"D" for Demigod
Disclaimer: I do not own The Kane Chronicles or The Heroes of Olympus
Chapter IV: Honestly, It Was About Time Someone Went Mad
Sadie was never very good at waiting. Unlike her dearest brother Carter, she wasn't one to sit and think about what's to come and plan (really, what was the point when things so often went wrong anyway?). She wasn't one to give up easily either.
Still.
Sadie was tired—going to school, training magicians, and dealing with magic politics all day tend to do that to a person—and maybe she could take a little break. Relax, free her mind from impending doom, and all that for once in her life.
She laid on the ground, hands behind her head and looking up at an impressively boring cement ceiling. Somewhere to her left, Drew was cursing the world and her life and then everyone else's lives. Lacy was still pacing.
Sadie wasn't keeping count, but she has the feeling it's been a good while since Jaiden had locked them all up inside the warehouse. Maybe thirty minutes?
"You demigods make everything so complicated," Sadie complained suddenly, lazily. "I have enough trouble keeping just the Egyptian stuff in my head—why do I bloody need to worry about the Greeks too?"
"Anyone introduced you to the Romans yet?" Drew asked drily.
They technically weren't on speaking terms, but jabs didn't count,
Sadie blinked. "Afraid not. Should I be expecting a visit? Because I'm ready to run off to the First Nome at a moment's notice. I'm sure my uncle will understand."
Drew shrugged. She swung her rope (or whatever it was Sadie's staff had turned into) in lazy circles, glaring at it like it had done some serious crimes against Drew. "Probably not. They're on the West Coast, and their camp is a lot better than ours anyway."
"That's not true…" Lacy said.
"Really? They have a New Rome. In case you haven't noticed, we don't have a "New Greece" for our older campers—no, they have to live in the mortal world after that, don't they? Camp Half-Blood has crud-all for anyone over eighteen. Even Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase are jumping ship."
Speaking of Annabeth, Sadie had spammed texts to her friend—most of them being along the lines of CRAZY DEMIGOD/MAGICIAN ENDING THE WORLD (AGAIN), SEND HELP ASAP PLZ AND THANK U. None of Sadie's texts had even gotten delivered, that stupid red exclamation mark bubble popping up over and over again. Sadie had to assume Jaiden had magicked her service away then. Smart bastard— he knew where it hurt.
"Drew.."
"Whatever." Drew ignored Lacy and began examining her nails for any permanent damage. She sneered, "What about magicians? Live in suitcases? Go to magic school?"
"Harry Potter is about as accurate as a cheese-elemental's aim," Sadie said, "No, magicians live and train in nomes—there's three-hundred-and-sixty of them, all over the world. They, uh...vary in size and quality."
She decided not to mention the three-hundredth or three-hundred-and-sixtieth nomes, both of which were punishment wards for magician criminals. Or the fifty-first nome in Dallas, Texas, which had been burned to ashes by Apophis. Or the seventy-third one in Los Vegas, which was...of an interesting nature (and where Sadie had learned that gambling, drinking, adults, and magic do not mix and she shall never try illusion magic on herself ever again).
"How do you visit them?" Lacy asked. "You said earlier, that you'd run to the First Nome. It's not near here, right?"
Sadie propped herself up and frowned. "No. It's in Cairo. We usually travel through portals."
"Can you make one here?"
Sadie then remembered that the world was still ending and she was still stuck in a warehouse with Drew Tanaka.
She shook her head. "No, I need a magical artifact for that. And we'd have to wait for the right time, too." Sadie sighed. "As for the Du'at—well, if we wanted to travel on the River of Night, we'd need a river first."
Sadie, for one, didn't see any rivers in the warehouse. Perhaps she should be more glad than upset over that one.
Lacy bowed her head, looking disappointed.
"Great, so we're stuck here 'till the end of time?" Drew said. "Or whenever Jaiden ends the world or whatever and invites us to his new kingdom?"
