Sins of the Flesh

Again, Calliope ran through the events of that evening in her mind and came up with the exact same answer she had arrived at as she’d mulled it over again and again on the long drive here.

“No.” She thought of the gold cartouche with Aset’s name that Malthus Krayl had had in his possession. She knew what she’d seen, and it led to a possibility that was both unlikely and obscene: that there was a traitor here in the Guard, allied with the soul reapers.

“You will need to investigate the possibility of a—” She broke off, unwilling, or perhaps unable, to say the word “traitor” aloud. “Zalika, all is not right with this. We are days away from the meeting of allies. There is evidence of at least three, likely more, murdered Daughters of Aset. There is a dead soul reaper whom no one should have been able to kill. We have Xaphan and Asmodeus poking into places they have no business being.”

“I have heard through a secondary source that even Izanami has stirred herself to have dialogue with Sutekh and the soul reapers,” Zalika said.

Calliope sent a quick glance around, judging the privacy of their conversation. Though they were already speaking in whispers, she lowered her voice even further. “I have confirmation that Izanami sent one of her Shikome to Sutekh’s realm.”

“How do you know this?”

“Because she went there to lay claim to the soul of Naphré Kurata.”

Zalika’s brows rose. “An odd coincidence. Roxy Tam is the only acolyte you have ever trained, and Naphré was the acolyte you would have trained had she not left the Guard before she was blooded.”

“An odd coincidence,” Calliope agreed. Odder still that both were now mated to soul reapers. There had to be some significance to that.

Yet, Calliope’s prescience had offered no forewarning; she had never seen a whisper of that outcome, and she had to wonder why.

“There are strange alliances unfolding, and they can all be traced back to the dead soul reaper,” Calliope said. “I have only my instincts on this, Zalika. No proof. I must rely on you to follow the trail…in the event that I do not leave the Hall of the Matriarchs.”

Zalika offered no denial to that. They both knew it was a possibility. Calliope had made her choices. If those choices had brought danger to them all, then she would pay a heavy price.

“Contact Roxy Tam,” Calliope said. “She can put you in contact with Naphré Kurata.”

Zalika stared at her. “Naphré long ago left the Guard, and Roxy has recently made that unfortunate choice as well. Neither can be trusted.”

“I trust Roxy. With my life,” Calliope said. “With the lives of my sisters in the Guard. With the lives of the Matriarchs.”

“Be that as it may, she is no longer one of us.”

“You need not trust her with our secrets, only ask her to share hers,” Calliope pointed out.

“My duty and my emotion are at odds in this,” Zalika whispered, her dark eyes shadowed. “My loyalty, as ever, is to the Guard.”

“As is mine. And that is all the more reason to pursue the possibility of a traitor. A viper within the nest is more dangerous than one attacking from without.”

Zalika closed her eyes and pressed her lips together. When she opened her eyes once more, her gaze was clear. “Yes,” she said, and in that word Calliope had her assurance.

They continued down into the lower levels of the compound. The mansion above them was enormous, but the levels belowground were all the more vast.

The Asetian Guard had laid out the headquarters with a careful eye to detail and respect for ancient Egyptian numerology.

Seven flights of seven steps each, then the polished wooden stairs ran out, replaced by stone.

“I must leave you now,” Zalika said. “You know the way.”

“I do.” Calliope had been called before the Matriarchs once before.

Zalika embraced her then, a brief instant of warmth and connection before she took her leave.





CALLIOPE CONTINUED DOWN the stone staircase. Seven flights of seven steps each, and with each flight the space narrowed. At this point, if she shifted inches to either side, her shoulder would touch the wall. Cold stone. Cold air. And the smell of earth all around her.

Seven. The symbol of perfection. Effectiveness. Completeness. Seven. The symbol of the vile betrayal Sutekh had perpetrated when he hacked Aset’s husband, Osiris, into fourteen pieces—seven for each of the two regions of Egypt, Upper and Lower. The hatred between Aset and Sutekh had started then, leading to generations of war and tensions, both open and concealed, that followed.

Rumor stated the dead reaper’s body had been hacked into fourteen parts, and those parts were scattered to ensure they were not brought together to offer a vessel for the reaper’s soul to inhabit once more. That in itself seemed to point to Aset or Osiris as the killer. How convenient. Any Underworlder wishing to start a war might well create such an obvious clue. But why would Osiris or Aset be so careless?