The Ring of Solomon

upwards and to the side. ‘No,’ she croaked. ‘A spider – over there.’
    The lizard looked with both eyes then, just in time to observe a large, fat spider-djinni squeezing out from a concealed opening in the wall. It had a tarantula’s body, swollen big as a cow corpse after the rains. Each of its legs was hard and knobbly as bamboo and ended in a sharpened sting. Its face, however, was human, with a neat little beard and a tall conical hat. Evidently, as a guardian of Solomon’s tower, it wasn’t under Zahzeel’s command; either that, or it was deaf. Whichever, it reacted swiftly enough now. A jet of yellow webbing shot from its baggy undercarriage and struck me full on, breaking my grip on the wall. I fell a few yards, caught desperate hold and hung one-handed, encased in webbing, swinging back and forth above the gulf.
    Somewhere below, I heard the girl cry out, but I hadn’t time to heed her. One of the spider’s legs rose, made ready to send a Flare high above the gardens; soon all Solomon’s slaves would have seen it and congregated at the scene.
    But the lizard acted. With one free leg I sent forth a Mantle to encase the spider. My spell shimmered into being just as the Flare was loosed: the bolt of energy struck the inside of the Mantle, rebounded and hit the spider’s balloon-like belly. At the same time, the lizard broke through its bonds with one slash of a fore-claw.
    Its body steaming where the Flare had struck, the spider broke the Mantle apart with a swiftly spoken counter-spell, bent its legs and leaped straight down the wall towards me. I swung to the side, dodged its swiping blow and, snaring it by a bristly hind leg, whirled it round and round with as much force as I could muster, before spinning it out with all my considerable might, straight into a drifting Pulse thirty feet or so beyond.
    There was a flash; a field of black and yellow bands of light engulfed the djinni, grew tight, grew tighter – and squeezed it messily into nothing.
    The magical effusion was regrettable, and might possibly be spotted from the south, but in the circumstances it couldn’t really be helped. The lizard looked down at the dangling girl and gave her a broad wink. ‘Like the throwing technique?’ I grinned. ‘Learned it squirrel-tossing with the Mongol nomads. 4 On quiet nights we’d— Oh! No! What are you doing?’
    She had the silver dagger poised in her hand again; her arm was drawn back, her eyes wild and staring.
    ‘Don’t!’ I cried. ‘You’ll kill us both! You’ll—’
    A whirl of movement; the dagger left her hand, flashed past my snout and embedded in something close behind with a soft, wet and very decisive splat.
    The lizard’s eyes swivelled once more, only to observe a second large, fat spider-djinni staring in astonishment at the silver dagger embedded in the centre of its belly. Its legs, which had been poised above my head, scrabbled weakly at the poisoned wound. Its essence grew brown and dull; like an aged puffball it fell in upon itself, letting out sprays of fine grey dust. It toppled from the wall, dropped like a stone, was gone.
    The night was still once more.
    I looked down at the girl, still dangling in my coiled tail. ‘Good,’ I said at last. ‘Well done.’
    ‘Well done?’ Possibly it was the starlight, possibly her tilted angle, but I could have sworn there was a mild smirk upon her face. ‘ Well done? What kind of a response is that?’
    ‘All right,’ I growled. ‘ Thank you .’
    ‘See?’ she said. ‘It’s hard, isn’t it?’
    The lizard did not reply, but with a slightly indignant flick of the tail continued up the wall. A moment later we had reached the balcony.

    1 I won’t go into the details here, to spare the sensibilities of my more delicate readers, but suffice it to say that the horrid scenes were enlivened by my caustic wit, plus certain rather clever changes of form, which had the amusing effect of— Well, you’ll see.
    2 He was one of your better-quality afrits, Zahzeel. Even in moments of high stress he kept his grammar up to scratch.
    3 It wasn’t a bad effect, all told. I’d probably use it one day. Assuming I was still alive.
    4 On quiet nights we’d go down to Lake Baikal with a basket of plump ones each and send them skimming out across the waves. My record was eight bounces, seven squeaks.

27
    T he ascent of the wall had proved something of a trial for Asmira. The motion-sickness had been bad enough – she strongly