AGELESS Campaign Episode 2 - Temple of the Cat-Goddess

Chapter 79, “Ra is Displeased” September 11, 1882, 12:30P.M.

Ruby leads them closer to the three main targets, the men her grandmother had pointed out. She focuses all her energy on the two in the back, trying to ascertain what they are thinking. She manages to move until she is barely within range of the spell. She is unable to read the thoughts from the High Priest. One of the men notices her and she is able to read his thoughts, with him thinking she is a "British Spy" and wondering if he is should have her apprehended. He then thinks that he should ask Abdullah that very question and softly speaks to his companion.

Hearing the man's thoughts as he speaks to his companion, the other one is Abdullah, who glances in Ruby's direction when his attention is called to her. Ruby immediately looks away. She grasps her grandmothers hand tighter, nods that she got what she wanted, then turns and fights the crowd, moving in the opposite direction. The parting thoughts from the man are his confirmation that she and her companion are indeed British spies, due to their quick departure once spotted.

Ruby waits to return to the men carrying the guns until she knows she is not being followed. Nobody from the crowd appears to follow. At this point the food vendors have arrived and are drawing crowds around their carts. Ruby takes a quick check of the surrounding buildings to get an idea of which would be best for their mission. They decide on one that is a little further back but higher, in order to minimize the chance of hitting any innocents. Mina, Ruby and the four soldiers enter through the back and go up the four staircases to the roof. George notes that Ruby and Mina are in position on the roof.

Callum says, "I see some people who I need to speak to." He gestures over to a building on the opposite side of the courtyard, some 300 feet away. Abby notes that he is pointing to a trio comprised of an older bearded man in Egyptian clothing standing next to a pair of young Egyptian boys. Upon closer examination she recognizes one of the children as the disguised young Henry Jones, last seen by her in Tanis. "I'd guess he wouldn't have stayed behind even if you asked him to?" Abby said and smiled. "Let's go see what he has to say." She started moving in that direction, but indirectly, making it look like they just end up in that area.

As they near that area the trio move further back and down a side street, away from any prying eyes and ears. A black cat is keeping pace with the two boys. Upon arrival the older man, who appears to be in his early-mid-fifties, states to Callum in an American Bostonian accent "Cal, is this your Abigail?" Callum smiles and replies, "She's Abigail Marsters, only time will tell if she is mine or not." He turns to her and says, "Abby, these are three associates of mine, in the same line of work. You've already met Henry Jones. His companion is also named Henry, Henry Jekyll to be precise. And my other friend (gesturing to the older man) is Mr. Maurice Boujoulais, we have known one another for over a decade." He then tells the trio, "She can be trusted, I no longer keep any secrets from her, you are free to speak."

Maurice says, "We successfully found The Armide in a hidden cove near Herakleion, a coastal town fifteen miles northeast of Alexandria. The French have a team of six wizards guarding her." Callum turns to Abby and says, "The Armide is an armored three-mast French Battleship built fifteen years ago. The wizard group purchased it from the French Government earlier this year, then made magical modifications to triple its cruising speed from 12 to 36 knots. It is where they are currently storing all of the Egyptian treasure given to them to hold by the Princess back in Zakazik."

The other lad, dressed as a beggar boy, interjects with a London accent "Mr. Stuart, things appear to be quite serious here. The man with Abdulla el Said and the Horus High Priest is not going to back down. He is a powerful Sheik and now that he has moved against the King he has no choice but to see this through to the end. He is the one financing this uproar in Cairo. Each of his six sons are intermixed with the crowds and he has supplied each of them with a Wand of Fireballs." Callum replies, "Thank you Doctor." While they are speaking the black cat moves away from the boys and starts rubbing against Abby's leg.

Abby leaned down to stroke the black cat rubbing against her leg. If the cat seems amenable, she'll pick it up to stroke it as she spoke to the others. If not she'll squat down to scratch it behind the ears. "Hello, lovely," she said quietly. The cat seems very happy to be in Abigail’s arms. The young man Henry Jekyll says, "Her name is Independent. I call her 'Indy' for short."

She raised her voice and said, "The people I'm with, we're trying to get the less dedicated to leave. Cal and I just spread a rumor about a run on the rice storages and about 1 in 10 of the people left. We're providing those food carts there with free food. A couple other things will happen pretty shortly that will hopefully scare off some more. But we never expected to actually stop this battle. We're just hoping to get most of the folk being used as pawns out of the way. But Wands of Fireball? That scares me. That's an entire city burned down.” Maurice says, "We believe the goal is to attack the palace, not the city itself, although you are right about the danger of fire in a mostly wooden city."

What was the purpose of finding the Armide? Hoping to use it for leverage somehow?" Callum says, "If the French plans start to fall apart they might be tempted to just take the money and run. That would complicate a peaceful settlement afterwards, given that the Princess and General Orabi both consented to the French taking the treasure. So we plan to prevent the ship from leaving Egyptian waters, even if we have to sink it."

She looked askance at Cal and added, "And I think we need to talk after this is all over." He nods but does not speak a reply. Abby says, "Alright. I need to get word to my people about what you've just told us. We knew that Abdullah was being riled up by someone. We thought it was a faction of the French. In all likelihood, it still is, just working with the Sheikh. Ugh, I hate politics. It gets complicated fast. Do you young gentlemen know what these sons look like? We'll need to get them out of play somehow, or at least get those wands away from them," she finished, still rubbing the cat behind her ears.

Maurice says, "The Doctor and I do, Mr. Jones just arrived shortly, after the boys had departed from their father. As to taking them out of play, I do have enough sleep powder to temporarily stop two of them, but it would hard to use it while they are with a crowd." Abby says, "I have some friends and I can cast at least one sleep spell myself. Right now I just want to make sure my friends all know who the men with the wands are. They can each take care of one in whatever way works for them. But I think we're getting short on time. Unless there's more to tell, Cal and I should get moving." She leaned down to put the black cat back down. "It was lovely, Indy," she said with a final stroke of the cat's fur.

Mina stands behind Ruby to shield her as she mutters and gestures to call forth her illusion. As she gestures as blazing sun appears over the palace in a dazzling burst of light. It burns brightly for a moment then zooms over the crowd before returning to its starting place over the palace gates. There the sun slowly has a twin grow next to it as the original sun becomes the left eye of the great Ra. The head of Ra looks down upon the crowd, undeniable anger and displeasure on it.

The illusion has the desired initial effect, as the crowds begin to panic and disperse. The Horus High Priest casts a spell of some sort. He then lifts up his staff in the direction of the illusion and begins to chant something in an ancient Egyptian language. George was expecting this and rapidly cast a quick little spell to disrupt the priest. The Priest finds himself on the receiving end of a deluge, which washes him to the floor of the stage. He does manage to hold onto his staff.

Callum and Abby return to the main square. She notices that the cat Indy has gone with them, following at their heels. They arrive at the crowds just as Mina's illusion begins, followed by George's water attack on the priest. Abby paused to stare at the illusion for a moment. "That is good." She chuckled as the water fell onto the priest. "Keep your eyes out for any of our people. Otherwise I'm heading back to the office to find Sabah. She should be able to help disarm the men with the wands." "You'll like her, Indy," she said casually to the little black cat following behind. "She's a Priestess of Bast."

Mina casts mage hand and uses it to lift the priest's robe up and over his head just as he tries to get up. So blinded the priest falls over again. Hardin calls out in Arabic "Look! The Priest has displeased Ra! He suffers now for it! We have been led to destruction. Run and hide while you still can!" The crowds run quicker now, knocking over two of the five food pushcarts in the process. Around a quarter of the 200 or so men with weapons clustered closer to the Palace also flee, but the others hold fast.

On the nearby rooftop Ruby notices the disguised Abby and Callum come out of a back alley and head back in the direction of where the soldiers are keeping their horses. Her gaze then shifts back to the stage as Abdullah and the man whose mind she read both jump from the stage together, leaving the priest alone.

The two rush off in the direction of the closest group of armed Egyptian men nearest them. "I think I've been adopted," Abby said with a smile as she settled the cat on the saddle in front of her. She got the horse started and rode to the office, looking for any of her others friends along the way.

On the rooftop, Ruby says, "Well, if Abdullah leaves, his followers should follow him, right Nana? That might thin the crowd out alone. And I've just been thinking, if he's as much of a coward as I think he is, if I just shoot a couple of warning shots off it should scare a good group of the crowd, and possibly him, away. Mina says, "That would probably work, but too many shots will draw their attention to where we are."

Ruby says, “We have to be careful now they think we're British spies. Though I think you may have actually BEEN a British spy Nana I don't want to open up THAT can of worms today." Mina says, "Oh no, I've never been a spy for the British, only the Americans. But I did help to save a British ship back during the Opium Wars, that's why they owe me a favor, which General Woolsley will be sure to recognize."

Ruby says, "I was thinking one, maybe two shots. I don't exactly relish the thought of possibly killing a man, even if he is crazy. Though I won't hesitate if I have to, to save the innocent people here." Ruby pauses and looks up at the clear sky. "It's so beautiful here. I wish I really had time to enjoy it. Somehow, things always seem to get a bit crazy. You've been through so much Nana, seems like I always get myself in trouble, just like you!"

She watched Abdullah and his companion try to slink away. "I'd better get that shot off now so Abdullah thinks it's meant for him." Ruby gets low on the roof and aims for a deserted area of the city. She waves for her grandmother to get low to be unseen. Once she is out of sight, Ruby takes aim at some large bags of rice resting on a nearby rooftop. She shoots and the sound of the shot seems to echo off every building wall around them.

"Wow, that was even louder than I thought it would be," Ruby says, peeking over the ledge to see if she can catch a glimpse of Abdullah running off. Abdullah and his companion do indeed scurry away, along with a small group of a dozen armed men. Given that the palace guards are still shooting at them nobody takes any extra notice that the shot came from a different direction.
"Well, duh. Guess we should have figured that, huh?" From the roof Ruby keeps an eye on Abdullah and watches where he and his cronies go.

They find good cover from the Palace guards, which also leaves them totally vulnerable from behind, which includes the top of the building that Ruby and Mina are on. Meanwhile, the soggy Priest has regained his footing and successfully dispels the "Ra" illusion with his staff. By now all but the 150 most loyal of the followers have fled, and those are spread out in clusters ranging from 6 to 20, continuing to fire at the palace guard.

George casts the spell message. A gentle zephyr whirls away and whispers in Ruby's ear "If you can shoot the priest's staff and break it" "Is he crazy??" Ruby laughs. "Nana did you hear that? George wants me to shoot the priests staff!" Ruby shakes her head back and forth and ponders.

"I suppose it's not much different than the targets Jake used to make me practice with back home. And Jake would never hesitate to try to shoot it if it was necessary. I'd like to know why but I guess we don't have time for that. Plus we have the advantage, they'll never know the shot came from up here with all the shooting going on down there. Stay down Nana I don't want anyone seeing you up here." Ruby lays as flat as she can to steady herself and the gun. She waits until she has a good line of sight on the staff with no one standing behind it and she takes the shot, aiming to break the staff.

The bullet strikes the staff with such force that it flies from the Priest's hand, going off of the stage and landing on the ground. The staff appears to still be solid, not being broken by the bullet strike.

Lawrence sees the priest get doused with water from the heavens. He hides a smile as he slides through the crowd back to the stage. He ducks when Ruby's shot disarms the priest. He whispers to Hardin, "Watch my back. I see an opportunity." The acquisitions expert scrambles on the ground for the staff while the crowd scatters.

Ruby exclaims, "Darn it! It must be magical because I hit it true, what a shot! We can't just run down and fetch it, we'll never get there in time, plus they already think we're spies. Maybe George is nearby and he'll run in and snatch it up!" She scans the crowd for any of her group. She does not see George. She does see the Priest stand back up and run to the side of the stage that the staff flew off from.

Meanwhile, George drifts through the remaining crowd in his disguise trying to make his way to Abdullah. Maybe if he could get a word to Abdullah he could stop some of this. George reaches the area where Abdullah and his companion are clustered with a dozen armed men, one of whom is holding a wand of some sort in his hand. Abdullah's companion appears to be the one in charge, telling the men to "Wait for the others to get into position."

Ruby spots Lawarence moving close to the bottom part of the stage in the direction of the staff simultaneous to the Priest reaching that same edge of the stage, where he could retrieve it by jumping off. “Ooohh, get it Laurence!" Ruby claps, rooting for her friend even though she doesn't know why. She quickly reloads the gun, in case he doesn't make it and has an altercation with the priest. Lawrence grabs the staff just as Abdullah jumps from the stage and grabs the other end of it. Ruby grits her teeth. "Darn it! George wants that staff and I don't know why. I feel so helpless up here! I don't want to accidentally shoot Lawrence." Mina interjects. "Why didn't you say so Ruby, I can help you with that."

The older redhead stepped up to the edge of the building and spoke some mystical words Ruby had often heard her friend Katherine speak. A spark of light shot from her hand and shot down directly to the priest hands. The magical bolts strike the man's hands, causing him to temporarily release the staff. Rather than try for it again, he steps back against the stage (giving him partial cover) and reaches inside his robe.

Lawrence stumbles back, when the priest releases the staff. He spins in a crouch, looking for a way through the crowd. Unfortunately the crowd has very much thinned out by this time. The man draws a revolver and points it at Lawrence, stating "Give me back my staff if you want to live." Lawrence's mind races. He swallows and puts his faith in Ruby. "Hermes, don't let me down." He slowly stands as if surrendering. Then he spins and bolts down the street with the staff away from the others.

George had filtered up to the group. As Lawrence bolts, George gives chase to the priest. The Priest does draw and prepare to fire. George fires but misses, but the shot draws the attention of other armed followers of Abdullah. Above, Ruby sees this also.

Ruby shakes her head. "George didn't do that very sneakily Nana, we may end up having to go down, though I think our position up here gives up an advantage." Ruby keeps a close eye on the action and keeps her gun trained, ready to fire. "Nana, be ready over here to fire off another missile if we need it. Things are getting crazy down there for Larry and George and, well, everyone.” Abdullah's Priest takes aim at Lawrence. Ruby curses then aims carefully. "I'm sure this won't kill him, he's obviously powerful but hopefully it'll knock him off balance."

Ruby shoots at the priest. The shot is on target and the man falls. This has the advantage of Lawrence being able to slip successfully away with the staff. However, the downside is that the group of nine men who had spotted George 80 feet away from them now believe that he was the one who shot the priest. Three of those men draw revolvers as another two reach for rifles on their backs. The remaining four run in the direction of the priest.

Lawrence ducks as the shots fly over his head. He runs as fast as he can, weaving to make targeting him harder. When he can, he slides around the nearest corner to catch his breath. Once he's sure that no one is following him, he pats himself for bullet holes. "That was a close one. I better get back to the others. I hope Hardin got away." Then he hunches over and hobbles away, using the staff as a walking stick.

George backs away from the men with his gun drawn as he makes an arcane gesture with his left hand as he incants "Somunos, sominum, sominiferum" (Casting a sleep spell on the men with guns drawn). Three of the men fall asleep and to the ground. One with a revolver and another drawing his rifle remain standing. "No!" Ruby shoots at the man with the pistol. "Nana, can you get the one drawing??" Mina replies, "No, I am unarmed," as Ruby hits the other man in the shoulder, causing him to drop his revolver.

George sees the other man start to point the rifle in his direction. George, with a drawn gun already fires off a snap shot aiming for the man's arm or shoulder. George's shot misses, but does cause the man to duck down, delaying a short back. George rushes up to the man and tries to wrestle the gun away from him.

(Sorry for the long delay - Weekly postings of this Campaign Journal will now resume)


Chapter 80, “Fire wands, fire wands, who has the fire wands?” September 11, 1882, 12:40P.M.

Once at the telegraph office Abby jumped down and secured the horse, picked up Indy, and strode inside. "Sabah, we need you." Sabah is inside the telegraph office with Cetan and Meren. The Bast Priestess says, "How can I be of help?"

Abby states, "Actually, I can use all of you. There's another player here we didn't know about. A Sheikh is bankrolling Abdullah, and he's here with him. He has six sons, all of them in the crowd and wielding wands of fireball. They're meant to attack the Palace, but this city is made up of a lot of wood, fire could go out of control fast. I need to get those men out of the picture, or at the very least, their wands.

I thought I could do a detect magic and try to spot them. Six identical auras should make it possible to pick them out. Then each of us can target one and get that tat wand out of play in whatever way works for them. Meren, Cetan, I could use both of you as well, if you're willing. I'll carry those items if you like, Sabah. Just so they aren't left here unattended. Or you could carry them, of course." The three immediately agree to help.

Abby looked to make sure Indy had made it inside. "And Sabah, it seems a little coincidental that this sweet little one seems to have adopted me in the last few minutes. Am I just seeing shadows now, or is this cat special?" She replies, "I will check, a Bast Priestess can communicate with felines without needing to use a spell." Sabah takes Indy and the two of them exchange what sounds like a series of meows, purrs and yelps. The Priestess then looks up at Abby and says with a smile, "Your feline friend wishes to remind you that the word 'Independent' translates as 'Alsoomse' in the Algonquin language."

"I don't think remind is quite the right word, since I don't speak Algonquin," Abby said with a smile and a shake of her head. "Alright, let's get out there and see if I can spot those sons." She stepped outside, hopefully the others following. Cetan, Meren and Sabah all accompany Abby and Callum, the cat following as well.

Abigail arrives back at the square along with Callum, Meren, Cetan and Sabah. They see that most of the crowd have fled, with the remaining men all clustered in smaller groups behind various cover and continuing to fire occasionally at the palace. Across the courtyard, Henry Jones heads in their direction. They do not immediately see Maurice Boujoulais or Henry Jekyll. Abby casts the detect magic cantrip and scanned the crowd, looking for six identical or near identical auras.

