Chapter 2

Sarah stood frozen, staring at the boy who had just spoken. He was looking back at her with curiosity in his green eyes. And they were weird eyes, she decided. While they were indeed green, they were so vibrant, they were almost glowin, the pupils dissappearing in their depths.

After looking for what felt like a full, solid minute, Sarah cleared her throat "Excuse me, what did you just say?"

"Did you like my tomb?" the boy asked again. "I know it is not grand, or filled with treasure, like one would expect, but it is still an intere-"

"No, I'm gonna stop you right there" Sarah said. "See, this cannot be happening now. I know I've been working too hard and maybe I'm seeing hallucinations, but this is too much, way too much".

"Sarah, calm down" the child said to her. "You are not hallucinating or anything. I'm real... Well, as real as I can be given the fact that I've been dead for the past three thousand years".

"How do you know my name?" Sarah asked him.

"Really, out of everything, that is what you want to know?"

"It is the only thing close to reality I can think of right now, and I do not want to start thinking about everything else, because I'm really goint to lose it. And I don't want to" she almost yelled the last sentence.

"Okay, okay, relax. You're right, it's too much to take in all at once. I'm going to start at the beginning. My name is Djety and I was the head priest of the cult of Osiris almost three thousand years ago. When I was alive, I made a deal with the gods, which led to a weird arrangement in my afterlife. This, in turn, led to my presence here, in what, I can assume, is your office. Bottom line, I wanted to to ask a favor of you. As to how I know your name, I happen to be a priest revived by the gods. I know things like that. Are you with me this far?"

Sarah had remained silent throughout this conversation. The logical part of her brain screamed at her that this was a hallucination due to the lack of sleep, but there was still a tiny part of her that wanted to believe that all this was real, that she was in fact staring at the reincarnation of an ancient egyptian priest, whose tomb she was digging.

She took a deep breath to calm her nerves. When she opened her eyes the child was still there, staring right back at her.

"Okay" she said, her voice still shaking from the shock. "Say that I believe you, that you are indeed the owner of the tomb I am responsible for digging."

"I am" he answered with a smile.

"Then, what is this favor you want to ask of me? And why must it be me who has to do it?"

"Well, at least you are taking it better than I thought" he answered. "Well, you see, amongst the artefacts you found, there was a medallion made of red gold with the ankh symbol engraved on it. Part of the deal I made so long ago, concerns this exact Jewel and I would like it back, if possible."

"Okay, now I'm curious, although I still cannot possibly believe that I'm having this conversation, I will ask, what is this medallion? Because I have seen a lot of golden jewelry, but this is different. It has something weird. A pull of some sort, and I don't mean that in a good way."

Djety looked away at her words, but she managed to catch a slight red of shame on his cheeks.

"I do not want to get you more involved than necessary with this. It's not something you want to know. Just help me get it back and then I will leave you in peace."

"But -" Whatever Sarah was about to say, she never managed to because at that moment the sound of breaking glass echoed in the room and startled them both.

Sarah and Djety looked at each other with panicked eyes.

"It came from the lab, where we have the artefacts" she said.

"Oh, no" Djety answered. They both took off running towards the lab and opening the door they came upon a horrible sight. Broken glass lay scattered on the floor from a nearby window and a dark figure, back turned to them, was frantically searching through the various boxes with the artefacts. With the opening of the door, it turned towards them. Sarah was left speechless. While it was humanoid in form, it was entirely made out of darkness, with two red eyes glaring furiously at her.

When it saw them, it opened its mouth and let loose the most horrible scream Sarah had ever heard. Fear overtook her and she threw up her hands to cover her ears. At that moment, Djety sprang forward and raising his hand, he uttered a string of words Sarah couldn't hear due to the scream. The effect was immediate. The scream ended and a blinding light enveloped the creature, which promptly shrank out of existence.

All was silent. Sarah slowly uncovered her ears and looked around. Shattered pottery and broken artefacts from the tomb lay all over the floor. Her eyes roamed the space, searching and finding the medallion, fortunately still there, before returning to Djety's eyes, only to find them filled with sadness.

"I'm so sorry Sarah" he said. "They shouldn't have seen you and now I've dragged you into this and this shouldn't have happened." His eyes were now filled with tears.

"What are you talking about? What was that?" Sarah asked panicked.

"That was one of Seth's hunters. A shadow of chaos, formed by hatred and fear. He sends them to do his bidding, in this case retrieve the medallion. Now they have seen you with me and they will come after you, believing you are related to this whole mess. I am a fool for letting my guard down" he spat the last sentence forcefully.

Sarah was still reeling from the shock, but she managed to calm down long enough to say to him "Okay, I still don't understand what is going on, but I also can see that this is dangerous. So here's what we'll do. We cannot remove the medallion from the lab without good cause, so I'm going to write a report that I took it with me for further study until tomorrow. We're going to my tent to figure some things out and see how it goes from there. Meanwhile, I'll ring the alarm and wait for someone to come and I'll explain to him about the attempted robbery here. Until, I'm done, you wait for me outside, away from prying eyes."

Djety nodded in agreement and promptly took off.

Sarah sighed and went to the other room to pick up her phone. She had a feeling that this was going to be a long night.

Hi everyone!!! I'm back!! So, after some thought and musings on how to go about this novella, I have decided to split this story into smaller chapters, which are easier to write... I really hope it goes well...
So I would like to thank you again so much for reading my story and I promise I will try to update sooner...