known any. It would not have mattered anyway. I was sitting in the Ifrit’s gigantic hand.
“And what are you?” he said, peering at me with an eyeball the size of my head. His deep voice vibrated, seeming to come from all around. Except for his size and his color-he was a green the shade of the sea during a storm-he looked almost human, but his ears were pointed, and the nails on the hand that held me narrowed into sharp claws. His body blocked most of the view, but I thought he was standing in the bottom of the circular valley.
“I am a wizard,” I said, though I had never felt less like a wizard since my first day at the school. “What have you done with my friends?”
“A mage?” inquired the Ifrit, his tone suggesting he was pleased and delighted something so small knew how to talk.
“A wizard,” I said firmly. I felt I had had enough eastern magic to last me a long time. “What have you done with the others?”
He poked me delicately with the forefinger of the other hand; the thrust nearly knocked me backwards. “They’re around,” he said vaguely. “You seem remarkably bold, little man.” In fact, I was so terrified that even struggling and shrieking seemed superfluous. “If you’re a wizard, do a trick for me.”
“I can’t do a trick. Your magic has defeated mine. Let me have my spells back, and I’ll do some very charming tricks for you.” I wondered desperately what an Ifrit might find charming.
“So you don’t know magic after all,” said the Ifrit in disgust. His hand started slowly to close around me. “I ought just to crush you.”
I closed my eyes and muttered a scrap of the psalms between my teeth.
But then the hand opened again. “On the other hand, humans can be very amusing sometimes. Do you think you could be amusing if I kept you alive for a while?”
A second ago, death with dignity had seemed the best alternative. Abruptly life without dignity seemed much more attractive. “What a good idea,” I said.
The Ifrit turned his hand this way and that to get a look at me from different angles. His stubbly beard was very close. “I think it’s because you humans always know you’re going to die someday,” he said after a minute. “That’s what makes you so amusing-you act as though everything was important and had some sort of meaning.”
“You could be amused a lot more,” I suggested, “if you brought all my friends here.” My voice sounded tiny and squeaky in comparison to his deep rumble. “By the way, here’s an idea. I’ll bet you were imprisoned in a bottle once, but it’s hard to imagine how you managed to fit your entire body inside. Do you think you could show me?”
At least the Ifrit chuckled rather than crushing me at once. “Nice try, little man, but I won’t be fooled that easily
I had known all along it wouldn’t work. But I would now never have a chance to tell Maffi, “I told you so.”
“Did you know King Solomon?” inquired the Ifrit. “But that’s right,” he said before I could answer. “I keep forgetting what a short time you humans live. Even Solomon only lived for a few centuries. Maybe it would be a kindness just to kill you and get it over with.”
“But then you’d be all by yourself again,” I said, “with no one to talk to and no one to amuse you.”
The Ifrit frowned, a creasing of his blue-green forehead like the violent erosion of a hillside. “I know what I can do,” he said after a moment, his forehead clearing. “I can take all these friends of yours that you keep worrying about and set them tests. Humans talk about setting tasks for Ifriti, but it would be much more interesting to test humans.”
“What kind of tests?” I asked cautiously.
“Tests of all the things humans worry about, honor, love, life itself. I already told you I’ve noticed how seriously you take things.”
“And if we pass your tests-”
“Then I’ll have had an amusing few days,” said the Ifrit.
“And then you’ll let us go?”
The Ifrit seemed more amused by this than anything else I’d said. “Of course not. You came here to my valley, and I’m under orders to guard it, so you’ll all have to die.”
Under orders. That meant, I thought, Kaz-alrhun, the only person I’d met in the east who could possibly master an Ifrit. “But none of them are dead yet?”
A few more days of life seemed a glorious reprieve-but then I didn’t know yet what the Ifrit’s tests might entail.
“I’m hungry and soon I’ll be ready for a nap,” he said, not answering my question. He lifted me up and put me on his shoulder. “Hold onto my hair.” I took hold of three strands of greasy hair, the size of cables, and as he rose from the ground I grabbed onto his ear lobe as well. He flew swiftly, pausing once to swoop down and scoop up something from the sand.
I could see a little better now; we were indeed in the circular valley. Ahead of us were a group of palms, doubtless marking a spring, though I could not remember seeing them from the pass in the valley wall. The afternoon sun had dipped low. When we reached the far side of the valley, the Ifrit landed on the ground again and reached up to pluck me from his shoulder. He placed me by his foot, then opened his other clawed hand to set something next to me. It was Joachim.
The chaplain sat up slowly, looking dazed. I staggered toward him.
The Ifrit bent to smile down on us, showing a row of enormous yellow teeth. “Do you want something to eat too, little men?”
“There’s plenty!” came a completely unexpected woman’s voice.
Gripping each other by the arms, Joachim and I turned toward the voice. We saw the last thing I had expected, a slim young human woman, wearing a big white apron and tending a fire. Three sheep carcasses were broiling over it.
She had black hair and eyes but very white skin, full breasts, and wore a gold necklace above the apron. Strung along the necklace were a number of rings.
She gave us a sharp, appraising glance. While we stared at her dumbfounded, she pulled one of the carcasses away from the fire and sliced off a large portion. “I’m having some myself,” she said. “You’d better take some while you have a chance. The Ifrit doesn’t need to eat very often, and he sometimes forgets that humans do.”
“Thank you,” said Joachim gravely. I found I had nothing to say.
“You’re a priest?” she asked, handing him a plate. “That should make it more interesting.” For some reason she started to laugh.
“Have you seen the others?” Joachim asked me in a low voice.
“No one but you,” I answered. “I don’t even know if Maffi was able to get away while the Ifrit was distracted by the rest of us.”
The mutton tasted surprisingly good. The nose and mouth could still appreciate fresh hot food, even if we were about to die.
The Ifrit crossed his legs and sat down, bringing him closer to our level but not by much. He tossed down a handful of melons as though they had been currents, then picked up a whole sheep carcass on its spit and bit into it. Greasy juice ran down his chin, and he licked it off with a wide pink tongue.
“You didn’t say thank you!” the woman shouted up at him, giving him a rap on the knee with a poker.
He bobbed his head. “Thank you my dear.” She smiled, satisfied, and he continued chewing.
“So, how do you like my wife?” he asked when he had finished the first batch of mutton and was reaching for the second. “Isn’t she fine? Best cook I’ve ever had, and the sweetest body.”
I was too horrified to answer.
“She’s so delicate and graceful, and so pure,” the Ifrit continued, pausing to wipe his jaw with an arm. “She keeps me amused. I like to call her my wife because she was going to be some human’s wife when I captured her. She probably doesn’t perform quite the services for me that she would for a man, but she keeps me happy!” Both
