Jake Ransom and the Howling Sphinx (23 page)

Jake spotted Kady directly below him. She had Shaduf up again, but sharks circled them, spooked by the fire and chaos. The pair could not reach the ship.

Nefertiti shook off her cloak, revealing a hunting outfit and a sheathed sword. “I will help your sister and my uncle! You see to your friend!”

With those words, she sprinted to one of the ropes and vaulted over the rail. Drawn in her wake, Jake reached for another rope, stopping only long enough to stuff a firebomb into his pack.

A shout reached him from the deck. “Jake! Don't! It's certain death!”

Djer stood at the stern, holding a shield to protect Horus from the onslaught of an archer trying to take out the ship's captain. The shield bristled with feathered arrows.

Djer shouted again. “We must leave with those we've rescued!”

Ignoring him, Jake leaned far over the edge. He spotted Marika trapped against the obelisk, a shark angling closer and closer. He wasn't abandoning his friends … any of them.

Grabbing the rope, Jake hopped the rail and swung to the ground. As soon as his boots hit the sand, he took off toward Marika.

To the left, he spotted Nefertiti. She ran with the end
of her rope twisted around her wrist. As she reached the end of the line, she leaped up, swung in an arc from the rope, and flew over the circling sharks to land beside Kady and Shaduf.

Jake turned his full attention back on Marika. He called to her. “I'm going to lure the shark to me! Then run for one of the ship's lines!”

Her emerald eyes shone with terror, but she nodded.

Jake twisted his pack and snatched his Swiss Army knife. Baring the blade, he cut into his palm as he ran. The pain was like placing his hand on a hot stove. Once near enough to the obelisk, he angled away and held out his arm. Blood flowed from his clenched fist and spattered into the sand.

He glanced over his shoulder and watched the circling shark turn in his direction, attracted by the fresh blood.

“Run!” he hollered.

Marika obeyed, and Jake took his own advice. He sprinted, intending to circle the obelisk and head back to the ship. But he needed to keep the shark from following.

Pulling his hand to his chest to stop the bleeding, Jake reached behind him for the firebomb.

Nothing like an explosion to chase a hunter from your trail
.

With the fire gourd in hand, he trotted a few steps sideways, like a quarterback readying for a Hail Mary pass.

Two yards away, a towering fin pushed out of the sand,
moving faster than he had expected.

He dared wait no longer.

Leaping up and spinning, Jake whipped the gourd at the fin.

He landed off balance on one boot and sprawled headlong across the sand, scattering the contents of his open pack and coming up on his hands and knees.

Not the most graceful move, but at least his aim was good.

The firebomb hit the fin—then bounced off and rolled harmlessly across the sand. It was a dud.

Okay, that's not good.

Jake leaped to the side as the monstrous sand shark lunged at him. He caught a glimpse of rows and rows of teeth opening in the rolling sand dune. He got clipped in the legs as it bulled past him, but he used the momentum to shoulder-roll to his feet.

Across the arena, he spotted Shaduf being hauled aboard the ship by a rope around his shoulders, supported by Nefertiti. Marika had made it aboard, too. Kady hung from another line, her sword in her belt. She waved a free arm at him.

“Get over here!”

What do you think I'm trying to do?

Jake began to run when he spotted a glint in the sand to his left. An emerald shine sparked in the first rays of the sun. He skidded and turned.

It was the crystal from Ankh Tawy, the one he'd taken from the pyramid. It had fallen out of his backpack.

“What are you doing?” Kady screamed.

He bolted toward the crystal. He couldn't leave it behind, not after everything they'd gone through to get it. Not stopping, he swept his arm down, snatched the emerald crystal off the sand with his bloody hand, and kept going.

Or that was the plan.

As soon as his fingers closed over the crystal, all strength left him. He fell headlong into the sand, sliding on his belly.

“Jake!”

He struggled to his hands and knees, still clutching the stone. But his body felt four times too heavy. His joints ached as if filled with ground glass.

What is happening?

“Behind you!” Kady screamed.

He turned and fell onto his backside. A wall of sand hurtled toward him. The monster burst free of the sand, jaws hinged wide, lined with teeth, gullet bottomless. The shark landed on its belly and twisted and snapped toward him like a downed power line.

Kady dropped from her rope to the sand and sped toward him, yanking out her sword. She would never get here in time.

Jake lifted a trembling arm, raising his only weapon, the crystal. He had read that hitting a shark on the nose could disorient it. He had hoped he would never have to test that theory.

The shark lunged.

He swung his arm and smacked the emerald crystal into its nose, bracing for the impact; but it never came. As the stone struck, the shark froze in midair. Its writhing body hung for a breath—then its flesh went gray and quickly shriveled down to its bones. Like fast time-lapsed photography, even those bones began to crumble.

