Mummy

Mummy

TW: Some gore mentioned.

Darius lifted the flap of the ‘ibu’ tent, his step heavier than usual. On the embalming table lay a woman’s body – and for a moment he was no longer the jackal-headed Anubis, protector of the dead and conductor of souls as chief embalmer – he was simply a man. Breath catching, he half expected the family friend who had helped raise him to rise and tease him about his big feet, as she had when he was a boy.

Darius had never minded the teasing. Having lost his own mother at a young age and with a father who was engrossed in important work, Zara had taken on a motherly role — letting him into her home, fussing over him, and treating him like one of her own children. That was how he remembered her in life.

In life… if only she were alive!

Now, in death, she must undergo the trial all mortals ultimately face. It was Darius’s job as priest and chief embalmer to help make the transition from the earthly life into the next one run smoothly. By preparing the body and performing the sacred rites, he would free her soul to re-join her body in the afterlife — to be carried to the Field of Reeds, the paradise beyond the sky.

Zara had been a lovely woman, inside and out. Always laughing, often with a kind word for others. The wife of a mason who, along with their sons, had long worked on the great temple at Karnak. When the project ended and Zara’s husband had retired, the family settled in Zara’s childhood village, granted a plot of land by a senior official. Darius, now a priest and chief embalmer himself, had been one of the first to visit them on their return. Zara had welcomed him into their home with the same arms that had comforted him as a child. The memory was so vivid that his hand flew to his mouth, stifling a grief that had no place in this hallowed work.

By evening, the desert heat was cooling. Having thoroughly washed and shaved, Darius was ritually clean and prepared for the sacred task.

Used to being surrounded by the paraphernalia of his trade, in that moment he was struck by the stark scene. The sharp metal scalpels, hooks and blades, china bowls, pots of fluid, bottles of cedarwood and myrrh, boxes of the desert salt called natron, and the stone canopic jars that would store her organs – they all rose up as if he was seeing them for the first time.

But they were the tools of his trade, and for Zara, he would use them better than he ever had before.

Rallying, he inhaled the scent of incense and picked up a scalpel. Forcing himself to think of her as a lifeless vessel, he made an incision into the left side of the abdomen. At intervals, he squeezed a tube attached to a huge basin in the floor, collecting blood and other fluids.

When all the internal organs had been removed, Darius cleaned out the cavity with palm wine. The sharp scent cut through the air. He then filled the space with crushed myrrh and cassia. After placing the lungs, liver, stomach, and intestines into large bowls, he covered them in natron salt. Later, each would rest in its own stone jars, each guarded by one of the four sons of Horus.

He paused over Zara’s still heart, the weight of his duty immense. He remembered the calm, rhythmic beat of that heart against his ear when she’d soothed him after a childhood fall. He clasped it now with utmost care, wrapping it in a cloth soaked in preserving fluids before returning it to its rightful place. As the seat of wisdom and emotion, Zara’s essence resided in this very organ, and its voice would be needed in the Hall of Truth. He prayed silently. Be light, dear heart. Be lighter than Ma’at’s feather when weighed. If a heart was heavy with misdeeds, it would be devoured by a monster, ending existence forever. Such a fate was unthinkable, and he would do everything he could to prevent it.

Darius’s son, Adel, entered the tent cautiously, aware that the lifeless woman laid out on the table had held a special place in his father’s affections.

“Do you want me now, Father?”

“Yes, come in. The time is right.”

“I’m ready,” Adel said, holding out a pair of smooth but not quite steady hands.

“I believe you’re ready to deal with the brain without my assistance. Whatever you do, try not to damage her face. The soul must always recognise its home. Keep her intact.”

Adel picked up a long, cool hook. “I’ll do my best not to harm her.”

Darius averted his eyes. “It’s a comfort to know the brain is a useless organ, of little value, merely the source of mucus.”

“Perhaps not entirely useless.” Adel mused, his interest in medical matters showing. “We know it plays a role in epilepsy, and some physicians have noted its hemispheres. There have even been reports of successful surgery.”

“That may be, but for our purposes we need to remove it quickly before it decays.”

“Of course.” Adel inserted the hook into the corpse’s nostril. Darius watched his son’s grip, noting the tension in his knuckles, the narrow focus in his gaze. The procedure demanded strength and composure, but Adel was learning. Darius found himself sweating, his own fatigue settling deep into his bones.

“If you can manage without me, I’ll leave you to it for a bit,” he said. “I’m going home but call me if you need me.”

“I will be fine. Shall I fill all the cavities with natron, or leave that to you?”

“Yes, do that. I’ll return for the final preparations.”

Darius walked the short distance to his house and joined his wife on the rooftop. The sky, vibrant with stars, had swallowed the sun and would now spend twelve hours passing through the underworld, preparing for rebirth.

