The night was too bright. 

Too easy to hunt prey under.

I needed darkness. A darkness as thick as tar where I could sink into. Where I could hide.

My lungs burned, legs ached, as I carried my body through the watery muck one foot at a time, my limbs screaming with exhaustion. I had crept slowly, taking my time to not splash through the river, but fear kept me tethered to the tall reeds by the bank. What was the point in crossing now, without my sister? The courage had left my limbs, leaving me wandering aimlessly among the shallows.

I hoped and prayed that they would leave, but as the night stretched on the hunt seemed to increase. There was the odd strangled scream now and again from a temple dweller that did not wish to submit and a dark plume of smoke had risen over the palace along with screams and wails of the souls departing to join Anubis in the netherworld. The cloud lingered like a curse from the dead while white palace walls I'd called home were swallowed in a blaze of orange and red as they purged with fire and blood. If I didn't find a better hiding spot soon, I would join them.

The luminous eye of the Moon Goddess Nut had started her descent in the west while the glowing fingers of dawn threading their way across the east bank, bathing the Nile's in a pale, rippling glow.

My legs shook with fatigue. Like a wounded gazelle hunted by a pack of hyenas, I was losing fight, losing speed. But I kept moving slowly north up the Nile and away from the temple, trudging through the thick layers of mud that gripped at her bare ankles, trying to suck them down. I noticed too late a group of lights floating to my right. The sound of voices growing closer as soldiers with torches came into focus.

The patch of thin reeds provided only a thin covering as I wedged myself between their tall stalks crouching low and small as I heard the men splash into the water just up ahead. My white dress, now stained with blood and dirt, glowed among the muted greens and browns against the rising dawn.

"Nefari!" A male shouted into the dark waters.

"Come out Priestess!" Another followed, wading in. "We promise not to hurt you." Lies.

"Come and dry off, get some food in your belly. I'm sure it's cold out there." The first man soothed, coaxing like a siren song. But I would not be swayed. Not by a man whose blade was tipped red with the blood of my people.

They're coming this way!

I clamped a hand over my mouth to quiet my wheezing breaths as the splashing grew louder and light reflecting off the water inched closer.

Nut, if you are watching, please help me, I prayed silently to the sky, but my hope in the Gods was spent. Where were they for Anaka, for their patron Zahara? No, if they didn't come for them, they were surely not coming for me.

"Come on out Priestess we don't have all night! Let's make this quick, shall we?" Frustration surfaced in the first man's voice as he hacked away at a group of reeds not five horse paces away.

"Are you sure she's still around here?" The second added, scanning the reeds with half hearted interest.

"They saw her go in and I was told the Priestess can't swim, she has to be on this side of the bank." The first replied, splashing closer.

Three paces away.

Two paces...

I held my breath. The water slapping against my beaded necklace, lightly chiming with the rustling and splashing from the two men. Hopefully, too busy looking and hacking at greenery to listen.

The flickering shadow of a man loomed ahead.

One pace.

I caught the glint of a sword in his right hand and below the reflection of flames danced wildly across the water's surface. Mirroring the great fire from the palace that roared in the distance behind him and the lingering wails rising with the dawn. Soon I would join them.

The man hacked his way through the reeds with his curved sword. Any second he would find me. I shut my eyes tight. Someone!

*Whack*

Please.

*Whack*

Help me.

*Whack*

"Hey I think I see something!" the man called.

No. I steeled my heart to meet my ancestors. And from the thundering of my heart ca,e a wash of calm surrender. This was my fate. The gods had already written my death, will it so.

As if to spite me, a golden ray shone brightly from the east, carrying a morning breeze and parting my thin cover as the reeds whipped wildly about in the zephyr.

Do you wish for help, sister? The wind whispered, and I was sure I was imagining it on the precipice of death.

Yes! I whispered to the wind; closing my eyes as I gave into the cool torrent swirling around me and lifting my damp locks from the water, like a final kiss. A hawk cried out in the darkness and I wished, as the bird, to be carried away in the breeze.

I dared to open my eyes. If I was to die today, I would look up at the face of my killer and curse him.

The man stood a few strides away, his frame looming as large as a watchtower. Had he always looked this big?

The sword in his hand swung up and I flinched, cowering lower only to see it put back in its sheath. The man stared at her before turning to shout to shore. "It's only a bird."

A- a bird?! Did he not see me?

I looked down at my hands to see a set of white feathered wings in their place and a strangled sort of squab rose when I tried to scream. Hands-now wings- flapped out at my sides and long thin bird legs rose-up from the mud, tucking naturally under my belly I bobbed on the water utterly perplexed.

Long neck craning, I inspected my small, buoyant body. The rippling reflection of yellow eyes and the white slender shape of a crane stared back at me. I gave another startled squab.

Holy Horus... I'm a bird.

