It was just another nome. Right? Well. Turns out we were extremely wrong. We got teleported to the Twenty-First nome by Chief Lector Kane to study under his nephew and Niece, Carter and Sadie Kane. He thought it would be good for us, seeinng as my brother was interested in studying the path of Orisis and I was still undecided. Yet, the lovely Chief Lector Kane must've decided that our first challenge at the Twenty-First nome, other wise known as the Brooklyn House was to have to climb up five different sets of stairs. We, possibly two of the laziest kids alive, managed to struggle up the stairs, sweating and panting. We reached the top of the abandoned building and collapsed.

{Alright, Fine. Geesh. I'll do that now}

I'm sure by now you're wondering several things. One of these things is probably, 'who in Ra's name is telling this story?' That would be I. Zahra Lansing, half-Egyptian, half-American(unfortunately). One other thing might be 'Who is we?' Well, We would consist of My idiot half-brother, Isaiah Herder {He just said he felt hurt. Whatever}, who is, unfortunately, all American and very annoying. Isaiah and I both have the same father, Ron Herder, an American scientist. My mother, Lilla Lansing, who is an descendant of Queen Cleopatra. Of course, if you listened to the Kane's recordings, you probably know that only Blood of the Pharaohs can perform magic of the gods. Well. . . . That's where Mrs. Herder comes in.

{Shut up Isaiah, I'm telling this story!}

Mrs. Herder, Isaiah's mother's, mother's, mother's, father's, father's, Ect. Ect. You know how it is, her great great great great great great great x500 or whatever's grandfather was the child of an Egyptian ruler. But the Herder's having been living in America since the 1900's, therefore they were as American as the next person on the street.

{Isiah is saying I should stop telling our lineage.}

I looked up as I heard the snapping of a crocodile mouth and shouted, jumping up as an albino Crocodile was speedily coming towards us.

"Back!" I shouted, grabbing a nearby stick and brandishing it at the animal, Isaiah yelped, jumping up and backing away, I was about to swing my stick at the crocodile's nose when a shout came from a now open door.

"Phillip!" I looked up at my savior as the crocodile made a hissing noise and backed away, before turning and lumbering off.

"Sorry about that," said the girl, walking closer to us. I pointed my stick at her, she chuckled.

"You two must be Zahra and Isaiah Lansing."

"Urm. I'm a Herder. Please . . . Don't associate me with that half of the family," Isaiah piped up, motioning at me when he said "that half".

"Isaiah, have you ever wondered how much force it takes to break a solid stick?" I asked.

"I mean, yeah, why?"

"Would you like to find out?" I held up the stick, as if to hit my brother over the head with it. Sadie was just laughing.

"You two are just like my brother and I. So, let me get this right, Zahra Lansing, and Isaiah . . . Herder?"

"Yep!" Isaiah said cheerfully. Sadie chuckled.

"If you can resist the temptation of hitting your brother over the head, I'll show you two to your rooms." Sadie turned and walked into the house, Isaiah and I stopped fighting, though Isaiah did steal the stick and threw it away. I glared at him, sticking a tongue out at him, and starting a miniature cat fight. Sadie coughed, having stopped in front of two doors. We paused, hands still in the air.

"Very professional, well trained, very serious," she said in a mocking tone, that I immediately recognized as Chief Lector Kane. I ducked my head, feeling slightly ashamed.

"Sorry," I said, Isaiah giggled.

"These will be your rooms," Sadie said, motioning to the two doors, "you can fight between the two. Or whatever, but just no magic." She gave me a pointed look. Obviously she sensed something off about me.

"Um, yeah, we don't have like any clothes, or anything," Isaiah said.

"That's fine, you'll be provided with some," Sadie said. "When you're done just come down to the lounge, I'll take you to talk to Carter, assuming you don't accidentally crash into him first."

She turned and walked away without a goodbye. When I turned to Isaiah he was already in a room, shutting it behind him. I shook my head, walking into the other room. I looked around the room. As soon as I stepped in things started materializing in the room. The record player from my room and a stack of records. My headphones and iPod also appeared on the bedstand where I always kept them and notebooks appeared also. These were all the things that had been set to be sent over whenever we got to our nome. I walked over to the bed and sat down, kicking off my high top converse and flopping back on the bed.

Well this is nice. said a voice in my head that had been strangely silent since we first arrived at the first nome.

Isaiah here! I'm taking over, since the internal argument that goes on next is Sooooo boring. {Ehehehehe. She's trying to punch me.}

Much as what happened with Zahra, after I ran into my room, things started appearing. Unlike the nerd next door, a regular radio with a stereo system appeared, followed by the handheld gaming console I had, and my headphones. I ventured around, going in and out of the walking closet several times to make sure I wasn't imagining things.

"Weeiirdddd" I said, going and flopping on the bed, I frowned at the strange headrest they had for a pillow, but put my head on it anyway, it definitely was not comfortable, I shoved it off the bed. That's when I noticed two things. One, there was a balcony, which, admittedly, was extremely cool. Two, there was a door on the wall between our rooms. I smirked, wondering what Zhara was doing and sneaked over, pulling it open and being greeted with another door. I frowned and pushed that door open.

"Boo!" I shouted. Zhara screamed and threw the headrest at me, I ducked under it, grinning widely at my sister, who had been sleeping, and ducked back, slamming the doors behind me, I quickly locked mine and heard pounding on it.

{I have recently been informed that Zhara wasn't sleeping .. . But do I believe that? No. Not really.}

I chuckled, going and getting my handheld console. 15 minutes later there was a knock on the outside door.

"If you're ready we should go meet Carter," said the voice.

"Yeah, one moment," I answered, setting down my console and sitting up. I carefully got off the bed and walked over to the door, yawning slightly. I stepped out the door and was met with a cup of water. There was laughing as Zhara went tearing down the hall, quickly followed by a very, very angry me.

"YOU LITTLE!" I shouted, after her, dashing the water out of his eyes.

"Have to catch me punk!" She shouted, turning and tearing down a set of stairs, I followed suit, but instead I jumped and slid down the stair banister, Zhara still reached the bottom first. She spun the opposite direction then I was on and continued to run away, I followed her and we tore through a hallway, upsetting another teenager who had been carrying books, causing her to drop every single book. Zhara crossed her arms in front of her face as she crashed through a door, luckily it was a swinging door and she easily passed through, I pushed through the door and saw my sister tearing past a couple teenagers sitting on a couch, playing a form of board game. I ran past them, throwing the board pieces everywhere. They shouted at us, Zhara crashed into a door, this one, however, had a latch. She stopped, fiddling with the latch. That gave me time to catch up. As soon as she got the latch I was only four feet away, she burst in, running into it, trying to close the door behind her, I shoved it open, tackling her, there was a scream as we rolled down a few stairs. I pinned her down as we stopped in front of a table. Zahra was still grinning at me, I was dripping from the water she threw on me, she was a total mess from the tussle we had.

"OUT!" A male voice shouted, someone grabbed my shirt, pulling me off my sister, another person picked her up, and we were shoved outside, the door slammed behind us. Zahra was laughing, I however, was still upset. It was half a minute before the door opened and then closed again, everyone in the immediate area was watching them.

"You two better prove that you're worth keeping, or I'll have both of you shipped back to Amos," the voice from earlier said. We turned, I saw Zahra's jaw drop as she saw the boy in front of her. His arms were crossed and a fire burned in his eyes.

A/N: That was fun! Like I said. I own only Zahra and Isiah. Everything else belongs to Rick Riordan or is just simple Egyptain mythology.