Fight of the Falcon God Read online

  “What’s down there?” Akori asked, keen to break the silence.

  “That’s the animal cemetery,” Manu explained.

  “Really?” said Akori. “But it’s so big. The animal in there must have been pretty important.”

  “Not just one animal,” Manu said. “That’s a communal tomb. There are dozens of animals in there.”

  Akori paused, glancing back at the path. He imagined all the different kinds of animals, from the smallest household pets to the Pharaoh’s most majestic war horses, mummified and lined up in their own tombs, resting inside. The thought sent an unexpected shudder along his spine.

  “Come on, Akori, we need to hurry,” said Manu. “If we don’t reach your tomb before sunset, we lose our only chance to enter the Underworld.”

  Akori was just turning away from the cemetery, when there came a sudden, loud scrabbling noise, like a nest of rats fighting violently to get out of a box. Then, just as suddenly, it stopped.

  Akori froze, his hand on his sword hilt.

  “What was that?” he whispered.

  Now came a rasping, grating noise, as if something were scraping long talons against a piece of rough stone. To his horror, Akori realized it was coming from behind the doors of the animal cemetery.

  “We should get out of here,” Manu said in a fearful voice. “Maybe ghouls are real after all. But I don’t want to stay and find out.”

  A horrendous dry screech echoed up from beneath the earth. Then came a low moan that rose to a rattling cry, as if a dog was howling down a rotten tube of parchment.

  “This is very wrong, whatever it is,” Akori said. Fighting all his urges to run back the other way, he edged closer to the doors.

  “I think something’s trapped in there,” he whispered. “Maybe a stray dog got in and couldn’t get out.”

  “Maybe,” Manu whispered back. He didn’t look convinced.

  Scrape, scrape, whine, went the thing inside the tomb.

  Akori made a decision. “I’m going to break the door down. Get ready.”

  But before Akori could move, a horrific wailing, screeching and scratching broke out inside, like the Underworld itself was trying to claw its way through to the surface.

  With terrifying certainty, Akori realized that this was no stray dog. It wasn’t a living animal at all. It was the sound of hundreds of bone-dry claws angrily raking at the door. Of starving howls ripping through dried-out throats. Of mummy wrappings splitting and cracking, coffins creaking open, clay jars shattering from within. Of a horde of eyeless creatures, brittle and shrunken, mad to tear the flesh of the still-living!

  “It’s the animal mummies!” Akori yelled. “They’re coming back to life. And they’re trying to get out!”

  Something heavy thumped on the door from inside.

  “What did Horus tell us?” said Akori. “Set is assembling an army of the dead, to wage war on Egypt…”

  Thump. A crack appeared across the tomb door. Thump.

  Manu turned to Akori, horrified. “It is beginning!”

  The cemetery door cracked again. Next moment it fell crashing to the ground in broken pieces. Framed by the doorway, half-hidden in the shadows and swirling dust, crouched a thing out of Akori’s nightmares.

  It was, or had once been, a baboon. Now its caved-in, empty-eyed face was almost entirely a skull. The skin had shrivelled back from its teeth in a hideous permanent snarl. Mummy wrappings trailed from its arms.

  “Manu, get back!” Akori shouted.

  Manu ran back up the path and hid behind a small chapel. Akori braced himself to fight, holding his khopesh firmly in a two-handed grip.

  The baboon jerked its head up towards the moon. It flung its jaws open, let out a ghastly shriek – and charged. Behind it surged a tide of scuttling, limping, grey-white bodies. Horrified, Akori thought of rats pouring out of a burning barn. There was a host of mummified cats, two more baboons, even something that looked like a mongoose.

  They half-ran, half-dragged themselves over the sand, like broken puppets. And was that a crocodile mummy behind them all, heaving and flopping out of the tomb?

  The lead baboon loped across the sand. Its long arms reached for Akori’s neck, to choke the life out of him.

  With a wild yell, Akori slashed at it with his khopesh. The razor-sharp metal bit deep.

  The baboon’s head came flying off its shoulders. The body blundered past, arms still clutching for Akori’s throat, and toppled to the ground.

