Anubis ²

The sands of Duat are cold. You lie there, arms spread wide, staring into the void. Your fingers are stained with blood. Your own? Someone else's? It doesn't matter anymore.

Anubis stands over you. His shadow blots out the light.

"Get up," he says. Flatly. Without emotion.

"Why."

"Not here."

You smirk, but you don't move. Your body feels like lead. Your soul is ash.

"Ra will send me again. And again. And again. I am his hound, Anubis. His flame. His killer."

He remains silent. Looking down at you, gripping his staff.

"Say something," you exhale. "Accuse me. Sentence me. You are the guardian, after all."

"You are your own sentence."

Blunt. Dry. You close your eyes.

The sand shifts. He sits beside you—not close, not touching. Knee to knee. The cold of eternity at your side.

"I have counted," Anubis says softly. "One hundred and thirty-four thousand. Over three centuries."

You freeze.

"You do not remember their names. I do. I escort everyone you have burned."

Bitter. You open your eyes.

"And you hate me."

A pause. A long one.

"No," he says. Like stone. "I see how you break. Every battle. Every scream. Do you think Ra is the only one watching?"

You sit up with a jerk. You look into his face—impassive, alien, impenetrable.

"Why do you watch."

Anubis slowly turns his head. He meets your gaze. A bottomless darkness.

"So that you do not vanish entirely."

The wind drives the sand. You do not cry. Gods of fire do not cry.

But in your chest, for the first time in centuries, something flickers. Not a blaze. A spark.

You are the first to look away.

"Don't you dare follow me."

He stands. Brushes off his knees.

"Do not command that which I cannot fulfill."

And he vanishes into the shadow. While you remain—with one hundred and thirty-four thousand names that he remembered for you.