Pyramids (26 page)

And then it had occurred to him that a god, when he was unhappy about the product, as it might be, maybe the plasterwork wasn’t exactly as per spec, or perhaps a corner of the temple was a bit low on account of unexpected quicksand, a god didn’t just come around demanding in a loud voice to see the manager. No. A god knew exactly where you were, and got to the point. Also, gods were notoriously bad payers. So were humans, of course, but they didn’t actually expect you to die before they settled the account.

His gaze turned to his other son, a painted silhouette against the statue, his mouth a frozen O of astonishment, and Ptaclusp reached a decision.

“I’ve just about had it with pyramids,” he said. “Remind me, lad. If we ever get out of here, no more pyramids. We’ve got set in our ways. Time to branch out, I reckon.”

“That’s what I’ve been telling you for
ages
, dad!” said IIb. “I’ve told you, a couple of decent aqueducts will make a tremendous—”

“Yes, yes, I remember,” said Ptaclusp. “Yes. Aqueducts. All those arches and things. Fine. Only I can’t remember where you said you have to put the coffin in.”

“
Dad
!”

“Don’t mind me, lad. I think I’m going mad.”

I couldn’t have seen a mummy and two men over there, carrying sledgehammers…

It was, indeed, Chidder.

And Chidder had a boat.

Teppic knew that further along the coast the Seriph of Al-Khali lived in the fabulous palace of the Rhoxie, which was said to have been built in one night by a genie and was famed in myth and legend for its splendor.
^*
The
Unnamed
was the Rhoxie afloat, but more so. Its designer had a gilt complex, and had tried every trick with gold paint, curly pillars and expensive drapes to make it look less like a ship and more like a boudoir that had collided with a highly suspicious type of theater.

In fact, you needed an assassin’s eyes for hidden detail to notice how innocently the gaudiness concealed the sleekness of the hull and the fact, even when you added the cabin space and the holds together, that there still seemed to be a lot of capacity unaccounted for. The water around what Ptraci called the pointed end was strangely rippled, but it would be totally ridiculous to suspect such an obvious merchantman of having a concealed ramming spike underwater, or that a mere five minutes’ work with an ax would turn this wallowing
Alcázar
into something that could run away from nearly everything else afloat and make the few that
could
catch up seriously regret it.

“Very impressive,” said Teppic.

“It’s all show, really,” said Chidder.

“Yes. I can see that.”

“I mean, we’re poor traders.”

Teppic nodded. “The usual phrase is ‘poor
but honest
traders,’” he said.

Chidder smiled a merchant’s smile. “Oh, I think we’ll stick on ‘poor’ at the moment. How the hell are you, anyway? Last we heard you were going off to be king of some place no one’s ever heard of. And who is this
lovely
young lady?”

“Her na—” Teppic began.

“Ptraci,” said Ptraci.

“She’s a han—-” Teppic began.

“She must surely be a royal princess,” said Chidder smoothly. “And it would give me the greatest pleasure if she, if indeed
both
of you, would dine with me tonight. Humble sailor’s fare, I’m afraid, but we muddle along, we muddle along.”

“Not Ephebian, is it?” said Teppic.

“Ship’s biscuit, salt beef, that sort of thing,” said Chidder, without taking his eyes off Ptraci. They hadn’t left her since she came on board.

Then he laughed. It was the old familiar Chidder laugh, not exactly without humor, but clearly well under the control of its owner’s higher brain centers.

“What an astonishing coincidence,” he said. “And us due to sail at dawn, too. Can I offer you a change of clothing? You both look somewhat, er, travel-stained.”

“Rough sailor clothing, I expect,” said Teppic. “As befits a humble merchant, correct me if I’m wrong?”

In fact Teppic was shown to a small cabin as exquisitely and carefully furnished as a jeweled egg, where there was laid upon the bed as fine an assortment of clothing as could be found anywhere on the Circle Sea. True, it all appeared secondhand, but carefully laundered and expertly stitched so that the sword cuts hardly showed at all. He gazed thoughtfully at the hooks on the wall, and the faint patching on the wood which hinted that various things had once been hung there and hastily removed.

