A Man Called Moses part 5 (the conclusion)

Armed guards, uncertain if they should arrest me or await orders, surrounded me as I entered Ramses’s audience chamber.

Ramses sat upon his throne at the end of the long hall ahead of me. His dark eyes glared.

His queen, Nefertari, sat beside him. She watched me with an expression equal parts hatred and grief.

“Have you returned to murder more of my sons?” Ramses asked me.

I halted as close to the two thrones as a dared. “I never killed the first one.”

Ramses cast a dismissive, exhausted wave. “Your god murdered him. What difference do the details make?”

I swallowed . . . and I crossed the point of no return. “God didn’t murder your son, either. A trio of bounty hunters called the Calves killed Spot. And I’m not your brother, Moses. He died days ago of exposure.”

If I hadn’t already commanded the attention of everyone in the audience chamber, I had now.

I explained the situation to the captivated pharaoh and queen.

Ramses licked his lips. “You’ve lied to me since day one. You impersonated a prince of Egypt. You tricked me into releasing the kingdom’s entire labor force from bondage, guaranteeing that my people will not survive the year.”

He looked rather displeased. I would have to employee unheard-of levels of diplomacy to win Ramses to my side.

“Um,” I said.

Ramses rose from his throne. “Give me one reason not to have my guards drag you outside and crucify you.”

I fumbled with my snake, Stiffy, who still mimicked a staff. “I’ll give you two.” I counted them on my fingers. “First, unless we rescue the Hebrews from the Calves, your kingdom’s screwed. You need their labor. Second, the Calves killed your son. I figured you might, you know, like to rip out their eyeballs.”

Ramses marched towards me. “You freed the Jews only to return them to bondage?”

“No. I’ll free the Jews from the Calves. You may, after that, offer them work for fair play plus citizenship.”

Ramses scoffed. “The Hebrews would never willingly work for me.”

“They’ll balk,” I said, “but they have nowhere else to go. If you’re fair, you might hammer out a deal with them.”

Ramses studied me. He turned his attention towards Nefertari. “What say you?”

She glared down at me. “We can’t trust this imposter. Deceit’s his specialty.”

“Agreed.” Ramses returned his attention towards me. “I won’t commit a single soldier to your cause.”

“I didn’t ask for soldiers,” I said. “The Calves control thousands of hostages. I can’t approach them with an army.”

“Then what do you want from me?” Ramses asked.

“Just a chariot so I can catch up with them.”

Ramses paced around me. “You expect to defeat, on your own, the three most dangerous bounty hunters in the desert? How?”

“As your wife pointed out,” I said, “I’m a liar. I’ll trick them.”

. . . Ramses gave me the chariot, at least. An old, splintery thing with a bad axle, a sickly horse, and a radio that only received the worst AM stations.

I had hoped to arrive in front of the Calves while the chariot’s bass blasted something action-y. I had to settle for a crackly version of Dancing Queen.

I drove alongside the river of confused faces that made up the recently “freed” Hebrews. The Calves had already decided to wrap the Jew’s wrists with chains.

The slaves, once they rebooted from their shock, called me a series of unpleasant names. I had, after all, abandoned them so that the Calves could sell them back into slavery.

I spotted the three bounty hunters at the front of the convoy. Two of them laughed when they saw me. The third (now atop a horse) watched me with his panther-like eyes.

I parked my chariot in front of the wide, wooden bridge that overlooked the Red Sea. I stepped out and, snake-staff in hand, marched out to meet the bounty hunters.

“Look!” one of the hunters said. “The ‘prophet’ returns.” He performed those annoying air-quotes.

“I spoke with Ramses,” I yelled, loud enough to ensure that the Hebrews heard me. “He has agreed to send his entire army to free the Jews from your bondage.”

The first hunter snorted. “Ramses would never agree to that.”

Ramses hadn’t, in fact.

“He has,” I insisted. “His soldiers shall slaughter you, should they discover you here. Unchain the Jews, flee, and the three of you shall live.”

Silence settled over the desert. Only the Red Sea’s roar produced any sound.

“That a fact?” asked the second hunter. “Funny. I don’t hear an army’s approach.”

I straightened. “Once you can hear Ramses’s army, they have already drawn too close for you to escape them.”

The first hunter shook his head. “Do you ever stop playing games, conman?”

I tried to conceal the defeat I felt. These hunters didn’t believe a word I said.

