When death seeks me out,
Bear me away on swift wings.
You who were gifted to me by the great god Anubis,
Your duty is to me, and me alone.
Death is not your end for I am your beginning.
When I call you from the east, west, north, or south,
You shall say, “Here am I. Here is your servant.”
Come, shabtis, and embrace your master!
When Amon finished, the little statues twitched, dancing in the dust like firecrackers. The violent movements became more and more pronounced and they rose in the air, rotating at blinding speeds.
Amon gestured that I should come to him, so I darted around the statues, giving them a wide berth, and grasped Amon’s outstretched hand. The cavernous tomb shook, and I wondered if the trembling of the earth could be felt several levels above us by the visitors to King Tut’s tomb.
A burst of dark smoke that sparkled with electric bursts of light wound around the statues, encircling them with thick black threads. Soon, I could no longer see the figurines. The clouds of smoke grew bigger and bigger and then seemed to draw into themselves and solidify into shapes resembling men.
Finally, the dark silhouettes completely formed and standing before us were two men dressed in a similar fashion to Amon when I first found him. The last place the smoke dissipated was around their eyes, and then they each took a breath. When they opened their eyes, smoke still rimmed their irises.
The taller of the two had a short cap of wavy gray hair. His face was kind and open, and he had expressive eyebrows. He immediately adopted a subservient attitude. The shorter one had curly black hair that blended into a full beard. Shifty eyes took in everything around him. It wasn’t the fact that he looked like a pirate that made me mistrust him, but the cold, calculating way he stared at us.
Immediately, the two men threw themselves upon the ground and stretched out their arms.
Amon raised his hand and swished his fingers like he had when we first met and couldn’t communicate.
He then addressed them. “Shabtis, are you ready to serve?”
“There is nothing else in this realm or any other that would deter us,” they replied together.
“Then I have a task for you,” Amon said with a satisfied smile.
The two shabtis rose from their prostrate positions. The taller one kept his eyes lowered, but the shorter raised his flinty eyes and fixed them upon me, his mouth slowly twisting into a leer that made me very uncomfortable. I took a step closer to Amon and wrapped my hand around his arm. This made the shorter man smile even wider.
“What is thy command, Master?” the taller of the two asked.
Addressing the inquirer, Amon instructed, “You, seek out the resting place of my brother, he who embodies the spirit of the moon god. And you”—Amon turned to the other servant, whose expression was now so full of humility that I doubted my original opinion of him—“find my canopic jars. Also, do not forget to leave a trail that I may follow.”
The two men bowed before crossing their arms over their chests. “We live to serve you,” they echoed before spinning into cyclones of dark smoke that rushed out of the catacombs in opposite directions.
When they were gone, Amon smiled. “You see? This is exactly the help we need.”
“I don’t trust the little one,” I replied. “He seems devious, like he’s planning an assault on us or something.”
“Put your worries aside. Shabtis may not ignore the commands of the one who gives them life. To go against the will of the one who summoned them is the most serious of crimes. If they do so, they condemn themselves to wander the Mires of Despair alone. Without a guide, they will be lost in the Caverns of the Dead, never again to experience a moment of happiness, never again to have their ka reunite with their body, never again to lay eyes on their loved ones. It is a punishment worse than death.”