53 pages • 1-hour read
The Serpent's Shadow
A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 5-9Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of illness.
Chapter 5 Summary: “A Dance with Death”
Right before it’s time to leave for the dance, Walt tells Sadie he isn’t going because he needs to save his strength to visit Thoth later. Sadie is disappointed because she wanted to dance and have fun with him. She wonders, “[W]hat’s the point of being a magician if you can’t wave your wand and make the people you care about feel better?” (79). Anubis is at the dance, which he’s able to visit because it’s the site of the 1776 Battle of Brooklyn Heights. As he and Sadie dance, spirits of soldiers and women twirl around them, unseen by any but the two of them.
Anubis knows of the plan to destroy Apophis by execrating his soul. He explains that a magician with access to the right magic and a god’s sheut could do a complete reset on the god, effectively destroying them. Anubis also tries to tell Sadie something about Walt, but before he can, his great-grandfather, Shu (god of wind), arrives to blast them apart. Anubis has broken the rules by having contact with Sadie and is banned from doing so again.
Before the gods disappear, Shu tells Sadie he’s sent help. As the spirits vanish back into the Duat, a boy Sadie recognizes from a past mission in Russia arrives, claiming they need to talk.
Chapter 6 Summary: “Amos Plays with Action Figures”
The boy’s name is Leonid, and he has information about an impending attack on the Cairo stronghold. Sadie will accompany him to Egypt while Carter and Walt visit Thoth. Though portal-travel has been dangerous and unpredictable since Apophis’s rise, Sadie risks it. She and Leonid appear high above Cairo, and Leonid channels Shu’s power to land them safely near an entrance to the stronghold. After answering a riddle to enter and passing through a long hallway with scenes from different ages in Egyptian history, Sadie and Leonid find Amos and Zia studying action figures on a map that’s enchanted to reveal the location of enemy forces.
Leonid reveals the rebels are working with Apophis and have set up a hidden base nearby, from which they plan to attack the Cairo stronghold. The rebels have fallen for Apophis’s lies that they will be spared, believing they can rebuild a better world and that “the change is worth any price—even mass annihilation” (112). The attack will come in three days on the autumn equinox—the same day Apophis will rise.
Sadie explains her plan to use Apophis’s shadow against him and her idea to test the theory on the god Bes, hopefully restoring his soul. Though it’s risky, Amos agrees and tells Zia to accompany Sadie.
Chapter 7 Summary: “I Get Strangled by an Old Friend”
Meanwhile, Carter and Walt travel to Memphis, TN, where they find Thoth’s pyramid home under attack. Walt and Carter join the fight, with Walt creating a sphinx from an amulet, and Carter summoning his copesh sword to harness Horus’s giant battle avatar.
Between this and Thoth hitting demons with spells like “intestinal problems,” the battle goes well until a demon rams through Carter’s avatar to grab him by the throat. Carter recognizes the demon as Face of Horror, who is now possessed by Apophis. As Face of Horror squeezes Carter’s throat, Carter hears whispered promises from Apophis: The serpent will spare Carter and his family so they can live together in the wake of his destruction. Thoth saves Carter by turning Face of Horror to dust.
After Thoth forces Carter and Walt to nap, the three discuss using Apophis’s shadow to destroy him. Thoth admits it’s possible but won’t tell the boys how to do it because he can’t give magicians the secret to destroying the gods, leaving them to conclude “for a god of knowledge, he isn’t very helpful” (130).
Thoth does direct them to the spirit of the magician Setne in the underworld, who should have the information they need. Carter’s father recently became the next iteration of Osiris (god of judgment in the underworld), and the boys will appeal to him to reduce Setne’s sentence so he can help find and destroy Apophis’s shadow.
Chapter 8 Summary: “My Sister, The Flowerpot”
On the way back to Brooklyn, Walt tells Carter he has at most a day before he succumbs to his family’s curse. Anubis has a plan to help, but before Walt can explain, they land at home, where they find Bast babysitting Ra and Sadie’s messenger shabti (made from a flowerpot). Carter and Sadie’s shabti swap stories, and Sadie recognizes Setne as the face who spoke to her at the Dallas museum.
While Carter, Sadie, and the others attend to their individual missions, Bast will take Ra back to the Cairo stronghold and protect him until it is time for the god to face Apophis. With Ra in his current condition, the group doesn’t have much hope that he’ll be able to defeat Apophis. Still, Carter acknowledges that having a plan feels “much better than standing around, dwelling on the hopelessness of [their] situation” (149).
Chapter 9 Summary: “Zia Breaks Up a Lava Fight”
Sadie calls on Isis to transport her and Zia to the nursing home of the gods, where her friend Bes has been since he gave up his soul to save her life. When they arrive, Zia’s eyes turn to fire, and she starts throwing fireballs at objects. Sadie forces her to stop, breaking the spell. Zia confesses she’s been experiencing blackouts where she’ll come to herself without remembering what she’s done. Spending time with Ra, even in his current state, has helped, but Zia fears she’ll lose control of her power during a blackout. Sadie wonders if Zia is somehow linked to Ra, but she doesn’t have time to figure out how or what she can do to help.