She breathed a huge sigh of relief when she saw how empty the square had gotten. "Cal, keep an eye on Henry. I'm going to be a bit distracted for a few moments. The place is pretty well cleared out though, this will take a lot less time than I'd imagined." With that, she cast the detect magic and began looking for six identical or near identical auras that should give away the fire-wielding sons.

The first grouping of nine men has six with magical auras, mostly on worn jewelry, although two have what appears to be magical ammunition inside their revolvers. Two men in the group have what appear to be magical wands, one hidden inside a robe, the other in a man's hand. That one being held is gold (most-likely gold-plated on tungston) and nine-inches long with an emerald fastened to the wand's end. The entire wand appears magical although the highest concentration is around the gem. The man with the held wand appears to have the most magic in this group.

"These people around fooling around, they're loaded for bear," Abby muttered to Cal while sweeping her eyes to another part of the square. Nearing a second group, there appears to be more men but less magic. She only spots three with magical items, one with magical footwear, another with a ring, and the third with a belted wand identical to that of the man with the first group. That man also has a revolver with magical ammunition. Once they passed far enough away from the group to not be overheard, Abby said quietly, "A second wand, I think I've seen two of them so far. Where's Mr. Jones? We need to know what he has to say."

Callum says, "He slipped into that next group." They approach while he spell is still activated. She not only sees young Henry but detects that he has magical sandals on his feet. This group, like the last one, is sparse on magic, with the only other person with any being a young man with an identical wand, magical ammunition in a rifle slung over his shoulder, and a magical rope belt. Abby says, "I need you to lead. The spell is going to go down soon and want to do all the looking I can. Just lead us somewhere that Mr. Jones can met us discreetly."

They approach the next group, a group of eleven men plus young Mr. Jones. This group only has one person with magic on him. It is an identical wand as the others, as well as magical ammunition in his revolver. The spell comes to an end. They keep walking until they're far enough away from the group of men to speak again. "I think I can spot those wands without the spell now." She described the men in each group who had one that she'd already seen. "If things go downhill, we need to neutralize those men as quickly as possible. Before if we can manage it."

Abby tried to stop in a place where young Mr. Jones could approach without suspicion. He sees them and hurries back as they move on towards the next group. She is then distracted by rifle fire, followed by shouting and other shots. She see a good distance back the high priest shooting at Lawrence, being shot at by Ruby, and others then firing on George. Several from that group run towards the priest as others collapse. George then charges the remaining man with a rifle.

As George nears the man attempts to club him with the rifle stock. George successfully ducks under it. Ruby reloads her rifle, really not wanting to take a shot at a man engaged in a scuffle with George. Ruby says, "We're still best up here at this vantage point Nana, we have an advantage. Stay sharp and be prepared with another missile if we need it."

Abby had a blade half-pulled before she realized what she was doing and slammed it back home. Instead she muttered a Grease spell under her breath, aiming at it Mr. Eastman's opponent. The Grease Spell is effective, with the man using the rifle as a club slipping and falling onto the ground. George attempts to kick the gun away from the man. George's kick is successful, and seeing himself alone, the man turns and runs. Ruby glances around the area, looking for any more potential trouble for George or Lawrence.

After Abby has cast her spell young Henry Jones whispers to her and Callum "They plan to launch a full attack on the palace when Ra's Chime rings out from his Temple. That's at approximately 1:00PM local time, around twenty minutes from now." Abby asks, "Who are "they" and how many people do they have. We've gotten this area pretty well cleared out." While waiting for the answer, Abby prepares to cast a message spell, looking for a place where she can be inconspicuous, as well as get the message to George and Mina at the same time.

He says, "That group of men I was just with and those other small groups. Each group has an Arab Prince with them. There are other groups behind the castle, planning to storm the rear entrances. Since those groups can't see these out front, and need to have a coordinated attack, they will use the chime as the signal for the attack." Abby says, "Alright, walk with me. Be as casual as you can and cover me. I need to pass the word."

She waited a few moments until they appeared to be just three people walking, coincidentally into a position where she could talk to both George and Mina. She made the slight, subtle gestures of the Message spell and then pointed toward George with one hand and Mina with the other, hoping she was close enough to both. She began to whisper. "Attack starts at 1:00PM with the chimes. They have groups behind the castle to attack the rear. Each of the groups out here in the front has a Prince with a wand of fireballs with them. You can respond to me, I'll hear you. The spell will last about ten minutes."

Meanwhile, Lawrence mimics an old man for a while. Every now and then he stops at a shop and tries to see if anyone if following him. Once he is sure, he'll walk normally back to Abby, George, and Ruby.

Both George and Mina receive the message. Mina relays it to Ruby. Ruby manages to spot both them at opposite sides of the main courtyard. She also now sees Callum and Abby walking with a young Arab boy. She says to Mina "What are they planning to do with the fireballs? Any way we can take them out instead? At least some of them?" Mina relays this back.

Abby replies, "I don't know specifically. But they're planning a battle, so they're going to burn the enemy or the Palace. Probably both. I think we need to focus on them and get the wands away from them. I've already determined who some of them are, and I know what the wands look like. I'm just trying to think of some subtle way to take them out. Otherwise I'll just be kicking off the party early."

George replies to Abby's spell. "Then we need to take out the chimes, does anyone know where they are? If they don't ring we can buy some time." After Abby relays George's question to Callum and Henry, Callum replies, "It is in the tower of the Temple of Ra, around three blocks away from here. But sounding the chimes is part of the sacred duties of the Priests of Ra. I doubt that we'd be able to convince them to abandon their responsibilities, nor are we ready to fight a group of innocent priests, some of whom are rather powerful." Abby relays this back to George.

George says, "Get Mina to cast a silence spell on the tower, she can do that remotely and not interfere with the priest's duties, they will ring the bell, it just won't sound. It can buy us at least 5 to 10 minutes". Callum likes the plan, and given that the spell's range for Mina is 560 feet, she would be able to get close enough. She would have to still walk a distance so should leave soon.

Abby says, "I'll make sure the people with me know who the men are with the wands. I hate to take them on one on one, but that may be what we'll have to do. Or at least two of us per and hope we can get to the others in time." "Damn it Abby I am on the ground, get me some faces and I will get those wands." mutters George back through a message spell as he takes in the quickly shifting battle and seeks cover of his own. "I can't get you pictures, but I can describe," Abby said. She then described the two in the groups closest to George, as well as the wands.

George grabs a new turban from a man on the ground and having altered his appearance some, but still disguised as an Egyptian, heads towards the closest of the groups. Ruby says, "Frankly, friends, I'm stumped. It seems there are way too many princes with wands of fireballs for us to take them out, especially since there are groups of people with each one. Now, I happen to know how to use those wands, if we got on hands on a couple of them I could use them to our advantage, but I wouldn't want to burn down this beautiful city. So, I just don't know what to do. And we're running out of time."

As Lawrence walks away from the square, he feels relieved to have gotten away without a scratch. Then he rounds a corner a spots a bunch of men gathered around a member of the nobility. They seem to be waiting for something and are looking at the gate. He thinks to himself, "Well, that can't be good. He looks around for horses he can spook.

George approaches a group that Abby and Callum have not visited yet. It is one of the larger groups, with close to two-dozen men, which makes it easy for George to blend into the group. The leader is a young Egyptian man who has what appears to be one of the aforementioned wands in his belt. He is acting very impatiently. Most of the others in this group are other young Egyptians, most armed with rifles. Two others in the group stick out due to their difference, an older couple who look to be of European or American descent. The man attired in a three-piece beige cotton suit with straw hat. The woman is wearing robes and has a large gold amulet worn around her waist that has symbols of Isis on it. She appears unarmed. He has a Colt Peacemaker sticking out of a suit pocket.

George sidles up to the non-Egyptians trying to overhear any conversation. He notes that they are speaking to each other in German. They are talking about how the Sheik's son is an idiot and how, despite their long friendship with his father, they will not follow the boy into a death trap.

Chapter 81, “All hell is about to break loose”, September 11, 1882, 12:50 P.M.

The past hour has been busy for the party. During that time using a combination of illusionary spells, other magical spells, well-placed rifle shots, some fisticuffs, and just plain dumb luck, they have managed to defeat the High Priest of Horus who had been assisting the revolutionary leader Abdullah and also disbursed the majority of the crowds who had surrounded the royal palace in Cairo. However, the remaining revolutionaries are the most determined.

Approximately 200 revolutionaries remain in clusters along the front courtyard of the palace, in groups ranging in size from 6 to 24. The rebellion’s leader Abdulla el Said is with a powerful Sheik. The Sheik’s six sons each have an identical Wand of Fireballs in their possession. They plan to launch an attack on the Palace at approximately 1PM.

Abigail Marsters, Callum Stuart, young Henry Jones (disguised as an Egyptian boy and with magical sandals on his feet) and Alsoomse (currently polymorphed as a black cat called ‘Indy’) are in the main courtyard watching the groups of revolutionaries. Abigail currently has a communication spell running.

Abby has identified one group of nine men where six have magical auras, mostly on worn jewelry, although two have what appears to be magical ammunition inside their revolvers. Two men in the group have what appear to be magical wands, one hidden inside a robe, the other in a man's hand. That held one is gold (most-likely gold-plated on tungsten) and nine-inches long with an emerald fastened to the wand's end. The entire wand appears magical although the highest concentration is around the gem. The man with the held wand appears to have the most magic in this group.

Abby has identified a second group of twenty-two men but less magic. She only spots three with magical items, one with magical footwear, another one with a ring, and the third with a belted wand identical to that of the man with the first group. That man also has a revolver with magical ammunition. She has also identified a third group with eleven men that is sparse on magic, with the only person with magic being a young man with an identical wand, magical ammunition in a rifle slung over his shoulder, and a magical rope belt. Henry Jones had previously infiltrated this group to gather information.

George Eastman is in the main courtyard as well, having worked his way into a group of twenty-four men while disguised in Egyptian garb. The leader is a young Egyptian man who has what appears to be one of the aforementioned wands in his belt. He is acting very impatiently. Most of the others in this group are other young Egyptians, most armed with rifles. Two others in the group are an older couple speaking in German. The man attired in a three-piece beige cotton suit with straw hat. The woman is wearing robes and has a large gold amulet worn around her waist that has symbols of Isis on it. She appears unarmed. He has a Colt Piecemaker sticking out of a suit pocket.

Ruby West, Willamina Parker and a pair of Egyptian Army soldiers currently assisting them (and disguised as Egyptian civilians) are atop the roof of a four-story building near the palace, where Ruby has her borrowed 1881 Swiss Vetterli sniper rifle trained on those below. The party has discovered that the sounding of Ra’s Chimes from the Temple of Ra, situated three blocks away, will be the revolutionary’s signal to start the attack. George has suggested that Mina go and use Silence spell to stop the chimes from sounding.

Lawrence Cantrell has just returned to the courtyard after earlier escaped unharmed with the Priest’s magical staff. John Wesley Hardin is at the far middle of the front courtyard. Near him and in the closest alleyway are two disguised Egyptian Army soldiers who are holding the party’s eight horses. Lawrence’s horse is currently wearing magical horseshoes that only he knows the command word for.

Two of Callum Stuart’s fellow British spies, an older man with a Bostonian accent named Maurice Beaujoulais and an English Physician and Alchemist named Doctor Henry Jekyll (currently polymorphed as an Egyptian beggar boy) are watching the groups of revolutionaries at the rear entrances of the palace.

Benjamin ‘Fish’ Trout has been following the two British spies referenced above for the past day hours, mistakenly believing them to be some of the French Wizards causing the problems. He had temporarily lost them near the palace an hour ago (when they had met up with Abby and Callum) but then saw these two again. He does not know where another Egyptian boy who had been with this pair has gone off to.

Egyptian Army Lieutenant Colonel Dhahabiya Hassan, commanding a group of at least 3,000 army infantry soldiers (and possibly up to 2,000 cavalry if they have arrived) have cordoned off the city in a radius four-blocks away from the palace in all directions to prevent the disbursed crowds from returning. The will remain where they are unless Lt. Hassan receives further instruction from George Eastman.

Sabah, the Priestess of Bast, remains a quarter-mile away at the Cairo telegraph office where she is guarding the Bast artifacts known as the Vestments of Djeserit Mew-Shir (crown, belt and necklace) that the party had earlier retrieved. The druids Cetan and Meren are with her. Egyptian soldiers are helping to guard the office.

Ruby takes a large breath in. Even though they had been involved now for a couple of days, the real fight was about the start. This was the calm before the storm, so to speak. "Nana, I hate to say this, but I think it's time we split up. You should take George's suggestion and go to the bells and try to silence them. Take the guards with you, at least take one of them, but both if you think both are necessary. I'll stay up here for now but if I am needed I will get down to the fight."

Mina nodded. "My spell will only silence the bells for so long Ruby, only minutes. Eventually the bells will ring. But perhaps minutes is all we need for a miracle to happen and other help to arrive. I will take one guard and leave one with you. Of course I prefer you stay up here and stay safe but I know you won't listen to me if I tell you to do so, so I will only ask that you stay safe." Ruby jumps to her feet and into her grandmother's arms. "You too Nana, stay safe. I somehow feel like I got us all involved in this by getting involved with the Princess but I just felt like I had to... I don't know, but I would not forgive myself if any of my loved one got hurt here today."

"I have confidence in you my dear. You followed your heart and instincts, just as I always have. I could ask nothing less of you." She then kisses Ruby on the forehead and heads off with one of the guards. Once her grandmother was gone Ruby carefully checks out her options - noting the nearby buildings, looking for emergency ways down in case she needs to get off the roof quickly. She notes that the only exit other than the central staircase inside the building where they entered from is a wooden fire escape ladder along one wall that stops a full nine feet before the ground.

She turned to the guard and looks him up and down. "May I ask your name?" He replies, "I am Corporal Hammadi. My primary job responsibility is to keep that weapon and a few other special weapons of the King's in serviceable condition. I trust that it meets with your satisfaction." Ruby takes note of the wooden ladder as she approaches the guard, then extends a hand. "Pleasure to meet you Corporal. Yes, as you can tell, the weapon is working very well, thank you very much. I'm trying to take good care of it. Now, are you able to fight in this battle or are you just a spectator?"

Stalling a bit and looking somewhat embarrassed he says, "Neither. My orders are very specific. I am here to do whatever I need to in order to protect the rifle." "Hrm, well, that's interesting. What's your friend up to then? Since my grandmother doesn't have a rifle, why did he agree to go along with her?" He replies, "The Lieutenant Colonel ordered him to protect you two women. Since you have now split up, and I have to stay with the rifle, he went with her. Besides, being an older and more delicate woman she is in more need of protection."

Ruby narrows her eyes suspiciously at the guard. "At any rate, since I have the gun, it's in YOUR best interest to keep me alive then, isn't it? I suppose now I'll have to keep an eye on you too." He replies, "You are the current keeper of the rifle, I will look after you both. Protecting you is an honor, you are a beautiful and resourceful woman and I would be honored to take you as my second wife."

Ruby laughs a hearty laugh, sending her thick red hair bouncing around her shoulders. "I'll take that as a compliment but believe me, you couldn't handle me as you first and only wife!" Ruby laughs again. "And if my grandmother ever heard you call her delicate that might be the last words you ever spoke!" Ruby gives him a playful slap on the arm, "I like you Corporeal, you have courage." "Thank you Miss," he states. "You're quite welcome," she replies.

Ruby looks back to the groups below and speaks to her friends. "Perhaps you should mosey on over to that smaller group with the lesser magic and try to get that wand away. I know how to use that particular wand and perhaps it would even the field a little bit if we had one too. We could take them on wholesale but it would be better if we had someone who could sneak in and try to nab it when he wasn't looking."

Down in the courtyard, Abby took a deep breath. She knew what needed to be done, but had not a clue how to do it. "Alright, we need to get those wands. But the only ways I can think of are suicidal and would start a battle in earnest. At least a real short battle where the four of us get killed. We can't take them magically, but we need them out of play. I'm not an experienced wizard. Do we know of anyone with the ability to dispel or dampen magic?" Callum says, "Yes, but it would only permanently negate spells, magical items would only cease to work simultaneous to when my spell is cast on that area. So if my timing were perfect I could stop one fireball from being sent, but the wand wielder could then just throw another afterwards."

"No good, but don't forget about that one, it may come in handy later. Do we have any options beside infiltrating the groups and trying to lift those wands? I'm dry other than that. I'm sure Indy can take care of herself, and I don't mind taking a crack at it.” At the suggestion Indy hops down and runs off in the direction of one of the groups that they had not yet approached. Abby continues, “But I doubt it'll be quiet, and it won't go unnoticed. I suppose I could try to charm and distract someone," she laughed. "It has always worked on me," Callum replies.

Abby says, "Alright, all hear this. We're splitting up between the groups and then we're going to try to get those fireball wands. Whether it's an accidental bump, you have light fingers, or you throw a punch. Objectors should do so now, or forever hold their peace. I'm going to try to stumble into one." George replies, "Three steps ahead of you Abby"

Ruby sits nears the edge of the roof so she can look over but not be seen. "I'm usually in on all the action, it's pretty hard for me to sit up here and do all this waiting around. I wish I knew what they all were planning down there. From here it doesn't look like they're doing anything! I could probably sit up here and just start trying to shoot anyone left down there with wands but that seems awful... well, not good, let's put it that way."

Ruby double checks the sniper rifle to make sure it's loaded. She also double checks her own personal weapons, derringer and hidden dagger. It was a habit she picked up from her first love, the one who taught her how to do most of her proper shooting and fighting and, well, a lot of the improper shooting and fighting too. She quickly pulls her mind back from that place and into the present while she sits and waits and tries to think of some clever plan to save the day.

George makes his way through the crowd of Egyptians towards the prince. he sends a message back to Ruby "All hell is about to break loose where I am, do you have a bead on me?" he whispers.

