He took Sadie by the shoulders. “Sweetheart, I love you. And I’m sorry...I’m sorry for many things, but there’s no time now. If this works, I promise I’ll make everything better for all of us. Carter, you’re my brave man. You have to trust me. Remember, lock up Dr. Martin. Then stay out of this room!”
Chaining the curator’s door was easy. But as soon as we’d finished, we looked back the way we’d come and saw blue light streaming from the Egyptian gallery, as if our dad had installed a giant glowing aquarium.
Sadie locked eyes with me. “Honestly, do you have any idea what he’s up to?”
“None,” I said. “But he’s been acting strange lately. Thinking a lot about Mom. He keeps her picture...”
I didn’t want to say more. Fortunately Sadie nodded like she understood.
“What’s in his workbag?” she asked.
“I don’t know. He told me never to look.”
Sadie raised an eyebrow. “And you never did? God, that is so like you, Carter. You’re hopeless.”
I wanted to defend myself, but just then a tremor shook the floor.
Startled, Sadie grabbed my arm. “He told us to stay put. I suppose you’re going to follow that order too?”
Actually, that order was sounding pretty good to me, but Sadie sprinted down the hall, and after a moment’s hesitation, I ran after her.
When we reached the
entrance of the Egyptian gallery, we stopped dead in our tracks. Our dad stood in front of the Rosetta Stone with his back to us. A blue circle glowed on the floor around him, as if someone had switched on hidden neon tubes in the floor.
My dad had thrown off his overcoat. His workbag lay open at his feet, revealing a wooden box about two feet long, painted with Egyptian images.
“What’s he holding?” Sadie whispered to me. “Is that a boomerang?”
Sure enough, when Dad raised his hand, he was brandishing a curved white stick. It did look like a boomerang. But instead of throwing the stick, he touched it to the Rosetta Stone. Sadie caught her breath. Dad was writing on the stone. Wherever the boomerang made contact, glowing blue lines appeared on the granite. Hieroglyphs.
It made no sense. How could he write glowing words with a stick? But the image was bright and clear: ram’s horns above a box and an X.
“Open,” Sadie murmured. I stared at her, because it sounded like she had just translated the word, but that was impossible. I’d been hanging around Dad for years, and even I could read only a few hieroglyphs. They are seriously hard to learn.
Dad raised his arms. He chanted: “Wo-seer, i-ei.” And two more hieroglyphic symbols burned blue against the surface of the Rosetta Stone.
As stunned as I was, I recognized the first symbol. It was the name of the Egyptian god of the dead.
“Wo-seer,” I whispered. I’d never heard it pronounced that way, but I knew what it meant. “Osiris.”
“Osiris, come,” Sadie said, as if in a trance. Then her eyes widened. “No!” she shouted. “Dad, no!”
Our father turned in surprise. He started to say, “Children—” but it was too late. The ground rumbled. The blue light turned to searing white, and the Rosetta Stone exploded.
When I regained consciousness, the first thing I heard was laughter—horrible, gleeful laughter mixed with the blare of the museum’s security alarms.
I felt like I’d just been run over by a tractor. I sat up, dazed, and spit a piece of Rosetta Stone out of my mouth. The gallery was in ruins. Waves of fire rippled in pools along the floor. Giant statues had toppled. Sarcophagi had been knocked off their pedestals. Pieces of the Rosetta Stone had exploded outward with such force that they’d embedded themselves in the columns, the walls, the other exhibits.
Sadie was passed out next to me, but she looked unharmed. I shook her shoulder, and she grunted. “Ugh.”
In front of us, where the Rosetta Stone had been, stood a smoking, sheared-off pedestal. The floor was blackened in a starburst pattern, except for the glowing blue circle around our father.
He was facing our direction, but he didn’t seem to be looking at us. A bloody cut ran across his scalp. He gripped the boomerang tightly.
I didn’t understand what he was looking at. Then the horrible laughter echoed around the room again, and I realized it was coming from right in front of me.
Something stood between our father and us. At first, I could barely make it out—just a flicker of heat. But as I concentrated, it took on a vague form—the fiery outline of a man.