Nobby put his head on one side. "It looks promising," he said critically. "We might be nearly there. I reckon the chances of a man with soot on his face, his tongue sticking out, standing on one leg and singing The Hedgehog Song ever hitting a dragon's voonerables would be ... what'd you say, Carrot?"
   "A million to one, I reckon," said Carrot virtu­ously.
   Colon glared at them.
   "Listen, lads," he said, "you're not winding me up, are you?"
   Carrot looked down at the plaza below them.
   "Oh, bloody hell," he said softly.
   "Wassat?" said Colon urgently, looking around.
   "They're chaining a woman to a rock!"
   The rank stared over the parapet. The huge and si­lent crowd that lined the plaza stared too, at a white figure struggling between half a dozen palace guards.
   "Wonder where they got the rock from?" said Co­lon. "We're on loam here, you know."
   "Fine strapping wench, whoever she is," said Nobby approvingly, as one of the guards wheeled off bow-legged and collapsed. "That's one lad who won't know what to do with his evenin's for a few weeks. Got a mean right knee, so she has."
   "Anyone we know?" said Colon.
   Carrot squinted.
   "It's Lady Ramkin!" he said, his mouth dropping open.
   "Never!"
   "He's right. In a nightie," said Nobby.
   "The buggers!" Colon snatched up his bow and fumbled for an arrow. "I'll give 'em voonerables! Well-spoken lady like her, it's a disgrace!"
   "Er," said Carrot, who had glanced over his shoul­der. "Sergeant?"
   "This is what it comes to!" muttered Colon. "De­cent women can't walk down the street without being eaten! Right, you bastards, you're . . . you're ge­ography-''
   '' Sergeant!'' Carrot repeated urgently.
   "It's history, not geography," said Nobby. "That's what you're supposed to say. History. 'You're history!' you say."
   "Well, whatever," snapped Colon. "Let's see how…"
   "Sergeant!"
   Nobby was looking behind them, too.
   "Oh, shit," he said.
   "Can't miss," muttered Colon, taking aim.
   "Sergeant!"
   "Shut up, you two, I can't concentrate when you keep shout…"
   "Sergeant, it's coming!"


   The dragon accelerated.
   The drunken rooftops of Ankh-Morpork blurred as it passed over, wings sneering at the air. Its neck stretched out straight ahead, the pilot flames of its nos­trils streamed behind it, the sound of its flight panned across the sky.


   Colon's hands shook. The dragon seemed to be aiming at his throat, and it was moving too fast, far too fast. . .
   "This is it!" said Carrot. He glanced towards the Hub, in case any gods had forgotten what they were there for, and added, speaking slowly and distinctly, "It's a million-to-one-chance, but it might just work!"
   "Fire the bloody thing!" screamed Nobby.
   "Picking my spot, lad, picking my spot," quavered Colon. "Don't you worry, lads, I told you this is my lucky arrow. First-class arrow, this arrow, had it since I was a lad, you'd be amazed at the things I shot at with this, don't you worry."
   He paused, as the nightmare bore down on him on wings of terror.
   "Er, Carrot?" he said meekly.
   "Yes, Sarge?"
   "Did your old grandad ever say what a voonerable spot looks like?"
   And then the dragon wasn't approaching any more, it was there, passing a few feet overhead, a streaming mosaic of scales and noise, filling the entire sky.
   Colon fired.
   They watched the arrow rise straight and true.

   Vimes half-ran, half-staggered over the damp cobbles, out of breath and out of time.
   It can't be like this, he thought wildly. The hero always cuts it fine, but he always get there just in the nick of time. Only the nick of time was probably five minutes ago.
   And I'm not a hero. I'm out of condition, and I need a drink, and I get a handful of dollars a month without plumes allowance. That's not hero's pay. Heroes get kingdoms and princesses, and they take regular exer­cise, and when they smile the light glints off their teeth, ting. The bastards.
   Sweat stung his eyes. The rush of adrenaline that had carried him out of the palace had spent itself, and was now exacting its inevitable toll.
   He stumbled to a halt, and grabbed a wall to keep him upright while he gasped for air. And thus he saw the figures on the rooftop.
   Oh, no! he thought. They're not heroes either! What do they think they're playing at?


   It was a million-to-one chance. And who was to say that, somewhere in the millions of other possible uni­verses, it might not have worked?
   That was the sort of thing the gods really liked. But Chance, who sometimes can overrule even the gods, has 999,999 casting votes.
   In this universe, for example, the arrow bounced off a scale and clattered away into oblivion.
   Colon stared as the dragon's pointed tail passed overhead.
   "It . . . missed . . ."he mouthed.
   "But it couldn't of missed!" He stared red-eyed at the other two. "It was a sodding last desperate million-to-one chance!"
   The dragon twisted its wings, swung its huge bulk around on a pivot of air, and bore down on the roof.
   Carrot grabbed Nobby around the waist and laid a hand on Colon's shoulder.
   The sergeant was weeping with rage and frustration.
   "Million-to-bloody-one last desperate bloody chance!"
   "Sarge…"
   The dragon flamed.
   It was a beautifully controlled line of plasma. It went through the roof like butter.
   It cut through stairways.
   It crackled into ancient timbers and made them twist like paper. It sliced into pipes.
   It punched through floor after floor like the fist of an angry god and, eventually, reached the big copper vat containing a thousand gallons of freshly-made ma­ture whisky-type spirit.
   It burned into that, too.
   Fortunately, the chances of anyone surviving the en­suing explosion were exactly a million-to-one.

   The fireball rose like a-well, a rose. A huge orange rose, streaked with yellow. It took the roof with it and wrapped it around the astonished dragon, lifting it high into the air in a boiling cloud of broken timber and bits of piping.
   The crowd watched in bemusement as the superhot blast flung it into the sky and barely noticed Vimes as he pushed his way, wheezing and crying, through the press of bodies.
   He shouldered past a row of palace guards and shambled as fast as he could across the flagstones. No one was paying him much attention at the moment.
   He stopped.
   It wasn't a rock, because Ankh-Morpork was on loam. It was just some huge remnant of mortared ma­sonry, probably thousands of years old, from some­where in the city foundations. Ankh-Morpork was so old now that what it was built on, by and large, was Ankh-Morpork.
   It had been dragged into the centre of the plaza, and Lady Sybil Ramkin had been chained to it. She ap­peared to be wearing a nightie and huge rubber boots. By the look of her she had been in a fight, and Vimes felt a momentary pang of sympathy for whoever else had been involved. She gave him a look of pure fury.
   "You!"
   "You!"
   He waved the cleaver vaguely.
   "But why you…?" he began.
   "Captain Vimes," she said sharply, "you will oblige me by not waving that thing about and you will start putting it to its proper use!"
   Vimes wasn't listening.
   "Thirty dollars a month!" he muttered. "That's what they died for! Thirty dollars! And I docked some from Nobby. I had to, didn't I? I mean, that man could make a melon go rusty!"
   "Captain Vimes!"
   He focused on the cleaver.
   "Oh," he said. "Yes. Right!"
   It was a good steel cleaver, and the chains were elderly and rather rusty iron. He hacked away, raising sparks from the masonry.
   The crowd watched in silence, but several palace guards hurried towards him.
   "What the hell do you think you're doing?" said one of them, who didn't have much imagination.
   "What the hell do you think you're doing?" Vimes growled, looking up.
   They stared at him.
   "What?"
   Vimes took another hack at the chains. Several loops tinkled to the ground.
   "Right, you've asked for…" one of the guards be­gan. Vimes's elbow caught him under his rib cage; before he collapsed, Vimes's foot kicked savagely at the other one's kneecaps, bringing his chin down ready for another stab with the other elbow.
   "Right," said Vimes absently. He rubbed the el­bow. It was sheer agony.
   He moved the cleaver to his other hand and ham­mered at the chains again, aware at the back of his mind that more guards were hurrying up, but with that special kind of run that guards had. He knew it well. It was the run that said, there's a dozen of us, let someone else get there first. It said, he looks ready to kill, no one's paying me to get killed, maybe if I run slowly enough he'll get away . . .
   No point in spoiling a good day by catching some­one.
   Lady Ramkin shook herself free. A ragged cheer went up and started to grow in volume. Even in their current state of mind, the people of Ankh-Morpork always appreciated a performance.
   She grabbed a handful of chain and wrapped it around one pudgy fist.
   "Some of those guards don't know how to treat…" she began.
   "No time, no time," said Vimes, grabbing her arm. It was like trying to drag a mountain.
   The cheering stopped, abruptly.
   There was a sound behind Vimes. It was not, par­ticularly, a loud noise. It just had a peculiarly nasty carrying quality. It was the click of four sets of talons hitting the flagstones at the same time.
   Vimes looked around and up.
   Soot clung to the dragon's hide. A few pieces of charred wood had lodged here and there, and were still smouldering. The magnificent bronze scales were streaked with black.
   It lowered its head until Vimes was a few feet away from its eyes, and tried to focus on him.
   Probably not worth running, Vimes told himself. It's not as if I've got the energy anyway.
   He felt Lady Ramkin's hand engulf his.
   "Jolly well done," she said. "It nearly worked."

   Charred and blazing wreckage rained down around the distillery. The pond was a swamp of debris, covered with a coating of ash. Out of it, dripping slime, rose Sergeant Colon.
   He clawed his way to the bank and pulled himself up, like some sea-dwelling lifeform that was anxious to get the whole evolution thing over with in one go.
   Nobby was already there, spread out like a frog, leaking water.
   "Is that you, Nobby?" said Sergeant Colon anx­iously.
   "It's me, Sergeant."
   "I glad about that, Nobby," said Colon fervently.
   "I wish it wasn't me, Sergeant."
   Colon tipped the water out of his helmet, and then paused.
   "What about young Carrot?" he said.
   Nobby pushed himself upon his elbows, groggily.
   "Dunno," he said. "One minute we were on the roof, next minute we were jumping."
   They both looked at the ashen waters of the pond.
   "I suppose," said Colon slowly, "he can swim?"
   "Dunno. He never said. Not much to swim in, up in the mountains. When you come to think about it," said Nobby.
   "But perhaps there were limpid blue pools and deep mountain streams," said the sergeant hopefully. "And icy tarns in hidden valleys and that. Not to mention subterranean lakes. He'd be bound to have learned. In and out of the water all day, I expect."
   They stared at the greasy grey surface.
   "It was probably that Protective," said Nobby. "P'raps it filled with water and dragged him down."
   Colon nodded gloomily.
   "I'll hold your helmet," said Nobby, after a while.
   "But I'm your superior officer!"
   "Yes," said Nobby reasonably, "but if you get stuck down there, you're going to want your best man up here, ready to rescue you, aren't you?"
   "That's . . . reasonable," said Colon eventually. "That's a good point."
   "Right, then."
   "Drawback is, though ..."
   "What?"
   ". . .I can't swim," Colon said.
   "How did you get out of that, then?"
   Colon shrugged. "I'm a natural floater."
   Their eyes, once again, turned to the dankness of the pond. Then Colon stared at Nobby. Then Nobby, very slowly, unbuckled his helmet.
   "There isn't someone still in there, is there?" said Carrot, behind them.
   They looked around. He hoicked some mud out of an ear. Behind him the remains of the brewery smoul­dered.
   "I thought I'd better nip out quickly, see what was going on," he said brightly, pointing to a gate leading out of the yard. It was hanging by one hinge.
   "Oh," said Nobby weakly. "Jolly good."
   "There's an alley out there," said Carrot.
   "No dragons in it, are there?" said Colon suspi­ciously.
   "No dragons, no humans. There's no one around," said Carrot impatiently. He drew his sword. "Come on!" he said.
   "Where to?" said Nobby. He'd pulled a damp butt from behind his ear and was looking at it with an ex­pression of deepest sorrow. It was obviously too far gone. He tried to light it anyway.
   "We want to fight the dragon, don't we?" said Car­rot.
   Colon shifted uncomfortably. "Yes, but aren't we allowed to go home for a change of clothes first?"
   "And a nice warm drink?" said Nobby.
   "And a meal," said Colon. "A nice plate of…"
   "You should be ashamed of yourselves," said Car­rot. "There's a lady in distress and a dragon to fight and all you can think of is food and drink!"
   "Oh, I'm not just thinking about food and drink," said Colon.
   "We could be all that stands between the city and total destruction!"
   "Yes, but…" Nobby began.
   Carrot drew his sword and waved it over his head.
   "Captain Vimes would have gone!" he said. "All for one!"
   He glared at them, and rushed out of the yard.
   Colon gave Nobby a sheepish look.
   "Young people today," he said.
   "All for one what?" said Nobby.
   The sergeant sighed. "Come on, then."
   "Oh, all right."
   They staggered out into the alley. It was empty.
   "Where'd he go?" said Nobby.
   Carrot stepped out of the shadows, grinning all over his face.
   "Knew I could rely on you," he said. "Follow me!"
   "Something odd about that boy," said Colon, as they limped after him. "He always manages to per­suade us to follow him, have you noticed?"
   "All for one what?" said Nobby.
   "Something about the voice, I reckon."
   "Yes, but all for one what?"

   The Patrician sighed and, carefully marking his place, laid aside his book. To judge from the noise there seemed to be an awful lot of excitement going on out there. It was highly unlikely any palace guards would be around, which was just as well. The guards were highly-trained men and it would be a shame to waste them.
   He would need them later on.
   He padded over to the wall and pushed a small block that looked exactly like all the other small blocks. No other small block, however, would have caused a sec­tion of flagstone to grind ponderously aside.
   There was a carefully chosen assortment of stuff in there-iron rations, spare clothes, several small chests of precious metals and jewels, tools. And there was a key. Never build a dungeon you couldn't get out of.
   The Patrician took the key and strolled over to the door. As the wards of the lock slid back in their well-oiled grooves he wondered, again, whether he should have told Vimes about the key. But the man seemed to have got so much satisfaction out of breaking out. It would probably have been positively bad for him to have told him about the key. Anyway, it would have spoiled his view of the world. He needed Vimes and his view of the world.
   Lord Vetinari swung the door open and, silently, strode out into the ruins of his palace.
   They trembled as, for the second time in a couple of minutes, the city rocked.

The dragon kennels exploded. The windows blew out. The door left the wall ahead of a great billow of black smoke and sailed into the air, tumbling slowly, to plough into the rhododendrons.
   Something very energetic and hot was happening in that building. More smoke poured out, thick and oily and solid. One of the walls folded in on itself, and then another one toppled sluggishly on to the lawn.
   Swamp dragons shot determinedly out of the wreck­age like champagne corks, wings whirring frantically.
   Still the smoke unrolled. But there was something in there, some point of fierce white light that was gently rising.
   It disappeared from view as it passed a stricken win­dow, and then, with a piece of roof tile still spinning on the top of his head, Errol climbed above his own smoke and ascended into the skies of Ankh-Morpork.
   The sunlight glinted off his silver scales as he hov­ered about a hundred feet up, turning slowly, balanc­ing nicely on his own flame . . .
   Vimes, awaiting death on the plaza, realized that his mouth was hanging open. He shut it again.
   There was absolutely no sound in the city now but the noise of Errol's ascent.
   They can rearrange their own plumbing, Vimes told himself bemusedly. To suit circumstances. He's made it work in reverse. But his thingys, his genes . . . surely he must have been halfway to it anyway. No wonder the little bugger has got such stubby wings. His body must have known he wasn't going to need them, except to steer.
   Good grief. I'm watching the first ever dragon to flame backwards.
   He risked a glance immediately above him. The great dragon was frozen, its enormous bloodshot eyes concentrating on the tiny creature.
   With a challenging roar of flame and a pummelling of air the King of Ankh-Morpork rose, all thought of mere humans forgotten.
   Vimes turned sharply to Lady Ramkin.
   "How do they fight?" he said urgently. "How do dragons fight?"
   "I... that is, well, they just flap at each other and blow flame," she said. "Swamp dragons, that is. I mean, who's ever seen a noble dragon fight?" She pat­ted her nightie. "I must take some notes, I've got my memo book somewhere ..."
   "In your nightshirt?"
   "It's amazing how ideas come to one in bed, I've always said."
   Flames roared into the space where Errol had been, but he wasn't there. The king tried to spin in mid-air. The little dragon circled in an easy series of smoke rings, weaving a cat's cradle in the sky with the huge adversary gyrating helplessly in the middle. More flames, hotter and longer, stabbed at him and missed.
   The crowd watched in breathless silence.
   " 'allo, Captain," said an ingratiating voice.
   Vimes looked down. A small and stagnant pond dis­guised as Nobby grinned sheepishly up at him.
   "I thought you were dead!" he said.
   "We're not," said Nobby.
   "Oh. Good." There didn't seem much else to say.
   "What do you reckon on the fight, then?"
   Vimes looked back up. Smoke trails spiralled across the city.
   "I'm afraid it's not going to work," said Lady Ramkin. "Oh. Hallo, Nobby."
   "Afternoon, ma'am," said Nobby, touching what he thought was his forelock.
   "What d'you mean, it's not going to work?" said Vimes. "Look at him go! It hasn't hit him yet!"
   "Yes, but his flame has touched it several times. It doesn't seem to have any effect. It's not hot enough, I think. Oh, he's dodging well. But he's got to be lucky every time. It has only got to be lucky once."
   The meaning of this sank in.
   "You mean," said Vimes, "all this is just - just show? He's just doing it to impress?"
   " 'S'not his fault," said Colon, materialising be­hind them. "It's like dogs, innit? Doesn't really dawn on the poor little bugger that he's up against a big one. He's just ready for a scrap."
   Both dragons appeared to realise that the fight was the well-known Klatchian standoff. With another smoke ring and a billow of white flame they parted and retreated a few hundred yards.
   The king hovered, flapping its wings quickly. Height. That was the thing. When dragon fought dragon, height was always the thing . . .
   Errol balanced on his flame. He seemed to be think­ing.
   Then he nonchalantly kicked his back legs out as though hovering on your own stomach gases was something dragons had mastered over millions of years, somersaulted, and fled. For a moment he was visible as a silver streak, and then he was out over the city walls and gone.
   A groan followed him. It came from ten thousand throats.
   Vimes threw up his hands.
   "Don't you worry, guv," said Nobby quickly. "He's - he's probably gone to, to have a drink. Or something. Maybe it's the end of round one. Or some­thing."
   "I mean, he ate our kettle and everything," said Colon uncertainly. "He wouldn't just run away after eating a kettle. Stands to reason. Anyone who could eat a kettle wouldn't run away from anything. "
   "And my armour polish," said Carrot. "It was nearly a whole dollar for the tin."
   "There you are then," said Colon. "It's like I said."
   "Look," said Vimes, as patiently as he could man­age. "He's a nice dragon, I liked him as much as you, a very nice little chap, but he's just done the sensible thing, for gods' sake, he's not going to get burned to bits just to save us. Life just doesn't work like that. You might as well face it."
   Overhead the great dragon strutted through the air and flamed a nearby tower. It had won.
   "I've never seen that before," said Lady Ramkin. "Dragons normally fight to the death."
   "At last they've bred one who's sensible," said Vimes morosely. "Let's be honest: the chances of a dragon the size of Errol beating something that big are a million-to-one"
   There was one of those silences you get after one clear bright note has been struck and the world pauses.
   The rank looked at one another.
   "Million-to-one?" asked Carrot nonchalantly.
   "Definitely," said Vimes. "Million-to-one."
   The rank looked at one another again.
   "Million-to-one," said Colon.
   "Million-to-one," agreed Nobby.
   "That's right," said Carrot. "Million-to-one."
   There was another high-toned silence. The mem­bers of the rank were wondering who was going to be the first to say it.
   Sergeant Colon took a deep breath.
   "But it might just work," he said.
   "What are you talking about?" snapped Vimes. "There's no…"
   Nobby nudged him urgently in the ribs and pointed out across the plains.
   There was a column of black smoke out there. Vimes squinted. Running ahead of the smoke, speeding over the cabbage fields and closing fast, was a silvery bul­let.
   The great dragon had seen it too. It flamed defiance and climbed for extra height, mashing the air with its enormous wings.
   Now Errol's flame was visible, so hot as to be al­most blue. The landscape rolled away underneath him at an impossible speed, and he was accelerating.
   Ahead of him the king extended its claws. It was almost grinning.
   Errol's going to hit it, Vimes thought. Gods help us all, it'll be a fireball.
   Something odd was happening out in the fields. A little way behind Errol the ground appeared to be ploughing itself up, throwing cabbage stalks into the air. A hedgerow erupted in a shower of sawdust . . .
   Errol passed silently over the city walls, nose up, wings folded down to tiny flaps, his body honed to a mere cone with a flame at one end. His opponent blew out a tongue of fire; Vimes watched Errol, with a barely noticeable flip of a wing stub, roll easily out of its path. And then he was gone, speeding out towards the sea in the same eerie silence.
   "He miss…" Nobby began.
   The air ruptured. An endless thunderclap of noise dragged across the city, smashing tiles, toppling chim­neys. In mid-air, the king was picked up, flattened out and spun like a top in the sonic wash. Vimes, his hands over his own ears, saw the creature flame desperately as it turned and became the centre of a spiral of crazy fire.
   Magic crackled along its wings. It screamed like a distressed foghorn. Then, shaking its head dazedly, it began to glide in a wide circle.
   Vimes groaned. It had survived something that tore masonry apart. What did you have to do to beat it? You can't fight it, he thought. You can't burn it, you can't smash it. There's nothing you can do to it.
   The dragon landed. It wasn't a perfect landing. A perfect landing wouldn't have demolished a row of cottages. It was slow, and it seemed to go on for a long time and rip up a considerable stretch of city.
   Wings flapping aimlessly, neck waving and spraying random flame, it ploughed on through a debris of beams and thatch. Several fires started up along the trail of destruction.
   Finally it came to rest at the end of the furrow, al­most invisible under a heap of former architecture.
   The silence that it left was broken only by the shouts of someone trying to organise yet another bucket chain from the river to douse the fires.
   Then people started to move.
   From the air Ankh-Morpork must have looked like a disturbed anthill, with streams of dark figures flow­ing towards the wreck of the dragon.
   Most of them had some kind of weapon.
   Many of them had spears.
   Some of them had swords.
   All of them had one aim in mind.
   "You know what?" said Vimes aloud. "This is go­ing to be the world's first democratically killed dragon. One man, one stab."
   "Then you've got to stop them. You can't let them kill it!" said Lady Ramkin.
   Vimes blinked at her.
   "Pardon?" he said.
   "It's wounded!"
   "Lady, that was the intention, wasn't it? Anyway, it's only stunned," said Vimes.
   "I mean you can't let them kill it like this," said Lady Ramkin insistently. "Poor thing!"
   "What do you want to do, then?" demanded Vimes, his temper unravelling. "Give it a strengthening dose of tar oil and a nice comfy basket in front of the stove?"
   "It's butchery!"
   "Suits me fine!"
   "But it's a dragon! It's just doing what a dragon does! It never would have come here if people had left it alone!"
   Vimes thought: it was about to eat her, and she can still think like this. He hesitated. Perhaps that did give you the right to an opinion . . .
   Sergeant Colon sidled up as they glared, white-faced, at one another, and hopped desperately from one squelching foot to the other.
   "You better come at once, Captain," he said. "It's going to be bloody murder!''
   Vimes waved a hand at him. "As far as I'm con­cerned," he mumbled, avoiding Sybil Ramkin's glare, "it's got it coming to it."
   "It's not that," said Colon. "It's Carrot. He's ar­rested the dragon.''
   Vimes paused.
   "What do you mean, arrested?" he said. "You don't mean what I think you mean, do you?"
   "Could be sir," said Colon uncertainly. "Could be. He was up on the rubble like a shot, sir, grabbed it by a wing and said 'You're nicked, chummy', sir. Couldn't believe it, sir. Sir, the thing is ..."
   "Well?"
   The sergeant hopped from one foot to the other. "You know you said prisoners weren't to be molested, sir . . ."


