‘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 organised. With both sides, naturally, because we’re strictly impartial. The weapons produced on this continent are really quite shocking. Down-right 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 yoghurt.’
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, crystallised 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 bandsaw.’ 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 okay,’ 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 offence 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 on to 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.’
‘It was smoking a cigar in my day. Well-known ancestral dream, that dream.’
‘What does it mean?’
The little man picked a seed from between his teeth.
‘Search me,’ he said. ‘I’d give my right arm to find out. I don’t think we’ve met, by the way. I’m Khuft. I founded this kingdom. You dream a good fig.’
‘I’m dreaming you, too?’
‘Damn right. I had a vocabulary of eight hundred words, do you think I’d really be talking like this? If you’re expecting a bit of helpful ancestral advice, forget it. This is a dream. I can’t tell you anything you don’t know yourself.’
‘You’re the founder?’
‘That’s me.’
‘I . . . thought you’d be different,’ said Teppic.
‘How d’you mean?’
‘Well . . . on the statue . .
Khuft waved a hand impatiently.
‘That’s just public relations,’ he said. ‘I mean, look at me. Do I look patriarchal?’
Teppic gave him a critical appraisal. ‘Not in that loincloth,’ he admitted. ‘It’s a bit, well, ragged.’
‘It’s got years of wear left in it,’ said Khuft.
‘Still, I expect it’s all you could grab when you were fleeing from persecution,’ said Teppic, anxious to show an understanding nature.
Khuft took another fig and give him a lopsided look. ‘How’s that again?’