The Serpent's Shadow

Page 24

“Walt,” Carter whispered, “when did you become a junior lawyer?”
I shushed him. Walt’s plan seemed to be working. The jackal tilted its head as if listening, then rose and padded away into the darkness. The obsidian double doors swung open silently.
“Well done, Walt,” I said. “How did you…?”
He faced me, and my heart did a somersault. Just for a moment I thought he looked like…No. Obviously my mixed-up emotions were playing with my mind. “Um, how did you know what to say?”
Walt shrugged. “I took a guess.”
Just as quickly as they’d opened, the doors began to close.
“Hurry!” Carter warned. We sprinted into the courtroom of the dead.
At the start of the autumn semester—my first experience in an American school—our teacher had asked us to write down our parents’ contact information and what they did for a living, in case they could help with career day. I had never heard of career day. Once I understood what it was, I couldn’t stop giggling.
Could your dad come talk about his work? I imagined the headmistress asking.
Possibly, Mrs. Laird…I’d say. Except he’s dead, you see. Well, not completely dead. He’s more of a resurrected god. He judges mortal spirits and feeds the hearts of the wicked to his pet monster. Oh, and he has blue skin. I’m sure he’d make quite an impression on career day, for all those students aspiring to grow up and become Ancient Egyptian deities.
The Hall of Judgment had changed since my last visit. The room tended to mirror the thoughts of Osiris, so it often looked like a ghostly replica of my family’s old apartment in Los Angeles, from the happier times when we all lived together.
Now, possibly because Dad was on duty, the place was fully Egyptian. The circular chamber was lined with stone pillars carved in lotus flower designs. Braziers of magic fire washed the walls in green and blue light. In the center of the room stood the scales of justice, two large golden saucers balanced from an iron T.
Kneeling before the scales was the ghost of a man in a pinstriped suit, nervously reciting from a scroll. I understood why he was tense. On either side of him stood a large reptilian demon with green skin, a cobra head, and a wicked-looking pole arm poised over the ghost’s head.
Dad sat at the far end of the room on a golden dais, with a blue-skinned Egyptian attendant at his side. Seeing my father in the Duat was always disorienting, because he appeared to be two people at once. On one level, he looked like he had in life—a handsome, muscular man with chocolate-brown skin, a bald scalp, and a neatly trimmed goatee. He wore an elegant silk suit and a dark traveling coat, like a businessman about to board a private jet.
On a deeper level of reality, however, he appeared as Osiris, god of the dead. He was dressed as a pharaoh in sandals, an embroidered linen kilt, and rows of gold and coral neckbands on his bare chest. His skin was the color of a summer sky. Across his lap lay a crook and flail—the symbols of Egyptian kingship.
As strange as it was seeing my father with blue skin and a skirt, I was so happy to be near him again, I quite forgot about the court proceedings.
“Dad!” I ran toward him.
(Carter says I was foolish, but Dad was the king of the court, wasn’t he? Why shouldn’t I be allowed to run up to say hello?)
I was halfway across when the snake demons crossed their pole arms and blocked my path.
“It’s all right,” Dad said, looking a bit startled. “Let her through.”
I flew into his arms, knocking the crook and flail out of his lap.
He hugged me warmly, chuckling with affection. For a moment I felt like a little girl again, safe in his embrace. Then he held me at arm’s length, and I could see how weary he was. He had bags under his eyes. His face was gaunt. Even the powerful blue aura of Osiris, which normally surrounded him like the corona of a star, flickered weakly.
“Sadie, my love,” he said in a strained voice. “Why have you come? I’m working.”
I tried not to feel hurt. “But, Dad, this is important!”
Carter, Walt, and Zia approached the dais. My father’s expression turned grim.
“I see,” he said. “First let me finish this trial. Children, stand here on my right. And please, don’t interrupt.”
My dad’s attendant stamped his foot. “My lord, this is most irregular!”
He was an odd-looking fellow—an elderly blue Egyptian man with a huge scroll in his arms. Too solid to be a ghost, too blue to be human, he was almost as decrepit as Ra, wearing nothing but a loincloth, sandals, and an ill-fitting wig. I suppose that glossy black wedge of fake hair was meant to look manly in an Ancient Egyptian sort of way, but along with the kohl eyeliner and the rouge on his cheeks, the old boy looked like a grotesque Cleopatra impersonator.
The roll of papyrus he held was simply enormous. Years ago, I’d gone to synagogue with my friend Liz, and the Torah they kept there was tiny in comparison.
“It’s all right, Disturber,” my father told him. “We may continue now.”
“But, my lord—” The old man (was his name really Disturber?) became so agitated he lost control of his scroll. The bottom dropped out and unraveled, bouncing down the steps like a papyrus carpet.
“Oh, bother, bother, bother!” Disturber struggled to reel in his document.
My father suppressed a smile. He turned back to the ghost in the pinstriped suit, who was still kneeling at the scales. “My apologies, Robert Windham. You may finish your testimony.”