   It was quite a large and heavy roof timber and it scythed quite slowly through the air, but when it hit people they rolled backwards and stayed hit.
   "Now look," said Carrot, hauling it in and pushing back his helmet, "I don't want to have to tell anyone again, right?"
   Vimes shouldered his way through the dense crowd, staring at the bulky figure atop the mound of rubble and dragon. Carrot turned slowly, the roof beam held like a staff. His gaze was like a lighthouse beam. Where it fell, the crowd lowered their weapons and looked merely sullen and uncomfortable.
   "I must warn you," Carrot went on, "that interfer­ing with an officer in the execution of his duty is a serious offence. And I shall come down like a ton of bricks on the very next person who throws a stone."
   A stone bounced off the back of his helmet. There was a barrage of jeers.
   "Let us at it!"
   "That's right!"
   "We don't want guards ordering us about!"
   "Quis custodiet custard?"
   "Yeah? Right!"
   Vimes pulled the sergeant towards him. "Go and organise some rope. Lots of rope. As thick as possi­ble. I suppose we can-oh, tie its wings together, maybe, and bind up its mouth so it can't flame."
   Colon peered at him.
   "Are you serious, sir? We're really going to arrest it?"
   "Do it!"
   It's been arrested, he thought, as he pushed his way forward. Personally I would have preferred it to drop in the sea, but it's been arrested and now we've got to deal with it or let it go free.
   He felt his own feelings about the bloody thing evaporate in the face of the mob. What could you do with it? Give it a fair trial, he thought, and then exe­cute it. Not kill it. That's what heroes do out in the wilderness. You can't think like that in cities. Or rather, you can, but if you're going to then you might as well burn the whole place down right now and start again. You ought to do it ... well, by the book.
   That's it. We tried everything else. Now we might as well try and do it by the book.
   Anyway, he added mentally, that's a city guard up there. We've got to stick together. Nobody else will have anything to do with us.
   A burly figure in front of him drew back an arm with a halfbrick in it.
   "Throw that brick and you're a dead man," said Vimes, and then ducked and pushed his way through the press of people while the would-be thrower looked around in amazement.
   Carrot half-raised his club in a threatening gesture as Vimes climbed up the rubble pile.
   "Oh, hallo, Captain Vimes," he said, lowering it, "I have to report I have arrested this-"
   "Yes, I can see," said Vimes. "Did you have any suggestions about what we do next?"
   "Oh, yes, sir. I have to read it its rights, sir," said Carrot.
   "I mean apart from that."
   "Not really, sir."
   Vimes looked at those parts of the dragon still vis­ible under the rubble. How could you kill one of these? You'd have to spend a day at it.
   A lump of rock ricocheted off his breastplate.
   "Who did that?"
   The voice lashed out like a whip.
   The crowd went quiet.
   Sybil Ramkin scrambled up on the wreckage, eyes afire, and glared furiously at the mob.
   "I said," she said, "who did that? If the person who did it does not own up I shall be extremely angry! Shame on you all!"
   She had their full attention. Several people holding stones and things let them drop quietly to the ground.
   The breeze flapped the remnants of her nightshirt as her Ladyship took up a new haranguing position.
   "Here is the gallant Captain Vimes…"
   "Oh gods," said Vimes in a small voice, and pulled his helmet down over his eyes.
   "…and his dauntless men, who have taken the trou­ble to come here today, to save your…"
   Vimes gripped Carrot's arm and manoeuvred him down the far side of the heap.
   "You all right, Captain?" said the lance-constable. "You've gone all red."
   "Don't you start," snapped Vimes. "It's bad enough getting all those leers from Nobby and the ser­geant."
   To his astonishment Carrot patted him companion-ably on the shoulder.
   "I know how it is," he said sympathetically. "I had this girl back home, her name was Minty, and her father…"
   "Look, for the last time, there is absolutely nothing between…" Vimes began.
   There was a rattle beside them. A small avalanche of plaster and thatch rolled down. The rubble heaved, and opened one eye. One big black pupil floating in a bloodshot glow tried to focus on them.
   "We must be mad," said Vimes.
   "Oh, no, sir," said Carrot. "There's plenty of precedents. In 1135 a hen was arrested for crowing on Soul Cake Thursday. And during the regime of Psychoneurotic Lord Snapcase a colony of bats was exe­cuted for persistent curfew violations. That was in 1401. August, I think. Great days for the law, they were," said Carrot dreamily. "In 1321, you know, a small cloud was prosecuted for covering the sun dur­ing the climax of Frenzied Earl Hargath's investiture ceremony."
   "I hope Colon gets a move on with…" Vimes stopped. He had to know. "How?" he said. "What can you do to a cloud?"
   "The Earl sentenced it to be stoned to death," said Carrot. "Apparently thirty-one people were killed." He pulled out his notebook and glared at the dragon.
   "Can it hear us, do you think?" he said.
   "I suppose so."
   "Well, then.'' Carrot cleared his throat and turned back to the stunned reptile. "It is my duty to warn you that you are to be reported for consideration of prosecution on some or all of the following counts, to whit: One, (One) i, that on or about 18th Grune last, in a place known as Sweet­heart Lane, the Shades, you did unlawfully vent flame in a manner likely to cause grievous bodily harm, in contra­vention of Clause Seven of the Industrial Processes Act, 1508; AND THAT, One, (One) ii, that on or about 18th Grune last, in a place known as Sweetheart Lane, the Shades, you caused or did cause to cause the death of six persons unknown.."
   Vimes wondered how long the rubble would hold the creature down. Several weeks would be necessary, if the length of the charge sheet was anything to go by.
   The crowd went silent. Even Sybil Ramkin was standing in astonishment.
   "What's the matter?'' said Vimes to the upturned faces. "Haven't you ever seen a dragon being arrested before?
   "…Sixteen (Three) ii, on the night of Grune 24th last, you did flame or cause to flame those premises known as the Old Watch House, Ankh-Morpork, valued at two hun­dred dollars; AND THAT, Sixteen (Three) iii, on the night of Grune 24th last, upon being apprehended by an officer of the Watch in the execution of his duty-"
   "I think we should hurry up," whispered Vimes. "It's getting rather restive. Is all this necessary?"
   "Well, I believe one can summarise," said Carrot. "In exceptional circumstances, according to Bregg's Rules for…"
   "It may come as a surprise, but these are exceptional circumstances, Carrot," said Vimes. "And they're going to be really astonishingly exceptional if Colon doesn't hurry up with that rope."
   More rubble moved as the dragon strained to get up. There was a thump as a heavy beam was shouldered aside. The crowd began to run for it.
   It was at this point that Errol came back over the rooftops in a series of minor explosions, leaving a trail of smoke rings. Dipping low, he buzzed the crowd and sent the front rank stumbling backwards.
   He was also wailing like a foghorn.
   Vimes grabbed Carrot and stumbled down the heap as the king started to scrabble desperately to get free.
   "He's come back for the kill!" he shouted. "It probably took him all this time just to slow down!"
   Now Errol was hovering over the fallen dragon, and hooting shrilly enough to bust bottles.
   The great dragon stuck its head up in a cascade of plaster dust. It opened its mouth but, instead of the lance of white fire that Vimes tensed himself to expect, it merely made a noise like a kitten. Admittedly a kit­ten shouting into a tin bath at the bottom of a cave, but still a kitten.
   Broken spars fell aside when the huge creature got unsteadily to its feet. The great wings opened, show­ering the surrounding streets with dust and bits of thatch. Some of it clanged off the helmet of Sergeant Colon, hurrying back with what looked like a small washing line coiled over his arm.
   "You're letting it get up!" Vimes shouted, pushing the sergeant to safety. "You're not supposed to let it get up, Errol! Don't let it get up!"
   Lady Ramkin frowned. "That's not right," she said. "They never usually fight like that. The winner usu­ally kills the loser."
   "Right on!" shouted Nobby.
   "And then half the time he explodes with the ex­citement in any case."
   "Look, it's me!" Vimes yelled, as Errol hovered un­concernedly over the scene. "I bought you the fluffy ball! The one with the bell in it! You can't do this to us!"
   "No, wait a minute," said Lady Ramkin, laying a hand on his arm. "I'm not sure we haven't got hold of the wrong end of the stick here…"
   The great dragon leapt into the air and brought its wings down with a whump that flattened a few more buildings. The huge head swung around, the bleary eyes caught sight of Vimes.
   There seemed to be some thought going on inside them.
   Errol arced across the sky and hovered protectively in front of the captain, facing the thing down. For a moment it looked as though he might be turned into a small flying charcoal biscuit, and then the dragon lowered its gaze in a slightly embarrassed way and started to rise.
   It climbed in a wide spiral, gathering speed as it did so. Errol went with it, orbiting the huge body like a tug around a liner.
   "It's-it's as though he's fussing over it," said Vimes.
   "Add up the bastard!" shouted Nobby enthusiasti­cally.
   "Total, Nobby," said Colon. "You mean 'total'."
   Vimes felt Lady Ramkin's gaze on the back of his neck. He looked at her expression.
   Realization dawned. "Oh," he said.
   Lady Ramkin nodded.
   "Really?" said Vimes.
   "Yes," she said. "I really ought to have thought of it before. It was such a hot flame, of course. And they're always so much more territorial than the males."
   "Why don't you fight the bastard!" shouted Nobby, at the dwindling dragons.
   "Bitch, Nobby," said Vimes quietly. "Not bastard. Bitch."
   "Why don't you fi…- what?!"
   "It's a member of the female gender," explained Lady Ramkin.
   "What?"
   "We meant that if you tried your favourite kick, Nobby, it wouldn't work," said Vimes.
   "It's a girl," translated Lady Ramkin.
   "But it's sodding enormous!" said Nobby.
   Vimes coughed urgently. Nobby's rodent eyes slid sideways to Sybil Ramkin, who blushed like a sunset.
   "A fine figure of a dragon, I mean," he said quickly.
   "Er. Wide, egg-bearing hips," said Sergeant Colon anxiously.
   "Statueskew," Nobby added fervently.
   "Shut up," said Vimes. He brushed the dust off the remains of his uniform, adjusted the hang of his breastplate, and set his helmet on squarely. He patted it firmly. This wasn't where it ended, he knew that. This was where it all got started.
   "You men come with me. Come on, hurry! While everyone's still watching them," he added.
   "But what about the king?" said Carrot. "Or queen? Or whatever it is now?"
   Vimes stared at the rapidly shrinking shapes. "I re­ally don't know," he said. "That's up to Errol, I sup­pose. We've got other things to do." . Colon saluted, still fighting for breath. "Where we going, sir?" he managed.
   "To the palace. Any of you still got a sword?"
   "You can use mine, Captain," said Carrot. He handed it over.
   "Right," said Vimes quietly. He glared at them. "Let's go."

The rank trailed behind Vimes through the stricken streets.
   He started to walk faster. The rank started to trot to keep up. Vimes began to trot to keep ahead.
   The rank broke into a canter.
   Then, as if on an unspoken word of command, they broke into a run.
   Then into a gallop.
   People scurried away as they rattled past. Carrot's enormous sandals hammered on the cobbles. Sparks flew up from the scads of Nobby's boots. Colon ran quietly for such a fat man, as fat men often do, face locked in a scowl of concentration.
   They pounded along the Street of Cunning Artifi­cers, turned into Hogsback Alley, emerged into the Street of Small Gods and thundered towards the pal­ace. Vimes kept barely in the lead, mind currently empty of everything except the need to run and run.
   At least, nearly everything. But his head buzzed and resonated manically with those of all city guards ev­erywhere, all the pavement-pounding meatheads in the multiverse who had ever, just occasionally, tried to do what was Right.
   Far ahead of them a handful of palace guards drew their swords, took a second look, thought better of it, darted back inside the wall and started to close the gates. They clanged together as Vimes arrived.
   He hesitated, panting for breath, and looked at the massive things. The ones that the dragon had burned had been replaced by gates even more forbidding. From behind them came the sound of bolts sliding back.
   This was no time for half measures. He was a cap­tain, godsdammit. An officer. Things like this didn't present a problem for an officer. Officers had a tried and tested way of solving problems like this. It was called a sergeant.
   "Sergeant Colon!" he snapped, his mind still buzz­ing with universal policemanhood, "shoot the lock off!"
   The sergeant hesitated. "What, sir? With a bow and arrow, sir?"
   "I mean…" Vimes hesitated. "I mean, open these gates!"
   "Sir!" Colon saluted. He glared at the gates for a moment. "Right!" he barked. "Lance-constable Car­rot, one stepa forwarda, take! Lance-constable Carrot, inna youra owna timer! Open these gatesa!"
   "Yes, sir!"
   Carrot stepped forward, saluted, folded an enor­mous hand into a fist and rapped gently on the wood­work.
   "Open up," he said, "in the name of the Law!"
   There was some whispering on the other side of the gates, and eventually a small hatch halfway up the door slid open a fraction and a voice said, "Why?"
   "Because if you don't it will be Impeding an Officer of the Watch in the Execution of his Duty, which is punishable by a fine of not less than thirty dollars, one month's imprisonment, or being remanded in custody for social inquiry reports and half an hour with a red-hot poker," said Carrot.
   There was some more muffled whispering, the sound of bolts being drawn, and then the gates opened about halfway.
   There was no one visible on the other side.
   Vimes put a finger to his lips. He motioned Carrot towards one gate and dragged Nobby and Colon to the other.
   "Push," he whispered. They pushed, hard. There was a sudden eruption of pained cursing from behind the woodwork.
   "Run!" shouted Colon.
   "No!" shouted Vimes. He walked around the gate. Four semi-crushed palace guards glowered at him.
   "No," he said. "No more running. I want these men arrested."
   "You wouldn't dare," said one of the men. Vimes peered at him.
   "Clarence, isn't it?" he said. "With a C. Well, Clarence with a C, watch my lips. Either you can be charged with Aiding and Abetting or..," he leaned closer, and glanced meaningfully at Carrot,"..with an axe."
   "Swivel on that one, doggybag!" added Nobby, jumping from one foot to the other in vicious excite­ment.
   Clarence's little piggy eyes glared at the looming bulk that was Carrot, and then at Vimes's face. There was absolutely no mercy there. He appeared to reach a reluctant decision.
   "Jolly good," said Vimes. "Lock them in the gate­house, Sergeant."
   Colon drew his bow and squared his shoulders. "You heard the Man," he rasped. "One false move and you're . . . you're…" he took a desperate stab at it,"…you're Home Economics!"
   "Yeah! Slam 'em up in the banger!" shouted Nobby. If worms could turn, Nobby was revolving at gener­ating speeds. "Doucheballs!" he sneered, at their re­treating backs.
   "Aiding and Abetting what, Captain?" said Carrot, as the weaponless guards trooped away. "You have to aid and abet something."
   "I think in this case it will just be generalised abet­ting," said Vimes. "Persistent and reckless abetment."
   "Yeah," said Nobby. "Can't stand abettors. Slime-breaths!"
   Colon handed Captain Vimes the guardhouse key. "It's not very secure in there, Captain," he said. "They'll be able to break out eventually."
   "I hope so," said Vimes, "because the very first drain we come to, you're going to drop the key down it. Everyone here? Right. Follow me."

   Lupine Wonse scurried along the ruined corridors of the palace, The Summoning of Dragons under one arm, the glittering royal sword grasped uncertainly in one hand.
   He halted, panting, in a doorway.
   Not a lot of his mind was currently in a state sane enough to have proper thoughts, but the small part that was still in business kept insisting that it couldn't have seen what it had seen or heard what it had heard.
   Someone was following him.
   And he'd seen Vetinari walking through the palace. He knew the man was securely put away. The lock was completely unpickable. He remembered the Patrician being absolutely insistent that it be an unpickable lock when it was installed.
   There was movement in the shadows at the end of the passage. Wonse gibbered a bit, fumbled with the doorhandle beside him, darted in, slammed the door and leaned against it, fighting for breath.
   He opened his eyes.
   He was in the old private audience room. The Pa­trician was sitting in his old seat, one leg crossed on the other, watching him with mild interest.
   "Ah, Wonse," he said.
   Wonse jumped, scrabbled at the doorhandle, leapt into the corridor and ran for it until he reached the main staircase, rising now through the ruins of the central palace like a forlorn corkscrew. Stairs-height-high ground-defence. He ran up them three at a time.
   All he needed was a few minutes of peace. Then he'd show them.
   The upper floors were more full of shadows. What they were short on was structural strength. Pillars and walls had been torn out by the dragon as it built its cave. Rooms gaped pathetically on the edge of the abyss. Dangling shreds of wall-hanging and carpet flapped in the wind from the smashed windows. The floor sprang and wobbled like a trampoline as Wonse scurried across it. He struggled to the nearest door.
   "That was commendably fast," said the Patrician.
   Wonse slammed the door in his face and ran, squeaking, down a corridor.
   Sanity took a brief hold. He paused by a statue. There was no sound, no hurrying footsteps, no whirr of hidden doors. He gave the statue a suspicious look and prodded it with the sword.
   When it failed to move he opened the nearest door and slammed it behind him, found a chair and wedged it under the handle. This was one of the upper state rooms, bare now of most of its furnishings, and lack­ing its fourth wall. Where it should have been was just the gulf of the cavern.
   The Patrician stepped out of the shadows.
   "Now you have got it out of your system…," he said.
   Wonse spun around, sword raised.
   "You don't really exist," he said. "You're a-a ghost, or something."
   "I believe this is not the case," said the Patrician.
   "You can't stop me! I’ve got some magic stuff left, I've got the book!" Wonse took a brown leather bag out of his pocket. "I'll bring back another one! You'll see!"
   "I urge you not to," said Lord Vetinari mildly.
   "Oh, you think you're so clever, so in - control, so swave, just because I've got a sword and you haven't! Well, I've got more than that, I'll have you know," said Wonse triumphantly. "Yes! I've got the palace guards on my side! They follow me, not you! No one likes you, you know. No one ever liked you."
   He swung the sword so that its needle point was a foot from the Patrician's thin chest.
   "So it's back to the cells for you," he said. "And this time I'll make sure you stay there. Guards! Guards!"
   There was the clatter of running feet outside. The door rattled, the chair shook. There was a moment's silence, and then door and chair erupted in splinters.
   "Take him away!" screamed Wonse. "Fetch more scorpions! Put him in ... you're not the…"
   "Put the sword down," said Vimes, while behind him Carrot picked bits of door out of his fist.
   "Yeah," said Nobby, peering around the captain. "Up against the wall and spread 'em, motherbreath!"
   "Eh? What's he supposed to spread?" whispered Sergeant Colon anxiously.
   Nobby shrugged. "Dunno," he said. "Everything, I reckon. Safest way."
   Wonse stared at the rank in disbelief.
   "Ah, Vimes," said the Patrician. "You will…"
   "Shut up," said Vimes calmly. "Lance-constable Carrot?"
   "Sir!"
   "Read the prisoner his rights."
   "Yes, sir." Carrot produced his notebook, licked his thumb, flicked through the pages.
   "Lupine Wonse," he said, "AKA Lupin Squiggle Sec'y PP…"
   "Wha?" said Wonse.
   "…currently domiciled in the domicile known as The Palace, Ankh-Morpork, it is my duty to inform you that you have been arrested and will be charged with…" Carrot gave Vimes an agonised look,"…a number of offences of murder by means of a blunt instrument, to whit, a dragon, and many further offences of general­ised abetting, to be more specifically ascertained later. You have the right to remain silent. You have the right not to be summarily thrown into a piranha tank. You have the right to trial by ordeal. You have the…"
   "This is madness," said the Patrician calmly.
   "I thought I told you to shut up!" snapped Vimes, spinning around and shaking a finger under the Patri­cian's nose.
   "Tell me, Sarge," whispered Nobby, "do you think we're going to like it in the scorpion pit?"
   "…say anything, er, but anything you do say will be written down, er, here, in my notebook, and, er, may be used in evidence.."
   Carrot's voice trailed into silence.
   "Well, if this pantomime gives you any pleasure, Vimes," said the Patrician eventually, "take him down to the cells. I'll deal with him in the morning."
   Wonse made no signal. There was no scream or cry. He just rushed at the Patrician, sword raised.
   Options flickered across Vimes's mind. In the lead came the suggestion that standing back would be a good plan, let Wonse do it, disarm him afterwards, let the city clean itself up. Yes. A good plan.
   And it was therefore a total mystery to him why he chose to dart forward, bringing Carrot's sword up in a half-baked attempt at blocking the stroke . . .
   Perhaps it was something to do with doing it by the book.
   There was a clang. Not a particularly loud one. He felt something bright and silver whirr past his ear and strike the wall.
   Wonse's mouth fell open. He dropped the remnant of his sword and backed away, clutching The Summon­ing.
   "You'll be sorry," he hissed. "You'll all be very sorry!"
   He started to mumble under his breath.
   Vimes felt himself trembling. He was pretty certain he knew what had zinged past his head, and the mere thought was making his hands sweat. He'd come to the palace ready to kill and there'd been this minute, just this minute, when for once the world had seemed to be operating properly and he was in charge of it and now, now all he wanted was a drink. And a nice week's sleep.
   "Oh, give up!" he said. "Are you going to come quietly?"
   The mumbling went on. The air began to feel hot and dry.
   Vimes shrugged. "That's it, then," he said, and turned away. "Throw the book at him, Carrot."
   "Right, sir."
   Vimes remembered too late.
   Dwarfs have trouble with metaphors.
   They also have a very good aim.
   The Laws and Ordinances of Ankh and Morpork caught the secretary on the forehead. He blinked, stag­gered, and stepped backwards.
   It was the longest step he ever took. For one thing, it lasted the rest of his life.
   After several seconds they heard him hit, five sto­reys below.
   After several more seconds their faces appeared over the edge of the ravaged floor.
   "What a way to go," said Sergeant Colon.
   "That's a fact," said Nobby, reaching up to his ear for a dog-end.
   "Killed by a wossname. A metaphor."
   "Dunno," said Nobby. "Looks like the ground to me. Got a light, Sarge?"
   "That was right, wasn't it, sir?" said Carrot anx­iously. "You said to…"
   "Yes, yes," said Vimes. "Don't worry." He reached down with a shaking hand, picked up the bag Wonse had been holding, and tipped out a pile of stones. Every one had a hole in it. Why? he thought.
   A metallic noise behind him made him look around. The Patrician was holding the remains of the royal sword. As the captain watched, the man wrenched the other half of the sword out of the far wall. It was a clean break.
   "Captain Vimes," he said.
   "Sir?"
   "That sword, if you please?"
   Vimes handed it over. He couldn't, right now, think of anything else to do. He was probably due for a scorpion pit of his very own as it was.
   Lord Vetinari examined the rusty blade carefully.
   "How long have you had this, Captain?" he said mildly.
   "Isn't mine, sir. Belongs to Lance-constable Car­rot, sir."
   "Lance…?"
   "Me, sir, your graciousness," said Carrot, saluting.
   "Ah."
   The Patrician turned the blade over and over slowly, staring at it as if fascinated. Vimes felt the air thicken, as though history was clustering around this point, but for the life of him he couldn't think why. This was one of those points where the Trousers of Time bifurcated themselves, and if you weren't careful you'd go down the wrong leg…

   Wonse arose in a world of shades, icy confusion pour­ing into his mind. But all he could think of at the moment was the tall cowled figure standing over him.
   "I thought you were all dead," he mumbled. It was strangely quiet and the colours around him seemed washed-out, muted. Something was very wrong. "Is that you, Brother Doorkeeper?" he ventured.
   The figure reached out.
   METAPHORICALLY, it said.

