Deep moaning echoed through the corridors, as if something—or a whole host of somethings—had woken up in a very bad mood.
“Out of here,” Walt said. “Great idea.”
As we ran through the previous chamber, I glanced at the statue of Ptah. I was tempted to take back the jerky and juice, just to be mean, but I decided against it.
I suppose it isn’t your fault, I thought. Can’t be easy to have a name like Ptah. Enjoy the snack, but I do wish you’d helped us.
We ran on. It wasn’t easy to remember our path. Twice we had to double back before finding the room with the family of mummies where we’d met Mad Claude.
I was about to bolt blindly across the chamber and into the last tunnel, but Walt held me back and saved my life. He shined his light on the far exit, then on the corridors to either side.
“No,” I said. ?
??No, no, no.”
All three doorways were clogged with human figures wrapped in linen. They pressed together as far as I could see down each corridor. Some were still completely bound. They hopped and shuffled and waddled forward as if they were giant cocoons engaged in a sack race. Other mummies had partially broken free. They limped along on emaciated legs, hands like dried branches clawing at their wrappings. Most still wore their painted-face portraits, and the effect was gruesome—lifelike masks smiling serenely at the top of undead scarecrows of bones and painted linen.
“I hate mummies,” I whimpered.
“Maybe a fire spell,” Walt said. “They’ve got to burn easily.”
“We’ll burn ourselves, too! It’s too close in here.”
“You have a better idea?”
I wanted to cry. Freedom so near—and just as I’d feared, we were trapped by a crowd of mummies. But these were worse than movie mummies. They were silent and slow, pathetic ruined things that once were human.
One of the mummies on the floor grabbed my leg. Before I could even scream, Walt reached out and tapped the thing on the wrist. The mummy instantly turned to dust.
I stared at him in amazement. “Is that the power you were worried about? That was brilliant! Do it again!”
Immediately I felt awful suggesting it. Walt’s face was tight with pain.
“I can’t do it a thousand more times,” he said sadly. “Maybe if…”
Then, on the central dais, the mummy family began to stir.
I will not lie. When the child-size mummy of little Pur-pens sat up, I almost had an accident that would’ve ruined my new jeans. If my ba could’ve shed my skin and flown away, it would have.
I gripped Walt’s arm.
At the far end of the room, the ghost of Mad Claude flickered into view. As he walked toward us, the rest of the mummies began to stir.
“You should be honored, my friends.” He gave us a crazy grin. “It takes a lot of excitement for ba to return to their withered old bodies. But we simply can’t let you leave until you’ve freed us for the afterlife. Use the knife, do your spells, and you can go.”
“We can’t free you all!” I shouted.
“A shame,” Claude said. “Then we’ll take the knife and free ourselves. I suppose two more bodies in the catacombs won’t make any difference.”
He said something in Latin, and all the mummies surged toward us, shuffling and tripping, falling and rolling. Some crumbled to pieces as they tried to walk. Others fell down and were trampled by their fellows. But more came forward.
We backed into the corridor. I had my staff in one hand. With my other, I held tight to Walt’s hand. I’d never been good at summoning fire, but I managed to set the end of my staff ablaze.
“We’ll try it your way,” I told Walt. “Light them up and run.”
I knew it was a bad idea. In close quarters, a blaze would hurt us as much as the mummies. We’d die of smoke inhalation or suffocation or heat. Even if we managed to retreat back into the catacombs, we’d just get lost and run into more mummies.
Walt lit his own staff.