The second hunter drew his curved sword. “You know what, conman? I think we will take that head of yours and enjoy the purse it’ll produce.” He approached me.

The ground rumbled. A war cry exploded. Thousands of Ramses’s soldiers, each atop a horse, rushed around a mountain before they flooded towards us.

Had Ramses decided to trust me? No. Nefertari led the assault. She raised her spear high over her head and screamed Spot’s name.

A dark expression passed over the third hunter’s otherwise calm face. He addressed his first comrade. “Shoot an arrow through the queen’s chest. Once she falls, the Egyptian soldiers shall flee.”

The first hunter nodded, fit an arrow into his bow, and stepped around the sea of slaves for a better shot.

The third hunter addressed the second. “Let’s not give the Jews cause to celebrate. We want them to fear rescue. Kill several of them so that they serve as examples.”

The third hunter’s attention snapped towards me. “I’ll cut the conman’s throat.”

Well. My plan worked swimmingly.

I, with a panicked scream, climbed back into my crummy chariot and motivated my sick horse to limp as fast as it could across the Red Sea’s bridge.

The third hunter chased me. His horse’s hooves produced machine gun reports across the bridge. His hand reached for the back of my neck. The distance between us melted.

I did the last thing my attacker expected. I leapt onto his horse with him. The horse overturned. We crashed and rolled. My legs and hips swerved over the bridge’s side. My chest glided across wood. My left hand seized the edge. I dangled, my “staff” in my other hand.

The third hunter rolled. His horse rolled. Its mammoth weight tore through the bridge. The animal slid off the edge and slammed into the sea, where it exploded for some reason.

I, too weak to do more, hung from the bridge. The third hunter’s shadow poured over me. He stomped upon my hand. I desperately swung my staff at him. He caught my weapon in a tight fist.

“Stiffy,” I yelled. “Help.”

My “staff” uncoiled into a snake, sank its fangs into my attacker’s forearm. He danced drunkenly, eyes wild, while he struggled to rip away the reptile. He tripped over his feet and plunged into the Sea far, far below me.

“That’s for Spot,” I muttered.

I would morn my lost pet later—assuming “later” happened. My grip continued to weaken. I would soon plunge to my death unless something miraculous happened.

Something miraculous happened.

Several pairs of hands swooped down to pull me atop the bridge. Chains jingled from those hands. The Jews had come to my rescue.

I knelt and labored to reclaim my breath. “What . . . what about the second hunter?”

The former slave closest to me shrugged. “We outnumbered him thousands to one.”

“True,” I said, “but you never before used that advantage.”

The Jews offered me a sad smile. “Until today, we expected God to rescue us. Once we understood that God wouldn’t fix our situation for us, we knew we had to fight for ourselves.”

That seemed a lot to digest, and I hadn’t time to digest it. The bridge beneath us moaned. It wooden boards cracked.

The Jews and I exchanged terrified expressions before we ran for our lives across the bridge—which crumbled behind us, dropped and splashed into the sea.

We reach the other side. My foot left the final board a split second before it fell into the foamy water.

My attention darted towards Nefertari’s army, which still stampeded towards us. I noticed the final hunter, arrow locked into his bow. He aimed at the queen.

I pointed. “We have to save Nefertari.”

The Jews snorted collectively. “Why? She kept us in bondage. Let God have her.”

My fists curled. “If God wants her, He’ll come and claim her. We have, until that time, a responsibility to help her.”

I raced after the last hunter, who released his arrow.

I’m too late, I thought.

The arrow soared at the queen—whose shield knocked aside the projectile in the nick of time.

I slammed into and bounced off the hunter before I crashed backwards, the wing knocked from my lungs. He stared down at me with open shock.

He reached for his knife—just as one of the Egyptian’s arrows blasted through his face. Blood cascaded in a pink cloud. He went cross-eyed and collapsed.

. . . It took three weeks for the Jews and Ramses to finalize their contract.

The Jews asked me to serve as the head of their new labor union. I accepted.

I did not accept when they asked me to serve as their spiritual advisor.

“We need commandments,” the Jews told me. “Directives by which to live. You’ve spoken with God. What would He want from us?”

I took a deep breath and addressed the thousands of frantic faces that surrounded me inside Ramses’s dining hall.

“The only commandment you need, is this,” I said. “Don’t be dicks. Treat each other with respect. Make the world a better place for the generation that comes behind you. You don’t need guidance more specific than that.”