"Alright. Let's go." Abby looked around to see if they were being watched currently. Then she pulled Cal back and planted a kiss on his lips. "Don't get yourself killed." "Wasn't planning on it," he replies. Abby replies, "Cal, you hit that second group, the one with about twenty men there. I'm going to steal Henry if you don't mind. If I can distract that man, I'm hoping he can relieve the man of the wand without him being the wiser. Or maybe he'll suddenly fall down or something. We'll improvise." Cal heads off to the second group on his own.

Watching both George and Callum move out Ruby comments, "I guess we started a little early!" She quickly lays on her belly and trains the gun to the group where George is, ready to get him out of trouble if necessary.

The impatient young Egyptian in charge of the group that George is with says to those in the group "It is nearly time. When you hear the chimes ring out my friend Willheim and I will start with our magic and the rest of you will be able to charge the palace guards without harm. Willheim's wife Gerta will also cast a protection spell onto you." As George gets next to the prince he shouts out as he points to the palace "The king is here!" While all the men turn to look at the palace, George notes that Gerta's gaze stays trained on him.

George grabs at the wand, but not before giving Miss Greta a roguish wink and grin. As George scoops the wand into his hand the older woman screams out in Arabic "Thief! Khalili, a thief!" The boy turns as the others in the group look towards George. The older man in the suit standing beside her begins to draw a revolver from his pocket. "What in HADES is he doing?" Ruby says angrily, shaking her head. "That was just stupid. I can't shoot everyone! Now I'm going to have to wait and hope they don't kill him on sight..."

Abby asks, "Henry, you got any oil, anything slippery on you? I already used my Grease spell. Otherwise I can play clumsy and fall into the man's feet. Hopefully he'll fall over and you could grab the wand in the confusion. If we're lucky he'll just think it's rolled away. You know what, let's just go with that. Here I go, making an ass of myself." As they got close Abby began to run and push through the men. "The King has been seen!" she shouted. As soon as she was close enough, she purposely caught her foot on one of the men’s legs and slammed into the calves of the man with the wand like a ton of bricks.

Ruby draws in a long breath then waits... ready to take a shot at the man with the revolver. "Drop it friend, no one wants a bloodbath today" shouts George in German as he points the wand at the man and Greta. George points the wand at the group as he slowly backs away. The older man continues to draw his gun and points it at George as he shouts in Arabic, "He is bluffing."

As Henry was already with the group before he has no difficulty getting himself into the group. Abby falls over with the man who screams "Ooafish woman! Away with me. Three of the man's companions immediately pull her off of him while Henry moves in and assists the young sheik-to-be to his feet, relieving him of the wand in the process. "Apologies, apologies, Sir," Abby said obsequiously, bowing even as the men dragged her up. She let them toss her out of the group and kept herself crouched over a little, heading toward the group where Cal had gone.

As Abby enters the next group she sees that Callum is having an argument with the group's leader, stating that he is incorrect about the time that the priests of Ra will sound the chime. The leader insists it will be momentarily while Callum states that they have another half-hour until then. Abby notes that there is a lot of waving and gesturing by both, but that Cal is still a good six-feet from the man.

She asks, "Henry, have you ever seen him do something like this before?" Henry says, "He's making himself a distraction for us to move into position. One of us should get behind the leader and the other should distract the others elsewhere." "He must have seen us coming. You go behind, I don't have light fingers."

Abby circled around and came into the group from the opposite site where Cal was. She began to stalk in, letting anger seep into her face. "What in the name of the gods is going on here," she said in Egyptian. "Who is this foreigner? And why haven't the bells chimed yet?" She glared at some of the men on her way through. "Today will be a day of glory! We will take back our country from the despot! We will fight for the glory of Egypt!" Callum screams at her "Can't any of you Egyptians tell time! It's too early!"

As George continues backing up he counters the man by shouting in Arabic "Oh I am not bluffing. Why do you trust these foreigners anyway." George spits. "The French the Germans, the English. Bah. Ra, Osiris and Bast will punish us all for allowing them here. The gods will purge our lands with holy fire for allowing these infidels here. I am an agent here from the great god Bast and I am trying to save you. Save you from the insanity that has infected Khalili an infection given to him by the foreigners."

The German man replies with a smile "You are bluffing because you lack the command word to use that wand. I haven't even told Khalili that incantation yet. Now put it down immediately or I will shoot." George whispers "Ok Ruby, take him down" As he loudly says again in Arabic "I would put down your gun German before the Gods smite you down."

Ruby exclaims, "Damn it! If I shoot this man, the others may pull weapons too! I wish my grandmother was back, she could help!" Ruby pulls out her own weapon and leaves it next to her. Then she prays. "Aphrodite, we're in a real fix here, and as I'm not looking to be fiance-less today, I really could use your help and guidance here. I'm asking really nicely, begging, really. Please help us." "Georgie, get ready to run." And with that, Ruby takes aim at the man pointing the gun at George.

Chapter 82, “Hell Breaks Loose”, September 11, 1882, 1:00 P.M.

For a weapon designed to accurately shoot up to a mile, a shot of little more than 100 yards from a skilled shooter is child's play. The shot is completely on target, striking the man's chest right at the heart. The German collapses to the ground as his wife screams.

The revolver the man was holding also strikes the ground and discharges. It apparently had some sort of magical ammunition inside as the bullet strikes one of the rebels that had been with the group, causing the man to spontaneously combust as he lets out a piercing scream which quickly ends as the body is immediately reduced to a pile of ashes. This draws the attention of everyone in the courtyard.

"IT IS THE VENGEANCE OF RA!" screams George inciting the crowd as he runs away wand stowed away in his robes. "ThankyouAphroditethankyou!" Ruby exclaims all in one breath as she quickly reloads the gun without taking her eyes off the action. "George RUN!!" "This just got serious. It looks like Abby is okay so far, I don't even see Larry, he's just blended in, I hope Nana is okay. Keep calm Ruby, it's going to be fine, we have the gods on our side, now don't we," she smiles, "We just have to after that."

No sooner had Abby stated “We will fight for the glory of Egypt!" when they are interrupted by the sound of gunfire and shouting from the adjacent group followed by a human inferno. Henry uses this distraction to take the wand, but the man must have felt something as he looks down at this belt where the wand had been seconds earlier.

"Too early? Too early to restore the honor of Egypt?" Abby screeched, trying to pull the man's attention back from his belt. "Ra is at his zenith, the height of his power, and he will share that power with us to restore our homeland! He will use the hands of this man," she shouted, placing her hand on the arm of the sheik's son. "Ra blesses us through him!" "Shut up you stupid cow!" the young Egyptian says as he slaps Abby across her face. Callum reacts to this by immediately drawing a concealed gun so quickly that even Hardin would have been impressed had he been watching, and then shoots the man in the face.

A short distance away Khalili draw his gun and begins shooting at George. The first shot misses. Meanwhile, Gerta rushes over to her fallen husband while simultaneously picking up the gun that he had dropped. "Oh no she doesn't, not with that gun!" Ruby takes a shot at the wife, not wanting to take any chances with that crazy magical ammunition. The shot is successful, killing the woman. Ruby then says, "Hey Corporeal, if you want me to stay up here nice and safe with this gun you ought to get over here and start helping me shoot things, now!"

Khalili's second shot at George is better than his first, the bullet hitting him in the leg and causing him to fall onto the ground. He is now 80 feet from the closest members of his group. Kahlili then orders his men "Go get that piece of excrement!" Ruby uses her second shot to shoot at Kahlili. "Bastard! You shot my man!"

Kahlili is moving around as he yells at his men, making himself a less stationary target. Ruby's shot therefore almost misses, just grazing him. Unfortunately one of Kahlili's followers also saw the bullet hit and points up to the roof where Ruby is at. George casts cure light wounds on himself to heal his leg as he stands and keeps running.

"Okay, time to fly. But, not before..." Ruby stays calm and reloads the gun, taking the brief moment to get it right. She stops and roots herself to ground and takes another shot at the Kahlili, hoping not to miss him again. She hits the man in the head and he falls. Several shots are fired up at the building, most striking the wall. Neither Ruby or the guard are hit.

For the briefest of seconds a look of absolute shock passed over Abby's face, not at the slap, but at the swift and cold violence that came from Cal. She pulled herself up deliberately, letting no shame show on her face from the slap. She held herself as if she was the most important prophet ever to walk Egypt. "Those who refuse the blessings of Ra shall suffer." She turned to Cal. "Foreigner, you have been an instrument of the great god today. Come with me." With that she turned and walked out of the crowd as if absolutely certain of her right to do so unmolested.

The men gathered in the group appear to be equally shocked by what has transpired. Abby and Cal are maybe fifteen feet away when one of the followers yells "Hey! He killed Ken-nate!" Another exclaims "Bastard! Let's get him!" "Time to run!" she said low. She turned back to the crowd and majestically raised her hands. The gesture was far more than was necessary, but every bit of theater here could help. At the conclusion of her spell-casting a concealing mist began to rise, and she turned to get out fast.

While the theatrics are impressive, it also makes her a second target as several of the men in that group fire their guns. One gun apparently has magical ammunition inside as the shot misses but causes an explosion in the dirt ahead of them when it strikes the ground.

The mist begins to rise as Abby sees a bullet strike Callum along his right side and his robe then begins to darken where the bullet struck. "Damn Cal, I told you to run," Abby said as she got herself up next to him to help him run. "Any secret healing up your sleeve?" He replies, "Fear not my dear, it is only water, they shot me in the canteen. We'd best hurry though, the next shot could be better for them."

Lawrence hears the gunshots from the courtyard. He mounts his horse and rides out to see if anyone needs rescuing. He quickly sees Abby and Cal dodge and weave until he gets hit. He spurs his horse towards them.

George is still a good 100 yards to cover when he hears a horse rapidly approaching from the side. He looks up to see John Wesley Hardin galloping towards him on the large black percheron stallion. George reaches up and grabs the back of the saddle and hauls himself up onto the back of the horse. "Good timing Hardin." says George as he takes out his gun and tries to clear out some followers "Looked like you needed it," the gunslinger turned lawyer replies.

Ruby sees Hardin rescuing George and Cal and Abby escaping. "I hope they are going to get out okay! Come on, let's get down, we've got a mob after us now too! I know they will be aimless without their leaders so we have an advantage." Ruby pulls up her hood over her red hair, tucking it inside the dark hood. They take the inside stairs and move quickly down, knowing the mob could not have made it to their building that quickly. Ruby stops to look and listen out the door before they go outside.

Ruby opens the door. The mob has not reached this section yet but there does appear to be a lot of commotion back in the courtyard. Ruby says to the soldier, "Come on, let's get back to the telegraph office, that is where we are meeting back up. I have to get back there and make sure George is okay. Stick close to me!" Ruby hangs close to the buildings to be safe and makes her way back to their temporary headquarters.

"Let's head over and gather up Ruby" says George pointing to the building she was on (not knowing that she left on the opposite side) as he picks off another rebel or two. The shots do not deter the men. Hardin quickly gets George over to the nearest cover, a street between two buildings. Glancing back to the courtyard he tells George, "Dismount, I need to go back for Abby and her friend." George deftly hops off and uses the corner of the building for cover as he aims more carefully and starting shooting the lead men.

Cal and Abby both then see Hardin on the large black horse charging in their direction and shooting his revolver at the men who had been firing on the two of them, his targets being their shoulders and gun arms. They then spot Lawrence also galloping towards them from the other side of the courtyard, both riders now 50 to 70 feet away as the wall of mist behind them becomes much thicker.

"Cal, run for Lawrence," she said As he nears Hardin puts his gun back into his belt and then leans over to scoop up Abby, planting her on the saddle behind him. He rides like the wind back towards where he had dropped off George., then took off in the direction of Harden. At least bullets weren't flying toward Lawrence yet. As he nears Hardin puts his gun back into his belt and then leans over to scoop up Abby, planting her on the saddle behind him. He rides like the wind back towards where he had dropped off George. Lawrence reaches down and grabs the younger man's hand. "Get on, Cal." He pulls him onto the horse and spurs them forward. "Hyaa!"

"Thanks for the rescue," Abby said to Hardin. She looked over her shoulder and saw Lawrence pick up Cal. With the fog she could only hope young Mr. Jones had made his way out of the crowd safely. Harden rode over to the alley where their horses were, and Abby jumped onto hers.

Instead of riding right back into the courtyard she went around and came back in a couple alleys down, then made for the telegraph office. Lawrence steers his horse through the bustling streets. Cal groans a bit as they ride. "Take a care, Lawrence. I think I got hurt back there." Lawrence looks over his shoulder. "I had no idea. Let's get you back to the telegraph office quickly, then." The pair makes it back without incident. "Abby should have some bandages."

Everybody now rescued, the party quickly trot and gallop through the streets the short distance back to the telegraph office. Ruby is the first to arrive at the telegraph office. "Where is everybody? I thought for sure Nana would at least be here! I'm going to have to go back out, George is hurt and maybe the others didn't make it out of the square. Are you coming Corporeal? I'm taking this," nods toward the gun, knowing it won't do much good up close. The guard nods reluctantly. "I'm giving them two minutes to get back, then I'll go after them."

Ruby is startled by the sudden arrival at the office of a black cat with one of the Fireball Wands held in her mouth. "What the...???" She leans over with a crooked grin and takes the wand from the cat, squinting her eyes to get a closer look. "What a clever kitty! Do we know each other?" she asks, petting the cat behind the ear. The cat rubs against Ruby's leg. Mina arrives back next.

"You just never know what you're gonna see..." she trails off as her somewhat disheveled grandmother enters the room. "NANA!!" She runs over to her grandmother and hugs her. "I was getting so worried about you!! I thought you should have been back by now and maybe you got into some trouble." Mina replies, "I did have trouble. The silence spell lasted shorter than I expected, as the head Priest was able to quickly dispel it. I had to resort to 'Plan B'."

Ruby continues, “A huge gunfight broke out in the main square. Well, we may have started it, but still, the others are out there! I've been trying to be patient and see if anyone would come back and well, here you are! But George got shot! Didn't look too bad from where I was, and Hardin rode in and scooped him up, which is why I was sure they'd be back... I am so glad you're okay. You ARE okay, right?"

Mina says, "I’m okay, I ripped my clothing in a few places and a few minor bruises, but otherwise fine. Thankfully I had both that Elixir of Arachnid Movement and a Magic Dagger with me. After I saw my spell was canceled I threw a second one, then I climbed up to the tower and cut the chime loose from its moorings. The guards shot at me, so I leaped head first from the tower, using the Arachnid ability to slow my descent near the bottom. It will probably take them a few hours to fix the damage I caused."

"Nana, you are one crazy lady!” Ruby exclaims. Mina smiles and replies, "I guess you come by it naturally then. We're two of a kind." “Thank goodness you are okay - and you had all that stuff with you, what you ended up doing really helped our cause. Without their signal they will have chaos." Ruby laughs, "Do you know what is up with this cat?"

Abby tied the horse up and ran inside. "The others should be here soon," she said when she saw Mina and Ruby inside. "All well here?" George and Lawrence arrive back to the telegraph office just moments behind Abby, Cal and Hardin. Ruby and Mina are already there, with the black cat Indy now rubbing her head against Mina's leg. At that moment George and Lawrence reenter the building. "GEORGE!" Ruby yells, running over to him. "How hurt are you? Where are you shot???" Ruby immediately starts searching him over, looking frantically for the bullet wound.

George smiles weakly at Ruby. "Not too bad my love." says George. "I was shot in the leg here. I cast a spell that stopped the bleeding and the pain. Let me get this bullet out." George pulls out a pocket knife and carefully digs into the wound in the back of his calf. He looses the bullet enough to pull it out with his fingers. He says a little prayer over the wound as it finishes sealing up. George stands up, his knife and fingers bloody. "Thank goodness for magic. I had to do that a few times before I learned magic. It took whiskey and a good bit of leather to bite down on." laughs George.

George says, "Ok, roll call. Where do we stand? I was able to garner a wand in exchange for the hole in my leg, anyone else?" Callum holds out a pair of wands and says, "These are the two that young Henry Jones was able to get. He gave these to me before I sent him off with a message to my two other colleagues about what had transpired." Abby says, "He made it out safely then. Good. I was worried."

"Great, now the German man whom Ruby shot mentioned that there was an activation word for this wand" says George producing his. "I think we may be able to assume the others do as well, perhaps we can get them to work. more importantly it shows that another foreign power is in play here adding weapons to the fire." Callum says, "But probably not the German Government, they are devoted followers of the Norse pantheon and shun the use of magic even more than the British and Americans. It does however make Abdullah out to be a hypocrite, given his anti-foreigner message to the masses."

George says, "Yes, but how do we then use that as leverage? The princes are already on board since they were receiving the wands. How do we reveal that hypocrisy to the masses to undercut his support?" Callum says, "Hmmm, that's a difficult one. Normally I would say to use the German himself to illustrate that point, but that might be rather difficult to do now, under the circumstances."

Ruby states, "Well, I wasn't about to let him kill my Georgie, that's for sure! Does anyone here speak German?" Ruby gives the wand in her hand a good looking over, looking for a secret, magically written word of any sort. Mina examines a wand and comments "No inscriptions or Norse runes, but if it was created by a German wizard the command word is probably in that language." Callum interjects, "Not necessarily, it they were made specifically for this Sheik, then they may have used a word in the local language instead. At any rate, it would probably take a much more powerful wizard than us to determine it."

Abby asks, "Are we planning on fighting in this battle then? I can't think of any other reason to try to get the activation words just now. We may be at that point though. Does anyone have an idea of any other steps we can take?" Lawrence produces the priest's staff from behind his back. "Oh, what do we do about this? Funny thing. This priest sort of gave it to me as a gift."

"Why Lawrence you sneaky little boy!" Ruby laughs, "Great job! I guess we won't know what this does either but at least it's out of their hands and they can't use it against us." Lawrence sketches a bow. "My pleasure, Ruby. I saw the opportunity and took it. This should throw a wrench into their plans."

Sahab, the Priestess of Bast, volunteers "I could probably figure out the staff as it was made for a priest in my pantheon." Ruby says, "I agree, Sahab, you check out that staff." Lawrence, presents the staff to the priestess. "Here you are, priestess. I hope you can figure out its secrets."

