“Well, if you’ll excuse us, officer. That’s a very handsome uniform, by the way. Do you work out?” Before he could respond, Bast grabbed my arm and hurried me toward the security checkpoint. “Don’t look back,” she said under her breath.
As soon as we turned the corner, Bast pulled me aside by the vending machines.
“The Set animal is close,” she said. “We’ve got a few minutes at best. What’s wrong with Sadie?”
“She can’t…” I stammered. “I don’t know exactly.”
“Well, we’ll have to figure it out on the plane.”
“How did you change clothes?” I asked. “And the document for the bird…”
She waved her hand dismissively. “Oh, mortal minds are weak. That ‘document’ is an empty ticket sleeve. And my clothes haven’t really changed. It’s just a glamour.”
I looked at her more closely, and I saw she was right. Her new clothes flickered like a mirage over her usual leopard-skin bodysuit. As soon as she pointed it out, the magic seemed flimsy and obvious.
“We’ll try to make it to the gate before the Set animal,” she said. “It will be easier if you stow your things in the Duat.”
“What?”
“You don’t really want to tote that box around under your arm, do you? Use the Duat as a storage bin.”
“How?”
Bast rolled her eyes. “Honestly, what do they teach magicians these days?”
“We had about twenty seconds of training!”
“Just imagine a space in the air, like a shelf or a treasure chest-”
“A locker?” I asked. “I’ve never had a school locker.”
“Fine. Give it a combination lock-anything you want. Imagine opening the locker with your combination. Then shove the box inside. When you need it again, just call it to mind, and it will appear.”
I was skeptical, but I imagined a locker. I gave it a combination: 13/32/33-retired numbers for the Lakers, obviously: Chamberlain, Johnson, Abdul-Jabbar. I held out my dad’s magic box and let it go, sure it would smash to the floor. Instead, the box disappeared.
“Cool,” I said. “Are you sure I can get it back?”
“No,” Bast said. “Now, come on!”
C A R T E R
22. Leroy Meets the Locker of Doom
I’D NEVER GONE THROUGH SECURITY with a live bird of prey before. I thought it would cause a holdup, but instead the guards moved us into a special line. They checked our paperwork. Bast smiled a lot, flirted with the guards and told them they must be working out, and they waved us through. Bast’s knives didn’t set off the alarms, so maybe she’d stored them in the Duat. The guards didn’t even try to put Sadie through the X-ray machine.
I was retrieving my shoes when I heard a scream from the other side of security.
Bast cursed in Egyptian. “We were too slow.”
I looked back and saw the Set animal charging through the terminal, knocking passengers out of its way. Its weird rabbit ears swiveled back and forth. Foam dripped from its curved, toothy snout, and its forked tail lashed around, looking for something to sting.
“Moose!” a lady screamed. “Rabid moose!”
Everyone started screaming, running in different directions and blocking the Set animal’s path.
“Moose?” I wondered.
Bast shrugged. “No telling what mortals will perceive. Now the idea will spread by power of suggestion.”
Sure enough, more passengers started yelling “Moose!” and running around as the Set animal plowed through the lines and got tangled up in the stanchions. TSA officers surged forward, but the Set animal tossed them aside like rag dolls.
“Come on!” Bast told me.
“I can’t just let it hurt these people.”
“We can’t stop it!”
But I didn’t move. I wanted to believe Horus was giving me courage, or that maybe the past few days had finally woken up some dormant bravery gene I’d inherited from my parents. But the truth was scarier. This time, nobody was making me take a stand. I wanted to do it.
People were in trouble because of us. I had to fix it. I felt the same kind of instinct I felt when Sadie needed my help, like it was time for me to step up. And yes, it terrified me. But it also felt right.
“Go to the gate,” I told Bast. “Take Sadie. I’ll meet you there.”
“What? Carter-”
“Go!” I imagined opening my invisible locker: 13/32/33. I reached out my hand, but not for my dad’s magic box. I concentrated on something I’d lost in Luxor. It had to be there. For a moment, I felt nothing. Then my hand closed around a hard leather grip, and I pulled my sword out of nowhere.
Bast’s eyes widened. “Impressive.”
“Get moving,” I said. “It’s my turn to run interference.”
“You realize it’ll kill you.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence. Now, scat!”
Bast took off at top speed, Sadie flapping to stay balanced on her arm.
A shot rang out. I turned and saw the Set animal plow into a cop who’d just fired at its head to no effect. The poor cop flew backward and toppled over the metal detector gate.
“Hey, moose!” I screamed.
The Set animal locked its glowing eyes on me.
Well done! Horus said. We will die with honor!
Shut up, I thought.
I glanced behind me to make sure Bast and Sadie were out of sight. Then I approached the creature.
“So you’ve got no name?” I asked. “They couldn’t think of one ugly enough?”
The creature snarled, stepping over the unconscious policeman.
“Set animal is too hard to say,” I decided. “I’ll call you Leroy.”
Apparently, Leroy didn’t like his name. He lunged.
I dodged his claws and managed to smack him in the snout with the flat of my blade, but that barely fazed him. Leroy backed up and charged again, slavering, baring his fangs. I slashed at his neck, but Leroy was too smart. He darted to the left and sank his teeth into my free arm. If it hadn’t been for my makeshift leather armguard, I would’ve been minus one arm. As it was, Leroy’s fangs still bit clear through the leather. Red-hot pain shot up my arm.
I yelled, and a primal surge of power coursed through my body. I felt myself rising off the ground and the golden aura of the hawk warrior forming around me. The Set animal’s jaws were pried open so fast that it yelped and let go of my arm. I stood, now encased in a magical barrier twice my normal size, and kicked Leroy into the wall.
Good! said Horus. Now dispatch the beast to the netherworld!
Quiet, man. I’m doing all the work.
I was vaguely aware of security guards trying to regroup, yelling into their walkie-talkies and calling for help. Travelers were still screaming and running around. I heard a little girl shout: “Chicken man, get the moose!”
You know how hard it is to feel like an extreme falcon-headed combat machine when somebody calls you “chicken man”?
I raised my sword, which was now at the center of a ten-foot-long energy blade.
Leroy shook the dust off his cone-shaped ears, and came at me again. My armored form might’ve been powerful, but it was also clumsy and slow; moving it around felt like moving through Jell-O. Leroy dodged my sword
