━━ CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT / the tomb

The belay was set-up by the time that the pair reached Layla. Steven had fallen completely silent, too in his own head and not saying a word to the brunette. Ronny couldn't complain, it was always going to happen. She had made her stance clear and she couldn't blame Steven for hating her for it or being frustrated.

"Is it safe?" Ronny asked as she grabbed the harness from the floor. Layla nodded as she finished with the one she already had on.

"It should be. They've already been down there." Ronny nodded and tightened all the buckles and made sure everything was in place before she attached herself.

"I'll wait for you at the bottom," Ronny didn't even bother to acknowledge Steven before she was heading down. She kept her speed controlled and landed gently on the floor, her eyes widening as she took in the outlines of the statues. She couldn't make out their shape until she landed and removed her harness. She pulled out her torch from her backpack and shined it upwards. Her jaw dropped to the floor.

This was no ordinary tomb. Ronny didn't even care about Steven and Layla now, rushing into the tomb. Following the path to see what else was in here. This is exactly what she had been hoping to discover in those long years of archeology. An actual tomb. This is what she had been looking for when everything went wrong.

"Ronny?" Layla called and she paused, standing in the middle of a room with a stone table. She had to wait for them and focus. This was a discovery, an amazing one but if either of them died, it would be her fault and she couldn't take that. She turned back around and walked through the sandstone corridors, appearing at the entrance again.

"I'm here. There's a room this way," Ronny said as she looked over them both. Steven looked so excited and Layla seemed apprehensive. She couldn't blame the woman. They were being chased by a maniac and there was clearly a divide that had grown between Ronny and Steven in the few minutes they spent together. But Layla ignored it.

The trio headed towards the room and Ronny lifted her flashlight across the walls. It was a small room with a stone table in the middle. The purpose was indiscernible but it was there covered in a thick layer of sand. Ronny just couldn't believe she was standing in a tomb. Her heart was hammering in her chest. She wished he would be here. He would have loved it. This is what they had been searching for all along.

"It's a maze," Layla commented as she shone her torch across each exit. Ronny nodded and looked around for any hieroglyphs of something that could be useful. There was usually some sort of navigation tool left behind for those who were worthy enough to read it.

"It's a-maze-ing," Steven commented, a smile on his face as he shone his torch around. Ronny hummed in response and glanced back the way they had come. Roots were growing down the side of the walls, no writing. The walls were blank.

"No, like there are six paths." Ronny knew that Thoth would know where to go. He was one of the most intelligent Gods. In seconds he would know where they were and which way to go but he was absent. Either he was still exhausted or didn't want to help. Both sounded plausible.

"Yeah, right, six points." Steven mumbled and Ronny turned around, shining her torch at Layla who had stepped into one of the paths. She picked up a few bullet casings.

"The tombs are always supposed to be complicated. We can't just go walking down one path because there will be traps. We have to work out the layout." Ronny said as she came up to one of the exits. She shone her torch down the side but it turned away from her view. There was no easy way to work out the right path just from looking.

"This whole structure," Steven began and Ronny turned, watching as he drew the eye of Horus. She tilted her head and stood beside him, "is a symbol." Ronny smiled despite her best efforts to remain straight faced.

"Is that the Eye of Horus?" Layla asked. Steven nodded, letting out a soft yeah in response. Ronny looked around and the eye was reflecting onto the ceiling from Steven's torchlight.

"It's the royal symbol, protection in the afterlife." And that confirmed it in Ronny's eyes. She had studied these tombs, this art, the Egyptians for most of her life. Even when she was chasing Marc and Layla, she cared. Maybe not as much as Steven but it was her passion, her life. This was a pharaoh's tomb.

"Ammit's last Avatar was a pharaoh." The certainty of Ronny's tone made them both look up at her, "I studied tombs my entire life. I searched for them. I know a pharaoh's tomb when I walk into one. I just don't know whose and this," Ronny continued, pointing directly at the symbol that Steven had drawn, "is our way around."

Steven was silent for a moment as he looked over it and then it all clicked, "Yeah, right, so. The Eye of Horus is also the eye of the mind, yeah? Representing the six senses, the six points," He explained but it was mostly for Layla more than Ronny. She knew this, she had studied this and it was here. An actual tomb that she had helped discover. "So you got the eyebrow that denotes thoughts. Pupil, sight, obviously. This point here is uh, hearing. Smell. Touch. And this long line ending in a spiral is the tongue." Steven explained, pointing across the symbol as Ronny tried to work out which path to follow. They could all lead to something of importance. A clue.

"The Avatar would be Ammit's voice," Layla said and Ronny grinned.

"This way." Ronny said, heading through the exit that should - hopefully - lead them to Ammit's tomb and whichever pharaoh had betrayed her. They walked through and eventually came across a room and Ronny took one look at the wall and her heart stopped. Heka priests. This was dangerous. She shone her torch across the stone table and the blood covered it. That's why the camp was so quiet, they were dead.

"I'm gonna check ahead. Be careful," Ronny announced. She shone her torch onto Layla's face and there was a grimace as she looked up at the Heka priests, "Protect each other. I'll make sure nobody's coming for us." She hoped that she was subtle enough not to scare Steven but get her worry across to Layla.

