‘I know what it was! Beyond the blue sand was, oh, it was so beautiful, so wonderful, so joyous a thing to find! It was –’ He swivelled his head, his scarlet eyes swirling to be sure of every serpent’s attention. ‘Dung!’ he declared happily. ‘Great mounds of fresh, brown stinking dung! And then we declared ourselves the Lords of the Four Realms. Lords of the Earth, the Sea, the Sky and the Dung!
