Chapter 8:
Kara
"Now, can anybody tell me the relationship between the gods Anubis and Horus?" Mr. Winkler asked the class. My hand shot straight into the air. "Ah, Kara!"
"They're half brothers," I started. "They both share the father Osiris; Horus' mother is Isis whilst Anubis' mother was said to be in love with Osiris but knew he was faithful to his wife. One legend says that she got him drunk and then seduced him, resulting in the birth of Anubis. Another legend claims that she disguised herself as Isis, in an attempt to seduce Osiris without him knowing her identity." I said.
"10 points to Gryffindor Hermione..." Eddie said from beside our table. The class laughed as I blushed.
"Yes, very funny Edison, that's correct Kara." Mr. Winkler said. I smiled inwardly, proud of myself for already knowing the lesson by heart.
I turned to stick my tongue out at Eddie and noticed Fabian and Nina looking at me worriedly.
"What?" I whispered to Nina.
"Nothing!" she said quickly, pretending to write something down in her notebook. I couldn't comprehend why everybody at this school seemed so damn mysterious. I looked at Mick with a questioning look, but he just shrugged.
"I don't know anything more than you do." he said reassuringly.
Brushing it off, I turned and continued paying attention to the lesson.
The rest of the day flew by like a breeze, and Mick was leading me to the drama theatre for the last class of the day- drama.
I entered the theatre and went to sit down next to Amber on the couch.
"Hey." I said, putting my bag down next to me.
"Hey Kara!" she replied enthusiastically. "Omg, I had no idea you were super smart! This morning in history I was like "wow, she really knows her stuff"! I think you're gonna do awesome in history because Egypt is like, all we ever talk about. Mind you, it's mine, Nina's, and Fabian's best subject as well... Probably because of the cup and whoops!" she said. What? Amber was still a creature of mystery to me- she didn't make much sense. I just sat there looking at her with a confused look on my face.
"Um..." she said. "We... Uh... Well... Last year we kinda... Um..."
"Goof afternoon class!" she was interrupted by Mr. Winkler starting the class. She let out a sigh of relief as he continued. "Today, we're going to do something fun. In fact, we'll be doing this for the next couple weeks as a new unit." he said.
"Well, what are we doing?" Mara asked eagerly.
"Musical Theatre!" he replied. There were mixed emotions within the room. Patricia, Jerome, Mick, and Eddie groaned, disappointment clearly showing on their faces, whereas Fabian, Nina, Joy, and Alfie looked excited, and Amber was hopping up and down squealing. Mara, like me, wore a small smile, hiding her true feelings on the unit. Back in America I learned that musical theatre can go one of two ways- either everybody is enthusiastic and having a good time, or some people want to have fun but can't because other people are being major jerks.
"So here's what's going to happen today," Mr Winkler continued. "Today, we're going to get into groups and pick a musical to research. You will study the script, characters, and lyrics and then explain the theme in a paragraph. Once you have completed the written portion, your group will perform a number from that musical complete with choreography and vocals. To start off today's lesson good and simple, I want everyone to list their favourite musical. I'll give you five minutes, and then we're going to go around the room and share." he said. Everybody's face fell and Amber stopped jumping.
"You mean we have to sing? In front of the class?" Nina asked.
"Yes!" he replied enthusiastically. "But don't worry, you'll all be fine. You won't be marked on the quality of your voice." I looked around the room and saw that nobody seemed too enthused about the assignment. "All right then, now get your brains in action and pick your favorite musical!"
The next five minutes were filled with students glancing at each other questioningly and quickly googling musicals on their smart phones. I laughed to myself as I resorted to the archive of musicals in my head. In my life I had encountered many people who thought that I was some pushover, try hard freak, but the truth was that I've never really exceeded in anything, so I'd taken it upon myself to know a little bit of everything. It had helped me a lot, not only with my self confidence, but also with school assignments as well as day to day situations.
"All right everyone!" Mr. Winkler called when our brainstorming time was over. "Time to see what you've got! Any volunteers to start?" He looked around the room and seeing as no one was volunteering, called upon Patricia. "Okay then, you start Patricia."
"What am I supposed to do?" she asked.
"Just burst out into song Trixie!" Jerome yelled, stifling a laugh.
"Oh, shut up Slimeball!" she retorted while Jason sent him a warning glance.
"All you have to do is name a musical that you like, that's it." He said reassuringly.
"Oh," she said, appearing to be pleased with the simplicity. "I like American Idiot then."
"Oh! I love that one!" I exclaimed, earning me some looks. Amber looked confused as she spoke up.
"Why would you like a musical that calls Americans idiots?" She asked.
"It's by Green Day," I said sheepishly. "They're one of my favorite bands. The musical is based off all of their songs." Patricia nodded and Amber let out an "ooh".
