The Throne of Fire (Kane Chronicles #2)(63)

“If it’s so easy, why don’t you do it?”

“Now he gets an attitude. I told you, kid, running water interferes with godly power. Probably one of the reasons Iskandar hid your friend down there, if that’s where she is. You can do this. Just—”

He suddenly tensed. “Get to the shore.”

“But you said—”

“Now!”

Before we could move, the river erupted around us. Three separate waterspouts blasted upward, and Bes was pulled underwater.

I tried to run, but my feet stuck in the mud. The waterspouts surrounded me. They swirled into human shapes with heads, shoulders, and arms made from ribbons of churning water, as if they were mummies created from the Nile.

Twenty feet downstream, Bes broke to the surface. “Water demons!” he spluttered. “Ward them off!”

“How?” I shouted.

Two of the water demons veered toward Bes. The dwarf god tried to keep his footing, but the river boiled into whitewater rapids, and he was already up to his armpits.

“Come on, kid!” he yelled. “Every shepherd used to know charms against water demons!”

“Well, find me a shepherd, then!”

Bes yelled, “BOO!” and the first water demon evaporated. He turned toward the second, but before he could scare it, the water demon blasted him in the face.

Bes choked and stumbled, water shooting out his nostrils. The demon crashed over him, and Bes went under again.

“Bes!” I yelled.

The third demon surged toward me. I raised my wand and managed a weak shield of blue light. The demon slammed against it, knocking me backward.

Its mouth and eyes spun like miniature whirlpools. Looking in its face was like using a scrying bowl. I could sense the thing’s endless hunger, its hatred for humans. It wanted to break every dam, devour every city, and drown the world in a sea of chaos. And it would start by killing me.

My concentration faltered. The thing rushed me, shattering my shield and pulling me underwater.

Ever get water up your nose? Imagine an entire wave up your nose—an intelligent wave that knows exactly how to drown you. I lost my wand. My lungs filled with liquid. All rational thought dissolved into panic.

I thrashed and kicked, knowing I was only in three or four feet of water, but I couldn’t get up. I couldn’t see anything through the murk. My head broke the surface, and I saw a fuzzy image of Bes getting tossed around atop a waterspout, screaming, “Boo, already! Be more scared!”

Then I went under again, my hands clawing at the mud.

My heart pounded. My vision started to go dark. Even if I could have thought of a spell, I couldn’t have spoken it. I wished I had sea god powers, but they weren’t exactly Horus’s specialty.

I was losing consciousness when something gripped my arm. I punched at it wildly, and my fist connected with a bearded face.

I broke the surface again, gasping for breath. Bes was half-drowning next to me, yelling: “Stupid—glub, glub—trying to save your glub glub.”

The demon pulled me under again, but suddenly my thoughts were clearer. Maybe that last mouthful of oxygen had done the trick. Or maybe punching Bes had snapped me out of my panic.

I remembered Horus had been in a situation like this before. Set had once tried to drown him, pulling him into the Nile.

I latched on to that memory and made it my own.

I reached into the Duat and channeled the power of the war god into my body. Rage filled me. I would not be pinned down. I followed the Path of Horus. I would not let a stupid liquid mummy drown me in three feet of water.

My vision turned red. I screamed, expelling the water from my lungs in one huge blast.

WHOOOM! The Nile exploded. I collapsed on a field of mud.

At first I was too tired to do anything but cough. When I managed to stagger to my feet and wipe the silt out of my eyes, I saw that the river had changed its course. It now curved around the ruins of the village. Exposed in the glistening red mud were bricks and boards, trash, old clothes, the fender of a car, and bones that might’ve been animal or human. A few fish flopped around, wondering where the river had gone. There was no sign of the water demons. About ten feet away, Bes was scowling at me in annoyance. He had a bloody nose and was buried up to his waist in mud.

“Usually when you part a river,” he grumbled, “it doesn’t involve punching a dwarf. Now, get me out of here!”

I managed to pry him free, which caused a sucking noise so impressive that I wished I had recorded it. [And no, Sadie, I’m not going to try to make it for the microphone.]

“I’m sorry,” I stammered. “I didn’t mean to—”

He waved aside the apology. “You handled the water demons. That’s what matters. Now we gotta see if you can handle that.”

I turned and saw the tomb.

It was a rectangular pit about the size of a walk-in closet, lined with stone blocks. Steps led down to a closed stone door etched with hieroglyphs. The largest was the symbol for the House of Life:

“Those demons were guarding the entrance,” Bes said. “There may be worse inside.”

Underneath the symbol, I recognized a row of phonetic hieroglyphs:

“Z—I—A,” I read. “Zia’s inside.”

“And that,” Bes muttered, “is what we call in the magic business a trap. Last chance to change your mind, kid.”