The Son of Sobek | Page 2

and a healing potion my friend Jaz had brewed for me a while back. (She knew that I got hurt a lot.)

There was just one more thing I needed.

I concentrated and reached into the Duat. Over the last few months, I’d got better at storing emergency provisions in the shadow realm – extra weapons, clean clothes, Fruit by the Foot and chilled six-packs of root beer – but sticking my hand into a magical dimension still felt weird, like pushing through layers of cold, heavy curtains. I closed my fingers round the hilt of my sword and pulled it out – a weighty khopesh with a blade curved like a question mark. Armed with my sword and wand, I was all set for a stroll through the swamp to look for a hungry monster. Oh, joy!

I waded into the water and immediately sank to my knees. The river bottom felt like congealed stew. With every step, my shoes made such rude noises – suck-plop, suck-plop – that I was glad Sadie wasn’t with me. She never would’ve stopped laughing.

Even worse, making this much noise, I knew I wouldn’t be able to sneak up on any monsters.

Mosquitoes swarmed me. Suddenly I felt nervous and alone.

Could be worse, I told myself. I could be studying cheese demons.

But I couldn’t quite convince myself. In a nearby neighbourhood, I heard kids shouting and laughing, probably playing some kind of game. I wondered what that would be like – being a normal kid, hanging out with my friends on a summer afternoon.

The idea was so nice I got distracted. I didn’t notice the ripples in the water until fifty yards ahead of me something broke the surface – a line of leathery blackish-green bumps. Instantly it submerged again, but I knew what I was dealing with now. I’d seen crocodiles before, and this was a freakishly big one.

I remembered El Paso, the winter before last, when my sister and I had been attacked by the crocodile god Sobek. That wasn’t a good memory.

Sweat trickled down my neck.

‘Sobek,’ I murmured, ‘if that’s you, messing with me again, I swear to Ra …’

The croc god had promised to leave us alone now that we were tight with his boss, the sun god. Still … crocodiles get hungry. Then they tend to forget their promises.

No answer from the water. The ripples subsided.

When it came to sensing monsters, my magic instincts weren’t very sharp, but the water in front of me seemed much darker. That meant either it was deep, or something large was lurking under the surface.

I almost hoped it was Sobek. At least then I stood a chance of talking to him before he killed me. Sobek loved to boast.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t him.

The next microsecond, as the water erupted around me, I realized too late that I should’ve brought the entire Twenty-first Nome to help me. I registered glowing yellow eyes as big as my head, the glint of gold jewellery round a massive neck. Then monstrous jaws opened – ridges of crooked teeth and an expanse of pink maw wide enough to gulp down a garbage truck.

And the creature swallowed me whole.


Imagine being shrink-wrapped upside down inside a gigantic slimy garbage bag with no air. Being in the monster’s belly was like that, only hotter and smellier.

For a moment I was too stunned to do anything. I couldn’t believe I was still alive. If the crocodile’s mouth had been smaller, he might have snapped me in half. As it was, he had gulped me down in a single Carter-size serving, so I could look forward to being slowly digested.

Lucky, right?

The monster started thrashing around, which made it hard to think. I held my breath, knowing that it might be my last. I still had my sword and wand, but I couldn’t use them with my arms pinned to my side. I couldn’t reach any of the stuff in my bag.

Which left only one answer: a word of power. If I could think of the right hieroglyphic symbol and speak it aloud, I could summon some industrial-strength wrath-of-the-gods-type magic to bust my way out of this reptile.

In theory: a great solution.

In practice: I’m not so good at words of power even in the best of situations. Suffocating inside a dark, smelly reptile gullet wasn’t helping me focus.

You can do this, I told myself.

After all the dangerous adventures I’d had, I couldn’t die like this. Sadie would be devastated. Then, once she got over her grief, she’d track down my soul in the Egyptian afterlife and tease me mercilessly for how stupid I’d been.

My lungs burned. I was blacking out. I picked a word of power, summoned all my concentration and prepared to speak.

Suddenly the monster lurched upwards. He roared, which sounded really weird from the inside, and