Chapter 5 Callie
five
Callie
I was still pacing when the door opened.
Two guards waited for me in the hall. They were identical twins, standing on four thick legs and resembling iridescent green scaled maned wolves with needle-like spines starting at the end of a truly impressive collar of rich black fur.
Above their wide orange eyes, tall ears rose, their ends curled in towards each other.
They were roughly the same height as some of my mother’s quarter horses, and looked like they weighed close to a thousand pounds each.
Just who the fuck did Anubis think I was?
This was overkill.
The one on the right cocked its head at me, its mouth opening to give me a toothy smile.
“The Lord invites you to dinner. Please follow us.”
The voice was feminine, lilting even and didn’t match at all the creature it spoke from.
“Are both of you female?” I asked, wishing I had my plasma rifle on me.
They smiled at me now, orange eyes flashing. “Yes. Thank you for asking,” the left twin said.
“Please follow us,” the right twin said, her tail twirled behind her like a cat, long and slender.
I narrowed my eyes at them. “And if I refuse?”
A giggle erupted from their throats, akin to a hyena’s cackle but deeper, richer. More terrifying. All the hair on my body stood on end. Their smiles stretched wide, like the Cheshire Cat.
“Then we will drag you,” they intoned together.
Something told me they hoped I’d refuse so they could do just that.
I could fight them, but they stood fifteen hands tall and looked to have what appeared to be retractable tiger claws on the end of their six toed feet.
Judging by the way their shoulders were shaped more like a big cat, they could use them with devastating effect.
No thanks.
I choose life.
I walked out into the wide hall. “After you.”
Their grins shrunk a fraction in disappointment before they turned and started down the hall with their tails waving in the air like those siamese cats from that kids movie.
I’d been upside down the last time I’d come this way so I’d missed all the details.
There were still all the gilded framed photos of random things.
Some had alien portraits, others held landscape paintings, but I’d failed to register just how loudly painted the hall was.
It looked like Elton John had thrown up in here.
It was a kaleidoscope of pinks, purples, greens and gold.
The long rug covering the flooring was a plush pink shag that looked like it had been stolen off an Austin Powers set.
I followed them past closed doors with numbers painted on them in alien script, each door a different wild theme, and turned right twice down two more hallways that were the mirror image of the one my room was located in.
I was guessing that I was in the guest quarters, with how many bedrooms were in this part of the palace.
Finally we came to a tall grandiose archway depicting twisting gold serpents with three heads coiling around the columns, and through them was a bonafide throne room half filled with junk pushed to the far wall.
It gathered around the bronze throne so that it looked like Anubis sat on a junk pile.
I stopped to stare at the body bleeding on the stairs to the dias. The blood had thickened into a pool on the floor. It smelled like Anubis in here… and rage. The hair on my neck stood up and I jogged a little to catch up to the twins.
Past the throne room was a wide hall, then double silver doors with a raised galaxy carved on it that moved with the planets orbiting a star at the center.
The twins pressed their shoulders into each door and pushed them open, revealing a moody purple dining room.
A long silver table took up the center of the room with eight heavy ornately carved chairs around it.
The table was laden with food, steam rising off platters of meat.
It smelled like a smokehouse and my painfully empty stomach jerked like it was going to try to beat me to the table.
Anubis rose from his chair at the head of the table, drawing my attention to him.
I blinked, momentarily stunned at the ridiculousness of his outfit.
The male was wearing tight metallic gold pants that molded to his muscular thighs like wet paint.
A belt made out of what appeared to be rubies hung low on his hips, and a sheer gold shirt clung to him like a second skin, the stiff glittering collar flaring high around his neck like something out of an Elizabethan painting.
His feet were bare, canid, with each claw painted a bright cherry red.
He wore several rings on his toes that matched the rings of gold around his ankles that jingled slightly as he shifted around the table.
“I’m so glad you chose to join me, Callie.
Please, have a seat,” he said, pulling out a chair to his left, which would put my back to the door.
The glimmer in his eye told me that he knew it too.
I clenched my teeth hard but sat down, letting him push the chair close to the table.
He poured a dark black liquid from a gold pitcher into a fancy glass goblet with a flourish before plunking it down in front of me.
The bracelets on his wrists clinked together like a chorus of mocking laughter.
He had jewels on every finger, too. They glittered under the low light of the floating balls suspended over the table, each one a different size.
With the deep purple of the room, the lights looked like stars.
The air felt heavy, heated a touch too high, and combined with the rich aroma of fire seared meat made my eyelids feel heavy.
It was only the gnawing beast my stomach had turned into that kept me conscious.
I didn’t know if this was a deliberate choice to make me more relaxed, or if Anubis just preferred it hot and humid.
I snapped upright when my eyes dropped low enough to nearly close, giving my head a shake to clear it before aiming a glare at him.
“Why am I here? You do realize my people will come for me, right? We are in the middle of a war.”
Anubis nodded his head and hummed as he forked a mini mountain of meat onto a delicate looking glass plate and placed it in front of me. There was a fork and knife to the right of the plate, sitting on top of a napkin that looked to be made out of spun spider web, it was so fine.
“You are here because I wanted you here. I am the Lord of Erral, Watcher In The Deep, He Who Wanders, Blood Of The Fallen, and I always get what I want.” He said all this nonchalantly, fixing his own plate and sitting down to take a bite before looking at me with a smile while he chewed his food, his fork held aloft.
Oookay.
“Look, you Anubis wannabe clown, I don’t care who you are.