He stepped out into the narrow corridor, and met Ptraci. She’d chosen a red court dress such as had been the fashion in Ankh-Morpork ten years previously, with puffed sleeves and vast concealed underpinnings and ruffs the size of millstones.

Teppic learned something new, which was that attractive women dressed in a few strips of gauze and a few yards of silk
can
actually look far more desirable when fully clad from neck to ankle. She gave an experimental twirl.

“There are any amount of things like this in there,” she said. “Is this how women dress in Ankh-Morpork? It’s like wearing a house. It doesn’t half make you sweaty.”

“Look, about Chidder,” said Teppic urgently. “I mean, he’s a good fellow and everything, but—”

“He’s very kind, isn’t he,” she agreed.

“Well. Yes. He is,” Teppic admitted, hopelessly. “He’s an old friend.”

“That’s nice.”

One of the crew materialized at the end of the corridor and bowed them into the state cabin, his air of old retainer-ship marred only by the criss-cross pattern of scars on his head and some tattoos that made the pictures in
The Shuttered Palace
look like illustrations in a DIY shelving manual. The things he could make them do by flexing his biceps could keep entire dockside taverns fascinated for hours, and he was not aware that the worst moment of his entire life was only a few minutes away.

“This is all very pleasant,” said Chidder, pouring some wine. He nodded at the tattooed man. “You may serve the soup, Alfonz,” he added.

“Look, Chiddy, you’re not a pirate, are you?” said Teppic, desperately.

“Is that what’s been worrying you?” Chidder grinned his lazy grin.

It wasn’t everything that Teppic had been worrying about, but it had been jockeying for top position. He nodded.

“No, we’re not. We just prefer to, er, avoid paperwork wherever possible. You know? We don’t like people to have all the worry of having to know everything we do.”

“Only there’s all the clothes—”

“Ah. We get
attacked
by pirates a fair amount. That’s why father had the
Unnamed
built. It always surprises them. And the whole thing is morally sound. We get their ship, their booty, and any prisoners they may have get rescued and given a ride home at competitive rates.”

“What do you do with the pirates?”

Chidder glanced at Alfonz.

“That depends on future employment prospects,” he said. “Father always says that a man down on his luck should be offered a helping hand. On terms, that is. How’s the king business?”

Teppic told him. Chidder listened intently, swilling the wine around in his glass.

“So that’s it,” he said at last. “We heard there was going to be a war. That’s why we’re sailing tonight.”

“I don’t blame you,” said Teppic.

“No, I mean to get the trade organized. With both sides, naturally, because we’re strictly impartial. The weapons produced on this continent are really quite shocking. Downright dangerous. You should come with us, too. You’re a very valuable person.”

“Never felt more valueless than right now,” said Teppic despondently.

Chidder looked at him in amazement.

“But you’re a king!” he said.

“Well, yes, but—”

“Of a country which technically still exists, but isn’t actually reachable by mortal man?”

“Sadly so.”

“And you can pass laws about, well, currency and taxation, yes?”

“I suppose so, but—”

“And you don’t think you’re valuable? Good grief, Tep, our accountants can probably think up fifty different ways to…well, my hands go damp just to think about it. Father will probably ask to move our head office there, for a start.”

“Chidder, I explained. You
know
it. No one can get in,” said Teppic.

“That doesn’t matter.”

“
Doesn’t matter
?”

“No, because we’ll just make Ankh our main branch office and pay our taxes in wherever the place is. All we need is an official address in, I don’t know, the Avenue of the Pyramids or something. Take my tip and don’t give in on anything until father gives you a seat on the board. You’re royal, anyway, that’s always impressive…”

Chidder chattered on. Teppic felt his clothes growing hotter.

So this was it. You lost your kingdom, and then it was worth more because it was a tax haven, and you took a seat on the board, whatever that was, and that made it all right.

Ptraci defused the situation by grabbing Alfonz’s arm as he was serving the pheasant.

“The Congress of The Friendly Dog and the Two Small Biscuits!” she exclaimed, examining the intricate tattoo. “You hardly ever see that these days. Isn’t it well done? You can even make out the yogurt.”

Alfonz froze, and then blushed. Watching the glow spread across the great scarred head was like watching sunrise over a mountain range.

“What’s the one on your other arm?”

