Pyramids

Dil snorted. ‘Wear? Wear? You shouldn’t talk to me about calico and wear. What happens if someone robs the tomb in a thousand years’ time and him in calico, I’d like to know. He’d lurch halfway down the corridor, maybe throttle one of them, I’ll grant you, but then he’s coming undone, right? The elbows’ll be out in no time, I’ll never live it down.’

‘But you’ll be dead, master!’

‘Dead? What’s that got to do with it?’ Dil riffled through the samples. ‘No, it’ll be the hessian. Got plenty of give in it, hessian. Good traction, too. He’ll really be able to lurch up speed in the passages, if he ever needs to.’

The king sighed. He’d have preferred something lightweight in taffeta.

‘And go and shut the door,’ Dil added. ‘It’s getting breezy in here.’

***

‘And now it’s time,’ said the high priest, ‘for us to see our late father.’ He allowed himself a quiet smile. ‘I am sure he is looking forward to it,’ he added.

Teppic considered this. It wasn’t something he was looking forward to, but at least it would get everyone’s mind off him marrying relatives. He reached down in what he hoped was a kingly fashion to stroke one of the palace cats. This also was not a good move. The creature sniffed it, went cross-eyed with the effort of thought, and then bit his fingers.

‘Cats are sacred,’ said Dios, shocked at the words Teppic uttered.

‘Long-legged cats with silver fur and disdainful expressions are, maybe,’ said Teppic, nursing his hand, ‘I don’t know about this sort. I’m sure sacred cats don’t leave dead ibises under the bed. And I’m certain that sacred cats that live surrounded by endless sand don’t come indoors and do it in the king’s sandals, Dios.’

‘All cats are cats,’ said Dios, vaguely, and added, ‘If we would be so gracious as to follow us.’ He motioned Teppic towards a distant arch.

Teppic followed slowly. He’d been back home for what seemed like ages, and it still didn’t feel right. The air was too dry. The clothes felt wrong. It was too hot. Even the buildings seemed wrong. The pillars, for one thing. Back ho— back at the Guild, pillars were graceful fluted things with little bunches of stone grapes and things around the top. Here they were massive pear-shaped lumps, where all the stone had run to the bottom.

Half a dozen servants trailed behind him, carrying the various items of regalia.

He tried to imitate Dios’s walk, and found the movements coming back to him. You turned your torso this way, then you turned your head this way, and extended your arms at forty-five degrees to your body with the palms down, and then you attempted to move.

The high priest’s staff raised echoes as it touched the flagstones. A blind man could have walked barefoot through the palace by tracing the timeworn dimples it had created over the years.

‘I am afraid that we will find that our father has changed somewhat since we last saw him,’ said Dios conversationally, as they undulated by the fresco of Queen Khaphut accepting Tribute from the Kingdoms of the World.

‘Well, yes,’ said Teppic, bewildered by the tone. ‘He’s dead, isn’t he?’

‘There’s that, too,’ said Dios, and Teppic realized that he hadn’t been referring to something as trivial as the king’s current physical condition.

He was lost in a horrified admiration. It wasn’t that Dios was particularly cruel or uncaring, it was simply that death was a mere irritating transition in the eternal business of existence. The fact that people died was just an inconvenience, like them being out when you called.

It’s a strange world, he thought. It’s all busy shadows, and it never changes. And I’m part of it.

‘Who’s he?’ he said, pointing to a particularly big fresco showing a tall man with a hat like a chimney and a beard like a rope riding a chariot over a lot of other, much smaller, people.

‘His name is in the cartouche below,’ said Dios primly.

‘What?’

‘The small oval, sire,’ said Dios.

Teppic peered closely at the dense hieroglyphics.

‘“Thin eagle, eye, wiggly line, man with a stick, bird sitting down, wiggly line”,’ he read. Dios winced.

‘I believe we must apply ourselves more to the study of modern languages,’ he said, recovering a bit. ‘His name is Pta-ka-ba. He is king when the Djel Empire extends from the Circle Sea to the Rim Ocean, when almost half the continent pays tribute to us.’

Teppic realized what it was about the man’s speech that was strange. Dios would bend any sentence to breaking point if it meant avoiding a past tense. He pointed to another fresco.

‘And her?’ he said.

‘She is Queen Khat-leon-ra-pta,’ said Dios. ‘She wins the kingdom of Howonderland by stealth. This is the time of the Second Empire.’

‘But she is dead?’ said Teppic.

‘I understand so,’ said the high priest, after the slightest of pauses. Yes. The past tense definitely bothered Dios.

‘I have learned seven languages,’ said Teppic, secure in the knowledge that the actual marks he had achieved in three of them would remain concealed in the ledgers of the Guild.

‘Indeed, sire?’