The path was covered in blood as she crossed through the frame and Layla was informing Steven about the priests as Ronny disappeared around the corner as she reached the end of the corridor, it split into two paths. She could hear bullets hitting the walls and then cries of pain. Then dragging, she backed into the other corridor and watched as a Heka priest slowly dragged a body along. They were half-alive and the priest was focused on dragging the man along. She knew that she could try and take them out but if all those bullets didn't do a thing to them, she was at a loss. Her suit could work but she didn't want to risk anything. She couldn't yet. But she knew she couldn't leave Layla and Steven alone.

So she rushed down the corridor hoping to find a way to loop back around to them but there didn't seem to be a way around. She came up onto a large open cavernous area. The walls were filled with hieroglyphs and there were sarcophaguses' lining the room. They were not ones suited for a pharoah but certainly ones suited to his slaves that would assist him in the afterlife.

Ronny glanced around, trying to read the hieroglyphs on the walls but Thoth had stripped her of that ability. He was still holding it from her but she ignored it, shining her torch to the exit on the other side. She went straight for it but then Harrow appeared. She stepped back and moved to hide behind one of the sarcophagus but he said her name before she had a chance.

Their gazes met and she glared at him. Unimpressed by how far he was willing to go for this. He was a maniac. He wasn't even Ammit's avatar. He was just a fanatic. A fan. An evil man. He claimed moral superiority but he was far from it.

"Are you ready to listen? If you leave here, you face certain death at the hands of the Heka priest," Harrow said and Ronny rolled her eyes. He was never going to make her turn to his side. He would never understand anything and yet he pretended.

"I will never join you." Ronny had made that abundantly clear in their conversations and yet he continued to approach them. She didn't even know what he had said about her at Mogart's but she didn't trust a word he said.

"You are beyond that but I have a question. Why do you trust Marc Spector?" Harrow asked. It was far from what she had expected but it was something she had never thought about. Not really. Her face twisted in confusion but only for a split second before she put up her neutral facade. It was something that she didn't even understand. He had shot her and they had fought so many times. Even after she got with Steven, there was a threat against her. She shouldn't trust him. He was changeable and cruel at times. But she did. She whole-heartedly did, "And therein lies your problem."

"I don't have to explain myself to you," Ronny responded, keeping her voice calm and even. If he saw that she was getting frustrated, then he would latch onto it and exploit it. She had one job and that was to protect Steven and Layla. Nothing else mattered.

"No, you don't, but what do you think will happen when he finds out what you did?" His words truly took Ronny back. How in the world did he know about that? She had never told anyone. Never said anything about it to anyone. Not a word and he saw it. He could see right through her.

"What do you mean?" She tried to feign ignorance but it was obvious that she was taken aback. He could see it written across her face.

"Of course the massacre that got Thoth banished wasn't you. But you did something much worse to Marc, and to Layla." Harrow continued his taunting and Ronny could feel the anger bubbling beneath the surface. It was a secret she had kept for far too long. Something that she had been having nightmares about for years.

"I didn't do anything." She said through gritted teeth. Harrow tilted his head slightly at her, looking over her face with complete neutrality.

"You left," He said simply.

"I was doing a supply run."

"You could have saved them all."

"I would be dead along with the rest of them if I hadn't left." Ronny didn't realise when she got so loud but she was nearly shouting now. The anger bubbling over and the guilt and shame building in her chest. She had spent so long trying to get over what had happened, remove the guilt but she couldn't shake it. And Harrow was only reaffirming what she had feared all along.

"I don't think they'll see it that way." He was taunting her now. He wasn't even trying to hide it but she didn't care enough to recognise that he was trying to rile her up.

"I had no choice." It was the weak line of argument that she had made but it was her choice to leave. She had practically begged to leave and then she had gotten caught up in town and it took too long to get back. She had done everything wrong. And by the time she got back, the choices she continued to make were wrong.

"Everyone has a choice." Harrow watched her before he added, "You made one that hurt them both."

"I didn't know what would happen," She snapped and Harrow smiled. A sadistic smile. He had her right where he wanted her.

"But will they believe you?" Ronny summoned the suit at that moment and she lunged at Harrow. Her fist came down across his face but he lifted his cane. A purple bolt of power shot out and smacked Ronny right in the chest. She was thrown backwards, her head smacking harshly against the sandstone walls as she collapsed to the floor.

A soft cry left her lips as she rolled over and Harrow left the room, leaving her to recover. She felt okay. The cape had saved her from everything but when she let the suit go, her cheeks ached. It was a harsh ache, her cheeks were black and blue already. It made her want to cry but she knew that she had to keep going.

She pushed herself up by her hands and clambered to her feet. She grabbed her backpack and put it back over her shoulders, continuing to walk. She had to find a way back to them before Harrow found them and killed them.

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NOTE
do i do a double update? cause i have chapter twenty-nine written already hehe! but after chapter twenty-nine is released, updates may be a bit slow because i need to plan the next section some more! but i hope you enjoyed this chapter <3