Rick Riordan - The Red Pyramid

“Sounds fun,” Sadie ventured. “And if we fail this test?”

Zia regarded her coldly. “This is not the sort of test you fail, Sadie Kane. You pass or you die.”

S A D I E

THEY TOOK CARTER TO A DIFFERENT dormitory, so I don’t know how he slept. But I couldn’t get a wink.

It would’ve been hard enough with Zia’s comments about passing our tests or dying, but the girls’ dormitory just wasn’t as posh as Amos’s mansion. The stone walls sweated moisture. Creepy pictures of Egyptian monsters danced across the ceiling in the torchlight. I got a floating cot to sleep in, and the other girls in training-initiates, Zia had called them-were much younger than me, so when the old dorm matron told them to go to sleep straightaway, they actually obeyed. The matron waved her hand and the torches went out. She shut the door behind her, and I could hear the sound of locks clicking.

Lovely. Imprisoned in a nursery school dungeon.

I stared into the dark until I heard the other girls snoring. A single thought kept bothering me: an urge I just couldn’t shake. Finally I crept out of bed and tugged on my boots.

I felt my way to the door. I tugged at the handle. Locked, as I suspected. I was tempted to kick it till I remembered what Zia had done in the Cairo Airport broom closet.

I pressed my palm against the door and whispered, “Sahad.”

Locks clicked. The door swung open. Handy trick.

Outside, the corridors were dark and empty. Apparently, there wasn’t much nightlife in the First Nome. I sneaked through the city back the way we’d come and saw nothing but an occasional cobra slithering across the floor. After the last couple of days, that didn’t even faze me. I thought about trying to find Carter, but I wasn’t sure where they’d taken him, and honestly, I wanted to do this on my own.

After our last argument in New York, I wasn’t sure how I felt about my brother. The idea that he could be jealous of my life while he got to travel the world with Dad-please! And he had the nerve to call my life normal? All right, I had a few mates at school like Liz and Emma, but my life was hardly easy. If Carter made a social faux pas or met people he didn’t like, he could just move on! I had to stay put. I couldn’t answer simple questions like “Where are your parents?” or “What does your family do?” or even “Where are you from?” without exposing just how odd my situation was. I was always the different girl. The mixed-race girl, the American who wasn’t American, the girl whose mother had died, the girl with the absent father, the girl who made trouble in class, the girl who couldn’t concentrate on her lessons. After a while one learns that blending in simply doesn’t work. If people are going to single me out, I might as well give them something to stare at. Red stripes in my hair? Why not! Combat boots with the school uniform? Absolutely. Headmaster says, “I’ll have to call your parents, young lady.” I say, “Good luck.” Carter didn’t know anything about my life.

But enough of that. The point was, I decided to do this particular bit of exploring alone, and after a few wrong turns, I found my way back to the Hall of Ages.

What was I up to, you may ask? I certainly didn’t want to meet Monsieur Evil again or creepy old Lord Salamander.

But I did want to see those images-memories, Zia had called them.

I pushed open the bronze doors. Inside, the hall seemed deserted. No balls of fire floated around the ceiling. No glowing hieroglyphs. But images still shimmered between the columns, washing the hall with strange, multicolored light.

I took a few nervous steps.

I wanted another look at the Age of the Gods. On our first trip through the hall, something about those images had shaken me. I knew Carter thought I’d gone into a dangerous trance, and Zia had warned that the scenes would melt my brain; but I had a feeling she was just trying to scare me off. I felt a connection to those images, like there was an answer within-a vital piece of information I needed.

I stepped off the carpet and approached the curtain of golden light. I saw sand dunes shifting in the wind, storm clouds brewing, crocodiles sliding down the Nile. I saw a vast hall full of revelers. I touched the image.

And I was in the palace of the gods.

Huge beings swirled around me, changing shape from human to animal to pure energy. On a throne in the center of the room sat a muscular African man in rich black robes. He had a handsome face and warm brown eyes. His hands looked strong enough to crush rocks.

The other gods celebrated round him. Music played-a sound so powerful that the air burned. At the man’s side stood a beautiful woman in white, her belly swollen as if she were a few months pregnant. Her form flickered; at times she seemed to have multicolored wings. Then she turned in my direction and I gasped. She had my mother’s face.

She didn’t seem to notice me. In fact, none of the gods did, until a voice behind me said, “Are you a ghost?”

I turned and saw a good-looking boy of about sixteen, dressed in black robes. His complexion was pale, but he had lovely brown eyes like the man on the throne. His black hair was long and tousled-rather wild, but it worked for me. He tilted his head, and it finally occurred to me that he’d asked me a question.

I tried to think of something to say. Excuse me? Hello? Marry me? Anything would’ve done. But all I could manage was a shake of the head.

“Not a ghost, eh?” he mused. “A ba then?” He gestured towards the throne. “Watch, but do not interfere.”

Somehow I wasn’t interested in watching the throne so much, but the boy in black dissolved into a shadow and disappeared, leaving me no further distraction.

“Isis,” said the man on the throne.

The pregnant woman turned towards him and beamed. “My lord Osiris. Happy birthday.”

“Thank you, my love. And soon we shall mark the birth of our son-Horus, the great one! His new incarnation shall be his greatest yet. He shall bring peace and prosperity to the world.”

Isis took her husband’s hand. Music kept playing around them, gods celebrating, the very air swirling in a dance of creation.

Suddenly the palace doors blew open. A hot wind made the torches sputter.

A man strode into the hall. He was tall and strong, almost a twin to Osiris, but with dark red skin, blood-colored robes, and a pointed beard. He looked human, except when he smiled. Then his teeth turned to fangs. His face flickered-sometimes human, sometimes strangely wolflike. I had to stifle a scream, because I’d seen that wolfish face before.

The dancing stopped. The music died.

Osiris rose from his throne. “Set,” he said in a dangerous tone. “Why have you come?”

Set laughed, and the tension in the room broke. Despite his cruel eyes, he had a wonderful laugh-nothing like the screeching he’d done at the British Museum. It was carefree and friendly, as if he couldn’t possibly mean any harm.

“I come to celebrate my brother’s birthday, of course!” he exclaimed. “And I bring entertainment!”

He gestured behind him. Four huge men with the heads of wolves marched into the room, carrying a jewel-encrusted golden coffin.

My heart began to race. It was the same box Set had used to imprison my dad at the British Museum.

No! I wanted to scream. Don’t trust him!

But the assembled gods oohed and aahed, admiring the box, which was painted with gold and red hieroglyphs, trimmed with jade and opals. The wolf-men set down the box, and I saw it had no lid. The interior was lined with black linen.