“Babe, are you okay?” Sybil says, cutting into my thoughts. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
I wet my lips, then focus on her. My whole body is trembling. Nero leans against me, lending his support. I place my hand on his head, slipping my fingers through his fur.
I take a long drink of my brew. Then, lowering my voice, I admit, “When I was in South America, after my plane crashed, I think…” I look around to make sure no one else is listening in. I swallow. “I think I woke something,” I whisper.
“What?” Sybil gives me a skeptical look. “What do you mean you woke something?”
I remember Memnon’s eyes: dark and smoky on the outside, light like honey on the inside. I remember the way those eyes looked at me, as though I were everything Memnon loved and then everything he hated.
“I… After the plane crashed, there was a voice—and magic—that called to me.”
“Called to you?” she echoes, her eyebrows rising in disbelief.
I nod. “My memory of it is a little fuzzy. But that magic…it led back to a tomb.”
“A tomb?” She’s looking at me like I’ve lost it.
“Goddess be damned,” I whisper. “I’m not making this up. I found an undisturbed tomb while on my magic quest, and I fucking disturbed it.” I pause to take a deep breath. “Listen, I know it sounds hard to believe. I’m not Indiana Jones. Still, I followed a trail of magic that led to a crypt, and I entered it.”
“Why would you do that?” she whispers furiously. Now, finally, she seems to believe me.
“I don’t know.” How can I explain the effect his magic had on me? Even now I remember how it whispered in my ear, and tugged on my skin, and drew me ever closer to the tomb. I…couldn’t ignore it. I didn’t want to.
“Okay,” Sybil says, waving my explanation away. “So you went inside a crypt…” She waits for me to continue.
I take a deep breath. “The place was covered in spells, really arcane ones. I don’t know how long they’d been there, but they were still intact.”
Sybil nods. “That sometimes happens with old spells,” she says. “Age can strengthen well-placed magic.” This girl loves magical history.
I continue. “Beyond all the spells, there was a sarcophagus—and I, uh, opened it.”
Sybil pinches the bridge of her nose, then takes a large swallow of her drink. She shakes her head. “You’re never supposed to open shit like that. Tombs—especially old ones—are full of curses.”
About that…
“There was a man inside the sarcophagus, Sybil. He looked just as alive as you or me, except he was sleeping.” I lower my voice even further. “Somehow, he was the one who had been calling to me. I don’t know how he managed to use his magic when he couldn’t wake, but he did. And it looked like he’d been in that coffin for centuries.”
Sybil frowns. “Selene, I say this with all the love in my heart, but are you sure you weren’t just imagining this? Maybe you got a concussion during the crash…”
I give my friend a look. “My memory may not be perfect, but I know what I saw.”
If anything, Sybil looks more horrified, not less. “Then what do you think happened to this man?” she asks.
“He was cursed”—My queen, what have you done?—“by someone close to him, I think.”
“And they buried him alive in that tomb? For centuries?”
It’s a terrifying prospect. “I don’t know, Sybil. There’s obviously more to the story than that. He seemed…like he might have done something to deserve it.”
She stares at me for a long second, her expression strange. “You said earlier that you woke something,” she begins slowly. “Please don’t tell me that he was that thing.”
I swallow. “I mean, I couldn’t just leave him there.”
“Selene,” she admonishes, like I forgot a coffee date and not, you know, let loose an evil ancient dude.
I open my mouth to defend myself, but what is there to say? It was a supremely bad idea. One I blithely embraced until Memnon the Cursed decided I was the asshole who ruined his life.
I run a thumb over the rim of the cup in my hand and chew my lower lip. “There’s one more thing.”
Sybil’s eyes widen. “How is there more to this story?”
I huff out a laugh, even though my stomach is tying itself into knots. “I think Memnon—”