“You look a little pale,” she said, kind eyes resting on him. “Can I get you anything?”

“A beer would be good.”

The beer was cool and filling. “What you are doing can’t be easy,” she said softly. “Zara was such a nice person.”

“She was.” Darius examined his feet. Not so large now. “I just want to do my best for her.”

“You will. You’re the finest embalmer in the region. The only person of merit you haven’t worked on is the Pharaoh himself.”

“That honour will fall to our son. This will be my last embalming.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m getting old, love.” He examined his hands. “My joints ache. I don’t want to slip up. It’s time for Adel to take over.”

Darius returned to a tent thick with the scent of myrrh. He was about to take over from Adel when the flap was flung aside. A guard from the vizier’s household stood panting, hand on his shield.

“Priest Darius, you are summoned,” he cried.

The intrusion shattered the sanctity of the place. Darius covered Zara’s body with a cloth, his movement slow and deliberate, a muscle working in his jaw. “This is a consecrated space. With you bursting in – it is a grave offence,” he hissed. “Who dares summon me?”

“I’m sorry. The vizier ordered it. His eldest son had a sudden fever… He is gone. He demands your presence right away — he will have no one else. You must not delay.”

The command broke the silence like a crack in a sacred jar. Darius looked from the guard’s troubled face to Zara’s shrouded form, torn. To leave her now felt like an abandonment, a betrayal of his final promise. But a command from the vizier was almost as binding as one from the Pharaoh.

Darius turned to his son, anxiously waiting.

“Adel, you must finish today’s work,” he said firmly. “Pack every cavity — don’t miss anything.” He wrapped his cloak round his shoulders. “I have to go.”

Alone again, Adel drew a steady breath. The interruption had shaken him. He grabbed another bundle of natron to begin the arduous task of drying the body. As he moved, his arm brushed a small table of sacred amulets. Unaware, he knocked the small lapis lazuli Djed pillar — a symbol of stability for the departed. It fell silently into the shadows, its impact absorbed by the thick reed mat.

When Darius finally returned hours later, weary from the grim task at the vizier’s home, he checked over his son’s work. With the cavities now filled with salt, Zara was barely recognisable. He worked long and hard, stuffing small gaps with sand and linen, trying to restore a semblance of the woman he had known.

Then came the placement of the amulets, a final act of reverence he would perform himself. It would take more than a week to complete the bandaging, sealing charms beneath each layer. He laid them out on a clean cloth: the Ankh for life, the scarab for rebirth, the Tyet for protection. He reached for the pillar.

The space was empty.

His weary eyes scanned the items again.

“Adel,” he said, his voice quiet. “The djed pillar. I don’t see it.”

“It was there when I last looked,” Adel replied, face paling.

A cold dread crept over Darius. His eyes darted round the tent. Perhaps it was a trick of the light, or his tired mind. Wondering where it could be, he took a step back, and his foot caught on something small and hard on the mat.

He bent down. The deep blue of the lapis lazuli glinted up at him. Retrieving the tiny pillar, a tremor ran through him. The cold stone felt like a mockery of feebleness rather than a symbol of strength. Adel’s face was drawn, horrified. The unspoken accusation hung heavy between them, a sudden chasm in the shared sanctity of their work.

His mind raced. He could place the amulet correctly next to the heart, where Osiris himself could see it. But that would mean undoing all of Adel’s careful packing. Cutting the stitches would violate the corpse. A sacrilege. He could not do it. He could not undo his son’s work.

Darius’s hand closed round the pillar. The perfection he’d sought for Zara was now impossible, and the failure haunted him. Yet when the time came, he placed the pillar on her chest, pressing it deep into the resin-soaked linen. It was there. But it was not in its rightful place.

Weeks later, Zara lay in her sarcophagus, ready for her journey to the far shore of the Nile. Darius should have been proud. He had soaked her body in the finest oils, making her smell divine. He had tucked every other amulet between the wrappings. At every stage he had recited the spells from the Book of the Dead to reawaken her. But all he saw was the one tiny flaw. He could only pray the gods of the underworld would overlook it and accept his friend into the Field of Reeds.

Before sealing her into the casket, he cast one last professional eye over his work. To his mind, her shrouded face radiated the same contentment she had worn in life. She lay motionless, a seamless work of art, without obvious flaw. Only then did Darius allow himself to feel a flicker of peace. He had done everything he could. He had prepared her body, and in doing so he hoped he had freed her soul.

As he turned away, he noticed a strip of linen left unused on the embalming table. He folded it carefully and slipped it into the pouch at his waist. There it would stay: a thread between their worlds, and a quiet remembrance of the woman who had meant so much.

She, who had once been like a mother to him, was now the perfect mummy — serene, complete.

He had to believe it was enough.

He could ask for no more.