"Huh, I wonder where that priest picked it up from. In any case we have a nice collection of weapons safely out of the hands of the mob. But there are still quiet a few out there. Have we gotten any more telegraphs on where the army should arrive?" asks George. Meren says, "They're all here, they've surrounded this whole area, blocking off a four-block radius of the palace. The Lieutenant Colonel is just waiting for further direction from you to move in."

"All right, well seeing as we have all been seen I don't know if we can do much more without provoking an immediate retaliation from the leaders. We have done what we can to forestall the assault and save the lives of the rabble roped into this. I think it is time we lead the army in the scatter the remainder. I suggest we act as auxiliaries to capture as many leaders and neutralize their magic as we can." suggests George. Ruby shrugs. "Then I guess we let the army in. I don't know what else we can do. George is right, we scattered as many innocent as we could. Bring in the army!"

Chapter 83, “Have Fun Storming the Castle”, September 11, 1882, 1:30 P.M.

George speculates dividing the Egyptian force into three parts, with 20% on the far right side of the square, in firing positions with the front rows kneeling. The officer in charge will blow his trumpet and call out for the surrender of the rebels. Simultaneous to that 40% of the forces will move in on the left, and the remaining 40% across the plaza. George says he expects the rebels to either scatter or charge the troops. The Egyptian troops will be in a position to flank the rebels at any case, cutting off a rebel retreat. Calllum reminds George of the rebels near the two rear palace entrances as well, which include some of the Sheik’s sons. George asks about the number of forces and Callum replies that each of these two groups by the rear entrances number 15 to 20.

Lieutenant Colonel Hassan informs George that most of the cavalry has now arrived, but that one cavalry battalion is not yet to Cairo. He therefore has at the immediate disposal approximately 3,000 infantry, 900 horse cavalry and 600 camel cavalry. Things move quickly for the next half-hour. Upon hearing George's suggestions for troop deployment the Lieutenant Colonel put them into action. The troops move in from all directions, with the mounted cavalry taking the center of the courtyard. A call for surrender of the 150-or-so rebels in the courtyards results in around one-third giving up. Once they are cleared a cavalry charge follows.

There is something very impressive about hundreds of horses moving from a walk, to a trot, to a canter with weapons extended. To the recipients, it is sheer terror, especially when there is nowhere to run. As thousands of pounds of equine barreled towards them a variety of emotions and reactions followed from the remaining hundred or so rebels. Many fired their weapons, but few hit, as fear prevented accurate aim. Others fell to the ground a prayed to their gods. Still others turned and fled behind them, a fatal mistake as that was the direction of the palace, where the guards who the rebels had been shooting at for the previous four hours were in position and now opened fire.

Abdullah and a dozen of his strongest followers stood their ground, managing to find enough cover to survive the cavalry change, but were hopelessly outnumbered as hundreds of infantry troops moved in from both flanks. As they fired into the approaching wall of soldiers the trumpets sounded double-time, and the swarm of soldiers soon overcame the remaining renegades.

The party had followed behind on their mounts, watching this transpire in the courtyard. Just when the last guns in the courtyard fell silent the unmistakable sound of fireballs exploding resound from the rear of the massive stone building. Galloping around the palace, they see that another last stand had occurred there, but with very different results.

The Lieutenant Colonel had been warned by the party of the remaining fireball wands, but discounted the threat, expecting to lose some troops to the magic while still overwhelming the small number of rebels by the superior force. Instead, the rebels turned their magic on the rear palace guards, blasting their way into the building. As the party looks on they see rear windows inside the massive stone structure explode outward in fire from both the first and second floors of the building. George swears in five languages.

Raising his gun above his head George rallies the party and Egyptian soldiers nearby with an Inspire Courage spell and orders them to follow and he charges on horseback into the Royal Palace after the rebels. Lawrence draws his revolver and tightens his grip on the reins of his horse with his other hand. Spurring his horse into action, he lets out a war whoop. "Let's go get 'em!"

Trotting under the doorway and into the wide rear hallway, they see several charred bodies of fireballed Egyptian guards. It is obvious which way the rebels went based upon the damage and distant explosions. Continuing down the hallway they reach a marble staircase up, with fireball sounds coming from above. There appears to still be rebels on this level as well due to gunshots from further down the hallway.

Lawrence dismounts and holds his index finger to his mouth. The rogue tries to sneak up the stairway, placing each foot carefully. Holding her rifle high Ruby yells, "Lawrence my love, this is not the time for sneaking! This is the time for riding up to our enemies and blasting them in the face! Come!"

Then, in a move that can only be considered pure Ruby, she begins singing. To her friends and allies her pure voice drowns out the sounds of the surrounding battle. "Come my friends and make history with me. Today we shall be heroes and set this city free!" Ruby spurs her horse up the stairs towards the rebels. Lawrence barks, "Tarnation, woman! You'll be the death of me yet." Shaking his head, he races back to his horse and follows her up the stairs. Abby raised one eyebrow and looked to Cal. "A little grandiose, but she's got the right idea." Her blade sang as she pulled it from its sheath and she urged her horse forward.

Ruby's horse reaches the top of the marble stairs first. The sound of fireballs exploding is coming from her left at the end of the long corridor. There are three windows on the south side of the corridor and pairs of wide double doors along the north end of the corridor at fifty-foot intervals. The middle pair, around 110 feet away, appear to currently be open.

Callum and Abigail reach the top of the staircase behind Ruby, who is already heading in the direction of the open doors. The trio soon reach the room. Ruby recognizes the room inside the doors as the large throne room of the King where she originally arrived at the Palace, although she had exited from doors on the opposite side. A major battle is taking place inside the room. At the far corner are dozens of servants and advisors to the King, cowering tightly together. A half-sphere shaped barrier surrounds them, apparently invisible but enough dust and debris has now settled upon it to show the outline.

A man and a young boy are near them, using the gold throne as partial cover. The man is throwing Magic Missile spells at his attackers. Ruby recognizes the boy as the one who had approached Abby and Callum back in the courtyard. Callum and Abby recognize them both as Callum’s allies Henry Jones and Maurice Beaujoulais.

The attackers are from the opposite side of the room and are led by the Sheik who had been supporting Abdullah. He has eight armed men with him, one of whom has a fireball wand in his hand. The other six men are firing the rifles at their opponents behind the throne and have not yet noticed the horses in the doorway. Also in the room is a dead or unconscious rhinoceros, that is on its side near a pile of six rebels, some of which are clearly dead others possibly unconscious.

In a sing song voice Ruby says to her friends, "Stay back but be ready, it our time to prove ourselves to the King!" She spurs her horse forward slightly into the room while simultaneously bring up the sniper rifle to her shoulder. "Traitors! You would kill your own king? Well guess what? Your French allies aren't the only ones to carry powerful weapons!" With that Ruby fires an unerring shot towards the head of the man with the fireball wand. George reigns up his horse as Ruby pulls out the magic boom-boom stick. From outside the doorway he aims his gun at the lead rifleman and fires off a shot of his own.

Ruby's bullet creates a third eye between the other two and he collapses to the floor. A the sight of yet another son dying before him the Sheik screams out in anguish, then throws his hands in Ruby's direction. A magical lightening bolt shoots forth, killing her mount Golden Eagle and inflicting moderate damage to Ruby as well. Despite the pain she manages to leap from the dying animal and lands on her feet, rifle still in hand. George's next shot misses as three of the men near the Sheik turn their guns in George's direction outside of the doorway.

Abby turned her horse to circle around the group of men and get some room. Once she has moved a bit to the side, she urged the horse forward, ready to slice into the first man she reaches. She takes care to stay to the side in order to stay out of the line of fire for the others.

Ruby lets out a scream of pain and falls behind the horse. Though she is hurt the adrenaline is coursing through her masking the majority of it. She puts her acting skills to use however and greatly exaggerates her injuries as she falls. She falls so that her position is such that the horse is blocking her mostly from her enemies but the barrel of the gun is still pointed directly at them. One peek over the horse, one calming breath just as Jake taught her and she aims for the Sheik who just blasted her and shoots the rifle.

Much to Ruby's surprise, her shot hits but then deflects off of his robes. The richochet does manage to strike one of his followers in the leg, causing the man to fall as he screams up in pain. The remaining men near the sheik now all turn their rifles and attention in the direction of Ruby and the fallen horse.

Mina, having just gotten to the doorway to see the Sheik hurt Ruby then see her granddaughter fall, immediately throws magical bolts from her fingertips at the Sheik that fly towards him at the same time Ruby's gunfire does. The missiles strike, as he turns his attention in Mina's direction. With his back now turned away from the throne, Maurice Beaujoulais quickly but quietly moves across the room towards his opponents (as his only remaining offensive spell requires touch).

George whirls his horse towards the soldiers who were following him on foot and have now reached the top of the stairs. He shouts in Arabic and calls out "For the King!" Holding his gun forward he leads the cavalry in a true dragoon charge, guns and swords slashing as the group charges through the doorway and down onto the riflemen. Once inside the room he see Ruby's horse lying dead on the floor, with her behind it. Abby, Callum and Mina are also in the room on horseback. The infantry men are hurrying down the hallway, still around 30 feet back. Lawrence rides down the past the infantry soldiers following George.

Abby rides forward and slices the shoulder of one of the men shooting at Ruby. His companion beside him drops his rifle and draws a scimitar to attack her. For the moment Abby stayed on the horse, leaning down to strike at the man's sword arm. Her eye is on the rifle, debating whether to slide down and grab it. Abby and the rebel exchange blows, their weapons striking together.

Ruby stays low and still, hidden behind the dead horse. With a quick look down to see that Ruby is Ok, George leads the soldiers straight into the mass of rebels, guns blazing, swords cutting and horses trampling. George covers half the distance to the men before his horse takes a bullet. It does not appear to be a mortal wound but the animal does scream out in pain and slows its trot to a walk.

Abby moves her sword in quick strikes meant to distract, then kicked the rebel in the back of the knee, hoping to send him to the floor and follow it up with a sword thrust. The kick is successful, knocking him back and into one of his companions. The companion charges forward and becomes the recipient of Abby's sword.

George urges the men onward as he takes a shot at the Sheik. From her hiding spot Ruby casts sleep at the group of men hoping to at least take a couple down for a few seconds. Ruby prepares to cast the spell just as she sees the man who had been back at the throne has successfully approached the sheik from behind. She realizes that making any of the men collapse right this second might cause the sheik to turn his head in that direction and possibly spot the man.

She holds off casting the spell, assuming the man (who only Callum and Abby have met thus far) is on their side having seen him sneak over from the opposite side of the room. She watches and waits instead not wanting to draw too much more attention to herself in her injured state. George's shot, like Ruby's deflects off of the robe. However, it has managed to hold the Sheik's full attention as the other man moves in behind him.

This man now simultaneously places his hands on the Sheik's neck as he casts a spell. Flames shoot forth from his fingertips onto the neck, with the palms then raised sending the flames upward and covering the man's head with fire and igniting his hair. The man screams and pulls up his robe in an attempt to cover his head and extinguish the flames. The man with the flaming hands points them down and then tries to ignite the man's feet and shoes. The sheik's screams momentarily distract the men with the rifles.

Seeing her opportunity, Ruby begins shooting at the men with the rifles, being careful to stay away from the Sheik or the party’s new unknown ally. Abby ripped her sword back out of the man, then kicked the man she tripped in the temple, hoping to keep him down. The man falls. Simultaneous to this, Ruby shoots another rifleman down. Maurice's spell ends just as Callum charges forward and scoops up his friend and ally.

Abby next attempted to take advantage of the spell being used by Maurice to skewer one of the riflemen. She hits the man, but only wounds him. However, she is now so close to him that he is unable to use his rifle to shoot her. Instead of using the blade again, Abby reached forward with her free hand and grabbed the rifle. She then pushed the rifle back, shoving the butt of the rifle into the man's should and then tried to twist it out of his hands. He releases the rifle, and grabbing onto her saddle, attempts to jump up onto the horse behind her.

Abby swung the rifle at the man like a baseball bat, hoping to send him back down to the floor. The man appears to have exceptional strength, as he manages to pull himself up onto the back of the saddle with one hand while holding up his and grabbing the rifle with the other, bringing it to a complete stop. He smiles and says to her in Arabic "Say please, and I might let you live."

While he is focused on Abby, Lawrence rides up a short distance behind the mounted man and fires his revolver at the rebel’s head. With excellent timing and even better aim, Lawrence dispatches the man. Lawrence looks down at the fallen man. "I don't know what you just said there. But a word of advice. Don't gloat until the deed is done."

Abby pulled in a deep breath and assisted her assailant with his fall to the floor. For the first time since they'd gotten to Egypt her voice rang with a full southern drawl as she said, "Why thank you Lawrence! I do believe that gentleman had less than honorable intentions." Before she even finished speaking she had shoved the rifle behind a saddlebag and was bringing the sword to bear on another foe. Lawrence waves his hand in a courtly gesture. "I do believe you are correct, my dear Abby. I would say he's learned his lesson."

Ruby waits patiently to have a safe shot then takes it, trying to shoot another rifleman. The remaining riflemen make what appears to be a fighting retreat towards the western end of the room, picking up the wounded Sheik in the process. Ruby takes a shot, but misses. Ruby notes that the western wall is the only one without exit doors, as the entire length of the room had been floor to ceiling windows, the room's primary source of natural light as well as affording an excellent view of the Great Pyramids at Gazah, eight miles to the west. Due to the battle and fireball debris, most of the windows are now broken and cracked, several missing entire sheets of glass.

"We can't let them get out the windows!" Ruby calls out to her friends. She takes a shot at the now injured Sheik hoping his enchantments have been broken. The shot also deflects off of his robe. Mina runs through the fray and throws herself to the floor, also using the horse as cover. "Ruby, Ruby are you alright? You're hurt!" Her grandmother begins looking her over for injuries.

Ruby says, "I've been better but I don't want to stop to think about it now Nana. Let's get these guys and we'll deal with it later." Mina answers, "Constance Grace, I am not putting your life in any more risk, if you can't go on you can't go on." Ruby raised an eyebrow at her grandmother.

Mina says, "Alright, you seem well enough for this moment. But I will absolutely put my foot down granddaughter. I am not going to lose you again." Ruby nods and gets her head back into the fight. She calls out, "I believe he's got a magical robe! Aim for his head." She uses the horse to steady her arm, aims very carefully for the Sheik's head and shoots.

She finds that she does not have a shot, as he is still using the robe to cover over his head burns. The only part of his body not covered by the robe are his feet and bottom of his legs, as the robe is hiked up higher-than-usual to cover the head. George leaps onto a passing soldier's horse behind the lead soldier as he and the group of soldiers charge forward and crash into the rebels, cutting and shooting the remaining riflemen.

Chapter 84, “Dragon Lady”, September 11, 1882, 2:00 P.M.

At this point only four enemies remain alive and moving, three of whom are wounded. They are the Sheik, the first man who Abby had knocked down who has regained consciousness and is assisting the man with the leg wound from the richocheted bullet, and lastly an armed rebel beside the sheik. That rebel's cloak hood has fallen down to reveal a female identity beneath the bulky robes. She is the only one actively firing at the party, killing the soldier seated on the same horse as George. The quartet is now within fifteen feet of the broken windows.

George signals and sends a half dozen of the soldiers along with himself galloping faster along a more oblique angle and ride between the rebel's and the windows. Meanwhile the main body of soldiers continues to rush into combat firing their guns at the rebels even as their horses slam their bodies into them. The horses are successful in closing the gap, cutting the quartet off from the windows. The woman orders the two wounded men, speaking in Arabic but clearly with a German accent, to get in front of the Sheik and fire their guns at the animals. The men begin to move and raise their weapons, the man with the leg wound kneeling.

The Shiek pulls out another of the Fireball Wands and tosses a fireball into the squadron of soldiers moving closest to the quartet. It manages to kill or wound over a dozen, causing the other soldiers to slow.

As George's mount cuts off the retreat, the added reach of being mounted allows him to stab his sabre right at the Sheik's face. With blinding speed, considerably faster than a person should be able to, the woman beside the Sheik draws and swings a glowing longsword that had been sheathed inside her robes. The arc of this swing has it striking the George's sabre, shattering his weapon where it strikes.

"Doesn't the King have any personal guards? Where's the King's personal army when you need them??" Ruby calls out. "Nana, blast her!" Mina sticks her head up from behind the horse and shoots off another round of magic missiles, this time at the girl. Abby circled her horse to get clear on the man who'd just fallen off and give herself more room for a run up. Then, planning on using the horse for her weapon, she headed full-tilt for the woman George was engaged with, planning to flat-out run her down.

George reels his horse up to strike the woman with it's hooves. The hooves from George's horse strike the woman, but she amazingly manages to keep on her feet. She then gets hit by Mina's Magic Missiles. The woman remains standing, and now sheds her hooded robe. She is attired from head-to-toe in a glossy-black scale mail suit of armor, with a coif covering her neck and head, her only exposed areas being her hands and face. Ornate Norse runes show on the arms and chest of the armor.

The woman turns as Abby's horse charges at her, whipping her blade up at a frenzied pace and cleanly decapitating the animal. Abby threw herself from the dying horse to keep herself from being trapped beneath it. She let her sword go, instead keeping a grip on the rifle she'd taken from her last opponent. She does not land cleanly, falling in the process and using the rifle to help break her fall.

As he sees the woman take down Abby's horse George leaps without hesitation at the woman grasping at her sword to wrench it from her hands, or at the least challenge her for control of the sword so that she cannot wield it against the now downed Abby. George concludes that the woman has some sort of magic that speeds up her movement, as she sidesteps his leap, keeping the sword from his grasp.