  The head rolled over and lay at his feet. The jaws were still opening and closing, trying to bite. Akori staggered backwards with a disgusted cry, and nearly fell over the headless body crawling over the sand looking for him.

  Manu grabbed a stone and smashed it down on the baboon’s shoulders. The body twitched and lay still.

  Akori edged towards a second tomb. I need to guard my back, he thought. These things could come at me from anywhere!

  A chittering, clawed thing came flying at his face. A mummified cat! He sliced it in two with a single blow. The sour dust of the grave burst in clouds around Akori. It burned in his nostrils, choked his throat.

  “Akori! Help!” Manu screamed. “They’ve got me!”

  The two other baboon mummies had grabbed Manu and were hauling him out from behind the chapel. Each of them held one of Manu’s arms. They were pulling him towards the crocodile mummy! It opened its jaws wide, ready to tear Manu limb from limb.

  Akori was still surrounded by swarming cat mummies, clawing at his legs. One of them leaped up onto his body and dangled from his cloak, biting his throat.

  With a yell of pain, Akori switched his sword to his right hand and grabbed the cat mummy with his left. It crunched in his grip like a dried-out fruit. The skull squirmed and yowled, sinking long teeth into the ball of his thumb and drawing fresh blood.

  He flung the gruesome thing as hard as he could. It smashed against the tomb wall and fell, limp and broken. It was sickening, but he had no choice. He was fighting for his life.

  “Akoriii!” Manu fought to get away from the baboons, but they held him fast. The crocodile mummy was skulking nearer and nearer.

  Akori shoved himself away from the tomb wall and ran across the sand. He leaped and brought the khopesh down in a scything stroke. The blade sliced a baboon’s arm clean off. Manu pulled himself free of the other baboon’s grip.

  Akori quickly sliced the armless baboon mummy in two at the waist. The other one scampered back away from him.

  “Find a weapon!” Akori shouted to Manu.

  “There aren’t any!”

  “Use something! Anything!”

  Manu grabbed the arm of a broken statue and held it like a club, while Akori faced off against the remaining baboon mummy. It crouched low in the sand and kept its distance. Akori frowned. Was this one cleverer than the others?

  Suddenly, the baboon hurled a jagged piece of rock. It slammed into Akori’s chest, knocking the wind out of him, flinging him onto his back.

  Gasping, he struggled to his feet. Strange – there was no pain at all. The magical armour of Horus must have taken the blow. Without it, Akori’s ribs would have shattered like a wooden birdcage.

  Akori muttered a curse and dodged out of the way of another flying rock thrown by the baboon mummy. Something clutched at his ankle – the severed baboon arm! He kicked it away. These things just didn’t know when they were dead.

  The crocodile snapped at Manu. It caught the hem of his cloak in its jaws and tried to drag him off his feet.

  Manu staggered. He tried to keep his footing. He fell forwards, but as he did so he brought the stone club down. The crocodile’s ancient, brittle skull shattered, caving in like an eggshell.

  The baboon leaped up, grabbed the edge of the roof of a chapel and hauled itself up there. It screeched mockingly and began to throw bits of broken masonry.

  “I’m going after it!” Akori told Manu. He ducked as a shard of rock whistled over his head. “You should be safe down here.
That crocodile was the last of them.”

  “Okay,” Manu said. He held onto the stone arm as if it were the most precious thing in the world. “Good luck.”

  Akori had to sheathe his khopesh. He needed both hands free to climb. Like the baboon had done, he jumped and grabbed the roof, heaving himself up.

  The baboon was waiting for him, grinning a lipless grin.

  But no sooner had Akori got up there than another beast burst out from a tomb down below. Manu gave a high-pitched scream as the mummified remains of a dog clawed up out of the ground. It shook itself like a wet dog would, but fragments of skin, mummy wrappings and dust flew off it.

  The baboon mummy lunged for Akori, huge paws swatting at him. He dodged and weaved, trying desperately to get his sword out.

  If any of those blows connected, he’d fall from the roof to the rocky sands below. And while his armour might stop a blow, it couldn’t protect him from a fall.

