Thoth gestured toward the picnic plates. “Did I mention we have barbecue?”
Sadie stomped her foot. “We had a deal, Ja-hooty!”
“You know…I like that name,” Thoth mused, “but not so much when you say it. I believe our deal was that I would explain how to use the spell book. May I?”
He held out his hand. Reluctantly I dug the magic book out of my bag and handed it over.
Thoth unfolded the pages. “Ah, this takes me back. So many formulae. In the old days, we believed in ritual. A good spell might take weeks to prepare, with exotic ingredients from all over the world.”
“We don’t have weeks,” I said.
“Rush, rush, rush.” Thoth sighed.
“Agh,” Khufu agreed, sniffing the guitar.
Thoth closed the book and handed it back to me. “Well, it’s an incantation for destroying Set.”
“We know that,” Sadie said. “Will it destroy him forever?”
“No, no. But it will destroy his form in this world, banishing him deep into the Duat and reducing his power so he will not be able to appear again for a long, long time. Centuries, most likely.”
“Sounds good,” I said. “How do we read it?”
Thoth stared at me like the answer should be obvious. “You cannot read it now because the words can only be spoken in Set’s presence. Once before him, Sadie should open the book and recite the incantation. She’ll know what to do when the time comes.”
“Right,” Sadie said. “And Set will just stand there calmly while I read him to death.”
Thoth shrugged. “I did not say it would be easy. You’ll also require two ingredients for the spell to work-a verbal ingredient, Set’s secret name-”
“What?” I protested. “How are we supposed to get that?”
“With difficulty, I’d imagine. You can’t simply read a secret name from a book. The name must come from the owner’s own lips, in his own pronunciation, to give you power over him.”
“Great,” I said. “So we just force Set to tell us.”
“Or trick him,” Thoth said. “Or convince him.”
“Isn’t there any other way?” Sadie asked.
Thoth brushed an ink splotch off his lab coat. A hieroglyph turned into a moth and fluttered away. “I suppose… yes. You could ask the person closest to Set’s heart-the person who loves him most. She would also have the ability to speak the name.”
“But nobody loves Set!” Sadie said.
“His wife,” I guessed. “That other goddess, Nephthys.”
Thoth nodded. “She’s a river goddess. Perhaps you could find her in a river.”
“This just gets better and better,” I muttered.
Sadie frowned at Thoth. “You said there was another ingredient?”
“A physical ingredient,” Thoth agreed, “a feather of truth.”
“A what?” Sadie asked.
But I knew what he was talking about, and my heart sank. “You mean from the Land of the Dead.”
Thoth beamed. “Exactly.”
“Wait,” Sadie said. “What is he talking about?”
I tried to conceal my fear. “When you died in Ancient Egypt, you had to take a journey to the Land of the Dead,” I explained. “A really dangerous journey. Finally, you made it to the Hall of Judgment, where your life was weighed on the Scales of Anubis: your heart on one side, the feather of truth on the other. If you passed the test, you were blessed with eternal happiness. If you failed, a monster ate your heart and you ceased to exist.”
“Ammit the Devourer,” Thoth said wistfully. “Cute little thing.”
Sadie blinked. “So we’re supposed to get a feather from this Hall of Judgment how, exactly?”
“Perhaps Anubis will be in a good mood,” Thoth suggested. “It happens every thousand years or so.”
“But how do we even get to the Land of the Dead?” I asked. “I mean…without dying.”
Thoth gazed at the western horizon, where the sunset was turning blood-red. “Down the river at night, I should think. That’s how most people pass into the Land of the Dead. I would take a boat. You’ll find Anubis at the end of the river-” He pointed north, then changed his mind and pointed south. “Forgot, rivers flow south here. Everything is backward.”
“Agh!” Khufu ran his fingers down the frets of the guitar and ripped out a massive rock ’n’ roll riff. Then he belched as if nothing had happened and set down the guitar. Sadie and I just stared at him, but Thoth nodded as if the baboon had said something profound.
“Are you sure, Khufu?” Thoth asked.
Khufu grunted.
“Very well.” Thoth sighed. “Khufu says he would like to go with you. I told him he could stay here and type my doctoral thesis on quantum physics, but he’s not interested.”
“Can’t imagine why,” Sadie said. “Glad to have Khufu along, but where do we find a boat?”
“You are the blood of pharaohs,” Thoth said. “Pharaohs always have access to a boat. Just make sure you use it wisely.”
He nodded toward the river. Churning toward the shore was an old-fashioned paddlewheel steamboat with smoke billowing from its stacks.
“I wish you a good journey,” Thoth said. “Until we meet again.”
“We’re supposed to take that?” I asked. But when I turned to look at Thoth, he was gone, and he’d taken the barbecue with him.
“Wonderful,” Sadie muttered.
“Agh!” Khufu agreed. He took our hands and led us down to the shore.
C A R T E R
26. Aboard the Egyptian Queen
AS FAR AS RIDES TO THE Land of Death go, the boat was pretty cool. It had multiple decks with ornate railings painted black and green. The side paddlewheels churned the river into froth, and along the paddlewheel housings the name of the boat glittered in gold letters: egyptian queen.
At first glance, you’d think the boat was just a tourist attraction: one of those floating casinos or cruise boats for old people. But if you looked closer you started noticing strange little details. The boat’s name was written in Demotic and in hieroglyphics underneath the English. Sparkly smoke billowed from the stacks as if the engines were burning gold. Orbs of multicolored fire flitted around the decks. And on the prow of the ship, two painted eyes moved and blinked, scanning the river for trouble.
“That’s odd,” Sadie remarked.
I nodded. “I’ve seen eyes painted on boats before. They still do that all over the Mediterranean. But usually they don’t move.”
“What? No, not the stupid eyes. That lady on the highest deck. Isn’t that…” Sadie broke into a grin. “Bast!”
Sure enough, our favorite feline was leaning out the window of the pilot’s house. I was about to wave to her, when I noticed the creature standing next to Bast, gripping the wheel. He had a human body and was dressed in the white uniform of a boat captain. But instead of a head, a double-bladed axe sprouted from his collar. And I’m not talking about a small axe for chopping wood. I’m talking battle-axe: twin crescent-shaped iron blades, one in front where his face should be, one in the back, the edges splattered with suspicious-looking dried red splotches.
The ship pulled up to the dock. Balls of fire began zipping around-lowering the gangplank, tying off ropes, and basically doing crew-type stuff. How they did it without hands, and without setting everything on fire, I don’t know, but it wasn’t the strangest thing I’d seen that week.