"This just got out of control," Ruby exclaims and shakes her head as she reaches up underneath her skirts. "Nana, stick with me and keep an eye on that... lady." She hands her grandmother the Swiss rifle while her other hand, once clear of the skirt, reveals a tiny derringer. Ruby actually gave a quick chuckle at the thought of going from the very large rifle to the teeny tiny derringer.

While the party are all centered on the woman the Sheik and his two wounded comrades begin to move away, not towards the western wall but to the closest doors along the north wall, still some twenty-feet away from them. Ruby speedily dodges though the battle to follow the Sheik with her grandmother on her heels. It doesn't take long to get close enough to be within range, where Ruby sends a tiny magical bullet speeding towards the Sheik.

Unlike the prior bullets, this one does not deflect off his robe but penetrates, however one problem with a derringer is that the small weapons are notoriously inaccurate at any distance other than point blank, the bullet hitting his shoulder rather than the intended heart that she was aiming for. He lets out a call of pain, which then catches the attention of the armored woman with the sword.

When the armored woman was distracted, the fallen Abby stands, lifts her rifle and swings it at the armored woman's head. The rifle misses, going through empty air, as the woman has already begun to swiftly move in the direction of the sheik. Abby snapped the rifle up, and after making sure that George is not in the line of fire, turns it to fire at the woman's head. The bullet deflects off of the armored coif on the woman's head. Once she has physically placed herself between the Sheik and the party the woman turns and yells out a word in a language that none present know. Mina sends another magic missile blazing towards the woman. The woman is hit by the missiles and a bright flash then follows from the woman.

George casts Light directly on the woman's nose even as he charges forward to try to grab the sword away from her again. Praying to Bast and anyone else who would listen, Abby hoped there was another round in the rifle and that at least this woman's face was vulnerable and took another shot. Abby’s shot strikes were the face had been a moment before, but the woman has now started to grow, so the bullet deflects off of the armored neck. She continues to grow as her face protrudes out and into a reptilian form as she falls forward, her hands now before her on the floor. A dark tail beings to grow from behind her and a pair of wings emerge out from her back. She continues to get larger.

George’s spell works but has no detrimental effect on her, as the woman continues to transform into a black dragon, the scales identical to that of the suit of armor she had worn in human form. The Norse runes remain where they had been. The woman's sword and belt meld into the dragon's body.

Abby's eyes went wide and she fought the urge to step back. Instead her eyes sought out Cal, then Mina, then the others, looking to see where they were and what their options might be. Magically she was close to spent and she had no more ammunition for the rifle. The real question was what in seven hells was this thing doing here? "Oh holy Hades," Ruby exclaims. "Either we run or I blast this thing. Any preference?"

The transformation ends, the head a good fifteen feet above the floor in the high-ceiling room. From head to the end of the tail the creature has to be a total of sixty-feet in length. Most of the remaining horses in the room panic and run in the opposite direction. The creature's head turns towards the party as it opens its mouth.

Without hesitation Abby ran in the opposite direction from the direction that the creature has turned its head. Whatever was going to happen there wasn't something she wanted to be there for. Vaguely, she hopes for one more shot in this rifle and to be able to get a shot off at the creatures eye.

Ruby says, "Okay, run." Ruby grabs her grandmothers hand and they begin running to the cover of the hallway. "GEORGE, ABBY, GET OUT!!!!!" George's run at the woman take a quick oblique angle as he changes direction, instead now running straight at Ruby, grabbing his finace and hustling her out of danger. Abby spots Maurice some thirty feet away, casting a spell.

Before they can get very far a strong flow of liquid emits from the dragon's mouth, not unlike water from a fire hose, but of a thick greenish texture. Rather than hitting the party, it strikes a solid but invisible wall that has now been erected between them and the creature, the liquid splashing back and down. When it hits the floor and furnishings they begin to smoke and burn, the liquid apparently being acidic in nature.

"What the heck?? Nana, did you cast that?" Ruby asks while pulling out a long metal rod from her bag. "If that wall comes down, I don't care if I have to blow up this whole building if that thing comes after us!!! What is going on here?? Where is the King anyway?? Arrgghh!!!!!!" Mina takes a good look over at the two-dozen or so people cowering beneath the other barrier. She says, "None of the Royal family are present, those are all the King's retainers and advisors."

"Fighting retreat Constance" says George over his shoulder. George is now standing in front of Ruby, shielding her with his body. He is slowly backing up as Ruby points the rod past him. "Keep that thing pointed at the dragon as we back it up." advises George.

Abby switched to French and shouted to Maurice, "Go, go, get out of here!" She began to follow her own advice, and didn't stop moving, but still looked to see if the trapped servants were able to get out of the room. "No, I think I can fix this," Maurice replies in French. He changes forward towards the Dragon, while remaining on this side of the barrier.

Maurice says in German "Astrid, stop, we mean you no harm. These people are not a threat to you and your Asgardians." The dragon replies in German, speaking loudly in a feminine voice, "Astrid was killed two years ago by your King and Ace of Spades, you French bastard! I am Freya! And while I remain here your group will not rule over this innocent nation."

George calls back in German. "Greetings Vanir. Hail to Freya Njordsdottir. I fear you have been deceived goddess. No Frenchmen are we here. We have come to prevent the faction of French who wish to subvert the rule of this innocent nation. It is indeed the faction of French wizards headed by the Ace of Spades who has fomented this ill-fated rebellion. We are here not on behalf of any government, nor are we French, with the possible exception of the gentleman there" says George inclining his head towards Maurice. Maurice interjects in an American accent, "Not me, my parents were from France but I'm from Boston."

George continues, "Do not cast blame so widely. I would not judge all Asgardians by the actions of Loki, neither should you judge all French by the actions of a few extremists. But the fact remains we are working against the machinations of the French Wizards. We are trying to preserve the independence of the Egyptian people. Come let us have a dialogue, calmly and openly, peacefully. You will see that I speak the truth and our goals are just." He calmly and open-handedly walks back towards the dragon.

Abby kept running, put pulled out and drank some more of Alsoomse's language potion as she did. "Maurice, what is going on?" she yelled. Callum exclaims, "The Asgardians? Abby, she's a member of a team of German and Scandinavian heroes. They are the mortal enemies of the French Weekly Wizards group."

Ruby knew some French, what her friend Katherine had time to teach her back in Promise City. What she was hearing however was really confusing her. "WHAT is going on?" Seeing her fiancé moving in the opposite direction, back towards the dragon, Ruby cries out. "GEORGE! What are you doing?!?!?"

The black dragon looks confused, then glances from side to side and states, "You French are such skilled liars, why should I believe anything you say? You just want me to relax my guard, you'll then outnumber and kill me." Ruby yells out, "I don't understand. How are we to believe YOU? You were here with one of the Sheiks with the boys with the fireball wands who our information has led us to believe were breaking into to castle to kill the King! What were you doing here then??"

She replies, "The King is but a puppet of your French masters! He is no longer fit to rule. General Orabi's rebellion will bring a true Egyptian to the throne, one who will rule Egypt for the Egyptians, not for you wealthy Europeans that feel the whole world is yours to manipulate. I will not let you do to Egypt what you did to the German lands."

George swears in several languages. "By Hel's frozen teats woman. I. AM. NOT. FRENCH. Nor I am I European. I am George Eastman of New York of the United States of America. We did not despoil your lands, nor have we sought dominions in Europe. And upon whose information do you judge the King? Upon what standards have you weighed the motives and trustworthiness of Orabi?

The princess is about the only person upon whom I can count on around here. If you want a TRUE Egyptian to rule Egypt, set her upon the throne. Orabi AND the King can rot. Orabi is supported by the French, of that we know, and have evidence of. So dear Freya you have been deceived as much as Hildesvini deceives those around him upon your behalf. What offer of truce would you have of us? We have the same goals, the same enemies, which if you would but allow us to show you will damn those who have sought to use you to actually aid the French wizards. And such a heinous act against you cannot be allowed to stand."

Abby interjects, "We are mostly Americans. My father was English, I am from the city of New Orleans. We came here out of concern for the historical sites here but soon discovered the plot of the French wizards. Ruby has made a friend of the Princess and General Orabi. We are here to protect the Royal Family. Some of us were even jailed because of the lies of the French Wizards here. Lady, we seek only to preserve an independent Egypt."

The dragon replies, "More French lies! New Orleans, a French city is it not?" Callum moves forward and says in his Scottish accent (and intentionally emphasizing it even more than when he regularly speaks) "Miss Freya, I am Callum Stuart, of the House of Stuart. We despise the French as much as you do, I would not be working with them. I am affiliated with her Majesty's 'League of Extraordinary Gentlemen', and I have personally worked before with your teammates Thorvald and Svein."

She stares intently at him and says, "More lies, you French are skilled with impersonations." Gesturing towards the sheik she says, "Ali stated that your Ace of Clubs was busy making powerful potions of polymorph. You may indeed have taken the identity of Mr. Stuart, but I sincerely doubt that you are him." The sheik turns and says "Freya, the newspaper had photographs of and by the American photographer Eastman in the newspaper. He was at the wedding of the Princess to the General."

She replies to the Sheik "Yes Ali, as were the French. And they were married in the exact same place as where the Ace of Clubs was making those potions! No doubt they have assumed Eastman's identity as well. As a weak businessman he would have been powerless against their use of real magic." George shakes his head ruefully and says, "You are the one who is weak Freya for you do not recognize true strength, nor can you recognize friend from foe. Especially not as a viper feeds poison into your ear. I shall not waste my breath on you if you are not willing to listen to the truth." George turns and walks back to Ruby.

Ruby says, "And we have no reason to believe you either. You could very well stand here and kill some of us but you'd better well believe none of us would just stand here and let you do it without a fight. I am from the West, of the United States and I am a friend of the princess, I was at her wedding only two days ago. I only seek to help make sure magics here stay free along with the innocent people who live here. We've had proof of French trying to influence many people here and doing very bad things along with that and we aim to stop that. That doesn't mean all French people are jerks, just that some of them are. I've never heard of Ass-guards or whatever you are but either you chose to believe us or not."

Loud voices bellow from outside the palace, clearly magically enhanced to increase the volume. The words are in Arabic and easily heard through the broken windows, although the volume is such that they would probably be heard even through solid wall. "Attention Rebels. We have the Castle surrounded by soldiers, there is no escape. Our allies now circle the air above the building and have many guns pointed downward at you. We know that the Royal Family is no longer inside, they are not your prisoners or hostages. You have ten minutes to exit the building and surrender or face destruction."

The Dragon turns back and says, "Ah, you were just trying to delay me until your French friends arrived in their flying warship!" Ruby exclaims, "Those are our friends, yes, and they are trying to end this war! George adds, "No, only a coward would confuse an earnest attempt at diplomacy for a ruse. Fly away with the Sheik Freya. Fly away into your deception. I only hope you learn the truth before it consumes you" calls George over his shoulder as he continues to walk away.

Abby interjects, "No, Lady. They will try to kill us as surely as they may try to kill you. Together may be the only way we can survive this. But if I am to die, I will do it with a prayer to Bast on my lips and fighting for Egypt to remain free of the French and the British. To an American, the fight for freedom is the most important. No one should rule without consent or from the shadows. My life is well given if it helps keep a threatened people free."

Ruby turns and asks Maurice, “What do you think of this Sheik and this Freya? Are they friends or foes?" Maurice replies, "This Freya is clearly of the Asgardians. The French could not have been able to duplicate her magical transformational armor, nor would they be able to use it if they had stolen it. It is made from the body of an Earth Spirit who watched over Europe and befriended the Vikings many centuries ago. It is only usable by those of Viking descent. We know that Abdullah was being manipulated by the French, but did even Abdullah know of this? How would those who supported him, including Sheik Ali? Are they friends or foes? I would say neither, but we all have a common enemy and a common goal, whether they realize it or not."

Chapter 85, “A Negotiated Truce”, September 11, 1882, 2:30 P.M.

Looking back and forth between Abby and George the Dragon states, "Something about your words....sounds too genuine to be a lie. But if you are speaking the truth, and are indeed working against the French, then why were you fighting for the King and his French allies against the rebellion?"

Abby says, "We are only mortal, Lady Freya. We have seen the French with fingers in all sides of this conflict. The rebels outside are under the influence of Abdullah. We witnessed a French wizard at his side, so we know for certain the wizards are influencing this rebellion. We therefore felt this attack on the palace should be stopped. I hope that we have not erred. Abdullah attempted to poison a Palace feast as well, and I could not condone mass murder, no matter the cause. Lady, if you have information we do not, then we can help each other. But I fear no matter who wins this battle, the French will still have active plots."

Ruby states, "What my friend says is true. There has been too many bad things we've found out over the past days for us to ignore what is going on here. The Princess is my friend and while she does not agree with her father she certainly does not want him dead."

The Sheik angrily exclaims "I will not work with these people. They murdered my sons." Freya turns to him and says, "Then go, these people will not harm you now, Eastman has given you leave to depart. The King will soon move against your family, you must flee from Egypt. Return to your home and make haste of it. Travel to my homeland, the Asgardians will give you sanctuary."

The Sheik nods agreement. He then walks towards the window and states a command word. His cloak grows and billows outward to the sides. He then leaps from the window as the cloak fans out into a diamond shape, not unlike the appearance of a devil ray fish. He then glides away through the air, much as a ray would swim through water. There are many rifle shots fired up at him from soldiers on the ground but none appear to penetrate the magical cloak.

The shadow of the massive Dreadnaught dirigible passes by outside as they speak. They then hear an amplified voice yell out from the rooftop above in Arabic "We followers of Adbullah will never surrender. Death to the King! And death to you vile Frenchmen." Abigail immediately recognizes the voice as that belonging to Rene Bellocq. Abby exclaims, "Bellocq, that son of a..., how many sides is he playing?" Abby reached for Cal's hand, confused and sick at heart. She knew they had done the best they could with what they knew, but the fact that they had killed men who might have been their allies left her fighting a terrible sense of guilt.

Abby soundly states, "Lady Freya, how do we move on from here? Would you have replaced the King with the man who fought by your side? Our aim here was to save as many lives as possible, block the French plans, and then work with the King, General Orabi, and the Princess to make sure Egypt still belonged to the Egyptians. Now I don't know who is on what side anymore, only that we are likely the last people remaining in this Palace that Abdullah's rebels will want to kill."

The Dragon says, "The King is working with the French Wizards. Abdullah and Sheik Ali were those who I have sworn my support of, in support of General Orabi's revolution." Callum moves forward beside Abby and says "We know for a fact that the King was also being duped by the French. They actually want him and his sons dead. My friend Abigail heard that directly from the lips of one of the French wizard leaders."

The barrier between the dragon and party remains but Maurice dispels the invisible barrier that is over the servants and advisors to the King, freeing them. The person in charge of this group appears to be an Arabian wizard familiar to Ruby, George and Mina, namely the scimitar wielding attorney that had been part of the Grand Vizier's group that teleported them to Cairo.

George says, "The French Wizards have played a very good game then. They have played both sides against each other, supporting and opposing both sides so that no matter the outcome they will be the power behind the throne." George smiles as he turns to Ruby saying a prayer to Athena and healing her of some of the damage the lighting caused. As the blackened skin heals and new epithelial cells replace the damaged he says, "I would never bet against our own Queen of Hearts" says George with a gentle kiss on Ruby's stilling healing forehead.

Turning back towards the dragon he states, "If we are going to play cards with these jokers, we have some of the best bluffer's in the game. I have a plan. I say we pull the wool over the eyes of the French. They know we are onto them somewhat but do not know the extent of the truth that we are aware. We absolutely must get General Orabi out of French hands. We need to get the Princess, the General and the King all here, together. Once we have the three of them together, between Freya and ourselves we can show them the treachery of the French. If we can do this quickly and quietly, we will have the opportunity to then use the King and Orabi to issue commands or order to the French that will disperse them and let us reverse some of their machinations.

Freya, in this we would rely heavily upon you to find Orabi and bring him here. The Princess is on her way in a French dirigible. We will take care of getting her of French hands. Then together we can find the King and begin a new revolution, one designed to free the Egyptians from foreign control. I am sure we can count on some American naval assistance if we need to" says George with a knowing look at Mina "And I am sure we can get some British help."

"And" says George with a grin at Ruby "I think I have a way to take that damned French flying fortress down as well" Ruby nods. "Yes, we can take that thing down. Though preferably not over the city." Ruby runs her hand over the new, pink skin. She would likely have another scar. She quickly shakes the thought out of her head, she would worry about that later. "It sounds like a good plan to me." Freya says, "That is good. Man-made objects should not fly. I could certainly assist in bringing that monstrosity down if I remain in this form, but while the dragon armor is relatively immune to small arms fire, I would still be vulnerable to those cannon."

Lawrence says, "I have horseshoes that will allow my horse to fly. We can sneak onboard more stealthily that way." "Excellent Lawrence. Once we locate the Princess and General, that will be a help. Perhaps we need to take out this wizard on the roof. But I would like to get him gone or dead without letting on about our new alliance." replies George. Lawrence says, "If we capture him, maybe he'll fill us in on their plans. Something like this would require a lot of coordination. We can trick him into coming back inside." Ruby adds, "If I am given just a little bit of time, I can try to read his thoughts. That might give us more information that trying to get him to give it to us any other way."

Maurice says, "Not so fast. We still need to finalize this truce before I bring down the magical wall. Freya, we have a common enemy in the French, but I would still like to have some assurances from you that you will not harm the Royal Egyptian family or the British military." She replies, "I will agree to that with stipulations. I will not intentionally target them, however if they physically stand in the way, and try to prevent me from seeking my vengeance against the French wizards, then I make no such guarantees.

Ruby states, "If I had time to speak to the princess, I know she would listen to me. However, I don't know that I will have that time. I really don't know how the French managed to infiltrate all areas of Egypt's royalty and play each section against the other. Also, how will we know exactly which French wizards are to blame here. They aren't ALL bad." Callum says, "That may be true, but we do know for a fact that the one that is currently up on the roof pretending to be am Egyptian rebel is."

