Ring Of Solomon (34 page)

Numbly Asmira reached out and took the cup from him. His fingers were long, the nails shaped and polished. The smallest finger had a bright red weal encircling it, just below the second knuckle.

Asmira stared at it. ‘The Ring …’

‘Is here,’ the man said. He gestured negligently to the table on his left. In its centre stood a silver platter, and on the platter lay a golden ring, studded with a small black stone. Asmira gazed at it, then at the king, then at the Ring again.

‘Such a lot of effort you’ve gone to for such a tiny thing.’ King Solomon smiled as he spoke, but the smile was tired and hard. ‘You’ve got farther than most, but the end will be the same. Now, listen to me. I am going to ask you another question, and you will open those dour little lips of yours and answer eagerly and well, or I will take the Ring and put it on, and then— Well, what do you think will happen? The end result will be that you answer anyway, and nothing will be different, save that you will no longer be quite so pert and pretty as you are now. It pains me to even suggest such things, but it is late, I am weary, and frankly somewhat surprised to find you in my rooms. So: take a good drink of wine and concentrate your mind. You came to kill me and steal the Ring – that much is obvious. I want to know the rest. First: what is your name?’

Asmira had calculated the distance from the bed to the chair. Were she standing, she might easily jump that far; she could strike his left arm down as it stretched out for the Ring, seize the dagger and run him through. Sitting down, however, it would be harder. She might be able to do it fast enough to block his hand, but it wasn’t likely.

‘
What is your name?
’

She focused on him reluctantly. ‘Cyrine.’

‘Where do you come from?’

‘Himyar.’

‘
Himyar?
So small and far away?’ The king frowned. ‘But I have nothing to do with that land. Who, precisely, do you serve?’

Asmira lowered her eyes. She had no answer. Her false identity hadn’t been prepared for capture and interrogation. In such circumstances, she had not assumed she would be alive.

‘Last chance,’ King Solomon said.

She shrugged and looked away.

King Solomon struck the arm of his chair in brisk impatience. He reached for the Ring, slipped it on his finger and turned it once. The room went dark. There was a thud; air shifted like a solid mass, flung Asmira back across the bed. She collided with the wall.

When she opened her eyes, a Presence stood beside the king, blacker than shadow. Power and terror radiated from it like heat from a great fire. Elsewhere in the darkness, she heard the scrolls and parchments fluttering in their racks.

‘Answer me!’ the king’s voice thundered. ‘Who are you? Who do you serve? Speak! My patience is at an end!’

The Presence moved towards her. Asmira gave a cry of mortal fear. She cowered back upon the bed. ‘My name is Asmira! I come from Sheba! I serve my queen!’

At once the figure was gone. Asmira’s ears popped; blood trickled from her nose. The lamps around the room resumed their normal light. King Solomon, grey with weariness or rage, took the Ring from his finger and tossed it back upon the silver plate.

‘Queen Balkis?’ he said, passing his hand across his face. ‘
Balkis?
Young miss, if you dare to lie to me …’

‘I do not lie.’ Asmira slowly struggled back into a sitting position. Tears welled in her eyes. Her sense of overwhelming horror had vanished with the Spirit of the Ring; now she reeled at the shame of her betrayal. She stared in blank hatred at the king.

Solomon tapped his fingers upon the chair. ‘Queen Balkis …?’ he mused again. ‘No! Why should it be?’

‘I speak the truth,’ Asmira spat. ‘Though it matters little either way, since you’ll kill me whatever I say.’

‘Are you surprised?’ The king seemed pained. ‘My dear young woman, it was not
I
who crept in here to put a knife in another’s back. It is only because you do not fit the normal run of demons or assassins that I speak with you at all. Believe me, most of them are drearily self-explanatory. But you … When I find a pretty girl upon the floor of my observatory, flat out in a faint, with a silver dagger in her belt and another embedded in my floor, and no obvious sign of how she evaded the sentries of my palace and climbed up here at all – I must say I am perplexed and intrigued. So if you have a grain of sense, you will take advantage of my interest, wipe away those unbecoming tears and speak rapidly and well, and pray to whatever god you hold dear that my interest is long maintained. For when I get bored,’ King Solomon said, ‘I turn to my Ring. Now, then. Queen Balkis sent you, so you say. Why should this be?’

