The rumors had started a few days before. He had heard them from so many different sources that he would be hard pressed to not believe them. The question was what did he do about it? If anything at all. All he knew right at that moment was one thing.

Set had returned.

( Upon hearing the news, )

It wasn't exactly a formal affair. She didn't want to have everything bogged down by formalities and niceties for the entire night. She enjoyed catching up with other rulers. There were always plenty of stories to share and things to learn from each other. In her experience, the rulers of the dead had a much more interesting view on the world of the living. A lot of gods stopped dealing with people after they bit the dust. The ones that were invited to the party did a lot of the work after that point.

Nothing had been changed for their arrival. The castle, non-drafty, was dark and looming. It had a classic Gothic design. It had dark corners, large stained glass windows which were highlighted by the candlelight. The carpets were all sorts dramatically deep reds mixed with black. The artwork were several macabre pieces. ( Hades' friend did like to have his fun. )

It was rare this time of year that he was able to sit down and put his feet up on the tasseled hassock in his study. Which was why, as he settled into the cushy plumpness of his red velvet chair, Santa began mentally reviewing his to-do list for today. Did he really have time to enjoy his peppermint hot cocoa, or had he forgotten something that would require his attention?

( The List )

(Note: Because Thoth likes everybody, anybody that he'd collected on his way out of the party would be welcome in his London home, along with Bast.)




There was light.

Why was there light?

There should not be light. Of any kind. Anywhere. Ever again.

Bast tried to pull one of her pillows over her head to block out the offending brightness, but her questing fingers found nothing to grasp. Despite her loathing of the light, she cracked one eyelid just enough to look for what was missing. There were no pillows in front of her, like there should be. Actually, the sheets were the wrong color too. And why had her bed been turned sideways so that it was in the path of the sunlight coming through that window?

( Wait. )

Sometimes Makaria's job was complicated. Sometimes it was easy. Today it was complicated. She was the Goddess of Blessed Death, but that didn't necessarily mean the souls themselves were ready to make their trip to the underworld. Sometimes they liked to give her a run for her money, or in this case, enjoyed cat and mouse more than anything else in the world. In his youth, Phillip had been a sprinter. Old age had robbed him of his ability to run at all. His hips had failed him, he had arthritis. So the moment life had passed out of him and he was free of his body.

Well.

"Where the Hades did he go?" Makaria scowled at nothing. He HAD been right there. She'd just been saying hello.

( This was not going to be fun. )

He was not sure as to what he should do. He honestly doubted that this had ever come up before. In any pantheon’s part of the Underworld. Of course there was the fact that none of the other pantheons really did much mummification so if they had been in a similar situation, they would not have that part to deal with. Anubis didn’t know how to handle this at all. He needed to get some advice.

Anubis left the Necropolis and shifted to his full jackal form before he entered the mortal world. When he was thinking about things and trying to figure them out, he liked to wander the desert for a while until something came to him. That was always easier as a jackal. Easier and it drew a lot less attention. What was one more jackal walking around the pyramids? Anubis’ fur was just a lot darker than the average mortal animal. There were plenty of black-backed jackals, but Nubie was black all over. The down side being that it was harder to hide from Bast in a pack of jackals with his coloring.

( He kept thinking )

If there was one thing guaranteed to make Shiva forget about the boring-ass day and put a smile on his face, it was this.

( It's an ancient Chineese art and everybody knew their part: from a feint into a slip, and kicking from the hip! )

Makaria was thinking of something serious. Serious enough that she needed guidance. She could speak with her father or mother, or she could have consulted various Gods in the Greek Pantheon, but what she really thought she needed was the guidance of a certain Egyptian God that she hadn't seen in awhile. Anubis was always very nice to her. And he wasn't bad to look at. NO. Okay he was really easy to look at. NO. She really needed to take a cold shower or something. She wasn't a pubescent teenager. She was a grown Goddess and however distracting his looks might have been this was serious business. She was not calling upon him to look at.

( But it was a bonus that he was so easy to look at. )

After putting the back on her second earring, Isis stood back and surveyed her reflection with pleasure. The simple red cocktail dress suited her skin tone, and red had always been her color. She'd left her hair down for a more relaxed look, and the gold earrings were the only adornment she chose for the evening. It was an elegant yet less rigid look than normal. She wanted to look her best. This was an important night for her, though many might look on it as something quite ordinary, boring even. Yet there were too few nights like this, and they seemed to grow more and more infrequent through the years.

( Her family was coming to dinner. )