   …and the Patrician handed the sword to Carrot.
   "Very well done, young man," he said. "Captain Vimes, I suggest you give your men the rest of the day off."
   "Thank you, sir," said Vimes. "Okay, lads. You heard his lordship."
   "But not you, Captain. We must have a little talk."
   "Yes, sir?" said Vimes innocently.
   The rank scurried out, giving Vimes sympathetic and sorrowful glances.
   The Patrician walked to the edge of the floor and looked down.
   "Poor Wonse," he said.
   "Yes, sir." Vimes stared at the wall.
   "I would have preferred him alive, you know."
   "Sir?"
   "Misguided, yes, but a useful man. His head could have been of further use to me."
   "Yes, sir."
   "The rest, of course, we could have thrown away."
   "Yes, sir."
   "That was a joke, Vimes."
   "Yes, sir."
   "The chap never grasped the idea of secret pas­sages, mind you."
   "No, sir."
   "That young fellow. Carrot, you called him?"
   "Yes, sir."
   "Keen fellow. Likes it in the Watch?"
   "Yes, sir. Right at home, sir."
   "You saved my life."
   "Sir?"
   "Come with me."
   He stalked away through the ruined palace, Vimes trailing behind, until he reached the Oblong Office. It was quite tidy. It had escaped most of the devastation with nothing more than a layer of dust. The Patrician sat down, and suddenly it was as if he'd never left. Vimes wondered if he ever had.
   He picked up a sheaf of papers and brushed the plas­ter off them.
   "Sad," he said. "Lupine was such a tidy-minded man."
   "Yes, sir."
   The Patrician steepled his hands and looked at Vimes over the top of them.
   "Let me give you some advice, Captain," he said.
   "Yes, sir?"
   "It may help you make some sense of the world."
   "Sir."
   "I believe you find life such a problem because you think there are the good people and the bad people," said the man. "You're wrong, of course. There are, always and only, the bad people, but some of them are on opposite sides. "
   He waved his thin hand towards the city and walked over to the window.
   "A great rolling sea of evil," he said, almost proprietorially. "Shallower in some places, of course, but deeper, oh, so much deeper in others. But people like you put together little rafts of rules and vaguely good intentions and say, this is the opposite, this will tri­umph in the end. Amazing!" He slapped Vimes good-naturedly on the back.
   "Down there," he said, "are people who will follow any dragon, worship any god, ignore any iniquity. All out of a kind of humdrum, everyday badness. Not the really high, creative loathesomeness of the great sinners, but a sort of mass-produced darkness of the soul. Sin, you might say, without a trace of originality. They accept evil not because they say yes, but because they don't say no. I'm sorry if this offends you,'' he added, patting the captain's shoulder, "but you fellows really need us."
   "Yes, sir?" said Vimes quietly.
   "Oh, yes. We're the only ones who know how to make things work. You see, the only thing the good people are good at is overthrowing the bad people. And you're good at that, I'll grant you. But the trouble is that it's the only thing you're good at. One day it's the ringing of the bells and the casting down of the evil tyrant, and the next it's everyone sitting around complaining that ever since the tyrant was overthrown no one's been taking out the trash. Because the bad people know how to plan. It's part of the specification, you might say. Every evil tyrant has a plan to rule the world. The good people don't seem to have the knack."
   "Maybe. But you're wrong about the rest!" said Vimes. "It's just because people are afraid, and alone…" He paused. It sounded pretty hollow, even to him.
   He shrugged. "They're just people," he said. "They're just doing what people do. Sir."
   Lord Vetinari gave him a friendly smile.
   "Of course, of course," he said. "You have to be­lieve that, I appreciate. Otherwise you'd go quite mad. Otherwise you'd think you're standing on a feather-thin bridge over the vaults of Hell. Otherwise existence would be a dark agony and the only hope would be that there is no life after death. I quite understand." He looked at his desk, and sighed, "And now," he said, "there is such a lot to do. I'm afraid poor Wonse was a good servant but an inefficient master. So you may go. Have a good night's sleep. Oh, and do bring your men in tomorrow. The city must show its gratitude."
   "It must what?" said Vimes.
   The Patrician looked at a scroll. Already his voice was back to the distant tones of one who organises and plans and controls.
   "Its gratitude," he said. "After every triumphant vic­tory there must be heroes. It is essential. Then everyone will know that everything has been done properly."
   He glanced at Vimes over the top of the scroll.
   "It's all part of the natural order of things,'' he said.
   After a while he made a few pencil annotations to the paper in front of him and looked up.
   "I said," he said, "that you may go."
   Vimes paused at the door.
   "Do you believe all that, sir?" he said. "About the endless evil and the sheer blackness?"
   "Indeed, indeed," said the Patrician, turning over the page. "It is the only logical conclusion."
   "But you get out of bed every morning, sir?"
   "Hmm? Yes? What is your point?"
   "I'd just like to know why, sir."
   "Oh, do go away, Vimes. There's a good fellow."

In the dark and draughty cave hacked from the heart of the palace the Librarian knuckled across the floor. He clambered over the remains of the sad hoard and looked down at the splayed body of Wonse.
   Then he reached down, very gently, and prised The Summoning of Dragons from the stiffening fingers. He blew the dust off it. He brushed it tenderly, as if it was a frightened child.
   He turned to climb down the heap, and stopped. He bent down again, and carefully pulled another book from among the glittering rubble. It wasn't one of his, except in the wide sense that all books came under his domain. He turned a few pages carefully.
   "Keep it," said Vimes behind him. "Take it away. Put it somewhere."
   The orangutan nodded at the captain, and rattled down the heap. He tapped Vimes gently on the knee­cap, opened The Summoning of Dragons, leafed through its ravaged pages until he found the one he'd been looking for, and silently passed the book up.
   Vimes squinted at the crabbed writing.
   Yet draggons are notte liken unicornes, I willen. They dwellyth in some Realm defined bye thee Fancie of the Wille and, thus, it myte bee thate whomsoever calleth upon them, and giveth them theyre patheway unto thys worlde, calleth theyre Owne dragon of the Mind.
   Yette, I trow, the Pure in Harte maye stille call a Draggon of Power as a Forsefor Goode in thee worlde, and this one nighte the Grate Worke will commense. All hathe been prepared. I hath laboured most mytily to be a Worthie Vessle . . .
   A realm of fancy, Vimes thought. That's where they went, then. Into our imaginations. And when we call them back we shape them, like squeezing dough into pastry shapes. Only you don't get gingerbread men, you get what you are. Your own darkness, given shape . . .
   Vimes read it through again, and then looked at the following pages.
   There weren't many. The rest of the book was a charred mass.
   Vimes handed it back to the ape.
   "What kind of a man was de Malachite?" he said.
   The Librarian gave this the consideration due from someone who knew the Dictionary of City Biography by heart. Then he shrugged.
   "Particularly holy?" said Vimes.
   The ape shook his head.
   "Well, noticeably evil, then?"
   The ape shrugged, and shook his head again.
   "If I were you, " said Vimes, "I'd put that book somewhere very safe. And the book of the Law with it. They're too bloody dangerous. "
   "Oook."
   Vimes stretched. ' 'And now,'' he said, ' 'let's go and have a drink. "
   "Oook. "
   "But just a small one. "
   "Oook."
   ' 'And you 're paying.''
   "Eeek. "
   Vimes stopped and stared down at the big, mild face.
   "Tell me," he said. "I've always wanted to know . . . is it better, being an ape?"
   The Librarian thought about it. "Oook," he said.
   "Oh. Really?" said Vimes.
 
   It was the next day. The room was wall-to-wall with civic dignitaries. The Patrician sat on his severe chair, surrounded by the Council. Everyone present was wear­ing the shiny waxen grins of those bent on good works.
   Lady Sybil Ramkin sat off to one side, wearing a few acres of black velvet. The Ramkin family jewels glittered on her fingers, neck and in the black curls of today's wig. The total effect was striking, like a globe of the heavens.
   Vimes marched the rank to the centre of the hall and stamped to a halt with his helmet under his arm, as per regulations. He'd been amazed to see that even Nobby had made an effort - the suspicion of shiny metal could be seen here and there on his breastplate. And Colon was wearing an expression of almost con­stipated importance. Carrot's armour gleamed.
   Colon ripped off a textbook salute for the first time in his life.
   "All present and correct, sah!" he barked.
   "Very good, Sergeant," said Vimes coldly. He turned to the Patrician and raised an eyebrow politely.
   Lord Vetinari gave a little wave of his hand.
   "Stand easy, or whatever it is you chaps do," he said. "I'm sure we needn't wait on ceremony here. What do you say, Captain?"
   "Just as you like, sir," said Vimes.
   "Now, men," said the Patrician, leaning forward, "we have heard some remarkable accounts of your magnificent efforts in defence of the city ..."
   Vimes let his mind wander as the golden platitudes floated past. For a while he derived a certain amount of amusement from watching the faces of the Council. A whole sequence of expressions drifted across them as the Patrician spoke. It was, of course, vitally im­portant that there be a ceremony like this. Then the whole thing could be neat and settled. And forgotten. Just another chapter in the long and exciting history of eckcetra, eckcetra. Ankh-Morpork was good at starting new chapters.
   His trawling gaze fell on Lady Ramkin. She winked. Vimes's eyes swivelled front again, his expression sud­denly as wooden as a plank.
   "... token of our gratitude," the Patrician fin­ished, sitting back.
   Vimes realized that everyone was looking at him.
   "Pardon?" he said.
   "I said, we have been trying to think of some suit­able recompense, Captain Vimes. Various public-spirited citizens…" the Patrician's eyes took in the Council and Lady Ramkin,"…and, of course, myself, feel that an appropriate reward is due."
   Vimes still looked blank.
   "Reward?" he said.
   "It is customary for such heroic endeavour," said the Patrician, a little testily.
   Vimes faced forward again. "Really haven't thought about it, sir," he said. "Can't speak for the men, of course."
   There was an awkward pause. Out of the corner of his eye Vimes was aware of Nobby nudging the ser­geant in the ribs. Eventually Colon stumbled forward and ripped off another salute. "Permission to speak, sir," he muttered.
   The Patrician nodded graciously.
   The sergeant coughed. He removed his helmet and pulled out a scrap of paper.
   "Er," he said. "The thing is, saving your honour's presence, we think, you know, what with saving the city and everything, or sort of, or, what I mean is ... we just had a go you see, man on the spot and that sort of thing ... the thing is, we reckon we're enti­tled. If you catch my drift."
   The assembled company nodded. This was exactly how it should be.
   "Do go on," said the Patrician.
   "So we, like, put our heads together," said the ser­geant. "A bit of a cheek, I know ..."
   "Please carry on, Sergeant," said the Patrician. "You needn't keep stopping. We are well aware of the magnitude of the matter."
   "Right, sir. Well, sir. First, it's the wages."
   "The wages?" said Lord Vetinari. He stared at Vimes, who stared at nothing.
   The sergeant raised his head. His expression was the determined expression of a man who is going to see it through.
   "Yes, sir," he said. "Thirty dollars a month. It's not right. We think," he licked his lips and glanced behind him at the other two, who were making vague encouraging motions,"we think a basic rate of, er, thirty-five dollars? A month?" He stared at the Patri­cian's stony expression. "With increments as per rank? We thought five dollars."
   He licked his lips again, unnerved by the Patrician's expression. "We won't go below four," he said. "And that's flat. Sorry, your Highness, but there it is."
   The Patrician glanced again at Vimes's impassive face, then looked back at the rank.
   "That's it?"he said.
   Nobby whispered in Colon's ear and then darted back. The sweating sergeant gripped his helmet as though it was the only real thing in the world.
   "There was another thing, your reverence," he said.
   "Ah." The Patrician smiled knowingly.
   "There's the kettle. It wasn't much good anyway, and then Errol et it. It was nearly two dollars." He swallowed. "We could do with a new kettle, if it's all the same, your lordship.''
   The Patrician leaned forward, gripping the arms of his chair.
   "I want to be clear about this," he said coldly. "Are we to believe that you are asking for a petty wage increase and a domestic utensil?"
   Carrot whispered in Colon's other ear.
   Colon turned two bulging, watery-rimmed eyes to the dignitaries. The rim of his helmet was passing through his fingers like a mill wheel.
   "Well," he began, "sometimes, we thought, you know, when we has our dinner break, or when it's quite, like, at the end of a watch as it may be, and we want to relax a bit, you know, wind down ..." His voice trailed away.
   "Yes?"
   Colon took a deep breath.
   "I suppose a dartboard would be out of the ques­tion…?"
   The thunderous silence that followed was broken by an erratic snorting.
   Vimes's helmet dropped out of his shaking hand. His breastplate wobbled as the suppressed laughter of the years burst out in great uncontrollable eruptions. He turned his face to the row of councillors and laughed and laughed until the tears came.
   Laughed at the way they got up, all confusion and outraged dignity.
   Laughed at the Patrician's carefully immobile ex­pression.
   Laughed for the world and the saving of souls.
   Laughed and laughed, and laughed until the tears came.
   Nobby craned up to reach Colon's ear.
   "I told you," he hissed. "I said they'd never wear it. I knew a dartboard'd be pushing our luck. You've upset 'em all now."
 
 
   Dear Mother and Father [wrote Carrot] You will never guess, I have been in the Watch only a few weeks and, already I am to be a full Constable. Captain Vimes said, the Patrician himself said I was to be One, and that also he hoped I should have a long and successful career in the Watch as well and, he would follow it with special interest. Also my wages are to go up by ten dollars and we had a special bonus of twenty dol­lars that Captain Vimes paid for out of his own pocket,
   Sgt Colon said. Please find money enclosed. I am keep­ing a little bit by though because I went to see Reel and Mrs Palm said all the girls had been following my ca­reer with Great Interest as well and I am to come to dinner on my night off. Sgt Colon has been telling me about how to start courting, which is very interesting and not at all complicated it appears. I arrested a dragon but it got away. I hope Mr Varneshi is well.
   I am as happy as anyone can be in the whole world.
   Your son, Carrot.
 
   Vimes knocked on the door.
   An effort had been made to spruce up the Ramkin man­sion, he noticed. The encroaching shrubbery had been pitilessly hacked back. An elderly workman atop a ladder was nailing the stucco back on the walls while another, with a spade, was rather arbitrarily defining the line where the lawn ended and the old flower beds had begun.
   Vimes stuck his helmet under his arm, smoothed back his hair, and knocked. He'd considered asking Sergeant Colon to accompany him, but had brushed the idea aside quickly. He couldn't have tolerated the sniggering. Anyway, what was there to be afraid of? He'd stared into the jaws of death three times; four, if you included telling Lord Vetinari to shut up.
   To his amazement the door was eventually opened by a butler so elderly that he might have been resur­rected by the knocking.
   "Yerss?" he said.
   "Captain Vimes, City Watch," said Vimes.
   The man looked him up and down.
   "Oh, yes," he said. "Her ladyship did say. I believe her ladyship is with her dragons," he said. "If you like to wait in 'ere, I will…"
   "I know the way," said Vimes, and set off around the overgrown path.
   The kennels were a ruin. An assortment of battered wooden boxes were lying around under an oilcloth awning. From their depths a few sad swamp dragons whiffled a greeting at him.
   A couple of women were moving purposefully among the boxes. Ladies, rather. They were far too untidy to be mere women. No ordinary women would have dreamed of looking so scruffy; you needed the complete self-confidence that comes with knowing who your great-great-great-great-grandfather was before you could wear clothes like that. But they were, Vimes noticed, incredibly good clothes, or had been once; clothes bought by one's parents, but so expensive and of such good quality that they never wore out and were handed down, like old china and silverware and gout.
   Dragon breeders, he thought. You can tell. There's something about them. It's the way they wear their silk scarves, old tweed coats and granddad's riding boots. And the smell, of course.
   A small wiry woman with a face like old saddle leather caught sight of him.
   "Ah," she said, "you'll be the gallant captain." She tucked an errant strand of white hair back under a head­scarf and extended a veiny brown hand. "Brenda Rodley. That's Rosie Devant-Molei. She runs the Sunshine Sanc­tuary, you know." The other woman, who had the build of someone who could pick up carthorses hi one hand and shoe them with the other, gave him a friendly grin.
   "Samuel Vimes," said Vimes weakly.
   "My father was a Sam," said Brenda vaguely. "You can always trust a Sam, he said." She shooed a dragon back into its box. "We're just helping Sybil. Old friends, you know. The collection's all to blazes, of course. They're all over the city, the little devils. I dare say they'll come back when they're hungry, though. What a bloodline, eh?"
   "I'm sorry?"
   "Sybil reckons he was a sport, but I say we should be able to breed back into the line in three or four generations. I'm famed for my stud, you know," she said. "That'd be something, though. A whole new type of dragon."
   Vimes thought of supersonic contrails criss-crossing the sky.
   "Er," he said. "Yes."
   "Well, we must get on."
   "Er, isn't Lady Ramkin around?" said Vimes. "I got this message that it was essential, she said, for me to come here."
   "She's indoors somewhere," said Miss Rodley. "Said she had something important to see to. Oh, do be careful with that one, Rose, you silly gel!"
   "More important than dragons?" said Vimes.
   "Yes. Can't think what's come over her." Brenda Rodley fished in the pocket of an oversized waistcoat. "Nice to have met you, Captain. Always good to meet new members of the Fancy. Do drop in any time you're passing, I'd be only too happy to show you around." She extracted a grubby card and pressed it into his hand. "Must be off now, we've heard that some of them are trying to build nests on the University tower. Can't have that. Must get 'em down before it gets dark."
   Vimes squinted at the card as the women crunched off down the drive, carrying nets and ropes.
   It said: Brenda, Lady Rodley. The Dower House, Quirm Castle, Quirm. What it meant, he realized, was that strid­ing away down the path like an animated rummage stall was the dowager Duchess of Quirm, who owned more country than you could see from a very high mountain on a very clear day. Nobby would not have approved. There seemed to be a special land of poverty that only the very, very rich could possibly afford . . .
   That was how you got to be a power in the land, he thought. You never cared a toss about whatever anyone else thought and you were never, ever, uncertain about anything.
   He padded back to the house. A door was open. It led into a large but dark and musty hall. Up in the gloom the heads of dead animals haunted the walls. The Ramkins seemed to have endangered more spe­cies than an ice age.
   Vimes wandered aimlessly through another mahog­any archway.
   It was a dining room, containing the kind of table where the people at the other end are in a different time zone. One end had been colonised by silver can­dlesticks.
   It was laid for two. A battery of cutlery flanked each plate. Antique wineglasses sparkled in the candlelight.
   A terrible premonition took hold of Vimes at the same moment as a gust of Captivation, the most expensive perfume available anywhere in Ankh-Morpork, blew past him.
   "Ah, Captain. So nice of you to come."
   Vimes turned around slowly, without his feet ap­pearing to move.
   Lady Ramkin stood there, magnificently.
   Vimes was vaguely aware of a brilliant blue dress that sparkled in the candlelight, a mass of hair the colour of chestnuts, a slightly anxious face that suggested that a whole battalion of skilled painters and decorators had only just dismantled their scaffolding and gone home, and a faint creaking that said underneath it all mere corsetry was being subjected to the kind of tensions more usually found in the heart of large stars.
   "I, er," he said. "If you, er. If you'd said, er. I'd, er. Dress more suitable, er. Extremely, er. Very. Er."
   She bore down upon him like a glittering siege en­gine.
   In a sort of dream he allowed himself to be ushered to a seat. He must have eaten, because servants ap­peared out of nowhere with things stuffed with other things, and came back later and took the plates away. The butler reanimated occasionally to fill glass after glass with strange wines. The heat from the candles was enough to cook by. And all the time Lady Ramkin talked in a bright and brittle way - about the size of the house, the responsibilities of a huge estate, the feeling that it was time to take One's Position in So­ciety More Seriously, while the setting sun filled the room with red and Vimes's head began to spin.
   Society, he managed to think, didn't know what was going to hit it. Dragons weren't mentioned once, al­though after a while something under the table put its head on Vimes's knee and dribbled.
   Vimes found it impossible to contribute to the con­versation. He felt outflanked, beleaguered. He made one sally, hoping maybe to reach high ground from which to flee into exile.
   "Where do you think they've gone?" he said.
   "Where what?" said Lady Ramkin, temporarily halted.
   "The dragons. You know. Errol and his wi - female."
   "Oh, somewhere isolated and rocky, I should imag­ine," said Lady Ramkin. "Favourite country for drag­ons."
   "But it - she's a magical animal," said Vimes. "What'll happen when the magic goes away?"
   Lady Ramkin gave him a shy smile.
   "Most people seem to manage," she said.
   She reached across the table and touched his hand.
   "Your men think you need looking after," she said meekly.
   "Oh. Do they?" said Vimes.
   "Sergeant Colon said he thought we'd get along like a maison en Flame. "
   "Oh. Did he?"
   "And he said something else," she said. "What was it, now? Oh, yes: 'It's a million to one chance,'," said Lady Ramkin,' 'I think he said, 'but it might just work'.''
   She smiled at him.
   And then it arose and struck Vimes that, in her own special category, she was quite beautiful; this was the category of all the women, in his entire life, who had ever thought he was worth smiling at. She couldn't do worse, but then, he couldn't do better. So maybe it balanced out. She wasn't getting any younger but then, who was? And she had style and money and common-sense and self-assurance and all the things that he didn't, and she had opened her heart, and if you let her she could engulf you; the woman was a city.
   And eventually, under siege, you did what Ankh-Morpork had always done - unbar the gates, let the conquerors in, and make them your own.
   How did you start? She seemed to be expecting something.
   He shrugged, and picked up his wine glass and sought for a phrase. One crept into his wildly reso­nating mind.
   "Here's looking at you, kid," he said.
 
