Behind him, hidden from the Protector by the taller men gathered about him but never more than a sword length away, his chief bodyguard stood, arms casually crossed, hands resting on the pommels of his most obvious weapons, unnoticed and almost unseen, gaze sweeping the surrounding crowd.

"Once there was a great Emperor who was much feared throughout what was then all the known world, save for the outer wastelands which nobody with any sense bothered about and where only savages lived. The Emperor had no equals and no rivals. His own realm covered the better part of the world and all the kings of all the rest of the world bowed down before him and offered him generous tribute. His power was absolute and he had come to fear nothing except death, which comes eventually for all men, even Emperors.

"He determined to try and cheat death too-by building a monumental palace so great, so magnificent, so spell-bindingly sumptuous that Death itself — which was believed to come for those of royal birth in the shape of a great fiery bird visible only to the dying — would be tempted to stay in the great monument and dwell there and not return to the depths of the sky with the Emperor clutched in its talons of flame.

"Accordingly the Emperor caused a great monumental palace to be built on an island in the centre of a great circular lake on the edge of the plains and the ocean, some way from his capital city. The palace was fashioned in the shape of a mighty conical tower half a hundred storeys tall. It was filled with every imaginable luxury and treasure the empire and kingdoms could provide, all secured deep within the furthest reaches of the monument, where they would be hidden from the common thief yet visible to the fiery bird when it came for the Emperor.

"There too were placed magical statues of all the Emperor's favourites, wives and concubines, all guaranteed by his holiest holy men to come alive when the Emperor died and the great bird of fire came to take him.