The storm clouds that had gathered the previous evening never broke. Instead they hung low and sullen over the Nile, turning the water the color of bruised copper and muting the usual morning chorus of birds. Kael-Ankh woke to the smell of wet earth and distant lightning—ozone sharp enough to taste. His body still carried the pleasant ache of last night's dance with Nefertari, but the Ka felt restless, as though it sensed the imbalance Ptahhotep had warned about.
He found the elder already at the shrine, standing before the open doorway and staring upstream.
"Ra's barque sails under cloud today," Ptahhotep said without turning. "Unusual. The sun fights to be seen."
Kael joined him. "The shadows feel heavier."
Ptahhotep nodded once. "Because they are no longer natural. Set's priests move. Not openly—not yet—but their taint spreads like ink in water. The cult of disorder has always existed in the margins: desert tribes, foreign mercenaries, men who feel cheated by Ma'at's order. But lately they grow bolder. They call themselves the Red Brotherhood, servants of the Red One. They offer chaos as liberation—power without consequence, strength without balance."
He turned, eyes grave.
"They do not worship destruction for its own sake. They worship the freedom that comes when the old laws are broken. They say Osiris's resurrection was a lie, that the gods keep mortals small by forcing them into cycles of death and rebirth. They promise a different path: to seize the power of Nun itself, the primordial chaos before creation, and remake the world without the Ennead's chains."
Kael felt a chill that had nothing to do with the weather.
"How do they gain followers?"
"By giving what the temples sometimes withhold: raw strength. A farmer whose fields flood year after year, a soldier who watched his comrades die while priests prayed instead of fought, a widow who lost everything and was told to accept Ma'at's will—they offer vengeance, not acceptance. They perform blood rites in hidden places, feed fragments of Apophis's essence to willing vessels, twist heka into weapons of disruption. Their mark is a red eye encircled by black flame—simple, but unmistakable once you know to look."
Ptahhotep placed a hand on Kael's arm.
"You saved a child from Sobek's jaws. That act ripples. The Red Brotherhood sees any who strengthen Ma'at as enemies. Nekht—the one whose name whispers through the villages—is their voice in this region. He was once a minor priest of Set in a border temple. He claims Set spoke to him in the desert, showed him the truth: that order is slavery, that only chaos births true freedom."
Kael's fingers brushed the lotus amulet at his throat.
"Then they'll come here."
"Soon," Ptahhotep agreed. "Prepare your Ka. The first true test arrives."
The day passed in tense quiet. Kael trained alone in the palm grove behind the Bastet shrine—practicing Shadow Embrace until the tendrils obeyed him like extensions of his own hands. He summoned the new Sistrum's Call twice, letting the bright, fierce rattle wash over him, bolstering his own morale and scattering a few curious sparrows.
Nefertari found him near dusk.
She wore only a thin linen wrap tied at the hip, gold beads in her short hair catching the dying light. Her green-gold eyes held something fiercer than playfulness today.
"You feel it too," she said. "The air tastes wrong."
Kael nodded. "Set's shadow."
She stepped close, pressing her body against his without preamble. "Then let us burn some of it away before it arrives."
She pulled him deeper into the grove, behind a screen of date palms where the ground was soft with fallen fronds. No teasing dance this time—no slow build. Nefertari shoved him back against a smooth palm trunk, hands already tearing at his kilt.
"Hard," she growled against his mouth. "No gentleness tonight. I want to feel you fight me back."
Kael met her ferocity with his own. He spun them so her back hit the trunk instead, lifting one of her legs around his waist while his free hand pinned both her wrists above her head. She laughed—wild, delighted—and bit his lower lip hard enough to draw copper.
He thrust into her without warning, deep and rough. She arched, nails raking down his back, leaving hot red trails. The rhythm was brutal, primal—no words, only gasps and growls and the wet slap of skin against skin. She locked her legs around him, heels digging into his ass, urging him harder, faster.
When she came it was sudden and violent—back bowing, a sharp feline yowl escaping her throat. Kael followed moments later, burying himself to the hilt and spilling inside her with a low groan.
They stayed locked together for long seconds, breathing raggedly.
Nefertari finally lowered her legs, but kept her arms around his neck.
"No child from this," she whispered, voice softer now. "I take the herbs. I serve Bastet, not motherhood—yet."
Kael brushed sweat-damp hair from her forehead. "Yet?"
She smiled—small, secret. "Perhaps one day. When the Red Brotherhood is dust and the Nile runs clear again. Then maybe I'll let a strong man put a child in me. But not tonight."
She kissed him once—slow, almost tender—then slipped away into the gathering dark, bells chiming faintly.
Kael leaned against the palm trunk, heart still racing.
System Note – Intimate Resonance Update
Nefertari Bond: 28% → 47% (raw passion + shared defiance against chaos)
Temporary Buff: Feline Fury – +12% Agility & attack speed for 8 hours after intense consensual encounter
Night fell fully. Kael returned to Merit's compound, but sleep would not come.
He sat cross-legged on the rooftop, facing north where the storm clouds glowed faintly with inner lightning. He summoned his inner ledger, then pushed deeper—searching for the wisdom he knew must be waiting.
A cool breeze brushed his mind. Not Ra's heat, not Taweret's maternal warmth. This was sharp, precise, like the scratch of a reed pen on fresh papyrus.
Knowledge unfolded.
Thoth—ibis-headed, moon-crowned, scribe of the gods, master of words, measurements, secrets. The one who recorded every heart-weighing, who invented hieroglyphs, who healed Horus's eye with magic and cunning.
A fragment offered itself—not forced, but presented like an open scroll.
System Notification – Mythos Fragment Acquisition
New Fragment Acquired: Thoth's Quill of Insight
Type: Wisdom / Knowledge / Magic Precision
Grade: Rare (offered directly in response to need)
Effects (Initial):
• Passive: +20% learning speed for new invocations & heka theory
• Passive: +15% accuracy & stability on all precision-based spells (targeted light, shadow shaping, etc.)
• Active Invocation Unlock: Thoth's Analytical Glance
• Cost: 16 Heka
• Effect: Reveal hidden patterns, weak points, or magical flows in a target (object, person, spell) for 15 seconds
• Flavor Text: The ibis sees what the falcon overlooks. Knowledge is the sharpest blade. Resonance Level: 9% (grows through study, teaching, solving riddles, or preserving/creating knowledge)
Heka Capacity: 148/200 → 180/200 (wisdom offering)
Kael exhaled slowly. The fragment felt like cool water on a fevered mind—clarity amid gathering storm.
He looked toward the river.
Tomorrow Nekht would come.
Tomorrow the Red Brotherhood would test him.
But tonight he had new tools, new bonds, new fire in his blood.
He lay back under the clouded sky, hand resting over the lotus amulet, thinking of Senet's laughter, Meret's dimples, Nefertari's claws.
Three women—each distinct, each fierce in her own way—already tied to him through pleasure, respect, shared defiance.
Room for one more, perhaps.
But for now, this was enough.
The horizon flickered with distant lightning.
Shadows on the horizon.
Kael-Ankh closed his eyes and smiled into the dark.
Let them come.