"Hey, I don't see you helping," Sadie told her. "Got any ideas? I'd love to hear them."
Drew glared. She dropped her gaze and said, "hmph".
"And what do you know about this Jaiden anyway?" Sadie asked, turning on the older girl. "He knows you, I know that at least."
"...It's none of your business, Kane."
"What? What big secret could possibly be more important than the end of the world? Stop kidding around, Tanaka. This isn't the school dance."
Drew sneered. "Speaking of school dances...that boy you were with, have you informed poor Walt yet?"
"Drew!" Lacy pleaded.
Sadie remembered that dance, remembered Anubis crashing the dance in his human-god form (not the jackal one or the jacket-headed one) and the terrible news she'd received right after. She scowled. "If you must know, Anubis and Walt get along fabulously. In fact, they share a body now."
Drew stared, blinking slow blinks. "What?"
"It's complicated. Stop deflecting and talk about Jaiden already." Sadie was not describing her roller-coaster of a love life to Drew Tanaka. Nope, not happening.
Lacy frowned, "Well, I heard—"
"Fine!" Drew snapped. "We grew up in the same orphanage. That's all. I guess you can call us former childhood friends or whatever."
"Yeah, he doesn't seem to like you that much, does he?"
"Shut up. He doesn't like most people, anyway." Drew sniffed. "He's one of those people who think they can fix the world, has the worst ego." Drew blew her hair out of her face and added as an afterthought, "...used to cry a lot."
"Brilliant!" Sadie said sarcastically. "That told me absolutely nothing!"
"What do you want from me, Kane? Seriously, your attitude makes me sick. 'Look at me~ perfect British girl with perfect life~'—"
"I'm sorry, what? My life is as far from perfect as—"
"Really, because from what I've seen—"
"Gods of Egypt, you're jealous! Ha, Drew Tanaka is jea—"
"For fu—"
"SHUT UP—BOTH OF YOU!" Lacy screamed suddenly. She shut her mouth, turning red.
Drew and Sadie froze and snapped their heads to attention.
Drew lowered her gaze and muttered something that sounded suspiciously like an apology.
Sadie felt her own face go red—with shame. Like gran had yelled at her for touching the food before supper and made her feel childish, and she knew she'd messed up somehow.
"Um..s-sorry," Lacy stammered. "Anyway, I was thinking, uh...this Lake of the Night thing, the Du'at and everything and magic compartments...can we use those?"
"I told you—" Sadie began. She shook her head. "Besides, I'd rather not risk all our lives on experimental stuff or going through the Land of the Dead. We might never find our way out, even if my dad happens to play host to Osiris."
For one, the gods weren't even supposed to be interacting with mortals anymore and Sadie had already pulled in way too many favors.
"It's better than sitting here, waiting for the spell to wear off or something, right?" Lacy pleaded. "What else can we do?"
"Sit here and wait?" Drew asked drily. "I'm not putting my life on the line for Jaiden—"
"You're not putting your life on the line for Jaiden," Sadie snapped, "You're putting it on the line for the world."
"And what has the world ever done for me?" Drew snarled.
"Fine, then stay here. Lacy, you're right. I'll try something." Sadie got on her feet and retrieved her staff and wand from the Du'at.
"You only say I'm right because Drew's being stuck-up," Sadie heard Lacy mutter under her breath. Sadie winced. She pretended she didn't hear anything and focused on the Du'at, on seeing into the Du'at. She saw...well, the usual. The hyper-neon colors, the ground—translucent and a never-ending cavern of layers, the air shimmering with magic. Hieroglyphs floated around Sadie. Lacy and Drew were surrounded by Greek letters and words. Surrounding the mansion though, were Jaiden's angry red hieroglyphs. They seemed to be breaking apart the Du'at, not just stopping it. Sadie had never seen anything like it before.
Sadie stepped forward with uncertainty. The Du'at didn't make her nauseous and reel as much as most people—she had a certain affinity with it. Still, that didn't make it any less loopy and if she wasn't careful...well, the effects wouldn't be pretty.
