CHAPTER ONE
Celosiawing has never seen all four pharaohs in the same place before. Scarabsun rules DeltaClan, and they are a constant fixture among the bent-reed dens, but the others are not normally welcome here. They should be fighting, yet they walk side-by-side with united purpose, picking their way between the trailing branches of the delta.
Scarabsun looks furious. They bristle with their tail arched over their back, poised like a scorpion, and even from a distance, Celosiawing can see their eyes blazing with all the heat of the desert.
Beside Scarabsun, the other pharaohs look equally unhappy in their own ways. Old Oriolesun radiates disappointment, her frame drooping with it, while Waspsun is taut with energy, his caliby pelt lying flat but his expression etched deep into a scowl. And where Celosiawing expects Cranesun’s cream pelt, there is a ginger she-cat in his place, brimming with an unfocused anger.
The group visits the medicine den first, much to Celosiawing’s surprise. All together, they squeeze into the woven reeds, only to back out again with greater fury. She has been visited by other medicine cats in the past, and her mentor before her was especially cordial to his equals, but Ripplebreeze has been dead for nearly eight moons now, and Celosiawing is hardly the socialite he was. And to be sought by all four pharaohs? Surely unheard of.
With her gathered papyrus leaves tucked under her chin, she trots around the deepest rivulets of the delta and makes her way across the warm black soil toward the party of pharaohs. “Does someone need help?” she asks, dropping the leaves beside her den.
The pharaohs whirl on her, having looked across the other end of the delta. None of them brighten at her appearance, and the unfamiliar red tabby surges forward. “You,” she snarls before Scarabsun steps in the way.
“Sandsun. Please allow me to handle this.”
“Handle what?” Celosiawing hates the tremor in her voice. A moment ago, she was ready to help the pharaohs, and now fear rushes through her veins like sand slipping out from under feet. The fury her pharaoh wears does nothing to soothe the sudden hammering of her heart, and the undercurrent of confusion in their eyes is even worse. “Handle what, Scarabsun?” she repeats.
The pharaohs fan out around Scarabsun, Sandsun remaining the closest. Scarabsun shakes their head. “Celosiawing,” they begin formally. “You are to report to the temple of Osiris. Your crimes are to be judged and your soul is to be weighed before the pharaohs of this world and the next. The murder of Cranesun cannot and will not go unpunished.”
Cranesun is dead. The pharaoh of DuneClan has been
murdered.
The world swims, as if trapped in a mirage. The pharaohs think Celosiawing is to blame for his death. “I… I…” she stammers. “He’s dead? When? How?”
The pharaohs close in a circle around her and begin to march her away from the medicine den. “You’ll tell us,” Sandsun promises, her words as sharp as her teeth. “And by the gods, you had better tell us the truth.”
CHAPTER TWO
The Temple of Osiris stands tall among the rest of the temples, but there is not another soul in sight. Humans frequent it rarely save to perform their death rites, and when the pharaohs escort Celosiawing up the steps in the scorching midday sun, there are no other cats to be seen either.
They vanish inside, and cool, damp air washes over them like a flood. Celosiawing shivers, as she has been since leaving the DeltaClan camp. No one has spoken to her, and she has given up pleading to be heard. Even Scarabsun has neglected to acknowledge her, a stinging realization. They have always been on her side before, even when she was young and desperate to change the course of her life, afraid to go forward as a warrior when the path of a medicine cat lay before her. They believed in her ability to become someone else, someone new.
Now they believe she has murdered a rival Clan’s pharaoh, and any support she once counted on has disappeared.
The path deeper into Anubis’s tomb is sloped, leading into the heart of the earth. The scent of magic hangs thick in the air, accompanied by the sweet scent of linen and preservatives that the humans bury their dead with. At the head of the group, Oriolesun pauses, then exhales, and a small cluster of light rises from between her shoulders, illuminating the passage. It’s a simple spell, one that many cats have mastered young, but Oriolesun is an old cat, and it looks as if the conjuration has required a great deal of effort.
Instinct pushes Celosiawing forward to check on OasisClan’s leader. If a single spell takes such a toll on her, then she ought to conserve her energy, and even better, have a long talk with a medicine cat. But the moment Celosiawing moves to fill that role, a vicious hiss from Waspsun forces her to fall back in line.
