53 pages • 1-hour read
The Serpent's Shadow
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Chapters 19-22Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 19 Summary: “Welcome to the Fun House of Evil”
Carter leads the magicians outside into battle, where Apophis has grown bigger than Cairo. Using Horus’s power, Carter calls the rest of the gods to battle. However, as the gods and magicians charge the serpent, Carter realizes Apophis is fracturing the Duat so that the charge feels like “running through a fun house full of mirrors, each mirror leading to another fun house filled with more mirrors” (355).
To ensure they don’t get lost, Carter and Sadie hold on to each other as they make their way toward where Zia/Ra battles Apophis. Zia sees them, which distracts her, and in that moment, Apophis strikes. When the serpent lifts its head, Zia is gone. As was foretold in the ancient stories, Apophis swallowed the sun god, and the terrifying cold of chaos settles over everything. Though all seems lost, Carter and Sadie refuse to give up. While Bes and Bast distract Apophis, the siblings cast the execration spell.
Chapter 20 Summary: “I Take a Chair”
As Carter and Sadie cast the spell, Carter finally understands that a creature’s shadow is the imprint they leave on the world. Thus, when they finish, the impact of Apophis’s existence suddenly lifts, as “the wars, murders, turmoil, and anarchy Apophis had caused since ancient times finally lost power” (368). Mid-rant about how the Kanes have made a mistake, Apophis’s head explodes, revealing Zia—whole and alive. Ra also emerges from the serpent. He and the other gods must pull away from the world because order and chaos must balance one another.
The magicians return to the Cairo stronghold. While healers tend to Zia, Carter roams the halls. Magicians from other strongholds pour through portals to offer support, and though Carter feels guilty about it, he can’t help but be angry they didn’t come sooner.
Before the gathered magicians, Carter assumes his position as pharaoh, promising to lead in times of need. In the meantime, though, he gives power back to Amos to lead efforts to rebuild the magicians in preparation for when chaos rises again.
Carter and Sadie’s father summons them to the underworld. Their mom (Ruby) is also there as a spirit, and the two congratulate Carter and Sadie for succeeding where they couldn’t. Setne somehow managed to escape, but Carter’s father shrugs this off as a problem for another day.
Following this conversation, Carter skips two weeks into the future while he’s on a date with Zia. Zia stayed in Egypt long enough to heal and help Amos start rebuilding. At Amos’s suggestion, she wants to come to Brooklyn and try living as a regular teenager. Carter loves the idea.
Chapter 21 Summary: “The Gods Are Sorted; My Feelings Are Not”
Sadie offers her own recap of the events following Apophis’s destruction: Her exhaustion, her worry about the gods vanishing, and her turmoil over Walt also disappearing. While visiting with her parents in the underworld, her mother pulls her aside to talk about Walt. Sadie’s mom knows Sadie is confused and hurt, but she urges Sadie to trust her feelings and not be afraid to care about people. Though the conversation feels awkward, Sadie is grateful for the advice, even if she doesn’t yet know what to do about Walt when she sees him. Her mother also warns that there are other challenges ahead, some involving other gods, and after everything that’s happened, Sadie unashamedly admits, “I preferred talking about boys” (390).
Later that night in Brooklyn, a portal opens, leading Carter and Sadie to the gods’ nursing home. Instead of somber, the atmosphere is lively as the gods dance and celebrate, finally feeling as if they have purpose again. Carter and Sadie thank Bes for his help before finding Bast outside.
Bast shows them an image of Horus sitting on the throne of the gods and giving a speech that’s very similar to the one Carter gave the magicians. Like the other gods, Bast has to pull back from the human world, but she’s sure Carter and Sadie can handle themselves. When Carter and Sadie get back to the Brooklyn stronghold, Walt is there.
