Carter looked at me, and for a moment I saw the doubt on his face. Horus would be urging him towards bloody vengeance. I was hesitating. This is what had turned Isis and Horus against each other before. I couldn’t let it happen now.
But more than that, in Carter’s wary expression I saw the way he used to look at me on our visiting days—when we were practically strangers, forced to spend time together, pretending we were a happy family because Dad expected it of us. I didn’t want to go back to that. I wasn’t pretending anymore. We were a family, and we had to work together.
“Carter, look.” I threw the feather of truth into the sky, breaking the spell.
“No!” Carter screamed.
But the feather exploded into silver dust that clung to the form of the serpent, forcing it to become visible, just for an instant.
Carter’s mouth fell open as the serpent writhed in the air above Washington, slowly losing power.
Next to me, a voice screamed: “Wretched gods!”
I turned to see Set’s minion, Face of Horror, with his fangs bared and his grotesque face only inches from mine, a jagged knife raised above my head. I only had time to think: I’m dead, before a flash of metal registered in the corner of my eye. There was a sickening thud, and the demon froze.
Carter had thrown his sword with deadly accuracy. The demon dropped his knife, fell to his knees, and stared down at the blade that was now sheathed in his side.
He crumpled to his back, exhaling with an angry hiss. His black eyes fixed on me, and he spoke in a completely different voice—a rasping, dry sound, like a reptile’s belly scraping over sand. “This is not over, godling. All this I have wrought with a wisp of my voice, the merest bit of my essence wriggling from my weakened cage. Imagine what I shall do when fully formed.”
He gave me a ghastly smile, and then his face went slack. A tiny line of red mist curled from his mouth—like a worm or a fresh-hatched snake—and writhed upward into the sky to join its source. The demon’s body disintegrated into sand.
I looked up once more at the giant red serpent slowly dissolving in the sky. Then I summoned a good strong wind and dispersed it completely.
The Washington Monument stopped glowing. The rift closed, and the little spellbook disappeared from my hand.
I moved towards Set, who was still ensnared in ropes of white energy. I’d spoken his true name. He wasn’t going anywhere just yet.
“You both saw the serpent in the clouds,” I said. “Apophis.”
Carter nodded, stunned. “He was trying to break into the mortal world, using the Red Pyramid as a gateway. If its power had been unleashed...” He looked down in revulsion at the pile of sand that had once been a demon. “Set’s lieutenant—Face of Horror—he was possessed by Apophis all along, using Set to get what he wanted.”
“Ridiculous!” Set glared at me and struggled against his bonds. “The snake in the clouds was one of your tricks, Isis. An illusion.”
“You know it wasn’t,” I said. “I could’ve sent you into the abyss, Set, but you saw the real enemy. Apophis was trying to break out of his prison in the Duat. His voice possessed Face of Horror. He was using you.”
“No one uses me!”
Carter let his warrior form disperse. He floated to the ground and summoned his sword back to his hand. “Apophis wanted your explosion to feed his power, Set. As soon as he came through the Duat and found us dead, I’m betting you would’ve been his first meal. Chaos would’ve won.”
“I am chaos!” Set insisted.
“Partially,” I said. “But you’re still one of the gods. True, you’re evil, faithless, ruthless, vile—”
“You make me blush, sister.”
“But you’re also the strongest god. In the ancient times, you were Ra’s faithful lieutenant, defending his boat against Apophis. Ra couldn’t have defeated the Serpent without you.”
“I am pretty great,” Set admitted. “But Ra is gone forever, thanks to you.”
“Maybe not forever,” I said. “We’ll have to find him. Apophis is rising, which means we’ll need all the gods to battle him. Even you.”
Set tested his bonds of white energy. When he found he couldn’t break them, he gave me a crooked smile. “You suggest an alliance? You’d trust me?”
Carter laughed. “You’ve got to be kidding. But we’ve got your number, now. Your secret name. Right, Sadie?”
I closed my fingers, and the bonds tightened around Set. He cried out in pain. It took a great deal of energy, and I knew I couldn’t hold him like this for long, but there was no point telling that to Set.
“The House of Life tried banishing the gods,” I said. “It didn’t work. If we lock you away, we’re no better than they are. It doesn’t solve anything.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” Set groaned. “So if you’ll just loosen these bonds—”
“You’re still a villainous piece of scum,” I said. “But you have a role to play, and you’ll need controlling. I’ll agree to release you—if you swear to behave, to return to the Duat, and not cause trouble until we call you. And then you’ll make trouble only for us, fighting against Apophis.”
“Or I could chop off your head,” Carter suggested. “That would probably exile you for a good long while.”
Set glanced back and forth between us. “Make trouble for you, eh? That is my specialty.”
“Swear by your own name and the throne of Ra,” I said. “You will leave now and not reappear until you are called.”
“Oh, I swear,” he said, much too quickly. “By my name and Ra’s throne and our mother’s starry elbows.”
