Dream Boat (34 page)

Ablaze with these mortal illuminations, mummies would awaken from the dead and cast off their bandages. The lame shall walk, the blind shall see, the barren shall bring forth a child.
Praise be to Ra, O lord of lords and king of kings, whose limbs are gold and emeralds are his eyes. Grant us peace in heaven, health on earth and acquittal on the final Day of Judgement.

The High Priest, with his ten priestesses, laid out flat dishes filled with oil and salt and his ten white-robed acolytes lit the floating wicks around the Barque of Ra. In the darkness, the gold prow glinted brighter than midsummer sunshine and as the hundreds upon hundreds of twinkling lights were lit, the Boat of a Million Years drifted on the waters of their hope.

Up in his secret cave, Seth felt his whole body glow with happiness. His skin tingled, his pulse skipped, he could not believe his luck.
Another one!
He danced around his table, unable to keep still. Tonight, while those fools down there celebrate the Festival of Lamps, The Master of Men's Destinies can begin the slow process of putting his own magic into practice. Dark, powerful magic which will make divinities of mere disciples.

He clasped his hands together and gave thanks to Ra. Ra, who had shown him the secret path to immortality. Ra, whose goodness shone on Seth by day and whose power guarded him by night.

Power! The knowledge of his own potency stirred his

manhood into action and he took the new arrival roughly and without care. In his heightened state of emotion, Seth could not recall her name, or the mask he'd allocated her -in fact, he could not recall any of their real names now. Thoth and Bast, Horus and Hathor, that's who they were. They had become the Ten True Fools, seated round his table for eternity, with Osiris coming last to bend the knee, as it must be. As it was ordained to be.

Seth climaxed.

The girl whimpered.

'Shut up!' He silenced her with his fist. 'Shut up, you bitch, I need to think!'

Think. Think . . .

But he couldn't think. He was too light-headed at the moment. He laughed. By heaven, it had taken him by surprise, back there on the stage, when Mentu actually mentioned Seth by name. For a minute, he'd wondered if the bastard was on to him - about to denounce him on the spot - and he didn't mind admitting, his heart had nearly stopped! But now, in retrospect, he was glad the subject of the Dark Destroyer was back out in the open. For some reason, Mentu hadn't mentioned him for a week or two, and Seth badly wanted the people to know about his power. To understand who they were dealing with.

He loped over to the back of his cave, to the set of scrolls hidden in the corner. He had set it all down in these books - everything, except the secret of his magic, naturally! That secret was his and his alone, it had been passed to him by Ra and would travel with him in the underworld. But when the time was right - and that time was fast approaching -he'd deposit his Book of Knowledge in the House of Life, along with the Forty-two Sacred Books of Wisdom, so that everyone might know who they'd be dealing with.

That Seth was no mere Dark Destroyer, Devourer of Souls.

That he was also Master of Eternity, controller of men's destiny, the Sorcerer, the Measurer of Time.

That he, with his ten disciples, could change the future of mankind.

He replaced the scrolls and looked around. His majestic seed had transformed mortal women into gods who now sat around his table and awaited the stupendous moment when Seth and Seth alone could breath life - eternal life - into them.

He counted. Eight. And only two to go!

Seth really could not believe his luck.

Like other rites and rituals practised by the Brothers of Horus, the Festival of Lamps was another mishmash of Egyptian heritage blended and jumbled so effectively that they emerged at the other end as a single hybrid. A chimera. Like the sphinx, the ceremony was part this, part that, part something else, until eventually it took on its own identity.

Claudia was in danger of losing hers.

Marcus was not where he was supposed to be. Junius was not where
he
was supposed to be. Flea - am I repeating myself? - was not where
she
was supposed to be (because Claudia would have staked her life Flea would have headed straight for Doodlebug), and Flavia, bless her little cotton socks, was nowhere to be found.

So much for organisation!

