Chapter Three #2
The guards didn’t move as they approached.
Anhur and Dante stopped a few feet away as Khalida strode past them, standing next to the tallest immortal.
With military precision, the guards disbanded and walked into the darkness, using the shadows to disappear from view.
The immortals wouldn’t have gone far, not with Anhur in the room.
Talik slowly walked toward the table. Khalida still wore the holier-than-thou expression on her face.
The stench was not getting any better. It was going to stay on his skin like some human infection, and it would likely be impossible to wash the stench off.
He bit back a sigh. He was going to demand hazard pay from Dante for this brief excursion.
But not before he was going to joyfully burn the uniform.
“You can have the honor,” Khalida said as he approached her. She clicked a button, and the glass covering retracted silently into the ground. Her arms crossed as she stood in a defensive position.
At first it was subtle, but then it hit him like a freight train. Decaying three-day-old corpse was putting it mildly. He took a step back at the intensity but quickly recovered. But not before noticing the hint of a wince on Khalida’s features.
He flashed her a smile as he grabbed the black cloth covering the serpopard, ignoring the stench emanating from it, and with a flourish flicked the material, and showcased the body underneath it.
Khalida sent him an annoyed look that immensely improved his mood even as he barely stopped himself from choking on the heavy air.
Taking a step back, he stared at the offending beast—a serpopard.
The damn creatures looked like they had been conjured up by someone’s nightmare.
A cross between a sabretooth tiger and a snake, they were the size of a giant lion.
Their enormous catlike bodies with short brown and white spotted fur was monstrous enough, without their snake-like necks and heads.
Its black forked tongue hung loosely and half curled around its sharp, razor-like teeth.
This close, the burn marks from the blasters were hard to miss as was the giant gaping hole where Khalida had slit its stomach open.
He grimaced. Pink intestines peeked out.
An unlucky Atlantean had attempted to stitch the stomach together, but they had done an abysmal job.
Not that Talik blamed them. He would never get used to them or their smell.
And he damn well hoped he never encountered a live one again.
Mother nature had outdone herself with this creation.
“Were any caught alive?” Anhur asked, breaking the silence as he poked at one of the giant paws, revealing claws that had been engineered to climb sheer rock faces and allowed them to almost defy gravity in their ability to traverse upside down across rocky ceilings.
“No,” Khalida answered curtly. “And they are likely still within the Arx. The tunnels we recently discovered haven’t been mapped, and we are unlikely to have an opportunity once the vault is closed—it houses our only known access point.”
“Can the vault not stay open?” Talik asked, ignoring the glare from Khalida as he pulled his shirt from his neck. Was he getting warm, or could he actually be allergic to the uniform he was stupidly still wearing?
“This would not be an issue if the Atlantean elite didn’t obsessively follow archaic bylaws,” Khalida said.
“Only opening it every five hundred years in some grand ceremony has resulted in us not being able to survey the underground tunnels. This could have prevented the serpopards from entering the Arx.”
Talik couldn’t fault Khalida’s logic. The serpopards had appeared out of nowhere, numbering in the hundreds, and somehow, they had infiltrated the ancient forgotten tunnel system as they had hunted for Rieka, Dante’s unofficial consort.
“Not without drawing the attention of the other Houses.” Anhur sighed as he pinched the bridge of his nose.
Talik wanted to object, but it would be futile.
When Atlantis and the royal House had fallen, it had given the surviving four Houses an opportunity to rewrite history and destroy any evidence that didn’t support their new narrative.
Despite outward appearances, the Atlantean Houses were not equals nor did they share many common interests, outside of a general dislike of humanity.
Dante stayed silent as he walked around the table, appearing unbothered.
“Any requests would have required us explaining the existence of the creatures,” Anhur reiterated. “Animals that we do not have any records of because our ancestors decided it was easier to erase the evidence from history than tell us about them.”
Anhur’s tone implied this wasn’t the first time they’d had this conversation. And Talik was smart enough to stay out of it.
“As far as we know, only a handful of people know the serpopards exist, and most of us are in this room. We need to keep it quiet,” Dante added. “I have no desire to deal with mass hysteria from the Atlantean or human population.”
