Chapter 7: I’m dead

Chaos spread across the room, finally, with a little bit of shouting and a couple of fireballs, Ra was able to restore some peace. He ordered everybody to take a seat, the mark on my arm no longer burned, as if it was there for years. With a single snap of his fingers, a dozen female guards with golden spears surrounded me, with their spears aimed right at my chest.

I raised my hands in defense, “Wait! Wait!” I exclaimed.

Horus ran to my aid, “He’s just a child grandfather.” He said gesturing for the guards to lower their spears, they did so, but were a bit hesitant about either following Horus or Ra, upon seeing this, Jupiter, Odin, and Zeus stood up.

“Kill him!” Odin bellowed.

“He could be a spy for all we know, we have to get rid of him.” Zeus said.

“Delightful people.” I muttered.

“A child will grow, and his threat will grow too,” Ra replied, ignoring the others,

“But this one’s different,” Horus looked at me, “I can feel it, he’s strong grandfather, if we could harness this power and tame it to our benefit, it could make all the difference between winning and losing this war, and you saw his mark-”

“He’s a Decapitai.” Ra spat out the word, “His mark means death to us.”

I was getting frustrated by this word, not because I didn’t know it, but because it rang a bell, I knew that word, I just couldn’t put my finger on it, like a memory in the last drawer of my brain, lost between all the other vague memories. I didn’t like how Horus talked about harnessing and taming my power either, and what power is he talking about, I don’t have any remarkable powers as far as I know, the only remarkable thing that happened, was that I got knocked out, not once, but twice.

“I know he’s a Decapitai, but that’s an opportunity we can’t miss, don’t you think it’s finally time to reunite with them? He could be the key to do this.”

Ra’s glare softened, “I know he’s just a kid, Horus, but we’re in very desperate times now, we can’t lose any more warriors, especially against a Decapitai, and what makes you so sure this isn’t another one of their nasty tricks?”

Horus looked at me, “I promise you grandfather, that he’ll be of great assistance to us, I’ll take personal care of him.”

Ra still didn’t look convinced, and the bad vibes coming from the other three wasn’t helping matters, he knew that if he gave the order to free me, he will have to face them.

“Grandfather, think about what would happen if we had one of them on our side.” Horus pleaded.

“Ra, you can’t let that happen, you’ll doom us all!” Warned Zeus, the others nodded in agreement.

The room became silent as we awaited Ra’s orders, “Ra, you can’t seriously be considering it.” Said Jupiter

“I’m not considering it,” snapped Ra, “I’m doing it. I’ll do what I see fit, and until another Council election, I’m still in charge here. He’s free to go.” He ordered the guards to lower their weapons, “He will be under your watch from now on, he’s your responsibility.” He said to Horus. Horus nodded.

Ra sighed, “But remember, he’s a Decapitai, you can never trust him.” He eyed me suspiciously.

“So you’re just going to let him walk out the door, what if he’s a spy?” Argued Zeus.

We left the room in a hurry and could barely catch the start of a quarrel. “What was that about! You people keep talking about me, and I don’t even know what you’re saying!” I cried as soon as we left the room.

“I’ll explain everything,” Horus replied enthusiastically.

“I’m all ears,” I said as we entered my room and Horus shrank to normal size, and sat at the foot of my bed,

“You must be wondering,” He said, “What does Decapitai mean.” I nodded, he continued, “Decapitai is an old Latin word which means ‘He who decapitates’, they are the elite of the elite, what makes them so special, is that they’re the only ones who can wield the Blades of Destruction; the two fiery blades which were constructed from the bones of Uranus, what makes them so dangerous, is that they never, ever, follow the council, in fact, they’re always opposing us.”

“Wait,” I said, “you mean there are others like me?”

“Yes, but we haven’t heard from them in a while, almost like they vanished.” He replied.

“But why do they do this? You must’ve done something.” I pointed out.

“We never trusted them, not with that amount of immense power, they always broke every agreement we made, so we never allowed them any voice in our meetings, or included them in any major occasion, whether it be a victory or a loss. Soon they started vanishing from under our eyes, only to emerge a couple of years later forming a secret underground act to overthrow the Council and take over authority, that was one of the bloodiest wars ever in the history of the Council, they were like reapers, they’d slash their way through our ranks and legions with surprising ease, their Blades of Destruction gave them this huge advantage over us.”

But I still had this question, nagging at me from what Horus and Ra said earlier, ‘we can’t lose any more warriors, especially against a Decapitai’ ‘their Blades of Destruction gave them this huge advantage over us.’

“You and Ra said something weird,” I said, “about losing to a Decapitai and their Blades of Destruction, what’s that?”

“The Blades of Destruction have an amazing ability for those who wield it.”

“What is it?” I asked.

“It can bring the enemies you slay back to life to assist you.” He said.

Silence echoed through the room, I stood there for a second, I waited for him to start laughing and say that it was all a joke, but it quickly became too late for that. “But,” Horus added, “only once, can you resurrect each one, then they’ll go to their place in the afterlife.”

“That’s a lot to process.” I managed to say.

“Fortunately, we have you on our side, you could be our chance to negotiate a peace treaty with them.”

I paced the room back and forth,

“What’s wrong?” Horus asked.

“I think I heard the word Decapitai before,” I replied, struggling to remember where.

“Every Decapitai has to swear an oath to the Commander, you pledge yourself to him, but you never remember it, it’s like memories from your early years, you can’t really grasp it, but it’s there.”

“Definitely too much to process,” I confirmed. “So now what?”

“We have to get your Blades of Destruction, unfortunately, we don’t have them here. ”

“What?” I asked, with a confused look, “I’ll go alone? I don’t even have enough training, none in fact. And how come you have a multiple floored arsenal, and you don’t have a pair of swords?”

“Hey, give them a little credit, we can’t keep something this dangerous here, plus no one can use them accept a Decapitai, and about going alone, we will arrange a companion, and we can’t train you without a weapon.”

I replayed the events of the past week in my head, my problems escalated quickly, from trying to keep a successful social life, to trying to not be killed by angry gods, all that in mind, I’m still determined to do whatever it takes to defend the circle of people I care about, which I found to be a pretty narrow one. “Ok, where to now?”

Horus smiled, “Vulcan, the god of the forges.”

I knew Vulcan from history class, he is the god of fire and blacksmiths, “But before that, you’ll need this.” He said handing me a paper that wasn’t in his hand a second earlier, I took one glance at it and then dropped it to the floor, written there in big bold letters, were the words ‘Death Certificate’.