The ghost bowed and scraped. “Y-yes, Lord Osiris.”
He referred to his notes and began rattling off a list of crimes he wasn’t guilty of—murder, theft, and selling cattle under false pretenses.
I turned to Walt and whispered, “He’s a modern chap, isn’t he? What’s he doing in Osiris’s court?”
I was a bit troubled to find that Walt once again had an answer.
“The afterlife looks different to every soul,” he said, “depending on what they believe. For that guy, Egypt must’ve made a strong impression. Maybe he read the stories when he was young.”
“And if someone doesn’t believe in any afterlife?” I asked.
Walt gave me a sad look. “Then that’s what they experience.”
On the other side of the dais, the blue god Disturber hissed at us to be quiet. Why is it when adults try to silence kids, they always make more noise than the noise they’re trying to stop?
The ghost of Robert Windham seemed to be winding down his testimony. “I haven’t given false witness against my neighbors. Um, sorry, I can’t read this last line—”
“Fish!” Disturber yelped crossly. “Have you stolen any fish from the holy lakes?”
“I lived in Kansas,” the ghost said. “So…no.”
My father rose from his throne. “Very well. Let his heart be weighed.”
One of the snake demons produced a linen parcel the size of a child’s fist.
Next to me, Carter inhaled sharply. “His heart is in there?”
“Shh!” Disturber said so loudly his wig almost fell off. “Bring forth the Destroyer of Souls!”
On the far wall of the chamber, a doggy door burst open. Ammit ran into the room in great excitement. The poor dear wasn’t very coordinated. His miniature lion chest and forearms were sleek and agile, but his back half was a stubby and much-less-agile hippo bum. He kept sliding sideways, swerving into pillars, and knocking over braziers. Each time he crashed, he shook his lion’s mane and crocodile snout and yipped happily.
(Carter is scolding me, as always. He says Ammit is female. I’ll admit I can’t prove it either way, but I’ve always thought of Ammit as a boy monster. He’s much too hyper to be otherwise, and the way he marks his territory…but never mind.)
“There’s my baby!” I cried, quite carried away. “There’s my Poochiekins!”
Ammit ran at me and leaped into my arms, nuzzling me with his rough snout.
“My lord Osiris!” Disturber lost the bottom of his scroll again, which unraveled around his legs. “This is an outrage!”
“Sadie,” Dad said firmly, “please do not refer to the Devourer of Souls as Poochiekins.”
“Sorry,” I muttered, and let Ammit down.
One of the snake demons set Robert Windham’s heart on the scales of justice. I’d seen many pictures of Anubis performing this duty, and I wished he were here now. Anubis would’ve been much more interesting to watch than some snake demon.
On the opposite scale, the Feather of Truth appeared. (Don’t get me started on the Feather of Truth.)
The scales wavered. The two saucers stopped, just about even. The pinstriped ghost sobbed with relief. Ammit whimpered disappointedly.
“Most impressive,” my father said. “Robert Windham, you have been found sufficiently virtuous, despite the fact you were an investment banker.”
“Red Cross donations, baby!” the ghost yelled.
“Yes, well,” Dad said dryly, “you may proceed to the afterlife.”
A door opened to the left of the dais. The snake demons hauled Robert Windham to his feet.
“Thank you!” he yelled, as the demons escorted him out. “And if you need any financial advice, Lord Osiris, I still believe in the long term viability of the market—”
The door shut behind him.
Disturber sniffed indignantly. “Horrible man.”
My father shrugged. “A modern soul who appreciated the ancient ways of Egypt. He couldn’t have been all bad.” Dad turned to us. “Children, this is Disturber, one of my advisors and gods of judgment.”
“Sorry?” I pretended not to have heard. “Did you say he’s disturbed?”
“Disturber is my name!” the god shouted angrily. “I judge those who are guilty of losing their temper!”
“Yes.” Despite my father’s weariness, his eyes sparkled with amusement. “That was Disturber’s traditional duty, although now that he’s my last minister, he helps me with all my cases. There used to be forty-two judgment gods for different crimes, you see, but—”
“Like Hot Foot and Fire-embracer,” Zia said.
Disturber gasped. “How do you know of them?”
“We saw them,” Zia said. “In the Fourth House of the Night.”
“You—saw—” Disturber almost dropped his scroll altogether. “Lord Osiris, we must save them immediately! My brethren—”
“We will discuss it,” Dad promised. “First, I want to hear what brings my children to the Duat.”
We took turns explaining: the rebel magicians and their secret alliance with Apophis, their impending attack on the First Nome, and our hope to find a new sort of execration spell that might stop Apophis for good.
Some of our news surprised and troubled our father—like the fact that many magicians had fled the First Nome, leaving it so poorly defended that we’d sent our initiates from Brooklyn House to help, and that Amos was flirting with the powers of Set.