Chapter One

Nirrana and the Pharaoh

Nirrana awoke from another dream filled with painful past memories. She sat up and looked around her chamber. Nearly everything in this room was gold, for she lived in the pharaoh's palace, as she was one of his mistresses. Nirrana was a young woman aged 24, the rest of the mistresses were at least 30 so she was the pharaoh's favourite.

Nirrana went over to her washbasin, where she wiped her face with a damp cloth. Looking up Nirrana saw her reflection in the mirror above. She looked extremely pale, her once neatly coiled, long, brown hair was in a tangled mess. Slowly she began the painful process of taking out her hair ties and ribbons, to tame her hair.

………

In the pharaoh's chamber the pharaoh sat on his bed talking to his wise man.

"How long do you think you can continue this madness?" asked the wise man pacing up and down the room.

"As long as I can!" replied the pharaoh "now sit down your making me dizzy!"

"But if someone finds out, there could be chaos!" exclaimed the wise man griping the pharaoh's shoulder.

"How dare you touch a god! Leave me, wise man, Imhotep needs his sleep!" and with that the wise man swept from his room cursing under his breath.

The pharaoh was not just any pharaoh but he was the god of healing called Imhotep. He was ridiculously handsome and had black hair and bright green eyes. The whole of Imhotep's clothes were woven with fine gold, masses of gold jewellery encrusted with precious stones hung on his wrists and around his neck.

All of the villagers worshiped him and gave offerings asking him to heal the sick.

But Imhotep was very greedy, and asked for ridiculous amounts of offerings until he would even consider healing anyone. As a result the whole of the village was extremely poor, but everyone knew, to defy a god meant the gods would curse your whole family.

………

Finished brushing her hair, Nirrana sat back down on her bed thinking about her dream. She had seen her parents, there painful faces calling out to her.

Nirrana's parents were killed in the great plague that had infected the whole of Egypt. This plague had been sent by the goddess Sekhmet to kill all unworthy subjects.

Nirrana's parents were killed when she was very little, but images of their painful faces still haunted her in her sleep.

With no family or home Nirrana was taken on as a servant to Imhotep, later becoming his mistress.

Standing up Nirrana went to the door intending to take her nightly walk. She walked down the glistening gold corridor occasionally stopping to look out windows. Nearly every night she walked these corridors, which somehow soothed her mind.

As she passed the Pharaoh's chamber, she heard laughter. Nirrana pushed her ear to the door to listen.

"Their so stupid!" she heard Imhotep say. "How could they possibly believe that I am a god?" Imhotep said followed by a burst of laughter. The pharaoh was talking to himself as far as Nirrana could make out.

"I mean I get everything I could possible want off them, they are blinded by their fear of the gods!" he roared.

Nirrana pulled her ear away from the door and quickly stepped back. So the pharaoh wasn't really Imhotep! He had fooled everyone! Nirrana rushed back to her chamber.

Panting Nirrana sat on her bed. She was going to have to tell everyone the truth, otherwise the gods would punish her.