Alfonz, who looked as though his past jobs had included being a battering ram, murmured something and, very shyly, showed her his forearm.

“‘S’not really suitable for ladies,” he whispered.

Ptraci brushed aside the wiry hair like a keen explorer, while Chidder stared at her with his mouth hanging open.

“Oh, I know that one,” she said dismissively. “That’s out of
130 Days of Pseudopolis
. It’s physically impossible.” She let go of the arm, and turned back to her meal. After a moment she looked up at Teppic and Chidder.

“Don’t mind me,” she said brightly. “Do go on.”

“Alfonz, please go and put a proper shirt on,” said Chidder, hoarsely.

Alfonz backed away, staring at his arm.

“Er. What was I, er, saying?” said Chidder. “Sorry. Lost the thread. Er. Have some more wine, Tep?”

Ptraci didn’t just derail the train of thought, she ripped up the rails, burned the stations and melted the bridges for scrap. And so the dinner trailed off into beef pie, fresh peaches, crystallized sea urchins and desultory small talk about the good old days at the Guild. They had been three months ago. It seemed like a lifetime. Three months in the Old Kingdom
was
a lifetime.

After some time Ptraci yawned and went to her cabin, leaving the two of them alone with a fresh bottle of wine. Chidder watched her go in awed silence.

“Are there many like her back at your place?” he said.

“I don’t know,” Teppic admitted. “There could be. Usually they lie around the place peeling grapes or waving fans.”

“She’s amazing. She’ll take them by storm in Ankh, you know. With a figure like that and a mind like…” He hesitated. “Is she…? I mean, are you two…?”

“No,” said Teppic.

“She’s very attractive.”

“Yes,” said Teppic.

“A sort of cross between a temple dancer and a band-saw.”

They took their glasses and went up on deck, where a few lights from the city paled against the brilliance of the stars. The water was flat calm, almost oily.

Teppic’s head was beginning to spin slowly. The desert, the sun, two gloss coats of Ephebian retsina on his stomach lining and a bottle of wine were getting together to beat up his synapses.

“I mus’ say,” he managed, leaning on the rail, “you’re doing all right for yourself.”

“It’s OK,” said Chidder, “Commerce is quite interesting. Building up markets, you know. The cut and thrust of competition in the privateering sector. You ought to come in with us, boy. It’s where the future lies, my father says. Not with wizards and kings, but with enterprising people who can afford to hire them. No offense intended, you understand.”

“We’re all that’s left,” said Teppic to his wine glass. “Out of the whole kingdom. Me, her, and a camel that smells like an old carpet. An ancient kingdom, lost.”

“Good job it wasn’t a new one,” said Chidder. “At least people got some wear out of it.”

“You don’t know what it’s like,” said Teppic. “It’s like a whole great pyramid. But upside down, you understand? All that history, all those ancestors, all the people, all funnelling down to me. Right at the bottom.”

He slumped onto a coil of rope as Chidder passed the bottle back and said, “It makes you think, doesn’t it? There’s all these lost cities and kingdoms around. Like Ee, in the Great Nef. Whole countries, just gone. Just out there somewhere. Maybe people started mucking about with geometry, what do you say?”

Teppic snored.

After some moments Chidder swayed forward, dropped the empty bottle over the side—it went plunk, and for a few seconds a stream of bubbles disturbed the flat calm—and staggered off to bed.

Teppic dreamed.

And in his dream he was standing on a high place, but unsteadily, because he was balancing on the shoulders of his father and mother, and below them he could make out his grandparents, and below them his ancestors stretching away and out in a vast, all right, a vast
pyramid
of humanity whose base was lost in clouds.

He could hear the murmur of shouted orders and instructions floating up to him.

If you do nothing, we shall never have been
.

“This is just a dream,” he said, and stepped out of it into a palace where a small, dark man in a loincloth was sitting on a stone bench, eating figs.

“Of course it’s a dream,” he said. “The world is the dream of the Creator. It’s all dreams, different kinds of dreams. They’re supposed to tell you things. Like: don’t eat lobster last thing at night. Stuff like that. Have you had the one about the seven cows?”

“Yes,” said Teppic, looking around. He’d dreamed quite good architecture. “One of them was playing a trombone.”