Author Games: The River of Night

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"This is getting interesting," Fatima commented, sipping her coffee. "I'm tempted to say the whole "yanked from their ordinary life" thing was ripped off of Star Wars, but this technically did come first. And it wasn't exactly a photo finish."

"Yes, yes, of course," Professor Wyndham murmured. He squinted at a particular cartouche before uncapping a Sharpie and circling it. Fatima frowned at him.

"You've done that a few times now. What's going on with that name? Is Mister-" she examined the symbols for a second- "KHLD a particularly important person?"

"Khalid, I would think from the context. It was a fairly common name for the time, but we can't be sure given the absence of vowels from the hieroglyphic system. There was a mark by his name- see? Right there. I can't be certain, but it seems to be a scarab, which as you well know..."

"Was associated with Khepri, the sun's rebirth," Fatima finished. "You think this Khalid will play an important role later in the myth?"

"I strongly suspect it, yes. I've been noting down the others marked in this manner, along with their probable pronunciations." He slid a sheet of paper towards her. Fatima turned it around and scanned it.

"Mm...'Ife Lerato-' odd name, that. Why'd you spell it that way?" 

"A whim, my dear. We can't be certain of the vowels, so I picked ones that amused me."

Fatima raised an eyebrow, but declined to comment. "Then we've got Khalid, a Ramia Gamal- really, professor, you're letting your imagination run wild, don't you think? Nour Tahir, which sounds a bit more likely. And Lucius Horatius! You don't think that's somewhat audacious, adding a Roman name to an ancient Egyptian sun-myth?"

"Audacity is one of the very few privileges of age, Miss Charobim, and it's of much greater use than wisdom."

Fatima suppressed an eye roll and took another sip of coffee. "Well. Let's see what they have in store for us, hm?"

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