No one comes within more than a whisker-length of her if they can help it. When one of the tunnels narrows, she can almost feel Scarabsun and Waspsun at her sides, but as soon as the passage widens, they give her a wide berth again, their eyes flickering sideways to watch her progress. And all the while, Sandsun remains behind her, a daunting presence. For such a young pharaoh, she carries the burden of power like a natural. Perhaps that is not unusual, as the line of succession is kept within families until the dynasty meets its end, but Sandsun could not have been prepared to take this role, not if her father was murdered.
It is possible the pharaoh’s fury sustains her. Celosiawing picks up her pace as Sandsun burns behind her, coming as close as she dares to the other pharaohs before they can snarl at her again. All the way to the heart of the temple, she bobs between the two extremes, her heart quailing deep in her chest as the air gets colder and a fresh breeze trickles up from below.
She has been here once before, when Ripplebreeze died, when she carried him to his resting place at the feet of Osiris. In the central chamber, with windows high above to let the night air in, sunlight falls on the black stone statue of the god, illuminating the worn path to his feet. Many paws have tread this way to leave their dead, and many human feet have approached to complete cats’ final rites, carrying them away, blessing them with linen and perfume like human royalty. It is familiar, but it is not comforting.
In the center of the chamber, where the sun has fallen so neatly, the pharaohs herd Celosiawing into place. The golden light is dazzling after the dark journey, and she blinks to clear her eyes.
Sandsun must see it as an admission of guilt. “Why did you kill Cranesun?” she snarls, pacing the sunlight’s edge. “What did you have to gain from poisoning him at the prime of his life?”
Poison. That’s more than the pharaohs were willing to share in the DeltaClan camp. Celosiawing winces as her gut knots itself over and over again; that would be one reason to suspect her, though hardly damning evidence. “I didn’t kill him,” she protests, shrinking from Sandsun’s rage. “I didn’t know he was dead until you fetched me!”
“And I suppose you don’t know why he was left on the steps of Thoth’s temple, either!” Even when Waspsun edges closer to Sandsun in warning, DuneClan’s leader refuses to hold her tongue. “How many cats have pledged themselves to Thoth? How many cats know all the desert’s poisons like the back of their paw? Not many. I know. I’ve asked, and you are the only one.”
Bile rises hot and fast in Celosiawing’s throat, and the world tilts on its side. Cranesun dead. Murdered. Poisoned and left to rot on the steps of Thoth’s temple. Her patron god’s sacred grounds were defiled with murder! And her own reputation, too! “I… I…” The words catch in her throat and die there, slain by doubt, by the eyes beginning to blink open all around the chamber. Caught up in Osiris’s towering form, in her own terror, she had failed to notice the other cats when the pharaohs escorted her in. The Clans’ scribes and medicine cats are there too, along with some of the more senior warriors. She sees Jackalstripe and Mandrakefur standing beside Aspheart in the shadow of a pillar, while the three medicine cats of CloudClan, Lionthorn, Swanheart, and Irispool, gather closer to the corner. A host of DuneClan cats glare at her from beyond Sandsun’s taut form, and almost hiding beside the statue of Osiris is Dustwhisker from OasisClan, along with a red tabby Celosiawing has never met before. They both look away when she catches their eyes.
“Tell us how you did it,” Scarabsun says, pulling Celosiawing’s attention away from the forms in the shadows. “Tell the truth, and the gods may have mercy on your soul.”
“I am telling the truth!” Her voice breaks. “Whatever happened to Cranesun is not my fault. I didn’t know. I swear on Thoth. I swear on Maat!”
Oriolesun’s voice is thin in the massive room, but of all the pharaohs, she carries the least vitriol in her voice. “Sandsun found him after the eclipse, when he failed to return to his den. That was last night. Where were you then? Can anyone vouch for you?”
Last night, last night. Celosawing’s mind races, and the eclipse burns bright and red in her mind. Thoth had given her the knowledge to predict it, and she had told the other medicine cats when it would arrive. She had not anticipated how long it would last, though, and as the desert sands writhed with the weight of the evil in the sky, she had not been able to safely return from gathering strands of ivy from the human gardens until far closer to dawn than she had anticipated.
The truth must be told. It must. “I was picking ivy from the gardens near the temple of Hathor to bind Turtleleaf’s splint. She twisted a paw in the mud yesterday morning, and I used up most of my stock. I needed more for a splint change this morning.”