While he had been speaking, Asmira had made great play of dabbing at her face with her dirty sleeve, and in so doing, shuffled forward on the bed. A last desperate attack was all she could hope for now. But she
might
still inch a little closer …

She lowered her arm. ‘
Why?
How can you even ask me that?’

The king’s face darkened. His hand stretched out—

‘Your threats!’ Asmira cried out in panic. ‘Your cruel demands! Why should I spell it out for you? Sheba cannot withstand your power, as you well know, so my queen took what action she could to save her honour! If I had succeeded, my country would have been saved! Believe me, I curse myself for failing!’

Solomon had not picked up the Ring, though his fingers hovered over it. His face was calm, but he breathed deeply, as one in pain. ‘This seems … an unusual course of action to take against someone who has offered marriage,’ he said slowly. ‘A rejection I can take. Assassination is a little more extreme. Don’t you think so, Asmira?’

She scowled at his use of her name. ‘I’m not talking about marriage. Your threat of invasion! Your demands for frankincense! Your vow to destroy our nation when the moon is new!’

‘Terrible threats, indeed.’

‘Yes.’

‘Except I never made them.’ He sat back in his chair, thin fingertips together, and gazed at her.

Asmira blinked. ‘But you did.’

‘Not so.’

‘I have it on my queen’s word. You must be—’

‘And here again,’ King Solomon said, stretching out and taking a fig from the bowl beside him, ‘I must educate you swiftly in the ways of kings. Perhaps, in matters of diplomacy, there are times when the meanings of certain royal words are stretched, or certain things are quietly left unsaid, but when a king looks you in the eye and tells you something is so, it
is
so. He does not lie. Even to suggest as much means death. Do you understand?
Look
at me.’

Slowly, reluctantly, Asmira met his eyes, which of all his ravaged features were the only parts she would have recognized from the mural in the Magicians’ Hall. All its implacable authority was in them. Despite herself, despite her fury, she said sulkily: ‘Yes, I understand.’

‘Good. So now you are in a dilemma.’

She hesitated. ‘My queen …’

‘Tells you something different. One of us is lying – or is perhaps mistaken.’

The tones he used were mild, and he smiled a little as he spoke, but Asmira flinched as if she had been struck. In its quiet way, this was a direct assault upon everything she held dear – just as violent as the burning of the Marib tower. The purpose of her entire life – and of her mother’s – was to defend the queen and, through her, Sheba. The queen’s will could not be questioned. Whatever she
did
was right; whatever she
said
was right. To suggest otherwise was to threaten the entire structure on which Asmira based her every waking deed. Solomon’s words gave her a sensation much like vertigo; she was on the edge of a precipice and about to fall.

Shuffling forward a little further on the bed, she said, ‘My queen would not lie.’

‘Might she be mistaken, then?’

‘No.’

‘Well, I suppose there’s no getting any sense from a slave.’ Solomon took a grape from the fruit dish, and chewed it thoughtfully. ‘I must say I am disappointed in Balkis. I’d heard tell that she was intelligent and graceful, but this is shoddy work all round. Still, what do the lapwings know? They also told me she was beautiful. I suppose they got that wrong as well. Never trust a migrating bird.’

Asmira spoke hotly. ‘She
is
very beautiful.’

He grunted. ‘Well, small chance of a marriage now. How did she hear of my wicked plans? Did she say?’

‘Your demon messenger.’

‘Which could have been sent by anyone. Honestly, a
child
might have thought to double-check. Asmira – I see you are walking your backside very subtly in my direction. Stop it, please, or the Spirit of the Ring shall continue this conversation with you instead of me. As you have seen, he is not as amiable as I am.’ King Solomon sighed. ‘We have established,’ he went on, ‘that you are here under a misapprehension. What were your exact orders?’

‘Kill you. Take the Ring, if I could.’

‘And what if you were captured – as was always going to be the case?’

Asmira shrugged. ‘I would turn my knife upon myself.’

‘These were your queen’s orders?’

‘She … did not say that. The priestesses did.’

King Solomon nodded. ‘But Balkis did not object. She was content that you were going to your death. I must say,’ he added, ‘I’m relieved the woman turned down my original proposals. The thought of a wife like that among one’s harem is enough to fill any man with dread. I ought to thank you, Asmira, for opening my eyes.’

