“The world must be brought under control,” he said calmly. “And that cannot happen unless the people on it are brought to heel. Ancient Egypt was one of the most orderly civilizations in the history of humankind. People respond best when they work to earn the approbation of a superior, a pharaoh, a god. I’m only applying that old system to the present day. You and I will build a Utopia.”
Krysty snorted. “You’ll build another tyrannical fiefdom, no different than all the other petty little kingdoms ruled by petty little dictators. I won’t help you build another.”
Akhnaton sighed again. He lifted a hand as if to stroke her face. His fingers closed around her throat, pressing the golden collar cruelly into the soft flesh of her throat. Krysty didn’t struggle. She stared fearlessly into his hell-hued eyes.
“It’s too late for you to think you have a choice,” he rasped. “Too late to rebel, too late to find a spine. You’ll cooperate with the ceremony. You’ll join me in the sarcophagus as I undergo the transformation, the ascension. You will submit to me as I fill you with my sperm. You will carry the seeds of my dynasty.”
Akhnaton released her as swiftly as he had grabbed her. She swayed, catching herself on the edge of the cart. He stared at the pyramidion and said tonelessly, “I hoped to love you, Krysty. I wanted to love you. If I cannot have that, then I’ll accept your obedience as a substitute.”
Krysty said nothing. She followed his gaze to the sparkling capstone, but focused her vision through it, beyond it. It was difficult to call on the power of the Earth Mother without a short period of meditation. She wasn’t sure if she could do it, but it was the only alternative left to her.
RYAN BOUNDED UP THE SIDE of the pyramid like a cat. The crowd below him paid no attention. They stood silent and spellbound, struck dumb by the spectacle of the palaquin reaching the apex of Pharaoh’s monument.
Ryan sluiced sweat away from his forehead before it flowed into his eye and blinded him. Air whistled in his throat, and his lungs labored. Leg muscles strained and twinged with the effort of propelling him at a reckless speed up the steep stairs.
He had no plan except to do what he could do to disrupt the ceremony of Hell Eyes. He refused to speculate on Krysty’s possible willing participation in it.
By the time he reached the opening in the face of the pyramid, Ryan’s legs were weak and rubbery and his heart pounded heavily. The steady creaking from the winch and pulley had ceased. In spite of the silence, the atmosphere around the pyramid was electric with expectancy. In the dimming light of the setting sun, Aten seemed to wait breathlessly.
Ryan didn’t wait, despite wanting to sit down to find his second wind. He stepped over to the recessed opening, feet on the stone lip, and pulled himself inside, holding on to a taut rope for support. The drum of the winch occupied most of the space, and he squirmed around it. A sharp edge caught a fold of his tunic and it ripped.
“Hey, you!” a surprised voice called from the dimness. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m lost,” Ryan called back.
“What?”
Two figures emerged from the shadows, dressed in the animal helmets of the Incarnates and carrying the metauh staves. One wore the likeness of Thoth, the other of Set. Due to their size and strength, they had been given the honor of winching Pharaoh and his bride to the place of marriage.
Ryan’s hands explored swiftly the area around the drum and winch, searching for anything he could use, or even improvise, as a weapon. All he found was a crank handle propped against the wall. It was of heavy cold-rolled iron, with one end bearing thick flanges.
Snatching it up, he hefted it experimentally and sprang out of the alcove in blind desperation. All of his strength and weight went into the arm that swung the handle. It crashed against the side of Thoth’s jaw, and the big man rolled lifeless to the floor, face shattered, cervical vertebrae fractured.