Red Pyramid, The (The Kane Chronicles, Book 1) by Riordan Rick

Author:Riordan, Rick [Riordan, Rick]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Tags: Fiction - Young Adult
Publisher: Disney Book Group
Published: 2010-04-27T16:00:00+00:00

S A D I E

23. Professor Thoth’s Final Exam

SADIE HERE. SORRY FOR THE DELAY, though I don’t suppose you’d notice on a recording. My nimble-fingered brother dropped the microphone into a pit full of...oh, never mind. Back to the story.

Carter woke with such a start, he banged his knees against the drinks tray, which was quite funny.

“Sleep well?” I asked.

He blinked at me in confusion. “You’re human.”

“How kind of you to notice.”

I took another bite of my pizza. I’d never eaten pizza from a china plate or had a Coke in a glass (with ice no less—Americans are so odd) but I was enjoying first class.

“I changed back an hour ago.” I cleared my throat. “It—ah—was helpful, what you said, about focusing on what’s important.”

Awkward saying even that much, as I remembered everything he’d told me while I was in kite form about his travels with Dad—how he’d gotten lost in the Underground, gotten sick in Venice, squealed like a baby when he’d found a scorpion in his sock. So much ammunition to tease him with, but oddly I wasn’t tempted. The way he’d poured out his soul...Perhaps he thought I didn’t understand him in kite form—but he’d been so honest, so unguarded, and he’d done it all to calm me down. If he hadn’t given me something to focus on, I’d probably still be hunting field mice over the Potomac.

Carter had spoken about Dad as if their travels together had been a great thing, yes, but also quite a chore, with Carter always struggling to please and be on his best behavior, with no one to relax with, or talk to. Dad was, I had to admit, quite a presence. You’d be hard-pressed not to want his approval. (No doubt that’s where I get my own stunningly charismatic personality.) I saw him only twice a year, and even so I had to prepare myself mentally for the experience. For the first time, I began to wonder if Carter really had the better end of the bargain. Would I trade my life for his?

I also decided not to tell him what had finally changed me back to human. I hadn’t focused on Dad at all. I’d imagined Mum alive, imagined us walking down Oxford Street together, gazing in the shop windows and talking and laughing—the kind of ordinary day we’d never gotten to share. An impossible wish, I know. But it had been powerful enough to remind me of who I was.

Didn’t say any of that, but Carter studied my face, and I sensed that he picked up my thoughts a little too well.

I took a sip of Coke. “You missed lunch, by the way.”

“You didn’t try to wake me?”

On the other side of the aisle, Bast burped. She’d just finished off her plate of salmon and was looking quite satisfied. “I could summon more Friskies,” she offered. “Or cheese sandwiches.”

“No thanks,” Carter muttered. He looked devastated.

“God, Carter,” I said. “If it’s that important to you, I’ve got some pizza left—”

“It’s not that,” he said.

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