Iago was most disgruntled to find his two friends unresponsive and stupid the next morning.

"I said," he bellowed, "the Cave of Wonders is WAKING UP! Which is more than I could say for you two," he added, darkly.

Suzuki's mouth hung slightly open, a thin cobweb of saliva strung between her lower lip and her left incisor. She could not focus on the table in front of her. Jafar's eyes were as red as his staff's, and he yawned widely every few minutes. Both of them had been unable to sleep after the night's events, and only now were their bodies demanding payment.

Jafar managed to rouse himself. "Oh... Iago... that is good news." He yawned again, and Iago had to fight the temptation to pluck a tooth out of the great gawping head.

"You want to know some better news, Jay?" he snapped.

"Do tell," murmured Jafar, massaging his bony forehead with serpentine fingers.

"That trinket you confiscated off the Egyptian trader..." Iago waited expectantly. The public beheading of the rebellious vendor had been one of Jafar's finer epiphanies for crowd control and Iago was sure he would want to gloat briefly over it. However, no exultation was forthcoming so he continued, a little ruffled; "It is linked to the activation of the Cave of Wonders."

"Oh?" Jafar feigned interest briefly then slumped onto his palms. Iago sighed, wandered over, and pecked the man sharply on the finger.

"Yeah, 'oh'," he said, when Jafar yelped and looked at him blearily. "It's got its own poem and everything. You like poetry, Suzie?" he asked, directing his verbal onslaught with suddenness at Suzuki, who had been surreptitiously falling asleep.

"V- very much," she mumbled. Normally she cooed over Iago in a contained manner, like a distant but adoring mother, and Iago responded with a kind of Oedipal fervour that often irritated Jafar into throwing cashew nuts at him. Iago strutted over to her side of the table and hopped lightly onto her shoulder, shedding a few feathers along the way through sheer annoyance.

"Then listen to this," he suggested, and leaned his beak to her ear.

"The desert sand is hurting for a light,

For eternity ill makes a proper torch.

It finds and flames a scarab into gold

And stars to scar the desert night, and scorch.

"Now the desert sand can see its fleshes,

And hates the eyes that forces it to know

The treasured hidden bowl of its belly.

It roars and paws the air, that life is so.

"No treasure sates the desert sand enough

Unless it finds its diamond in the rough."

"Iago," Jafar drawled, "that was derivative in the extreme."

"I didn't write it!" Iago exclaimed, affronted. "I'm just being," here his voice changed to a distinct sneer, "your faithful slave, and doing what I'd said I'd do. Get information. And now I have. So there." He fell silent and started to sulk.

Jafar stretched. "Mmm...Very well. We will see if we can find the other half of the scarab beetle."

Iago and Suzuki both stared at him. At length, Suzuki said, "...Pardon, honourable one?"

The wasir sighed deeply. "Try to pay attention, Suzuki. The activation of the Cave of Wonders is linked to a golden scarab beetle, which then 'forces it to see'- I assume it either provides light or provides eyes. However, I only have one half of this 'trinket', as dear Iago calls it, therefore I have not been able to locate the fabled cave. We must find the other half."

"And the last line?" asked Iago testily, as he was most aggrieved he had not been able to work this out himself. "What's this rubbish about diamonds in the rough? You don't find diamonds among the rough. Trust me, I've tried nicking their stuff and all I ever get is paste gems. Has that got something to do with the lamp?"

Jafar stroked his beard in a leisurely manner. "Indeed, it may well do. For legend has it that the lamp is a crude, battered looking instrument of little surface value. Yet truly," he laughed dryly, "it would be a gem to own!"

"I don't think that's quite the interpretation the poem intends," Suzuki ventured, but was waved into silence by Jafar- something that angered her more than his forced entry into her room and person. She reached up for Iago from her shoulder and hugged him to her sparse bosom, stroking the scruffy red head. Iago sighed contentedly. Jafar flashed them a private look of fury, but controlled his voice exquisitely.

"Suzuki, you will go and inform our hapless little clown that I cannot be summoned into his foolish fat presence today, as I am ill. I believe the heat has got to me at last. I apologise for the inconvenience of not being allowed to stuff crackers down Iago's throat in my presence. Also inform him the abysmally idiotic Prince Ahmed al-Jihad is visiting in three days, and he had better get his wench of a daughter kitted out in appropriate and modest clothing. Dress that up in diplomacy and deliver it, will you?" He yawned again, and did not meet Suzuki's furiously flaming eyes.

"May I venture another translation of the poem?" she suggested in a voice so cold the heat of the room seemed to falter in its onslaught.

"No," purred Jafar, "you may not. Do as you are told."