Our Creation Myth

On the dreadful morning after his dearest friend's disappearance, Hisan went out into the desert and found the sphinx in exile.

“Where is Somnambula?”

He was in the kinghood of his power, wings flared in pharaoh’s might. The monster who slunk into his nightmares to drag him back to her keep would not defeat him.

Instead, she wasted here, scraping her claws along the cave floor. The once brilliant gold of her diadem and wesekh were dulled by a powdery layer of sand. Lifting her head, she turned her eerie equine face toward him.

And from her cavernous chest, she asked, “Why do you believe she is here?”

Hisan’s heart beat against his ribs like a whirring scarab. “Because you took me.”

“That was a decade ago.”

Hisan’s wings fell, feathertips brushing the dust-laden floor. “She isn't here.”

“She’s not. But in a way, I did take her.” The sphinx's lips rolled back, revealing her wet teeth. She recited:

“For to claim my power makes you a prisoner.
Through me you are known, yet never understood.
To refuse me is to die in peace.
To earn me is to live forever.”

Loathed to hear her riddle, Hisan fled the cave.