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I stared at her. “You’re kidding, right?”
“We would not kid about such a thing. ”
The scene shifted again. I saw a man standing over a table of battle figurines: wooden toy ships, soldiers, and chariots. The man was dressed like a pharaoh, but his face looked oddly familiar. He looked up and seemed to smile right at me. With a chill, I realized he had the same face as the ba, the bird-faced spirit who’d challenged me on the bridge.
“Who is that?” I asked.
“Nectanebo II,” Zia said. “The last native Egyptian king, and the last sorcerer pharaoh. He could move entire armies, create or destroy navies by moving pieces on his board, but in the end, it was not enough. ”
We stepped over another line and the images shimmered blue. “These are the Ptolemaic times,” Zia said. “Alexander the Great conquered the known world, including Egypt. He set up his general Ptolemy as the new pharaoh, and founded a line of Greek kings to rule over Egypt. ”
The Ptolemaic section of the hall was shorter, and seemed sad compared to all the others. The temples were smaller. The kings and queens looked desperate, or lazy, or simply apathetic. There were no great battles. . . except toward the end. I saw Romans march into the city of Alexandria. I saw a woman with dark hair and a white dress drop a snake into her blouse.
“Cleopatra,” Zia said, “the seventh queen of that name. She tried to stand against the might of Rome, and she lost. When she took her life, the last line of pharaohs ended. Egypt, the great nation, faded. Our language was forgotten. The ancient rites were suppressed. The House of Life survived, but we were forced into hiding. ”
We passed into an area of red light, and history began to look familiar. I saw Arab armies riding into Egypt, then the Turks. Napoleon marched his army under the shadow of the pyramids. The British came and built the Suez Canal. Slowly Cairo grew into a modern city. And the old ruins faded farther and farther under the sands of the desert.
“Each year,” Zia said, “the Hall of Ages grows longer to encompass our history. Up until the present. ”
I was so dazed I didn’t even realize we’d reached the end of the hall until Sadie grabbed my arm.
In front of us stood a dais and on it an empty throne, a gilded wooden chair with a flail and a shepherd’s crook carved in the back—the ancient symbols of the pharaoh.
On the step below the throne sat the oldest man I’d ever seen. His skin was like lunch-bag paper—brown, thin, and crinkled. White linen robes hung loosely off his small frame. A leopard skin was draped around his shoulders, and his hand shakily held a big wooden staff, which I was sure he was going to drop any minute. But weirdest of all, the glowing hieroglyphs in the air seemed to be coming from him. Multicolored symbols popped up all around him and floated away as if he were some sort of magic bubble machine.
At first I wasn’t sure he was even alive. His milky eyes stared into space. Then he focused on me, and electricity coursed through my body.
He wasn’t just looking at me. He was scanning me—reading my entire being.
Hide, something inside me said.
I didn’t know where the voice came from, but my stomach clenched. My whole body tensed as if I were bracing for a hit, and the electrical feeling subsided.
The old man raised an eyebrow as if I’d surprised him. He glanced behind him and said something in a language I didn’t recognize.
A second man stepped out of the shadows. I wanted to yelp. He was the guy who’d been with Zia in the British Museum—the one with the cream-colored robes and the forked beard.
The bearded man glared at Sadie and me.
“I am Desjardins,” he said with a French accent. “My master, Chief Lector Iskandar, welcomes you to the House of Life. ”
I couldn’t think what to say to that, so of course I asked a stupid question. “He’s really old. Why isn’t he sitting on the throne?”
Desjardins’ nostrils flared, but the old dude, Iskandar, just chuckled, and said something else in that other language.
Desjardins translated stiffly: “The master says thank you for noticing; he is in fact really old. But the throne is for the pharaoh. It has been vacant since the fall of Egypt to Rome. It is. . . comment dit-on? Symbolic. The Chief Lector’s role is to serve and protect the pharaoh. Therefore he sits at the foot of the throne. ”
I looked at Iskandar a little nervously. I wondered how many years he’d been sitting on that step. “If you. . . if he can understand English. . . what language is he speaking?”
Desjardins sniffed. “The Chief Lector understands many things. But he prefers to speak Alexandrian Greek, his birth tongue. ”
Sadie cleared her throat. “Sorry, his birth tongue? Wasn’t Alexander the Great way back in the blue section, thousands of years ago? You make it sound like Lord Salamander is—”
“Lord Iskandar,” Desjardins hissed. “Show respect!”
Something clicked in my mind: back in Brooklyn, Amos had talked about the magicians’ law against summoning gods—a law made in Roman times by the Chief Lector. . . Iskandar. Surely it had to be a different guy. Maybe we were talking to Iskandar the XXVII or something.
The old man looked me in the eyes. He smiled, as if he knew exactly what I was thinking. He said something else in Greek, and Desjardins translated.
“The master says not to worry. You will not be held responsible for the past crimes of your family. At least, not until we have investigated you further. ”
“Gee. . . thanks,” I said.
