Tut (28 page)

I put up my hand. “I don't want to talk about it.” Maybe I'd want to in the future, but right now, I felt too … empty. Even though I'd never have changed what I'd done for anything.

“If you ever do…”

I forced out a smile. “I'll let you know. Did Horus make it back yet?”

Gil's face tensed. He was actually worried about Horus, too. “I haven't heard anything from him.” And then he looked away.

“What?” I shifted on the futon and felt sweat start to bead up on my forehead. I motioned Major Rex forward. He seemed to be in charge now that Colonel Cody was gone.

He ran to me and bowed. “Yes, Great Master?”

“Would you mind opening a window?”

Major Rex bowed again and snapped his fingers. It was nice to know they still loved me, even if I wasn't immortal anymore.

Two shabtis opened the window and cool air blew into the town house. But I kept sweating.

Gil let out a deep breath and spoke. “It's all my fault.”

I shook my head. “Nothing's your fault.”

“I'm supposed to protect you,” Gil said, ignoring my words.

“No,” I said. “If anyone's to blame for anything, it's me. Henry was about to die, all because I let him get too close. I should have never become friends with him in the first place.”

“Tut, having friends is never something to regret,” Gil said. “You're the best friend Henry's ever had.”

Drowsiness was starting to cloud my mind. “How do you know that?”

“He told me,” Gil said.

“When?” I asked.

“This morning while you were still asleep,” Gil said. “Henry recovered quickly.”

“He came by?” I asked.

Gil shook his head. “No, he called. He's afraid to come over.”

“Afraid?” I narrowed my eyes. “Why?”

“Because he thinks you'll regret what you did,” Gil said. “He thinks you'll be sorry and never want to see him again.”

I opened my mouth to say something, but stopped. Sure, part of me did regret it. Losing my immortality. My future. But it was the only thing to do. It's what a friend would do. And I was Henry's friend.

“It's not Henry's fault,” I said. “I made the decision, and even if it's a change, I'll get used to it. Maybe I should go see him.” I stood up, but the change in elevation made stars spin in my head. Gil caught me and settled me back on the futon. I wiped sweat off my forehead, but our town house had gone from warm to downright hot.

“You're not going anywhere,” Gil said. “This will be my last failure.”

“Failure!” I said. “You never fail at anything.”

Gil put on a wry smile and sighed. “I've lived my life as one constant failure after another. I ruined tons of people's lives. My best friend died because I was stupid and selfish and only thought of myself. I lost the throne. And then that kid died.”

“I'm as much to blame for that as you,” I said.

Gil ignored me. “I've always felt like no matter how much good I do, I'll never be able to balance it all out.” He grabbed my shoulders and looked me in the eye. “Now I've failed you. And I will make this up to you, Tut. I swear it on my mother's name.”

My eyelids started to droop at that point. Maybe being mortal, I'd get tired more often.

“You don't have anything to make up,” I said. “And could you turn down the heat?”

“No. I don't think so.”

I tried to force my eyes wide at that point, because the tone of his voice clued me in to the fact that something was seriously wrong. But heat descended on the town house. I realized, even through my drowsy mind, where it was coming from.

“What are you doing, Gil?”

Gil smiled, and clarity like I hadn't seen in ages moved onto his face. “Don't you know?”

I sat up, but the heat kept coming—from Gil. He was turning the entire town house into an oven. The shabtis ran over, ostrich fans in hand, but one look from Gil and they stopped in their tracks.

I knew what he planned to do then.

“Stop it now,” I said. “This isn't what I want.”

Gil held up the golden knife. “You don't have a choice. I said I'd make it up to you, and it's what I'm going to do.”

Inside my chest, my human heart started to pound. And Gil's scarab heart started to glow. I fought to keep my eyes open, but the heat was too much. The last thing I remember seeing was Gil talking to the shabtis. For a moment I wondered if they wouldn't listen to him, since they thought he was a heathen. But then I realized they would. They'd want to help me as much as Gil wanted to. I opened my mouth again, thinking I could tell them to hold Gil back, but words wouldn't come out.