But who can provide an alibi for Celosiawing? [Voting has closed and the winner is Laurelthorn.]» Irispool of CloudClan, the youngest medicine cat, only a moon into her training and known to frequent the gardens
» Dustwhisker of OasisClan, a warrior seen and briefly greeted while crossing the territory line between CloudClan and DeltaClan
» Jackalstripe of DeltaClan, a warrior Celosiawing spoke to before she left camp to find the ivy for the splint
» Laurelthorn of DuneClan, a warrior seen lurking near the gardens but left unchallenged due to DuneClan/DeltaClan tensionsAnd which pharaoh should Celosiawing focus her plea of innocence on? [Voting has closed, and the winner is Scarabsun.]» Scarabsun» Sandsun
» Oriolesun
» Waspsun
CHAPTER THREE
To speak so openly to the pharaohs is daunting, and to be doubted despite the truth shakes Celosiawing to her core. Nonetheless, she continues; what other choice does she have?
“I knew the eclipse was coming, and intended to return before it arrived. I would never risk the red sands, not for anything in Egypt. That’s why I stayed in the gardens when the eclipse came early.”
In the circle of cats, this ring of judgment, cats murmur amongst themselves. None of them would dare to cross the red sands. Even kits know that when the earth runs red, Set is about, and his evil knows no bounds. Those that stray into his path are never the same again, provided they survive. Hiding from the god of chaos is the only prudent choice.
But Waspsun looks unimpressed. “Did anyone see you, though? We cannot take your word for it when a pharaoh lies dead.”
At her fellow leader’s words, Sandsun curls her lip, eyes flashing. Her words, though, she directs at Celosiawing. “Answer the question. My patience wears thin.”
A heartbeat passes. Two. The air begins to grow stale in Celosiawing’s lungs, but the weight on her chest refuses to let her take a fresh breath. Like the time she was bit by an adder, watched by her mentor until she summoned the spell to heal herself, the world seems impossible, and all sense of time evades her. Instead of fever pumping through her veins, warring with venom, fear makes her head spin.
“Laurelthorn,” she finally wheezes. The name rings like thunder in the stillness of the chamber, tearing through the silence. Then, in the next moment, the rest spills free. “I saw them at our shared border, and they saw me. I don’t know what they were doing, and I was thinking more about getting ivy for Turtleleaf. We didn’t talk, but we saw each other before the eclipse began.”
Fire erupts in Sandsun’s eyes. “You accuse one of my warrior of crossing the borders—”
“I accuse Laurelthorn of nothing but seeing me! And you accuse me of a murder I did not commit!”
Never has Celosiawing dared to interrupt a pharaoh before, but the words tumble out in a rush, and her limbs tremble as she bottles up an apology. Sandsun may be a pharaoh, but that does not mean Celosiawing cannot be angry with her, nor that she must apologize for defending herself.
Her outburst takes too long to settle over the gathered cats, the silence too thick to be comfortable. Through the windows high above, the sunlight takes on an orange hue, bathing the stone floor in evening light.
Orange, so soon before sunset? And already shifting to red? Celosiawing remembers then that eclipses often come in pairs. Last night was an unusually long lunar eclipse, and now its solar counterpart has arrived.
Most of the cats in the chamber have noticed as well. Cats skitter into the shadows to escape the shifting light, and even the pharaohs exchange glances, brows furrowed and tails lashing tightly, low to the sandy floor. “We should call a recess,” suggests Oriolesun, “until the Lord of Chaos has passed us by.”
They should, it is true, but the Lord of Chaos descends too quickly. The temple floor is plunged into furious red light, and cats hiss and screech, sprinting away from Set’s evil influence. Few get far, though, including Celosiawing. By the time her paws catch up with the logic in her head and the terror in her heart, the ground is roiling beneath her. The heaving sands throw her headlong into one of the pillars that supports the vaulted ceiling, and chunks of stone rain down around her. One plunges into the ground beside her head, spraying sand, and another glances off her shoulder. She can feel the hot rush of blood welling to the surface in the stone’s wake.
And as suddenly as it began, it is over. Set passes, and the sun’s golden glow returns, dappling the temple in gentle light. The earth stills, the sand settles, and all is as it was before.
Except for the injured.
Which cat should Celosiawing attempt to heal first? Select one.» Oriolesun
» Aspheart
» Jackalstripe
» Dustwhisker
» Sandsun
CHAPTER FOUR
Coming after voting on Chapter Three ends!