Clayton Emery - Star of Cursrah

Papyrus crackled on an easel as it unrolled. Queer, thought Star. Whatever they planned, the operation was so new the highest-trained vizar had to follow written instructions.

"Knife," came a hiss.

A hooked blade flashed before Star's eyes, and her heart thumped. A female acolyte cut into her grimy traveling clothes. As cold metal kissed Star's skin, to the floor went her stained tunic, her sweaty trousers, her linen breeks, even her sandals. Nude, dusky, and miserable, Star shivered under the reptilian gaze of the priests.

"Fleam," the grand vizar said, calling for the bloodletting knife. "Catch the flow in that silver basin. This will weaken her resistance."

Star heard metal stropped on leather. A steel tooth bit the inside of her limp forearm. The grand vizar muttered a spell, invoking some vampiric touch, as Star felt heat trickle down her forearm. Loss of blood, or plain fright, made her dizzy.

"Razors."

From a narrow bottle, an acolyte poured ice-cold olive oil onto Star's armpits, crotch, and legs, then saturated her black hair of dusty cornrows. Priests encircled the table holding obsidian razors mounted on gold handles. Shifting her arms, the priests scraped her armpits clean of fine dark hair. Spreading her legs, they did the same, then scraped her legs and even her forearms.

"Bucket."

Yanking taut, the grand vizar's scalpel snipped off Star's beautiful beaded cornrows and dropped them tinkling in a pail. Soon a flint razor scraped her scalp, grating loudly in Star's ears. Even her eyebrows were scraped away, and her eyelashes trimmed short. Tears leaked from her unwinking eyes as, within minutes, she was as naked and hairless as any vizar.

"Roll her over. Bring that pail."

More indignities. Star was washed head to toe, even between her toes, with icy saltwater then dried with rough linen towels. A felt swatch was pressed onto her tongue, and she couldn't gag it out. The princess trembled. What were they doing?

"Spoon. The tiniest one."

The vizar ladled crimson drops into Star's unmoving eyes. The solution burned and itched, making her eyes tear. Worse, her vision grew blurry. Blinded! she wailed inwardly, but gradually her eyes focussed again, though the room was tinged red.

"Get the Ghast Salve. That copper dish there," the new grand vizar instructed her juniors as if dissecting a frog.

"Normally, this step takes ninety days, with the first forty soaking in the tub. Here, we approximate the process. You, recite Abi-Dalzim's wilting as we work. Slowly! Necromancy takes time."

A dish of salt-stinking paste was plunked on the table.

Spidery hands dug out handfuls, and to a monotonous sing-song dirge, slathered it on Star's body, rolled her, and applied more. The grand vizar daubed cold gunk onto Star's face, eyelids, lips, ears, nose, and her shaven pate, rubbing hard in circles to soak the gunk deep. Rubbed into her nostrils, Star identified natron, a sea mud used to dry out mummies. Fresh terror gripped her.

All the gods of Toril, I pray, have mercy! I'm not dead yet!

A junior wheedled, "Shall I invoke bone blight, Master?"

"No. We decided her bones must remain strong. Unfold the shroud."

Shroud! Amenstar almost jerked upright. Clothes donned by the dead!

With many hands lifting her, Star's legs and torso were cocooned in gauze that stuck to the salve coating her skin. The grand vizar fussed to smooth creases.

"As the cloth shrinks, it may abrade the skin. Bring the wrappings, small patches first."

Linen patches were neatly packed between Star's toes and fingers. More were stuffed into her ears so sounds grew muffled.

"Now we wrap. Neatly, always, the legs first. While we wrap, each invoke the living embalm enchantment we rehearsed."

Embalming! Preserving the dead! Star wanted to scream. How could anyone be embalmed who still lived?

Hands lifted one of Star's flaccid legs, which was wrapped in yards of linen bandages, as her calf had been after the lion wound-but this bandage was so tight! Her limbs would turn gangrenous for lack of blood!

"Stand back. Ready your brushes." An iron pot was lifted off a brazier and set on the table, smoking evily. All the vizars dipped horsehair brushes. Star's bandage was saturated with a hot glue that smelled like a cedar grove in summer. It was resin, resin that would harden like a beetle's carapace.

Amenstar's heart quaked. Was she to be buried alive?

It couldn't be, she thought. Not even the unspeakably cruel vizars could do that. Entombed in a coffin or sepulchre, Star would suffer for days, slowing dying of thirst. Why administer such a horrific fate? For what purpose? Just to punish her? Could even her cold-blooded parents wish a lingering death on their own daughter?

"Another basket."

Star glimpsed a long, ragged strip of linen, which was tugged tight around her torso and painted with resin. So it was true. She was swaddled like a mummy, to be entombed alive. Amenstar prayed desperately to any god who'd listen, but especially to Selune, gentlest and most motherly of goddesses. She knew the moon's light never penetrated to these depths, but the princess prayed anyway while priests entwined her arms. Daubing on resin, they repeated the process several times, wrapping and painting, until Star's arms and legs were rotund.

"Herbs."

A sweet-spicy basket was brought. In it were crushed petals and stems of fennel, hyssop, bee balm, sour chamomile, woodsy sage, and other plants. Onto the resin was now sprinkled this herbaceous mix, so for a second Star thought of a garden in sunshine, and realized once more that she'd never see sunshine or flowers again.

Hours passed as sweating acolytes tugged, smoothed, and daubed hundreds of yards of linen. Eventually Star's hands were pinned by her sides and her legs tucked together, then bound tightly and smeared with brown pitch.

"Cartonnage, then the gilded linen."

Cartonnage was gloppy wet papyrus pulp laid on Star's wrappings with a trowel. Over that went fresh wrapping soaked in gilt paint for a luminous yellow sheen.

"Carefully now. Off the right side. You fetch the mask."

Seven acolytes were needed to slide Star's multilayered body off the table. She was propped against a cedar framework tilted at an angle. For the first time in hours, she felt a tingling in her muscles. The petrifying potion must be wearing off. She could blink slowly, though her eyelids were weighed down by salty salve. Testing, she could almost waggle her jaw and wrinkle her nose. This tiny movement, a small act of resistance, lifted her spirits a fraction. Still, she felt as heavy as a turtle, as hot as a hard-run horse, and as dense as a rhino. Crushing terror and stress made her weak, but she felt in control, a little. Only by dying could Star escape these ghouls, and she prayed it would come quickly.

An acolyte entered the room bearing a gilded mask. As it was set on the table, Star felt new trepidation. Fashioned of layered cartonnage, the mask bore her face, down to her pouting red lips, insolent dark eyes, and beaded cornrows, or rather, what her face had resembled in life, before the vizars- shaved and smeared her. The princess swallowed a sob. She'd been beautiful and free only hours ago.

"Behold our Protector! The painted eyes let one see out… do you see?"

After hours of quiet mumbling, the grand vizar's loud jibe jarred Star, even with ears muffled.

"But a few steps remain, the most important now. Fetch them, my willing hands!"

Acolytes shuffled from the lab. For the moment, Star was alone with the newly crowned grand vizar. The sexless woman had so far bustled, busy and businesslike, but now her cruel nature erupted like bile.

"Moonstruck ghouls, are we?" she sneered. "Ice-hearted bloodsuckers? Twisted tarantulas? You'll regret those words, samira. You'll learn who truly wields the power in Cursrah-us, her most potent artisans, masters of life and death!"