 

26

WHERE I DREAM ABOUT BUGS

I had a strange dream. I was back in the monument, cutting open my chest. My side ached in my dream, but it didn't stop me. I hardly had to touch the knife to my skin before it opened. And then I reached into my chest and closed my hand around what I found inside.

In my dream, when I pulled my hand out of my chest, my heart pulsed between my fingers—my human heart. I watched it beat—over and over—hypnotized by the rhythm. And even though my human heart was no longer inside me, life poured through me.

I sort of floated over to a table that had been set up against the wall. There lay the
Book of the Dead
. I placed my beating heart in a shallow clay bowl and unrolled the scrolls. From the book, I heard a spell. I wasn't speaking it myself. Somewhere in my dream, the spell came, words in ancient Egyptian. I heard it over the sound of my beating heart. I picked up a roll of gauze and my human heart, and with swift movements, I began to wrap the heart—to mummify it.

When I finished, I shoved the wrapped heart back into my chest. Even in my dream, I gasped when I felt it reconnect. This was the start of it. I was being mummified. But here in my dream, it didn't frighten me.

Next, I picked up a Canopic jar. I wanted to see what was inside, so I lifted the lid.

Scarabs poured out and began to crawl over me. But where they crawled my skin stung, as if somehow they were digging into my flesh.

“Don't slap so hard,” I heard.

Another slap.

“He's waking up.”

My eyes fluttered open to see Major Rex's green face only inches away.

Slap. This time on my leg.

“Stop it!” I said.

“But, my lord, the scarabs are getting out of control,” Major Rex said. “We formally request permission to annihilate the beetle population.” He made sure to stand all of his six inches tall when he asked it.

“Wow, that sounds a little final,” Henry said from somewhere in the room.

I rubbed my eyes, sitting up. Slap. Near my foot this time.

“You can kill half of them. No more.” Fifty percent should be able to hold the population until Horus got back.
If
Horus got back. Which I really hoped he did.

“But Master,” Major Rex said. “That would still leave approximately—”

I put up my hand. “Half. No more.”

I looked around the town house. Gil was gone, but Henry sat on the green camel seat.

“Hey,” I said carefully, not sure how he would react.

Henry ran his fingers through his mop of blond hair, pushing it off his forehead. He looked different, but I couldn't quite place why.

“Hey,” he said. “You slept for a long time.”

I stretched to get my blood circulating again. “I guess I was tired.”

Henry shifted like he had a thorn in his bottom. Camel seats weren't the height of comfort, so I could understand.

“I wanted to thank you,” he said, placing a hand over his chest. I'm not sure if he even knew he was doing it.

“It was nothing,” I said.

But Henry shook his head. I guess he wasn't going to let the fact that I'd healed him and drained my scarab heart in the process go. “No, it wasn't nothing. It was everything. I'd be dead right now if it weren't for you.” He looked down at his feet. “That's like the nicest thing anyone's ever done for me.”

I looked down also, not sure what to say. So I decided to go for the truth. “You know, I haven't had a real friend in a long time. But then you came along, and … well … anyway, I'm glad we started hanging out.” Okay, that was enough of that. I glanced around. “Where's Gil?”

“Gone.”

“Gone where?”

“I have no idea,” Henry said. “He took the knife and left. Didn't say where he was going.”

“Did he say when he was coming back?”

Henry again gave me a look like I should know the answer. “I don't think he is ever coming back.”

Panic hit me, making my chest tighten. Never coming back?

“Why would you think that?” But as the words came out, I knew. Gil's final gift to me. How had I missed it? The hole in my chest had vanished, and in its place sat a scarab heart. Gil's scarab heart.

My face must have shown my thoughts because Henry nodded.

“He did it while you were sleeping,” Henry said. “And then he left.”

Even with the immortality pumping through me, heaviness moved in and sat on my heart. “I told him not to do it.”

“He said it was the only way to make things right,” Henry said.

