Abdullah laughed and rolled his head to keep his nose out of the dog’s squiddy breath. He was quite as delighted as the dog was. “So you were dreaming of me!” he said. “My friend, I shall arrange for you to have a bowl of squid daily. You have saved my life and possibly Flower-in-the-Night’s, too!”

As soon as the dog’s rapture had abated a little, Abdullah began rolling and working himself along the floor in his chains, until he was lying, propped on one elbow, on top of the carpet. He gave a great sigh. Now he was safe. “Come along,” he said to the dog. “Get on the carpet, too.”

But the dog had found the scent of what was certainly a rat in the corner of the dungeon. It was pursuing the smell with excited snorts. At each snort Abdullah felt the carpet quiver beneath him. It gave him the answer he needed.

“Come along,” he said to the dog. “If I leave you here, they will find you when they come to feed me or question me, and they will assume I have turned myself into a dog. Then my fate will be yours. You have brought me the carpet and revealed me its secret, and I cannot see you stuck on a forty-foot stake.”

The dog had its nose rammed into the corner. It was not attending. Abdullah heard, unmistakable even through the thick walls of the dungeon, the tramp of feet and the rattle of keys. Someone was coming. He gave up persuading the dog. He lay flat on the carpet.

“Here, boy!” he said. “Come and lick my face!”

The dog understood that. It left the corner, jumped on Abdullah’s chest, and proceeded to obey him.

“Carpet,” Abdullah whispered from under the busy tongue. “To the Bazaar, but do not land. Hover beside Jamal’s stall.”

The carpet rose and rushed sideways—which was just as well. Keys were unlocking the dungeon door. Abdullah was not any too sure how the carpet left the dungeon because the dog was still licking his face and he was forced to keep his eyes shut. He felt a dank shadow pass across him—perhaps that was when they melted through the wall—and then bright sunlight. The dog lifted its head into the sunlight, puzzled. Abdullah squinted sideways across his chains and saw a high wall rear in front of them and then fall below as the carpet rose smoothly over it. Then came a succession of towers and roofs, quite familiar to Abdullah though he had only seen them by night before. And after that the carpet went planing down toward the outer edge of the Bazaar. For the palace of the Sultan was indeed only five minutes’ walk from Abdullah’s booth.