17.03.2017

Walt

I've often wondered what it would feel like to exist without the pain. All those people walking past me in the hall, no idea I'm hurting. They move through the day, not ever thinking about fatigue or chronic pain or energy levels.

What does it feel like to wake up in the morning and just be able to get up?

Julian and Alyssa took Felix for ice cream after class today. They just left the training room and headed for the front door. What does that feel like?

After laying in bed and staring at the ceiling for what felt like forever, I found myself knocking on Carter's door.

Khufu opened instead.

"Agh?"

"I just wanted to talk to Carter." I explained.

It felt a little weird, talking to a baboon. Khufu took my hand and pulled me inside the room, towards the balcony.

Carter seemed hypnotized by his scrying bowl (which I made him, by the way).

It was still cold and rainy outside. The wind off the East River cut through my bones.

I knocked on the opened door.

"Hey. Um, hope you don't mind. Khufu let me in."

"Agh!" Khufu confirmed. He led me outside, then jumped on the railing, disregarding the hundred-foot drop to the river below.

Carter smiled. "No problem."

I nodded at the scrying bowl. "How's that working for you?"

Carter waved his hand over the bowl.

"Working fine." he turned back to me. "How are you feeling?"

My whole body tensed. He couldn't know, right? Jaz was the only one that knew about the curse and she was still in the infirmary. Unless someone had overheard us talking. Or was it simply that obvious that I was in pain?

I'd done my best to mask it ever since I came. But maybe I wasn't as good at masking as I thought I was.

Did the whole Nome know? Were they worried about me but too afraid to say anything?

I had to play it cool. "What do you mean?"

Carter raised an eyebrow. "The training room incident. The three-headed snake. What did you think I meant?"

Of course.

"Right, sorry, just a weird morning. Did Amos have an explanation?"

I did my best to pay attention, ignoring the slight tension that began to wrap itself around my head.

When Carter was done talking, I stepped over to the railing where Khufu was perched. I needed to lean on something. "Apophis let that thing loose in the house? If we hadn't stopped it-"

"Amos thinks the serpent didn't have much power. It was just here to deliver a message and scare us."

I shook my head in dismay. "Well now it knows our abilities, I guess. It knows Felix throws a mean shoe."

Carter smiled. "Yeah. Except that wasn't the ability I was thinking of. That gray light you blasted the snake with and the way you handled the shabti practice dummy, turning it to dust-"

"How did I do it?" I shrugged helplessly. "Honest, Carter, I don't know. I've been thinking about it ever since, and... it was just instinctive. At first I thought maybe the shabti had some kind of self-destruct spell built into it, and I accidentally triggered it. Sometimes I can do that with magic items-cause them to activate or shut down."

"But that wouldn't explain how you did it again with the serpent."

"No."

I've heard of people's auras turning gray when they were dying. Was something similar happening to my magic? Was my time closer then I anticipated?

"Walt.." Oh, no. Carter was using his 'older brother' voice! He really had noticed something. "This new ability, turning things to dust-it wouldn't have anything to do with, you know, whatever you were telling Jaz?"

It's not that I didn't trust Carter and Sadie. That was the problem, I did. If the Kane family had one distinguished feature, it was how deeply they loved. And stubbornness, but that's not the point. The point… the point was that I knew they would go through Hell and back to help me.

With the world ending, we couldn't afford that. The last thing the Kanes needed was a distraction, a burden to worry over.

"I know," Carter said quickly, "it's none of my business. But you've been acting upset lately. If there's anything I can do..."

I stared down at the river. The water moved slowly and steadily. I imagined this river dipping into Duat, merging with the Nile. Did the dead get to swim in it, no longer concerned about crocodiles and life?

Khufu grunted and patted me on the shoulder.

"Sometimes I wonder why I came here."

I don't know why I said this. Right in this moment, I wasn't talking to my teacher or my leader. I was talking to my best friend and I really wished I could open up to him without it ending the world.

"Are you kidding?" Carter asked. "You're great at magic. One of the best! You've got a future here."

I put my hand in my pocket and touched something – one of the dried-up scarabs from the practice room. An empty shell.

"Thanks. But the timing... it's like a bad joke. Things are complicated for me, Carter. And the future, I don't know."

"Look, if there's a problem. If it's something about the way Sadie and I are teaching-"

"Of course not. You've been great. And Sadie-"

"She likes you a lot. I know she can come on a little strong. If you want her to back off-"

I couldn't help but laugh. "No, it's nothing about Sadie. I like her, too. I'm just-"

"Agh!" Khufu barked so loudly, it made me jump. He was snarling at the scrying bowl.

I came up next to Carter, trying to see inside the bowl.

"What's wrong? What is it?"

"Sadie."

The oil turned black. Carter shut his eyes tightly as the surface of the oil erupted in flames.

I pulled him back before his face could get burned. Khufu barked in alarm and tipped the bronze saucer over the railing, sending it hurtling toward the East River.

"What happened?" I asked. "I've never seen a bowl do-"

"Portal to London." Carter coughed. "Nearest one. Now!"

Sadie.

"Our portal's still on cool-down. We'll need to go back to the Brooklyn Museum."

"The griffin," Carter said.

"Yeah. I'm coming too."

Carter turned to Khufu. "Go tell Amos we're leaving. Sadie's in trouble. No time to explain."

Khufu barked and leaped straight over the side of the balcony-taking the express elevator down.

Carter and I bolted from the room. My blood pumped as we raced up the stairs to the roof.