   The gongs of various midnights banged out the old day.
   (. . . and further towards the Hub, where the Ram-top Mountains joined the forbidding spires of the cen­tral massif, where strange hairy creatures roamed the eternal snows, where blizzards howled around the freezing peaks, the lights of a lone lamasery shone out over the high valleys. In the courtyard a couple of yellow-robed monks stacked the last case of small green bottles on to a sleigh, ready for the first leg of the incredibly difficult journey down to the distant plains. The box was labelled, in careful brush-strokes, "Mstr. C.M.O.T. Dibbler, Ankh-Morpork."
   "You know, Lobsang," said one of them, "one can­not help wondering what it is he does with this stuff.")
   Corporal Nobbs and Sergeant Colon lounged in the shadows near the Mended Drum, but straightened up as Carrot came out bearing a tray. Detritus the troll stepped aside respectfully.
   "Here we are, lads," said Carrot. "Three pints. On the house."
   "Bloody hell, I never thought you'd do it," said Colon, grasping a handle. "What did you say to him?"
   "I just explained how it was the duty of all good citizens to help the guard at all times," said Carrot innocently, ' 'and I thanked him for his co-operation.''
   "Yeah, and the rest," said Nobby.
   "No, that was all I said."
   "Then you must have a really convincing tone of voice."
   "Ah. Well, make the most of it, lads, while it lasts," said Colon.
   They drank thoughtfully. It was a moment of su­preme peace, a few minutes snatched from the reali­ties of real life. It was a brief bite of stolen fruit and enjoyed as such. No one in the whole city seemed to be fighting or stabbing or making affray and, just for now, it was possible to believe that this wonderful state of affairs might continue.
   And even if it didn't, then there were memories to get them through. Of running, and people getting out of the way. Of the looks on the faces of the horrible palace guard. Of, when all the thieves and heroes and gods had failed, of being there. Of nearly doing things nearly right.
   Nobby shoved the pot on a convenient window sill, stamped some life back into his feet and blew on his fingers. A brief fumble in the dark recesses of his ear produced a fragment of cigarette.
   "What a time, eh?" said Colon contentedly, as the flare of a match illuminated the three of them.
   The others nodded. Yesterday seemed like a lifetime ago, even now. But you could never forget something like that, no matter who else did, no matter what hap­pened from now on.
   "If I never see any bloody king it'll be too soon," said Nobby.
   "I don't reckon he was the right king, anyway," said Carrot. "Talking of kings: anyone want a crisp?"
   "There's no right longs,'' said Colon, but without much rancour. Ten dollars a month was going to make a big difference. Mrs Colon was acting very differently towards a man bringing home another ten dollars a month. Her notes on the kitchen table were a lot more friendly.
   "No, but I mean, there's nothing special about hav­ing an ancient sword," said Carrot. "Or a birthmark. I mean, look at me. I've got a birthmark on my arm."
   "My brother's got one, too," said Colon. "Shaped like a boat."
   "Mine's more like a crown thing," said Carrot.
   "Oho, that makes you a king, then," grinned Nobby. "Stands to reason."
   "I don't see why. My brother's not an admiral," said Colon reasonably.
   "And I've got this sword," said Carrot.
   He drew it. Colon took it from his hand, and turned it over and over in the light from the flare over the Drum's door. The blade was dull and short, and notched like a saw. It was well-made and there might have been an inscription on it once, but it had long ago been worn into indecipherability by sheer use.
   "It's a nice sword," he said thoughtfully. "Well-balanced."
   "But not one for a king," said Carrot. "Kings' swords are big and shiny and magical and have jewels on and when you hold them up they catch the light, ting. "
   "Ting, " said Colon. "Yes. I suppose they have to, really."
   "I'm just saying you can't go round giving people thrones just because of stuff like that,'' said Carrot. "That's what Captain Vimes said."
   "Nice job, mind," said Nobby. "Good hours, king­ing."
   "Hmm?" Colon had momentarily been lost in a lit­tle world of speculation. Real kings had shiny swords, obviously. Except, except, except maybe your real real king of, like, days of yore, he would have a sword that didn't sparkle one bit but was bloody efficient at cut­ting things. Just a thought.
   "I say kinging's a good job," Nobby repeated. "Short hours."
   "Yeah. Yeah. But not long days," said Colon. He gave Carrot a thoughtful look.
   "Ah. There's that, of course."
   "Anyway, my father says being king's too much like hard work," said Carrot. "All the surveying and as­saying and everything." He drained his pint. "It's not the kind of thing for the likes of us. Us," he looked proudly,"guards. You all right, Sergeant?"
   "Hmm? What? Oh. Yes." Colon shrugged. What about it, anyway? Maybe things turned out for the best. He finished the beer. "Best be off," he said. "What time was it?"
   "About twelve o'clock," said Carrot.
   "Anything else?"
   Carrot gave it some thought."And all's well?'' he said.
   "Right. Just testing."
   "You know," said Nobby, "the way you say it, lad, you could almost believe it was true."
 
   Let the eye of attention pull back . . .
   This is the Disc, world and mirror of worlds, borne through space on the back of four giant elephants who stand on the back of Great A'Tuin the Sky Turtle. Around the Rim of this world the ocean pours off end­lessly into the night. At its Hub rises the ten-mile spike of the Cori Celesti, on whose glittering summit the gods play games with the fates of men...
   ... if you know what the rules are, and who are the players.
   On the far edge of the Disc the sun was rising. The light of the morning began to flow across the patch­work of seas and continents, but it did so slowly, because light is tardy and slightly heavy in the presence of a magical field.
   On the dark crescent, where the old light of sunset had barely drained from the deepest valleys, two specks, one big, one small, flew out of the shadow, skimmed low across the swells of the Rim ocean, and struck out determinedly over the totally unfathomable, star-dotted depths of space.
   Perhaps the magic would last. Perhaps it wouldn't. But then, what does?

Notes

1
    All this was untrue. The truth is that even big collections of ordinary books distort space, as can readily be proved by anyone who has been around a really old-fashioned secondhand bookshop, one of those that look as though they were designed by M. Escher on a bad day and has more staircases than storeys and those rows of shelves which end in little doors that are surely too small for a full-sized human to enter. The rele­vant equation is: Knowledge = power = energy = matter = mass; a good bookshop is just a genteel Black Hole that knows how to read.
2
   A figgin is defined in the Dictionary of Eye-Watering Words as 'a small short-crust pasty containing raisins'. The Dictionary would have been in­valuable for the Supreme Grand Master when he thought up the Society's oaths, since it also includes welchet ('a type of waistcoat worn by certain clock-makers'), gaskin ('a shy, grey-brown bird of the coot family'), and moules ('a game of skill and dexterity, involving tortoises').
3
   The pronoun is used by dwarfs to indicate both sexes. All dwarfs have beards and wear up to twelve layers of clothing. Gender is more or less optional.
4
    i.e., about 55.
5
   Lit. dezka-knik, 'mine supervisor'.
6
   One of the remarkable innovations introduced by the Patrician was to make the Thieves' Guild responsible for theft, with annual budgets, for­ward planning and, above all, rigid job protection. Thus, in return for an agreed average level of crime per annum, the thieves themselves saw to it that unauthorised crime was met with the full force of Injustice, which was generally a stick with nails in it.
7
   Lit: "Good day! Good day! What is all of this that is going on here (in this place)?"
8
   Listen, sunshine [lit: 'the stare of the great hot eye in the sky whose fiery gaze penetrates the mouth of the cavern'] I don't want to have to give anyone a smacking, so if you play B'tduz* with me, I'll play B'tduz with you. Okay?"**
   *) A popular dwarfish game which consists of standing a few feet apart and throwing large rocks at one another's head.
   **) Lit: "All correctly beamed and propped?"
9
   Evening, all. " (Lit: 'Felicitations to all present at the closing of the day.')
10
   Like a bouncer, but trolls use more force.
11
   And mime artists. It was a strange aversion, but there you are. Anyone in baggy trousers and a white face who tried to ply their art anywhere within Ankh's crumbling walls would very quickly find themselves in a scorpion pit, on one wall of which was painted the advice: Learn The Words.
12
   While being bang alongside the idea of necessary cruelty, of course.
13
   The Guild of Fire Fighters had been outlawed by the Patrician the pre­vious year after many complaints. The point was that, if you bought a contract from the Guild, your house would be protected against fire. Un­fortunately, the general Ankh-Morpork ethos quickly came to the fore and fire fighters would tend to go to prospective clients' houses in groups, making loud comments like "Very inflammable looking place, this" and "Probably go up like a firework with just one carelessly-dropped match, know what I mean?"
14
   A species of geranium.
15
   Some rioters can be quite well-educated.
16
   The phrase "Set a thief to catch a thief had by this time (after strong repre­sentations from the Thieves' Guild) replaced a much older and quintessentially Ankh-Morporkian proverb, which was "Set a deep hole with spring-loaded sides, tripwires, whirling knife blades driven by water power, broken glass and scorpions, to catch a thief."
17
   Tridlins: A short and unnecessary religious observance performed daily by the Holy Balancing Dervishes of Otherz, according to the Dictionary of Eye-Watering Words.
18
   The three rules of the Librarians of Time and Space are: 1) Silence; 2) Books must be returned no later than the last date shown; and 3) Do not interfere with the nature of causality.
19
   A number of religions in Ankh-Morpork still practised human sacrifice, except that they didn't really need to practise any more because they had got so good at it. City law said that only condemned criminals should be used, but that was all right because in most of the religions refusing to volunteer for sacrifice was an offence punishable by death.

The bees of Death are big and black, they buzz low and sombre, they keep their honey in combs of wax as white as alter candles. The honey is black as night, thick as sin and sweet as treacle.
   It is well known the eight colours make up white. But there are also eight colours of blackness, for those that have the seeing of them, and the hives of Death are among the black grass in the black orchard under the black-blossomed, ancient boughs of trees that will, eventually, produce apples that... put it like this... probably won't be red.
   The grass was short now. The scythe that had done the work leaned against the gnarled bole of a pear tree. Now Death was inspecting his bees, gently lifting the combs in his skeletal fingers.
   A few bees buzzed around him. Like all beekeepers, Death wore a veil. It wasn't that he had anything to sting, but sometimes a bee would get inside his skull and buzz around and give him a headache.
   As he held a comb up to the grey light of his little world between the realities there was the faintest of tremors. A hum went up from the hive, a leaf floated down. A wisp of wind blew for a moment through the orchard, and that was the most uncanny thing, because the air in the land of Death is always warm and still.
   Death fancied that he heard, very briefly, the sound of running feet and a voice saying, no, a voice thinking oshitoshitoshit, I'm gonna die I'm gonna die I'm gonna DIE!
   Death is almost the oldest creature in the universe, with habits and modes of thought that mortal man cannot begin to understand, but because he was also a good beekeeper he carefully replaced the comb in its rack and put the lid on the hive before reacting.
   He strode back through the dark garden to his cottage, removed his veil, carefully dislodged a few bees who had got lost in the depths of his cranium, and retired to his study.
   As he sat down at his desk there was another gust of wind, which rattled the hour-glasses on the shelves and made the big pendulum clock in the hall pause briefly in its interminable task of slicing time into manageable bits.
   Death sighed, and focused his gaze.
   There is nowhere Death will not go, no matter how distant and dangerous. In fact the more dangerous it is, the more likely he is to be there already.
   Now he stared through the mists of time and space.
   OH, he said. IT'S HIM.

   It was a hot afternoon in the late summer in Ankh-Morpork, normally the most thriving, bustling and above all the most crowded city on the Disc. Now the spears of the sun had achieved what innumerable invaders, several civil wars and the curfew law had never achieved. It had pacified the place.
   Dogs lay panting in the scalding shade. The river Ankh, which never what you might call sparkled, oozed between its banks as if the heat had sucked all the spirit out of it. The streets were empty, oven-brick hot.
   No enemies had ever taken Ankh-Morpork. Well, technically they had, quite often; the city welcomed free-spending barbarian invaders, but somehow the puzzled raiders always found, after a few days, that they didn't own their own horses any more, and within a couple of months they were just another minority group with its own graffiti and food shops.
   But the heat had besieged the city and triumphed over the walls. It lay over the trembling streets like a shroud. Under the blowlamp of the sun assassins were too tired to kill. It turned thieves honest. In the ivy-covered fastness of the Unseen University, premier college of wizardry, the inmates dozed with their pointy hats over their faces. Even bluebottles were too exhausted to bang against windowpanes. The city siesta'd, awaiting the sunset and the brief, hot, velvet surcease of the night.
   Only the librarian was cool. He was also swinging and hanging out.
   This was because he'd rigged up a few ropes and rings in one of the sub-basements of the Unseen University library - the one where they kept the, um, erotic1 books. In vats of crushed ice. And he was dreamily dangling in the chilly vapour above them.
   All books of magic have a life of their own. Some of the really energetic ones can't simply be chained the bookshelves; they have to be nailed shut or kept between steel plates. Or, in the case of the volumes on tantric sex magic for the serious connoisseur, kept under very cold water to stop them bursting into flames and scorching their severely plain covers.
      The Librarian swung gently back and forth above the seething vats, dozing peacefully.
   Then the footsteps came out of nowhere, raced across the floor with a noise that scraped the raw surface of the soul, and disappeared through the wall. There was a faint, distant scream that sounded like ogodsogodsogods, this is IT, I'm gonna DIE.
   The Librarian woke up, lost his grip, and flopped into the few inches of tepid water that was all that stood between The Joy of Tantric Sex with Illustrations for the Advanced Student, by A Lady, and spontaneous combustion.
   And it would have gone badly for him if the Librarian had been a human being. Fortunately, he was currently an orang-utan. With so much raw magic sloshing around in the Library it would be surprising if accidents did not happen sometimes, and one particularly impressive one had turned him into an ape. Not many people get the chance to leave the human race while still alive, and he'd strenuously resisted all efforts to turn him back. Since he was the only librarian in the universe who could pick up books with his feet the University hadn't pressed the point.
   It also meant that his idea of desirable female companionship now looked something like a sack of butter thrown through a roll of old inner tubes, and so he was lucky to get away with only minor burns, a headache, and some rather ambivalent feelings about cucumbers, which wore off by teatime.
   In the Library above, the grimoires creaked and rustled their pages in astonishment as the invisible runner passed straight through the bookshelves and disappeared, or rather disappeared even more...
   Ankh-Morpork gradually awoke from its slumber. Something invisible and yelling at the top of its voice was passing through every part of the city, dragging in its wake a trail of destruction. Wherever it went, things changed.
   A fortune-teller in the Street of Cunning Artificers heard the footsteps run across her bedroom floor and found her crystal ball had turned into a little glass sphere with a cottage in it, plus snowflakes.
   In a quite corner of the Mended Drum tavern, where the adventuresses Herrena the Henna-Haired Harridan, Red Scharron and Diome, Witch of the Night, were meeting for some girl talk and a game of canasta, all the drinks turned into small yellow elephants.
   "It's them wizards up at the university," said the barman, hastily replacing the glasses. "It oughtn't to be allowed."

   Midnight dropped off the clock.
   The Council of Wizardry rubbed their eyes and stared blearily at one another. They felt it oughtn't to be allowed too, especially since they weren't the ones that were allowing it.
   Finally the new Archchancellor, Ezrolith Churn, suppressed a yawn, sat up straight in his chair, and tried to look suitably magisterial. He knew he wasn't really Archchancellor material. He hadn't really wanted the job. He was ninety-eight, and had achieved this worthwhile age by carefully not being any trouble to anyone. He had hoped to spend his twilight years completing his seven-volume treatise on Some Little Known Aspects of Kuian Rain-making Rituals, which were an ideal subject for academic study in his opinion since the rituals only ever worked in Ku, and that particular continent had slipped into the ocean several thousand years ago.2 The trouble was that in recent years the lifespan of Archchancellors seemed to be a bit on the short side, and the natural ambition of all wizards for the job had given way to a curious, self-effacing politeness. He'd come down one morning to find everyone calling him 'sir'. It had taken him days to find out why.
   His head ached. He felt it was several weeks past his bedtime. But he had to say something.
   "Gentlemen -" he began.
   "Oook."
   "Sorry, and mo -"
   "Oook."
   "I mean apes, of course -"
   "Oook."
   The Archchancellor opened and shut his mouth in silence for a while, trying to re-route his train of thought. The Librarian was, ex officio, a member of the college council. No-one had been able to find any rule about orang-utans being barred, although they had surreptitiously looked very hard for one.
   "It's a haunting," he ventured. "Some sort of a ghost, maybe. A bell, book and a candle job."
   The Bursar sighed. "We tried that, Archchancellor."
   The Archchancellor leaned towards him.
   "Eh?" he said.
   "I said, we tried that, Archchancellor," said the Bursar loudly, directing his voice at the old man's ear. "After dinner, you remember? We used Humptemper's Names of the Ants and rang Old Tom."3
   "Did we, indeed. Worked, did it?"
   "No, Archchancellor."
   "Eh?"
   "Anyway, we've never had trouble with ghosts before," said the Senior Tutor. "Wizards just don't haunt places."
   The Archchancellor groped for a crumb of comfort.
   "Perhaps it's just something natural," he said. "Possibly the rumblings of an underground spring. Earth movements, perhaps. Something in the drains. They can make very funny noises, you know, when the wind is in the right direction."
   He sat back and beamed.
   The rest of the council exchanged glances.
   "The drains don't sound like hurrying feet, Archchancellor," said the Bursar wearily.
   "Unless someone left a tap running," said the Senior Tutor.
   The Bursar scowled at him. He'd been in the tub when the invisible screaming thing had hurtled through his room. It was not an experience he wanted to repeat.
   The Archchancellor nodded at him.
   "That's settled, then," he said, and fell asleep.
   The Bursar watched him in silence. Then he pulled the old man's hat off and tucked it gently under his head.
   "Well?" he said wearily. "Has anyone got any suggestions?"
   The Librarian put his hand up.
   "Oook," he said.
   "Yes, well done, good boy," said the Bursar, breezily. "Anyone else?"
   The orang-utan glared at him as the other wizards shook their heads.
   "It's a tremor in the texture of reality," said the Senior Tutor. "That's what it is."
   "What should we do about it, then?"
   "Search me. Unless we tried the old -"
   "Oh, no," said the Bursar. "Don't say it. Please. It's far too dangerous -"
   His words were chopped off by a scream that began at the far end of the room and dopplered along the table, accompanied by the sound of many running feet. The wizards ducked in a scatter of overturned chairs.
   The candle flames were drawn into long thin tongues of octarine light before being snuffed out.
   Then there was silence, the special kind that you get after a really unpleasant noise.
   And the Bursar said, "All right. I give in. We will try the Rite of AshkEnte."
   It is the most serious ritual eight wizards can undertake. It summons Death, who naturally knows everything that is going on everywhere.
   And of course it is done with reluctance, because senior wizards are generally very old and would prefer not to do anything to draw Death's attention in their direction.
   It took place in the midnight in the University's Great Hall, in a welter of incense, candlesticks, runic inscriptions and magic circles, none of which was strictly necessary but made the wizards feel better. Magic flared, the chants were chanted, the invocations were truly invoked.
   The wizards stared into the magic octogram, which remained empty. After a while the circle of robed figures began to mutter amongst themselves.
   "We must have done something wrong."
   "Oook."
   "Maybe He is out."
   "Or busy..."
   "Do you think we could give up and go back to bed?"
   WHO ARE WE WAITING FOR, EXACTLY?
   The Bursar turned slowly to the figure beside him. You could always tell a wizard's robe; it was bedecked with sequins, sigils, fur and lace, and there was usually a considerable amount of wizard inside it. This robe, however, was very black. The material looked as though it had been chosen for its hard-wearing qualities. So did its owner. He looked as though if he wrote a diet book it would be a bestseller.
   Death was watching the octogram with an expression of polite interest.
   "Er," said the Bursar. "The fact is, in fact, that, er, you should be on the inside."
   I'M SO SORRY.
   Death stalked in a dignified way into the centre of the room and watched the Bursar expectantly.
   I HOPE WE ARE NOT GOING TO HAVE ANY OF THIS "FOUL FIEND" BUSINESS AGAIN, he said.
   "I trust we are not interrupting any important enterprise?" said the Bursar.
   TO SOMEBODY.
   "Er. Er. The reason, o fou - sir, that we have called you here, is for the reason -"
   IT IS RINCEWIND.
   "What?"
   THE REASON YOU HAVE SUMMONED ME. THE ANSWER IS: IT IS RINCEWIND.
   "But we haven't asked you the question yet!"
   NEVERTHELESS THE ANSWER IS: IT IS RINCEWIND.
   "Look, what we want to know is, what is causing this outbreak of... oh."
   Death pointedly picked invisible particles off the edge of his scythe.
   The Archchancellor cupped a gnarled hand over his ear.
   "What'd he say? Who's the fella with the stick?"
   "It's Death, sir. You know."
   "Tell him we don't want any," said the old wizard, waving his stick.
   The Bursar sighed. "We summoned him, Archchancellor."
   "Is it? What'd we go and do that for? Bloody silly thing to do."
   The Bursar gave Death an embarrassed grin. He was on the point of asking him to excuse the Archchancellor on account of his age, but realised that this would in the circumstances be a complete waste of breath.
   "Are we talking about the wizard Rincewind? The one with the -" the Bursar gave a shudder - "horrible Luggage on legs? But he got blown up when there was all that business with the sourcerer, didn't he?"4
   INTO THE DUNGEON DIMENSIONS. AND NOW HE IS TRYING TO GET BACK HOME.
   "Can he do that?"
   THERE WOULD NEED TO BE AN UNUSUAL CONJUNCTION OF CIRCUMSTANCES. REALITY WOULD NEED TO BE WEAKENED IN CERTAIN UNEXPECTED WAYS.
   "That isn't likely to happen, is it?" said the Bursar anxiously. People who have it on record that they were visiting their aunt for two months are always nervous about people turning up who may have mistakenly thought that they weren't, and owing to some trick of the light might have believed they had seen them doing things that they couldn't have been doing owing to being at their aunt's.
   IT WOULD BE A MILLION TO ONE CHANCE, said Death. EXACTLY A MILLION TO ONE CHANCE.
   "Oh," said the Bursar, intensely relieved. "Oh dear. What a shame." He brightened up considerably. "Of course, there's all the noise. But, unfortunately, I expect he won't survive for long."
   THIS COULD BE THE CASE, said Death blandly. I AM SURE, THOUGH, THAT YOU WOULD NOT WISH ME TO MAKE A PRACTICE OF ISSUING DEFINITIVE STATEMENTS IN THIS FIELD.
   "No! No, of course not," said the Bursar hurriedly. "Right. Well, many thanks. Poor chap. What a great pity. Still can't be helped. Perhaps we should be philosophical about these things."
   PERHAPS YOU SHOULD.
   "And we had better not keep you," the Bursar added politely.
   THANK YOU.
   "Goodbye."
   BE SEEING YOU.
   In fact the noise stopped just before breakfast. The Librarian was the only one unhappy about it. Rincewind had been his assistant and his friend, and was a good man when it came to peeling a banana. He had also been uniquely good at running away from things. He was not, the Librarian considered, the type to be easily caught.
   There had probably been an unusual conjunction of circumstances.
   That was a far more likely explanation.

   There had been an unusual conjunction of circumstances.
   By exactly a million to one chance there had been someone watching, studying, looking for the right tools for a special job.
   And here was Rincewind.
   It was almost too easy.