. . . The Jews built their new condos by the river (which had recently reverted from blood to water). They afterwards built, at my request, a monument to Spot.

They wanted to build one for me, too, but I still didn’t know which name they ought to carve upon it.

. . . I took a walk one night, and I came across a bush that hosted flames.

I knelt beside it. “How are you and Moses doing?”

The bush offered an annoyed flicker. “My name’s Jayden. I think you confused me with someone else.”

I blinked. “I thought you were God.”

“I’m over here,” said another burning bush fifty feet away.

“Oh,” I said.

“No. It’s fine,” said the first bush. “I get it. All us burning bushes look alike.” He mumbled something under his breath. It sounded negative.

I knelt beside the second bush. “Hello, God.”

“Hello, Moses.”

“I’m not the real Moses. Remember?”

“Then who are you?”

I shrugged. “I still haven’t picked a name for myself.”

“Would you cuddle with a lion, had I named it ‘Kitty’?”

I shook my head. “Calling it ‘Kitty’ does make it less of a lion.”

The bush chuckled. “Then why so worried about your name? You stand a collection of your actions and decisions, regardless of what anyone calls you.”

A regretful sigh shuddered through me. “Some of those decisions have proven pretty bad.”

“Stand, then,” said the bush. “Make better ones.”

This five-part miniseries, a first for this blog, proved a crazy to complete. I hope that you've enjoyed it. I worked on it while I labored with a lot of last-minute changes (do other sorts exist?) in plans for my move to Colorado from Seattle.

I invite you all to enjoy my previously published, short stories on this blog, as well as both my movie reviews (moviesmartinwolt.blogspot.com) and my novels, such as "Daughters of Darkwana" available on Kindle and any device with a Kindle app.

Thanks for reading! Catch you next time.

A Man Called Moses part 4

I stared at Ramses and his armed soldiers. Spot stood beside me. I glanced over my shoulder, only to realize that the Calves had already vanished. Damn, those guys could move, a trio of gold-plated ninjas.

I returned my attention towards the pharaoh, whose eyes zeroed upon me with naked hate plus a side order of betrayal. You’d think that I, as a conman, would’ve grown immune to that look.

You’d think . . .

“Moses.” Ramses’s voice quivered. “How could you do this to me?”

My mind spun, sought escape.

Ramses marched towards me. His soldiers followed, spears and swords raised.

“I forgave your past crimes,” Ramses whispered. “I took you back into our home, our family. Why do you value those lowly Jews more than me?”

Because I’m not really your brother, I didn’t dare say. Because I’m a conman who just looks like Moses. Because I want to live as a prince of Egypt while I earn a favor from God.

“Darkness,” I whispered. “If the Jews remain under your heel tomorrow, God shall plunge your world into darkness.” I prayed that my calculation for tomorrow’s eclipse would prove correct.

“I don’t care if I never see the sun again,” Ramses said. “I will never release the Hebrews.”

I swallowed. Then, I went for broke. “After the sun vanishes, it shall return, only to herald the worst plague of all. Ramses, if you do not release the Jews by the time the sun returns . . . God shall kill your children. One a day.”

“What!” cried Spot.

I slapped my forehead. I had forgotten that one of Ramses’s sons stood right behind me.

“What?” a woman whispered.

Everyone redirected his attention towards Nefertari, who stood at the doorway.

Her eyes widened with fright. “Husband, we cannot risk our children.”

Ramses hesitated. “The Hebrew’s god wouldn’t dare to anger me.”

“Yes, He would,” I said. My knees threatened to shake. I mastered them with an effort.

Ramses looked as if he had chewed the bitterest root. He pointed at me. “Arrest that man.”

His soldiers grabbed me. I didn’t bother to resist.

Ramses stepped nose-to-nose with me. “You owe me your fingers and your head, brother. Tomorrow, when the sun fails to vanish, when my children continue to live, when your Hebrew god fails to carry out your threats, I shall take my prizes from you.”

. . . You may find this hard to believe, but Ramses’s prison proved a rather nice place to stay. Fluffy towels. My own personal servant. I slept on a marshmallow of a bed. A guy could get used to this sort of imprisonment.

Ramses would, in the next few hours, order my head removed from my shoulders, which put something of a damper on my enjoyment.

I watched, through the slit-thin window of my cell, while the sun vanish behind the moon, just as I had predicted. It would soon return. None of Ramses’s children would die when that happened, which meant I would.

