Akhmose knelt beside the body. Wrapped in linen with the arms crossed over the chest, the body resembled a mummy. Steam rose from the corpse. He touched the bandages. Cold. He prodded the body with his finger. Soft.

Inside the statue, behind where the body had stood, Akhmose noticed a cylindrical object. A papyrus scroll. Bound with a gold ribbon.

He snatched the scroll. The ribbon bore the seal of the great god Djehuty.

The hairs on his body stiffened. A strange tingling rushed over him.

Lightning exploded before him. In its wake, a man hunched. The lamplight set his red hair afire.

The stranger strode toward Akhmose. He extended a hand. "Give me the scroll."

Akhmose hugged the scroll to his chest.

"Do not," Isesi rasped. "Its wisdom will save our people, as the legend foretells."

The stranger scowled at Akhmose. "Relinquish the scroll."

Akhmose gaped at the stranger. He let his jaw fall open, for he could not hold it shut.

"Y-you," Akhmose said. "You are the god -"

"I am chaos. That is all you need to know."

The god stepped toward him. Akhmose scuttled backward.

With a shout, Isesi rushed at the god. He rammed his head into the god's gut. When the god struck his jaw, Isesi wrestled him to the ground. Limbs flailed. Cries echoed off the limestone walls.

Akhmose bolted through the sanctuary door into the antechamber, through the columned hall, past the pylons into the sandstorm that had settled over the town. The wind tore through the streets. It battered him until his flesh ached.

He glanced backward. A light, larger than a hundred suns, hovered above the temple. Flames devoured the temple's roof.

Akhmose hurtled through the storm.

Lightning burst behind him. He ran faster, the scroll clutched to his chest, the sand scouring his breaths. Ahead, lightning erupted. A woman shrieked.

Out of the dust something rolled toward him. He tripped over the woman's body.

Her eyes stared up at him without seeing. Blood streamed from wounds on her chest.

A knife gored his back. Pain wrenched through his body. He lurched forward. The assailant tore out the blade and plunged it into him again. He gasped for breath. The pain wrung his body like a fist, and his knees buckled. He collapsed onto the ground. The scroll slipped from his hand, rolling away into the storm.

His assailant stabbed the blade into his back. As his ka flowed from his body on a river of blood, he glimpsed a woman fleeing past him. She clasped the scroll to her chest.

Screams echoed through the town.

His assailant thrust the blade into him one last time.

Akhmose whispered a prayer to Ra—and then he died.