Chapter 861: Harper And Nitocris [II / Bonus - ]
Chapter 861: Harper And Nitocris [II / Bonus Chapter]
FWOOM!
In a swirl of violet-and-black smoke that smelled of sweet cinnamon and myrrh, the eight-pound cat dissolved and stretched upward into her full human form.
She stood tall on the mattress with her bare feet sinking into the silk comforter.
Her deep brown skin caught the dim lamplight like polished mahogany, radiating a sun-drenched warmth that ignored the autumn chill.
Her heavy black-and-violet hair cascaded past her waist, framing a flat, toned stomach and generous hips.
Silas’s oversized black shirt hung off her left shoulder, showing the gold armband around her upper arm with the hem brushing her smooth thighs as she moved.
She stretched her long arms over her head and arched her back with slow laziness, her full chest lifting the dark fabric in a way that practically begged for attention.
Harper stopped mid-step, her violet eyes narrowing into two frosty slits.
She looked at the gold armband, she looked at the effortless curve of the empress’s waist and then she looked at the oversized black shirt that clearly smelled of Silas’s soap, hanging loose over a body that belonged painted on a temple wall.
A sharp petty surge of jealousy flared in her chest.
’Look at her…’ Harper thought with her teeth grinding slightly. ’Standing there like she owns the place, wearing my man’s shirt, stretching like she’s on a private beach… If Sera were here, the two of them would set the curtains on fire just trying to out-pose each other.’
Nitocris caught the venomous glare instantly, and her lips curved into a wide shameless smirk.
“Do you find the view intimidating, Harper?” she drawled, her rich voice sliding through the dim room like warm silk. “You have a magnificent core, little one… but the divine line of Khemet doesn’t bow to apprentices, Nyaa~”
Nito casually lifted her right hand, she didn’t need to plant her feet or take a deep focusing breath… She just twitched her index finger.
WHUMM!
The air in the room flattened.
A wave of pure concentrated divinity burst from the empress’s chest and crashed outward in a heavy invisible tide that made the thick glass of the balcony windows rattle in their frames.
The light rolling off her wasn’t pale gold-white like Harper’s… It was a deep solar violet that burned with the ancient heat of a thousand desert noons.
It was three times heavier and five times purer than the spark Harper had just shown, and it carried the weight of an empress who’d ruled an entire era before any of the current kingdoms had names.
Harper took an involuntary half-step back, her eyes widening as the sheer pressure of it pushed against her collarbones then, as quickly as it had come, the light pulled back.
The pressure lifted, and the room settled back into its quiet warmth as Nitocris lowered her hand and looked down past her own chin.
Harper’s gaze followed hers.
Both of them lowered their eyes at the same time and stared with absolute, deadpan intensity at the center of Nitocris’s chest, right where the small sealed piece of Ititius sat quietly beneath her skin.
They stood there in silence for five long seconds as the silence turned intensely awkward.
…They both hated Ititius.
They hated him with a burning passion… He’d been an arrogant, monstrous desert god who’d treated Harper’s body like a puppet, nearly torn both their souls to ribbons, and brought nothing but pain and blood to the sands of Khemet.
If he were standing in front of them right now, they’d have happily tied him to the bumper of Harper’s supercar and dragged him thirty miles over broken glass and yet…
Looking at the staggering divinity that had just lit up the room…
Looking at the power he’d left behind in both of them, the power that had turned a lonely woman in a Khopesh into a goddess and an eighteen-year-old heiress into a walking natural disaster…
Harper let out a long conflicted breath through her nose.
“I mean…” she muttered, crossing her arms tightly over her chest with her lips twitching with grudging bitter amusement. “…he was a bastard.”
“A wretched, parasitic abomination without a shred of grace, Nyaa~” Nitocris agreed heartily, looking down at her own chest with a haughty sniff.
“A completely irredeemable scumbag who deserved to get vaporized by Silas…” Harper went on.
“A bloated blundering relic whose memory offends the sun, Nyaa~” Nitocris nodded.
