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immediately to harvest more wishes from the old man, he found himself instead standing before the massive pyramid in the heat and birdcalls of a foreign jungle.
    ‘ I am so stupid, ’ Fain thought, shaking his head, and before doing anything else, sat down to decide what his next wishes would be. ‘ Future travel, instant land travel, and knowing the location of Hackler Thorn at any time, wherever he is. ’ Making a mental note of this, he stood again and walked toward the pyramid.
    Fain climbed the broad stone steps toward the dish-eye. Reaching it, he saw the legend around the iris which read: AS A CHEAT WITH LITTLE TIME DISSEMBLES UNTO UNION. Fain waited until nightfall, using the time to find a sturdy log and drag it up the steps. By nightfall the iris seemed to have swollen a little, and a small hole had appeared at its centre. Fain stood before the eye and began to flatter it, stating that it was beautiful, perfect in its roundness, and that he understood it. He wished he could add that he and it were the same, that they would be together always, but his recent oath prevented him. Yet the iris had grown larger and the hole at its centre had revolved open. Fain braced the entrance with the log and ducked through.
    Inside, the stone of the passage wall was cool and moist, granular beneath his hand. Raising his lamp, he saw that the wall was patterned with jigsaw curlicues which he realised were the outlines of a thousand stone geckos, ingeniously interlocked. He emerged into a titanic vaulted hall, the pointed ceiling lost in mist. The building was completely hollow, and lit inadequately here and there with flaming torches. Fain noticed that even these sheer inner walls were complicated with interlocking lizards.
    Against the far distant opposite wall there was something like steps and a throne. Dowsing his lamp, he decided to become invisible. He was glad to find that he could still see what was around him, but found that not being able to see his own feet made it difficult to walk. Several minutes later he reaches the steps, which led up to a square head on a stained stone pedestal. It almost resembled a huge stone owl. Fain found it was near to impossible to climb the stairs without visible legs, and re-appeared in sheer frustration halfway up the steps.
    ‘ Tomb robbers have cored the marrow of this place, ’ boomed the square granite head. Fain noticed that it had a single round eye. ‘ What do you hope to gain here? ’
    ‘ Information about the sorcerer Drake. ’
    ‘ I am Suvramizana, idol of time. Drake the Adept was drawn here by the Sertris Eye. He expected, wrongly, that it related to his craft, because the eyeball happens to be the only way one disguised sorcerer can recognise another. ’
    ‘ I don ’ t understand, ’ said Fain, who had arrived on the platform on which the pedestal stood. He had to crane his head to see the sad, flickering stone face. There was a stone teardrop suspended from the oyster eye.
    ‘ Your eyeballs turn upside down when you become a true sorcerer. Being completely round, it is the one part of the body which can be inverted without an external observer being any the wiser. ’
    Fain doubted this, as he had met people whose entire face could be turned upside-down without looking much different, but he kept silent on the matter. ‘ How long have you been here? ’
    ‘ Since the excommunication of the sky, ’ chimed the statue mournfully. ‘ Time is not what people believe it is. It is the colour which is always present but which cannot be seen until truthfully named. Its name is not “ time ” . Decisions of life can be forged in a moment — the contours and notches of the moment will tell you a great deal about the man. ’ The echoing voice faded, a pause. ‘ Yet I cannot sense any such thing with you. I can taste the dissolution and miscommunications surrounding a person who has begun life in the middle. ’
    ‘ As opposed to what? ’
    ‘ There are, now and