Under the oppressive clouds, no moon shone down. The wooded hills stood black against the sky. Implacable. Remote. In the lampglow, the ceremonial pool shone like molten copper and around it women clutching burning brands huddled close, their bodies stiff with prayer, as the High Priest stood, hands outstretched and raised, entreating that this holy water receive the blessing of the sun god, from whom all life is made.

Resurrection. Regeneration. Fertility and potency. Powerful stuff, Claudia thought, powerful stuff the brothers were brewing.

And these Pyramidiots guzzled every last drop, their tongues even hanging out for more. How weird can you get, believing the sun's propelled by a bloody boat? For gods' sake, the sun's

the sun! Apollo might look after it, but he doesn't
drive
the damn thing.

More and more lamps were lit, until thousands of tiny flames flickered in the blackness, many stationery but others moving, tiny torches carried in the hands of individuals. A honey glow surrounded white-robed acolytes as they swung flaming censers outside the temple doors, others rolled a blazing hoop between the alabaster sphinxes, and still more carried shallow dishes of flames which dangled on triple-chained stems. You'd think that so many lights would make it bright, but in this twinkling maze Claudia couldn't see a sausage, much less recognise anybody, and frustration frayed her temper. Around now, Min would be keeping his appointment for their amorous liaison behind the House of Life. She smiled a wicked smile, and wondered how erotic itchy loin cloths were to him.

'Nasty place to have a rash, old chap. Why don't you take a dip in the heated indoor pool, followed by a long lie down?'

This was midnight, where the hell
was
everyone? Claudia had checked out the yard behind the storehouse. No Marcus. She'd hung around the stables. No Flea. She'd waited for Junius in the temple compound, and been handed a small lighted stick by a sanctimonious priestess. The torch was handy, because it was easy to become disorientated in this labyrinth of lamps, but surely five sensible adults could contrive to meet up at an appointed place?

Five. The number made her flesh crawl. Five men, one a certain killer, while who knows what hideous deeds the others might have perpetrated. They all had the capability. She shivered as she recalled Neco's fury when she'd burst in on his bout of self-flagellation. With his front-toothed whistle, he had reminded her of a striking cobra as he had reared up on his knees and hissed for her to get the fuck out of his room.

His venom clung. Long after she'd left the wing, long after the sun had set, oh how Neco's venomous whistle had stayed with her.

Despite the throbbing heat, the rasp of the cicadas, the flicker

of the flames, Claudia felt a chill run through to her bones.

And felt the breath of evil on the breeze.

Four men responsible for the daily running of the commune listened to the High Priest's chants and did not hear the words. Each man's thoughts were turned inwards, and their thoughts were turned on hell.

One saw it as a vision - literally the hell on earth spies and traitors must endure before they walk the Path of Righteous to the Fields of the Blessed in the Afterworld.
The Ordeal of the Lakes.
In his mind, he heard again and again the terrible screams of a youth, trussed like some sacrificial beast, roasted slowly over an open fire. That, the overseer thought, was bad, but the animal screeches when the poor kid was thrown into the boiling cauldron had haunted his dreams ever since. They made him fractious. Jumpy. Each day thereafter, he had relived the boy's execution, knowing in his heart of hearts that it had been wrong. Wicked, even, but although he held a powerful office in the commune, no one could overturn Mentu's decision once it was decreed. Therefore, each day had become a living hell, as he feared for fate of the next unfortunate . . .

For the second overseer, hell was something far more personal. He had fled his previous life because of the scandal which had been about to erupt, expecting to put it all behind him in the peaceful running of this commune. Hoping that, by immersing himself in daily commerce here, he might forget: pretend that he was normal; convince himself that he was just like any other man. Oh, how quickly he'd found out! How soon he'd realised he could not leave this dreadful thing behind! Each day he was tormented, each waking hour - yes, each and every minute plagued him. Forced him to resist his natural urge. From the corner of his eye, he watched a young man's muscles ripple in the lamplight. And by all that was holy, lusted after him. The overseer's fists clenched with his pain. To his eternal mortification, he knew he had not left his hell behind. It sat with him, on his back. Always. And cursed him . . .