Anger sloshed like acid in her belly. ‘Why didn’t you just kill me when you found me?’

‘I am not that sort. Besides, I have more questions. Who brought you up here?’

‘I came alone.’

‘Asmira, you are doubtless very determined, and extremely good with knives, but neither of those attributes was enough to get you to my rooms. Any ordinary assassin—’

‘I’m
not
an assassin, I’m a hereditary guard.’

‘You must forgive me, the difference is subtle. If you are an ordinary “guard”,’ the king went on, ‘then someone with great abilities in magic has given you his aid. The only other possibility is that you are an accomplished magician yourself, with powerful slaves at your command.’ He looked at her sceptically.

Asmira’s eyes widened. For the first time since she had woken, her self-absorption shifted. She thought of Bartimaeus. He had warned her of the trap; he had tried to stop her. And now she was captured and he … was dead or gone.

‘Well, what is the truth, then?’ the king demanded. ‘How did you get here?’

‘I was … brought here by a spirit that I summoned myself.’

‘Indeed? Then where is it? I sent out sensors and found nothing.’

‘I expect your demon destroyed it,’ Asmira said.

The elegant brows furrowed. ‘What was its nature? A marid?’

‘A djinni.’

‘Oh, now I
know
that you are lying.’ The king reached out and took the Ring from the silver plate. ‘A mere
djinni
could not get past all my slaves below. You are no magician. But a magician has surely helped you …’ His eyes narrowed, became harsh with suspicion. ‘Who was it, then? One of my own?’

Asmira frowned in perplexity. ‘What?’

‘Hiram? Nisroch? Khaba? Come, you are protecting someone.’ He waved a hand towards the window. ‘The Seventeen grow impatient in their little towers down there. They are close to the source of power, but not as close as they would like! Who knows, perhaps they secretly work in tandem with this queen of yours. Perhaps, like her, they look for someone young and gullible, someone hot-headed, burning with addled zeal – someone who might strike a blow against me on their behalf!’ Asmira tried to speak, but the king’s voice grew louder; he sat forward in his chair. ‘Perhaps you even work for them directly! Tell me, Asmira, what did they offer you if you crept in here on your suicidal mission? Love? Silks? Riches? Quickly now, the Ring is on my finger! Speak! Tell me the truth before it turns!’

For a moment the rage and confusion that warred within her struck Asmira quite dumb. Then she laughed. She set her untouched wine carefully on the floor and got slowly to her feet. ‘I’ve
told
you the truth,’ she said. ‘Turn the Ring and have done.’

King Solomon grimaced. ‘Sit down. I warn you – sit!’

‘No.’ She walked towards him.

‘Then you leave me no choice.’ Solomon raised his left hand and, with the thumb and forefinger of his right, turned the band of gold upon his little finger.

Asmira stopped where she was. She closed her eyes; blood pounded in her head …

Nothing happened. Somewhere, as if at one remove, she heard the king give a muttered oath.

Asmira opened one eye. Solomon sat as before, spinning the Ring upon his finger. Round and round it went. No terrifying entity materialized between them.

Even as she watched, the slender band of gold grew limp and soggy, took on a somewhat grey and fishy air. It sagged against his finger. King Solomon and Asmira stared at it openmouthed.

‘A calamari ring …’ Asmira breathed.

Solomon’s voice was barely audible. ‘Someone’s switched it …’ he began.

‘Ah yes, now that would have been me.’ At this, a small, striped sand cat sauntered out from behind the nearest rack of scrolls, whiskers sparkling, eyes gleaming, tail held high in a particularly jaunty manner. It looked inordinately pleased with itself. It strolled over the rugs and came to a halt between them. ‘One “mere djinni” at your service,’ it said, settling itself down neatly, and winding its tail around its paws. ‘One “mere djinni”’ – here it paused and blinked round at them for dramatic effect – ‘who, while you’ve both been chatting away like fishwives, has got himself a ring.’

I made it look easy, didn’t I? But it wasn’t
quite
as straightforward as all that.

True, getting
into
the chamber wasn’t so hard – there weren’t any traps or sentinels, and Solomon had his back to me when I peeked round the door. And nipping over to the rack beside the window was a doddle too, since he and the girl were absorbed by their rather tense ‘discussion’, and were hardly likely to notice a discreetly passing fly
⁹⁶
.