Plus, I was still annoyed with Sadie for the comments she’d made at the museum in New York—how I had it so good traveling the world with Dad. She had no idea how often I wanted to complain about the constant traveling, how many days I wished I didn’t have to get on a plane and could just be like a normal kid going to school and making friends. But I couldn’t complain. You always have to look impeccable, Dad had told me. And he didn’t just mean my clothes. He meant my attitude. With Mom gone, I was all he had. Dad needed me to be strong. Most days, I didn’t mind. I loved my dad. But it was also hard.
Sadie didn’t understand that. She had it easy. And now she seemed to be getting all the attention, as if she were the special one. It wasn’t fair.
Then I heard Dad’s voice in my head: “Fairness means everyone gets what they need. And the only way to get what you need is to make it happen yourself.”
I don’t know what got into me, but I drew my sword and marched across the plank. It was like my legs were working by themselves, not waiting for my brain. Part of me thought: This is a really bad idea. But part of me answered: No, we do not fear this. And the voice didn’t sound like mine.
“Carter!” Sadie cried.
I kept walking. I tried not to look down at the yawning void under my feet, but the sheer size of the chasm made me dizzy. I felt like one of those gyroscope toys, spinning and wobbling as I crossed the narrow plank.
As I got closer to the opposite side, the doorway between the two statues began to glow, like a curtain of red light.
I took a deep breath. Maybe the red light was a portal, like the gate of sand. If I just charged through fast enough...
Then the first dagger shot out of the tunnel.
My sword was in motion before I realized it. The dagger should’ve impaled me in the chest, but somehow I deflected it with my blade and sent it sailing into the abyss. Two more daggers shot out of the tunnel. I’d never had the best reflexes, but now they sped up. I ducked one dagger and hooked the other with the curved blade of my sword, turned the dagger and flung it back into the tunnel. How the heck did I do that?
I advanced to the end of the plank and slashed through the red light, which flickered and died. I waited for the statues to come alive, but nothing happened. The only sound was a dagger clattering against the rocks in the chasm far below.
The doorway began to glow again. The red light coalesced into a strange form: a five-foot-tall bird with a man’s head. I raised my sword, but Zia yelled, “Carter, no!”
The bird creature folded his wings. His eyes, lined with kohl, narrowed as they studied me. A black ornamental wig glistened on his head, and his face was etched with wrinkles. One of those fake braided pharaoh beards was stuck on his chin like a backward ponytail. He didn’t look hostile, except for the red flickering light all around him, and the fact that from the neck down he was the world’s largest killer turkey.
Then a chilling thought occurred to me: This was a bird with a human head, the same form I’d imagined taking when I slept in Amos’s house, when my soul left my body and flew to Phoenix. I had no idea what that meant, but it scared me.
The bird creature scratched at the stone floor. Then, unexpectedly, he smiled.
“Pari, niswa nafeer,” he told me, or at least that’s what it sounded like.
Zia gasped. She and Sadie were standing behind me now, their faces pale. Apparently they’d managed to cross the chasm without my noticing.
Finally Zia seemed to collect herself. She bowed to the bird creature. Sadie followed her example.
The creature winked at me, as if we’d just shared a joke. Then he vanished. The red light faded. The statues retracted their arms, uncrossing their spears from the entrance.
“That’s it?” I asked. “What did the turkey say?”
Zia looked at me with something like fear. “That was not a turkey, Carter. That was a ba.”
I’d heard my dad use that word before, but I couldn’t place it. “Another monster?”
“A human soul,” Zia said. “In this case, a spirit of the dead. A magician from ancient times, come back to serve as a guardian. They watch the entrances of the House.”
She studied my face as if I’d just developed some terrible rash.
“What?” I demanded. “Why are you looking at me that way?”
“Nothing,” she said. “We must hurry.”
She squeezed by me on the ledge and disappeared into the tunnel.
Sadie was staring at me too.
“All right,” I said. “What did the bird guy say? You understood it?”
She nodded uneasily. “He mistook you for someone else. He must have bad eyesight.”