   So Rincewind opened his eyes. There was a ceiling above him; if it was the floor, then he was in trouble.
   So far, so good.
   He cautiously felt the surface he was laying on. It was grainy, woody in fact, with the odd nail-hole. A human sort of surface.
   His ears picked up the crackle of a fife and a bubbling noise, source unknown.
   His nose, feeling that it was being left out of things, hastened to report a whiff of brimstone.
   Right, so where did that leave him? Lying on a rough wooden floor in a firelit room with something that bubbled and gave off sulphurous smells. In his unreal, dreamy state he felt quite pleased at this process of deduction.
   What else?
   Oh, yes.
   He opened his mouth and screamed and screamed and screamed.
   This made him feel slightly better.
   He lay there a bit longer. Though the tumbled heap of his memories came the recollections of mornings in bed when he was a little boy, desperately subdividing the passing time into smaller and smaller units to put off the terrible moment of getting up and having to face all the problems of life such as, in this case, who he was, where he was, and why he was.
   "What are you?" said a voice on the edge of his consciousness.
   "I was coming to that," muttered Rincewind.
   The room oscillated into focus as he pushed himself up on his elbows.
   "I warn you," said the voice, which seemed to be coming from a table, "I am protected by many powerful amulets."
   "Jolly good," said Rincewind. "I wish I was."
   Details began to distil out of the blur. It was a long, low room, one end of which was occupied by an enormous fireplace. A bench all down one wall contained a selection of glassware apparently created by a drunken glassblower with hiccups, and inside its byzantine coils coloured liquids seethed and bubbled. A skeleton hung from a hook in a relaxed fashion. On a perch beside it someone had nailed a stuffed bird. Whatever sins it had committed in life, it hadn't deserved what the taxidermist had done to it.
   Rincewind's gaze swept across the floor. It was obvious that it was the only sweeping the floor had had for some time. Only around him had space been cleared among the debris of broken glass and overturned retorts for -
   A magic circle.
   It looked an extremely thorough job. Whoever had chalked it was clearly aware that its purpose was to divide the universe into two bits, the inside and the outside.
   Rincewind was, of course, inside.
   "Ah," he said, feeling a familiar and almost comforting sense of dread sweep over him.
      "I adjure and conjure thee against all aggressive acts, o demon of the pit," said the voice from, Rincewind now realised, behind the table.
   "Fine, fine," said Rincewind quickly. "That's all right by me. Er. It isn't possible that there has been the teeniest little mistake here, could there?"
   "Avaunt!"
   "Right!" said Rincewind. He looked around him desperately. "How?"
   "Don't you think you can lure me to my doom with thy lying tongue, o fiend of Shamharoth," said the table. "I am learned in the ways of demons. Obey my every command or I will return thee unto the boiling hell from which you came. Thou came, sorry. Thou came'st, in fact. And I really mean it."
   The figure stepped out. It was quite short, and most of it was hidden by a variety of charms, amulets and talismans which, even if not effective against magic, would have protected it against a tolerably determined sword thrust. It wore glasses and had a hat with long sidepieces that gave it the air of a short-sighted spaniel.
   It held a sword in one shaking hand. It was so heavily etched with sigils that it was beginning to bend.
   "Boiling hell, did you say?" said Rincewind weakly.
   "Absolutely. Where the screams of anguish and the tortured torments -"
   "Yes, yes, you've made your point," said Rincewind. "Only, you see, the thing is, in fact, that I am not a demon. So if you would just let me out?"
   "I am not fooled by thy outer garb, demon," said the figure. In a more normal voice it added, "Anyway, demons always lie. Well-known fact."
   "It is?" said Rincewind, clutching at this straw. "In that case, then - I am a demon."
   "Aha! Condemned out of your own mouth!"
   "Look, I don't have to put up with this," said Rincewind. "I don't know who you are or what's happening, but I'm going to have a drink, all right?"
   He went to walk out of the circle, and went rigid with shock as sparks crackled up from the runic inscriptions and earthed themselves all over his body.
   "Thou mays'nt - thou maysn't - thou mays'n't -" The conjurer of demons gave up. "Look, you can't step over the circle until I release you, right? I mean, I don't want to be unpleasant, it's just that if I let you out of the circle you will be able to resume your true shape, and a pretty awful shape it is too, I expect. Avaunt!" he added feeling that he wasn't keeping up the tone.
   "All right. I'm avaunting. I'm avaunting," said Rincewind, rubbing his elbow. "But I'm still not a demon."
   "How come you answered the conjuration, then? I suppose you just happened to be passing through the paranatural dimensions, eh?"
   "Something like that, I think. It's all a bit blurred."
   "Pull the other one, it has got bells on." The conjurer leaned his sword against a lectern on which a heavy book, dripping bookmarks, lay open. Then he did a mad little jig on the floor.
   "It's worked!" he said. "Heheh!" He caught sight of Rincewind's horrified gaze and pulled himself together. He gave an embarrassed cough, and stepped up to the lectern.
   "I really am not -" Rincewind began.
   "I had this list here somewhere," said the figure. "Let's see, now. Oh, yes. I command you - thee, I mean - to, ah, grant me three wishes. Yes. I want mastery of the kingdoms of the world, I want to meet the most beautiful woman who has ever lived, and I wan to live forever." He gave Rincewind an encouraging look.
   "All that?" said Rincewind.
   "Yes."
   "Oh, no problem," said Rincewind sarcastically. "And then I get to have the rest of the day off, right?"
   "And I want a chest full of gold, too. Just to be going on with."
   "I can see you've got it all thought out."
   "Yes. Avaunt!"
   "Right, right. Only -" Rincewind thought hurriedly, he's quite mad, but mad with a sword in his hands, the only chance I've got is to argue him out of it on his own terms," - only, d'you see, I'm not a very superior kind of demon and I'm afraid those sort of errands are a bit out of my league, sorry. You can avaunt as much as you like, but they're just beyond me."
   The little figure peered over the top of its glasses.
   "I see," he said testily. "What could you manage then, do you think?"
   "Well, er -" said Rincewind, "I suppose I could go down to the shops and get a packet of mints, or something."
   There was a pause.
   "You really can't do all those things?"
   "Sorry. Look I'll tell you what. You just release me, and I'll be sure to pass the word around when I get back to -" Rincewind hesitated. Where the hell did demons live, anyway? "Demon City," he said hopefully.
   "You mean Pandemonium?" said his captor suspiciously.
   "Yes, that's right. That's what I meant. I'll tell everyone, next time you're in the real world be sure and look up - what's your name?"
   "Thursley. Eric Thursley."
   "Right"
   "Demonologist. Midden Lane, Pseudopolis. Next door to the tannery," said Thursley hopefully.
   "Right you are. Don't you worry about it. Now, if you'll just let me out -"
   Thursley's face fell.
   "You're sure you really can't do it?" he said, and Rincewind couldn't help noticing the edge of pleading in his voice. "Even a small chest of gold would do. And, I mean, it needn't be the most beautiful woman in the whole of history. Second most beautiful would do. Or third. You pick any one out of, you know, the top one hundr - thousand. Whatever you've got in stock, sort of thing." By the end of the sentence his voice twanged with longing.
   Rincewind wanted to say: Look, what you should do is stop all this messing around with chemicals in dark rooms and have a shave, a haircut, a bath, make that two baths, buy yourself a new wardrobe and get out of an evening and then - but he'd have to be honest, because even washed, shaved and soaked in body splash Thursley wasn't going to win any prizes - and then you could have your face slapped by any woman of your choice.
   I mean, it wouldn't be much, but it would be body contact.
   "Sorry," he said again.
   Thursley sighed. "The kettle's on," he said. "Would you like a cup of tea?"
   Rincewind stepped forward into a crackle of psychic energy.
   "Ah," said Thursley uncertainly, as the wizard sucked his fingers, "I'll tell you what. I'll put you under a conjuration of duress."
   "There's no need, I assure you."
   "No, it's best this way. It means you can move around. I had it all ready anyway, in case you could go and fetch, you know, her."
   "Fine," said Rincewind. As the demonologist mumbled words from the book he thought: Feet. Door. Stairs. What a great combination.
   It occurred to him that there was something about the demonologist that wasn't quite usual, but he couldn't put his finger on it. He looked pretty much like the demonologists Rincewind had known back in Ankh-Morpork, who were all bent and chemical-stained and had eyes with pupils like pinheads from all the chemical fumes. This one would have fitted in easily. It was just that there was something odd.
   "To be honest," said Thursley, industriously mopping away part of the circle, "you're my first demon. It's never worked before. What is your name?"
   "Rincewind."
   Thursley thought about this. "It doesn't ring a bell," he said. "There's a Riinjswin in the Demonologie. And a Winswin. But they've got more wings than you. You can step out now. I must say that's a first-class materialisation. No-one would think you were a fiend, to look at you. Most demons, when they want to look human, materialise in the shape of nobles, kings and princes. This moth-eaten-wizard look is very clever. You could've almost fooled me. It's a shame you can't do any of those things."
   "I can't see why you'd want to live for ever," said Rincewind, privately determining that the words "moth-eaten" would be paid for, if ever he got the opportunity. "Being young again, I can understand that."
   "Huh. Being young's not much fun," said Thursley, and then clapped his hand over his mouth.
   Rincewind leaned forward.
   About fifty years. That was what was missing.
   "That's a false beard!" he said. "How old are you?"
   "Eighty-seven!" squeaked Thursley.
   "I can see the hooks over your ears!"
   "Seventy-eight, honest! Avaunt!"
   "You're a little boy!"
   Eric pulled himself up haughtily. "I'm not!" he snapped. "I'm nearly fourteen!"
   "Ah-ha!"
   The boy waved the sword at Rincewind. "It doesn't matter, anyway!" he shouted. "Demonologists can be any age, you're still my demon and you have to do as I say!"
   "Eric!" came a voice from somewhere below them.
   Eric's face went white.
   "Yes, mother?" he shouted, his eyes fixed on Rincewind. His mouth shaped the words: don't say anything, please.
   "What's all that noise up there?"
   "Nothing, mother!"
   "Come down and wash your hands, dear, your breakfast's ready!"
   "Yes, mother." He looked sheepishly at Rincewind. "That's my mother," he said.
   "She's got a good pair of lungs, hasn't she," said Rincewind.
   "I'd, I'd better go, then," said Eric. "You'll have to stay up here, of course."
   It dawned on him that he was losing a certain amount of credibility at this point. He waved the sword again.
   "Avaunt!" he said. "I command you not to leave this room!"
   "Right. Sure," said Rincewind, eyeing the windows.
   "Promise? Otherwise you'll be sent back to the Pit."
   "Oh, I don't want that," said Rincewind. "Off you trot. Don't worry about me."
   "I'm going to leave the sword and stuff here," said Eric, removing most of his accoutrements to reveal a slim, dark-haired young man whose face would be a lot better when his acne cleared up. "If you touch them, terrible things will befall."
   "Wouldn't dream of it," said Rincewind.
   When he was left alone he wandered he wandered over to the lectern and looked at the book. The title, in impressively flickering red letters, was Mallificarum Sumpta Diabolicite Occularis Singularum, the Book of Ultimate Control. He knew about it. There was a copy in the Library somewhere, although wizards never bothered with it.

This might seem odd, because if there is one thing a wizard would trade his grandfather for, it is power. But it wasn't all that strange, because any wizard bright enough to survive for five minutes was also bright enough to realise that if there was any power in demonology, then it lay with the demons. Using it for your own purposes would be like trying to beat mice to death with a rattlesnake.
   Even wizards thought demonologists were odd; they tended to be surreptitious, pale men who got up to complicated things in darkened rooms and had damp, weak handshakes. It wasn't like good clean magic. No self-respecting wizard would have any truck with the demonic regions, whose inhabitants were as big a collection of ding-dong as you'd find outside a large belfry.
   He inspected the skeleton closely, just in case. It didn't seem inclined to make a contribution to the situation.
   "It belonged to his wossname, grandfather," said a cracked voice behind him
   "Bit of an unusual bequest," said Rincewind.
   "Oh, not personally. He got it in a shop somewhere. It's one of them wossname, articulate wossnames."
   "It's not saying much right now," said Rincewind, and then went very quiet and thoughtful.
   "Er," he said, without moving his head, "what, precisely, am I talking to?"
   "I'm a wossname. Tip of my tongue. Begins with a P."
   Rincewind turned around slowly.
   "You're a parrot?" he said.
   "That's it."
   Rincewind stared at the thing on the perch. It had one eye that glittered like a ruby. Most of the rest of it was pink and purple skin, studded with the fag-ends of feathers, so that the net effect was of an oven-ready hairbrush. It jiggled arthritically on its perch and then slowly lost its balance, until it was hanging upside down.
   "I thought you were stuffed," said Rincewind.
   "Up yours, wizard."
   Rincewind ignored it and crept over to the window. It was small, but gave out on to a gently sloping roof. And out there was a real life, real sky, real buildings. He reached out to open the shutters -
   A crackling current coursed up his arm and earthed itself in his cerebellum.
   He sat on the floor, sucking his fingers.
   "He tole you," said the parrot, swinging backwards and forwards upside down. "But you wouldn't wossname. He's got you by the wossnames."
   "But it should only work on demons!"
   "Ah," said the parrot, achieving enough momentum to swing upright again, whereupon it steadied itself with the stubby remains of what had once been wings. "It's all according, isn't it. If you come in the door marked `wossnames` that means you get treated as a wossname, right? Demon, I mean. Subject to all the rules and wossnames. Tough one for you."
   "But you know I'm a wizard, don't you!"
   The parrot gave a squawk. "I've seen 'em, mate. The real McWossname. Some of the ones we've had in here, they'd make you choke on your millet. Great scaly fiery wossnames. Took weeks to get the soot off the walls," it added, in an approving tone of voice. "That was in his granddad's day, of course. The kid hasn't been any good at it. Up to now. Bright lad. I blame the wossnames, parents. New money, you know. Wine business. Spoil him rotten, let him play with his wossname's old stuff, `Oh, he's such an intelligent lad, nose always in a book`," the parrot mimicked. "They never give him any of the things a sensitive growing wossname really needs, if you was to ask me."
   "What you mean love and guidance?" said Rincewind.
   I was thinking of a bloody good wossname, thrashing," said the parrot.
   Rincewind clutched at his aching head. If this was what demons usually had to go through, no wonder they were always so annoyed.
   "Polly want a biscuit," said the parrot vaguely, in much the same way as a human would say "Er" or "As I was saying", and went on, "His granddad was keen on it. That and his pigeons."
   "Pigeons," said Rincewind
   "Not that he was particularly successful. It was all a bit trial and wossname."
   "I thought you said great big scaly -
   "Oh, yes. But that wasn't what he was after. He was trying to conjure up a succubus." It should be impossible to leer when all you've got is a beak, but the parrot managed it. "That's a female demon what comes in the night and makes mad passionate wossn -"
   "I've heard of them," said Rincewind. "Bloody dangerous things."
   The parrot put its head on one side. "It never worked. All he ever got was a neuralger."
   "What's that?"
   "It's a demon that comes and has a headache at you."

   Demons have existed on the Discworld for at least as long as the gods, who in many ways they closely resemble. The difference is basically the same as that between terrorists and freedom fighters.
   Most of the demons occupy a spacious dimension close to reality, traditionally decorated in shades of flame and maintained at roasting point. This isn't actually necessary, but if there is one thing that your average demon is, it is a traditionalist.
   In the centre of the inferno, rising majestically from a lake of lava substitute and with unparalleled views of the Eight Circles, lies the city of Pandemonium.5 At the moment, it was living up to its name.

   Astfgl, the new King of the Demons, was furious. Not simply because the air-conditioning had broken down again, not because he felt surrounded by idiots and plotters on every side, and not even because no-one could pronounce his name properly yet, but also because he had just been given bad news. The demon who had been chosen by lottery to deliver it cowered in front of his throne with its tail between its legs. It was immortally afraid that something wonderful was soon to happen to it.6
   "It did what?" said Astfgl.
   "It, er, it opened, o lord. The circle in Pseudopolis."
   "Ah. The clever boy. We have great hopes of him."
   "Er. Then it closed again, lord." The demon shut its eyes.
   "And who went through?"
   "Er." The demon looked around at its colleagues, clustered at the far end of the mile-long throne room.
   "I said, and who went through?"
   "In point of fact, o lord -"
   "Yes?"
   "We don't know. Someone."
   "I gave orders, did I not, that when the boy succeeded the Duke Vassenego was to materialise unto him, and offer him forbidden pleasures and dark delights to bend him to Our will?"
   The King growled. The problem with being evil, he'd been forced to admit, was that demons were not great innovatory thinkers and really needed the spice of human ingenuity. And he'd really been looking forward to Eric Thursley, whose brand of super-intelligent gormlessness was a rare delight. Hell heeded horribly-bright, self-centred people like Eric. They were much better at being nasty than demons could ever manage.
   "Indeed, lord," said the demon, "And the duke has been awaiting the summons there for years, shunning all other temptations, steadfastly and patiently studying the world of men -"
   "So where was he?"
   "Er. Call of supernatural, lord," the demon gabbled. "Hadn't turned his back for two minutes when -"
   "And someone went through?"
   "We're trying to find out -"
   Lord Astfgl's patience, which in any case had the tensile strength of putty, snapped at this point. That just about summed it up. He had the kind of subjects who used the words "find out" when they meant "ascertain". Damnation was too good for them.
   "Get out," he whispered. "And I shall see to it that you get a commendation for this -"
   "O master, I plead -"
   "Get out!"
   The King stamped along the glowing corridors to his private apartments.
   His predecessors had favoured shaggy hind legs and hoofs. Lord Astfgl had rejected all that sort of thing out of hand. He held that no-one would ever get taken seriously by those stuck-up bastards in Dunmanifestin when their rear end kept ruminating all the time, and so he favoured a red silk cloak, crimson tights, a cowl with two rather sophisticated little horns on it, and a trident. The end kept dropping off the trident but, he felt, it was the sort of get-up in which a demon king could be taken seriously...
   In the coolness of his chambers - oh, by all the gods or, rather, not by all the gods, it had taken him ages to get them up to some sort of civilised standard, his predecessors had been quite content just to lounge around and tempt people, they had never heard of executive stress - he gently lifted the cover off the Mirror of Souls and watched it flicker into life.
   Its cool black surface was surrounded by an ornate frame, from which curls of greasy smoke constantly unfolded and drifted.
   Your wish, master? it said.
   "Show me the events around the Pseudopolis gate over the last hour," said the King, and settled down to watch.
   After a while he went and looked up the name "Rincewind" in the filing cabinet he had recently had installed, in place of the distressingly-bound old ledgers that had been there; the system still needed ironing out, though, because the bewildered demons filed everything under P for People.
   Then he sat watching the flickering pictures and absent-mindedly playing with the stuff on his desk, to soothe his nerves.
   He had any amount of desk things; notepads with magnets for paperclips, handy devices for holding pens and those tiny jotters that always came in handy, incredibly funny statuettes with slogans like "You're the Boss!", and little chromium balls and spirals operated by a sort of ersatz and short-lived perpetual motion. No-one looking at that desk could have any doubt that they were, in cold fact, truly damned.
   "I see," said Lord Astfgl, setting a selection of shiny balls swinging with one tap of a talon.
   He couldn't remember any demon called Rincewind. On the other hand, there were millions of the wretched things, swarming all over the place with no sense of order, and he hadn't yet had time to carry out a proper census and retire the unnecessary ones. This one seemed to have a fewer appendages and more vowels in his name than most. But it had to be a demon.
   Vassenego was a proud old fool, one of the elder demons who smiled and despised him and not-quite-obeyed him, just because the King'd worded hard over the millennia to get humble beginnings to where he was today. He wouldn't put it past the old devil to do this on purpose, just to spite him.
   Well, he'd have to see about that later. Send him a memo or something. Too late to do anything about it now. He'd have to take a personal interest. Eric Thursley was too good a prospect to pass up. Getting Eric Thursley would really annoy the gods.
   God! How he hated the gods! He hated the gods even more than he hated the old guard like Vassenego, even more than he hated humans. He'd thrown a little soir\a233e‚e last week, he'd put a lot of thought into it, he wanted to show that he was prepared to let bygones be bygones, work with them for a new, better and more efficient universe. He'd called it a "Getting to know you!" party. There'd been sausages on sticks and every thing, he'd done his best to make it nice.
   They hadn't even bothered to answer the invitations. And he'd made a special point of putting RSVP on them.

   "Demon?"
   Eric peered around the door.
   "What shape are you?" he said.
   "Pretty poor shape," said Rincewind.
   "I've brought you some food. You do eat, do you?"
   Rincewind tried some. It was a bowl of cereal, nuts, and dried fruit. He didn't have any quarrel with any of that. It was just that somewhere in the preparation something had apparently done to these innocent ingredients what it takes a million gravities to do a neutron star. If you died of eating this sort of thing they wouldn't have to bury you, they would just need to drop you somewhere where the ground was soft.
   He managed to swallow it. It wasn't difficult. The trick would have been preventing it from heading downwards.
   "Lovely," he choked. The parrot did a splendid impersonation of someone being sick.
   "I've decided to let you go," said Eric. "It's pretty pointless keeping you, isn't it."
   "Absolutely."
   "You haven't any powers at all?"
   "Sorry. Dead failure."
   "You don't look too demonic, come to think about it," said Eric.
   "They never do. You can't trust them wossnames," chortled the parrot. It lost its balance again. "Polly want a biscuit," it said, upside down.
   Rincewind spun around. "You stay out of this beaky!"
   There was a sound behind them, like the universe clearing its throat. The chalk marks of the magic circle grew terribly bright for a moment, became fiery lines against the scuffed planks, and something dropped out of the empty air and landed heavily on the floor.
   It was a large, metal-bound chest. It had fallen on its curved lid. After a while it started to rock violently, and then it extended hundreds of little pink legs and with considerable effort flipped itself over.
   Finally it shuffled around until it was watching the pair of them. It was all the more disconcerting because it was staring without having any eyes to do it with.
   Eric moved first. He grasped the home-made magic sword, which flapped wildly.
   "You are a demon!" he said. "I nearly believed you when you said you weren't!"
   "Wheee!" said the parrot.
   "It's just my luggage," said Rincewind desperately. "It's a sort of... well. it goes everywhere with me, there's nothing demonic about it... er." He hesitated. "Not much, anyway," he finished lamely.
   "Avaunt!"
   "Oh, not again."
   The boy looked at the open book. "My commands earlier resume," he said firmly. "The most beautiful woman who has ever lived, mastery of all the kingdoms of the world, and to live forever. Get on with it."
   Rincewind stood frozen.
   "Well, go on," said Eric. "You're supposed to disappear in a puff of smoke."
   "Listen, do you think I can just snap my fingers -"
   Rincewind snapped his fingers.
   There was a puff of smoke.

