Strange and Ever After (Something Strange and Deadly #3)(61)

“Oliver!” I shrieked.

Two of the statues dived off their pedestals.

Oliver stopped, fingers frozen at the Old Man’s wrinkled neck . . . and the statues’ spears frozen at Oliver’s.

“Oh God.” I stumbled toward Oliver, screeching at the Old Man, “Get the statues off!”

“Do it!” Daniel shouted, two pulse pistols now aimed at the Old Man.

“I did not call the guard.” The Old Man turned a bemused eye on Oliver’s fingers. “The girl is their pharaoh, and the mummies protect her. And you . . .” The Old Man’s eyes slid to Joseph. Then Daniel. “You should not even bother with your electricity. It cannot kill an imperial guard.”

“Then how do I call them off?” I cried.

“Command them, Pharaoh.”

I wet my lips, tasting dust, and looked at the mummies. “Uh . . . leave Oliver alone?”

As one, the two guards jerked back in a clank of armor and marched to their pedestals on stomping, cloth-wrapped feet.

And all I could manage was a gawk. I had controlled them.

Oliver staggered away from the Old Man. His fury pulsed off him, and like a scorching sun, I could not dampen our bond enough to block what he felt.

And what he felt was a high-pitched, digging rage. He had fulfilled his command to Elijah—he had found the Old Man—yet the boiling in his gut had not lessened.

I clutched my hands to my ears and staggered to the nearest mummy, trying to stay in the moment. The dirt and armor had made it seem carved from stone, but up close, I could see its desiccated skin.

The mummies that guard many of the tombs are meant to protect any of the pharaohs. Those had been Professor Milton’s words only the night before—and here I was, facing them. Controlling them.

“Empress.” Daniel laid a hand on my shoulder. “Empress, are you all right?”

“Yes. No. I don’t reall—”

No time. The jackal’s voice sliced through my thoughts. You must hurry.

I gulped. I had to hurry, so with a nod at Daniel, I forced myself to face the Old Man once more. “Why am I the guards’ leader?”

He blinked. “You do not know?” At my glare, he hastened to add, “You wield the clappers of Hathor. The ivory artifacts made to look like hands.”

Daniel stiffened behind me as Joseph repeated, “Ivory artifacts? She has no such things.”

The Old Man’s eyes crinkled with pleasure. “Yes, she does. Stuffed into her boots, she has two ivory clappers that were once gifts from a Hittite king to an Egyptian pharaoh. Whoever possesses the clappers possesses the power to control the imperial guards, the power to control me. And,” his voice dropped to a whisper, “the power to raise the Black Pullet.”

“Eleanor,” Joseph said, his voice low. “Please tell me he is wrong.”

I clamped my lips tight. What could I possibly say right now? Even when Daniel whispered “Is this true?” I simply replaced my pistol in my belt and slid the ivory pieces from my boots—before holding them out for Daniel and Joseph to see.

Daniel choked, the blood draining from his face. “No. No, Empress.”

“How?” Joseph began, just as pale. “That fist was atop the Marquis’s cane. How did you get it?”

“Madame Marineaux.” It was all I could say right now. They could scold me later, but the jackal had said to hurry—and I knew I needed to listen. So, twisting back to the Old Man, I thrust the clappers toward him. “You said Hathor had these. Who is Hathor? And why do I have his artifacts?”

“She. Hathor is a she, and she is one of the Annunaki.”

“The what?” I demanded.

“The Annunaki,” Oliver murmured nearby. His eyes flicked to me, a dull yellow. No anger keened off him now. Only defeat. “That was the magic Elijah told me about, El. The one even darker than necromancy, remember? I told you of it in Paris. Elijah called it the magic of the Annunaki.”

“The Annunaki are not darker than necromancy.” The Old Man wagged his head. “You should know that better than anyone else here, demon boy. They come from the spirit realm. Your world, and they wield your magic. It is simply stronger than yours or mine or any magic ever seen. They possess the purest energy of all: the power of life and death.

“So now you must see that this is how an ivory artifact can steal a man’s soul. The power over life is inside Hathor’s clappers. Which is why a closed fist”—he flourished his cane at the clappers—“can contain a soul. Or part of it.” He flashed his white eyebrows at me. “Someone has been using the energy.”

“What?” My voice cracked out. “I don’t understand.” Except I did understand. The ivory fist had held a person’s soul inside; and every time I had touched it, stroked it, or gazed upon it, I had taken some of that soul. The ivory fist had made me feel strong because it was bolstering me—giving me power.

And I knew whose power I had used—whose power the fist had stolen.

The Marquis’s.

We had found his body, shriveled and drained of life in Madame Marineaux’s sitting room. That was when Oliver had referred to the Annunaki as a magic darker than necromancy.

“The fist holds the Marquis’s soul,” I rasped. “It sucked the life from him and killed him, didn’t it?” My breathing turned shallow. I grabbed at my stomach. Of course the fist had killed him. It made too much sense to be anything else. And then . . .