The Cursed Tomb

TheCursedTomb

**By Vijay Sharma Erry**

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The discovery was mind blowing by most standards. I mean who unearths an Egyptian mummy after so many centuries?

"Dr. Hima!"

I turn surprised by my assistant's shout. His wide, frightened eyes stare back at me. "What is it, Ron?"

He points at the corner of the mummy's coffin. "That's dried blood, Dr. I think there's someone else in there with that mummy."

My heart skips a beat. In my fifteen years of archaeological work, I've seen many strange things, but this... this was different. I move closer to examine the coffin, my hands trembling slightly as I brush away centuries of dust.

"Get the lights closer," I command, trying to keep my voice steady.

As the harsh LED lights illuminate the sarcophagus, I see what Ron was talking about. Streaks of dark, rust-colored stains run along the inner edge of the coffin. But it's not the ancient kind of blood one might expect from burial rituals. This looks different. Fresher somehow, despite the dust covering it.

"Dr. Hima," Ron whispers, his voice barely audible. "Look at the inscription."

I lean in to read the hieroglyphics carved into the golden surface. My blood runs cold as I translate: "Here lies Amenhotep, the Betrayed. Sealed with the one who wronged him. May they share eternity in darkness."

"A double burial?" Ron asks, his face pale.

"Not exactly," I reply, my mind racing. "This suggests someone was entombed alive... with the mummy."

The tomb we'd discovered was hidden deep beneath the Valley of the Kings, in a chamber that shouldn't exist according to all known maps. It took us three months of excavation to reach this point, and now we stood before something that defied explanation.

"Should we open it?" Ron asks.

I hesitate. Every instinct screams at me to be cautious, but curiosity—the curse and blessing of every archaeologist—wins out. "Yes. But carefully. Document everything."

As we begin the delicate process of opening the sarcophagus, I notice something else. Scratch marks. Deep gouges in the wood lining the inside of the lid, as if someone had desperately tried to claw their way out.

"Oh God," Ron mutters, stepping back.

The lid finally gives way with a sound like a sigh—or perhaps a scream frozen in time. Inside, wrapped in deteriorating linen, lies the mummy of Amenhotep. But Ron was right. There is someone else.

Curled at the foot of the sarcophagus, partially mummified by the dry conditions, is another body. This one wears no royal trappings, no jewelry. Just tattered remains of what might have been priestly robes. And clutched in the skeletal hands is a papyrus scroll, somehow preserved despite the centuries.

"Ron, the scroll," I say, my voice barely a whisper.

With gloved hands, I carefully extract the ancient document. The papyrus is brittle but intact. As I begin to unroll it, I notice the writing is different from typical hieroglyphics—it's hieratic script, the cursive form used for religious and administrative documents.

"Can you read it?" Ron asks, peering over my shoulder.

I nod slowly, translating as I go: "I am Khenti, high priest of Amenhotep. I write this as my final testament, though none may ever read it. I was sealed within this tomb for speaking truth to power. The Pharaoh died by poison, not by natural causes as proclaimed. I witnessed his brother, Ramose, administer the fatal dose. When I threatened to reveal this treachery, Ramose had me entombed here with my master, to ensure my silence for eternity."

Ron gasps. "A murder. We've uncovered evidence of a three-thousand-year-old murder."

But I'm still reading. "As I write, my torch burns low. The air grows thin. I hear scratching in the darkness—rats perhaps, or something worse. Amenhotep's spirit is restless. I feel his anger, his betrayal. He knows what happened. He knows I could not save him. And now... now I hear his voice in the darkness, promising that this tomb will curse any who disturb it. Not with ancient magic, but with truth. The truth of betrayal, of power, of—"

The text ends abruptly, the final words trailing off into illegible scratches.

"That's it?" Ron asks.

I examine the scroll more carefully and notice something odd. Between the lines of hieratic script, there are other marks—numbers, written in a different hand, much more recent.

"Ron, look at this." I point to the numbers. "These aren't ancient. These are... modern dates?"

We study the markings more closely. They appear to be calendar dates, all from the 1920s, along with initials: "H.C."

"Howard Carter?" Ron suggests. "He was excavating here around that time."

"But Carter's discoveries were all documented," I argue. "If he found this tomb, why didn't he report it?"

I flip the scroll over carefully and find more modern writing on the back, in English this time, written in fading pencil:

"April 15, 1923. I have found what I should not have found. This tomb proves that Ramose, who succeeded Amenhotep, was a murderer and usurper. But Lord Carnarvon is dead. The newspapers call it the 'mummy's curse.' They know nothing. The curse is not supernatural—it is political. The Egyptian authorities will not allow this discovery. It would rewrite history, delegitimize Ramose's entire dynasty. I must reseal this tomb. Some truths are too dangerous. May God forgive me. - H.C."

Ron and I stare at each other in stunned silence.

"Carter found this tomb," I breathe. "And he covered it up."

"But why would the authorities care about a three-thousand-year-old political scandal?" Ron asks.

"Because," I explain, thinking it through, "Ramose's dynasty lasted for generations. Many of Egypt's greatest pharaohs claimed descent from him. If the founder of that lineage was a murderer and usurper, it would shake the foundations of Egyptian royal history."

"So what do we do?" Ron asks. "Do we report this?"

I look at the mummy of Amenhotep, at the skeletal remains of the priest who died protecting the truth, at the scroll that has guarded its secret for millennia. Then I think of Howard Carter, one of history's greatest archaeologists, who chose silence over revelation.

"We document everything," I say finally. "Every detail. We publish our findings. The truth has been buried long enough."

"But what about the authorities? What if they try to stop us, like they stopped Carter?"

"Then let them try," I reply with more confidence than I feel. "We have something Carter didn't have—the internet. By tomorrow morning, this discovery will be all over the world. They can't bury the truth anymore."

As we begin the careful process of photographing and documenting everything, I notice Ron has gone quiet. He's staring at the scroll, at Khenti's final words about hearing Amenhotep's voice in the darkness.

"Dr. Hima," he says slowly, "do you believe in curses?"

I laugh, but it sounds hollow in the tomb's confines. "I believe in human nature, Ron. Greed, betrayal, the hunger for power—those are the real curses that haunt history."

But as we work through the night, I can't shake a feeling of unease. Somewhere in the darkness of the tomb, I swear I hear something—not a supernatural presence, but the weight of history itself, the accumulated silence of three thousand years demanding to be heard.

The truth, I realize, is both a burden and a liberation. Amenhotep and Khenti waited centuries for someone brave enough to tell their story. Howard Carter couldn't do it. But perhaps, in this age of information, neither kings nor curses can keep the truth buried forever.

As dawn breaks and we emerge from the tomb, I clutch the carefully preserved photographs and notes. Behind us, Amenhotep and Khenti rest together as they have for millennia, but no longer in silence.

Their truth is finally free.

**THE END**

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*Word Count: 1,200 words*  

*© Vijay Sharma Erry*