      Rincewind gave his fingers a long shocked stare, as one might regard a gun that has been hanging on the wall for decades and has suddenly gone off and perforated the cat.
   "They've hardly ever done that before," he said.
   He looked down.
   "Aargh," he said, and closed his eyes.
   It was a better world in the darkness behind his eyelids. If he tapped his foot he could persuade himself that he could feel the floor, he could know that he was really standing in the room, and that the urgent signals from all his other senses, which were telling him that he was suspended in the air some thousand miles or so above the Disc, were just a bad dream he'd wake up from. He hastily cancelled that thought. If he was asleep he'd prefer to stay that way. You could fly in dreams. If he woke up, it was a long way to fall.
   Perhaps I have died and I really am a demon, he thought.
   It was an interesting point.
   He opened his eyes again.
   "Wow!" said Eric, his eyes gleaming. "Can I have all of it?"
   The boy was standing in the same position he had been in the room. So was the luggage. So, to Rincewind's annoyance, was the parrot. It was perching in mid-air, looking speculatively at the cosmic panorama below.
   The Disc might almost have been designed to be seen from space; it hadn't, Rincewind was damn sure, been designed to be lived on. But he had to admit that it was impressive.
   The sun was about to rise on the far rim and made a line of fire that glittered around half the circumference. A long slow dawn was just beginning its sweep across the dark, massive landscape.
   Below, harshly lit in the arid vacuum of space, Great A'Tuin the world turtle toiled under the weight of Creation. On his - or her, the matter had never really been resolved - carapace the four giant elephants strained to support the Disc itself.
   There might have been more efficient ways to build a world. You might start with a ball of molten iron and then coat it with successive layers of rock, like an old-fashioned gobstopper. And you'd have a very efficient planet, but it wouldn't look so nice. Besides, things would drop off the bottom.
   "Pretty good," said the parrot. "Polly want a continent."
   "It's so big," breathed Eric.
   "Yes," said Rincewind flatly.
   He felt that something more was expected of him.
   "Don't break it," he added.
   He had a nagging doubt about all this. If he was for the sake of argument a demon, and so many things had happened to him recently he was prepared to concede that he might have died and not noticed it in the confusion7, then he still didn't quite see how the world was his to give away. He was pretty sure that it had owners who felt the same way.
   Also, he was sure that a demon had to get something in writing.
   "I think that you have to sign for it," he said. "In blood."
   "Whose?" said Eric.
   "Yours, I think," said Rincewind. "Or bird blood will do, at a pinch." He glared meaningfully at the parrot, which growled at him.
   "Aren't I allowed to try it out first?"
   "What?"
   "Well suppose it doesn't work? I'm not signing for it until I've seen it work."
   Rincewind stared at the boy. Then he looked down at the broad panorama of the kingdoms of the world. I wonder if I was like him at his age? he thought. I wonder how I survived?
   "It's the world," he said patiently. "Of course it will bloody well work. I mean, look at it. Hurricanes, continental drift, rainfall cycle - it's all there. All ticking over like a bloody watch. It'll last you a lifetime, a world like that. Used carefully."
   Eric gave the world a critical examination. He wore the expression of someone who knows that all the best gifts in life seem to require the psychic equivalent of two U2 batteries and the shops won't be open until after the holidays.
   "There's got to be tribute," he said flatly.
   "You what?"
   "The kings of the world," said Eric. "They've got to pay me tribute."
   "You've really been studying this, haven't you," said Rincewind sarcastically. "Just tribute? You don't fancy the moon while we're up here? This week's special offer, one free satellite with every world dominated?"
   "Are there any useful minerals?"
   "What?"
   Eric gave a sigh of long-suffering patience.
   "Minerals," he said. "Ores. You know."
   Rincewind coloured. "I don't think a lad your age should be thinking of -"
   "I mean metal and things. It's no use to me if it's just a load of rock."
   Rincewind looked down. The Discworld's tiny moonlet was just rising over the far edge, and shed a pale radiance across the jigsaw pattern of land and sea.
   "Oh, I don't know. It looks quite nice," he volunteered. "Look, it's dark now. Perhaps everyone can pay you tribute in the morning?"
   "I want some tribute now."
   "I thought you might."
   Rincewind gave his fingers a careful examination. It wasn't as if he'd ever been particularly good at snapping them.
   He gave it another try.
   When he opened his eyes again he was standing up to his ankles in mud.
   Pre-eminent amongst Rincewind's talents was his skill in running away, which over the years he had elevated to the status of a genuinely pure science; it didn't matter if you were fleeing from or to, so long as you were fleeing. It was flight alone that counted. I run, therefore I am; more correctly, I run, therefore with any luck I'll still be.
   But he was also skilled in languages and in practical geography. He could shout `help!` in fourteen languages and scream for mercy in a further twelve. He had passed through many of the countries on the Disc, some of them at high speed, and during the long, lovely, boring hours when he'd worked in the Library he'd whiled away the time by reading up on all the exotic and faraway places he'd never visited. He remembered that at the time he'd sighed with relief that he'd never have to visit them.
   And, now, here he was.
   Jungle surrounded him. It wasn't nice, interesting, open jungle, such as leopard-skin-clad heroes might swing through, but serious, real jungle, jungle that towered up like solid slabs of greenness, thorned and barbed, jungle in which every representative of the vegetable kingdom had really rolled up its bark and got down to the strenuous business of outgrowing all competitors. The soil was hardly soil at all, but dead plants on the way to composthood; water dripped from leaf to leaf, insects whined in the humid, spore-laden air, and there was the terrible breathless silence made by the motors of photosynthesis running flat out. Any yodelling hero who tried to swing through that lot might just as well take his chances with a bean-slicer.
   "How do you do that?" said Eric.
   "It's probably a knack," said Rincewind.
   Eric subjected the wonders of Nature to a cursory and disdainful glance.
   "This doesn't look like a kingdom," he complained. "You said we could go to a kingdom. Do you call this a kingdom?"
   "This is probably the rain forests of Klatch," said Rincewind. "They're stuffed full of lost kingdoms."
   "You mean mysterious ancient races of Amazonian princesses who subject all male prisoners to strange and exhausting progenitative rites?" said Eric, his glasses beginning to fog.
   "Haha," said Rincewind stonily. "What an imagination the child has."
   "Wossname, wossname, wossname!" shrieked the parrot.
   "I've read about them," said Eric, peering into the greenery. "Of course, I own those kingdoms as well." He stared at some private inner vision. "Gosh," he said, hungrily.
   "I should concentrate on the tribute if I was you," said Rincewind, setting off down what was possibly a path.
   The brightly-coloured blooms on a tree nearby turned to watch him go.
   In the jungles of central Klatch there are, indeed, lost kingdoms of mysterious Amazonian princesses who capture male explorers for specifically masculine duties. These are indeed rigorous and exhausting and the luckless victims do not last long.8
   There are also hidden plateaux where the reptilian monsters of a bygone epoch romp and play, as well as elephants' graveyards, lost diamond mines, and strange ruins decorated with hieroglyphs the very sight of which can freeze the most valiant heart. On any reasonable amp there's barely room for the trees.
   The few explorers who have passed on a number of handy hints to those who follow after, such as: 1) avoid if possible any hanging-down creepers with beady eyes and a forked tongue at one end; 2) don't pick up any orange-and-black-stripped creepers that are apparently lying across the path, twitching, because there is often a tiger on the other end; and 3) don't go.
   If I'm a demon, Rincewind thought hazily, why is everything stinging me and trying to trip me up? I mean, surely I can only be harmed by a wooden dagger through my heart? Or do I mean garlic?
   Eventually the jungle opened out into a very wide, cleared area that stretched all the way to a distant blue range of volcanoes. The land fell away below them to a patchwork of lakes and swampy fields, here and there punctured by great stepped pyramids, each one crowned with a thin plume of smoke curling into the dawn air. The jungle track opened out into a narrow, but paved, road.
   "Where's this demon?" said Eric.
   "It looks like one of the Tezuman kingdoms," said Rincewind. "They're ruled over by the Great Muzuma, I think."
   "She's an Amazonian princess, is she?"
      "Strangely enough, no. You'd be astonished how many kingdoms aren't ruled by Amazonian princesses, Eric."
   "It looks pretty primitive, anyway. A bit Stone Age."
   "The Tezuman priests have a sophisticated calendar and an advanced horology," quoted Rincewind.
   "Ah," said Eric, "Good."
   "No," said Rincewind patiently. "It means time measurement."
   "Oh."
   "You'd approve of them. They're superb mathematicians, apparently."
   "Huh," said Eric, blinking solemnly. "Shouldn't think they've got a lot to count in a backward civilisation like this."
   Rincewind eyed the chariots that were heading rapidly towards them.
   "I think they usually count victims," he said.

   The Tezuman Empire in the jungle valleys of central Klatch is known for its organic market gardens, its exquisite craftsmanship in obsidian, feathers and jade, and its mass human sacrifices in honour of Quezovercoatl, the Feathered Boa, god of mass human sacrifices. As they said, you always knew where you stood with Quezovercoatl. It was generally with a lot of people on top of a great stepped pyramid with someone in an elegant feathered head-dress chipping an exquisite obsidian knife for your very own personal use.
      The Tezuman are renowned on the continent for being the most suicidally gloomy, irritable and pessimistic people you could ever hope to meet, for reasons that may soon be made clear. It was true about the time measurement as well. The Tezuman had realised long ago that everything was getting worse and, having a terrible literal-mindedness, had developed a complex system to keep track of how much worse each succeeding day was.
   Contrary to general belief, the Tezumen did invent the wheel. They just had radically different ideas about what you used it for.

   It was the first chariot that Rincewind had ever seen that was pulled by llamas. That wasn't what was odd about it. What was odd about it was that it was being carried by people, two holding each side of the axle and running after the animals, their sandalled feet flapping on the flagstones.
   "Do you think it's got the tribute in it?" said Eric.
   All the leading chariot seemed to contain, apart from the driver, was a squat, basically cube-shaped man wearing a puma-skin outfit and a feather head-dress.
   The runners panted to a halt, and Rincewind saw that each man wore what would probably be described as a primitive sword, made by affixing shards of obsidian into a wooden club. They looked to him no less deadly than sophisticated, extremely civilised swords. In fact they looked worse.
   "Well?" said Eric.
   "Well what?" said Rincewind.
   "Tell him to give me my tribute."
   The fat man got down ponderously, marched over to Eric and, to Rincewind's extreme surprise, grovelled.
   Rincewind felt something claw its way up his back and onto his shoulder, where a voice like a sheet of metal being torn in half said, "That's better. Very wossname, comfy. If you try and knock me off, demon, you can wossname your ear goodbye. What a turn up for the scrolls, eh? They seemed to be expecting him."
   "Why do you keep saying wossname?" said Rincewind.
   "Limited wossname. Doodah. Thingy. You know. It's got words in it," said the parrot.
   "Dictionary?" said Rincewind. They passengers in the other chariots had got out and were also grovelling to Eric, who was beaming like an idiot.
   The parrot considered this.
   "Yeah, probably," it said. "I've got to wing it to you," it went on. "I thought you were a bit of a wossname at the start, but you seem to be delivering the wossname."
   "Demon?" said Eric, airily.
   "Yes?"
   "What are they saying? Can't you speak their language?"
   "Er, no," said Rincewind. "I can read it, though," he called out, as Eric turned away. "If you could just sort of make signs for them to write it down..."

   It was around noon. In the jungle behind Rincewind creatures whooped and gibbered. Mosquitoes the size of humming-birds whined around his head.
   "Of course," he said, for the tenth time, "They've never really got around to inventing paper."
   The stonemason stood bake, handed the latest blunted obsidian chisel to his assistant, and gave Rincewind and expectant look.
      Rincewind stood back and examined the rock critically.
   "It's very good," he said. "I mean, it's a very good likeness. You've got his hairstyle and everything. Of course, he's not as, er, square as that normally but, yes, very good. And here's the chariot and there's the step-pyramids. Yes. Well, it looks as though they want you to go to the city with them," he said to Eric.
   "Tell them yes," said Eric firmly.
   Rincewind turned to the headman.
   "Yes," he said.
   "\a191[Hunched-figure-in-triple-feathered-headdress-over-three-dots]?"
   Rincewind sighed. Without saying a word, the stonemason put a fresh stone chisel into his unresisting fingers and manhandled a new slab of granite into position.
   One of the problems of being a Tezuman, apart from having a god like Quezovercoatl, is that if you unexpectedly need to order an extra pint of milk tomorrow you should have started writing the note last month. Tezumen are the only people who beat themselves to death with their own suicide notes.

   It was late afternoon by the time the chariot trotted into the slab city around the largest pyramid, between lines of cheering Tezumen.
   "This is more like it," said Eric, graciously acknowledging the cheers. "They're very pleased to see us."
   "Yes," said Rincewind, gloomily. "I wonder why?"
   "Well, because I'm the new ruler, of course."
   "Hmm." Rincewind glanced sidelong at the parrot, who had been unnaturally silent for some time and was now cowering up against his ear like an elderly spinster in a strip club. It was having serious thoughts about the exquisite feather headdresses.
      "Wossname bastards," it croaked. "Any wossname lays a hand on me and that wossname is minus one finger, I'm telling you."
   "There's something not right about this," said Rincewind.
   "What's that?"
   "Everything."
   "I'm telling you, one feather out of place -"
   Rincewind wasn't used to people being pleased to see him. It was unnatural, and boded no good. These people were not only cheering, they were throwing flowers and hats. The hats were made out of stone, but the thought was there.
   Rincewind thought they were rather odd hats. They didn't have crowns. They were, in fact, mere discs with holes in the middle.
   The procession trotted up the wide avenues of the city to a cluster of buildings at the foot of the pyramid, where another group of dignitaries was waiting for them.
   They were wearing lots of jewellery. It was all basically the same. There are quite a lot of uses to which you can put a stone disc with a hole in the middle, and the Tezumen had explored all but one of them.
   More important, though, were the boxes and boxes of treasure stacked in front of them. They were stuffed with jewels.
   Eric's eyes widened.
   "The tribute!" he said.
   Rincewind gave up. It was really working. He didn't know why, but at last it was all going Right. The setting sun glinted off a dozen fortunes. Of course, it belonged to Eric, presumably, but maybe there was enough for him too...
   "Naturally," he said weakly. "What else did you expect?"

   And there was feasting, and long speeches that Rincewind couldn't understand but which were punctuated with cheers and nods and bows in Eric's direction. And there were long recitals of Tezuman music, which sounds like someone clearing a particularly difficult nostril.
   Rincewind left Eric sitting proudly enthroned in the firelight and wandered disconsolately across to the pyramid.
   "I was enjoying the wossname," said the parrot reproachfully.
   "I can't settle down," said Rincewind. "I'm sorry, but this sort of thing has never happened to me before. All the jewels and things. Everything going as expected. It's not right."
   He looked up the monstrous face of the steep pyramid, red and flickering in the firelight. Every huge block was carved with a bas-relief of Tezumen doing terribly inventive things to their enemies. It suggested that the Tezumen, whatever sterling qualities they possessed, were not traditionally inclined to welcome perfect strangers and heap them with jewels. The overall effect of the great heap of carvings was very artistic - it was just the details that were horrible.
   While working his way along the wall he came to a huge door, which artistically portrayed a group of prisoners apparently being given a complete medical check-up.9
   It opened into a short, torch-lit tunnel. Rincewind took a few steps along it, telling himself he could always hurry out again, and came out into a lofty space which occupied most of the inside of the pyramid.
   There were more torches all around the walls, which illuminated everything quite well.
   That wasn't really welcome because what they mainly illuminated was a giant-sized statue of Quezovercoatl, the Feathered Boa.
   If you had to be in a room with that statue, you'd prefer it to be pitch black.
   Or, then again, perhaps not. A better option would be to put the thing in a darkened room while you had insomnia a thousand miles away, trying to forget what it looked like.
   It's just a statue, Rincewind told himself. It's not real. They've just used their imagination, that's all.
   "What the wossname is it?" said the parrot.
   "It's their god."
   "Get a way?"
   "No, really. It's Quezovercoatl. Half man, half chicken, half jaguar, half serpent, half scorpion and half mad."
   The parrot's beak moved as it worked this out.
   "That makes a wossname total of three homicidal maniacs," it said.
   "About right, yes," said the statue.
   "On the other hand," said Rincewind instantly, "I do think it's frightfully important for people to have the right to worship in their own special way, and now I think we'll just be going, so just -"
   "Please don't leave me here," said the statue. "Please take me with you."
   "Could be tricky, could be tricky," Rincewind said hurriedly, backing away. "It's not me, you understand, it's just that where I come from everyone has this racial prejudice against thirty-foot-high people with fangs and talons and necklaces of skulls all over them. I just think you'll have trouble fitting in."
   The parrot tweaked his ear. "It's coming from behind the statue, you stupid wossname," it croaked.
   It turned out to be coming from a hole in the floor. A pale face peered short-sightedly up at Rincewind from the depths of a pit. It was an elderly, good-natured face with a faintly worried expression.
   "Hallo?" said Rincewind.
   "You don't know what it means to hear a friendly voice again," said the face, breaking into a grin. "If you could just sort of help me up...?"
   "Sorry?" said Rincewind. "You're a prisoner, are you?"
   "Alas, this is so."
   "I don't know that I ought to go around rescuing prisoners just like that," said Rincewind. "I mean, you might have done anything."
   "I am entirely innocent of all crimes, I assure you."
   "Ah, well, so you say," said Rincewind gravely. "But if the Tezumen have judged -"
   "Wossname, wossname, wossname!" shrieked the parrot in his ear as it bounced up and down on his shoulder. "Haven't you got the faintest? Where've you been? He's a prisoner! A prisoner in a temple! You've got to rescue prisoners in temples! That's what they're bloody there for!"
   "No it isn't," snapped Rincewind. "That's all you know! He's probably here to be sacrificed! Isn't that right?" He looked at the prisoner for confirmation.
   The face nodded. "Indeed, you are correct. Flayed alive in fact."
   "There!" said Rincewind to the parrot. "See? You think you know everything! He's to be flayed alive."
   "Every inch of skin removed to the accompaniment of exquisite pain," added the prisoner, helpfully.
   Rincewind paused. He thought he knew the meaning of the word "exquisite", and it didn't seem to belong anywhere near "pain".
   "What, every bit?" he said.
   "This is apparently the case."
   "Gosh. What was it you did?"
   The prisoner sighed. "You'd never believe me..." he said.

   The Demon King let the mirror darken and drummed his fingers on his desk for a moment. Then he picked up a speaking tube and blew into it.
   Eventually a distant voice said: "Yes, guv?"
   "Yes sir!" snapped the King
   The distant voice muttered something. "Yes, SIR?" it added.
   "Do we have a Quezovercoatl working here?"
   "I'll see, guv." The voice faded, came back. "Yes, guv."
   "Is he a Duke, Earl, Count or Baron?" said the King.
   "No, guv."
   "Well, what is he?"
   There was a long silence at the other end.
   "Well?" said the King
   "He's no-one much, guv"
   The King glared at the tube for some time. You try, he thought. You make proper plans, you try to get organised, you try to help people, and this is what you get.
   "Send him to see me," he said.

   Outside, the music rose to a crescendo and stopped. The fires crackled. >From the distant jungles a thousand glowing eyes watched the proceedings.
   The high priest stood up and made a speech. Eric beamed like a pumpkin. A long line of Tezumen brought baskets of jewels which they scattered before him.
   Then the high priest made a second speech. This one seemed to end in a question.
   "Fine," said Eric. "Jolly good. Keep it up." He scratched his ear and ventured, "You can all have a half holiday."
   The high priest repeated the question again, in a slightly impatient tone of voice.
   "I'm the one, yes," said Eric, just in case they were unclear. "You've got it exactly right."
   The high priest spoke again. This time there was no slightly about it.

   "Let's just run through this again, shall we?" said the Demon King. He leaned back in his throne.
   "You just happened to find the Tezumen one day and decided, I think I recall your words correctly, that they were 'a bunch of Stone-Age no-hopers sitting around in a swamp being no trouble to anyone', am I right? Whereupon you entered the mind of one of their high priests - I believe at the time they worshiped a small stick - drove him insane and inspired the tribes to unite, terrorise their neighbours and bring forth upon the continent a new nation dedicated to the proposition that all men should be taken to the top of ceremonial pyramids and be chopped up with stone knives." The King pulled his notes towards him. "Oh yes, some of them were also to be flayed alive," he added.
   Quezovercoatl shuffled his feet.
   "Whereupon," said the King, "they immediately engaged in a prolonged war with just about everyone else, bringing death and destruction to thousands of moderately blameless people, ekcetra, ekcetra. Now, look, this sort of thing has got to stop."
   Quezovercoatl swayed back a bit.
      "It was only, you know, a hobby," said the imp. "I thought, you know, it was the right thing, sort of, thing. Death and destruction and that."
   "You did, did you?" said the king. "Thousands of more-or-less innocent people dying? Straight out of our hands," he snapped his fingers, "just like that. Straight off to their happy hunting ground or whatever. That's the trouble with you people. You don't think of the Big Picture. I mean, look at the Tezumen. Gloomy, unimaginative, obsessive... by now they could have invented a whole bureaucracy and taxation system that could have turned the minds of the continent to slag. Instead of which, they're just a bunch of second-rate axe-murderers. What a waste."
   Quezovercoatl squirmed.
   The King swivelled the throne back and forth a bit.
   "Now, I want you to go back down there and tell them you're sorry," he said.
   "Pardon?"
   "Tell them you've changed your mind. Tell them that what you really wanted them to do was strive day and night to improve the lot of their fellow men. It'll be a winner."
   "What?" said Quezovercoatl, looking extremely shifty. "You want me to manifest myself?"
   "They've seen you already, haven't they? I saw the statue, it's ver lifelike."
   "Well, yes. I've appeared in dreams and that," said the demon uncertainly.
   "Right, then. Get on with it."
   Quezovercoatl was clearly unhappy about something.
      "Er," he said. "You want me to actually materialise, sort of thing? I mean, actually sort of turn up on the spot?"
   "Yes!"
   "Oh."

   The prisoner dusted himself down and extended a wrinkled hand to Rincewind.
   "Many thanks. Ponce da Quirm," he said.
   "Pardon?"
   "It's my name."
   "Oh."
   "It's a proud old name," said da Quirm, searching Rincewind's eyes for any traces of mockery.
   "Fine," said Rincewind blankly.
   "We were searching for the Fountain of Youth," da Quirm went on
   Rincewind looked him up and down.
   "Any luck?" he said politely.
   "Not significantly, no."
   Rincewind peered back down into the pit.
   "You said we," ha said. "Where's everyone else?"
   "They got religion."
   Rincewind looked up at the statue of Quezovercoatl. I took no imagination whatsoever to imagine what kind.
   "I think," he said carefully, "that we had better go."
   "Too true," said the old man. "And quickly, too. Before the Ruler of the World turns up."
   Rincewind went cold. It starts, he thought. I knew it was all going to turn out badly, and this is where it starts. I must have an instinct for these things.
   "How do you know about that?" he said.
   "Oh, they've got this prophecy, really, it's more the entire history of the world, start to finish. It's written all over this pyramid," said da Quirm, cheerfully. "My word, I wouldn't like to be the Ruler when he arrives. They've got plans."

   Eric stood up.
   "Now just you listen to me," he said. "I'm not going to stand for this sort of thing. I'm your ruler, you know..."