I sat up straight, feeling the energy pulse through me. “But now he's mortal.”

“I know,” Henry said. “And I think he's relieved.”

I thought about everything I knew about Gil. About everything he'd said before I'd fallen asleep. Even though I knew it was what he wanted, it didn't seem fair. Why should I live when Gil would die? He didn't owe me anything.

“Do you have any side effects?” I asked, trying to take my mind off of Gil. Henry was now pumped full of immortal energy. That had to make a difference.

Henry pulled at the ends of his hair. “Everything's growing really fast. Like my nails and my hair. And my eyesight…”

“What about it?”

“It's perfect. No glasses. People at school won't recognize me.”

That's what looked different about Henry. He didn't have his normal wire-rimmed glasses perched on his nose. That said, people would have no trouble recognizing Henry. He still wore a ridiculous Pluto T-shirt. This one read,
BACK IN
MY
DAY,
WE
HAD 9
PLANETS
. It was actually a pretty cool shirt.

“I'm not going back to school,” I said. The sole benefit I could see of Gil not being here was that I'd never be tricked or coerced into going to school again.

“Yes, you are,” Henry said. “There is no way you are ditching me. And anyway, next year is high school. You can pass as a freshman.”

I knew I could. I had before on numerous occasions. I just didn't want to.

“Being a freshman guy stinks,” I said. “You're at the bottom of the food chain. Every single upperclassman in the school picks on freshman guys. And the girls don't give you the time of day.”

“So it really won't be any different in that regard,” Henry said.

“Not in your case.”

“You have to go with me,” Henry said.

“I don't.”

“Please?”

“I'll think about it.”

Just then Horus jumped in through the fire escape window.

“I see you stopped your curse,” Horus said.

“Horus!” I wanted to hug him but didn't dare. He wasn't one for extraneous emotions. But he was right. The curse was gone. It had been from the second I gave up my quest for revenge.

“You won't believe the week we had,” I started.

Horus held up a paw to stop me. “Did you fight a god and almost get your eye ripped out?”

“No.”

“Did you end up halfway around the world, sacked out in a gutter?”

“No.”

“How about food? Have you eaten in the last week?”

“I get it, Horus. You've had a rough week, too.” I looked to Major Rex, who immediately summoned some shabtis to fill Horus's bowl with milk. Waiting on Horus was below Lieutenants Virgil and Leon. They only waited on me.

“Oh, by the way,” Horus said while he waited for his milk bowl to be filled. “I got summoned to the afterworld. It seems Maat needed a jury to judge Horemheb. Something about the fact that he was an immortal and had Set protecting him.”

“He did make it there, then?” I said. Relief flooded through me. Osiris and the
Book of the Dead
had not failed me.

“Nice work, Tutankhamun,” Horus said, pulling out the full-name thing. For a second, I thought I heard pride in his voice. I'm sure I was mistaken.

“What did the jury say?” I knew there was no way Horemheb would ever be judged worthy of life in the Fields of the Blessed, even with Set as his benefactor, but I wanted to hear it from Horus's mouth.

“Let's just say Ammut had a tasty snack.” Horus lowered his mouth and started lapping at the bowl, but raised it after a couple of seconds. Milk dripped from his tongue. “Oh, and one more thing.”

“What now?” I asked.

He gave me his best pirate scowl. “Now's not the time to be ungrateful. I brought you a small souvenir. Don't say I never did anything for you.” He looked to the fire escape window.

In climbed Colonel Cody!

“Great Master,” Colonel Cody said, and bowed to the ground.

“Colonel Cody!” I ran to him and picked him up, hugging him to my chest. “You stupid, brave little shabti. I thought I'd never see you again! Great Osiris, I missed you.” On the last words, my voice cracked. I didn't care.

“And I missed you as well, Great Master,” Colonel Cody said.

“Don't ever do that again, okay?” I forced down the lump in my throat.

Colonel Cody tried to bow, but I had my fingers wrapped too tightly around him. “Very good, Great Master. Never again.”