Suddenly, the monster's skeleton crashed to the sand and blasted apart into a cloud of dust.

Jake coughed as he breathed in bits of shark dust.

Kady appeared through the cloud, waving a hand before her nose, a shocked expression fixed to her face.

A screech of fury sounded behind him.

He twisted, still weak.

From the lower stands, a familiar dark figure—all shadow and robe—flew over the bleacher's wall and landed in the arena. It was Heka, Kree's witch. Her skeletal arm pointed at him.

“He's found the sssecond timestone!”

Jake stared at the crystal in his hand.

From the stands, Kree ordered, “Guards! Kill the outlander! Now!”

But before they could be obeyed, a horn sounded from inside the stadium. With a roar, Grymhorst led his warriors, both men and women, into the stands. They flooded down from all directions.

How had they broken through the ranks of the palace guard?

Then Jake saw that many of the warriors were simple
townsfolk, both slaves and Egyptians. They carried whatever weapons they could find: clubs, knives, even broken pieces of statuary. The flames of a few had ignited a true wildfire.

Palace guards closed ranks around Kree, whisking him away from the battle; but the witch, Heka, stalked across the sand toward Jake.

The sharks all retreated from her wake, keeping a safe distance back.

With a shake, she parted her robe and pulled out a weapon: not her bloodstone-tipped wand, but a wooden staff about the size of a cane. A fist-sized stone sat atop it and reflected the sunlight into a thousand jeweled shades. It was a ruby crystal, one Jake had seen before. It was the same as the stone held by his mother in the mural.

For a moment, a fleeting fear passed through him. Could it be his mother hidden inside those robes? Or had the witch killed his mother to obtain the ruby crystal.

He refused to believe either scenario.

The witch pointed the staff at him. The crystal glowed like a ruby eye. “My massster is not done with you!”

Something about the sibilant, hissing quality of that voice struck Jake as familiar. Not his mother … but instead …

Then he remembered.

Oh, no
.

As if sensing her ruse was exposed, the witch leaped and burst high up in the air, shedding her robes in a blast
of shadows. Scabrous wings unfolded, clawed hands and feet scratched free, and a porcine visage hissed at him, revealing needle-sharp teeth.

A grakyl.

This was not one of the smaller harpylike ancestors, but one of the Skull King's true creatures. Plainly female. She stood tall, her claws sharp and long, with an intelligence shining in those eyes that was more wicked and keen than any harpy's. But she also looked battered and scarred. One wing was torn and shriveled. The side of her face was gnarled.

With her bad wing fluttering, she fell back to the arena floor—and slammed the crystal-tipped end of her staff into the sand.

A wave blasted outward like a ripple on a pond. It sped in all directions, consuming all color, turning all it touched to a dead gray. One of the sharks tried to flee, leaping up in the air; but as the ripple reached its tail, the wave climbed its twisting form and froze it into a grotesque statue.

It had been turned to stone.

The wave spread in every direction, freezing every creature it touched, foe and friend alike. All in its wake were left petrified.

Jake struggled to stand as the same rippling wave sped toward him. He managed to get to his feet, but that was all he could do. He lifted his own crystal toward the grakyl witch's.

As the wave neared him, it parted to both sides, as if Jake were in a protective bubble. He stared at his stone.

Maybe it is protecting me
.

But apparently no one else.

A sharp scream erupted behind him. He turned. Kady stood only a few yards away. Seeing what was coming, she fled backward, her arms pinwheeling. Jake attempted to pursue her, to pull her into his protective bubble.

But he was too weak, too enfeebled. Whatever magic was in the stone, it had sapped all his strength, turning him into an old man. The sand was rock hard under his feet.

“Kady!”

She met his gaze, knew she was doomed; but rather than looking scared, she looked sorry. He knew why: for having to leave him like so many others.

“Jake!” she cried.

Then the wave rolled over her—turning her to stone.

Jake crashed to his knees. Or he would have if something hadn't grabbed him by the shoulders and yanked him up in the air. He was sure it was the witch, ready to tear out his throat.

“Hang on!” his captor shouted.

Jake craned up at a winged man trailing fire. He'd been rescued by a skyrider. With a blast of flames, the man sped Jake up toward the ship.

Jake kept staring down.

To the statue of a girl with a sword.

They had been aloft for most of the day, not that Jake was aware of it. Dull with shock, lost in grief, he retreated to a small cabin belowdecks. Empty of tears, he sat on the bed, staring at the green stone resting on a table. It had both saved his life and ruined it.

Once he let go of the crystal, his strength had slowly returned. He'd touched the crystal with a fingertip to see if it would have the same effect again. But nothing happened. He could guess why. He fingered the bandage around his palm. The wound still throbbed, but the stone required blood.

He knew nothing else about it. The grakyl witch's screech sat like a hot coal in his heart.
He's found the sssecond timestone
!