   Rincewind stared at the blocks nearest the statue. It had taken the Tezumen two storeys, twenty years and ten thousand tons of granite to explain what they intended to do to the Ruler of the World, but the result was, well, graphic. He would be left in no doubt that they were annoyed. He might even go so far as to deduce that they were quite vexed.
   "But why do they give him all these jewels to start with?" he said, pointing.
   "Well, he is the Ruler," said da Quirm. "He's entitled to some respect, I suppose."
   Rincewind nodded. There was a sort of justice in it. If you were a tribe who lived in a swamp in the middle of a damp forest, didn't have any metal, had been saddled with a god like Quezovercoatl, and then found someone who said he was in charge of the whole affair, you probably would want to spend some time explaining to him how incredibly disappointed in him you were. The Tezumen had never seen any reason to be subtle in dealing with deities.
   It was a very good likeness of Eric.
   His eye followed the story on to the next wall.
   This block showed a very good likeness of Rincewind. He had a parrot on his shoulder.
   "Hang on," he said. "That's me!"
   "You should see what they're doing to you on the next block," said the parrot smugly. "It'll turn your wossname."
   Rincewind looked at the block. His wossname revolved.
   "We'll just leave very quietly," he said firmly. "I mean, we won't stop to thank them for the meal. We can always send them a letter later. You know, so's not to be impolite."
   "Just a moment," said da Quirm, as Rincewind dragged at his arm, "I haven't had a chance to read all the blocks yet. I want to see how the world's going to end -"
   "How it's going to end for everybody else I don't know," said Rincewind grimly, dragging him down the tunnel. "I know how it's going to end for me."
   He stepped out in to the dawn light, which was fine. Where he went wrong was stepping into a semi-circle of Tezumen. They had spears. They had exquisitely chipped obsidian spearheads, which, like their swords, were nowhere near as sophisticated as ordinary, coarse, inferior steel weapons. Was it better to know that you were going to be skewered by delicate examples of genuine ethnic origin rather than nasty forge-made items hammered out by people not in contact with the cycles of nature?
   Probably not, Rincewind decided.

"I always say," said da Quirm, "that there is a good side to everything."
   Rincewind, trussed to the next slab, turned his head with difficulty.
   "Where is it at the moment, precisely?" he said.
   Da Quirm squinted down across the swamps and the forest roof.
   "Well. It's a first-class view from up here, to begin with."
   "Oh, good," said Rincewind. "You know, I never would have looked at it like that. You're absolutely right. It's the kind of view you'll remember for the rest of your life, I expect. I mean, it's not as if it will be any great feat of recollection."
   "There's no need to be sarcastic. I was only passing a remark."
   "I want my mum," said Eric, from the middle slab.
   "Chin up, lad," said da Quirm. "At least you're being sacrificed for something worthwhile. I just suggested they tried using the wheels upright, so they'd roll. I'm afraid they're not very responsive to new ideas around here. Still, nil desperandum. Where there's life there's hope."
   Rincewind growled. If there was one thing he couldn't stand, it was people who were fearless in the face of death. It seemed to strike at something absolutely fundamental in him.
   "In fact," said da Quirm, "I think -" He rolled from side to side experimentally, tugging at the vines which were holding him down. "Yes, I think when they did these ropes up - yes, definitely, they -"
   "What? What?" said Rincewind.
   "Yes, definitely," said da Quirm. "I'm absolutely sure about it. They did them up very tightly and professionally. Not an inch of give in them anywhere."
   "Thank you," said Rincewind.
   The flat top of the truncated pyramid was in fact quite large, with plenty of room for statues, priests, slabs, gutters, knife-chipping production lines and all the other things the Tezumen needed for the bulk disposal of religion. In front of Rincewind several priests were busily chanting a long list of complaints about swamps, mosquitoes, lack of metal ore, volcanoes, the weather, the way obsidian never kept it's edge, the trouble with having a god like Quezovercoatl, the way wheels never worked properly however often you laid them flat and pushed them, and so on.
   The prayers of most religions generally praise and thank the gods involved, either out of general piety or in the hope that he or she will take the hint and start acting responsibly. The Tezumen, having taken a long hard look around their world and decided bluntly that things were just about as bad as they were ever going to get, had perfected the art of the plain-chant winge.
   "Won't be long now," said the parrot, from its perch atop a statue of one of the Tezumen's lesser gods.
   It had got there by a complicated sequence of events that had involved a lot of squawking, a cloud of feathers and three Tezumen priests with badly swollen thumbs.
   "The high priest is just performing a wossname in honour of Quezovercoatl," it went on, conversationally. "You've drawn quite a crowd."
   "I suppose you wouldn't kind of hop down here and bite through these ropes, would you?" said Rincewind.
   "Not a chance."
   "Thought so."
   "Sun's coming up soon," the parrot continued. Rincewind felt that it sounded unnecessarily cheerful.
   "I'm going to complain about this, demon," moaned Eric. "You wait my mother finds out. My parents have got influence, you know."
   "Oh, good," said Rincewind weakly. "Why don't you tell the high priest that if he cuts your heart out she'll be right down to the school tomorrow to complain."
   The Tezumen priests bowed towards the sun, and all eyes in the crowd below turned to the jungle.
   Where something was happening. There was the sound of crackling undergrowth. Tropical birds erupted through the trees, shrieking.
   Rincewind, of course, could not see this.
   "You never should have wanted to be ruler of the world," he said. "I mean, what did you expect? You can't expect people to be happy about seeing you. No-one ever is when the landlord turns up."
   "But they're going to kill me!"
   "It's just their way of saying that, metaphorically, they're fed up with waiting for you to repaint the place and see to the drains."
   The whole jungle was in uproar now. Animals exploded out of the bushes as if running from a fire. A few heavy thumps indicated that trees were falling over.
   At last a frantic jaguar crashed through the undergrowth and loped down the causeway. The Luggage was a few feet behind it.
   It was covered with creepers, leaves and the feathers of various rare jungle fowls, some of which were now even rarer. The jaguar could have avoided it by zigging or zagging to either side, but sheer idiot terror prevented it. It made the mistake of turning its head to see what was behind.
   This was the last mistake it ever made.
   "You know that box of yours?" said the parrot.
   "What about it?" said Rincewind.
   "It's heading this way."
   The priests peered down at the running figure far below. The Luggage had a straightforward way of dealing with things between it and its intended destination: it ignored them.
   It was at this moment, against all his instincts, in great trepidation and, most unfortunately of all, in deep ignorance of what was happening, that Quezovercoatl himself chose to materialise on top of the pyramid.
   Several of the priests noticed him. The knives fell from their fingers.
   "Er," squeaked the demon.
   Other priests turned around.
   "Right. Now, I want you all to pay attention," squeaked Quezovercoatl, cupping his tiny hands around his main mouth in an effort to be heard.
   This was very embarrassing. He'd enjoyed being the Tezumen god, he'd been really impressed by their single-minded devotion to duty, he'd been very gratified by the incredible lifelike statue in the pyramid, and it really hurt to have to reveal that, in one important particular, it was incorrect.
   He was six inches high.
   "Now then," he began, "this is very important -"
   Unfortunately, no-one ever found out why. At that moment the Luggage breasted the top of the pyramid, its legs whirring like propellers, and landed squarely on the slabs.
   There was a brief, flat squeak.

   It was a funny old world, said da Quirm. You had to laugh, really. If you didn't, you'd go mad, wouldn't you? One minute strapped to a slab and about to undergo exquisite torture, the next being given breakfast, a change of clothes, a hot tub and a free lift out of the kingdom. It made you believe there was a god. Of course the Tezumen knew there was a god, and that he was currently a small and distressing greasy patch on top of the pyramid. Which left them with a bit of a problem.
   The Luggage squatted in the city's main plaza. The entire priesthood was sitting around it and watching it carefully, in case it did anything amusing or religious.
   "Are you going to leave it behind?" said Eric.
   "It's not as simple as that," said Rincewind. "It generally catches up. Let's just go away quickly."
   "But we'll take the tribute, won't we?"
   "I think that could be an amazingly bad idea," said Rincewind. "Let's just quietly go, while they're in a good temper. The novelty will wear off soon, I expect."
   "And I've got to get on with my search for the Fountain of Youth," said da Quirm.
   "Oh yes," said Rincewind.
   "I've devoted my whole life to it, you know," said the old man proudly.
   Rincewind looked him up and down. "Really?" he said.
   "Oh, yes. Exclusively. Ever since I was a boy."
   Rincewind's expression was one of acute puzzlement.
   "In that case," he began, in the manner of one talking to a child, "wouldn't it have been better... you know, more sensible... if you'd just got on with..."
   "What?" said da Quirm.
   "Oh, never mind," said Rincewind. "I'll tell you what though," he added, "I think, in order to prevent you getting, you know, bored, we should present you with this wonderful talking parrot." He made a swift grab, while keeping his thumbs firmly out of harm's way. "It's a jungle fowl," he said. "Cruel to subject it to city life, isn't it?"
   "I was born in a cage, you raving wossname!" screamed the parrot. Rincewind faced it, nose to beak.
   "It's that or fricassee time," he said. The parrot opened its beak to bite his nose, saw his expression, and thought better of it.
   "Polly want a biscuit," it managed, adding, sotto voce, "wossnamewossnamewossname."
   "A dear little bird of my very own," said da Quirm. "I shall look after it."
   "wossnamewossname."
   They reached the jungle. A few minutes later the Luggage trotted after them.

   It was noon in the kingdom of Tezuma.
   From inside the main pyramid came the sounds of a very large statue being dismantled.
   The priests sat around thoughtfully. Occasionally one of them stood up and made a short speech.
   It was clear that points were being made. For example, how the economics of the kingdom depended on a buoyant obsidian knife industry, how the enslaved neighbouring kingdoms had come to rely on the smack of firm government, and incidentally on the hack, slash and disembowelling of firm government as well, and on the terrible fate that awaited any people who didn't have gods. Godless people might get up to anything, they might turn against the fine old traditions of thrift and non-self-sacrifice that had made the kingdom what it was today, they might start wondering why, if they didn't have a god, they needed all these priests, anything.
      The point was well put by Mazuma, the high priest, when he said: "[Squashed-figure-with-broken-nose, jaguar claw, three feathers, stylised spiny anteater]."
   After a while a vote was taken.
   By nightfall, the kingdom's leading stonemasons were at work on a new statue.
   It was basically oblong, with lots of legs.

   The Demon King drummed his fingers on his desk. It wasn't that he was unhappy about the fate of Quezovercoatl, who would now have to spend several centuries in one of the nether hells while he grew a new corporeal body. Serve him right, the ghastly little imp. Nor was it the broad trend of events on the pyramid. After all, the whole point of the wish business was to see to it that what the client got was exactly what he asked for and exactly what he didn't really want.
   It was just that he didn't feel in control of things.
   Which was of course ridiculous. If the best came to the best he could always materialise and sort things out personally. But he liked people to believe that all the bad things happening to them were just fate and destiny. It was one of the few things that cheered him up.
   He turned back to the mirror. After a while he had to adjust the temporal control.

   One minute the breathless, humid jungles of Klatch, the next...
   "I thought we were going back to my room," Eric complained.
   "I thought that, too," said Rincewind, shouting to be heard over the rumbling.
   "Snap your fingers again, demon."
   "Not on your life! There's plenty of places worse than this!"
   "But it's all hot and dark."
   Rincewind had to concede that. It was also shaking and noisy. When his eyes grew used to the blackness he could make out a few spots of light here and there, whose dim radiance suggested that they were inside something like a boat. There was a definite feel of carpentry about everything, and a powerful smell of wood shavings and glue. If it was a boat, then it was having an awfully painful launching down a slipway greased with rocks.
   A jolt slung him heavily against a bulkhead.
   "I must say," complained Eric, "if this is where the most beautiful woman lives I don't think much of her choice of boodwah. You'd think she'd put a few cushions or something around the place."
   "Boodwah?" said Rincewind.
   "She's bound to have one," said Eric smugly. "I've read about 'em. She reclines on it."
   "Tell me," said Rincewind, "have you ever felt the need to have a cold bath and a brisk run around the playing fields?"
   "Never."
   "It could be worth a try."
   The rumbling stopped abruptly.
   There was a distant clanging noise, such as might be made by a pair of great big gates being shut. Rincewind thought he heard some voices fading into the distance, and a chuckle. It wasn't a particularly pleasant chuckle, it was more of a snigger, and it boded no good for someone. Rincewind had a pretty good idea who.
   He'd stopped wondering how he'd come to be here, wherever it was. Malign forces, that was probably it. At least nothing particularly dreadful was happening to him right now. Probably it was only a matter of time.
   He groped around a bit until his fingers encountered what turned out to be, following an inspection by the light of the nearest knot-hole, a rope ladder. Further probing at one end of the hull, or whatever it was, brought him in contact with a small, round hatchway. It was bolted on the inside.
   He crawled back to Eric.
   "There's a door," he whispered.
   "Where does it go?"
   "It stays where it is, I think," said Rincewind.
   "find out where it leads to, demon!"
   "Could be a bad idea," said Rincewind cautiously.
   "Get on with it!"
   Rincewind crawled gloomily to the hatch and grasped the bolt.
   The hatch creaked open.
   Down below - quite a long way below - there were damp cobblestones, across which a breeze was driving a few shards of morning mist. With a little sigh, Rincewind unrolled the ladder.
   Two minutes later they were standing in the gloom of what appeared to be a large plaza. A few buildings showed through the mist.
   "Where are we?" said Eric.
   "Search me."
   "You don't know?"
   "Not a clue," said Rincewind.
   Eric glared at the mist-shrouded architecture. "Fat chance of finding the most beautiful woman in the world in a dump like this," he said.
   It occurred to Rincewind to see what they had just climbed out of. He looked up.
   Above them - a long way above them - and supported on four massive legs, which ran down to a huge wheeled platform, there was undoubtedly a huge wooden horse. More correctly, the rear of a huge wooden horse.
   The builder could have put the exit hatch in a more dignified place, but for humorous reasons of his own had apparently decided not to.
   "Er," said Rincewind.
   Someone coughed.
   He looked down.
   The evaporating mists now revealed a broad circle of armed men, many of them grinning and all of them carrying mass-produced, soulless but above all sharp long spears.
   "Ah," said Rincewind.
   He looked back at the hatchway. It said it all, really.

   "The only thing I don't understand," said the captain of the guard, "is: why two of you? We were expecting maybe a hundred."
   He leaned back on his stool, his great plumed helmet in his lap, a pleased smile on his face.
   "Honestly, you Ephebian!" he said. Talk about laugh! You must think we was born yesterday! All night nothing but sawing and hammering, the next thing there's a damn great wooden horse outside the gates, so I think, that's funny, a bloody great wooden horse with airholes. That's the kind of little detail I notice, see. Airholes. So I muster all the lads and we nips out extra early and drag it in the gates, as per expectations, and then we bides quiet, like, around it, waiting to see what it coughs up. In a manner of speaking. Now," he pushed his unshaven face close to Rincewind, "you've got a choice, see? Top seat or bottom seat, it's up to you. I just have to put the word in. You play discus with me and I'll play discus with you."10
   "What seat?" said Rincewind, reeling from the gusts of garlic.
   "It's the war triremes," said the sergeant cheerfully. "Three seats, see, one above the other? Triremes. You get chained to the oars for years, see, and it's all according whether you're in the top seat, up in the fresh air and that, or the bottom seat where" - he grinned - "you're not. So it's down to you, lads. Be co-operative and all you'll need to worry about will be the seagulls. Now. Why only the two of you?"
   He leaned back again.
   "Excuse me," said Eric, "is that Tsort, by any chance?"
   "You wouldn't be trying to make fun of me, would you now, boy? Only there's such a thing as quinquiremes, see? You wouldn't like that at all."
   "No, sir," said Eric. "If you please, sir, I'm just a little lad lead astray by bad companionship."
   "Oh, thank you," said Rincewind bitterly. "You just accidentally drew a lot of occult circles, did you, and - "
   "Sarge! Sarge!" A soldier burst into the guardroom. The sergeant looked up.
   "There's another of 'em, sarge! Right out side the gates this time!"
   The sergeant grinned triumphantly at Rincewind.
   "Oh, that's it, is it?" he said. "You were just the advance party, come to open the gates or whatever. Right. We'll just go and sort your friends out, and we'll be right back." He indicated the captives. "You stay here. If they move, do something horrible to them."
   Rincewind and Eric were left alone with the guard.
   "You know what you've done, don't you," said Eric. "You've only taken us all the way back to the Tsortean Wars! Thousands of Years! We did it at school, the wooden horse, everything! How the beautiful Elenor was kidnapped from the Ephebians - or maybe it was by the Ephebians - and there was this siege to get her back and everything." He paused. "Hey, that means I'm going to meet her." He paused again. "Wow!" he said.
   Rincewind looked around the room. It didn't look ancient, but then it wouldn't, because it wasn't, yet. Everywhere in time was now, once you were there, or then. He tried to remember what little he knew of classical history, but it was just a confusion of battles, one-eyed giants and women launching thousands of ships with their faces.
   "Don't you see?" hissed Eric, his glasses aglow. "They must have brought the horse in before the soldiers had hidden in it! We know what's going to happen! We could make a fortune!"
   "How, exactly?"
   "Well..." The boy hesitated. "We could bet on horses, sort of thing."
   "Good idea," said Rincewind.
   "Yes, and -"
   "All we've got to do is escape, then find out if they have horse races here, and then really try hard to remember the names of the horses that won races in Tsort thousands of years ago."
   They went back to looking glumly at the floor. That was the thing about time travel. You were never ready for it. About the only thing he could hope for, Rincewind decided, was finding da Quirm's Fountain of Youth and managing to stay alive for a few thousand years so he'd be ready to kill his own grandfather, which was the only aspect of time travel that had ever remotely appealed to him. He had always felt that his ancestors had it coming to them.
   Funny thing, though. He could remember the famous wooden horse, which had been used to trick a way into the fortified city. He didn't remember anything about there being two of them. There was something inevitable about the next thought that turned up.
   "Excuse me," he said to the guard. "This, er, this second wooden thing outside the gate... it's probably not a horse, I expect?"
   "Well, of course you'd know that, wouldn't you?" said the guard. "You're spies."
   "I bet it's more oblong and sort of smaller?" said Rincewind, his face a picture of innocent enquiry.
   "You bet. Pretty unimaginative bastards, aren't you?"
   "I see." Rincewind folded his hands on his lap.
   "Try to escape," said the guard. "Go on, just try it. You try it and see what happens."
   "I expect your colleagues will be bringing it into the city," Rincewind went on.
   "They might do," the guard conceded.
   Eric began to giggle.
   It had just begun to dawn on the guard that there was a lot of shouting going on in the distance. Someone tried to blow a bugle, but the notes gurgled into silence after a few bars.
   "Bit of a fight going on out there, by the sound of it," said Rincewind. "People winning their spurs, doing heroic deeds of valour, being noticed by superior officers, that sort of thing. And here's you hanging around in here with us."
   "I've got to stick to my post," said the guard.
   "Exactly the right attitude," said Rincewind. "Never mind about everyone else out there fighting valiantly to defend their city and womenfolk against the foe. You stop in here and guard us. That's the spirit. They'll probably put up a statue to you in the city square, if there's one left. `He did his duty,` they'll write on it."
   The soldier appeared to think about this, and while he was doing so there was a terrible splintering creak from the direction of the main gates.
   "Look," he said desperately, "if I just pop out for a moment..."
   "Don't you worry about us," said Rincewind encouragingly. "It's not even as if we're armed."
   "Right," said the soldier. "Thanks."
   He gave Rincewind a worried smile and hurried off in the direction of the noise. Eric looked at Rincewind with something like admiration.
   "That was actually quite amazing," he said.
   "Going to go a long way, that lad," said Rincewind. "A sound military thinker if ever I saw one. Come on. Let's run away."
   "Where to?"
   Rincewind sighed. He'd tried to make his basic philosophy clear time and again, and people never got the message.
   "Don't you worry about to," he said. "In my experience that always takes care of itself. The important word is away."

   The captain raised his head cautiously over the barricade, and snarled.
   "It's just a box, sergeant," he snapped. "It's not even as if it could hold one or two men."
   "Beg pardon, sir," said the sergeant, and his face was the face of a man whose world has changed a lot in a few short minutes. "It holds at least four, sir. Corporal Disuse and his squad, sir. I sent them out to open it sir."
   "Are you drunk, sergeant?"
   "Not yet, sir," said the sergeant, with feeling.
   "Little boxes don't eat people, sergeant."
   "After that it got angry, sir. You can see what it did to the gates."
   The captain peered over the broken timbers again.
   "I suppose it grew legs and walked over there, did it?" he said sarcastically.
   The sergeant broke into a relieved grin. At last they seemed to be on the same wavelength.
   "Got it in one, sir," he said. "Legs. Hundreds of the little bleeders, sir."
   The captain glared at him. The sergeant put on the poker face which has been handed down from NCO to NCO ever since one protoamphibian told another, lower-ranking protoamphibian to muster a squad of newts and Take That Beach. The captain was eighteen and fresh from the academy, where he had passed with flying colours in such subjects as Classical Tactics, Valedictory Odes and Military Grammar. The sergeant was fifty-five, and instead of an education he had spent about forty years attacking or being attacked by harpies, humans, cyclopses, furies and horrible things on legs. He felt put upon.
   "Well, I'm going to have a look at it, sergeant - "
   "- not a good plan, sir, if I may - "
   "- and after I've had a look at it, sergeant, there is going to be trouble."
   The sergeant threw him a salute. "Right you are, sir," he predicted.
   The captain snorted and climbed over the barricade towards the box which sat, silent and unmoving, in its circle of devastation. The sergeant, meanwhile, slid into a sitting position behind the stoutest timber he could find and, with determination, pulled his helmet down hard over his ears.

   Rincewind crept through the streets of the city, with Eric tagging along behind.
   "Are we going to find Elenor?" the boy said.
   "No," said Rincewind firmly. "What we're going to do is, we're going to find another way out. And we're going to go out through it."
   "That's not fair!"
   "She's thousands of years older that you! I mean attraction of the mature woman, all right, but it'd never work out."
   "I demand that you take me to her," wailed Eric. "Avaunt!"
   Rincewind stopped so sharply that Eric walked into him.
   "Listen," he said. "We're in the middle of the most fatuous war there has ever been, any minute now thousands of warriors will be locked in mortal combat, and you want me to go and find this over-rated female and say, my friend wants to know if you'll go out with him. Well, I won't." Rincewind stalked up to another gateway in the city wall; it was smaller that the main one, didn't have any guards, and had a wicket gate in it. Rincewind slid back the bolts.
   "This isn't anything to do with us," he said. "We haven't even been born yet, we're not old enough to fight, it isn't our business and we're not going to do anything more to upset the course of history, all right?"
   He opened the door, which saved the entire Ephebian army a bit of effort. They were just about to knock.

