I Need You
By
Kamala
Chapter 2
Temple of Isis, Secret Location along the Blue Nile
Devi stood looking out at the Blue Nile as it ran through the jungle oasis that his the Temple of Isis
Complex. ‘Who were you really, Imhotep?’
She glanced towards his personal writings sitting on her desk. She had spent the last few days reading
them between her duties. They were all that were left of an exiled man, whom the Med-jai had gone to
extreme measures to erase all traces of.
‘We know so little about you, Imhotep. What did you see in her? Did you love her that much, only to
have her betray you later?’
She had been told, since she was a small child, about him and what he did. Never about the man himself
and what in his life caused him to reject his god and his beliefs . The only other mention of him was in the
Journals of Evelyn O’Connell. Those references did not reflect too kindly on the man either, except for
her entry after the events of Ahm Shere..
“…he lost his battle to live when the one woman, whom he had moved mountains and condemned
his soul for, ran from his pleas for help. I believe it was at this point he discovered the difference
between love and lust and was broken…”
That passage preyed on her mind and had for years, making her wonder-- the nature of the man they had
watched over for some many years. As she grew older and came to understand what drove men, the hate
she had been taught to feel towards him changed to curiosity; an interest in a man who gave up everything
for an eternal love.
‘But why does that one passage that stays with you, Devi?’
She looked out to the Blue Nile, the moon was slowly rising in the star lit sky. She inhaled the exotic
smells, she always associated with this place.
“I wish, I could have met you. High Priestess to High Priest,” she said, surprising herself.
‘Because, silly one, he feels the same things you do. The same loneliness, the longing for someone to
share Temple life with. Someone to love and be loved by. And he is probably one of the few people who
understand the loneliness of the position.’
She walked back to her desk and picked up the scroll she has been reading.
“This morning, my day started out as all others. A morning ritual that lasted until midday. Seti
requested my presence afterwards at the palace, so I missed midday ritual, and it has thrown my
whole day off. Which is probably the reason I am feeling out of sorts. My time with my true lord,
Osiris, soothes my Ka. My mind strays more often now. Many of my priests have taken wives of
late.. I wonder if I will find anyone to share my life with…”
‘Why is it my journals echo this exactly?’
She skimmed past the more mundane entries.
“Typical male,” Devi said as she read an account of an encounter with a temple singer, who seemed to
have a serious oral fixation. An encounter, which repeated itself over several other encounters and the
physical pleasures found there.
The encounters provided her with intimate information about him. The emptiness he felt afterwards; the
statements of how it had been a needed physical release. How the only true satisfaction he felt was when
he had those dreams.
Though she found that hard to relate to -- her position within the temple and being a Med-jai warrior
hadn’t allow time for her to even date men. She was trained in the sensual arts as part of her training as a
priestess.
In her other lives, she had married and had children, she could remember almost every one of those lives
and the emotions tied to them because of the rituals she had gone through.
‘What was so special about those dreams?’
He kept referring to a dream through out the scrolls, yet never gave any details about it. He only
mentioned them and the euphoria he felt afterwards.
“How just like a male, short on details with important things.” She sat back in her chair, pondering the
dream.
“They had to be erotic in nature,” she said. “He mentions the euphoria he felt afterwards and I know he
had a high libido judging by the number of encounters he has recorded. What was he dreaming of or
better yet, who was he dreaming of? Anck-su-namun?”
She wondered about this and got up crossing the room to a hanging mirror. She pulled it to one side and
held her arm up matching the amulet to the pattern on the wall. A compartment opened and she looked at
the books resting there and scrolls in jars. She ran her finger along the jars until she came to the one for
the time period of Seti.
‘Maybe the Book of Days would give me a better idea of the timing of the events. Isis knows we are
fanatics about keeping records when the Pharaohs were alive and events that surrounded them. With
Imhotep’s position as High Priest to the Pharaoh there should be some mention of him in them.' She
unrolled the scroll with one hand and re-rolled it with the other, a practiced move. Her eyes skimmed the
text looking for mentions of Seti or Imhotep.
Towards the middle of the scroll was the mention of the hom dai and Imhotep’s death. Her eyes moved
up the scroll until she got to a reference of Imhotep entering the priesthood at the age of ten. All it stated
was he had a great future ahead of him. She moved on until she found references that corresponded to
those mentioned in his writings and began to search for Anck-su-namun’s name.
| |
|
|
|
|