Pyramids

‘Thank you very much. Thank you very much indeed, I must say.’ The pharaoh went and sat by the cat. It seemed that people only had respect for the dead when they thought the dead were listening.

‘I suppose,’ said the apprentice, with some uncertainty, ‘he did look a bit ugly compared to the frescoes.’

‘That’s the point, isn’t it,’ said Dil meaningfully.

Gern’s big honest spotty face changed slowly, like a cratered landscape with clouds passing across it. It was dawning on him that this came under the heading of initiation into ancient craft secrets.

‘You mean even the painters change the—’ he began.

Dil frowned at him.

‘We don’t talk about it,’ he said.

Gern tried to force his features into an expression of worthy seriousness.

‘Oh,’ he said. ‘Yes. I see, master.’

The sculptor clapped him on the back.

‘You’re a bright lad, Gern,’ he said. ‘You catch on. After all, it’s bad enough being ugly when you’re alive. Think how terrible it would be to be ugly in the Netherworld.’

King Teppicymon XXVII shook his head. We all have to look alike when we’re alive, he thought, and now they make sure we’re identical when we’re dead. What a kingdom. He looked down and saw the soul of the late cat, which was washing itself. When he was alive he’d hated the things, but just now it seemed positively companionable. He patted it gingerly on its flat head. It purred for a moment, and then attempted to strip the flesh from his hand. It was on a definite hiding to nothing there.

He was aware with growing horror that the trio was now discussing a pyramid. His pyramid. It was going to be the biggest one ever. It was going to go on a highly fertile piece of sloping ground on a prime site in the necropolis. It was going to make even the biggest existing pyramid look like something a child might construct in a sand tray. It was going to be surrounded by marble gardens and granite obelisks. It was going to be the greatest memorial ever built by a son for his father.

The king groaned.

Ptaclusp groaned.

It had been better in his father’s day. You just needed a bloody great heap of log rollers and twenty years, which was useful because it kept everyone out of trouble during Inundation, when all the fields were flooded. Now you just needed a bright lad with a piece of chalk and the right incantations.

Mind you, it was impressive, if you liked that kind of thing.

Ptaclusp IIb walked around the great stone block, tidying an equation here, highlighting a hermetic inscription there. He glanced up and gave his father a brief nod.

Ptaclusp hurried back to the king, who was standing with his retinue on the cliff overlooking the quarry, the sun gleaming off the mask. A royal visit, on top of everything else …

‘We’re ready, if it please you, O arc of the sky,’ he said, breaking into a sweat, hoping against hope that …

Oh gods. The king was going to Put Him at his Ease again.

He looked imploringly at the high priest, who with the merest twitch of his features indicated that there was nothing he proposed to do about it. This was too much, he wasn’t the only one to object to this, Dil the master embalmer had been subjected to half an hour of having to Talk about his Family only yesterday, it was wrong, people expected the king to stay in the palace, it was too …

The king ambled towards him in a nonchalant way designed to make the master builder feel he was among friends. Oh no, Ptaclusp thought, he’s going to Remember my Name.

‘I must say you’ve done a tremendous amount in nine weeks, it’s a very good start. Er. It’s Ptaclusp, isn’t it?’ said the king.

Ptaclusp swallowed. There was no help for it now.

‘Yes, O hand upon the waters,’ he said, ‘O fount of—’

‘I think “your majesty” or “sire” will do,’ said Teppic.

Ptaclusp panicked and glanced fearfully at Dios, who winced but nodded again.

‘The king wishes you to address him—’ a look of pain crossed his face — ‘informally. In the fashion of the barba — of foreign lands.’

‘You must consider yourself a very fortunate man to have such talented and hard-working sons,’ said Teppic, staring down at the busy panorama of the quarry.

‘I … will, O … sire,’ mumbled Ptaclusp, interpreting this as an order. Why couldn’t kings order people around like in the old days? You knew where you were then, they didn’t go round being charming and treating you as some sort of equal, as if you could make the sun rise too.

‘It must be a fascinating trade,’ Teppic went on.

‘As your sire wishes, sire,’ said Ptaclusp. ‘If your majesty would just give the word—’

‘And how exactly does all this work?’

‘Your sire?’ said Ptaclusp, horrified.

‘You make the blocks fly, do you?’

‘Yes, O sire.’

‘That is very interesting. How do you do it?’

Ptaclusp nearly bit through his lip. Betray Craft secrets? He was horrified. Against all expectation, Dios came to his aid.