  Manu was yelling again. The mummified hound was pacing slowly towards him, growling. Akori knew it could easily tear the young priest’s throat out. He had to do something.

  The baboon seized Akori round the waist. He felt himself lifted off the ground. It was going to throw him off the roof!

  Only one chance. He smashed down with the hilt of his khopesh into the thing’s face. The paws went slack. Beetles crawled inside the mummy’s ruined head.

  “Akori!” Manu screamed.

  Quickly Akori wrestled himself free, kicked the baboon’s body away and looked down over the edge. The dog mummy had backed Manu up against a tomb wall and was snarling at him.

  The stone arm trembled in Manu’s grip. The dog mummy advanced. There would be blood on the sands any moment now.

  Then, to Akori’s amazement, the cat that had followed them from the palace came scrambling up onto the roof!

  It looked at him with wide, golden eyes.

  “Get out of here, cat!” Akori yelled at it. “You won’t last a second in this place!”

  The cat ignored him. It trotted to the edge of the roof and looked down at Manu, who was cowering as the hound prepared to spring.

  The cat jumped. In the instant before it reached the ground, its body stretched, growing huge and long. The beast that landed gracefully on the sand was the size of a lioness.

  Akori stared. It couldn’t be…

  The cat-beast gave a threatening growl. The dog mummy spun around on the spot, just as the huge cat launched itself at it. The gigantic paws knocked it sprawling.

  The dog struggled to stand, its legs kicking the sand up.

  A single blow, ending in a sharp crack – and it was all over. The mummified dog lay still, never to move again.

  Manu ran forwards, crying for joy. “Ebe!”

  One moment the cat-beast was standing before them, casting an enormous shadow across the sand. The next, there was just an ordinary cat again.

  She came over to Manu and butted her head against his shin, purring a greeting.

  “Ebe?” Manu said. “It is you, isn’t it?”

  The cat hesitated – and nodded.

  Akori lowered himself down from the roof and ran over to meet her. “Ebe! You’re back!” he laughed. “It’s so good to see you again!”

  Ebe mewed. She sounded happy.

  Akori rubbed her under the chin. “I guess you didn’t feel like being a human this time around, huh?”

  “She’s being smart,” Manu said. “Who’s going to suspect one little cat of being the Goddess Bast in disguise?”

  Akori stroked Ebe’s furry back. She arched into his hand happily.

  “I don’t understand how she can even be here,” Akori said. “Didn’t Horus say the Gods couldn’t help us this time?”

  “I thought so…no, wait! Do you remember his exact words? ‘Only those who travel with you can help you.’”

  “So Ebe’s travelling with us?” Akori said delightedly.

  Ebe-the-cat nodded again. Then she began to wash her paw in a bored kind of way, as if fighting animal mummies in an ancient cemetery was the most normal thing in the world.

  “So we’ve got a Goddess on our side!” Akori grinned. “That should even the odds a little.”

  “Not just a Goddess,” Manu said. “An old friend.”

  “Even if she never says a word to us,” Akori said with a chuckle. “Some things never change, do they?”

  Ebe looked up at him. Her little pink tongue was sticking out.

  Akori laughed until his sides hurt.

  The three of us are back together again, he thought. Now I feel like I could take Set on, and all his dark Gods. He couldn’t stop us last time, and he won’t stop us now.

  “How long until sunset?” he asked Manu.

  Manu frowned up at the sky, now awash with hues of gold and red. “Less than an hour, I’d say. We need to get moving.”

  “Fine by me. I can’t wait to get out of this place.”

  “You think you can leave my domain so easily?” boomed a mournful voice from beneath the ground. “Little fool. You shall never leave!”

  Ebe gave a yowl and scooted up to the top of a nearby statue. Her fur stood on end.

  A rhythmic crashing sound made the ground shake. Footsteps underground, coming closer – as if something colossal was coming up a set of steps towards them…

  “Akori, we should run,” said Manu, pulling at his sleeve. “There’s no time.”