Perhaps I would get lucky, and Spot would fall down some stairs or something. I didn’t really want that to happen, though. I had grown fond of Spot.

The sunlight returned. I heard, shortly thereafter, the march of footsteps towards my cell. Ramses’s soldiers had certainly come to collect me.

I sighed with my entire, tired body. What made me think I could pull off a scam as grand as this?

The door to my cell unlocked, swung open. Nefertari, her eyes red and puffy, stood at the other side. She stared at me with an expression of suffering and hatred and confusion so intense that I couldn’t break eye contact with her.

She flew across the room. Her fingernails raked my face while she screamed incoherent rage at me. I fought to catch her wrists, but a fury fueled her movements, motivated them to superhuman speeds.

Ramses’s voice exploded. “Stop!”

She froze, as did I. Ribbons of blood dribbled down my face and neck.

Ramses marched towards me. The gold chains that adorned him jingled with his every step. The anger had drained from him. Something far worse had refilled him. Grief.

“Moses,” he whispered. He could say no more.

I glanced from the king to his queen and back again. “What happened?”

“As if you didn’t know,” Nefertari said, her voice a hiss of escaped gas.

“How powerful is this god of yours, Moses?” Ramses asked. “He killed Spot as well as the seven guards I assigned to watch him.”

Nefertari spun to face her husband. “I told you to place our children under more protection than a few guards!”

“It wouldn’t have mattered,” I said. “God would have just as easily killed a thousand soldiers to get to His target.” It amazed me that, even under these circumstances, I could lie so quickly, so effortlessly. What was I?

I had, in the past, felt a touch of temporary guilt for my deceptions. Today, I discovered self-hatred . . . to say nothing of confusion. Who had killed Ramses’s son?

I realized the riddle’s answer as soon as I considered the question. The Calves would gain nothing if Ramses killed me. They needed my scam to work. They hadn’t fled Spot’s chamber yesterday. They had remained, hidden, and overheard everything I told Ramses. They had killed the boy and his guardians.

I felt inhuman. It proved a distasteful sensation, the realization that the world officially and irreversibly sucked more for my involvement in it.

“Will your God continue to kill my children every day that I keep the Jews in enslavement?” Ramses asked me.

“Even if you kill me. Nothing will stop His mission to free His people.” The lies flowed from my monster’s lips.

Ramses’s gaze sank towards the floor. “Then take the Jews you love so much and never return.”

. . . The Hebrews had, by the day’s end, packed their few belongings. They cheered for me, sang my praises.

They looked to me for leadership. I could offer them nothing, not even a destination.

My gaze drifted across the kingdom around me. Half-completed buildings surrounded me, which required the Jews to finish them. The crops remained half-planted. All of Egypt would suffer for the Jews’ freedom.

I, with no plan at all, led the Hebrews into the desert.

I discovered, fewer than thirty minutes into our journey, the Calves, who walked beside me.

“Why,” I whispered, “did you kill that boy?”

“You know why,” the first hunter said with a sneer.

“We needed Ramses to grant your request,” said the second.

“So what now?” I asked.

“You owe us a lot of gold,” said the first.

I said nothing. I didn’t have their gold.

“The way we see it,” said the first hunter, “we have two choices.”

The second hunter spoke. “We could turn in your head for your ransom.”

“Or,” said the first, “we could take the slaves, instead.”

“They aren’t slaves, anymore,” I said with little conviction.

The first hunter laughed. “Sure, they are, and we can march them into any kingdom and sell them as such.”

I should have felt horrified by the suggestion. I felt nothing.

The third hunter grabbed my arm, jerked me to a halt. “Decide, conman. You. Or them.”

I closed my eyes. “You already know which I’ll choose.”

I sensed the first hunter’s nod. “Them, then. Very well.”

The first hunter chuckled. “Nice doing business with you, conman.”

I climbed up a pile of boulders near the mountains, raised my hands. Once I commanded the attention of the entire population of the Hebrews, I said, “God has decided that you must follow these three men.” I pointed at the gold-plated Calves. “Do as they tell you. They will lead you to the Promised Land.”

One former slave asked, “What of you, Moses?”

I cringed. “God has decided that I must not join you in the Promised Land. I have . . . committed a wrong. I . . . can lead you no further.”

