Ebony of Nubilia and the Throne of Solomon

Ebony was convalescing.

The Shoggoth always insisted that his High Priestess have a period of recovery after being brought back to life. Ebony was not sure if there was any reason for this since it was her first time through the process and she felt fine, but it did mean that she was stuck for a week or two with nothing to do.

Of course, Sherri was full of ideas, but since they involved working at her "Exotic Dance Club" Ebony felt rather honour-bound to decline them.

Thus it was that she was spending rather more time in Soho than normal, drinking Latte as if it was going out of fashion. Just as she felt that she was plumbing the depths of boredom, The Reverend Harlesdon came to her with a proposition.

And not the sort that one would normally expect in Soho.

"A trip to Egypt?"

"Yes.", replied the minister. "one of my old University colleagues is doing some... research out there, and thinks he has found something that I would be interested in."

This elicited a curious glance from Ebony.

"You see, he is, or was, something of an occult scholar. Always mumbling on about the Seal of This, the Scepter of That and the Codex of the Other. Lore about artifacts coming out of his ears, and - sad to say - out of his lips."

The Reverend Harlesden stirred his tea thoughtfully. "What he was blathering on about was that he thinks that he has found the Throne of Solomon."

"And this is important in which way?", queried Ebony.

"Well, Solomon was famed for his wisdom and power. His name crops up in all sorts of places in occult lore - there is a Seal of Solomon, for example, and a Key, Amulet and Crown. All supposed artifacts of great power. The throne is supposed to be the Seat of his Wisdom and Power. All rubbish, if you ask me, but it kept old Shambles happy."

Ebony, whose generally kept herself to Elder Creatures, held her piece.

"And at my age, of course, it is probably better to take a couple of young people with me."

There was a thump behind her, caused by PJs dropping a rucksack.

"Sherri is a little busy with her job, so naturally we thought of you."

Traveling by mundane means was a new experience for Ebony. Although she had been driven in Sir Mumphery's Rolls Royce (at least, one of them), and had thrilled to the delights of crossing the Solent in a Passenger Ferry, Intercontinental transport was something new.

Having - technically speaking - never crossed a border in her life, she had never possessed, or even seen the need for a passport or visa.

And was now approaching Passport Control in Egypt, carefully positioned behind her traveling companions.

The Passport Clerk was - as is often the case - bored with life. This is a frequent problem with a job that is essentially repetative in nature.

Tourist. Tourist. Tourist. Commercial Traveler. Tourist. Tourist. Tourist with invalid visa (idiot). Tourist. Tourist. Tourist wearing silly pajama things (likewise idiot). Idiot (sorry - Tourist) in western clerical dress. Some stupid (but admittedly attractive, if slightly nubidian in character) female trying to sneak past unseen. There is always one...

"Excuse, please.", the clerk said, rather loudly. "Visa?".

"Ah,", said Ebony, somewhat abashed. "I don't think I have one. I don't have Access or MasterCard, either.". This was quite true. Ebony had found that gold doubloons were welcome everywhere, and said more about you than Plastic ever could.

"Must have Visa, Miss. Have Passport?" The clerk was starting to warm to his work. There was nothing like catching a real live one to brighten up the day.

"Well. I have never needed one of the things before. What is a passport, exactly?"

The clerk was almost in heaven (figuratively speaking). He was on the verge of summoning security when Ebony leaned across the counter, a dazzling smile on her face.

Now, thought the clerk, she attempts to be seductive. Truly, the amusement factor of the day was almost at its highest. Next, she would whisper hints of the possibility of carnal delights. Not that it would work, of course.

Ebony spoke. Quietly and briefly. She then walked off to rejoin her companions.

Much to the annoyance of the queue, the clerk closed his station. And as soon as he could manage, he was going to go off somewhere quiet and empty. Preferably where there was a clean pair of trousers.

"Problems?" asked PJs.

"No." replied Ebony. "I generally find that a smile and quiet word solves most bureaucratic issues."

There followed a quick - literally (an Egyptian taxi driver doesn't muck about) - trip to the place where Shambles, AKA Dr Phillip Hunter-Davis (PhD, oxen) had set up his camp.

It would have been too much to hope that he was there, of course. There were signs of a struggle, and there were odd antiquities scattered hither and yon. Notebooks had been pulled off shelves and scattered wide.

Everything was covered with dust. What had happened, had happened some time ago.

They searched through the wreckage for clues.

PJs managed to find a fine throwing knives with an ivory hilt. Well balanced, but - as Ebony remarked - not a great deal of help for locating missing scholars unless it had first been seriously magnetised.

Ebony, with a certain amount of professional pride, found the secret compartment in the trunk that contained the scholar's most important papers.

However, James Harlsden was the one who managed to open it, using a priceless antique ceremonial ankh as a key. Or something like that.

It took several hours to read through and understand the papers. Most great minds encrypt thief most important writings. Some devise methods of encoding that are still unbroken today.

Dr Phillip Hunter-Davis, Shambles to his older friends, resorted to the method used by most Doctors through the ages, medical or otherwise.

As James Harlsden commented, "He was never one for good calligraphy."

Ebony, whose first (and indeed, last) steps on the road towards literacy had been learning Great Old One, was rather inclined to agree. She still managed the lions share of the reading.