“If you betray us,” I warned, “I have your name. I won’t show you mercy a second time.”
“You always were my favorite sister.”
I gave him one last shock, just to remind him of my power, and then let the bindings dissolve.
Set stood up and flexed his arms. He appeared as a warrior with red armor and red skin, a black, forked beard, and twinkling, cruel eyes; but in the Duat, I saw his other side, a raging inferno just barely contained, waiting to be unleashed and burn everything in its path. He winked at Horus, then pretended to shoot me with a finger gun. “Oh, this will be good. We’re going to have so much fun.”
“Begone, Evil Day,” I said.
He turned into a pillar of salt and dissolved.
The snow in the National Mall had melted in a perfect square, the exact size of Set’s pyramid. Around the edges, a dozen magicians still lay passed out. The poor dears had started to stir when our portal closed, but the explosion of the pyramid had knocked them all out again. Other mortals in the area had also been affected. An early-morning jogger was slumped on the sidewalk. On nearby streets, cars idled while the drivers took naps over the steering wheels.
Not everyone was asleep, though. Police sirens wailed in the distance, and seeing as how we’d teleported practically into the president’s backyard, I knew it wouldn’t be long before we had a great deal of heavily armed company.
Carter and I ran to the center of the melted square, where Amos and Zia lay crumpled in the grass. There was no sign of Set’s throne or the golden coffin, but I tried to push those thoughts out of my mind.
Amos groaned. “What...” His eyes clouded over with terror. “Set...he...he...”
“Rest.” I put my hand on his forehead. He was burning with fever. The pain in his mind was so sharp, it cut me like a razor. I remembered a spell Isis had taught me in New Mexico.
“Quiet,” I whispered. “Hah-ri.”
Faint hieroglyphs glowed over his face:
Amos drifted back to sleep, but I knew it was only a temporary fix.
Zia was even worse off. Carter cradled her head and spoke reassuringly about how she would be fine, but she looked bad. Her skin was a strange reddish color, dry and brittle, as if she’d suffered a horrible sunburn. In the grass around her, hieroglyphs were fading—the remains of a protective circle—and I thought I understood what had happened. She’d used her last bit of energy to shield herself and Amos when the pyramid imploded.
“Set?” she asked weakly. “Is he gone?”
“Yes.” Carter glanced at me, and I knew we’d be keeping the details to ourselves. “Everything’s fine, thanks to you. The secret name worked.”
She nodded, satisfied, and her eyes began to close.
“Hey.” Carter’s voice quavered. “Stay awake. You’re not going to leave me alone with Sadie, are you? She’s bad company.”
Zia tried to smile, but the effort made her wince. “I was...never here, Carter. Just a message—a placeholder.”
“Come on. No. That’s no way to talk.”
“Find her, will you?” Zia said. A tear traced its way down her nose. “She’d...like that...a date at the mall.” Her eyes drifted away from him and stared blankly into the sky.
“Zia!” Carter clutched her hand. “Stop that. You can’t...You can’t just...”
I knelt next to him and touched Zia’s face. It was cold as stone. And even though I understood what had happened, I couldn’t think of anything to say, or any way to console my brother. He shut his eyes tight and lowered his head.
Then it happened. Along the path of Zia’s tear, from the corner of her eye to the base of her nose, Zia’s face cracked. Smaller fractures appeared, webbing her skin. Her flesh dried out, hardening...turning to clay.
“Carter,” I said.
“What?” he said miserably.
He looked up just as a small blue light drifted out of Zia’s mouth and flew into the sky. Carter backed away in shock. “What—what did you do?”
“Nothing,” I said. “She’s a shabti. She said she wasn’t really here. She was just a placeholder.”
Carter looked bewildered. But then a small light started to burn in his eyes—a tiny bit of hope. “Then...the real Zia is alive?”
“Iskandar was protecting her,” I said. “When the spirit of Nephthys joined with the real Zia in London, Iskandar knew she was in danger. Iskandar hid her away and replaced her with a shabti. Remember what Thoth said: ‘Shabti make excellent stunt doubles?’ That’s what she was. And Nephthys told me she was sheltered somewhere, inside a sleeping host.”
“But where—”
“I don’t know,” I said. And in Carter’s present state, I was too afraid to raise the real question: If Zia had been a shabti all this time, had we ever known her at all? The real Zia had never gotten close to us. She’d never discovered what an incredibly amazing person I was. God forbid, she might not even like Carter.
Carter touched her face and it crumbled to dust. He picked up her wand, which remained solid ivory, but he held it gingerly as if he were afraid it too would dissolve. “That blue light,” he began to ramble, “I saw Zia release one in the First Nome, too. Just like the shabti in Memphis—they sent their thoughts back to Thoth. So Zia must’ve been in contact with her shabti. That’s what the light was. They must’ve been, like, sharing memories, right? She must know what the shabti’s been through. If the real Zia is alive somewhere, she might be locked up or in some kind of magic sleep or— We have to find her!”