The Parasol Protectorate Boxed Set (164 page)

“How do you know they have not? Who do you think gathered that data you were so interested in, on the extent of the plague?”

“Ah.”

“Ah, indeed. Are you reassured by this?” The Beta turned to face him. Biffy could feel those concerned hazel eyes fixed on his profile. He kept resolutely facing the far
horizon.
At least I have a good profile
, he consoled himself.

“You mean now that we know I am an Alpha?” Biffy considered the question. To be reassured that he had a safe place to die as a werewolf when once, an age ago now, he had thought to live forever as a vampire? He gave a tiny sigh. “Yes, I suppose I am.” He paused. “How long do I have?”

Professor Lyall gave a little huff of amusement. “Oh, a few hundred years at least, possibly more, if you settle well. You still have to do military service, of course. That's always a risk.”

“Learn to fight?”

“Learn to fight. I shouldn't worry, my dandy. Lord Maccon will make an excellent teacher.”

“You think he's coming back?”

“Yes, I do. If only to yell at me over the sins of the past.”

“Optimistic.”

“I think, in this matter, young pup, I know our Alpha better than you.”

“He will tolerate my presence, even with…?” Biffy gestured at his head.

“Of course. You are young yet and certainly no challenge to an Alpha of his standing.”

“Funny, I was beginning to feel rather old.”

Professor Lyall gave a tiny smile. “Come on, then, to bed with us, and I will remind you, in the best possible way, how young you really are.”

“Very good, sir.”

“Ah, Biffy, I rather think that
now
that is my line.”

Biffy laughed and straightened his spine, grabbing the Beta by the hand. “Right'o, come along, then.”

“
Very
good, sir.” Professor Lyall managed, somehow, to make his reply sound like a change in rank, a promise of wickedness, and the approval of a favorite teacher, all in one simple phrase.

A
lexia, Conall, and Prudence were five days with the balloon nomads of Egypt floating south. Five days drifting at speed above the long rope of the Nile River, a deep, dark blue-green during the day and a silvered strand at night. During those five days, the full moon came and went, with Conall, for the first time in hundreds of years, unaltered by its presence. The earl could freely play with and, much to Lady Maccon's delight, take care of his daughter any time of the day or night without repercussions. He also grew a very large and scruffy beard, with which she was far less delighted.

“A man's virility is in his beard,” he insisted.

To which Alexia replied, “And a woman's is in her décolletage. Yet you don't see me allowing mine to get out of control, now, do you?”

“If wishes were balloons,” was his only response.

Drifting was, thought Alexia, a most agreeable pastime. True, the accommodations on board left something
to be desired and were rather cramped, but there were some wonderful moments that could only be experienced on a trip by way of balloon. For two days they linked up with what appeared to be most of Zayed's extended family. They, too, sported bright balloons, mostly of a purple color, which drifted up close to Zayed's, then floated a short distance off and hitched in to the same aether current. Zayed cast out a massive circular net, and as each new balloon arrived, they would pick up a section of net, until there they were, all linked together, with a kind of immense hammock dangling under and between them. This became the walkway by which certain matters of business were conducted and a playground for the children. Conall, still mostly uncomfortable with being up high at all, refused point-blank to even test it, but Alexia was never one to shirk a new experience when it presented itself with such appeal. She set forth, even knowing that should anyone on the ground have binoculars they might very well see up her skirts. Soon enough, she found herself bouncing and tumbling across the wide net. It was not so easy to traverse as it looked. She was entirely unable to effect the smooth bobbing walk of the Drifter women, who managed to go from basket to basket, in an odd reflection of the British housewife paying a social call, with great mounds of food balanced atop their heads.

Prudence, of course, took to the new sky-high transport like a newly minted vampire to blood, springing about with little Anitra, who was her new favorite person in the world. Alexia was tolerably assured that Anitra, who had been raised on such folderol as nets in the aether, knew more than the average child about falling. Alexia also noticed that there always seemed to be older children
or mothers about with a watchful eye to the net's edge, and so she relaxed some of her own vigilance. Not so Conall, whose eyes stayed fixed in horrified terror on first his daughter and then his wife. Each of whom he would yell to in turn. “Now, Prudence, don't jump so high!” “Alexia, if you fall off, I shall kill you!” “Wife, look to our daughter!” Prudence, blissfully uncaring of her father's concern, continued to bounce. Alexia ignored his rantings as those of a man whose feet, two or four, ought to always be on the ground.

