The Serpent's Shadow (The Kane Chronicles, Book Three) by Rick Riordan Page B

excellent at gumming biscuits, drooling, and singing nonsense songs. Fighting Apophis? Not so much.
    “You’re babysitting again ?” I asked.
    Zia shrugged. “It’s after sunrise here. Horus and Isis watch him most nights on the sun boat. But during the day…well, Ra gets upset if I don’t come to visit, and none of the other gods want to watch him. Honestly, Carter…” She lowered her voice. “I’m afraid of what they’d do if I left Ra alone with them. They’re getting tired of him.”
    “Wheee!” Ra said in the background.
    My heart sank. Yet another thing to feel guilty about: I’d saddled Zia with nanny duty for a sun god. Stuck in the throne room of the gods every day, helping Amos run the First Nome every night, Zia barely had time to sleep, much less go on a date—even if I could get up the courage to ask her.
    Of course, that wouldn’t matter if Apophis destroyed the world, or if Sarah Jacobi and her magical killers got to me. For a moment I wondered if Jacobi was right—if the world had gone sideways because of the Kane family, and if it would be better off without us.
    I felt so helpless, I briefly considered calling on the power of Horus. I could’ve used some of the war god’s courage and confidence. But I suspected that joining my thoughts with Horus’s wouldn’t be a good idea. My emotions were jumbled enough without another voice in my head, egging me on.
    “I know that expression,” Zia chided. “You can’t blame yourself, Carter. If it weren’t for you and Sadie, Apophis would have already destroyed the world. There’s still hope.”
    Plan B, I thought. Unless we could figure out this mystery about shadows and how they could be used to fight Apophis, we’d be stuck with Plan B, which meant certain death for Sadie and me even if it worked. But I wasn’t going to tell Zia that. She didn’t need any more depressing news.
    “You’re right,” I said. “We’ll figure out something.”
    “I’ll be back at the First Nome tonight. Call me then, okay? We should talk about—”
    Something rumbled behind her, like a stone slab grinding across the floor.
    “Sobek’s here,” she whispered. “I hate that guy. Talk later.”
    “Wait, Zia,” I said. “Talk about what?”
    But the oil turned dark, and Zia was gone.
    I needed to sleep. Instead, I paced my room.
    The dorm rooms at Brooklyn House were amazing—comfortable beds, HD TVs, high-speed wireless Internet, and magically restocking mini-fridges. An army of enchanted brooms, mops, and dusters kept everything tidy. The closets were always full of clean, perfectly fitting clothes.
    Still, my room felt like a cage. Maybe that’s because I had a baboon for a roommate. Khufu wasn’t here much (usually downstairs with Cleo or letting the ankle-biters groom his fur), but there was a baboon-shaped depression on his bed, a box of Cheerios on the nightstand, and a tire swing installed in the corner of the room. Sadie had done that last part as a joke, but Khufu loved it so much, I couldn’t take it down. The thing was, I’d gotten used to his being around. Now that he spent most of his time with the kindergartners, I missed him. He’d grown on me in an endearing, annoying way, kind of like my sister.
    [Yeah, Sadie. You saw that one coming.]
    Screensaver pictures floated across my laptop monitor. There was my dad at a dig site in Egypt, looking relaxed and in charge in his khaki fatigues, his sleeves rolled up on his dark muscular arms as he showed off the broken stone head of some pharaoh’s statue. Dad’s bald scalp and goatee made him look slightly devilish when he smiled.
    Another picture showed Uncle Amos onstage at a jazz club, playing his saxophone. He wore round dark glasses, a blue porkpie hat, and a matching silk suit, impeccably tailored as always. His cornrows were braided with sapphires. I’d never actually seen Amos play onstage, but I liked this photo because he looked so energetic and happy—not like he did