"Okay, you next Alfie."
"Book of Mormon!" He shouted, high fiveing Jerome. I rolled my eyes, of course they'd like that one. We continued on around the circle as people named their favorite musicals. There was Wicked, The Lion King, Phantom of the Opera, Mamma Mia, West Side Story, Xanadu, and so on until finally it was my turn.
"I really like 'Chicago' and '9 to 5'," I said. Two musicals that hadn't been mentioned by the class. I only knew them because of my musical theatre classes, but they were still my favorite. Mr. Winkler smiled and continued on with the lesson.
"Great, now I'd like you all to get into groups of five for your project." He informed us. We all got into our groups as he continued, assigning each group a different musical to study. I was in a group with Mick, Amber, Alfie, and Joy and the musical Winkler had assigned to us was "Miss Saigon". I wasn't too disappointed, as it was another musical that I enjoyed, but the rest of my group seemed kind of put down.
"What's wrong with Miss Saigon?" I asked them as they exchanged irritated looks.
"We've never even heard of if," Joy sighed, the rest of the group nodding in agreement. "Why couldn't we have had something easy like a Disney movie or something?" I laughed.
"Don't worry, Miss Saigon is a great musical, and I'm sure that even though you don't think you know it, you've actually heard a couple of the songs from it." I told them.
"Like what?" Mick asked with a blank expression.
"Well... There's 'The Heat is On in Saigon'," I said before singing a small part of the chorus. "And there's 'Now That I've Seen Her' which is a pretty popular one." I continued to sing an excerpt from that song as well, as well as a bit of a few other ones, watching as my group members' faces started to dawn in recognition.
"Oh yeah, I think I've heard a couple of those." Joy said, the others in the group nodding as well.
"Yeah," Alfie said. "I think they played that first one at a school dance I went to at one of my last schools." I smiled.
"See? This won't be too hard!" I claimed optimistically.
"You have a really nice voice by the way." Joy told me and the rest of the group voiced their agreement, causing me to blush.
"Thanks guys..." I replied shyly, hiding me face behind my hair. As Amber was about to say something else, the bell rang signally the end of the school day. Getting up, we went and grabbed our bags before heading home.
We all filed out of the classroom and I started down the hall behind Mick. I was about to call his name and try to start up a conversation when someone grabbed my shoulder from behind.
"What the- oh, hi Nina!"
"Hey, sorry if I scared you!" she said with an apologetic smile.
"Ah, it's okay, I get scared easily." I replied, momentarily thinking back to the figure in my head. I shook it off before addressing Nina. "What's up?"
"I was wondering, all the books you have on Egypt, where did you get them?" she asked. I opened my mouth to respond, but upon doing so, realized I had no answer.
"I'm not sure... I've always had them. My mom told me that they belonged to my grandfather or something..." I told her truthfully. Now that I was thinking about it, I realized that I'd always had my books, they were a part of the collection on our big bookcase that we kept in the basement. My parents let me keep the Egyptology books when I expressed interest in them.
"Oh..." Nina said. She looked disappointed. Instinct told me to apologize, but logic told me that would be stupid as I didn't do anything, so I just awkwardly stood there for a bit.
"Why?" I finally asked, breaking the silence.
"Oh, just curious! Thank you!" she said before running off to Fabian. She whispered something in his ear and they both looked at me, making me feel really uncomfortable. I knew Nina and Fabian were super nice, but it just felt like they were saying mean things about me. I frowned, wondering if this school was going to be the same as all the other ones.
"Hey!" Mick said, appearing beside me.
"Hey..." I replied halfheartedly, not showing any surprise at his sudden appearance.
"What's wrong?" he asked before following my gaze. He also noticed Fabian and Nina talking and continuously throwing me glances. I sighed.
"They're talking about me..." I whispered sadly.
"I can see that... I wonder why? You didn't slip cabbage in Nina's shoes did you?" he asked, and I just had to laugh.
"Why on earth would I put cabbage in somebody's shoes?" I questioned.
"It was just a question." he replied, smiling. "Besides, it made you laugh didn't it?"
"Mick, I swear, you are one of the strangest people I've ever met. Which is saying something, as I come from the state that invented deep fried food."
"What does deep fried food have to do with anything?" he asked with confusion.
"If you walked into my house and I was dunking a pig in oil, would you not think I was insane?" I offered. He thought about that for a minute.
"Ah," he said finally. "But I already knew you were insane."
"Mick!" I exclaimed, slapping his arm. He just laughed and we continued arguing about how weird we were until we reached the house.
"I'm not weird, I'm gifted." I said before opening the door and rushing inside.
"No, I'm pretty sure you're just weird." he countered.