The same voice yells out from the roof "Death to the King! Egypt for Egyptians! We will never surrender!" The party then hear the distinct sound of rockets firing, explosions in the courtyard, and the screams of dying horses and soldiers. George strains an ear. "Ok, our hand may be forced. The French are presenting themselves as rebels to justify the bombardment. Maurice turns to George and says, "I fear that you are correct sir. They seem to be giving themselves an excuse to destroy this building. From what we've deduced, their overall plan apparently includes using magically-disguised imposters, and they mistakenly think that this entire building has magic which would reveal those identities."

George says, “Lawrence, perhaps you can go scout the dreadnaught and see if the Princess or General are on board. It is of paramount importance that we find them, and get them to safety before we retaliate openly against the French.” Lawrence replies, "I can do that. It's better than having me on the front lines."

The young boy Henry Jones is over by the fallen Rhinoceros. He exclaims, "Doctor Jekyll still lives." The boy then holds up a leather doctor's bag and says "One of his elixirs gives invisibility, but I am not certain which one it is." "Wait, are you saying the rhino is Dr Jekyll or are you saying Dr Jekyll is over by the rhino and invisible?" Ruby asks, obviously confused. The boy replies, "He used an elixir to become the rhino. The other elixirs are in the bag, but only he knows which is which."

“For now let the rest of us go and get this French wizard on the roof impersonating a rebel. Perhaps Freya would be willing to lure him in if he still thinks she is on the side of the rebels?" suggests George. Callum says, "That might work, but she'd have to act fast if he's already firing rockets into the crowds below." Freya asks, "So are we in agreement on this truce?" The redhead nods, "I don't think any of us disagree, I believe we are all on the same page here." Maurice says, "Very well then" and dispels the Wall of Force between them and the dragon.

Ruby says, "Let us make our way up to the top and see if we can find this French Wizard. Before we do anything to him let me see if I can figure out his thoughts, perhaps I can get some of their plan that way." 'Ruby gather up those wands. Ruby nods and begins gathering up the wands that have been left scattered among the fallen enemies. She only finds the one the Sheik's son had dropped (Note, they still have four others from earlier, for a total of five).

“Freya, perhaps since we are on the same side you could give us the command words for the wands so that we may put your Teutonic weapons to use against the French?" says George. The Dragon replies, "Sheik Ali's seven wands? Why yes, he has a rich sense of humor and wanted something unexpected. Since the Roman Church opposes all magic, the command words are the Italian names of the seven hills of Rome." "All the hills for each wand or one hill per wand?" clarifies George. She replies, "A single hill is the command for each wand. I do not know which is which, they are nearly identical."

Lawrence snorts, "That is rich indeed. Could you tell us the words? My Italian is a bit rusty." George rattles off the hills quickly for Lawrence “Capitoline, Quirinal, Viminal, Esquiline, Caelian, Aventine, and Palatine”. Lawrence says, "Thanks, George. I guess we'll try to get lucky as far as which word belongs to which wand."

"Ok head back tot he gate we came in through, but do not go out into the street yet" George directs the Egyptian troops. "We need to get close to the roof, then Abby or Ruby can help us identify the French wizard. We also need to identify the origin of the dirigible. Most likely it is the French dreadnaught, but I want to make sure it is not the British. If it is the French dreadnaught we need to bring it down but only after we are assured the princess nor general Orabi is aboard."

George calls over to the king's advisors 'Quickly, if you do not want this building destroyed about us, what is the quickest way to the roof and if any among you love you King you will guide us there." The scimitar wielding lawyer orders a soldier to dismount, climbs onto the horse, and says to follow him. He rides down the long corridor, turns right, and then charges up a marble staircase. The group mount up to follows, with Abby commandeering a rider-less mount.

Lawrence asks "What's the plan for getting the princess and general off the dreadnaught, if they're there?" Ruby reloads the sniper rifle while the talking is going on. She heads over to Mina's horse and saddles up then pulls her grandmother up behind her. "We're ready." George asks Freya to head up to the roof in whichever form she chooses, probably as a dragon. Once there she is to convince the Wizard disguised as a rebel that they have been victorious below. As she discusses the next step with him it will distract him long enough for the others to reach the roof. Ruby exclaims, "Wait, no, that is not the plan! I want to try to access his thoughts first. Plus, Freya should not go alone. Who knows what abilities that Wizard has."

Ruby yells out, "We all go up together and try to stay back and unknown to anyone on the roof, if we can. I will use my spell. After I get what I can, then we can go all out and attack, okay? Let's get going upstairs. Freya, stay with us as we travel on, go back to human form but be ready to turn back into a dragon once we are attacking. Now let's stick together and get upstairs."

The group follows their guide upstairs to the roof. They try to stop far enough away to not be seen or heard. Ruby passes Abby two of the wands of fireball. "Give it a try, I'm keeping mine at the ready, who knows, we might be able to get them to work." Ruby then casts her spell which will help her read the minds of those around her.

They arrive at the roof. Ruby does not sense any thoughts. One the wall facing the couryard are a pair of wooden and metal rocket launcher holders, but no more rockets are there and nobody is near them. The Dreadnaught Balloon is hovering only thirty feet above the roof, with all eight of its cannon pointing at steep downward angles, a smaller one pointing almost directly at the party. "Lawrence whistles, "Wow, that one big balloon. Now, where is that wizard?"

Ruby detects thoughts on the dirigible. From where she is, the gondola is barely within the sixty-foot range. She detects the thoughts of the soldiers on the bottom level preparing to fire. She hears their then commander counting down from twenty in French. "Quick!" She screams out to palace adviser, "Which area of the palace is the least occupied? I need to know NOW!! They are about to blow this place to smithereens!!" "Oh no, not again." Lawrence activates his magical horseshoes and his horse leaps into the sky.
He hopes to get clear of the blast area.

She pulls a long metal rod out of her bag as she scrambles off her horse. “All the rest of you, you should be running. Now." The Egyptian lawyer turns his horse around and charges down the stairs, where there is barely room given the other horses that are currently headed up. "Hell's bells woman" sighs George as he sees Ruby's plan in a heart beat. George jumps off his horse, grabs Ruby and throws her on her back so that together they are braced against the roof as George gives her advice on where to aim. As Ruby’s spell ends she hears the end of the countdown in French saying “three, two, one, fire.”

Chapter 86, “I have no idea what in seven hells we're doing, but let's do it anyway”, September 11, 1882, 3:00 P.M.

All eight cannon fire at once. The projectile from eight-inch gun smashes a large hole in the northern section of the roof, causing a 20-foot diameter section to collapse. The three six-inch guns each break through as well, creating approximately 10-foot diameter holes and starting a fire in the room below on the east facing wall. The quartet of four-inchers do not break through, but apparently have pyrotechnic charges, as sections of the roof where they hit erupt in a rapidly spreading flame, each covering a twenty-foot diameter area.

"Hades, it's like they're trying to kill us or something!" Ruby calls out as she dodges pieces of flying rubble. Mina and Abby's horses were just reaching the roof when this hits, the flame causing the animals to retreat downward at a faster pace. George and Ruby's horses run across the roof away from the flames. Freya is on foot and standing within the flames, which appear to have no effect on her despite her still being in human form. Lawrence and his mount are now six feet above the roof.

Mina and Abby take off the way the came in. "We'll try to be right behind you. Take Freya with you." "George, get up!" Ruby pulls him up off the ground. "I'm not planning on sticking around to watch the fireworks. I only pray the Princess is not on that thing." Lawrence flies right in front of Ruby and she swears. "Watch out Lawrence!" she calls out. "Damn it now I don't have a shot!"

Ruby then yells, "Lawrence, don't go too far! Freya, are you ready for an assault on that flying monster?" Alright thinks George "Abby climb up behind Lawrence, Freya if you could turn back into a dragon, and perhaps carry a few of us up to the dreadnaught. From there we shall break in and search for the princess as well as disable the guns. We may even be able to destroy the thing, but we have to make sure the princess is not on board." Lawrence shakes his head to clear the ringing from his ears. He hears the yelling and swoops back down onto the roof. "We need to move now. It'll take them a while to reload. Prepare boarders." He grins as he says the last bit.

George notes that the eight cannon can only pivot downward up to 45-degrees, which they are currently at. That leaves a ‘blind spot’ directly beneath the gondola where the party are currently at, where there is also a large trap door that is currently closed (the trap door could be used as either an emergency exit, or to drop bombs from). He also sees that all four corners of the lower gondola also have Gatling guns. He also recalls from his previous Dreadnaught ride, that sixteen soldier work the lower gondola, twelve enlisted and two officers.

Abby carried every gun she had managed to collect and could still hold while still getting up onto Lawrence's horse. "I have no idea what in seven hells we're doing, but let's do it anyway." Lawrence holds his horse still as Abby climbs up. He says, "Don't worry. I have no idea either." He waits for the others to prepare. Going up with just the two of them would be risky.

Freya moves forward to the point immediately beneath the gondola, within the balloon's blind spot and transforms back into the dragon form. George recalls that it takes three minutes for the Dreadnaught to reload and over a minutes has passed by since the artillery barrage. In that time the balloon has pivoted in place 45-degrees, so that the four large cannon are now lined up with unbroken sections of the roof and the four smaller cannon with the incendiary charges are pointing directly at the holes in the roof that the larger cannon had created.

"Have your weapons and spells at the ready" says George. George, Ruby and Mina hop astride Freya. George signals Lawrence to follow them up. George calls out directions to Freya as they ascend in a tight spiral underneath the dirigible, staying out of line of sight of the spotters. As they rise they pull up directly underneath the hatch on the keel on the dirigible. There, as Freya beats her wings, George holds Ruby steady as she reaches up and begins to work the latch with her tools.

The deadbolt for the door is on the inside and the thick doors prove difficult for Ruby to work her tools through. Freya cranes her neck around and asks "Do you want me to just punch the door out with my fist?" By George's calculations the cannon are now within twenty seconds of firing off a second barrage. "Struggling to be heard over the wing beats of the mighty dragon, Lawrence shouts, "Do it! They can't be much longer." "Agreed" calls out George giving Freya the go-ahead signal.

She tells those on her back to hang on tight. The three grip handholds between her scales as she changes her flight to stand more upright. George and Ruby are able to hang on but Mina loses her grip and falls free. Freya notices this and manages to reach out with the claw on her rear right leg and catches her.

She balls up her right fist and punches the door, but due to the delay of her catching Mina it is now too late to stop the next artillery barrage which releases almost simultaneously. The trapdoor is broken totally free of its hinges and falls the 80 feet to the roof below. White smoke bellows out of the trapdoor as well as all the side windows from the artillery. Four new large holes appear in the palace roof, which now begins to resemble a moonscape, as fires erupt in the floor beneath the roof from the new incendiary charges. Freya immediately changes her flight, leveling off her back again as she flies parallel the gondola and near it to give Ruby and George access to the doorway.

"Up inside before they get to the guns." cries George as he leaps through the opening and pointing the wand at a corner with soldiers quickly recites the seven hills of Rome in Italian. One advantage to Freya busting the door simultaneous to the guns going off is that all sixteen soldiers were focused on the roof, the cannon blasts and the recoil which kept all of them from hearing and noticing the trapdoor's destruction.

Four of the soldiers do hear George's Italian incantations and turn in his direction just as he gets to the name of the third hill, at which point a flash of light exits the wand towards the opposite side of the room. A massive fireball erupts, instantly killing the six men caught inside the blast. It also ignites a pair of four-inch pyrotechnic shells for a secondary blast. All occupants, including George, are hurt by the second blast which physically hurls George back through the trapdoor and downward.

Ruby uses her catlike reflexes to try to reach out and grab George as he falls backwards, grabbing at him while trying to brace herself against the airship. She manages to grab him, but looses her grip on the dragon's back. As they slide down the magnificent creature Freya pivots around in the air and catches them with the leg claw opposite the one holding Mina. Continued explosions erupt above in the gondola, as more ammunition is ignited.

George signals Lawrence and yells “Fly over head up to the top level port side, we need to conduct a search for the princess. All hands should be headed to fight the fire here so it shouldn't be too bad. Freya, head up to starboard top level." Lawrence points upwards in understanding. "Right." He pulls back on the reins to move his horse upwards towards the upper deck. The flying horse and the dragon both fly upward.

Ruby asks, "Freya, if we do find the Princess, will you be able to hold her too? How many of us do you think you can handle at one time?" She says, "I have four claws and am only holding you three in two of them." Ruby says "You are amazing!

“The lower tier of the gondola is in total ruins, although curiously enough there are no fires, indicating that some fire-suppression magic had apparently been used in its creation. All of the soldiers appear to be either dead or unconscious. The dragon and flying horse reach the outside of the upper level, which appears to have been protected from the blast below. The Princess and General Orabi do not appear to be any of the seven people present on this level. Four of these men are the pilot and engineers, who appear to be hitting the controls to gain altitude as the balloon begins to rise. The other three look to be Frenchmen, two of whom George recognize from his prior meeting as Joseph-Michael Montgolfier and Jules-Henri Poincare.

Lawrence shouts over his shoulder, "Abby I don't see the princess. Do you see them?" Ruby says, “Now, how do we figure out if the Princess is in there is the question. She could be in an area we can see. It's hard to know if those," Ruby points to those they can see, "Are part of the conspiracy or not. Either way I imagine this thing is not going to stay in the air for much longer now." Lawrence replies, "I'm not so sure, the balloon is fine."

The dirigible begins to gain altitude and turns. Lawrence exclaims, "Crap, they're getting away. Freya, can you drop people off through the door?" George says, "Ok Ruby time to stop playing cowboy and start playing pirate. Let's go take over the airship, or at least search it." Lawrence smiles to Ruby as he nods in agreement with George. Freya says, "Why bother? They're French wizards, they all deserve to die. Why don't I just shower them in acid!" Ruby exclaims, "What if the Princess is still on there and we just can't see her? She's no French Wizard." "I didn't see women in there. Hold on...." The dragon pokes its head up by the window and inhales. She then exclaims..."Yes, only males there...."

Abby paused, then said, "What's the difference between us going on there and taking them one on one, or Freya doing what she does? I doubt they'll surrender to us!" Ruby nods, "She's right." Ruby pulls out the big magical rod. "Freya, look menacing. Not that you don't already look menacing, but back me up here. Get me up by the windows."

Ruby points the rod at the dirigible and yells out menacingly, "Land this thing now and you may yet live. Continue on this path and this will surely be the last stupid mistake you make! Land NOW. And if you fire one more time or make one more move that is not toward the ground, we will help you to the ground ourselves!"

The dirigible continues to climb higher at a 30-degree angle. Dragon Freya has no difficulty keeping pace with it, holding the rear claw with George and Ruby by the open side window. Ruby says, "What do you think Freya? They seemed to have some sort of magical immunity to fire or ways to put out fire, do you feel like lighting this thing up? We could let them get out from over the city so as to not to injure anyone below..."

Abby pulled out one of her own fireball wands and looked toward Ruby. "Looks like they're not feeling cooperative," she said, loud enough for the French to hear., adding "Mother Earth longs to welcome them home!" George sighs and shakes his head. Such a senseless waste of knowledge and talent. "Ok, Freya" says George reluctantly "Gas them" The man who George does not recognize yells out something incomprehensible in an odd variation of French. Iron walls suddenly appear where all of the open windows had been a second before.

Abby says, "Alright, let's bring this balloon down. I'm going to fire this wand. Ruby, you try too. Freya, if you would be so kind as to bathe the balloon in acid, we'll bring these bastards to the ground." Abby pointed the fireball wand and began reciting the names of the hills of Rome. Freya flies up above and ahead of the dirigible. When she is directly above the upper top she lets loose a deluge of acid from her throat which showers onto the top of the outer covering. As the vehicle is still climbing at a 30-degree angle, the green liquid flows down the entire length of the material as well as spilling down the sides

As Abby rattles off the name of the seventh and final hill of Rome the wand discharges. It strikes the side where some of the acid had already flowed down and the material had begun to dissolve. George had been told that the balloons were fire resistant, and they do not ignite, but the impact of the fireball itself against the already weakened balloon frame cause that section of metal and wood lattice-work beneath the outer coat to collapse inward, which then cuts holes into the interior balloon in that section. Abby whooped. "That's exactly what we want! Get a couple holes in that balloon and watch it float to the ground!"

Ruby lets loose at the acid covered nose of the balloon, pointing the wand of fireball and reciting the seven hills of Rome until she learns the activation word to fire. The fireball explodes with the second hill named. As she struck where it had been most heavily coated in acid the outer covering shreds with the force of the fireball. Freya assists this shredding by grabbing a section that flies up by her and pulling while flying higher. The upper frame begins to shatter. It now becomes obvious that within the cigar-shaped frame are eleven different round and oval balloons ranging from 75 to 200 feet in width, three of which are now cut open and loosing their gas.

Two of the other balloons are still fully inflated but now float independently away from the dirigible, these two rising quickly once free of the extra gondola weight holding them down. The remaining six interior balloons remain wedged within the still intact sections of the dirigible frame. The dirigible itself now stops rising, but continues to hold level. Abby aimed her wand again at another acid covered area, away from any allies, hoping to enlarge the hole without igniting the gas inside. The name of the last hill of Rome again passed her lips to loose a streak of fire. Ruby exclaims, "Nice shot Abby!!!" She waited to see the damage Abby did before firing off her next shot.

Another section breaks away, falling to the side and covering over the right side of the gondola. The balloon in that area gets sliced open in the process, the air shifting out, at which point the adjacent balloon to it floats free and away. By now the first three cut balloons are mostly deflated, now leaving just four fully-intact balloons of the original eleven. The frame and the dirigible begins to make a gradual descent although they are still over 1000 feet above the city. At this point they are nearly a mile from the palace, having traveled northwest and towards the Nile.

