Short and squat—no more than four feet tall—but densely packed with layered silt and clay. His surface looks wet in some lights, matte in others: streaks of glossy river-silt run like veins over a core of sun-baked ochre. Where joints meet, braided reeds and thin strips of leather (now petrified) form crude tendons. When he moves he rocks like a child's dinghy: awkward, heavily weighted steps that nevertheless finish with tiny, precise shifts of balance. Unexpectedly, his right shoulder bears a neat band of polished black obsidian embedded flush with the mud, as if someone placed a jewel into him and someone else—patiently—polished it nightly. The obsidian glints like an eye but does not glow.