The Throne of Fire

I quickly put away the figurine.

My old friend Bast stood over me. With her slight smile and glinting yellow eyes, she might’ve been concerned or amused. It’s hard to tell with a cat goddess. Her black hair was pulled back in a ponytail. She wore her usual leopard-skin leotard, as if she were about to perform a backflip. For all I knew, she might. As I said, you never can tell with cats.

“I’m fine,” I lied. “Just…” I waved my flaming hand about helplessly.

“Mmm.” The scroll seemed to make Bast uncomfortable. “Let me see what I can do.”

She knelt next to me and began to chant.

I pondered how odd it was having my former pet cast a spell on me. For years, Bast had posed as my cat, Muffin. I hadn’t even realized I had a goddess sleeping on my pillow at night. Then, after our dad unleashed a slew of gods at the British Museum, Bast had made herself known.

She’d been watching over me for six years, she’d told us, ever since our parents released her from a cell in the Duat, where she’d been sent to fight the chaos snake Apophis forever.

Long story, but my mum had foreseen that Apophis would eventually escape his prison, which would basically amount to Doomsday. If Bast continued to fight him alone, she’d be destroyed. However, if Bast were freed, my mum believed she could play an important role in the coming battle with Chaos. So my parents freed her before Apophis could overwhelm her. My mother had died opening, then quickly closing, Apophis’s prison; so naturally Bast felt indebted to our parents. Bast had become my guardian.

Now she was also Carter and my chaperone, travel companion, and sometime personal chef (Hint: if she offers you the Friskies du Jour, say no).

But I still missed Muffin. At times I had to resist the urge to scratch Bast behind the ears and feed her crunchy treats, although I was glad she no longer tried to sleep on my pillow at night. That would’ve been a bit strange.

She finished her chant, and the scroll’s flames sputtered out. My hand unclenched. The papyrus dropped into my lap.

“God, thank you,” I said.

“Goddess,” Bast corrected. “You’re quite welcome. We can’t have the power of Ra lighting up the city, can we?”

I looked out across the borough. The fires were gone. The Brooklyn night skyline was back to normal, except for the emergency lights and crowds of screaming mortals in the streets. Come to think of it, I suppose that was fairly normal.

“The power of Ra?” I asked. “I thought the scroll was a clue. Is this the actual Book of Ra?”

Bast’s ponytail puffed up as it does when she’s nervous. I’d come to realize she kept her hair in a ponytail so that her entire head wouldn’t explode into a sea urchin shape each time she got startled.

“The scroll is…part of the book,” she said. “And I did warn you. Ra’s power is almost impossible to control. If you insist on trying to wake him, the next fires you set off might not be so harmless.”

“But isn’t he your pharaoh?” I asked. “Don’t you want him awakened?”

She dropped her gaze. I realized how foolish my comment was. Ra was Bast’s lord and master. Eons ago, he’d chosen her to be his champion. But he was also the one who’d sent her into that prison to keep his archenemy Apophis occupied for eternity, so Ra could retire with a clear conscience. Quite selfish, if you ask me.

Thanks to my parents, Bast had escaped her imprisonment; but that also meant she’d abandoned her post fighting Apophis. No wonder she had mixed feelings about seeing her old boss again.

“It’s best we talk in the morning,” Bast said. “You need rest, and that scroll should only be opened in the daylight, when the power of Ra is easier to control.”

I stared at my lap. The papyrus was still steaming. “Easier to control…as in, it won’t set me on fire?”

“It’s safe to touch now,” Bast assured me. “After being trapped in darkness for a few millennia, it was just very sensitive, reacting to any sort of energy—magical, electrical, emotional. I’ve, ah, dialed down the sensitivity so it won’t burst into flames again.”

I took the scroll. Thankfully, Bast was right. It didn’t stick to my hand or light the city on fire.

Bast helped me to my feet. “Get some sleep. I’ll let Carter know you’re all right. Besides…” She managed a smile. “You’ve got a big day tomorrow.”

Right, I thought miserably. One person remembers, and it’s my cat.

I looked over at my brother, who was still trying to control the griffin. It had Carter’s shoelaces in its beak and didn’t seem inclined to let go.

Most of our twenty trainees were surrounding Jaz, trying to wake her up. Walt hadn’t left her side. He glanced up at me briefly, uneasily, then turned his attention back to Jaz.

“Maybe you’re right,” I grumbled to Bast. “I’m not needed up here.”

My room was a lovely place to sulk. The last six years I’d lived in an attic in Gran and Gramps’s flat in London, and although I missed my old life, my mates Liz and Emma, and most everything about England, I couldn’t deny that my room in Brooklyn was much more posh.

My private balcony overlooked the East River. I had an enormous comfy bed, my own bathroom, and a walk- in closet with endless new outfits that magically appeared and cleaned themselves as needed. The chest of drawers featured a built-in refrigerator with my favorite Ribena drinks, imported from the UK, and chilled chocolates (well, a girl does have to treat herself). The sound system was absolutely bleeding edge, and the walls were magically soundproofed so I could play my music as loud as I wanted without worrying about my stick-in-the-mud brother next door. Sitting on the dresser was one of the only things I’d brought from my room in London: a beat-up cassette recorder my grandparents had given me ages ago. It was hopelessly old-fashioned, yes, but I kept it around for sentimental reasons. Carter and I had recorded our adventures at the Red Pyramid on it, after all.

I docked my iPod and scrolled through my playlists. I chose an older mix labeled sad, as that’s how I felt.

Adele’s 19 began playing. God, I hadn’t heard that album since…

Quite unexpectedly I began to tear up. I’d been listening to this mix on Christmas Eve when Dad and Carter picked me up for our trip to the British Museum—the night our lives changed forever.

Adele sang as if someone were ripping her heart out. She went on about the boy she fancied, wondering what she must do to make him want her properly. I could relate to that. But last Christmas, the song had made me think of my family as well: my mum, who’d died when I was quite small, and my father and Carter, who traveled the world together, left me in London with my grandparents, and didn’t seem to need me in their lives.

Of course I knew it was more complicated than that. There’d been a nasty custody battle involving lawyers and spatula attacks, and Dad had wanted to keep Carter and me apart so we didn’t agitate each other’s magic before we could handle the power. And yes, we’d all grown closer since then. My father was back in my life a bit more, even if he was the god of the underworld now. As for my mother…well, I’d met her ghost. I suppose that counted for something.

Still, the music brought back all the pain and anger I’d felt at Christmas. I suppose I hadn’t gotten rid of it as completely as I’d thought.

My finger hovered over the fast-forward icon, but I decided to let the song play. I tossed my stuff on the dresser—the papyrus scroll, the wax mini-Carter, my magic bag, my wand. I reached for my staff, then remembered I didn’t have it anymore. The griffin had eaten it.

“Manky birdbrain,” I muttered.

I started changing for bed. I’d plastered the inside of my closet door with photos, mostly of my mates and me from school last year. There was one of Liz, Emma, and me making faces in a photo booth in Piccadilly. We looked so young and ridiculous.

I couldn’t believe I might be seeing them tomorrow for the first time in months. Gran and Gramps had invited me to visit, and I had plans to go out with just my mates—at least, that had been the plan before Carter dropped his “five-days-to-save-the-world” bombshell. Now, who knew what would happen?

Only two non–Liz-and-Emma pictures decorated my closet door. One showed Carter and me with Uncle Amos the day Amos left for Egypt on his…hmm, what do you call it when someone goes for healing after being possessed by an evil god? Not a holiday, I suppose.

The last picture was a painting of Anubis. Perhaps you’ve seen him: the fellow with the jackal’s head, god of