Hathor looked at me so long I felt as though her gaze was seeping into my very bones. It was not only the gaze of the goddess of love—it was the gaze of a witness, one who knows what a broken heart truly means.
"Amenemhet," she spoke softly, "we gods can help you only once. Only once can we strip away a love that consumes you. If you wish it, we shall do so. But remember—this is the only moment in which we can grant you such aid."
I lifted my head, torn between anger and grief. "Only once?"
She nodded. "Only once. And from this moment on… when you cross the boundary and return to the past, our hands will never touch you again. You will be there as though you no longer exist for us. We will not guide you, we will not warn you, we will not protect you. Everything you have received—all the gifts that were entrusted to you—you already carry. There will be no more. From then on, it will be only you, and your choices."
My mouth opened, but words failed me. What she said was clear: the last chance to rid myself of this burden, the last chance for peace. And the last moment when I could be certain the gods stood by me.
"If you wish it," Hathor continued, "you will forget this love. Your heart will be closed. You will never again feel what you feel for her now. You will walk the path laid before you without pain. Without the chains of desire."
My hands trembled. "But… if I refuse?"
"Then you will carry this love, burning, until the end. And if ever you should wish to cast it off, there will be no one left to hear your plea. We can help you only now. It is both a gift and a curse."
I clenched my fists. I felt Cleopatra—her laughter, her anger, her childish questions, her grown words. I felt her carve into my heart, and I knew this burden I could never bear.
"Then please…" my voice broke, "do it. Destroy my love. Let my heart feel no more. Let it never again suffer for what it cannot have."
Hathor reached out her hand and laid it upon my chest. Her touch was cold, but it was not death—it was emptiness. As though someone had torn a piece of me out and buried it deep beneath the sands, never again to see the sun.
When her hand fell away from my chest, I stood there like an empty vessel. Only moments ago, my heart had raced at the thought of Cleopatra. The memory of her voice, her eyes, had been both agony and sweetness. Now… nothing.
The memories remained—clear, sharp, vivid. I remembered holding her in my arms when she was a child. Teaching her to write her first signs. The day she threw me into the bath and laughed while the water streamed down my face. All of it was there, etched like carvings in stone.
But the feelings? They were gone. No desire, no pain, no joy. Only emptiness. As though I was looking at a fresco—beautiful, but cold, lifeless.
I raised my eyes, searching for the gods, but they were silent. I felt their power withdraw. And then I understood—this was the last time I would ever turn to them. From now on, I would be only a shadow in history. For them, I would cease to exist.
The weight of that realization struck me harder than the loss of love. For pain from love could be endured—I had carried it for years. But the knowledge that I now walked alone, with no one left to guide me or warn me… that was a loneliness I had never known.
I looked at my hands. They were the same hands that once built temples, healed the sick, taught the princess to write. But I was not the same. I was a man without a heart. And yet I knew this was the price I had chosen.
From now on, my steps would be my own. My decisions mine alone. And my future—though long, perhaps endlessly long—would be only the result of what I did. The gods had given me all they could. And then they closed the doors.
I was left here, ready to walk on. Without love. Without gods. With only myself
When the gods vanished and the temple sank back into silence, only the two of us remained. The silence was not empty—it hung heavy between us, as if the walls themselves held their breath, waiting for what I would say. I felt that if I stayed quiet now, there would never again be a chance.
"Cleopatra," I began, my voice trembling though I had thought that after all these trials nothing could break me. "There is something I should have told you long ago. And now, as I must leave, you have to know it."
Her eyes fixed on me—dark, deep, ready to absorb every word.
"I once loved you," I said, and the words felt heavier than the stones I had once laid in the temples.
She gasped. "You… what?"
I closed my eyes and let it all pour out. "At first, I loved you like a father. When you were a child and I carried you in my arms, when you laughed and the world was nothing but a game to you, I felt as if I had been given a second chance—a chance at a family that had been taken from me. Later, when you grew, I loved you as a teacher loves his pupil. I taught you to write your first signs, to play the flute, I told you stories that you listened to with wide eyes. It was pure, proud, beautiful."
I hesitated, but there was no going back now. "And finally, when you became a woman… I loved you as a man loves a woman. But I knew I could never say it. That it could never be."
She stood before me, frozen. Her hands pressed to her chest, as if she were trying to hold her racing heart in place.
"And you carried all of that… alone?" she asked, her voice hoarse. "For years?"
"Yes," I answered. "I could do no other. I was a eunuch, a slave. I had no right to such feelings. If I had told you, I would have destroyed everything we had between us. And I never wanted you to bear my burden."
Tears welled in her eyes, but they did not break her. "I'm so sorry… sorry that I didn't see what you meant to me. That I took you for granted. And even more sorry that you suffered in silence. I should have known. I should have seen you."
I reached out my hand toward her, then stopped midway. I no longer had the right to give her the touch that once had meant everything.
"It is not your fault," I said. "Fate led us both down different paths. But I needed you to know the truth. At least once."
She stepped closer and placed her palm on my cheek. Her touch was warm, filled with pain and longing. "And I…" she whispered, "I love you too. Perhaps I denied it for too long, perhaps I was afraid, but I feel it now. I feel it when I face losing you."
She leaned in and kissed me. Her lips trembled, carrying everything—confession, hope, despair. And I stood motionless, unable to return her kiss.
When she drew back and saw the emptiness in my eyes, it broke her. "You feel nothing…" she breathed.
"No," I nodded. "The gods took love from me. The memories remain, but the feelings are gone. I remember everything, but I feel nothing."
She trembled and clung to me tightly, as if she could hold me there. I let her, though inside I was hollow.
"I must go," I said at last. "Into the past, to the first Pharaoh-Queen. That is my path. I must stop the ruin that began. But you… you will stay here."
She gripped my shoulders, as if refusing to release me. "No, you cannot…"
I brushed her hair one last time and gave her a faint smile that carried no feeling. "For me it will be centuries, but one day we will meet again. I will wait. Only I will wait."
Her eyes brimmed with new tears. "And if I had told you sooner? If I had told you that I loved you… would it have changed anything?"
"No," I answered truthfully. "Fate was stronger than us both. But it would have made the pain easier to bear. That is all it would have changed."
It broke her even more. She stood before me, shaken, realizing that I had given her my whole heart even though I could never reveal it. And now it was too late.
I turned away. Because if I had looked any longer, perhaps I would have broken my own vow. And now I had to go.