"If the barrier is in the mortal world and the Du'at like you said," Lacy was saying, "It could be a little more fragile in some places, right? And what if you decide to look at it another way, like—"
"Outside," Sadie breathed. "That's the trick. That's brilliant, Lacy. That's how Jaiden makes it so strong. He reversed the barrier. I should have known, he used a protection spell, Lacy. Instead of keeping things out—"
"—he keeps them in," Lacy finished for Sadie. Lacy and Sadie grinned at each other.
"Yeah, one problem." Drew raised a hand. "We're all on the inside?"
Sadie's grin grew wider. "No. Not all of us. See, on the way here I used a summon…" Her enthusiasm recharged, Sadie ran to the door. She screamed, "FREAK!"
"Do you want to get arrested?!" Drew hissed in Sadie's ear.
"Shhhh. Trust me, I know what I'm doing."
"I wouldn't trust you with my name."
Sadie waved her hand and stepped away from the door. "Move back, everyone…"
Drew started stepping back hesitantly.
Then the door flew off its hinges and a large, looming beast burst through.
"Freak!" Sadie hugged the giant—approximately double the size of a lion—griffin's necks. "Hope Carter won't mind me borrowing you too much."
"Freak!" said Freak.
"Carter names his griffin Freak?" Lacy asked, stepping away from the beast.
"Yes, well, he's not very creative," Sadie mused.
Drew had tip-toed to the other side of the room. "Somehow after nearly getting murdered by a Sphinx," she said, clamoring to the wall, "I'm not very excited to meet another giant flying lion mutant."
"Come on, Freak's a friendly monster," Sadie said, giving Drew a sharp smile.
"Freak!" Freak agreed, rearing on his hind legs and making a dent in the ceiling.
That didn't seem to reassure Drew too much.
"Now come on," Sadie said, climbing onto the boat tied behind Freak (Freak's wings were too dangerous for anyone to ride on his back). "Freak can travel through the Du'at and we've already wasted enough time—" Sadie nodded at Lacy "so we'd better hurry up."
"He's soft…" Lacy said, petting Freak's feathers. Freak hummed in pleasure.
Sadie helped Lacy onto the boat. "Drew," Sadie warned.
"Fine." Drew crossed her arms and inched towards the griffin.
Long story short, she managed to get on the boat with a little more coaxing.
"To Governor's Island," Sadie told Freak. Freak cawed in acknowledgment and began running. Then his wings began flapping and flapping, until it was just a blur—like a hummingbird, if hummingbird wings could tear through metal like it was nothing.
Sadie felt the atmosphere around then began to change, becoming more...natural and heavy.
Freak was cutting into the Du'at.
Lacy leaned over the side of the boat, a hand clenched to the boat ridge and eyes wide with wonder.
Drew stayed in the middle, stoutly refusing to look anywhere but at the bottom of the boat. She shivered and hugged herself tighter.
Lacy turned to Sadie. "So—"
"Hello!"
"Look out!" Sadie jumped onto her feet—but she was too late.
The Sphinx streaked out of nowhere, its claws outstretched. It flew over the boat and—
—grabbed Lacy. Just as quickly, it began flying off.
"Sadie!"
"A'max!" Sadie yelled, pointing. She tried to focus her magical energy into her finger—tried to focus without a wand and a staff.
She collapsed on the spot, her body bursting at the seems. "Ghh!"
"Stop!" Drew yelled, eyes blazing. "Stop!"
The Sphinx staggered—then hieroglyphs flickered into existence around it and it reorientated itself—it held onto Lacy and soared away.
"Bloody hell!" Sadie pulled herself back up and ran to the edge of the boat. She summoned her staff and wand. "Tas! Ha-di!"
Her magic did nothing. The Sphinx was too far away.
Sadie fell again. She felt her body burn. "No…"
Drew began cursing.
Lacy had vanished.
Next Chapter: We Chart a Way to Not Die
