"Give me but four minutes, Mistress, and you shall see it spread beneath the trees of this oasis, beside the clear spring that bubbles through the sand." She strolled back to her uncle and her betrothed, a secret smile on her lips. In the specified four minutes a banquet popped into sight just beside them. Godwin jumped. "What the devil!" "I'm hungry," said Ramizail, at once on the defensive. "Mihrjan!" said Godwin, glaring at her. "You had him do this. How often must I tell you my sentiments concerning all this magic, witch-wench?" "Never again, Godwin dear, for I know them by heart." "Ramizail," he said angrily, his eyes sparkling blue, "this is going to stop here and now. When you gave me the ring, and thus shared your power over the djinn with me, you promised not to command Mihrjan to do anything I didn't approve of." "Oh, well," grumbled the girl, "I'm hungry for real food!" "Ramizail, give me the sigil!" Her eyes blazed back at his. "Come and take it, you big oaf!" El Sareuk leaned against a date palm and smiled to himself. It was always a toss-up as to which of these iron-willed people would win an argument. Godwin strode over to the girl, upsetting a goblet of pale pink sherbet with his foot, and took her by the shoulders. She hit him on the nose. He turned her over and smacked her on her lightly-clad bottom. She screeched and bit his leg. He dropped her on the sand and sat on her. Mihrjan, invisible but no more than three feet from them, laughed deeply. El Sareuk said to Yellow-eyes, the old peregrine falcon, who was sitting on his shoulder watching the brawl, "Thy master has met, if not his match, at least a very worthy foe!" * * * * * Godwin, after a great deal of fumbling, got hold of the sigil where it hung on a chain round her neck, and opened the clasp and took it off. "Bully!" shrieked Ramizail. "Swaggering, bragging, girl-defeating bully! Give me that back!" "Not a chance," said Godwin equably. He moved over and sat in the small of her back. He locked the sigil into the ring he wore on his little finger, and the designs of each caught the other and made a single lump of gold. "Now," he said, "I control the djinn." "Have them transport me to the Isles of the Western Sea," said the girl savagely, "or by the Crescent and Cross, Godwin, I'll murder you when I get up!" "Nothing so drastic. Mihrjan!" "Yes, Lord?" "I control you now absolutely, don't I?" "Yes, Lord." "You follow us for love, I know, but we can't really command you unless one of us holds both these baubles, isn't that so?" "'Tis so, one of a Hundred Monarchs, though thou knowest I would answer any summons thou or my mistress made, Solomon's Seal or no. But the sigil and ring are life's and death's powers over me."