Then I, without another word, wandered from the pile of boulders and into the mountains. I heard the Jews’ confused cries behind me. I never looked back.

I sat atop one mountain, held my pet snake, Stiffy. He still mimicked a walking staff. I watched the river of former slaves far beneath me, while the Calves led them to their next world of bondage.

I witnessed, in the opposite direction, Egypt, where Ramses’s kingdom would suffer without their slaves.

Heat reflected off my back. I spun around and spotted a small bush that hosted flames. The bush did not appear to burn.

“Oh,” I whispered. “It’s you.”

The bush spoke in a soft whisper. “Moses. Have you surrendered your faith in yourself?”

I snorted. “I’m not Moses. Remember?”

“Who are you, then?”

I shrugged. My mother had, for whatever reason, abandoned me as a child. I had filled my belly via trickery ever since. I could not recall my real name.

“I don’t know who I am.” My vision blurred with tears.

“Then, decide whom to become,” said the bush.

The fire, all at once, vanished. The un-scorched bush sat in silence.

Fire exploded from it, spread, surrounded me. The tears on my cheeks sizzled and vaporized. The fire chased itself into a tornado, rose towards the heavens. I sat centered within it, my eyes wide with wonder.

An unexpected anger overtook me. I leapt to my feet and screamed at the tornado. “You said You hadn’t the power to save the Jews.”

“I don’t,” said the tornado.

I waved at the flames that churned around me. “What’s all this then?”

“Did a tornado free the Hebrews?” asked the tornado. “Did I predict the eclipse? Did I train your snake to mimic a staff?”

I threw out my arms. “I can’t rescue the Jews from the Calves. I can’t save Ramses’s kingdom.”

The tornado grew violently bright and hot. “Do you suspect that I drew your name from a hat? I choose you. Have faith in yourself. Perform your own miracles and quit whining like a crusty twat.”

The tornado vanished. The bush smoked.

My gaze first returned to Ramses’s kingdom. The citizens of Egypt faced starvation without their slave-based workforce. My gaze glided towards the Jews. The Calves led them towards their new slavery.

A tiny particle of ash glowed, drifted past my face. “Your problems provide you your strengths,” it whispered.

My attention darted from one challenge to the next, until they blurred together, and I understood exactly what I had to accomplish.

To be concluded . . .

(Catch my move reviews at moviesmartinwolt.blogspot.com and my novels, such as “Daughters of Darkwana” on Kindle. See you next time!)

A Man Called Moses Part 3

I paced within Moses’s old bedroom inside Ramses’s palace. Morning would arrive soon, and Ramses’s soldiers would arrive with it. They would drag me outside and cut one of my fingers from my hand. I could do nothing to prevent it.

I had arrived here, in Egypt, to pull off my greatest scam yet. I had used my resemblance to the recently, and secretly, deceased Moses to trick the pharaoh, who mistook me for his younger brother.

I had only aimed to live as a prince. The goal hadn’t felt so greedy.

Then God showed up in the form of a burning bush, asked me to free the Hebrew slaves from Ramses’s kingdom. If I succeeded, God would owe me a favor.

I thought my conman’s clever tricks could persuade Ramses to release his slaves.

My tricks backfired. I pushed Ramses too far. I had (somehow) turned the lakes and rivers to blood. Ramses had afterwards ordered me locked away in my room. I would forfeit a finger every morning that the blood remained.

This morning would prove the first, and I hadn’t a clue how to make the blood vanish.

To further complicate matters, a trio of bounty hunters called the Calves, wise to my true identity, gave me ten days to collect for them a handsome amount of gold. The Calves would expose me as a fraud if I failed.

I didn’t just swim over my head; I rested miles below the ocean’s surface.

Footsteps sounded near my locked door. My heart raced. My hands tightened around my pet snake, Stiffy, whom I had trained to mimic a staff.

Someone outside my door turned the lock. I held my breath while I expected Ramses’s soldiers to pile inside my room.

The door opened. A woman entered. She stared at me with an expectant expression.

I blinked, confused.

“Don’t you recognize me, Moses?” she asked. “It’s me. Nefertari.”

Ramses’s wife? I nodded. “Right. Of course you are.”

An expression of hurt spread across her face. “Please, Moses. Don’t act like that.” She approached me, placed a hand on my face. “Surely, we didn’t end our relationship on such bad terms that you must treat me as a stranger.”

