The Ring of Solomon

palely in the light of the Flares I’d sent forth to illuminate the room, and its ruby eyes shone evilly like dying embers. As a work of art alone, it was probably beyond price, but that was only half the story. It was magical too, with a strange pulsing aura visible on the higher planes. 2
    Good. That was that settled, then. I’d take the serpent and be on my way.
    ‘Excuse me, excuse me …’ This was me politely ushering the dead aside, or in most cases using Infernos to strike them burning across the hall. More were still emerging, trundling forth from slot-like alcoves in each wall. There seemed no end to them, but I wore a young man’s body, and my movements were swift and sure. With spell and kick and counter-punch I ploughed my way towards the altar—
    And saw the next trap waiting.
    A net of fourth-plane threads hung all around the golden serpent, glowing emerald green. The threads were very thin, and faint even to my djinni’s gaze. 3 Feeble as they looked, however, I had no wish to disturb them. As a general principle, Sumerian altar-traps are worth avoiding.
    I stopped below the altar, deep in thought. There were ways to disarm the threads, which I would have no trouble employing, provided I had a bit of time and space.
    At that moment a sharp pain disturbed me. Looking down, I discovered that a particularly disreputable-looking corpse (who in life had clearly suffered many skin ailments and doubtless looked upon mummification as a sharp improvement to his lot) had snuck up and sunk his teeth deep into the essence of my forearm.
    The temerity! He deserved special consideration. Shoving a friendly hand inside his rib-cage, I fired a small Detonation upwards. It was a manoeuvre I hadn’t tried in decades, and was just as amusing as ever. His head blew clean off like a cork from a bottle, cracked nicely against the ceiling, bounced twice off nearby walls and (this was where my amusement smartly vanished) plopped to earth right beside the altar, neatly snapping the net of glowing threads as it did so.
    Which shows how foolish it is to go enjoying yourself in the middle of a job.
    A deep concussion echoed across the planes. It was fairly faint to my hearing, but over in the Other Place it would have been hard to ignore.
    For a moment I stood quite still: a thin young man, dark of skin and light of loincloth, staring in annoyance at the writhing filaments of broken thread. Then, swearing in Aramaic, Hebrew and several other languages, I leaped forward, plucked the serpent from the altar and backed hurriedly away.
    Eager corpses came clamouring behind me: without looking I unleashed a Flux and they were whirled asunder.
    Up beside the altar the fragments of thread stopped twitching. With great speed they melted outwards, forming a pool or portal upon the flagstones. The pool spread beneath the corpse’s upturned head. The head dropped slowly down into the pool, out of existence, away from this world. There was a pause. The pool shone with the myriad colours of the Other Place, distant, muffled, as if seen from under glass.
    A tremor passed across its surface. Something was coming.
    Turning swiftly, I considered the distance to the shattered patch of ceiling where I’d first broken through: trickles of loose sand still spooled down into the chamber. My tunnel had probably collapsed with the weight of sand; it would take time to push my way back up – time I didn’t presently have. A Trigger-summons never takes long.
    I spun back reluctantly to face the portal, where the surface of the pool was flexing and contorting. Two great arms issued forth, shimmering green and veinous. Clawed hands grasped the stonework on either side. Muscles flexed and a body rose into the world, a thing of nightmare. The head was human in semblance, 4 and surmounted by long black coils of hair. A chiselled torso came next, and this was of the same green stuff. The components of the bottom half, which followed, seemed to have been chosen almost at random. The legs, corded with muscle, were those of a beast – possibly a lion or some other upscale predator – but ended sinisterly in an eagle’s splaying claws. The creature’s rear end was mercifully cloaked by a wrap-around skirt; from a slit in this rose a long and vicious scorpion tail.
    There was a pregnant pause as the visitation pulled free of the portal and stood erect. Behind us, even the last few milling dead were somewhat hushed.
    The creature’s face was that of