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"Loitering again?" a harsh voice asked

I looked up, expecting Snow He usually hassled me in the Inferno Bar

Instead, it was his security chief, Grizelle, wearing heavy oddess The bossfro unhus on my cell phone from my Karnak visit were photos I needed yptians fast The Internet would have that

"I need a computer," I told Grizelle

"They sell theht now!"

"Tough"

"It’s a matter of life and death, at least so your CinSim over there says"

Her green eyes, brightened as they glanced Rick’s way They radiated fury

"One of our CinSie without permission? He must return immediately to his slot in the lower depths"

"Glad you can take the lost sheep in hand First, Miss Bo Peep, point me to a computer"

Her head lashed back to ainst her black velvet cheeks "You presu, butof rhinestones from my belt and whipped it around her tabby-shadow-patterned bare black forearlossed lips snarled, but she backed down "Use the one in the boss’s office I believe you know the way It’s empty"

"Fine And, Nicky-" I turned to finda ills "Please send me an Albino Vampire there Snow said they were on the house Eternally"

Grizelle glowered at Nicky Nicky shrugged Behind thelass, then eyed Grizelle with ured it was a draw all around and headed through the dancers and then the wandering crowds and the casino to Snow’s office far behind the e purse, an unlikely partnership of technology and style, of current events and past fashion

Despite its cool, metal sheath, it felt like a hot potato in hed

It felt like a ht mean the world tobefore the Internet becaood, bad and unreliable?

I tended to think these heavy thoughts because I was sitting in the tufted white leather chair behind Snow’s desk, accessing the Internet froht be found on it with soraveon Groggle alwayson a test in school It was sinfully easy to bone up on any subject in a half hour or so Obviously, I needed to research ancient Egyptian culture to get a handle on just what the Karnak was and what yptian pharaohs had been named Kephron or Kepherati, and no royal twins ever had jointly ruled the Upper and Lower Kingdoms

The sixty-four erial setup at the Karnak ho, or what, the over-devoted head pair were Were they actual surviving ancient Egyptians hiding out? Were they deluded wealthy as?

People today, fascinated by the richness and beauty of to to the afterlife was a high-end adventure tour Not so It was terrifying, Groggle revealed The Egyptians didn’t have things like The Book of the Dead and The Book of the Netherworld for nothing

According to one reputable-looking Web source, the spirit went to a Hall of Judgment, which sounded a lot like the two Kephs’ reception cha corpse had to face the judg of the heart cereod of the dead, and the whole darn Egyptian set of forty-two gods The heart was the only organ left in the body just to star in this final cereht Watcher’s fear of the weekly scale was puny by coas be the eternity that lurked beyond the ancient Egyptian river journey of the dead? Were there so yptians here at the Karnak because they’d been crossing over for centuries? The royal twins’ reception hall was beneath the surface of the desert An entire Egyptian necropolis and city could lurk under all this Nevada sand, a secret Area 51 for aliens from Earth’s past inner space, rather than outer space

I kept skiyptian custo in the here and now I played hooky too, taking a detour tothe loot there to what I’d seen in the netherworld at the Karnak hotel Even if it was reproduction, the Karnak stuff orth e about the tomb of Tutankha pharaoh’s cute azed on color photos of the boy ruler’s iold and lapis lazuli, the exquisite collars and bangles

Talk about a vintage treasure trove! Art Deco style was influenced by the art and artifacts Howard Carter discovered in Tut’s tomb I loved that period, but Art Deco furniture would never fit in the cozy late-forties atold, piles of it, was beautifully wrought And the tall gold lily in the pot,Tut’s to Keph and Keph’s paired thrones!

I opened ander at the photos I’d uest of the royals Yup, the saerly reading the text beside the online photo

The weird dangling forms I’d seen both online and at the Karnak were Imiut fetishes!

So ere Imiut fetishes? A stuffed or decapitated animal skin tied by its tail to a pole which was, in turn, inserted into a flower-pot-like stand The skin, usually froes Its tail often ended in a papyrus flower In some depictions, the skin dripped blood into the pot Gruesome!

The ones in Tut’s toilded versions

The fetish was originally connected with a god nas as in "mummy" He eventually becaod who evolved into the gatekeeper of the underworld and who protected the dead as they journeyed there Anubis wasn’t soand therefore associated with e and funerals He was also the patron of lost souls and thereforegulp!orphans

We have a patron, Irma crowed

I sat back in Snow’s cushy chair, sipped the Albino Vah My shoulders ached, not just fro up the slippery silk velvet of ohich wanted to become an off-the-shoulder style Who knew sedentary scholarship could be so wearing?

I drank deeper of the Albino Vampire to unchain my brain and relaxain Sohoulish and oddly undecorative decorative objects had bothered me from the ht

They sih to flank pharaonic thrones

Like I’yptian funerary objects Still I studied the dangling beheaded object It gavea pair of them placed so close to those entwined twins creeped ant accessory for a throne room Keph and Keph had intentionally placed sy further, I found the blue lotus-the lily topping the golden pole-closed nightly only to reopen with thesun and was a symbol of rebirth So a symbol of dead flesh combined with one of renewalcould this odd object embody a ritual by which the dead were returned to life?

I wanted to poundaround the far reaches of my brain