The denizens of the nursing home are out on the blackened rock overlooking the river of lava for a beach day. Sadie and Zia are greeted by the nurse Tawaret (hippo goddess of motherhood), who is sad to hear her charges will have to endure the end of time in addition to being forgotten by humans. As Tawaret leads them to Bes, the girls see a host of gods, including two former gods of judgment who are attacking each other in the river. Zia wades in to break up the fight while Tawaret and Sadie continue to Bes.
Bes is unchanged since Sadie last saw him—still unresponsive and vacant. Though he can’t hear her, Sadie details her plan to reverse-engineer the shadow execration spell to try to restore Bes’s soul. Tawaret insists Sadie needs to focus on defeating Apophis. Sadie argues this is her focusing because, if the restoration works on Bes, it should also work to execrate the serpent. Even more, Sadie made a promise to help Bes, and as she says, “would not go to my death without first knowing I’d done everything I could to save my friend” (169).
Chapters 5-9 Analysis
Leonid’s arrival in Chapter 5 reintroduces the ongoing conflict between the magician factions, invoking the theme of Maintaining Balance Between Order and Chaos. The rebels are called so because they have moved against Amos, the leader of the Egyptian stronghold and, by extension, of all the magicians. However, the rebels believe they are in the right to do so because Amos and others have chosen to harness the power of the gods, which has traditionally been seen as an abomination. This conflict brings its own strife to Carter and Sadie’s mission, as they must contend with Apophis’s threat in addition to danger from these other magicians. With Apophis inspiring the rebels with his manipulative and deceptive promises, the forces of chaos are growing stronger.
More broadly, these warring factions highlight how a shared heritage does not automatically translate to being on the same side. Even without the rebels being corrupted by Apophis, the actions of the Kanes are viewed as terrible enough to spark dissent. This conflict also adds additional tension to Carter’s relationship with Zia: As a lifelong magician, Zia also believes that calling upon the gods is wrong. However, watching Carter do so and succeed makes Zia second-guess what she knows and forces her to rethink what she believes. This comes to a head when Zia realizes she is the key to Ra reclaiming his full strength, further blurring the boundaries between magicians and gods.
Walt and Carter’s visit with Thoth and the demon altercation highlight the different types of struggles each magician faces, as well as how the gods and demons are affected by Apophis’s increasing chaotic power. Face of Horror has attacked Carter in the past, but back then, the demon did not have Apophis’s power behind him. The demon’s increased strength as a result of Apophis’s influence reflects how much the serpent’s power has grown. Face of Horror also operates as a messenger of Apophis here. The whispers Carter hears are similar to the temptation he resists from Horus, only much more powerful in keeping with Apophis’s greater strength. In addition, where Horus tempts Carter with power that Carter finds relatively easy to refuse, Apophis uses Carter’s greatest fears and desires against him—namely, wanting to keep his family safe.
Thoth’s refusal to provide Carter and Walt with all the information they need again harkens to the selfishness of the gods. Thoth realizes the magicians could also destroy him with this knowledge, and so he gives in to his sense of self-preservation, even though he knows the magicians will obtain the knowledge from another source. In doing so, Thoth slows the progress toward destroying Apophis. However, it is also clear that the gods and their magic follow strict rules. Apophis is set to rise to power on the equinox—when order and chaos are perfectly balanced, leading to the time of year when chaos draws more power from longer nighttime darkness. Thus, Thoth’s delay serves to push the confrontation with Apophis back to when the day and night are aligned. In addition, Ra must be present at the confrontation if the prophecy has a chance of being fulfilled: The equinox means Ra and Apophis will be as evenly matched as possible.
While Horus and Isis represent the struggles Carter and Sadie face from the most powerful of the gods, the siblings’ relationships with Bast (the cat goddess) and Bes (the dwarf god) highlight how their relationships with lesser gods are also shaped by power dynamics, as well as the siblings’ growing assurance in meeting The Challenges of Being an Effective Leader. Long ago, Ra placed Bast as the lone guard to keep Apophis from escaping his prison by engaging the serpent in endless battle. As a result, Bast understands the severity of Apophis’s increasing power, and her experience battling the serpent has been invaluable in preparing the Kanes for their final fight. As the series has progressed, Bast has taken a more and more passive role in the conflict, which represents Carter’s and Sadie’s heroic arcs. The siblings are the protagonists and rising magicians of the series. Thus, it must ultimately be the two of them who defeat Apophis.
Similarly, Bes helped the siblings during their Russia mission in the previous book. As a result, Bes lost his shadow, saving Sadie’s life, and Sadie’s refusal to give up on him highlights her own heroic qualities. Though she knows Apophis’s threat is more important, she maintains the order she needs to emerge victorious by not giving up on promises she’s kept, including to help Bes.
Unlock all 53 pages of this Study Guide
Get in-depth, chapter-by-chapter summaries and analysis from our literary experts.
- Grasp challenging concepts with clear, comprehensive explanations
- Revisit key plot points and ideas without rereading the book
- Share impressive insights in classes and book clubs