The third overseer's hell was equally carnal. It involved

him and an older woman, making love. Perverted love, at that. That's why he'd left her and come here. To get away from her, from the things she'd made him do. He didn't mind so much that she liked him to tie her up and whip her, but other times she made him do things. . . things he couldn't talk about, couldn't bear to even think about. Degrading things. And the tragedy of it all was that the woman was his mother . . .

Hell for the fourth overseer was no less agonising, but it was at least wide-ranging. Lately he had come to believe what he had suspected for some time. Not so much that the reincarnation was a sham - Mentu had told him from the start that his health would not stand proving his immortality with such regularity, that on some occasions he'd have to pull a stunt and he'd need help. That was not the problem; the fourth overseer could live with that. But recently it had come to his knowledge that the contributions to the Solar Fund were not going to the upkeep of Ra's holy barque and temple. In fact, he was not convinced there even
was
a Ra. Lately he had come to believe this whole commune was a con. A means of making money from a lot of trusting innocents and, if this was true, what on earth was he do to? There was no one to confide in. It was hell.

The fifth overseer's thoughts were as far from the abyss as human thoughts might be. The night was hot, his blood was up.

He was having fun . . .

The heat and the dark and the mass of twinkling lamps was as disorientating as anything Mentu could have organised for his band of Pyramidiots. Cicadas buzzed like blunted woodsaws in the grass. The low, oppressive clouds hung like heavy, winter cloaks over the hills which enclosed this fertile, pear-shaped valley. In the distance, thunder rumbled and the summer storm, never far away, pawed the ground like an angry bull preparing to charge.

The analogy was apt, thought Claudia. This whole place reminded her of the lair of the Minotaur, and not just on account of the thunder. So many tiny lamps - thousands upon thousands dotted round - coupled with the moving torches and the swirling wheels and censers turned the commune into an unfamiliar maze and, just like the Minotaur's labyrinth on Crete, she was going round in circles. But somewhere in this flickering web was an aristocrat dressed like a guard and a bodyguard dressed like an aristocrat, surely one of the two would stand out, even in the dark?

The bull roared louder, and the earth trembled with his bellow.

Dammit, for the third time, possibly the fourth, Claudia found herself back at the ceremonial pool, where the High Priest blessed the holy water and the women, including Mercy, chanted out their prayers as they sat in vigil through the night. One of the temple parakeets screeched inside its cage and shook its feathers, then the aviary fell still. Only the cicadas and the chanting competed with the thunder.

Claudia fumbled her way out through the wicker gate which

enclosed the temple forecourt and wedged her torch into a terracotta ear. Damned thing was neither use nor ornament, she couldn't see with it and she couldn't see without it, so she might as well have both hands free in case— She pulled up short. In case of what, Claudia? She shivered, because she didn't know and that was the horror of it.

The not knowing . . .

The nameless dread she felt inside but couldn't - wouldn't - allow her mind to dwell on for too long.

What's that? She squinted into the gloom. That figure, in the silver cloak which billowed out behind, was one she didn't recognise. Not a member of the Holy Council - she was familiar with the cow, the jackal, the ugly crocodile, and Mentu's mask was gold. This figure wore a mask of silver and a shimmering silver-plated wig, whose dreadlocks tinkled like a thousand sistrum bells. Curious, Claudia followed the figure with her eyes, surprised that it did not turn into the temple forecourt but swept on past, unaware of her presence in the shadows. This figure was not disoriented by the labyrinthine lamps. It marched with purpose across the grass towards the bushes.

Claudia felt a beat of unease pound inside her heart. Unless she missed her guess, that figure also clutched a bundle of white rags in his left hand. They looked like bandages.