"Gifted!" I said, slipping off my jacket and heading down the hallway.
"Weird!"
"Gifted!" I said again as we walked into the common room. When we entered, I saw Nina and Fabian whispering with Amber, Alfie, and Patricia. They all looked up at me and stopped talking immediately. My face dropped slightly and I sighed. I should have known this kind of thing would happen, it always did. I should have gotten the hint by that point that obviously nobody liked me.
I turned on my heel and stomped out of the room. I had to fight back tears on my way up the stairs, but I let them fall when I got to my room. I sat on the bed and started to think (and anyone who knows me knows that this is very bad). Why did I think being in a different country would change things? I was still the odd, geeky, ugly, untalented, stupid loser that I was back in America. But why did it bug me so much more this time? Probably because this time, the whispers came from the people that I was sure were actually my friends.
Fabian
"Fabian!" Nina called, running up behind me.
"What's up?" I asked, grabbing her hand.
"I just asked Kara where she got her books." she said.
"And?" I questioned excitedly.
"She said that she's had them for as long as she can remember, but that her mom said they were from her grandfather or something, but she wasn't entirely sure." I thought for a moment. So if she had them all her life, and she wasn't sure exactly where they came from, they could have been hand-me-downs from Robert Frobisher-Smythe.
I turned to glance at Kara and saw that she was watching us, a hurt expression on her face.
"She thinks we're talking about her in a mean way.." I said to Nina.
"Really?" she asked, turning her head. "Well crap. What are we supposed to say? Yeah, we're talking about you, but don't worry we're only whispering about the possibility that you could be linked to an ancient mystery that could put your life in danger? That'd go over real well..." she grumbled.
"Well, let's just hope that she trusts our kindness," I sighed. "Because I still don't think we should tell her about the mystery. We still aren't 100% sure that it's her we need. Her last name and the books could just be a coincidence." I said.
"Okay," she replied. "But I still think we should tell the others and see what they think."
"Fair enough."
We kept walking until we reached the house. Once inside, we found all the other Sibunas as well as Eddie in the common room. We figured there was no point in kicking Eddie out being that he already knew about Sibuna but just didn't necessarily care.
"Guys," Nina said. Everyone looked up at her from their spots on the floor. They were playing some hand game of Ambers (except for Eddie who was just watching). "We think we've figured out the part about the cousin's daughter." Everybody's eyes widened with excitement, except for Eddie who just walked away. Nina and I sat down before explaining.
"We think it's Kara." she said. This was met with gasps, "no"s, and "what?"s. Nina waited for everyone to calm down before explaining everything she told me earlier, from the last name thing right down to the books.
"But," I added when she was finished. "We don't think we should tell her yet, in case it is just a coincidence." To which everybody nodded except for Alfie.
"I don't know guys," he said. "I still think we should tell her, and now we have even more reason to! The riddle even said, we need her help to continue. Maybe she knows something?"
"That is, if it is her!" Patricia said. Just then, I noticed Kara and Mick walking in the room. Alfie was starting to say something but quickly stopped when he spotted Kara. Unfortunately, she had heard our voices before she came in, so she knew we were talking. Then our abrupt stop when we saw her gave her all the reason to believe we were talking about her. Her face turned an angry shade of red before she turned on her heel and stormed out of the room. I let out an agrovated sigh before Mick started yelling at us.
"You guys and your stupid secrets!" he shouted. "Can't you see that you're upsetting her? You're the first real friends she's had and you keep talking about her behind her back! Knock it off before you really hurt her!" he finished, dashing out of the room behind Kara.
"Tell her." Amber said, breaking the silence that had formed after Mick's speech.
"Should we?" Nina asked skeptically.
"She thinks we're talking badly about her, it's only fair we tell her the truth." Patricia said. "Even if she isn't the cousin's daughter, it would be better if she knew. Besides, Alfie's right, her knowledge of Egypt could help us out."
"Maybe we should tell Mick too..." Amber said.
"I don't know Amber," I replied. "I still don't think we should tell either of them." She stood up and walked towards the door.
"I'm telling her right now, and you aren't stopping me," she said. "Kara is now one of my BAFs, and I don't want her to think I hate her. She is the cousin's daughter because there is never any coincidences in this house!" She quickly left before anyone could stop her.
"Guess the cat's out of the bag," Nina sighed. "Come on, let's go help her." We all got up and followed Amber upstairs to her room. She knocked before letting herself in, the rest of us following. Kara was sitting on her bed with her face buried in Mick's shoulder; it was obvious that she had been crying.
"Heeeey BAF!" Amber said, stretching out the e. Kara didn't look up and Mick just glared at her. "We have something we kinda have to tell you!" Mick's face softened and he nudged Kara, whispering something in her ear. She nodded and Mick stood up and left the room.
