Warrior's Queen

Chapter - 13

Their reunion with Alex was interrupted when the eery sound of rustling and squealing told them that they were no longer alone in the forest.

"Time to go!" Rick ushered the group on, not batting an eye as he ran for the opposite direction.

"I thought you said they were nothing!" Jonathan protested, staring from the bushes to Rick in confusion before Jasmine grabbed his arm and pulled on him.

"Come on, Jonathan!" she said, still dragging him on after her. As they ran, Jasmine made the mistake of looking back and gasped when she saw the tiny mummies swinging towards them on vines. And the worst thing about them was that they holding small, sharp daggers in their hands.

In her hesitation, Jonathan accidentally ran down a different path from Rick and Evie, but with the mummies chasing them, it was too late for the two to turn back.

"Oh, great! Now we're lost!" she complained. Jasmine knew they had no chance to defeat the mummies alone, and at the moment she was ready with her gun and ready to use the sword if needed.

She suddenly felt a pang in her chest, and with an air of sadness, she realized that she missed Ardeth more than ever. She wanted to see him, to hear his reassuring voice, to have him tell her that everything would be alright. He would understand the conflicting turmoil bubbling inside her.

Her footsteps slowed.

"Keep going!" Jonathan yelled, jolting her out of her reverie and smacking right into the body of one of the red-scarved men as they turned a corner. When they were running from a common enemy, though, their rivalry had been long forgotten.

Their earlier battle had turned into a race for their lives. Never had Jasmine forced herself to run this fast, but she knew that if she slowed even a little bit, she would be done for. No matter how much her legs begged to rest, she had to keep running for the sake of seeing Ardeth again. She couldn't give up, not now, not when they were so close...

He must be fighting, too. Jasmine couldn't let him down. Not now.

Jasmine sent a prayer of thanks to the gods of Egypt when Jonathan noticed a small clearing to one side and pointed triumphantly to it. "Look! There's a burial ground. We're safe, we're safe! See those sacred stones? They'll never cross those!"

"You are sure?" the dark-skinned man asked doubtfully.

Jonathan glared back, silently daring the other man to challenge him. "Yes, of course, I'm sure!"

Jasmine managed to get her foot stuck in some roots near and fell down hard. She took a second to recover and pulled herself up to see. "No! " She shouted. "They can cross it!" But it was too late.

Jonathan and the red-scarfed man screaming but Jonathan ducked in time, making Jasmine squat down just in time. This, unfortunately, left the third man completely open and received the mummy's stab to his chest. Their screams caught the mummy's attention, but it simply screamed back at them before climbing up the wooden platform and disappearing into the darkness.

"Sorry! My mistake!" Jonathan apologized quickly to their companion, who now had a knife protruding from his wound and was looking back in shock. He then beckoned to Jasmine, and the two of them ran on, out of the clearing.

"Should we have left him behind?" Jasmine fussed, some of her old personality coming back to her as she saw the injured man. "We could still have saved him if we brought him along..."

Jonathan groaned. "At a time like this, it's every man for himself, Mini!"

He did have a point - and his advice was something that only Jonathan would know - but Jasmine still felt guilty as they finally stumbled upon the path that Rick and Evie had gone.