Chapter Nine — SADIE

"So, what you're telling us," Carter said as he paced along the outside deck, "is that Setne is back, and he's collaborating with some unknown being, possibly a ghost or some Greek monster, and the demigods you saw at your work today were concerned about it?"

"That pretty much sums it all up, yeah," I replied from my seat at the table. Walt was next to me, Uncle Amos catty-cornered to me at the head of the table, and Zia on the opposite side to me, watching her husband with worried eyes.

"You know, wearing a hole into the deck isn't going to solve our problems," I noted as he turned around for the sixtieth time (not that I had been counting). "In fact, If you fall through, and land in the pool and Philip accidentally mistakes you for lunch, we're going to have an even bigger problem."

Though Carter glared at me, Zia seemed to share my sentiments. "She's right, Carter," my sister-in-law said. "All this worrying isn't helpful, or healthy."

"It's my job to worry," he countered, going around for the sixty-second time.

"Yes, well, you can do that job just fine from in this chair rather than over and over again on that strip of floor," his wife replied. Carter sighed, but finally obliged us and took a seat next to Zia and across from Walt.

"Technically, we don't really know if there is anything to worry about," Walt pointed out. I liked how he tried to be optimistic, but I disagreed, as Carter obviously did, and Zia and Amos didn't seem too convinced of my husband's side either.

"Sadie saw Setne in her dreams, Walt," Carter responded, stressing our great-uncle's name as much as he could. "He's never up to anything that we shouldn't worry about, especially since he's been quiet all these years, and now, this!"

"I just think you're overreacting," my husband argued. My brother stared at him, almost challengingly for a moment, before heaving a deep sigh.

"I know," he said, a near-miserable tone in his voice. "I know I probably am. It's just, like I said, he's quiet, and as soon as we discover a whole other pantheon, he's sneaking around with something that might be from that pantheon? And, you know I hated to bring in young kids like Shelby last time, but now I have my own kids to think about, as well as all the other kids of magicians...it's a lot. I want to be prepared, and better to be over rather than under, right?"

I glanced behind me to see the boys watching as Khufu and a few of his baboon friends played basketball. They waved their little arms and cheered, and I knew exactly what Carter meant. It's not like we didn't care about Julian and Felix and Shelby, the kids we had become like older siblings to, but now we were officially in the parent role, and that meant our protective feelings were so much more intense.

"Yes," Zia agreed, a soothing note in her voice. "That's true. But let's get all the facts before we go completely crazy with the over, alright?" Carter glanced at her, then nodded slowly.

"Alright," he said. He shook his head to clear it. "So what are the facts in this?"

"I would put my money on it being a Greek monster," Amos said, putting in his two cents for the first time since our discussion. "I don't believe there is an Egyptian goddess or other being matching Sadie's description – though, of course, a goddess may look however she pleases."

"Yeah, but I can't imagine why any one of them would want to look like such a hag," I responded, shivering as I remembered the woman's pupiless eyes and her ghastly half and half appearence.

"Well, at least we have some new friends who can help us deal with Greek monsters," Walt said. "And speaking of that, I came home for lunch real quick today, and there was a message on the answering machine, from Annabeth. She said she and Percy talked to her mother, the...the goddess Athena, and it seems like she'll vouch for our friendliness. So, hopefully, the rest of the Greco-Roman gods won't smite us." I sighed in relief while Carter groaned at Walt's word choice and Zia offered a small smile.

"Well, that is good news," she said. "Now all we need is for them to get back to us on what the woman might be." She paused for a moment. "Have we picked up any traces of Setne's magic or other indicators of his presence anywhere?" Carter and Amos shook their heads in unison.

"I haven't gotten any letters or calls indicating that," Carter said. He frowned. "I guess he's lying low still, like he's been all this time. I wonder why he's chosen now to plan something...?"

"Maybe we're not the only ones who've recently discovered other pantheons," I suggested. Everyone's heads swiveled towards me. "I mean, if this creature is Greek, or Roman, then maybe Setne just found her like we just found the demigods and that's why he's planning now."

"That does make sense," my husband said, tapping his chin in thought. "So I guess everything just boils down to whether the woman is Greek, and what sort of Greek thing she is."

"And what she might want in teaming up with Setne," Amos added.

"So we just have to wait for Piper to get back to us?" Carter asked.

"Or we could do research ourselves," I replied. "I mean, Greek mythology should be all over the Internet."

"I suppose it couldn't hurt," Zia said. She rose from the table and I followed suit. "Sadie and I will do some research," she declared, "and you three...well, Amos, you should make some calls to make sure Setne hasn't shown up anywhere; Carter, you look into setting up some protocol in case he does, like checking into the Nomes or something. And maybe ask Cleo to look through the First Nome archives to find something; and Walt...well, talk with Anubis and see if he knows anything. Alright?"

Carter grinned widely at his wife. "Aye, aye, ma'am," he replied cheerfully. She rolled her eyes but smiled at him; then I took her by the hand and dragged her over to our computer.

...

Our entering 'Greek mythology + half white half black' didn't help, mostly just giving us different renderings of Theseus and the Minotaur, and descriptions of satyrs and centaurs. I bit my lip and looked at Zia.

"Well, you said it was a woman," she said, staring at the screen. "So add that." I obliged and something new came up, a Wikipedia article about a goddess named Melinoe. I clicked on it and my sister-in-law and I read it together.

"Well," I said after we had finished, "this sounds the most promising." The article had described this Melinoe as the daughter of Persephone and – sickeningly enough – her own father, Zeus, when he disguised himself as his daughter's husband, his own brother, Hades (and I thought the Egyptian family tree was twisted). Melinoe was half white and half black, a goddess that dwelled in the Underworld and caused night terrors and insanity in mortals. Well, she had been terrifying.

"Then let's tell the boys," Zia replied. Just then my phone buzzed in my pocket. I took it out and looked at it; a new text message sat in my inbox, from Piper. At our mass meeting on Tuesday we had all exchanged cell numbers.

Found out what your monster is. Not good. Also, other things we need to talk about; meet us tomorrow at nine in front of Empire State Building.

I raised an eyebrow, then showed it to Zia. "Looks like we gotta tell them about this, too," I said. She nodded.

Th Empire State Building...I wonder what that had to do with anything...?