Avril has managed to clear her divan of its detritus, although the floor is now a sea of garments, blankets, and what looks like papyrus pressed into dense rectangles with colourful, shiny coverings of bare-chested men with large swords. Avril catches my gaze on them and kicks them out of sight, her cheeks darkening to a flushed pink.

"Okay?" she says, turning back to me and Luke. "Um if your royal highness could maybe just sit here?" She points to the center of the divan where Oliver is standing and marching in place with his two front legs, his eyes half closed in contentment.

"Oliver!" she cries and snatches him away, holding him against her like a baby. I expect him to scratch her eyes out. Instead, he snuggles up to her, closes his eyes, and purrs so loud I feel a twinge of envy. We have cats in the palace, of course. They are the ambassadors of the goddess Bastet, and where they choose to reside is noted daily by the palace priests, who read their signs for coming blights, wars, or times of plenty, and the opportunity for conquest and expansion. But we treat the children of Bastet with reverence, not as though they are infants to be coddled. As a child I was thrilled if one deigned to join me on my bed. But my mother said although it is a great honour, I must not touch them, that they move between the world of men and gods and are older than time. I would barely sleep those nights, so afraid I might touch a child of Bastet with my foot. Those nights, I dreamed my dreams clinging to the edge of the bed.

But here, in the future, cats are not only smaller, rounder, fluffier, and tamer, they thoroughly beg to be touched. I long to reach out and stroke Oliver's face, but I do not because I am Neferu-re and destined to be the next pharaoh of Egypt. I cannot risk displeasing Bastet by dishonouring one of her kin. I remind myself that soon my misadventure to this unpleasant, ugly world of over-bright lights, disorder and noise will be soon erased with a long soak in my bathing pool, surrounded by the happy chirps of my garden birds and a soft, cooling breeze provided by Wesemkhet and my peacock feather fan.

I move to the sofa, wait for Luke to offer me his hand to help me descend. He stands there, dense as a granite block, doing nothing, occupied with looking into a small, illuminated tablet in his hand. I sigh, lift my skirts, turn and sit, on my own.

"And Luke, can you sit beside her on the right?" Avril continues, somehow managing to be both bossy and nervous at once. "And I'll go on the left. I think that's best."

"Ye sure ye want me in on this?" Luke asks without looking up from his magical tablet. "Might be best if it's just the two o' ye as before."

"I don't think it matters, it's one for one, right?" Avril says. "Anyway, I want to be right beside her when Nerys arrives. God knows what condition she will be in."

"Maybe I should go. I don' want tae be the cause o' any complications,"  Luke says. Though when his looks up and his eyes move to mine, I sense his desire to remain.

"No!" Avril says, her voice rising towards panic. "Please stay. Don't leave me alone with this. And stop scrolling Instagram, oh my god."

"I'm no scrollin' social media, hen," Luke smiles. "I'm catchin' up on history, tryin' tae find out more about our wee princess here." He turns the face of the tablet towards us, and I glimpse the great pyramids in it, but there are no avenues of date palms, no waterways, and no port teeming with barges and skiffs. It is dry and desolate, surrounded by sand. This must be what is left of my empire. A pang of sorrow strikes me. Everything we have built to honour the gods, its order, beauty and power – all of it gone. I blink back a sudden burn of tears. This means one day the gods will abandon us. When I return, and I am pharaoh, I will ensure this does not happen.

"Can you not?" Avril huffs, smacking his tablet down. "You can read all you want later. Right now, let's just get Princess Neferu-re home and Nerys back. Remember, our friend?"

"Alright hen," Luke slides the tablet into the same place where he had secreted my hairpin, turns and eases his weight down beside me, his thigh touching me in a way I don't want to admit I like. He turns to look at me, winks and says with a smile, "Ye come here often?"

I blink. For a heartbeat, I am uncertain of his meaning. He knows I never come here. This is my first time. Perhaps he is an idiot. I decide to ignore him, though it is difficult, since he smells of warmth and cedar, and many other scents I cannot place that are distinctly male and having a pleasant effect on me.

"What is this perfumed oil you wear?" I ask.

"Y Le Parfum by Yves Saint Laurent," Luke says with a look that can only be considered flirtatious. "Ye like it?"

"It is . . . interesting," I answer. "Different. I wish to know what is in it, to make it once I am home."

"Aye, that's gonnae be the tonka bean ye're getting," he says with another wink, "drives the wee women wild."

"Luke! Seriously?" Avril huffs. "How can you be talking about tonka beans at a time like this? Like, they could be torturing Nerys right now? Hello?"

"Right," Luke says, and sits up straighter, his hands on his knees. I note how well-shaped they are, and an image of him holding my face with them, decked in royal rings flashes through my mind. I cut off the thought, moving my attention to my own hands, resting in my lap, wearing the rings Wesemkhet placed there this morning. Soon he will be gone, and I will return to my own life. His hands will never touch my face, especially while wearing royal rings, it is impossible. Though the thought slips back, and I find it pleases me in an utterly un-princess-like way.

"Okay," Avril says as she deposits Oliver onto the divan beside me. "I'm going to go get the mirror. Just stay there. Nobody move."

We wait as Avril disappears back into the depths of her residence. Sounds of rummaging come from near the door with the wall of locks, then further in where I first woke. Doors open and slam shut again. Muffled exclamations of frustration erupt every now and then that I assume are curses. I wonder if her chaos has a life of its own which absorbs items left its path. If so, I fear we may be in for a long wait.

A soft push meets my upper arm. I turn and Oliver looks up at me, his soft yellow-green eyes wide and inquisitive. He butts his head against my upper arm again. He gives me a little chirp and the purring starts once more. My heart does a little quaver. My hand longs to go to him, to touch his soft face but I must not touch him. I cannot. I curl my fingers into a fist.

Luke leans forward, notes Oliver's interest.

"He wants ye tae pet him," he smiles at the cat, who slowly blinks back at him. "He likes ye."

I shake my head, enduring Oliver's rubbing against my arm, my senses traitorously revelling in the softness of his fur. He moves forward, looks up at me, waits, then takes a tentative step onto the linen of my gown. I freeze. I cannot stop him, to do so would be to touch him. He can touch me, but I must not touch him. He finds no resistance from me so places another paw on my lap, then a third and finally the fourth. His weight is substantial. He turns several times and settles into the shape of an orb on my lap, his face tucked into his belly, his paw over his nose. He gives a contented sigh and purrs himself to sleep.

I cannot move, can barely breathe. Never in my life has a cat sat on me. I gaze at him, drinking in the details of his little body, nothing like the cats of the palace with their long, lithe bodies, their faces and ears sharp and pointed, utterly unlike than this soft, warm, round creature that is their kin.

Luke reaches over and strokes Oliver. "Since ye don't want tae do it, I'll pet him for ye." Oliver snuggles deeper into my lap imprinting himself onto me, and my heart, long made cold in my mother's palace feels soft, gentle things it's never felt before.

A shout of triumph comes from the far end of the cluttered residence. 

"Finally!" Avril cries as she barrels back into the room where we wait, the mirror held aloft like a trophy, its face towards us. And as we look up - Oliver on my lap, and Luke with his hand on Oliver's back - the mirror's face shimmers, transforming instantly from metal into a rapidly rotating swirl of golden light that bursts free and slams into me, a wave of blinding power. The divan vanishes beneath me. I can no longer feel Oliver's weight, or Luke's thigh against mine. 

And then . . .

There is nothing.