‘Yes. That’s what I’m afraid of,’ said Ptaclusp.
‘It’s just a way of letting your money work for you,’ said another son. ‘It’s probably quantum.’
‘Oh, good,’ said Ptaclusp weakly.
‘We’ll get the block on tonight, don’t worry,’ said one of the IIbs. ‘After it’s flared the power off we can all settle down.’
‘I told the king we’d do it tomorrow.’ The Ptaclusp IIbs went pale in unison. Despite the heat, it suddenly seemed a lot colder in the tent.
‘Tonight, father,’ said one of them. ‘Surely you mean tonight?
‘Tomorrow,’ said Ptaclusp, firmly. ‘I’ve arranged an awning and people throwing lotus blossom. There’s going to be a band. Tocsins and trumpets and tinkling cymbals. And speeches and a meat tea afterwards. That’s the way we’ve always done it. Attracts new customers. They like to have a look round.’
‘Father, you’ve seen the way it soaks up. . . you’ve seen the frost . .
‘Let it soak. We Ptaclusps don’t go around capping off pyramids as though we were finishing off a garden wall. We don’t knock off like a wossname in the night. People expect a ceremony.
‘But-‘
‘I’m not listening. I’ve listened to too much of this new-fangled stuff. Tomorrow. I’ve had the bronze plaque made, and the velvet curtains and everything.’
One of the IIas shrugged. ‘It’s no good arguing with him,’ he said. ‘I’m from three hours ahead. I remember this meeting. We couldn’t change his mind.’
‘I’m from two hours ahead,’ said one of his clones. ‘I remember you saying that, too.’
Beyond the walls of the tent, the pyramid sizzled with accumulated time.
There is nothing mystical about the power of pyramids.
Pyramids are dams in the stream of time. Correctly shaped and orientated, with the proper paracosmic measurements correctly plumbed in, the temporal potential of the great mass of stone can be diverted to accelerate or reverse time over a very small area, in the same way that a hydraulic ram can be induced to pump water against the flow.
The original builders, who were of course ancients and therefore wise, knew this very well and the whole point of a correctly-built pyramid was to achieve absolute null time in the central chamber so that a dying king, tucked up there, would indeed live forever – or at least, never actually die. The time that should have passed in the chamber was stored in the bulk of the pyramid and allowed to flare off once every twenty-four hours.
After a few aeons people forgot this and thought you could achieve the same effect by a) ritual b) pickling people and c) storing their soft inner bits in jars.
This seldom works.
And so the art of pyramid tuning was lost, and all the knowledge became a handful of misunderstood rules and hazy recollections. The ancients were far too wise to build very big pyramids. They could cause very strange things, things that would make mere fluctuations in time look tiny by comparison.
By the way, contrary to popular opinion pyramids don’t sharpen razor blades. They just take them back to when they weren’t blunt. It’s probably because of quantum.
Teppic lay on the strata of his bed, listening intently.
There were two guards outside the door, and another two on the balcony outside, and – he was impressed at Dios’s forethought – one on the roof. He could hear them trying to make no noise.
He’d hardly been able to protest. If black-clad miscreants were getting into the palace, then the person of the king had to be protected. It was undeniable.
He slipped off the solid mattress and glided through the twilight to the statue of Bast the Cat-Headed God in the corner, twisted off the head, and pulled out his assassin’s costume. He dressed quickly, cursing the lack of mirrors, and then padded across and lurked behind a pillar.
The only problem, as far as he could see, was not laughing. Being a soldier in Djelibeybi was not a high risk job. There was never a hint of internal rebellion and, since either neighbour could crush the kingdom instantly by force of arms, there was no real point in selecting keen and belligerent warriors. In fact, the last thing the priesthood wanted was enthusiastic soldiers. Enthusiastic soldiers with no fighting to do soon get bored and start thinking dangerous thoughts, like how much better they could run the country.
Instead the job attracted big, solid men, the kind of men who could stand stock still for hours at a time without getting bored, men with the build of an ox and the mental processes to match. Excellent bladder control was also desirable.
He stepped out on to the balcony.
Teppic had learned how not to move stealthily. Millions of years of being eaten by creatures that know how to move stealthily has made humanity very good at spotting stealthy movement. Nor was it enough to make no noise, because little moving patches of silence always aroused suspicion. The trick was to glide through the night with a quiet reassurance, just like the air did.
There was a guard standing just outside the room. Teppic drifted past him and climbed carefully up the wall. It had been decorated with a complex bas relief of the triumphs of past monarchs, so Teppic used his family to give him a leg up.
The breeze was blowing off the desert as he swung his legs over the parapet and walked silently across the roof, which was still hot underfoot. The air had a recently-cooked smell, tinted with spice.
It was a strange feeling, to be creeping across the roof of your own palace, trying to avoid your own guards, engaged on a mission in direct contravention of your own decree and knowing that if you were caught you would have yourself thrown to the sacred crocodiles. After all, he’d apparently already instructed that he was to be shown no mercy if he was captured.
Somehow it added an extra thrill.
There was freedom of a sort up here on the rooftops, the only kind of freedom available to a king of the valley. It occurred to Teppic that the landless peasants down on the delta had more freedom than he did, although the seditious and non-kingly side of him said, yes, freedom to catch any diseases of their choice, starve as much as they wanted, and die of whatever dreadful ague took their fancy. But freedom, of a sort.
A faint noise in the huge silence of the night drew him to the riverward edge of the roof. The Djel sprawled in the moonlight, broad and oily.
There was a boat in midstream, heading back from the far bank and the necropolis. There was no mistaking the figure at the oars. The flarelight gleamed off his bald head.
One day, Teppic thought, I’ll follow him. I’ll find out what it is he does over there.
If he goes over in daylight, of course.
In daylight the necropolis was merely gloomy, as though the whole universe had shut down for early-closing. He’d even explored it, wandering through streets and alleys that contrived to be still and dusty no matter what the weather was on the other, the living side of the water. There was always a breathless feel about it, which was probably not to be wondered at. Assassins liked the night on general principles, but the night of the necropolis was something else. Or rather, it was the same thing, but a lot more of it. Besides, it was the only city anywhere on the Disc where an assassin couldn’t find employment.
He reached the light well that opened on the embalmers’ courtyard and peered down. A moment later he landed lightly on the floor and slipped into the room of cases.
‘Hallo, lad.’
Teppic opened the lid of the case. It was still empty.
‘She’s in one of the ones at the back,’ said the king. ‘Never had much of a sense of direction.’
It was a great big palace. Teppic could barely find his way around it by daylight. He considered his chances of carrying out a search in pitch darkness.
‘It’s a family trait, you know. Your grandad had to have Left and Right painted on his sandals, it was that bad. It’s lucky for you that you take after your mother in that respect.’
It was strange. She didn’t talk, she chattered. She didn’t seem to be able to hold a simple thought in her head for more than about ten seconds. Her brain appeared to be wired directly to her mouth, so that as soon as a thought entered her head she spoke it out loud. Compared to the ladies he had met at soirees in Ankh, who delighted in entertaining young assassins and fed them expensive delicacies and talked to them of high and delicate matters while their eyes sparkled like carborundum drills and their lips began to glisten compared to them, she was as empty as a, as a, well, as an empty thing. Nevertheless, he found he desperately wanted to find her. The sheer undemandingness of her was like a drug. The memory of her bosom was quite beside the point.