Necropolis. James Axler

swagger sticks had left wounds on shoulders and backs, changing the familiar terrain so that even Lyta couldn’t tell who he was.

      And the yokes prevented speech easily even without the menace of the whip.

      Lyta was alone. Everyone was alone in this line. There was no more sense of community. The chains and collars took away every chance of intimacy and communication.

      And again, we return to the theme of communication. The guards discourage it, prevent it, grind it into the ground. They don’t need it, and they want no one else to have it.

      “The gods want us to remember that we humans are alone.” The man’s whispers returned.

      It sounded as if he were reading from an ancient book, occasionally stopping to paraphrase to his listener for clarity. Lyta strained to get a look at him. His voice was old, raspy, weathered.

      But no, she couldn’t without turning her head.

      Lyta ground her molars against her tongue and twisted her head just an inch. Just an inch, and she felt the collar cut into her neck like a hot knife, shredding the skin of her throat and upper chest as she forced herself to get a good look at the man she assumed was speaking.

      It was a young boy, no older than fourteen. Too old to be taken to the rape camps for education as a child soldier, too young to have the experience and skills necessary to be put into forced labor.

      And he was asleep. Beyond him, there was a woman, and another woman beyond that.

      There was no one who matched the voice that had tickled her ear, threading legends from ancient times. Lyta straightened her gaze up to the sky.

      The agony of just that slight movement, holding her head to see who was talking, had all been in vain. And it stole the last dregs of strength she had for the day.

      She closed her eyes, wishing that her sleep would be eternal.

      Now is not the time for any to sleep. Death will die, and the Queen awakens, stirring from her millennial slumber.

      Lyta opened her eyes again.

      And as she did, she looked up into a pair of catlike eyes, slitted in the middle, amber wreathing the narrow flames, and a flat face framed by a cobra-hood of muscle flexing in sheets from top of head to shoulders.

      Before Lyta could open her mouth to scream, scaled fingers covered her lips, and a hiss issued from his.

      Chapter 2

      As always when the Cerberus warriors said goodbye to those whom they’d assisted, the parting moments were filled with a quiet sadness and embraces that seemed to last a moment too long. Of course, Brigid Baptiste might have had a biased view of those hugs, especially since she realized that she was an attractive and desirable woman. She’d noticed that among the other women they’d traveled with, too: Domi and Sinclair were offered extended and enthusiastic embraces by the Zambian soldiers. Meanwhile, Kane and Grant kept their farewells to hearty handshakes.

      “Ah, dear Brigid, your presence here in our little outpost has been an experience,” Lomon said. “I wish it were all delightful...”

      “I understand,” Brigid responded. “You and your men have been excellent hosts. We’ll miss you.”

      Lomon nodded. His eyes glazed for a moment as he thought of the past couple of days and the losses incurred. They had come under the assault of a pair of groups; each had taken turns at controlling the strange clone hybrids called the Kongamato. The Kongamato, named after an African cryptid, were brutish, powerful winged creatures that were equal parts bat and gorilla. They had killed a great number of Zambian troops, first the outpost defenders at the power station attached to the redoubt, and then a company of soldiers who had been on their way to relieve the besieged trio of survivors.

      “Don’t worry,” Brigid spoke up, breaking the elder Zambian soldier from his recollection of the horrors he’d endured. “We’ll find the ones responsible.”

      Lomon rested a hand on her shoulder. “I wish I could send an army with you, girl.”

      Brigid smiled, looking toward her companions, former Cobaltville Magistrates Kane and Grant. “We’ve taken care of armies before. I doubt that Durga has that much of a force left. The Millennium Consortium members were wiped out, and Gamal and the Panthers of Mashona turned out to be using him as a distraction.”

      Brigid wanted to feel regret over the deaths of the members of the Millennium Consortium betrayed and murdered by Makoba, but there had been more than sufficient bad blood between the millennialists and Cerberus over the past couple of years that all she could manage was disappointment at the consortium’s vetting process for new members. Even then, she wasn’t too surprised at the millennialists picking the wrong person for the job. Austin Fargo and Erica van Sloan both boasted affiliations with the assembly of technocrats who sought to create their own new world order.

      This time, the Millennium Consortium had thrown in their lot with Durga, the fallen prince of the Nagah, as both parties searched Africa for Annunaki wonders and ancient technology. In the process, the combined force had stumbled on a subterranean facility attached to the Victoria Falls redoubt that had a breed of mutants inside it to serve as their new shock troops.

      Durga had maintained control of the monstrosities, but only for a brief period of time, until an African named Makoba had betrayed both the Nagah prince and the Millennium Consortium by stealing the control “crown.” Makoba was the brother of a local warlord, Gamal, who himself had already discovered the technology to control the Kongamato and had usurped control of them. With a major contingent of Panthers of Mashona soldiers and the means of growing an entire army of winged horrors, Gamal had been poised to conquer the continent of Africa.

      Unfortunately for the deadly warlord, Gamal had run straight into the heroes of Cerberus redoubt. Grant and Brigid had disarmed Gamal of his control system, and Kane had set off a self-destruct after the Kongamato horde was summoned back to their birthplace. The self-destruct brought down the cloning facility and the winged monsters with a blast nearly as powerful as a nuclear weapon.

      The threat of an army of cloned winged horrors was ended, as well as the more conventional threat of Gamal’s forces, thanks to planning, positioning and surprise on the part of the Cerberus operatives. With grenades and precision rifle fire, they’d scattered the bandit army, then watched as an ally wrested control of the creatures to send them to their doom in the self-destruction of the cloning facility.

      That ally walked outside the group, standing at the edge of the Victoria Falls hydroelectric power station. Thurpa was freshly healed from major injuries inflicted by the ancient artifact that had brought Kane running to Africa. Thurpa himself was an artifact, a member of the Indian Nagah, a race created by the benign Annunaki Enki to watch over the subcontinent of India.

      He’d come, one of the fallen prince Durga’s last followers, as an emissary for the crippled regent. Thurpa had been a true believer, having a low opinion of the Westerners who made up the bulk of the consortium gunmen who’d joined in this African trek.

      And then the millennialist Makoba usurped Durga’s control of the Kongamato, and Thurpa was wounded, on the run, about to be killed by his prince’s perfect living weapon. What had saved him was the intervention of Kane and his allies.

      Thurpa had gone from contempt for mammals—as he called normal humans despite his half-mammalian DNA—to a new appreciation for people. Kane and the others had protected him, had trusted him more than they trusted one of their own human companions, had nursed him back to health. Then when it came time to engage in final combat with the Kongamato, Thurpa had only barely survived Makoba’s betrayal of the millennialists to Gamal. Had it not been for the warlord summoning all the winged horrors to aid him against Grant and Brigid and the other Cerberus Away Team, Makoba would have killed the last of the Zambians.

      With only a rifle, Makoba had taken one of the injured men hostage, only to be ambushed by Thurpa and beaten to death with a length of steel rebar. It was then that Thurpa and Lomon had combined their