  “I’m Pharaoh,” Akori said, summoning up his courage. “I don’t turn tail and run. Not from anything.”

  But what he saw then nearly made him eat those bold words.

  A terrifying sight came clambering out of a tomb. It was a figure like a man, but over five royal cubits tall, eyes blazing with ghostly fire. Wings like a falcon’s spread out from his back and tattered bandages hung from his limbs and body. The sword he carried could have split an ox in two lengthways.

  He turned his head to face Akori and breathed out a plume of roaring flames. The tombs flared with hideous light.

  “Manu,” Akori gulped, “what is that?”

  “It’s Sokar,” Manu said. His throat was closing up with sheer fright. “The guardian of tombs! And unless I’m very wrong, he’s been bewitched into working for Set!”

  Sokar rewarded Manu with a ghoulish leer and a fresh blast of flames. “Protector of the tombs that you defiled, little children!” he roared. “Who are you, to break open these sacred resting places and destroy the mummies?”

  “We had no choice!” Akori shouted. “We were fighting for our lives!”

  “I don’t think he’s going to listen to reason, Akori!” said Manu.

  Sokar bellowed. He struck the ground with his sword.

  A zigzag crack opened up in the earth. It grew wider before their eyes. Sand poured in like a waterfall.

  Akori looked down into the chasm. To his horror, he saw Sokar’s shattering blow had exposed a group of underground tombs. Mummies were stirring down there, clutching up at him with bony arms. If he fell in, they’d tear him to bits!

  Sokar leaped over the chasm and stood ready to fight. Akori quickly looked around. The tomb was to his left, the chasm to his right, and Sokar straight ahead. If he turned around, he might be able to run back to the path…

  He shook his head. There was no running away from this fight. “Come on!” he yelled instead. “If you’re going to fight me, then fight me!”

  Sokar laughed, as if to mock Akori’s bravery. He swung his great sword at him, perhaps thinking this would all be over in seconds.

  Akori blocked it. Metal screeched and sparks flew.

  Sokar blinked. “You dare…”

  He never finished the sentence. Akori launched into a furious attack.

  He rained down blows with his khopesh so hard and fast it was like a shimmer of gold around him. Sokar barely brought his own sword up in time to parry.

  The bewildered dark God found he was falling back before the onslaught. Akori slashed and struck, spinning around on the s
pot for extra force.

  “Come on, Akori!” Manu cheered. “Send him back to the Underworld!”

  Deep, bloodless gashes began to appear on Sokar’s body where the blade had hit home. The mummy wrappings that covered him were dangling loose now. And still Akori came, like a hurricane of gold, brown and white.

  Sokar took another step back as Akori made yet another fierce cut. Now, Sokar was standing on the very edge of the chasm he himself had opened up. The low moaning of a hundred mummies came from the smashed-open tombs below.

  One good hard blow should knock Sokar off his feet and send him tumbling into the chasm. Akori raised his khopesh, ready to finish this.

  Sokar lashed out with sudden, blinding speed. His sword struck Akori’s and knocked it flying out of his grasp.

  It landed on the other side of the chasm, far beyond reach.

  Akori stood dumbfounded. He had no weapon…

  An evil, hungry sneer began to spread across Sokar’s face. Slowly, maliciously, he raised his sword.

  “What will you do now, little boy?” Sokar thundered.

  Fear ran icy steel needles through Akori’s stomach. Never before had he faced such an opponent without even having a weapon in his hand.

  This was impossible. He couldn’t win. Sokar would surely kill him. The quest was over before it had begun – unless he turned and ran, ran for his life without looking back.

  He glanced over his shoulder. Manu and Ebe were behind him, both wide-eyed and frightened out of their wits. They had good reason to be. Once Sokar had finished with him, they would be next.

  Then he saw a familiar piece of stone lying on the sand – the statue’s arm that Manu had used as a club – and he knew what he had to do. He grabbed it and stood ready to fight again.

  “I am no ‘little boy’,” he shouted bravely up at Sokar. “I am Pharaoh of all Egypt, ally of the good Gods, and the champion of Horus. If you think you can defeat me, then go ahead and try!”