Ruby says, "Freya, why don't you go in and get one last balloon with your claws! It will make you feel good and it will guarantee this thing comes down." Freya does as requested, her claws making very short work of the next balloon, which quickly shreds. The outflow of gas blows strongly against Ruby, George and Mina, who have to hold on tight to keep from being blown off from the rear claws. Another balloon then floats free, leaving just a pair of intact balloons inside the remaining frame, which quickens the descent, now at 900 feet and falling at around 50 feet a minute.

George says, “Ok, this works well, Freya are you strong enough to push or pull the airship as it descends to steer it towards a less populated place to land?" She says, "I could try, but as weakened as the remainder is, it might crumble if I apply too much pressure." Ruby says, "I think that does the job, what do you guys think? Where do we go now?" "Let's just puncture one of the others. We need them down faster. They could be teleporting out of there, and we want those people. We need to know what they know," Abby states.

Ruby listens to the others, "No, you are right. We shouldn't let them escape. If we bring them down someplace it'll be easier to confront them on the ground. I'm just afraid we're all tapped out of spells, mostly. These little wands are quite handy though! We should pick a few more up before we leave this magical land of... magic."

George tells Freya, "Let us try to do so, but from the stern. But take out one more balloon first." Abby lets off another fireball into the frame alongside one of the remaining intact balloons, which causing punctures in it. The rate of descent increases. Then the iron walls over the upper windows all vanish, subtracting close to a ton of added weight, and the descent slows as the dirigible starts to level off at a 500 foot elevation, despite only one intact balloon remaining above. Ruby is now reminded of the magical levitation plates coating the outer wall of the gondola. The four engineers and pilot appear to be frantically working. Only one of the Frenchmen is immediately seen on that deck, but some movement is also now seen on the lower level.

George calls out, "Freya, take out the last balloon" As Ruby watched the dirigible float away from them in a downward fashion, the adrenaline wearing off just a bit, she felt a sharp stab in her side. She put her hand over her wound. "Maybe a little rest is in order. This war thing is tough on a body."

Freya does as commanded, not only breaking it but pushing it away from the gondola, which now has wreckage from above draped over both the front and right side, and making it more difficult for the frantic pilots. The wreckage causes the Gondola to list to the starboard bow as it is now just 350 feet above the African continent's largest city and now descending at a rate of more than 100 feet a minute.

Ruby says, "Freya, is there a way you can drag this a little bit so as it goes down it goes to a less populated area?" "Alright Freya the sin against nature is mostly destroyed, let us save what innocents we can below. Guide the gondola as best you can towards the Nile regions, it is more agricultural over that direction. They have some sort of levitation in the cabin all we need to do is push laterally don't worry about slowing it down." says George with a few mental calculations.

She flies to the right front and uses her tail to grab onto the balloon wreckage enshrouding that section of the gondola. She starts to tow it in the direction of the rice and grain warehouses closer to the Nile in the northwestern section of the city. Her pulling also accelerates the descent, with them now just 150 feet above the ground and buildings. Freya spots an open section between two warehouse that she steers it towards, now less than half-a-minute from a crash landing. George gives the count and a good twenty seconds before impact and once assured of minimal collateral damage, gives the signal to Freya to release the gondola so that she can slow herself down Ruby says, "Great job! That's a good spot, better than most I guess. Question is, what do we do once it's crashed?"

Abby and Lawrence followed the dirigible down, staying a bit back in case of any unexpected movements. Abby kept her eyes focused on what was going on inside the gondola. She was in a state of hyper-focus, vaguely aware that it was easy to miss other things when she was so solely focused on the enemy. Something had stirred in her blood during this fight and she was struggling to keep her mind in the game as well as her sword arm.

The Frenchman still on the upper deck is Mongolfier, who is working with the pilot and engineers to try to control the descent and crash. Abby sees the other pair of Frenchmen on the lower deck, one strapping himself in using some cannon supports, the other appears to be casting a spell onto one of the downed soldiers.

The gondola first strikes on the front bow, which is the part weighted down by the balloon debris. One reason that the warehouses were built in this area is that only a few feet of topsoil are above a solid stone ledge, which causes the dirigible so hit very hard, the front corner folding in like an accordion on the lower level.

The large bow cannon then digs into the dirt and hits ledge, causing the entire gondola to upend at a ninety-degree angle. The only thing preventing it from completing flipping over is the balloon debris draped and pinned into the section that had collapsed, which pulls the gondola down and to the right. The right side hits the ground hard, the three cannon on that side breaking through their supports and back into the gondola. The combined weight of all the cannon on the lower floor then cause the entire gondola to land flat on the earth with a resounding thud and a large cloud of dust blows upward. As the dust starts to settle it appears that none of the occupants are standing or moving around. George sighs and shakes his head, "Ok, let's go search the wreckage" Lawrence looks for a place to set down, while staying out of the way of Freya.

Chapter 87, “Accusations.”, September 11, 1882, 3:30 P.M.

Freya drops George, Mina and Ruby off near the door to the Gondola's lower level, then flies up again to guard the area. Lawrence's horse with him and Abby lands shortly thereafter. The front and right walls are covered over by the remains of the balloon canvas and framing, but the rear wall and left wall are still open. It takes little effort for George to open the door. Inside the damage is horrific. A pile of dead soldiers in the front right corner piled on the smashed in section, with the large loose cannon that had been on the right wall having smashed them to pieces.

The French mathematician and cartographer, Henri Poincare, had lashed himself to the largest left-side cannon. That move appears to have caused more harm than good, as one of the smaller cannon that came loose from the right has smashed and wedged itself against that cannon, crushing both of his legs to a pulp, with blood pooling around it. He is not moving and either dead or dying.

Much to George and Ruby's surprise, there are two men still alive inside. The Frenchman who George did not recognize is leaning along the left wall near the front. His left arm hangs limp to his side and he has a nasty gash running from his forehead down his left cheek and to his chin, from which a steady stream of blood is pouring out. He is staring blindly ahead, apparently in shock. Beside him is a French Foreign Legion Officer, covered in ash with his uniform a tattered ruin from the earlier ammunition explosion. He is more lucid than his companion, and raises his right arm towards the door, holding in it a sawed off double-barrel shotgun that is now pointed at George and Ruby.

George pushes Ruby past the opening of the door out of the line of fire as he too dives after her. Lawrence lands not far from where George and Ruby just jumped aside to. George and Ruby are clear of the doorway. The gun does not fire. George calls out in French " We want to help you, we want to heal you.” "That was close," Ruby whispers. "How can we get that gun away from him without getting killed??"

George hears voices inside speaking softly in French. The conversation is as follows:
1st Voice: "Snap out of it."
2nd Voice: "Huh...what.....Henri!" (sound of movement)
1st Voice: "Forget him, he's dead."
2nd Voice: "No, he still has a pulse. I can save him, I saved you."
1st Voice: "We have no time, the enemy are outside."

George calls out in a loud voice in French "You have time. We are not trying to kill you. We will help you heal if you allow us" The first voice changes to a different language, one unknown to George and Ruby. Mina whispers over "It's Bohemian...he's telling his friend to leave the wounded one for you to heal." Ruby asks, "George, why would we heal them, they tried to kill us? Nana, what kind of language is Bohemian?" George says, "It is a language in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It is spoke in the region of Bohemia just southeast of Germany.” Mina adds, "Their major city is Prague. Today they only speak German there, the language is ancient, used back when the land was under Roman rule."” "Yes the Bohemia were named by the Romans after the tribe of Celts who lived there." adds George

George continues, “Our intent wasn't to ever kill these people, we tried to let them surrender peacefully. We have downed the airship. The military officer is certainly not involved with the overall group. The other two are certainly talented men, who may have not been involved with the overall plot. Healing them saves the world their valuable talents and skills. They may also be able to help us, especially if we show them our true mettle." "Well, then I suppose this is where you come in with your diplomacy more then me with my intimidation. Start sweet talking them baby," Ruby smiles from her uncomfortable spot on the ground. "The faster the better!"

George calls out in French again "Will you accept our help? We do not want to kill you, we could have done so had we wished. Is Joseph-Michael Montgolfier still alive? I do want to help you save Henri. We do not want to see further bloodshed. We believe that we can help each other, but we of course do not want to have shotguns pointed at us." The first speaker calls out in French "Wait, we need to discuss this amongst ourselves." Ruby, George and Mina then hear a small amount of shuffling-type movement inside.

George whispers to Mina and Ruby, "While I do not expect anything, be prepared for an attack" says George pulling out his revolver. Ruby raises her wand of fireball and shrugs. "It's all I really have left. Well, I do have the rifle too but that's not exactly great at this close range. Then again, neither is shooting fireballs." Ruby laughs. "I guess we use what we have."

Two minutes pass with no further sounds from inside. Ruby says, "It looks like they took off or are waiting for us to come in. Do we chase after them or what?" "Gentlemen?" calls out George in French. There is no answer. Abby came up quietly behind the others and kept her voice low. "Nothing from inside? They won't let us help them?" "I think they took off." Ruby quietly gets up off the ground, creeps up toward the doorway and peeks inside.

The men who were conscious are both gone. Part of the tattered balloon canvas that had been draped over a window in the front looks to have been pushed back. The man Poincare is still lying by the cannon, but the bleeding appears to have been stopped by some type of healing spell. "There's one guy in here, hurt but not bleeding out. The other two who shot at us are gone," Ruby whispers back. "At least, not that I can see."

George calls up to Freya still flying over head "Freya, there were men in here who have fled do you see them?" She flies lower and says, "No. Large crowds of Egyptians keep pointing up at me but they are all keeping their distance." Turning to Ruby he says "Let us get Henri out of there, he deserves more than this." says George moving into the cabin. There he begins a quick triage to see if anyone else can be stabilized. The prior healing spell appears to have stabilized his condition. It will still take considerable strength to move the cannon off his battered legs to free him.

Ruby follows George in and gives a quick look over the area to make sure no one is hiding. After she is done with that she helps George look over Henri and the others. "Freya, we need your help in here! We need you to help move this cannon." Ruby turns to George. "Do you know this Frenchman?" "Yes I do. He is a talented mathematician, topologist and cartographer, and I would like to save him. Get Freya to help you i want to look for the other man I saw" says George. “I'll come with you, George," Abby said.

Freya flies down and moving her tail through the nearest window pulls the cannon to the side. Without any more questioning Ruby began to help the man. "Abby, do you have any healing abilities? I have a little bit of knowledge of healing." Abby calls back, "I'm no good at healing.” "He is stable Ruby, make him comfortable. Abby and I will look for Joseph" says George as he and Abby start searching the cabin for the balloonist.

Ruby nods at Abby as she goes off with George. There wasn't much she could do. "We have to get him to healing soon so don't be long." Ruby kneels on her heels next to the man and tries her best to bind his wounds. She rips a few pieces of cloth off his own shirt to tie up wounds on his legs in case the bleeding starts again. She says some silent prayers to Aphrodite to watch over all of them as she presses on her own side. Once she feels she has done what she can she looks for any signs of life in the other bodies.

George heads up the spiral staircase to the upper level. The ceiling/floor appears to have partially raised during the crash landing. One advantage to the expanding/contracting spring mechanism is that everything on the upper level is firmly fastened down, with solid straps on the chairs. The only casualty on that level appears to have been the engineer seated in the starboard bow seat, who was pummeled by metal debris from the balloon remnants above. The other four men, including Montgolfier, appear injured but alive, with the pilot still conscious. Upon spotting George the pilot quietly says in French "Mr. Eastman, stay down and be quiet. That German Dragon who attacked us is right outside and may swallow us whole if it sees us."

George suppresses a smile. George does crouch and speaks quietly "How badly injured are any of you? The engineer look badly off. There were two men below who delayed us terribly, threatening us with weapons. But they have fled leaving you to fend for yourselves. Who were they? There was an officer there and another man who spoke a strange language, Bohemian I think it was. Who was that man? And why would he abandon you" asks George earnestly.

The pilot says, "Bohemian you say? That would be the Foreign Legion officer who was second in command, he was originally from that region. I did not catch his name, only his rank of Lieutenant. His orders were to protect the wizards, so he should not have abandoned Mr. Montgolfier." The pilot unstraps himself and checks Mongolfier stating, "Joseph-Michael appears to be okay, his leather coat and helmet appear to have buffered him somewhat from the impact." He then checks the three Engineers saying "Andre looks to have suffered some broken ribs. Pierre looks like he might have a concussion. Marc is dead."

"Henri is down below and hurt very badly. I have a colleague down below watching him. We can at the least provide some basic healing for all of you." says George as he moves forward to examine the injured men and bind what wounds he can. "Can you tell me how this came about?" The pilot replies "Yes, we were attempting to help the Egyptian King suppress a rebellion. They had overtaken the palace and were firing from the palace roof onto the crowds below. When we tried to stop them an evil German Wizard who was working with the traitorous rebels transformed into a dragon and attacked our vehicle."

George stares intently at the men for a moment gauging their honesty. George senses that the Pilot totally believes everything he has just told George. "Yes there were rebels in the palace, though they had not 'overtaken' the palace in any manner. There were no rebels on the roof of that I can assure you. I can tell you for a fact that Rene Bellocq was on the roof and this young lady here and I can tell you we heard him with our very own ears. We heard him cry out in Arabic the words 'We followers of Adbullah will never surrender. Death to the King! And death to you vile Frenchmen.'"

George pauses a moment to let this fact sink in. "Joseph, I respect you and Henri very much and it pains me to say this, but the facts are self-evident and undeniable. Bellocq's deception clearly designed to goad this vessel into an attack coupled with the abandonment of you by the men below indicates to me that there is a faction or a cabal within your Wizard society that seeks, nay promotes the conflict in Egypt. I fear this cabal is promoting and escalating this war. We have borne witness to a variety of acts by a number of Wizards that sought to actively kill, weaken or over-throw the king. Bellocq is one as is Bernhardt. There are others we have yet to fully identify."

"I know this is a tremendous betrayal to lay before you, especially in your current condition, but it is imperative that you know, imperative that you help save the Kingdom from the rogue members of your group." says George.

Joseph-Michael Montgolfier unstraps himself from his seat and approaches George. He walks with a limp and winces in pain as he moves, but then stands defiantly before George. The French engineer says, "Or so you would wish us to believe Mr. Eastman. However, your true intentions are now known to me, and the facts are indeed self-evident and undeniable. I will not fall for further deceptions from you." He turns towards the pilot and says, "Jacques, do not tell this man anything further, this man and his colleagues are spies, working directly for the American military and Mr. Giffard's former partner Ferdinand Von Zeppelin. He seeks to steal the secrets of our dirigible construction."

George smiles ruefully and shakes his head. "Ok. I am not here to bandy words. I am here to help save you." Turning to Jacques he says "I am no spy monsieur. For the Americans military or the German. I have no designs upon the workings of your dirigible. My apologies to you for intruding." George turns back to Joseph. "Very well, you are either blinded by personal loyalty to your colleagues, or are blinded by professional jealousy. I can respect either. However. I am telling the truth, and your aspersions upon my intentions and character are not acceptable."

"However, I cannot wring water from a stone, and if faced with the truth you choose or are unable to accept it I cannot force you to. I offered only succor, safety and salvation. You choose to cling to untruths whether intentionally or unintentionally. Whatever mental reservations you have about accepting my word is yours. I cannot stand around and try to convince you of my honesty. You have chosen a very difficult path Joseph. For that I am sorry. I am more sorry for the men who serve under you, men like Jacques who are brave and loyal, men who will die in your service because of your inability to accept the truth, your blind loyalty, blind faith, blind ambition or jealousy. I bid you good day gentlemen. Good luck with your endeavors. Jacques I wish you and your men the best and you have my sympathies." with that George signals Abby to follow him and he turns and descends back to the lower level.

As they descend Montgolfier yells out "Deny all you want, I know the truth Eastman! Giffard had you investigated after you showed such interest in our inventions. Do you deny that you recently visited Promise City, Arizona, where Von Zeppelin is now building his dirigible factory? Or that you are personal friends with the Mexican wizard named Manuel Gonzales? He is the man who convinced Von Zeppelin to relocate to that location, and the very same Gonzales was spotted right here in Cairo just this morning! Do you also deny that two of your colleagues have just been reinstated to active duty in the United State military, which occurred only AFTER you joined us for the balloon flight? The evidence of your spying is indeed overwhelming!"

George pauses on the stairs. He turns slowly and stares intently at Montgolfier for a long silent moment. "My life is fairly open, it is not hard to investigate me. It is just as easy to misinterpret the ensuing information. So to address your allegations in order. Yes I was recently in Promise City Arizona. And yes I was aware of Von Zepplin's dirigible factory. But I never met the man. Shall I damn you for residing within the same city as General Orabi? Does the fact that you merely existed within 50 miles of him that within a city of 5 million souls, you of necessity sought him out? So if you would tar me with your accusations merely by nature of proximity? Well then sir, I can damn you with more villains within a given radius than any host of man you can name.

Secondly, yes I do know Manuel Gonzales, but I was unaware of his relationship with Von Zeppelin, since as I have said I never met that later. As to the fact that he is in Cairo, well sir that is news to me, and my thanks are to you for bringing it to me. I shall seek him out. So if I am to be damned for knowing him, let me go and meet him first then you can damn me with your accusations, but not before. Thirdly, yes two members of my party were indeed reinstated to the United States military. And yes it was after my voyage on your once noble vessel, that they were reinstated. However, what your vaunted Gifford failed to deduce was that I had no contact with those two between my return and their reinstatement. Not only that but that the reinstatement had been initiated BEFORE I had boarded, nay before I had even been invited aboard your vessel.

And lastly yes I showed interest in your miraculous design, as I would have with any new technological marvel.
Now, if all of your so-called evidence stands up before the light of truth and reason, so be it. But that makes you either a fanatic or insane. If you will not examine evidence in the cold light of actual empirical evidence and not circumstantial, if you would damn me solely by association, then I can say nothing further. I had thought you a man of learning, a man of science. One of the most brilliant minds of our day! Where is that man now? His mind befouled by his own allegiances? Or has his mind been corrupted by the bogey-man of jealousy?