I stood at a loss for words. Moses and Nefertari shared a relationship before she married the king? I wondered what someone might pay for such a juicy bit of gossip.

She squeezed my arm. “My husband’s soldiers shall arrive soon. We must flee now if you wish to escape his rage.”

I allowed her to lead me away from my room, down a set of stairs, past a Starbucks, and into a room filled with dull, practice weapons and board games.

“Hello,” someone said.

I turned and spotted the kid from Ramses’s audience chamber. “Um, hi?”

Nefertari waved at the child. “This is your nephew, Spot.”

I performed a double take. The kid served as Ramses’s son?

“You named him Spot?” I asked.

She nodded. “Moses, you must remain hidden here, where my husband will never find you. Spot promised to keep silent about your presence.”

Ramses would never find me in his son’s room? That spoke volumes.

Spot smiled up at me. “Do you like to play games, Mister?”

Kid, you don’t know the half of it.

. . . Someone found, later that day, a frog in her living room. Gross exaggerations followed. The nightshift workers soon discussed the "millions of frogs Moses unleashed upon Egypt."

The next day, some guy about to get sucked into a pyramid scheme discovered lice in his hair, so that became that day’s “plague.” Everyone overreacted accordingly.

Ramses found a fly in his soup the day after that, so everyone gossiped about the billions of flies I had sent to swarm across the country.

Friday. A cow threw up. People couldn’t contain their terror. “Moses’s god poisoned our livestock! What will we do?”

Saturday. Someone located a boil on his ass. Time to panic.

Sunday. Some guy set his roof on fire while trying to light a fart. Everyone freaked out about how I had set the sky on fire. Blah. Blah. Blah.

Monday arrived with locusts of something. I honestly stopped paying attention at that point.

. . . Spot and I played board games. I won every time (I cheated).

“Too bad, kid,” I said as I collected my winnings (I could always talk Spot into gambling a bit). “I really thought you would’ve won that round. Try again?”

Spot nodded. “This time, I’m gonna sink your battleship in the first round.”

“I bet you will, sport.” He wouldn’t. I switched the position of my toy ships whenever I needed.

“Excuse us,” someone said, so close that I jumped from my chair.

The three bounty hunters collectively known as the Calves stood inside Spot’s room. Two of them grinned at me the way a child grins at a stack of birthday presents. The third hunter’s cold eyes drilled into my core.

“How did you get in here?” asked Spot.

One of the grinning hunters answered. “We’re good at sneaking into places.”

The other grinner spoke. “You disappeared on us, Moses.” He pronounced my name in such a way that reminded me he knew my true identity.

“The pharaoh’s been looking for you,” said the first grinner. “Seems you owe him some fingers.”

“And you owe us,” said the second, “some gold.”

I glanced at my board game-winnings, not nearly enough to cover the amount I had promised these hunters. They would certainly betray me afterwards, even if I could pay them.

The third hunter’s voice dripped menace. “When people owe us gold, we don’t like to have to look for them.”

I walked towards them so I could whisper. I didn’t want Spot to overhear our conversation. “The next plague will force Ramses to release the Jews. I’ll make Ramses pay them for their services. Then, I’ll funnel their pay to you. Okay?”

The third hunter snorted. “What plague? Your tricks don’t fool us.”

I nodded. “I haven’t caused any real plagues, but I’ve studied the sky most of my life. Tomorrow, the moon shall block out the sun, cast all of Egypt into darkness. That ought to scare Ramses into submission.”

The hunters leveled their skepticism straight at me.

I waved towards a few empty chairs. “Have a seat. If the sun doesn’t vanish tomorrow, you may do whatever you like to me. Would any of you care for some string cheese while you wait?”

The third hunter shook his head. “String cheese causes Asperger’s.”

“Oh, that’s just a stupid rumor,” I said.

The third hunter straightened. “My wife ate string cheese when she was pregnant. Now, our son falls down every five seconds.”

I didn’t believe that Asperger’s caused anyone to fall down. The bounty hunter’s son, I suspected, existed as a clumsy idiot. I did not feel inclined to share these beliefs.

The door opened, and Ramses, surrounded by several armed soldiers, marched inside Spot’s room.

The pharaoh’s furious eyes zeroed upon me, and I felt myself sink just a little bit deeper into the ocean I created for myself.

. . . To be continued.

(You can catch my movie reviews at moviesmartinwolt.blogspot.com and my novels on Kindle. Thanks for reading!)