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himself from further search and investigation.
    ‘Spells, it was!’ cried Wedge. ‘Spells, magic! Don’t beat me!’
    ‘The boy has not learnt to use his powers,’ said the Magus. ‘That I know to be true. If he left the dormitory, and manifestly, he did leave the dormitory, then he left not by magic, but by the door! You left it unlocked, Wedge, and for your stupidity you shall starve for three days and three nights.’
    ‘Starve her, then!’ cried Wedge. ‘For She is the Keeper of the Keys, as well you know, and She gives me the key of a night to lock the door, as well you know, and I lock it according to the key . . .’ He tapered off, mumbling, ‘as well you know’.
    ‘You shall both be starved,’ said the Magus. ‘Now get out of my sight.’
    Wedge hopped towards the door and, as he passed Jack, he said under his breath in a low snarl, ‘Now you have made an enemy of me, my fine lad, my Jackster. An enemy have you made!’
    The Magus sat down at the round stone table and gestured for Jack to sit near him. Unwillingly Jack did so.
    ‘I have something to show you,’ said the Magus, ‘that no soul here but myself has ever seen. Behold!’
    The Magus opened a stone jar that sat on the stone table, and took out a handful of dust. He threw this on the fire, and the fire immediately raged up, and then changed colour, first to green, then to red, then, as the flames turned back to gold, there appeared in the flames in the fireplace, a golden city.
    ‘London!’ cried Jack.
    There was St Paul’s, there was London Bridge with its houses and shops and golden horses going to and fro. There was Cheapside, crammed with stalls selling flowers and root vegetables, and there was Billingsgate, sizeable as a whale, selling every fish of every kind, some in tanks, some in casks, some still gasping golden on golden slabs.
    There was the Strand and its printing shops, where Jack was going to be an apprentice. There were the Inns of Court.
    There was the Queen’s palace at the Tower of London, and the bear gardens at Vauxhall. There was the river itself, the Thames, turning through the city like a bow, but in the flames it was like a golden bow, that bent past the banks and wharves of the city.
    ‘Imagine a city made of gold, and each thing in it made of gold, and every person as golden as a precious statue, and the Thames itself a flowing golden god, where a dropped line would hook a golden fish, and where a dipped bucket would pour pure gold. Imagine it, Jack. Such a city would be the wonder of the world and the wealth of the world. A man who was king of that city would be a king indeed.’
    ‘It is real?’ asked Jack, kneeling and looking in wonder into the flames.
    ‘It is a vision,’ said the Magus. ‘A vision of what shall be.’
    The flames began to die back, and as they did so the golden city shrank and disappeared into the burning wood.
    ‘So you must stay with us, Jack,’ said the Magus, ‘and if you are what I believe you to be, riches and power will be yours.’
    ‘What do you believe me to be?’ asked Jack.
    ‘You are the Radiant Boy,’ answered the Magus, ‘the boy that is written in the ancient books of life, and when your power is added to my power, there is nothing that we shall not accomplish.’
    It was almost day. Through the window Jack saw the night disappearing.
    The Magus told him to go into the laboratory and stoke the furnace. ‘I shall not punish you on this occasion,’ he said. ‘But I shall watch you closely, and I shall know what you say, what you think, what you do, and where you are. If you become a fly, I shall become a spider. If you become a mouse, you shall feel my whiskers at your tail. If you become a horse, I shall be your rider. And if you are a fish, I shall soon be your net. Run where you will, Jack, I shall not let you go.’
    The Magus left the room. Downhearted, Jack went to begin his work. Then his mind went over the night’s events, and the Sunken King, and