“Do not mock our generosity, boy,” Desjardins warned. “Your father broke our most important law twice: once at Cleopatra’s Needle, when he tried to summon the gods and your mother died assisting him. Then again at the British Museum, when your father was foolish enough to use the Rosetta Stone itself. Now your uncle too is missing—”
“You know what’s happened to Amos?” Sadie blurted out.
Desjardins scowled. “Not yet,” he admitted.
“You have to find him!” Sadie cried. “Don’t you have some sort of GPS magic or—”
“We are searching,” Desjardins said. “But you cannot worry about Amos. You must stay here. You must be. . . trained. ”
I got the impression he was going to say a different word, something not as nice as trained.
Iskandar spoke directly to me. His tone sounded kindly.
“The master warns that the Demon Days begin tomorrow at sunset,” Desjardins translated. “You must be kept safe. ”
“But we have to find our dad!” I said. “Dangerous gods are on the loose out there. We saw Serqet. And Set!”
At these names, Iskandar’s expression tightened. He turned and gave Desjardins what sounded like an order. Desjardins protested. Iskandar repeated his statement.
Desjardins clearly didn’t like it, but he bowed to his master. Then he turned toward me. “The Chief Lector wishes to hear your story. ”
So I told him, with Sadie jumping in whenever I stopped to take a breath. The funny thing was, we both left out certain things without planning to. We didn’t mention Sadie’s magic abilities, or the encounter with the ba who’d called me a king. It was like I literally couldn’t mention those things. Whenever I tried, the voice inside my head whispered, Not that part. Be silent.
When I was done, I glanced at Zia. She said nothing, but she was studying me with a troubled expression.
Iskandar traced a circle on the step with the butt of his staff. More hieroglyphs popped into the air and floated away.
After several seconds, Desjardins seemed to grow impatient. He stepped forward and glared at us. “You are lying. That could not have been Set. He would need a powerful host to remain in this world. Very powerful. ”
“Look, you,” Sadie said. “I don’t know what all this rubbish is about hosts, but I saw Set with my own eyes. You were there at the British Museum—you must have done, too. And if Carter saw him in Phoenix, Arizona, then. . . ” She looked at me doubtfully. “Then he’s probably not crazy. ”
“Thanks, Sis,” I mumbled, but Sadie was just getting started.
“And as for Serqet, she’s real too! Our friend, my cat, Bast, died protecting us!”
“So,” Desjardins said coldly, “you admit to consorting with gods. That makes our investigation much easier. Bast is not your friend. The gods caused the downfall of Egypt. It is forbidden to call on their powers. Magicians are sworn to keep the gods from interfering in the mortal world. We must use all our power to fight them. ”
“Bast said you were paranoid,” Sadie added.
The magician clenched his fists, and the air tingled with the weird smell of ozone, like during a thunderstorm. The hairs on my neck stood straight up. Before anything bad could happen, Zia stepped in front of us.
“Lord Desjardins,” she pleaded, “there was something strange. When I ensnared the scorpion goddess, she re-formed almost instantly. I could not return her to the Duat, even with the Seven Ribbons. I could only break her hold on the host for a moment. Perhaps the rumors of other escapes—”
“What other escapes?” I asked.
She glanced at me reluctantly. “Other gods, many of them, released since last night from artifacts all over the world. Like a chain reaction—”
“Zia!” Desjardins snapped. “That information is not for sharing. ”
“Look,” I said, “lord, sir, whatever—Bast warned us this would happen. She said Set would release more gods. ”
“Master,” Zia pleaded, “if Ma’at is weakening, if Set is increasing chaos, perhaps that is why I could not banish Serqet. ”
“Ridiculous,” Desjardins said. “You are skilled, Zia, but perhaps you were not skilled enough for this encounter. And as for these two, the contamination must be contained. ”
Zia’s face reddened. She turned her attention to Iskandar. “Master, please. Give me a chance with them. ”
“You forget your place,” Desjardins snapped. “These two are guilty and must be destroyed. ”
My throat started closing up. I looked at Sadie. If we had to make a run for it down that long hall, I didn’t like our chances. . . .
The old man finally looked up. He smiled at Zia with true affection. For a second I wondered if she were his great-great-great-granddaughter or something. He spoke in Greek, and Zia bowed deeply.
Desjardins looked ready to explode. He swept his robes away from his feet and marched behind the throne.
“The Chief Lector will allow Zia to test you,” he growled. “Meanwhile, I will seek out the truth—or the lies—in your story. You will be punished for the lies. ”
I turned to Iskandar and copied Zia’s bow. Sadie did the same.
“Thank you, master,” I said.
The old man studied me for a long time. Again I felt as if he were trying to burn into my soul—not in an angry way. More out of concern. Then he mumbled something, and I understood two words: Nectanebo and ba.
He opened his hand and a flood of glowing hieroglyphs poured out, swarming around the dais. There was a blinding flash of light, and when I could see again, the dais was empty. The two men were gone.