Either you let me go before my people get here to burn your little playground to ashes or I am going to off you myself.
You can’t keep me. I will find a way to escape eventually.
You’ll catch me a few times, no doubt. But I’ll keep trying.
Over and over until all your resources are spent trying to keep me contained and then I’ll kill you. ”
He smiled slowly, sat his fork down and leaned back in his chair.
“I am not an Anubis “wannabe”. I am Anubis. Or at least, that is what they called me on your little planet. You may call me Rathal. It is my preferred name, one I reserve for close friends… or lovers.”
I threw up my hands. The male was so arrogant I could hit him over the head with facts all day and he’d still be full of himself. This stupid, pigheaded—wait, what?
“Exactly who called you Anubis?”
He chuckled, forking another perfectly cut square of cooked meat into his mouth. “The humans who ruled the Nile. The Pharaoh's people. I went to your planet in search of what was left of my kin. I found them there… meddling.”
I covered my face with both hands, drawing in a deep, calming breath. It didn’t help much. I really couldn’t handle anymore fucking random ass revelations this year. It was all too much.
Aliens were real.
Jack was a fucking homicidal werewolf who is also an alien.
Aliens lived on Earth, who are also werewolves.
I missed my normal life sometimes. I really did.
I was going to have to explain so much crap to my mother when I finally made it back to Earth.
The lecture was going to be scathing. We Ramirez women were expert lecturers.
My mother was going to start cussing in Spanish so fast I wouldn’t be able to keep up.
Dropping my hands from my face with a sharp exhale through my nose, I picked up my fork and knife in defeat and started eating. I almost screamed in pure frustrated rage the second the meat touched my tongue.
He’d cooked the meat just enough to warm it up for me. It was delicious.
Someone shoot me in the face and put me out of my misery.
Rathal sucked his teeth. “Too much?”
When I only stared at him in response, he tipped his chin with a shrug.
“Ah, well. I’m afraid there’s more, darling. You see, I have another goal. One I think you will have to agree to eventually.”
I sneered at him and took another bite, chewing exaggeratingly hard.
Rathal chuckled darkly. “Rage all you like but you will give in to me in the end.”
He picked up his glass goblet of black liquid, took a sip, and then swirled the drink around while he watched me eat.
“Marry me, Callisto Ramirez.”
I choked on my food, coughing and sputtering while he watched, his smile full of teeth.
I reached for my own goblet and took a desperate gulp of whatever the fuck was in it, not even tasting it as it went down.
“Over my dead fucking body you crazy sonofabitch,” I ground out, setting the glass down hard enough that the liquid sloshed over the sides.
His laughter just about sent me over the table, the knife for cutting my meat suddenly clutched in my fist without me remembering reaching for it.
“Oh, you will,” he purred, leaning forward, his eyes shining.
“Because, if you want to get back to your little war and help your friends, you’ll need my help.
I’m in all their surveillance drones. I’m deep in their systems. I know their supply routes, their back channels in and out of their planets.
All the holes in the defense shields. I’m a fucking pirate, darling. I know how to bring them down.”
I sneered at him and pointed the knife at his face. “We have Anu. She can do all that and more. I don’t need you.”
“You’d think that wouldn’t you? The all powerful Anu, here to save the day.
But people will still die while she’s busy stretching herself thin.
She is a power and her reach is vast, but she is still only one person.
How many soldiers are you and your gaggle of riffraff willing to sacrifice to give her time?
I could save you the trouble. A two pronged approach to cyber warfare is better than one, is it not? ”
Anger locked my spine straight, my shoulders tight with the suppressed urge to stab him in the eye. “Fuck you.”
Rathal threw his head back and laughed deep from his belly. It left his thick throat exposed. He caught me mid lunge, his hand wrapping around mine holding the knife. We stared at each other while the steady drop of spilled wine filled the silence.
“Careful, my prize, you’ll cut yourself.”
I threw my weight forward with as much strength as I could muster.
Rathal’s other hand clutched my shoulder and stopped me dead.
No matter how hard I strained, his relaxed face never twitched.
His eyes shone and his smile remained fixed.
He didn’t even do me the service of shaking a little under my onslaught. Goddamned aliens.
“If you want in my lap, you need only ask. All these dramatics are unnecessary.”
He jerked me forward before my screech of rage could reach full volume, pulling me all the way onto his lap, and wrapping his arms around me tightly to bring my struggles to pissed off wiggling.
A hot breath brushed my ear. “Mmm, don’t stop, darling.”
I snapped my head to the side, my teeth snapping on empty air as he jerked his head out of my way with a laugh.
“Bite me and I will bite back,” he warned. A hot slow lick to the side of my neck had me freezing in place, suddenly very aware of where I sat. “And I’d make sure you’d enjoy it.”
“Hell will freeze over first,” I ground out, my fists clenched at my sides where he had my arms pinned.
“We shall see.”
He stood, taking me with him like I was made of air, and plopped me down on my chair and took his seat again. “But finish eating first. Important decisions shouldn’t be made on an empty stomach.” He held out my steak knife, his eyes mocking me. “Here dear, you’ll be needing this.”
I snatched it, and glared at him.
“Eat. You can go back to your room once you’re done.
” He rose and stood over me. “I will give you three days to decide. Three days to ponder your situation and whether or not you can truly afford to say no. I’ll see you in the morning.
Sleep well, darling.” He winked at me and left.
The twins had stood sentinel at the doors the whole time and they looked at me now with matching smiles.
I flipped them off and finished my meal.