After removing the overenthusiastic gibberish, mystical references, caballic overtones and the occasional daemonic poems, the gist of it was this:

The Throne of Solomon did indeed exist. After his death, when much of his lore was lost to the world, his most devoted followers stole his throne - the seat of wisdom and power - and took it where nobody would be able to abuse its power.

The Throne then passed into history, only a small cabal knowing that it had been secreted in a chamber under the Great Pyramid of Cheops (or Khufu, or however the translators wish to spell it this year).

And, discussed at great length in the notes, the Throne conferred on the bearer (or rather, person sitting upon it) wisdom and the power to rule. This was rather succinctly summed up in the phrase: "Whosoever stitteth on the Throne, Rules.".

"Cheops.", muttered James. "Why is it always Cheops."

"Could be worse.", noted Ebony. "I was involved in a rather unpleasant happening in the Sphinx during my training."

"Oh? What did you learn there?", queried PJs.

"Mummies are very flammable. I didn't say it was unpleasant for me."

The general consensus was that a visit to the pyramids was in order. A guide was unnecessary since Ebony knew the area. Admittedly, this was from a thousand years ago when the Shoggoth was having one of its very rare bursts of interest in things other than Anime, but she felt that nothing much was likely to have changed.

Camels were, however, a necessity. They were quite intractable until the travelers had managed to move them out of sight of the Camel Dealer. A few words from Ebony and they were off. Very quickly.

Ebony, who had never quite managed to detune her instincts the way most city dwellers did, was the first to notice that they were being followed. PJs was the second, judging by the speed he had his knife out when the first group of assassins struck.

The Journey to and across the Valley of the Kings took several days. Supplies were not a problem (Ebony was not above using her cave in Antarctica as a store-room, although she kept mum about the onsen), but they had continual problems with the general hazards of the desert: snakes, scorpions and crazed assassins. After the third wave of the latter Ebony started keeping specimens for questioning, and determined that there were at least four cults that had got wind of the discovery, and were tailing them to [a] find out what they knew, and [b] remove them from the competition.

Eventually, they arrived near the Sphinx. A little scouting showed that there was a group of people encamped well clear of the tourist areas, who also appeared to be excavating a tunnel.

They observed the site for a few days. On the third day, judging by the excitable behavior in the camp, followed by the attacks by the four other cults. The fighting spread down the tunnel and, presumably, into the chamber.

The company ran over to the camp. A quick search of the camp turned up a rather dusty and tied up Shambles ("That's how he got his nickname.", James noted, referring to former rather than the latter). They then got into an argument with him about what they were to do next. Shambles wanted to follow the cultists to try and stop them abusing the Throne. PJs and James wanted to (in PJs' words) "Get the Hell out of here".

In the end, Ebony managed to persuade the group that the best course of action was to go down the tunnel, if only on the grounds that the Shoggoth could collapse the tunnel and (if necessary) the chamber.

They followed the tunnel down to the chamber. It was truly a grand chamber, with ornate carvings on the walls and ceilings, and rugged flagstones on the floor. True, it was somewhat heavy with the dust of ages. It was also marred with the occasional dead body as the various groups of cultists fought for possession of the throne.

The Throne of contention was at the far end of the chamber, on a raised dais. It was partly in shadow, since most of the lights were nearer the entrance, but the gilded wood, inlaid with gems, looked majestic, none the less.

The quartet watched the melee, PJs and Ebony taking care to restrain Shambles from joining the fight. As they watched, one of the cultists clearly had a flash of inspiration. He broke out of the melee sprinted towards the throne, and triumphantly sat down on it.

He yelled out something, which Shambles helpfully translated as "Ha! The Throne is mine! Lay down your arms and bow down, you dogs!".

The various cultists, with rather glazed and shocked expressions, slowly stopped fighting and laid down their arms. Some of them started to bow down.

Ebony nodded to PJs, who drew his knife, and took careful aim.

"Drop Weapon, Bow Down.", yelled the cultist in rather fractured English.

PJs ignored this, throwing his knife in a graceful arc across the chamber. It impacted the cultist in the chest, fatally pinning him to the back of the throne.

Ebony and PJs grabbed Shambles by the arms - one each - and dragged him from the chamber. As they ran through the tunnel, part of the Shoggoth dropped off the amulet and delayed any pursuit by dropping the ceiling of the tunnel behind them.

After they made their escape, they faced the rather hopeless task of explaining the plot to Shambles.

"So, you see, all the wisdom and power belonged to Solomon. There was nothing special about the throne.", Ebony explained, with mounting irritation.

"But it was written: 'Whosoever stitteth on the Throne, Rules.'"

"That's because he was the damn king. Sorry, Reverend.", which was PJ's contribution to the argument.

"Shambles, the only mystic function Solomon's throne ever performed was that it kept his arse off the ground."

The Reverend James Harlsden was likewise ignored.

Eventually, they gave up trying to convince him. After all, they all had better things to do.

Footnotes, footnotes everywhere, and not a drop to drink (except for the other bottle of Mead):

The Original "Throne of Solomon" story was a Role-Playing scenario engendered by The Hooded Hood. I wasn't there for that one, so this is something of a vicarious experience. The original was probably better.

"Access" is a UK brand of credit card, now extinct. Whilst we are on the subject, the tagline of Barclaycard (a more pretentious credit card) was "says more about you than cash ever can".