She was essentially insulting herself but Nito didn’t mind. After all, even though in essence they were the same person… Nito and Ititius were different.
’I still don’t understand how she took her obsession so far that she actually became Ititius.’ Nito shivered.
Harper tapped her foot against the carpet. “But… you really can’t complain about the gains.”
Nitocris let out a melodic laugh and ran a hand through her long hair.
“Indeed! The abomination was utterly repulsive, but his divinity was exceptionally nutritious, Nyaa~”
Harper chuckled, and the tension melted into the strange warmth of two women who’d shared a soul, survived a catastrophe and come out the other side holding the weapons of gods then her competitive fire reignited with a vicious snap.
She stepped forward and dropped into a light aggressive fighting stance, cracking her knuckles one after another.
“Alright, Nito,” she challenged with her violet eyes gleaming. “You’ve got the bigger divinity, the oversized shirt and the smug attitude… How about we head down to the combat room in the basement right now? Ten rounds and no holding back… I’ve been waiting weeks to beat the crap out of you for stealing my body in Khemet.”
Nitocris paused and blinked in mild surprise.
She looked at Harper’s tight stance and the purple sparks dancing over her knuckles then she looked back at the soft, plush pillows of the canopy bed.
A slow lazy yawn parted her lips, showing small perfect white teeth.
“I think I’ll pass, fledgling,” she said, waving a dismissive hand. “Another time, perhaps, when the stars align and the mood strikes me, Nyaa~”
Harper dropped her hands in disbelief. “What?! You’re turning down a fight?! After all that trash talk about Khemet?!”
Nitocris didn’t answer.
’Right now, I want to be lazy…’ she thought, her mind already drifting toward far more entertaining things. ’Fighting is noisy, sweating ruins my coat, and running around a concrete basement is a job for common soldiers… Meanwhile, Silas is soaking in a huge tub upstairs, completely defenseless and wonderfully easy to tease. Why would I trade that for a fistfight?’
FWOOM!
Before Harper could throw out another challenge, the empress vanished in a puff of purple smoke.
A small black cat landed lightly on the comforter, gave her tail a haughty flick, and trotted to the locked double doors.
She sprang up, hooked one paw over the brass handle, twisted the deadbolt with a neat flick of her claws and nudged the door open with her head.
At the threshold, she glanced back over her shoulder with a slow blink.
“Train hard, little one,” she purred. “Maybe someday you’ll earn the right to touch my royal whiskers, Nyaa~”
With a soft patter of paws, she vanished down the hallway toward the master suite to go bother Silas some more.
Harper stood alone in the dim room, staring at the empty doorway with her hands on her hips.
She let out a long exasperated groan and picked her glasses back up off the side table.
’What a grumpy woman…’ she thought, shaking her head with an affectionate, helpless scowl. ’Lazy ancient empress… She really is just an oversized house cat.’
She straightened her blazer, brushed a stray grain of sand off her lapel, and stepped out into the bright corridor.
Downstairs, in the dining room off the foyer, the three younger girls were already gathered around the big walnut dining table.
They’d changed out of their uniforms… Lia wore an oversized pastel yellow sweater and soft gray leggings, Penelope had switched into a black graphic T-shirt and loose athletic shorts with her purple pigtails bouncing and Kaede was bundled up in a huge pink fleece hoodie that made her dark side-ribbons bob whenever she moved.
Their bags were open, and workbooks were spread across the polished wood, surrounded by pens, rulers and neat stacks of notebook paper.
Martha stood at the head of the table, setting down a plate of sliced green apples dusted with cinnamon and four tall glasses of cold milk.
Harper paused in the archway and leaned her shoulder against the carved trim with a warm smile.
“Working hard, ladies?”
Lia looked up from her workbook and brightened. “Miss Harper! Are you going to study with us?”
“Not today, sweetie,” Harper said, walking over to pat Lia’s shoulder and then tug one of Penelope’s pigtails. “I’ve got to head out for a bit. I’ll probably be back around this time tomorrow to check on all of you…”
Penelope dropped her chin onto her palm with a tragic groan. “You’re leaving us to the Math Tyrant, Sis?! Have you no sisterly mercy?!”
