Chapter 4 #2
“Fair point.” She checked her phone. “I’m starving. There’s supposed to be a few excellent restaurants nearby. Are you going to judge my food choices too?”
“Of course.”
The restaurant she chose was small, tucked down a side street, with plastic chairs and faded awnings. I admired her willingness to travel off the beaten path. I approved of her choice, though I did not tell her so immediately.
She ordered koshary, and when it arrived as a glorious mess of rice, lentils, pasta, and spiced tomato sauce, she dug in with clear pleasure. I sat across from her, a shimmer of glamour showing other diners a man sipping coffee, while in truth I simply observed.
“You don’t eat?” she asked between bites.
“Not as mortals do. If necessary, I can, but I do not require sustenance the same way you do.”
“Must be nice. I require sustenance constantly. That’s why I’m not a size 0.” She paused, her fork halfway to her mouth. “This is so weird. I’m having lunch with a god.”
“You are having lunch. I am observing you eating lunch.”
“Even weirder.” But she smiled again.
A man approached our table then. He was large, aggressive, and smelled of cheap cologne and bad intentions. He leaned over Jessica, speaking in heavily accented English.
“You American? I can show you the best papyrus shop, real Egyptian art, very good price.”
“No, thank you,” Jessica said politely, but he did not move.
“Special tour, just for you, beautiful lady. I will make a very good deal.”
I stood.
To Jessica, I was a six-foot-tall jackal rising to my full height, with my ears back and lips pulled away from teeth that could crush bone. To the vendor, I was simply a tall man, but the glamour carried enough of my true presence to make him stumble backward.
“The lady said no,” I said quietly.
He turned, shuddered and left, muttering under his breath.
Jessica stared at me as I settled back into my chair. “That was incredible. Thank you.”
“He was being disrespectful.”
“Most people are just trying to make a living.”
“There is a difference between honest business and harassment.”
She took another bite of her koshary, studying me with those thoughtful brown eyes. “You’re very protective for someone who threatened to curse me less than twenty-four hours ago.”
“I have not decided about the curse yet.”
“But you just defended me from a papyrus seller.”
“Consistency is overrated.”
She laughed again, and I felt something strange in my chest, a warmth I had not experienced in longer than I could measure.
After lunch, we walked through the Khan el-Khalili market, and I pointed out authentic artifacts among the mass-produced souvenirs.
In one dealer’s case lay a genuine scarab amulet.
In another, a piece of Roman-era glass that had somehow survived.
Jessica stopped at a bronze cat that dated to the Late Period, priced far below its actual value because the seller did not recognize its age.
“Should I buy it?” Jessica asked me, holding the cat with both hands as if it were the most precious object in the world.
“Why would you?”
“To preserve it. To keep it safe.”
“You cannot save everything.”
“No,” she agreed. “But I can save this one piece of history.”
Against my protests, she bought the cat, haggling with a competence that surprised me, and tucked it into her bag.
The sun was setting as we returned to the hotel, painting Cairo in evening light. Jessica was tired; I could see it in the way she walked, the slight slump of her shoulders, but there was a lightness to her that had not been there that morning.
“Today surprised me. It was nice,” she said as we entered the hotel lobby. “Weird, but nice. Thank you for the history lessons. And for the papyrus seller thing.”
“I simply observed you, as agreed.”
“Sure. Observing.” She pressed the button for the elevator. “How much time do I have left?”
I checked the position of the sun before stepping into the elevator, looking at the rotation of the stars beyond the ceiling. “Fourteen hours.”
“And then you’ll decide? About the curse?”
“Yes.”
She was quiet as we rode the elevator to her floor. When we reached her room, she turned to face me, one hand on the door handle. “Can I ask you something?”
“You may ask. I may not answer.”
“Fair enough.” She took a breath. “Are you lonely? You said the dead don’t recognize what’s happening when they pass through your realm. That sounds like you’re always alone, even when you’re surrounded by souls.”
No one had asked me that question in three thousand years. Perhaps no one had ever asked me that question. “I am a god,” I said after a while. “Loneliness is a mortal concern.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It is the only answer I have.”
She looked at me for a long moment, and I had the unsettling feeling that she saw more than my jackal form, more than the divine power I carried. She saw something I had forgotten existed.
“For what it’s worth,” she murmured, “I enjoyed your company today. Even if you are a judgmental snob who hates plastic or resin pyramids.”
“They are an abomination.”
“See? Snob.” She opened her door. “Good night, Anubis.”
“Good night, Jessica.”
I settled into the chair by her window, watching her prepare for sleep with the same elaborate ritual as the night before. But something had shifted. This time, observation no longer felt like a duty.
It felt like something far more dangerous. It felt like a concern.