CHAPTER 1
THE LEGEND BEGINS
“So…” said the museum guide, holding his flashlight under his chin so it gave his face a creepy glow and showed us way too much of what was up his nose. “Who wants to hear about the Curse of the Cat of Kings?”
The hand of every kid in the room shot up, including mine and Pradeep’s. This History Museum sleepover was turning out to be way cooler than I’d expected.
“Legend has it,” said the guide, “that two grave robbers set off into the Egyptian desert to find the tomb of the Cat of Kings. Their goal: to steal the mummified cat’s treasure! No one knows exactly what happened, but days later the robbers were found wandering through the desert with layers of scarab beetles clinging to their backs!”
“Urrrgh!” I shuddered. I really hate bugs.
“The robbers had lost the ability to speak—so they could tell no one what had befallen them.” He paused and looked around at our faces. “They were the first victims of the Curse of the Cat of Kings. Thus the tomb remained undiscovered and intact … until earlier this year when builders unearthed it while digging the foundations for a new MoonBucks coffee shop.”
“The museum arranged for the whole tomb to be transported here,” Pradeep whispered. “It’s still sealed—so the museum scientists can excavate it and do loads of tests and stuff!”
“According to the legend, anyone not ‘pure of heart’ who tries to enter the tomb will suffer the same fate as the Egyptian grave robbers,” the guide continued.
I blurted out, “So the robbers couldn’t make a single sound?”
“The robbers weren’t mute,” the guide replied. “Instead, the only sound they could make was Miaoooooowwww!” The guide made a loud miaowing noise that suddenly turned into an “Aaarrrraaagh!” His voice shot up to a squeal. He jumped up and the flashlight clattered to the floor. “Something wet just bit me!”
Pradeep and I shot each other a look that said, “FRANKIE?”
Frankie, my pet zombie goldfish, really doesn’t like cats. Especially one particularly evil little kitten that belongs to my Evil Scientist big brother, Mark. I guess Frankie was thinking that if a cat’s miaowing at you, you bite it first and ask questions later! I glanced down at the mug of water that Frankie had been sitting in while we listened to the scary History Museum stories. Yep, he was definitely gone. This was bad for three reasons:
Firstly, even though he’s a zombie, Frankie is also a goldfish, so he can’t stay flopping around out of water for long.
Secondly, being a zombie goldfish, Frankie has the ability to zombify anyone that looks into his eyes, and we didn’t want to end up with a lot of zombified kids in pajamas mumbling, “Swishy little fishy.”
Thirdly, when the museum guide squealed, all the kids jumped up from their sleeping bags and started to panic. So there were lots of feet stomping around on the same ground that Frankie was flopping about on.
“I can see Frankie!” Pradeep said. “By the baseboard at twelve o’clock.”
I looked at him blankly.
Pradeep sighed. “Twelve o’clock means straight ahead!” He pointed to the orange flash that was Frankie, who was slowly flopping toward us. “I’ll block—you take the mug and grab him!”
We threw ourselves into the mosh of screaming kids and sleeping bags, dodging flapping arms and stomping feet. Frankie made a dive over one particularly flappy kid’s head, bounced off a Spider-Man pillowcase and landed with a splash back in the mug!
“You couldn’t just sit and listen, could you, Frankie?” I whispered.
“My mom would say that you have a ‘low boredom threshold’,” Pradeep added as he crawled over to join us. “Come on—we’ve got to find you a better hiding place or we’ll be thrown out of the museum and you’ll be flushed down the toilet.”
“The toilet,” I said. “That’s it!”
“When in doubt,” we said at the same time, “hide in the toilets and figure it out!”
Text copyright © 2014 by Mo O’Hara
Illustrations copyright © 2014 by Marek Jagucki