“None whatsoever,” Harper laughed, tapping Penelope’s nose with her knuckle. “Work calls… Big houses don’t pay for themselves, you know.”
’Well… a whole lot of work, actually,’ she thought, her violet eyes sharpening behind her glasses.
She had another meeting with her Board at the LAB tonight, and they’d been hinting all week that they had big plans to show her.
She was honestly excited to hear what they’d put together. In a boardroom, Harper was a predator, and tearing through a stack of proposals gave her the same rush as a good fight.
She turned to Martha with a polite nod.
“Take good care of them, Martha and make sure Silas eats something real when he finally crawls out of that tub…”
“You can count on me, Miss Harper,” Martha said with a graceful curtsy. “I’ve got a beef and vegetable stew simmering on the stove and fresh bread in the oven. Safe travels, Miss…”
“See you tomorrow, girls!” Harper called, waving over her shoulder as she headed for the foyer.
A minute later, the deep throaty roar of her violet supercar echoed across the plateau, and the car swept through the gates and down the switchbacks of Celestine Heights.
Martha clapped her hands together with a sharp pop that made all three girls sit bolt upright.
“Now then, young ladies,” she announced. “Books open to page forty-seven… We’ll start with ward geometry, then move on to spatial formulas.”
Penelope let out a gasp and slumped forward until her forehead hit the table.
“Page forty-seven?! Martha, my brain’s already running on empty!”
“I can’t do math today, my spirit is too fragile!” Kaede cried, clutching her pen to her chest. “Princesses shouldn’t have to calculate the curve of a lightning shield…”
“Then you’ll be the first princess who can,” Martha replied smoothly, setting a clean sheet of paper in front of her.
Lia, who’d already opened her book, glanced at the big grandfather clock in the corner.
The brass pendulum swung in slow, steady arcs, and the hands pointed to half past five.
“Martha…?” she asked hopefully. “Is it true what Penelope said earlier, about the TV tonight?”
Penelope’s head snapped up off the table.
“YES! Martha, the movie! They’re showing the anniversary edition of The Starlight Princess of the Crystal Rain tonight at seven o’clock!”
“We’ve been waiting three whole months for it!” Kaede gasped, clasping her hands. “We have to see the coronation scene…!”
“And we brought our figurines from the old apartment!” Penelope pleaded. “If we finish, can we please play with them in the lounge and watch the movie together?!”
Martha looked at the three eager faces, and a slow, warm, affectionate smile softened her strict expression.
“Well now…” she murmured, her eyes twinkling. “If you finish all twelve problems without a single mistake, and write a two-page summary of the northern borders… then yes. You can set your figurines up on the rug in the lounge and watch the whole movie with hot cocoa.”
The dining room exploded.
“YES!” Penelope roared, grabbing her pen so fast she nearly flung it across the table.
“FOR THE STARLIGHT PRINCESS!” Kaede shrieked, hunching over her paper.
Lia giggled and set to work with calm careful focus.
The promise of their favorite movie turned the three of them into an unstoppable study squad.
For the next hour, the only sounds in the room were scratching pens, turning pages, and Martha’s quiet corrections as she walked behind their chairs, gently guiding their hands and refilling their milk.
[A Few Hours Later]
The grandfather clock in the lower hall struck seven, its slow chimes drifting through the quiet corridors.
DONG! DONG! DONG!
Upstairs in Lia’s room, the lamp glowed warm and gold over a picture of perfect peace.
On the big four-poster bed beneath the lavender quilt, the three girls were curled together in a heap, fast asleep.
They’d been far more tired than they’d let on as they’d never even made it to the TV.
Martha tucked the blanket up to their chins one by one, turned the lamp down low and slipped out, easing the door shut behind her.
CLICK!
She stood in the quiet corridor, and the silence of the huge house rushed in around her.
The children were asleep, Miss Harper had left and the movers were long gone.
…That left her alone with Master Silas.
’There’s n-no need to be shy…’