Ancient Thebes, Egypt – 1400 BCE
The scent of sacred oils clung to the warm air inside the temple sandalwood, myrrh, and lotus blending into a thick haze that blurred the gold-lined pillars and hieroglyph-covered walls. Moonlight poured through the lattice windows, casting shifting silver patterns across the polished stone floor.
High Priestess Nafre-Aset, daughter of the divine order of Isis, stood at the altar in her ceremonial white linen. The translucent fabric hugged her hips and fell to her ankles in soft folds, leaving her shoulders bare beneath intricate gold jewelry. Her skin, the color of burnished honey, shimmered with scented oil. In her hands, she held the ceremonial dagger a symbol of judgment and offering.
She was alone, or so she believed.
From behind one of the heavy columns, a figure crouched in shadow.
Kessef had scaled the outer wall of the temple at midnight, using the vines and broken bricks near the northern gate. The guards were lazy, drunk, or bribed he didn't care which. He'd spent weeks planning this. Weeks watching her. The high priestess with eyes like fire and lips like sin. He hadn't meant to desire her. He was a thief, not a worshipper. But the moment he saw her perform the New Moon Ritual, cloaked in white, chanting prayers with outstretched arms, he burned.
Not just with want.
With need. Familiar. Primal.
Something inside him stirred when he saw her like he already knew the softness of her thighs, the shape of her mouth when she gasped.
He didn't come for gold tonight. He came for her.
He moved in silence, staying hidden until she knelt to place offerings at the foot of the altar. That's when he stepped forward, slow and quiet.
Nafre-Aset didn't hear him at first, but the air shifted.
She straightened.
And turned.
Their eyes locked.
He froze.
She didn't scream.
Not right away.
Instead, she looked at him with a strange, almost haunted expression as though she, too, remembered something her body knew before her mind did.
"You dare enter the House of the Goddess?" she said quietly, her voice low, melodious.
Kessef stepped forward, his dark eyes scanning her face, then her mouth, then the way her chest rose and fell with slow, measured breaths.
"I didn't come for your treasure," he said. "Only you."
A sharp breath escaped her. "You're mad."
"Maybe."
She reached for the dagger still on the altar, but he was faster. He caught her wrist.
The moment their skin touched, they both gasped.
A spark hot, electric, ancient shot through them like fire. Her knees nearly buckled. His hand trembled around hers. Something cracked open in the space between their hearts.
Visions. Fragments. A flash of stars, sand, blood, lips on skin. It all vanished in a second.
"What was that?" she whispered.
He didn't know how to answer. He didn't care. The connection felt older than time, deeper than sin. His other hand reached up, cupping her cheek. Her skin was impossibly soft. Warm. Familiar.
"You feel it too," he murmured.
"I don't even know you."
"But your body does," he said.
Her eyes fluttered closed as his thumb stroked the curve of her lower lip.
"This is madness," she said.
"And yet you're not stopping me."
She hadn't moved. Her breathing was shallow, and her cheeks flushed. Her free hand rose slowly, as if guided by invisible threads, and pressed against his chest.
His heartbeat thudded wildly under her palm.
"I should call the guards," she said, though her voice lacked conviction.
"You should," he agreed, leaning closer. "But if you do, you'll never know what this is. Why this feels like coming home."
His mouth hovered inches from hers.
The smell of her skin incense, heat, woman wrapped around him like a spell.
Her resistance melted.
Their lips met.
The kiss was slow, reverent. Like they'd kissed a thousand times before, in lives neither could remember. Their mouths fit too perfectly. Their bodies leaned into each other instinctively.
She moaned against his mouth, and he growled softly in response, pressing her against the altar.
The cool stone touched her back as his hands slid to her hips, fingertips trembling against her linen-covered curves. She parted her legs just slightly, her body betraying her vow of chastity, her sacred duty.
She didn't care.
He kissed down her neck, across her collarbone, and lower, his mouth worshipping her like she was the altar herself.
"Who are you?" she whispered, clutching his shoulders.
"I don't know anymore," he murmured. "But I've dreamed of this. Of you. A thousand lifetimes."
His hand slid up her thigh, bunching the linen. She gasped again, her head falling back.
Then footsteps.
They both froze.
From the outer hallway came the heavy rhythm of sandals on stone.
She pushed him back with shaking hands. "Go."
He hesitated, lips swollen, eyes wild.
"Please." Her voice cracked. "If they find you, they'll kill you."
He nodded, stepping back into the shadows, disappearing the same way he came.
She collapsed to her knees.
Her body burned.
But her soul? Her soul screamed with something else.
Recognition. Longing. Loss.
Outside, under the moonlit sky, Kessef scaled the wall again and vanished into the night.
But both knew this wasn't over.
Whatever that touch was, it had changed them.
They would crave each other again.
In this life and the next.