"What do you want?" she asked, her voice hoarse, but her face clear of tears.
"We were only talking about you because we were debating whether or not to tell you about this" I said.
"Thing is," Amber started. "This house is a wee bit special!" Kara looked at Amber as though she were on drugs.
"Remember when you told me that you thought there was something weird about this house?" Nina clarified and Kara nodded. "Well, you were right. It holds loads of secrets and ancient mysteries." she looked at us like we were crazy. Nina sighed and sat down next to her, pulling out her locket.
"The eye of Horus?" Kara asked. My eyes widened in shock. How did she possibly know what it was?
"Y-yes..." Nina stuttered. "H-How did you know?"
"It is the symbol of protection and sacrifice. Legend states that when Horus was fighting Seth for the throne after Osiris' death, Seth gouged his eye out. Horus offered it to his dead father in an attempt to revive him. It brought him back as a god, who watched over Horus as he ruled Egypt." she stated. "But it looks a little different than the one in the legend... It's missing a lot."
"Okay, even we didn't know that," Amber said. "Told you telling her was a good idea."
Nina nodded and then went on to explain the events of the past two years as Kara listened intently.
"Senkhara?" she interrupted as soon as Nina mentioned her. "As in the forgotten ruler? The murderer of King Tut? You met her?"
"We did more than meet her..." Patricia murmured. Kara looked at her, shock and fear in her expression.
"What do you mean?" she asked.
"She made Patricia mute, Amber old, Alfie into a baby, and me forget everything. She also branded us all with the mark of Anubis and said she would kill us all if we didn't find the mask." I explained.
"Oh my god..." she said. "I can see why you tried not to tell anyone! How did you get rid of her?"
"When we found the mask, Rufus put it on but it plunged him and Senkhara into hell."
"Sounds... Eventful, but why are you still keeping secrets? Aren't the mysteries over?" she asked.
"Actually... A new one is just getting started..." Amber said as Nina went and grabbed her box of things from Sarah.
"You may recognize this," Nina said, pulling out the papyrus. Kara screamed and jumped up from the bed, scurrying across the room as if to get as far from it as possible.
"The papyrus!" she squeaked. Nina nodded. "That was supposed to only be a dream!"
"And this came with it" she said, pulling out the riddle. Kara came closer and Nina offered it to her.
"To unlock the secrets of the house's father, you must seek the help of the cousin's daughter. Find the beloved and things shall end well, try on your own and perish in hell?" she asked.
"We think that the house's father is Robert Frobisher-Smythe because-" I started, but I was interrupted by Kara.
"You're wrong," she said quietly, examining the clue closely.
"Excuse me?" Patricia asked, crossing her arms.
"You're wrong," she repeated. "The house's father isn't the man who built it. It's talking about the Egyptian gods. This is Anubis house, it's talking about Anubis's father Osiris." she said. We all looked at her absolutely dumbfounded. "It makes more sense! You found the riddle connected to the Papyrus of Osiris, it only makes sense that that's who it's talking about."
"Who said the papyrus had anything to do with Osiris?" Patricia asked.
"The same person that told me where it was." she said vaguely before turning back to the clue. Patricia gave us a "what the hell?" look before Kara spoke again. "Who's the cousin's daughter?" she asked.
"Um... We aren't entirely sure..." Nina said.
"I thought we decided it was hmmph! Hmmph hmm!" Amber said as Patricia put her hand over her mouth. Luckily Kara didn't notice because she was too busy examining the clue.
"The first part was the only part that made sense..." she murmured. "The beloved? Could that be...? Maybe..."
"Hey!" Alfie said. Kara's head popped up. "Maybe you should try looking at the papyrus! How good are you with hieroglyphics?"
"Not a master, but I know the basics." she replied picking up the ancient paper. "See this squiggly line? That means name. So it has someone's name written on it... This here is the symbol for Ra or the sun. In this case it's the syllable. So it's somebody's name that ends in Ra." she explained. She flipped it to the other side. "This is the symbol for the god Osiris... And over here is Isis. Between them is the symbol for power and beside that, life." she looked it over a bit more before continuing. There's a lot on here, but it's pretty simple. Give me some time and I can probably translate most of it."
"Sounds great!" Nina said. "But maybe for now we should just go downstairs." Everybody nodded in reply so we all filed out of the room. Just as I got into the hallway, I felt Nina grab my arm and pull me back inside.
"What's wrong?" I asked. She looked really worried.
"I think Amber's right." she said. "This can't be a coincidence. In the papyrus, somebody's name that ends in Ra? It's her Fabian, there's no denying it." I took a deep breath.
"Then I guess we'll just have to protect her." I said, leading my girlfriend out of the room and back downstairs.