During their five days of travel, they landed only once, on the evening in which they were linked to the other balloons. Zayed insisted that they needed to rest and restock both fuel and water. They drifted down slowly after the sun had set, pulling the net in as they went and coming to ground by a little oasis. The tingly feeling of the God-Breaker Plague was much stronger in the desert. It was almost uncomfortable for Alexia, as it had not been while floating. She felt the beginnings of that odd little push, that physical repulsion she had first experienced in the presence of one very small mummy, decorated with a broken ankh. Prudence, too, wasn't happy grounded. “Up,” she kept saying. “Mama, up!” Only Conall was pleased, rolling about in the sand like a puppy before stripping down to bathe in the oasis. Alexia supposed not even the God-Breaker Plague could really get the wolf out of Lord Conall Maccon.

Two days later, they arrived at the bend in the Nile.

Alexia was hypnotized by the spot as they floated over it. It was the early evening, so their descent was slow and measured. From the sky, the place looked oddly familiar, the wide curve of the river forming a shape in the desert
that Alexia was certain she recognized. But it was like trying to see a figure in the clouds. Then, as they dropped down closer and closer, she realized what it was.

She beckoned autocratically at her massive husband. “Conall, do come over here. Do you see that?”

The earl gave his wife a very dour look. “Alexia, I am trying
not
to look down.” But he made his way over to her.

“Yes, but, please? Just there. Zayed, if you could spare a moment? What
is
that?”

Their host came over to where the Maccons stood, Alexia leaning over the basket's edge, looking down intently.

He nodded. “Ah, yes, of course. The Creature in the Sands.”

Alexia pointed it out for the benefit of her husband, even though Conall clearly wasn't interested. “See there, the curve of the river? That is its head, and there, stretching out in ribbons into the desert, those are its legs. Are those pathways, Zayed?” The earl, unwilling to study further the ground he would probably describe as
rushing
toward them, went over to lie down on a pile of colorful blankets, shutting his eyes.

Zayed confirmed Alexia's assessment. “Ghost trails into the desert.”

“Really, made by actual ghosts? Before the plague, I assume?”

“So they say. Not just any ghosts, lady. Ghosts of kings and queens and the servants of kings and queens. Must be ghosts, lady. What living man would walk voluntarily into the desert sands?”

“Eight trails, eight legs,” ruminated Alexia thoughtfully.
It is an octopus. But an upside-down octopus? Of
course, because the Nile runs backward!
She continued interrogating her host. “And that spot there? The one that represents its eye?”

“Ah, lady, that is, how you might say, a temple.”

“For which of the many Ancient Egyptian gods?”

“Ah, no, not for a god, lady. For a queen. A queen who would be king.”

Alexia knew enough of Egyptian history to know that could mean only one person. “Hatshepsut? Indeed. How
very
interesting.”

Zayed gave her a very funny look. “Yes, lady. What might she say to you visiting here?”

“Goodness, why should her opinion matter? Has it been properly excavated yet, that temple?”

Before Zayed could answer, several things happened at once. The balloon lost altitude, as the air began to cool with proximity to the river, dropping down toward the very point under discussion—the Eye of the Octopus. Alexia felt a sensation of total repulsion, one she had only experienced heretofore from a preternatural mummy. Only this time it was ten times worse. She felt as if she were being pushed, literally pushed, by hundreds of invisible hands. All of them were trying to press her skin inward so that it melted back into flesh and bone. It was a horrible sensation and she wanted more than anything to beg Zayed to take the balloon back up into the aether. But she also knew that the answers to all her many questions lay down below.

At the same time, Conall said, “Oh, I feel much better,” and sat upright.

Prudence cried out, “Mama, Mama, Mama. No!”

Alexia, dizzy from the repulsion, sank forward, tilting
over the edge of the basket slightly, and spotted, moored near that fateful octopus eye, a large modern-style dahabiya.

Oblivious to the internal chaos of his lady passenger, Zayed answered Alexia's question. “One should never disregard the opinion of a queen. But
that
queen changed the pathways of the world.”

Alexia felt as though she were missing something. As though the earth were spinning away from her, as fine and silvery fast as the Nile in full flood. The pushing came on harder and harder until it was as though she were being suffocated in a vat of molasses.

