The Ring of Solomon

retrieve it before it sinks a dozen yards. Besides which, its aura is bright enough to be seen even in the remotest depths. I would find it even if you stuffed it in a whale. Throw me the Ring and, on my honour, despite the retribution I so sorely owe you, I promise I will kill you quickly. But keep it from me a moment more, and I swear that I shall do such things to you that even Khaba would weep to look on your remains.’ 2
    I stood quietly above the water. Below my feet and the shadow’s pin-sharp tapers, the blue-pink wave crests rose and fell, sloshing and sucking gently. The sun rose in the east, prising open the lid of the dark blue sky. After all the fire and fury of the night just gone, everything was, for a moment, calm. I saw things clearly once again.
    Ammet was right. It was pointless to throw it into the deep.
    ‘Give it up,’ the shadow said. ‘Look at the damage it’s doing to you! You’ve been holding it far too long.’
    I considered my melting hand.
    ‘Has it burned away your wit, Bartimaeus?’ The shadow flitted towards me across the sea. ‘No more of this. Give me the Ring.’
    I smiled, came to a decision. Without a word, I changed my form. Solomon the Wise stood there. 3
    The shadow drifted to an uncertain halt.
    ‘What do you think?’ I said. ‘Do I look the part? I’m betting I do. I’ve got the slightly pear-shaped hips and everything. Even the voice is pretty good, wouldn’t you say? But there’s one thing missing.’ I showed both hands, palms outwards, waved them from side to side. ‘Let’s see now … Where is it?’ I patted my robes all over in a show of mild concern; then, like a back-street conjurer, pulled a small gold band from out of my ear. ‘Ta-da! The Ring! Recognize this?’
    I held it up, grinning, so that it caught the bright dawn light. Ammet’s outline had sagged a little, grown gauzy with anxiety. ‘What are you doing?’ he hissed. ‘Put it down!’
    ‘You know, Ammet,’ I said. ‘I agree with you. Holding the Ring’s really been messing up my essence. So much so, it seems to me I’m not going to lose anything right now by going one step further …’
    The shadow took a swift step forwards. ‘It’ll kill you. You wouldn’t dare.’
    ‘Oh, wouldn’t I?’
    I put the Ring upon my finger.
    It was a nice fit.
    A nice fit that happened to come with the excruciating sensation of being violently pulled in two directions at once. The Ring, as I may have said before, was a gateway. Holding it was like feeling the breeze passing under the gate. Putting it on? That was the gate blowing open, with the full hurricane coming roaring in, and you being caught there, small and helpless. 4 It was like a Dismissal in full flow, dragging me back towards the Other Place – and yet my essence was unable to obey it. I felt my essence tearing as I stood there in the silence on the calm, unruffled water, and knew I didn’t have long.
    Perhaps, in those first moments, while I was reeling, Ammet might yet have acted. But he was too stupefied by my audacity. He hung beside me like a greasy stain wiped on the morning. He seemed transfixed. He didn’t move.
    I mastered the pain, spoke over it as best I could. ‘Now then, Ammet,’ I said in an agreeable voice, ‘you’ve been talking a lot recently about punishments and retribution. You’ve been quite vocal on the subject. I quite agree we should look into that in some considerable detail. Just hold on a mo.’
    ‘No, Bartimaeus! No! I beg you—’
    This, then, was the terror the Ring induced. This was its power. This was what the magicians fought for, why Philocretes and Azul and the rest had risked everything to get it in their hands. It wasn’t very pleasant. Still, I was going to see it to the end.
    I turned the Ring about my finger. The pain fluxed and twisted; my essence tore. I gasped aloud at the rising sun.
    All about me the seven planes warped. The dark Presence hung beside me in the air. The dawn light did not illuminate its shape at all, but passed right through it, leaving it as deep and black as if a hole had been cut in the day. It cast no shadow.
    Speaking of which, poor old Ammet’s trademark blackness looked rather grey and gauzy beside the newcomer’s. He didn’t know what to do with himself, exposed out there on the water. He flitted left and right with little nervous movements, shrank low, waxed long, and spun spiral trails in the water with his trailing strands.
    As on the balcony,