I don't want anything from you Montgolfier. Not your ship, not the plans for the ship. Not for the U.S. military, not for Von Zeppelin, not for myself. If you will not see reason, if you will damn me with unfounded and unproven accusations then I say good day sir. I came to offer help, aid and succor. I have been met with accusations and the sullying and besmirching my honor and intentions. So I say good day sir. I shall leave you to your fate." says George turning away again.

They descend the staircase and see that Lawrence and Abigail have managed to safely remove the injured and unconscious Poincare to outside the downed dirigible. Freya continues to fly overhead, her presence keeping others away. As they depart the structure Mina turns to Ruby and says, "Your young man is very noble and honest, very good traits, but perhaps he spoke a bit too hastily. If the French actually believed what Montgolfier just stated it would have provided our AGELESS team with an excellent alibi for our current presence in Egypt, one that has nothing to do with finding magical gateways."

Mina next touches a large sheet of metal on the side of the gondola and says, "And as for our interest in this airship, this dirigible gondola would have easily fit onto the deck of the USS Franklin Pierce. The large magical levitation plates on it alone are worth in excess of a million dollars, and their immediate loss would have probably set this French wizard group back years in their efforts." Ruby says, "Well, maybe they will believe Montgolfier anyway?" Mina glances back at Ruby and gesturing to the dirigible gondola says, "So we can take it then?"

Ruby says, "Why not? I don't care if we take the thing. But what would you do with it?" Mina says, "I'm sure James will come up with some good uses for the levitation plates." "Leave it to me." George walks over to the open field in full view of the gondola. There he signals Freya to come down. As she alights he has a rather animated conversation with her, out of earshot. She then flies back up into the air. George walks back to the gondola. Abby, Ruby and Mina are waiting outside. "Ok, let's see if I can't come up with Ruby's bride price" whispers George to the group.

George enters the lower level of the gondola and checks that Henri is still stable. he calls out "Monsieur Montgolfier! I have arranged a temporary truce with the German dragon. The dragon has agreed to not kill you all if the dragon can destroy the rest of the gondola. You must leave now, I do not know how long a dragon will hold to a truce. You may come get Pointcare as well. But you must leave or I fear the dragon will roast you all alive."

As they exit from above Montgolfier has a look on his face that could kill. The pilot and engineer are very anxious to depart, and only stop to carry Poincare after Montgolfier orders them to. George maintains a look of sympathetic concern to the French.

Chapter 88, “The Flying Ogre”, September 11, 1882, 4:00 P.M.

As the last Frenchmen depart George signals Freya to fly down again. George rallies the group. Freya is to carry the gondola out to the USS Franklin Pierce with a letter from Mina to stow in under tarps and heavy guard. Freya will then meet back with the group at the Telegraph Office where the group will go to seek healing after a hard fought day. From there they will hopefully get a better idea of the status of the rebellion.

Freya lands and after stripping off the balloon remnants manages to carry the gondola aloft. George, Mina, Ruby, Abby and Lawrence return to the telegraph office for the others. Telegraphs that have come in during the last hour indicate that Orabi's army is continuing to mobilize by the town of Tel El-Kabir, 30 miles southeast of Zakazik. No telegrams regarding the British forces have arrived.

Abby asked quickly, "Have you heard from Cal or Boujoulais? Anyone who went with us to the Palace? Do we know anything about the location of the General, the King, or the Princess?" Hardin has returned from the palace with the rest of the party's horses, with two horses on loan from the Egyptian army as replacements for Abby and Ruby’s. There is no knowledge of what happened with the British spies. Similarly, there is no knowledge or any telegrams regarding the General or Princess.

As for the King, witnesses claim that his Grand Vizier and the French Wizards teleported the entire Royal Family away to an unknown location once the rebels with the fireball wands stormed the palace. Abby kept her personal fears about Cal to herself. She stated "So as far as we know the royal family could already be dead. We have no idea what faction the French wizards who were with them belonged to. Or if Belloq is some kind of traitor or double agent, or just knows the real French plan."

"How convenient" murmurs George "Okay, so the French could conceivably have the Entire Royal family AND the Princess essentially kidnapped. I am sure there is a French "Advisor" to General Orabi. I think we need to head back to the palace and see for ourselves. Make sure the rebels are routed and Royal troops have the palace secured. Once that is accomplished we can try to locate the royals."

Ruby says to the group, "We need healing, several of us are injured. I know we have some potions but if any of you know of a temple here that could help us out, that would be a better, wiser option I think. Anyone have any ideas for us?" Sahab offers to lead the group to the Temple of Ra. Ruby says, "Okay, first to the Temple of Ra. Our safety first George. And frankly, I'm not keen on going back to the crumbling remnants of the palace. Is there another way we can figure out where the royals are?" Abby interjects, "Ruby's right. We won't do anyone any good if we run ourselves into the ground until we collapse. Much as I want to see what happened at the Palace after we left.”

The group ride to the Temple to seek healing. They arrive at the Temple of Ra. Meren and Cetan take the horses to the adjacent stable while the others head inside, following Sabah's lead. She escorts them to a large private chamber that has alters to four different Egyptian Gods, one of them being Bast, where she states a prayer. A High Priest of Ra soon arrives and converses with Sabah in a language that only the linguist Alsoomse (still in cat form) appears to recognize. Sabah explains that the Priest will cast healing spells on all who need it. They will then be taken to bedchambers separated by gender, where a Priest or Priestess will prepare a bed for each of them and then cast a spell which will give them all the equivalent of eight-hours sleep in just one hour.

While the priestesses prepare, Lawrence paces. He says, "One problem down, but two crop up. Maybe this General Orabi can be reasoned with." "If the French don't kidnap him. If he isn't fully their unwitting pawn. If we can reach him before he does too much harm." muses George. "We need to intercept him somehow, reach him to persuade him. To have him help us get his bride back. We also need to figure how if there are any of the French wizards who are actually on Egypt's side. At this point I doubt it." Lawrence replies, "Probably true, but who knows?"

Ruby says, "Let us all dream of what we should do when we awake, we're going to need all the help we can get." She gives George a kiss and follows Mina and Abby to the women's area where she happily takes a rest.

After the hour is up Ruby emerges from the secure area, rested and alert. She stretches, "That was so refreshing! Doesn't everyone feel so much better?" She thanks the priests of Ra for the gracious healing and speaks to them. "Have you heard any recent news of what is going on in the city? She is told by one of the priests that the army has instituted martial law and is telling everybody to stay in their homes until further notice.

Lawrence says, "That can't include the army. We'll have to liberate some uniforms. That should give us freedom to walk around." "Good idea, but what about Mina, Ruby and Abby?" asks George. Mina says, "As long as we are together with one of you in uniform I am sure you can think of a reason to support it." Lawrence replies, "We can say we're escorting them to a safe place."

One of the acolytes comes in and says, "This is strange. There is a uniformed ogre flying over the city!" Ruby snaps to attention. "Where? Can you point him out? Quickly friends, if it is who I think it is, we must get his attention!!" The acolyte gives Ruby and confused look and replies, "Point him out? How many flying ogres do you think there are in the sky? He's rather obvious!"

Ruby rolls her eyes. "I just meant what direction. There's a lot of sky out there!" Her face lights up and she quickly looks around the room. "Where are the stairs to the roof? The acolyte says she will take her up to the bell tower. Mina waves Ruby aside and says, "I'd better stay here. The Priests and guards up at the tower may recognize me as the one who broke their chime four hours ago."

Ruby nods. "I understand Nana. Why don't you go outside here and see what you spot, just in case we are too late up there." Ruby scoots the acolyte in the direction. "Now, we must hurry!" They run up the stairs as quickly as they can to get to the roof. Lawrence and George follow Ruby to the roof. Ruby and Lawrence head up the stairs, it takes considerable time, as the top of the bell tower is a good eighty feet above the street. Seeing that, Ruby realizes that her Grandmother had "played down" the degree of danger that had been involved in her earlier escapade here, as she had freely dived from this height.

There are a dozen men up top, four construction workers fixing the chime, two Priests of Ra, and six armed guards. Ruby also notes that the chime is considerably broken. Further observation reveals over a dozen sections of one upper wall near the edge where chinks and chips of the stone are broken off and a few bullets remain lodged in the wall . Given the close formation of the bullets it appears that when Mina indicated guards had shot at her, that there were a considerable number of them. Ruby concludes that her own impulsive streak towards danger is clearly an inherited trait.

Looking out and across the sky, it does not take long to spot the Ogre. He is making a wide circle around three blocks away, looking down upon the royal palace. George, who had followed Ruby outside asks to borrow her compact make up case. After a confused look she hands it over. George changes his position to account for the sun and uses the mirror to reflect the sun and to signal the flying ogre. George finds that he has some difficulty due to the fact that his target is a quarter-mile away and moving while facing the opposite direction.

"Well, we could shoot him." suggests George with a sardonic grin. George suddenly has an idea as he runs inside to the temple. Moments later he emerges with a shiny copper pan, some beeswax and a hammer. George kneels down and begin hammering the sides of the pan to form deeper depression. George pauses every now and again to check the shape by eye and do a few mental calculations. Lawrence asks what he is doing. George replies “I am making a parabolic photo-reflector to project a more intense and focused beam of light.” With one more hammer stroke George exclaims in delight. He places the mirror from the compact in the very center with some beeswax and aims it at a sharp angle between the ogre and the sun.

Lawrence wheezes and leans against the wall. "I ... am ... too old ... for this." From his hunched over posture, he can spot the ogre easily. "There he is. He's going to get himself killed if he doesn't land soon." Ruby is about to tell George he's crazy when his invention actually works. She shakes her head. "What a bunch we are," she laughs. She jumps up and down to get the ogres attention, hoping he recognizes her. He turns and flies in the direction of the temple's bell tower. As he nears Ruby recognizes him as Princess Neferka's personal bodyguard Mengesha.

Back below, despite the attentions of the Priestesses at the Temple, Abby had a hard time falling asleep. Worry and adrenaline from the battle kept her heart beating hard, and she'd actually had to meditate and focus on keeping her body calm and her mind clear in order to let her body rest. When the others went tearing up to the roof, Abby stayed with Mina and Sabah. "Now that the excitable ones are gone, where do we really stand? Everywhere we turn there seems to be French wizards working to cause chaos. I seriously doubt they know what the others are doing. If we can find the Royal Family we'll know what side to stand on. If we can’t?...."

Mina says, "We know is that they were working in eight teams of six all around Egypt, so indeed, it did seem like they were everywhere. They must be coming close to their "end-game", perhaps we should reflect back on what we know to try to figure out exactly what that will be." Another acolyte enters and says that the flying ogre is heading towards the temple.

Back up above, the ogre Mengesha lands upon the roof beside Ruby and George. Gesturing to the priests, guards and workmen he softly says "Are they allies? Should we speak in their presence?" "Honestly, they helped us but I'd rather talk more privately about these important matters," Ruby whispers back. "My friend!" She says in a louder voice, "You are safe, I am so relieved! We have so much to discuss! Friends," she turns to the priests, "Is there somewhere more private my friend and I may speak? We have some important matters to talk about and right now even the skies are not safe."

The taller priest orders one of the guards to bring them to a place labeled as the Tehuti Room. On the way down, Ruby collects Abby and her grandmother, telling them they are about to get some news. They are led below and through a long corridor, to a conference room with ornate chairs and a table made of dark onyx stone. A fresco on the wall depicts a humanoid in Egyptian garb with the head of a stork. Ruby thanks the priest and the guard for their help and makes sure the door is shut behind them.

"Mengesha!" She gives him a big hug. Then she starts in one breath, "I am so relieved to see you! Very quickly, this is my fiance George, My grandmother Mina and my friend Abby. Everyone, this is the Princesses personal bodyguard Mengesha. Now that that's taken care of, please forgive my rudeness but where is the Princess? What has happened to her? So you know where general Orabi is? We've been going crazy here trying to figure out what to do next!!" Ruby lets out one big breath. "Whew. Sorry."

The ogre replies "By now she and the General should be on their way to meet with the King. He extended his original deadline of 4PM to dusk due to his having to relocate from the palace." He removes the backpack he is wearing and from it takes out a wrapped package which he gives to Ruby stating, "The Princess wished for you to have this." Ruby begins opening the package. "Where is the royal family now? Where are they meeting?"

He replies, "They would not tell her, not until the French dirigible was in the air. They did not trust General Orabi to keep the location secret from his rebel allies. But the Princess is almost certain that she knows where they are. The King has a private chamber in one of the pyramids." Abby mulls, "A French Dirigible. Can we even trust that the Princess and the General will arrive safely?" The ogre replies, "They should be safe. They were negotiating a truce before General Orabi agreed to come. The King has given assurances that he will not be harmed.

Abby turned to the Ogre and said, "Everywhere we've turned today we've found French fighting on both sides. Some claim to be for the Royal Family, some for the rebels, others seem to just want to throw Egypt into chaos.” The Orge says, "My Sovereign has accompanied her and has sworn to protect her. Neither the King of Egypt or these French wish a war with Nubia. Abby says, “I think we need to take our chances and go where the Princess thinks they were headed."

Ruby's eyes go wide. "Wait-a-minute. Who are they?? What dirigible? Was the Princess on the Dreadnaught? Is she with the General?" The ogre says, "Not the one with the guns, the other one. They were leaving an hour after I departed. My flying belt is swift, but it took a while to find you here. If they are coming directly they should be in Gizah in the near future." Ruby breathes a deep sigh of relief. "Thank you Aphrodite! Okay, so they are on their way to the pyramids, that's where we need to go too then." Ruby pauses and looks up at the ogre. "Well, does the Princess still wish us to come to her?" Gesturing to the package the ogre says, "I do not think that she would have sent you that otherwise."

Ruby finishes unwrapping it. Inside is the lavender silk dress with platinum and gold embroidery throughout and rubies sewn into a white collar that they had negotiated the purchase of back in Zakazik. The sheik selling it had said that the dress was once worn by the Greek Goddess Venus, known to the Roman's as Aphrodite. He stated that it affords protection to the wearer as though they were attired in the strongest of magical armors

Ruby's eyes widen and her mouth drops open. "This is just... just..." She runs her hands along the soft silk as she gets herself together. "Of course, this color looks amazing on me," she grins. "I should look fabulous going into battle." Abby says, "If you were looking for Miss West, does that mean the Princess wants her presence there. With Mr. Eastman and Mrs. Parker? It certainly makes things easier if we're invited. The King isn't terribly pleased with any of us at the moment."

The ogre says, "He is far less pleased with General Orabi, but a truce has been negotiated that will last from now until midnight, when the moon is at its highest." Abby nodded. "A truce between the King and the General is the best outcome we can hope for. They need to be united to face the external threats to Egypt. Mainly from France. Abdullah will be nothing if they are not fighting against each other. Of course Europeans have interest here, Americans too. United they can make sure Egypt meets them as equals."

"We need more than a truce, we need resolution. What will happen at midnight Mengesha? If Orabi and the King do not reach an agreement what happens to the rebels here and to Orabi?" asks George. The ogre replies "At midnight, probably nothing. But at dawn Orabi's army will fight the British. It was the General who set that end time, to keep from being delayed in Gizah. He wanted sufficient time to return to Tel-el Kabir and prepare for battle.” "Will the French allow him to leave? Will they transport him?" asks George. The ogre replies, "Yes, they have promised to return him to the northeast once the audience with the King is concluded."

Ruby says, "I'm wondering, what does your King, the King of Nubia, have to do with any of this? Why is he interested in Protecting the Princess?" The ogre replies, "He wishes for Egypt to be ruled by the Egyptians. He has heard a prophesy from our priests that the British will take over both Egypt and Nubia unless the current path of time is changed. He seeks to prevent that from occurring." She says, "I can understand that I suppose."

Abby had half turned to ask Cal when she remembered that she had no idea where he was, or if he was even alive. She swallowed hard against the panic that threatened to rise in her throat. "Your King is wise," she said simply. Mengesha replies, “The wisest man that I have ever know, although his title is Prince rather than King. The Egyptian King will not allow for him to hold the title of an equal." Ruby states, "That seems unfair, don't you have your own country?" He replies, "Nubia is allowed autonomy, but it technically remains a part of Egypt."

"Well Mengesha, I don't know if that prophecy will come true, but hopefully a ragtag group of Americans can help keep Egypt, Egyptian. To do that though we need to reach that pyramid as fast as we can. Is there some way you can help us do that?” The ogre says, "It is eight miles away. I could carry one of you, perhaps two of the smaller, but that is all that the flight belt would allow." “Also were you looking for Ruby as you flew over the palace?" asks George. Mengesha replies, "I first checked at the telegraph office. You were no longer there. Then I flew around until I found you."

Ruby lifts up her new dress. "So, how long will it take for us to get to the pyramids?" Mina says, "By horseback, probably around an hour." "Then let us get some horses and ride. We may need all the time we can manage", George states.

Once Sabah hears where they want to go she sends a priest to the telegraph office to get the group's horses. Sabah also finds them robes so that they can travel as clergy. She explains that the closest Temple to Bast is in Gizah, so she and her entourage would have no difficulty getting through military checkpoints to go there. Abby says, "Thank you, Sabah. I don't know why, my instincts are screaming at me that you should be with us. Maybe you just make me feel better." Abby asks, "Mengesha, will you be there to meet us, to make sure we're admitted?" He says that he will fly there but is unsure of his personal influence.

Ruby has a priest take her to a private area where she can change into her new dress. She slips it on and even though it should feel heavy because of the jewels it feels soft and as light as air as it caresses her skin. She closes her eyes and drops to her knees, thanking Aphrodite for keeping her and her friends safe and asking for just a little more of her blessings and protections as they are about to embark on their most dangerous mission yet.

She strides out feeling confident and she does a twirl before George and Mina. "What do you think?" "The clothing of Aphrodite herself is the only thing that could possibly make you look more beautiful my dearest." replies George appreciatively Ruby says, "Alright. So we're going to the pyramids.”