The balloon bumped down not ten paces from the Temple of Hatshepsut, but Alexia knew none of this. For only the second time in her adult life, she had fainted dead away.

Lady Maccon awoke to the sensation of cool water being splashed on her face and cool water surrounding her body.

Someone had thrown her into the Nile River—fully dressed.

She sputtered. “Oh my goodness, what?”

“It was my idea.” Genevieve Lefoux's mellow, slightly accented voice came from behind Alexia's head. The Frenchwoman seemed to be supporting her by the shoulders so that she could float with the current.

Her husband's worried face appeared, blocking out the stars in the evening sky far above. “How do you feel?”

Alexia assessed the situation. The pressure was still there, the sense of repulsion, but mostly around her head and face now. Where her body was fully immersed in water, she felt nothing at all. “Better.”

“Well, good. Don't scare me like that, woman!”

“Conall, it wasn't my fault!”

He was truculent. “Still, quite un-Alexia of you.”

“Sometimes even I behave unexpectedly.”

He was not to be mollycoddled. “Don't do it again.”

Alexia gave up; there was no way he would be reasonable. She tilted her head back to look at Madame Lefoux, upside down. “It was a good idea, Genevieve. But I can't stay here in the Nile indefinitely. I have an octopus to investigate.” Then she remembered something. “Primrose! Genevieve, did you steal Primrose and bring her with you?”

“No, Alexia. I did not even know she was missing until your husband asked me that same question not ten minutes ago.”

“But we thought…”

“No, I am sorry. I was in a rush to leave the hotel because I had uncovered some very telling information and wanted to make my way here as quickly as possible. I had no idea there was a kidnapping. I do hope the little girl is all right.”

“Don't we all? Blast it, we were hoping you saw something and were on the trail of the kidnappers. What was so interesting, then?” Alexia had no subtlety.

The Frenchwoman sighed. “Well, as you are here now, we might as well combine forces. Perhaps you are in possession of some missing pieces of my puzzle.”

“How do you know it's not the other way around?” interjected the earl.

Genevieve continued as though he hadn't interrupted her. “I found myself in the company of Edouard Naville, a burgeoning archaeologist.”

“An OBO member? I knew you had some other reason for visiting Egypt.”

Madame Lefoux made no acknowledgment of any connection to the Order of the Brass Octopus. That, in and of itself, was an admission. “He has recently received the concession for Deir el-Bahri.”

“Oh, indeed,” encouraged Alexia, understanding none of this. She paddled frantically to right herself, touching her feet down into what she was certain was a filthy river bottom, but as she still had her walking boots on, it was impossible to tell. She stayed crouched down to keep as much of herself immersed as possible.

Conall offered his assistance with the maneuver. Alexia made note that while they had not bothered to remove
her
dress, Conall was quite naked, and Genevieve was wearing some kind of gentleman's undergarment as a bathing costume. Behind her, on the shore, Alexia could make out Zayed's balloon, mostly deflated, and a party of human shadows that must be made up of Zayed's family and the crew of Genevieve's dahabiya. They were engaging in some kind of trade, or meal, or both. Alexia could hear Prudence, with her usual lack of interest in water, shrieking with laughter. The infant was utterly unperturbed by her mother's ailment or resulting damp predicament.

Madame Lefoux gestured behind her at the shore. “
This
is Deir el-Bahri. You can make out some of the ruins of the temple behind our party. Beyond it is the Valley of the Kings. But this… this is the Eye of the Octopus.”

Alexia nodded. “Yes, I had figured as much.”

“Naville is young yet, but he hopes eventually to excavate here. I was sent to investigate, you know,
the source
.”

Alexia was one step ahead of her. “The source of the God-Breaker Plague. You too?”

Lord Maccon interrupted, “Whose temple did you say it was?”

“I didn't, but Monsieur Naville believes it to be the mortuary temple of Queen Hatshepsut.”

At which Conall, quite unexpectedly, busted out with a great crack of booming laughter. It echoed out over the river. “Well, well, well, I'm certain she won't like us visiting.”

Alexia frowned. “Mr. Zayed said much the same thing.”

Her husband continued. “And it could hardly be a mortuary temple. A metamorphosis temple, perhaps, but not mortuary.”

Alexia began to comprehend what he was getting at, almost falling backward into the Nile in her surprise. “Are you telling me…?”