This couldn't be a dream, could it? Or, perhaps-the wind? Had the gods truly answered my prayers? I'd heard tales of shape shifter gods, of strange blessings and magics but never a bird!

"It's a nice looking one," the guard approached cautiously, and I froze.

"You're not paid to watch birds," a voice I knew. A voice I loathed, drifted from the bank. As I saw the twilight blue of Sarena's robes, fluttering in the wind from her elevated perch on a black chariot. "Keep looking."

"Yes, mistress."

The man turned from her, splashing back toward the bank as his lumbering frame struggled through the mud. The sorceress's eyes slid to mine with an appraising eye. Her face in shadow, haloed by the flames that glowed from the burning palace behind her.

"On second thought, capture it. It will be a gift for the Pharaoh's bathhouse."

No!

I spread my wings wide, flapping awkwardly, trying to take flight. I felt the wind billow lifting me higher off that water's surface, but not fast enough as the soudiers's meaty hand clamped around my slender leg, dragging me back down.

I was dragged underwater and in the next moment up again, strung upside down like a hung chicken. I struggled, twisting, squawking and flapping wildly in his grip as he wade back to the shore with his captured prize. I cried for the gods once more, but when the wind curled around my feathered body, her voice was silent. I snapped my long beak at the man's leg where the flesh was exposed just below his white tunic.

"Hey! It's a wild one," the man chuckled, holding his arm out to keep me from pecking further as I swayed in his grip. My feeble attempts; no more than a mild annoyance for the hulking warrior. Instinct rose in my to submit. To hang my head limp and play dead, but that instinct was not my own. I wanted to struggle to fight, I wanted to kill Sarena!

But this bird body was small, weaker than my human flesh and it exhausted quickly, as my head hung catching my breath. Perhaps I should play dead? Maybe they would let me go. I let my body fully relax in his iron grip, eyes closed. My neck wobbled with the sway of his gait, but he did not seem to notice, or if he did, not to care. The soldier had his orders.

The man tore at the cloth on his toga with a free hand. Wrapping the black fabric around my legs as a bind taking advantage of my limp state. I was too slow to react, to wiggle free until it was too late. He tried to wrap another around my beak and I reared back spearing at his flesh, satisfied when he pulled back with a hiss and I saw several drops of blood.

"This ones too wild." Yes, let me go. "Let's just kill it," the guard suggested to the sorceress. No.

"Don't," Sarena commanded. " It's more satisfying that way-when they're finally broken." A sort of sadistic smile twisted up the corners of her mouth. I thought I heard the guard mumble something about crazy magicians before clamping a hand round my beak with a speed that betrayed his size as he wrapped the cloth tight.

Once finished he tossed my body on the bank with a thump, my feathered belly slamming painfully onto some stones.

Finally, free of his grasp I spread my wings wide, though my feet were bound perhaps I could still fly.

The grating of steel caught my attention.

A whoosh of air drew down to my right, a pain shooting through my arm and I cried around the gag. I caught sight of feathers coming up with the mud on the man's sword. He's clipping my wings! He wiped the muck off on his leg and I tried to close the other wing but he stomped on my long feathers with a sandaled foot, pinning them there before driving his sword down once more, slicing the tip of my left wing.

"Mistress!" Another figure came up toward the chariot and I strained my neck to see, to make sure it was not the voice I thought. Short bobbed hair came into focus, the familiar curves and simple white servants robes and then I saw her with sickening clarity. With the eyes of a bird.

Imi.

My Imi... has betrayed me?  Shock stiffened my limbs and tongue to silence. All I could do was stare.

"I searched the remaining boats by the palace but she's not there," Imi addressed the sorceress with a bow, "it seems none are missing."

"Good. That means she's near." The sorceress' face turned back to the burning empire, long midnight hair swaying against the small of her back. But in this form keen eyes picked up the wetness of her robes, and a metallic smell mixed with the smoke on the breeze, tickling my nose. Blood.

"What's the bird for?" Imi nodded to my flightless form, splayed out on the bank like a ritual sacrifice.

"A gift." The sorceress motioned for Imi to pick me up. "Take it back to the supply carts and finish up with the burials. We must move quickly."

"Yes Mistress," Imi. My friend, my confidant, my betrayer, picked me up by my long yellow legs, slinging me over her shoulders like a sack of flour. Disgust rolled through me. I struggled and thrashed as she trudged off back down the path toward the temple.

Away from the Nile.

Away from freedom.

The horror was too much and I felt the world dim around me as my eyes closed shut, body falling slack to the sway of Imi's gait.

If I could reverse the hourglass of time, I would wish this wretched day never came to pass. I would wish I'd stabbed Sarena when I first saw her. Better yet, I wished that those dark chariots never rolled up to the palace gates.

That he never returned.

And with that final thought, I let the darkness consume me.