Chapter 22 Summary: “The Last Waltz (for Now)”
Carter goes inside so Walt and Sadie can talk. Walt apologizes for not telling Sadie about himself and Anubis sooner, but insists it’s still him, just with Anubis’s power. Sadie gives Walt a tough time, but it’s clear she wants him to stay and to give their relationship a chance. The two dance on the roof of the stronghold.
Sadie ends the story by detailing how she and Carter are running the Brooklyn stronghold with help from a few adult magicians. Though Apophis is destroyed, there are, as Sadie’s mother said, still challenges to face. Their forces can never have too many magicians, so if anyone reading this feels the call of the pharaohs, “Brooklyn House is open for business” (401).
Chapters 19-22 Analysis
The mounting battle against Apophis in Chapter 19 again reveals the power of chaos to fracture order, bringing the theme of Maintaining Balance Between Order and Chaos to its culmination. By dividing the Duat, Apophis also divides the attacks against him so they are made against separate parts of his being. By doing so, he effectively reduces the overall power of the attack because he is forced to fend off minor attacks, not one large offensive. Carter and Sadie holding tight to one another means they rely on the order in themselves and each other to restore order more generally in this cosmic battle.
Thus, even when Apophis devours Zia/Ra and plunges the world into chaos, Carter and Sadie know they can’t give up because there is still order as long as they have one another. Successfully casting the execration shows that order can triumph despite all the obstacles chaos throws in its way. It also keeps with the idea of a price for power: Carter and Sadie “win” by banishing Apophis, but in doing so, they must also send order away from the world and lose their connections to the gods.
Carter and Sadie’s reaction to the aftermath of the battle shows a different type of price and highlights The Challenges of Being an Effective Leader. While Carter is glad the world is safe, he also struggles with less positive emotions, namely bitter spite at the magicians who didn’t help before when he needed them. Carter realizes that even a world without chaos can’t and won’t work exactly how he wants it to, but that he must do his duty anyway. His maturity and acceptance of his responsibilities appear in his speech before the magicians. He recognizes the responsibility he now holds and what he must do to help the magicians prepare for further chaos threats. However, he also acknowledges that he’s still a child and needs balance in his life, much like order and chaos must balance out one another. The similar speech Horus gives among the gods shows that Carter and Horus are irrevocably linked, even while the gods are farther from the mortal world.
The final meeting between Carter, Sadie, and their parents represents The Resilience of Relationships in Difficult Times. Carter and Sadie have relied on their parents less and less during their struggles because their parents were harder and harder to reach. Now that Apophis is defeated, their father will also pull away from the world, and their mother will return to the Duat as a spirit. Despite this, the link between the family is stronger than it’s ever been because Carter and Sadie understand the sacrifices their parents made in the past to prepare their children for the battle against Apophis.
The strength of the family’s bond also allows Carter and Sadie to build a new family among the living magicians. With his new understanding of how the gods and magicians work together, Carter comes to terms with how Zia and Ra merged. This knowledge allows Carter to pursue his relationship with Zia, and the two end the book committed to living as both magicians and teenagers together. Similarly, Sadie is finally able to find balance within herself and accept that the new Walt is a mix of both the boys she had feelings for before.
The final parting between Carter, Sadie, and Bast is the ultimate proof that the siblings no longer need protection from the gods. Bast has been their guardian since they learned of their magician heritage, so it is fitting she is the last god they say goodbye to. This parting clears the way for the magicians to expand and pursue different types of relationships with the gods than magicians have in the past—namely, calling on specific gods for power.
Sadie explains this shift in her recap at the end of Chapter 22. This section is a hallmark of Riordan’s storytelling style. In all of his mythology series, the main characters speak directly to the reader. This invites young readers to be closer to the story and to pretend the stories are real. In addition, Sadie’s mother hints at struggles involving other gods—this is a direct reference to how Riordan sets all his mythology series in the same universe. Specifically, he refers to the crossover novellas that tell what happens when Carter and Sadie meet Percy and Annabeth from the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series.
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