“Not good for business,” Khalida said sarcastically.
Dante raised an eyebrow at Khalida. “No.”
“For now, it is the best we can do,” Anhur countered. “Until we have a better grasp of what is occurring, we need to control the narrative. And if that requires us keeping the existence of these creatures a secret, then that is what we will do. It will not be for forever.”
Khalida twitched, her hand tightening on the hilt as she visibly forced herself not to argue with her father. Her gaze was glacial. “As you wish, Lord Azaes.”
“What about the wayfarers and the Anki?” Talik asked, choosing to change the subject as the temperature in the room dropped a few degrees.
He wasn’t sure he enjoyed being the voice of reason.
The appearance of the serpopards hadn’t been the only surprise they had gotten in the last few days.
The ancient Atlanteans had been very good at keeping secrets.
They had graciously wiped out any hint of an existence of an ancient pantheon of gods, the Anki, and their zealot minions known as the wayfarers.
He would have been impressed if they weren’t dealing with the consequences.
“Did the immortals glean any more information about them?”
“The worthless Atlanteans and humans who have betrayed their own species... the so-called wayfarers.” Khalida asked, as a dark look passed over her features. “They died before they could be interrogated. Self-inflicted. But not before declaring their allegiance to their ancient gods.”
“I have seen your definition of self-inflicted,” Dante drolly added.
So had Talik, and it was not pretty.
Khalida ignored Dante, turning to look at the serpopard.
She touched the base of the table, and the glass cover ascended, blocking some of the stench, but not enough.
“They all said one name. Ninhursag. One of the Anki I assume. I am assuming they were declaring their allegiance to their ancient god.”
“Not to the O’hurani?” Talik asked. He would have assumed they would have begged for protection from the O’hurani, the king of the Anki, a god who supposedly had limitless power, and not one of his subordinate gods.
Maybe the wayfarers were not very bright?
Or perhaps the wayfarers were not aware of the hierarchy within the Anki pantheon and that Ninhursag served the King.
“Ninhursag is also the name given to an ancient Mesopotamian deity who was worshipped more than three thousand years ago,” Anhur mused before he looked them over. “I wonder if they are linked or if it is coincidence.”
Talik didn’t believe in coincidences, not with power-hungry gods who wanted to remake the world in their bloody image. “And they were the deity of...”
“The creation of humanity and the earth was attributed to her.”
“Nothing major? Just a mother goddess figure?” Talik put his hands in his pockets and took a couple of steps away from the marble table. “I’m assuming she also wants to find Atlantis.”
Khalida’s top lip curled. “And more than enough time to build networks and allegiances that will be nigh impossible to identify without an insider.”
The silence surrounding them grew until it was almost uncomfortable.
“We need to find Ninhursag and prevent her from finding Atlantis. Under no circumstances can she be allowed to reunite with the O’hurani,” Dante quietly said, as he looked at Talik.
“We contain and interrogate her. She may have a clue to stopping the O’hurani before his powers are fully replenished. ”
Unlike Dante, Talik was not as confident that they could kill a true god.
Khalida shook her head ruefully. “We need more than Ninhursag. Our ancestors were only able to slow down the O’hurani, and it cost us the destruction of Atlantis. It may have triggered an eleven-thousand-year hibernation, but he is now waking up. Because of us.”
Talik wouldn’t go so far as to place the blame entirely on their actions, but they certainly had helped the process of awakening the ancient god when Rieka had activated the violet flame.
As a direct descendant of Vandana, the last queen of Atlantis—Rieka had been the missing link the Anki had been looking for.
“Going to appeal to the god’s better nature?” Talik muttered under his breath.
Dante slowly smiled, but his eyes remained glacial. “Even gods know that there are worse things than death...especially gods who have been relegated to the past and forgotten by time.”
“How do you propose finding Ninhursag?” Khalida asked as she tightened her grip on the hilt of her sword.
Talik took in the subtle movement. She must be slightly more annoyed than she was letting on.
“Sypha.” Talik shook his head, slightly uneasy at the turn of conversation. They were going to need someone they trusted, and the seer was their only actual option. “If they wake up.”