      All day long the noise of battle raged. This was chronicled by later historians, who went on at length about beautiful women being kidnapped, fleets being assembled, wooden animals being constructed, heroes fighting one another, and completely failed to mention the part played by Rincewind, Eric and the Luggage. The Ephebians did notice, however, how enthusiastically the Tsortean soldiery ran towards them... not so much keen to get into battle as very anxious to get away from something else.
   The historians also failed to note another interesting fact about ancient Klatchian warfare, which was that it was still at that stage quite primitive and just between soldiers and hadn't yet been thrown open to the general public. Basically, everyone knew that one side or the other would win, a few unlucky generals would get their heads chopped off, large sums of money would be paid in tribute to the winners, everyone would go home for the harvest and that bloody woman would have to make up her mind whose side she was on, the hussy.
   So Tsortean street life went on more or less as normal, with the citizens stepping around the occasional knots of fighting men or trying to sell them kebabs. Several of the more enterprising ones began to dismantle the wooden horse for souvenirs.
   Rincewind didn't attempt to understand it. He sat down at a street caf\a233 and watched a spirited battle take place between market stalls, so that amid the cries of "Ripe olives!" there were the screams of the wounded and shouts of "Mind your backs please, m\a234l\a233e coming through."
   The hard part was watching the soldiers apologise when they bumped into customers. The even harder part was getting the caf\a233 owner to accept a coin bearing the head of someone whose great-great-great-grand father wasn't born yet. Fortunately, Rincewind was able to persuade the man that the future was another country.
   "And a lemonade for the boy," he added.
   "My parents let me drink wine," said Eric. "I'm allowed one glass."
   "I bet you are," said Rincewind.
   The owner industriously swabbed the tabletop, spreading its coating of dregs and spilt retsina into a thin varnish.
   "Up for the fight, are you?" he said.
   "In a manner of speaking," said Rincewind guardedly.
   "I shouldn't wander about too much," said the owner. "They say a civilian let the Ephebians in - not that I've got anything against the Ephebians, a fine body of men," he added hurriedly, as a knot of soldiery jogged past. "A stranger, they say. That's cheating, using civilians. There's people out looking for him so's they can explain." He made a chopping motion with his hand.
   Rincewind stared at the hand as though hypnotised.
   Eric opened his mouth. Eric screeched and clutched at his shins.
   "Have they got a description?" Rincewind said.
   "Don't think so."
   "Well best of luck to them," said Rincewind, rather more cheerfully.
   "What's up with the lad?"
   "Cramp."
   When the man had gone back behind his counter Eric hissed, "You didn't have to kick me!"
   "You're quite right. It was an entirely voluntary act on my part."
   A heavy hand dropped on to Rincewind`s shoulder. He looked around and up into the face of an Ephebian centurion. A soldier beside him said: "That's the one, sarge. I'd bet a year's salt."
   "who'd of thought it?" said the sergeant. He gave Rincewind an evil grin. "Up we come, chummy. The chief would like a word with you."

   Some talk of Alexander and some of Hercules, of Hector and Lysander and such great names as these. In fact, throughout the history of the multiverse people have said nice things about every cauliflower-eared sword-swinger, at least in their vicinity, on the basis that it was a lot safer that way. It's funny how the people have always respected the kind of commander who comes up with strategies like "I want fifty thousand of you chappies to rush at the enemy", whereas the more thoughtful commanders who say things like "Why don't we build a damn great wooden horse and then nip in at the back date while they're all round the thing waiting for us to come out" are considered only one step above common oiks and not the kind of person you'd lend money to.
   This is because most of the first type of commanders are brave men, whereas cowards make far better strategists.
   Rincewind was dragged before the Ephebian leaders, who had set up a command post in the city's main square so that they could oversee the storming of the central citadel, which loomed over the city on its vertiginous hill. They were not too close, however, because the defenders were dropping rocks.
   They were discussing strategy when Rincewind arrived. The consensus seemed to be that if really large numbers of men were sent to storm the mountain, then enough might survive the rocks to take the citadel. This is essentially the basis of all military thinking.
   Several of the more impressively dressed chieftains glanced up when Rincewind and Eric approached, gave them a look which suggested that maggots were more interesting, and turned away again. The only person who seemed to be pleased to see them -
   - didn't look like a soldier at all. He had the armour, which was tarnished, and he had the helmet, which looked as though its plume had been used as a paintbrush, but he was skinny and had all the military bearing of a weasel. There was something vaguely familiar about his face, though. Rincewind thought it looked quite handsome.
   "Pleased to see them" was only a comparative description. He was the only one who acknowledged their existence.
   He was lounging in a chair and feeding the Luggage with sandwiches.
   "Oh, hallo," he said gloomily. "It's you."
   It was amazing how much information can be crammed in to a couple of words. To achieve the same effect the man could have said: It's been a long night, I'm having to organise everything from wooden horse building to the laundry rota, these idiots are about as much help as a rubber hammer, I never wanted to be here anyway and, on top of all this there's you. Hallo, you.
   He indicated the Luggage, which opened its lid expectantly.
   "This yours?" he said.
   "Sort of," said Rincewind guardedly. "I can't afford to pay for anything it's done, mind you."
   "Funny little thing, isn't it?" said the soldier. "We found it herding fifty Tsorteans into a corner. Why was it doing that, do you think?"
   Rincewind thought quickly. "It has this amazing ability to know when people are thinking about harming me," he said. He glared at the Luggage as one might glare at a sly, evil-tempered and generally reprehensible family pet who, after years of biting visitors, has rolled over on its scabby back and played as Lovable Puppy to impress the bailiffs.
   "Yes?" said the man, without much surprise. "Magic, is it?"
   "Yes."
   "Something in the wood, is it?"
   "Yes."
   "Good job we didn't build the sodding horse out of it, then."
   "Yes."
   "Got into it by magic, did you?"
   "Yes."
   "Thought so." He threw another sandwich at the Luggage. "Where you from?"
   Rincewind decided to come clean. "The future," he said. This didn't have the expected effect. The man just nodded.
   "Oh," he said, and then he said, "Did we win?"
   "Yes."
   "Oh. I suppose you can't remember the results of any horse races?" said the man, without much hope.
   "No."
   "I thought you probably wouldn't. why did you open the gate for us?"
   It occurred to Rincewind that saying it was because he had always been a firm admirer of the Ephebian political position would not, strangely enough, be the right thing to do. He decided to try the truth again. It was a novel approach and worth experimenting with.
   "I was looking for a way out," he said.
   "To run away."
   "Yes."
   "Good man. Only sensible thing, in the circumstances." He noticed Eric, who was staring at the other captains clustered around their table and deep in argument.
   "You, lad," he said. "Want to be a soldier when you grow up?"
   "No, sir."
   The man brightened a bit.
   "That's the stuff," he said.
   "I want to be a eunuch, sir," Eric added.
   Rincewind's head turned as though it was being dragged.
   "Why?" he said, and then came up with the obvious answer at the same as Eric: "Because you get to work in the harem all day long," they chorused slowly.
   The captain coughed.
   "You're not this boy's teacher, are you?" he said.
   "No."
   "Do you think anyone has explained to him - ?"
   "No."
   "Perhaps it would be a good idea if I got one of the centurions to have a word? You'd be amazed at the grasp of language those chaps have got."
   "Do him the power of good, I expect," said Rincewind.
   The soldier picked up his helmet, sighed, nodded at the sergeant and smoothed out the creases in his cloak. It was a grubby cloak.
   "I think I'm expected to tell you off, or something," he said.
   "What for?"
   "Spoiling the war, apparently."
   "Spoiling the war?"
   The soldier sighed. "Come on. Let's go for a stroll. Sergeant - you and a couple of lads, please."
   A stone whistled down from the fort high above them, and shattered.
   "They can hold out for bloody weeks, up there." Said the soldier gloomily, as they walked away with the Luggage padding patiently behind them. "I'm Lavaeolus. Who're you?"
   "He's my demon," said Eric.
   Lavaeolus raised an eyebrow, the closest he ever came to expressing surprise at anything
   "Is he? I suppose it takes all sorts. Any good at getting into places, is he?"
   "He's more the getting-out kind," said Eric.
   "Right," said  Lavaeolus. He stopped beside a building and walked up and down a bit with his hands in his pockets, tapping on the flagstones with the toe of his sandal.
   "Just here, I think, sergeant," he said after a while.
   "Right you are, sir."
   "Look at that lot, will you?" said Lavaeolus, while the sergeant and his men started to lever up the stones. "That bunch around the table. Brave lads, I'll grant you, but look at them. Too busy posing for triumphant statues and making sure the historians spell their names right. Bloody years we've been laying siege to this place. More military, they said. You know, they actually enjoy it? I mean, when all's said and done, who cares? Let's just get it over with and go home, that's what I say."
   "Found it, sir," said the sergeant.
   "Right." Lavaeolus didn't look round. "O-kay." He rubbed his hands together. "Let's sort this out, and then we can get an early night. Would you care to accompany me? Your pet might be useful."
   "What are we going to do?" said Rincewind suspiciously.
   "We're just going to meet some people."
   "Is it dangerous?"
   A stone smashed through the roof of a building nearby.
   "No, not really," said Lavaeolus. "Compared to staying here, I mean. And if the rest to them try to storm the place, you know, in a proper military way - "
   The hole led into a tunnel. The tunnel, after winding a bit, led to stairs. Lavaeolus mooched along it, occasionally kicking bits of fallen masonry as if he had a personal grudge against them.
   "Er," said Rincewind, "where does this lead?"
   "Oh, it's just a secret passageway into the centre of this citadel."
   "You know, I thought it would be something like that," said Rincewind. "I've got an instinct for it, you know. And I expect all the really top Tsorteans will be up there, will they?"
   "I hope so," said Lavaeolus, trudging up the steps.
   "With lots of guards?"
   "Dozens, I imagine."
   "Highly trained, too?"
   Lavaeolus nodded. "The best."
   "And this is where we're going," said Rincewind, determined to explore the full horror of the plan as one probes the site of a rotting tooth.
   "That's right."
   "All six of us."
   "And your box, of course."
   "Oh, yes," said Rincewind, making a face in the darkness.
   The sergeant tapped him gently on the shoulder and leaned forward.
   "Don't you worry about the captain, sir" he said. "He's got the finest military brain on the continent."
   "How do you know? Has anyone ever seen it?" said Rincewind.
   "You see, sir, what it is, he likes to get it over with without anyone getting hurt, sir, especially him. That's why he dreams up things like the horse, sir. And bribing people and that. We got into civvies last night and come in and got drunk in a pub with one of the palace cleaners, see, and found out about this tunnel."
   "Yes, but secret passages!" said Rincewind. "There'll be guards and everything at the other end!"
   "No, sir. They use it to store the cleaning things, sir."
   There was a clang in the darkness ahead of them. Lavaeolus had tripped over a mop.
   "Sergeant?"
   "Sir?"
   "Just open the door, will you?"
   Eric was tugging at Rincewind's robe.
   "What?" said Rincewind testily.
   "You know who Lavaeolus is, don't you?" whispered Eric.
   "Well -"
   "He's Lavaeolus!"
   "Get away?"
   "Don't you know the Classics?"
   "That isn't one of these horse race we're supposed to remember, is it?"
   Eric rolled his eyes. "Lavaeolus was responsible for the fall of Tsort, on account of being so cunning," he said. "And then afterwards it took him ten years to get home and he had all sorts of adventures with temptresses and sirens and sensual witches."
   "Well I can see why you've been studying him. Ten years, eh? Where did he live?"
   "About two hundred miles away," said Eric earnestly.
   "Kept getting lost, did he?"
   "And when he got home he fought his wife's suitors and everything, and his dear dog recognised him and died."
   "Oh, dear."
   "It was the carrying his slippers in its mouth for fifteen years that killed it off."
   "Shame."
   "And you know what, demon? All this hasn't happened yet. We could save him all that trouble!"
   Rincewind thought about this. "We could tell him to get a better navigator, for a start," he said.
   There was a creak. The soldiers had got the door open.
   "Everyone fall in, or whatever the bloody stupid command is," said Lavaeolus. "The magic box to the front, please. No killing anyone unless it's really necessary. Try not to damage things. Right. Forward."
   The door led into a column-lined corridor. There was the distant murmur of voices.
   The troop crept towards the sound until it reached a heavy curtain. Lavaeolus took a deep breath, pushed it aside and stepped forward and launched into a prepared speech.
   "Now, I want to make myself absolutely clear," he said. "I don't want there to be any unpleasantness of any kind, or any shouting for guards and so forth. Or indeed any shouting at all. We will just take the young lady and go home, which is where anyone of any sense ought to be. Otherwise I shall really have to put everyone to the sword, and I hate having to do things like that."
   The audience to this statement did not appear to be impressed. This was because it was a small child on a potty.
   Lavaeolus changed mental gear and went on smoothly: "On the other hand, if you don't tell me where everyone is, I shall ask the sergeant here to give you a really hard smack."
   The child took its thumb out of its mouth. "Mummy is seeing to Cassie," it said. "Are you Mr Beekle?"
   "I don't think so," said Lavaeolus.
   "Mr Beekle is a silly." The child withdrew its thumb and, with the air of one concluding some exhaustive research, added: "Mr Beekle is a poo."
   "Sergeant?"
   "Sir?"
   "Guard this child."
   "Yessir. Corporal?"
   "Sarge?"
   "Take care of the kid."
   "Yes, sarge. Private Archeios?"
   "Yes, corp," said the soldier, his voice gloomy with prescience.
   "See to the sprog."
   Private Archeios looked around. There was only Rincewind and Eric left and, while it was true that a civilian was in every respect the lowest possible rank there was, coming somewhere after the regimental donkey, the expressions on their faces suggested that they weren't about to take any orders.
   Lavaeolus wandered across the room and listened at another curtain.
   "We could tell him all kinds of stuff about his future," hissed Eric. "He had - I mean, he will have - all kinds of things happen to him. Shipwrecks and magic and all his crew turned into animals and stuff like that."
   "Yes. We could say `Walk home`," said Rincewind.
   The curtain swished aside.
   There was a woman there - plump, good-looking in a slightly faded way, wearing a black dress and the beginnings of a moustache. A number of children of varying sizes were trying to hide behind her. Rincewind counted at least seven of them.
   "Who's that?" said Eric.
   "Ahem," said Rincewind. "I rather think it's Elenor of Tsort."
   "Don't be silly," whispered Eric. "She looks like a mum. Elenor was much younger and was all -" His voice gave out and he made several wavy motions with his hand, indicative of the shape of a woman who would probably be unable to keep her balance.
   Rincewind tried not to catch the sergeant's eye.
   "Yes," he said, going a bit red. "Well, you see. Er. You're absolutely right, but well, it's been a long siege, hasn't it, what with one thing and another."
   "I don't see what that's got to do with it," said Eric sternly. "The Classics never said anything about children. They said she spent all her time mooning around the towers of Tsort and pining for her lost love."
   "Well, yes, I expect she did pine a bit," said Rincewind. "Only, you know, you can only pine so much, and it must have been a bit chilly up on those towers."
   "You can catch your death, mooning," nodded the sergeant.
   Lavaeolus watched the woman thoughtfully. Then he bowed.
   "I expect you know why we're here, my lady?" he said.
   "If you touch any of the children I shall scream," said Elenor flatly.
   Once again Lavaeolus showed that along with his guerilla abilities was a marked reluctance to waste a prepared speech once he had it all sorted out in his head.
   "Fair maiden," he began. "We have faced many dangers in order to rescue you and take you back to your loved..." His voice faltered. "...ones. Er. This has all gone terribly wrong, hasn't it?"
   "I can't help it," said Elenor. "The siege seemed to go on for such a long time and King Mausoleum was very kind and I never liked it much in Ephebe anyway -"
   "Where is everyone now? The Tsorteans, I mean. Apart from you."
   "They're all out on the battlements throwing rocks, if you must know."
   Lavaeolus flung up his hands in desperation.
   "Couldn't you, you know, have slipped us a note or something? Or invited us to one of the christenings?"
   "You all seemed to be enjoying yourselves so much," she said.
   Lavaeolus turned and shrugged gloomily. "All right," he said. "Fine. QED. No problem. I wanted to leave home and spend ten years sitting in a swamp with a bunch of meat-headed morons. It wasn't as if I had anything important to do back home, just a little kingdom to rule, that sort of thing. O-kay. Well, then. We might as well be off. I'm sure I don't know how I shall break it to everyone," he said bitterly, "they were having such fun. They'll probably have a bloody great banquet and laugh about it and get drunk, it'd be their style."
   He looked at Rincewind and Eric.
   "You might as well tell me what happens next," he said. "I'm sure you know."
   "Um," said Rincewind.
   "The city burns down," said Eric. "Especially the topless towers. I didn't get to see them," he added sulkily.
   "Who did it? Their lot or our lot?" said Lavaeolus.
   "Your lot, I think," said Eric.
   Lavaeolus sighed. "Sounds like them," he said. He turned to Elenor. "Our lot - that is, my lot - are going to burn down the city," he said. "It sounds very heroic. It's just the kind of thing they go for. It might be a good idea to come with us. Bring the kids. Make it a day out for all the family, why don't you?"
   Eric pulled Rincewind's ear towards his mouth.
   "This is a joke, isn't it?" he said. "She's not really the fair Elenor, you're just having me on?"
   "It's always the same with these hot-blooded types," said Rincewind. "They definitely go downhill at thirty-five."
   "It's the pasta that does it," said the sergeant.
   "But I read where she was the most beautiful -"
   "Ah, well," said the sergeant. "If you're going to go around reading -"
   "The thing is," said Rincewind quickly, "it's what they call dramatic necessity. No-one's going to be interested in a war fought over a, a quite pleasant lady, moderately attractive in a good light. Are they?"
   Eric was nearly in tears.
   "But it said her face launched a thousand ships - "
   "That's what you call a metaphor," said Rincewind.
   "Lying," the sergeant explained, kindly.
   "Anyway, you shouldn't believe everything you read in the classics," Rincewind added. "They never check their facts. They're just out to sell legends."
   Lavaeolus, meanwhile, was deep in argument with Elenor.
   "All right, all right," he said. "Stay here if you like. Why should I care? Come on, you lot. We're going. What are you doing, Private Archeios?"
   "I'm being a horse, sir," explained the soldier.
   "He's Mr poo," said the child, who was wearing Private Archaios' helmet.
   "Well, when you've finished being a horse, find us an oil lamp. I caught my knees a right wallop in that tunnel."

Flames roared over Tsort. The entire hubward sky was red.
   Rincewind and Eric watched from a rock down by the beach.
   "They're not topless towers, anyway," said Eric after a while. "I can see the tops."
   "I think they meant the toppleless towers," Rincewind hazarded, as another one collapsed, red-hot, into the ruins of the city. "And that was wrong, too."
   They watched in silence for a while longer, and the Eric said, "Funny, that. The way you tripped over the Luggage and dropped the lamp and everything."
   "Yes," said Rincewind shortly.
   "Makes you think history is always going to find a way to work itself out."
   "Yes."
   "Good, though, the way your luggage rescued everyone."
   "Yes."
   "Funny to see all those kids riding on its back."
   "Yes."
   "Everyone seems quite pleased about it."
   The opposing armies were, at any rate. No-one was bothered to ask the civilians, whose views on warfare were never reliable. Among the soldiery, at least among the soldiery of a certain rank, there was a lot of back-slapping and telling of anecdotes, jovial exchanging of shields and a general consensus that, what with the fires and sieges and armadas and wooden horses and everything, it had been a jolly good war. The sound of singing echoed across the wine-dark sea.
   "Hark at them," said Lavaeolus, emerging from the gloom around the beached Ephebian ships. "It'll be fifteen choruses of 'The Ball of Philodelphus' next, you mark my words. Lot of idiots with their brains in their jockstraps."
   He sat down on the rock. "Bastards," he said, with feeling.
   "Do you think Elenor will be able to explain it all to her boyfriend?" said Eric.
   "I imagine so," said Lavaeolus. "They usually can."
   "She did get married. And she's got lots of children," said Eric.
   Lavaeolus shrugged. "A moment's wild passion," he said. He gave Rincewind a sharp look.
   "Hey, you, demon," he said. "I'd like a quiet word, if I may."
   He led Rincewind towards the boats, pacing heavily across the damp sand as if there was a lot on weighing on his mind.
   "I'm going home tonight, on the tide," he said. "No sense in hanging about here, what with the war being over and everything."
   "Good idea."
   "If there's one thing I hate, it's sea voyages," said Lavaeolus. He gave the nearest boat a kick. "It's all idiots striding around and shouting, you know? Pull this, lower that, avast the other. And I get seasick, too."
   "It's heights with me," said Rincewind, sympathetically.
   Lavaeolus kicked the boat again, obviously wrestling with some big emotional problem.
   "The thing is," he said, wretchedly. "You wouldn't happen to know if I get home all right, would you?"
   "What?"
   "It's only a few hundred miles, it shouldn't take too long, should it?" said Lavaeolus, radiating anxiety like a lighthouse.
   "Oh." Rincewind looked at the man's face. Ten years, he thought. And all kinds of weird stuff with winged wossnames and sea-monsters. On the other hand, would it do him any good to know?
   "You get home okay," he said. "You're well known for it, in fact. There's whole legends about you going home."
   "Phew." Lavaeolus leaned against a hull, took off his helmet and wiped his forehead. "That's a load off my mind, I'll tell you. I was afraid the gods might have a grudge against me."
   Rincewind said nothing.
   "They get a bit angry if you go around thinking up ideas like wooden horses and tunnels," said Lavaeolus. "they're traditionalists, you know. They prefer people just to hack at one another. I thought, you see, that if I could show people how to get what they wanted more easily they'd stop being so bloody stupid."
   From further along the shoreline came the sound of male voices raised in song:
   " - vestal virgins, Came down from Heliodeliphilodelphiboschromen os, And when the ball was over, There were - "
   "It never works," said Rincewind.
   "It's got to be worth a try, though. Hasn't it?"
   "Oh, yes."
   Lavaeolus slapped him on the back. "Cheer up," he said. "Things can only get better."
   They walked out into the dark breakers  where Lavaeolus' ship was riding at anchor, and Rincewind watched him swim out and climb aboard. After a while the oars were shipped, or unshipped, or whatever they called it when they were stuck through the holes in the sides, and the boat moved slowly out into the bay.
   A few voices floated back over the surf.
   "Point the pointed end that way, sergeant."
   "Aye, aye, sir!"
   "And don't shout. Did I tell you to shout? Why do you all have to shout? Now I'm going downstairs for a lie down."
   Rincewind trudged back up the beach. "The trouble is," he said, "is that things never get better, they just say the same, only more so. But he's going to have enough to worry about."
   Behind him, Eric blew his nose.
   "That was the saddest thing I've ever heard," he said.
   From further along the beach the Ephebian and Tsortean armies were still in full voice around their convivial campfires.
   " - the village harpy she was there - "
   "Come on," said Rincewind. "Let's go home."
   "You know the funny thing about his name?" said Eric, as they strolled along the sand.
   "No. what do you mean?"
   "Lavaeolus means `Rinser of winds`."
   Rincewind looked at him.
   "He's my ancestor?" he said.
   "Who knows?" said Eric.
   "Oh. Gosh." Rincewind thought about this. "Well, I whish I'd told him to avoid getting married. Or visiting Ankh-Morpork."
   "It probably isn't even built yet..."
   Rincewind tried snapping his fingers.
   This time it worked.

   Astfgl sat back. He wondered what did happen to Lavaeolus.
   Gods and demons, being creatures outside of time, don't move in it like bubbles in the stream. Everything happens at the same time for them. This should mean they know everything that is going to happen because, in a sense, it already has. The reason they don't is that reality is a big place with a lot of interesting things going on, and keeping track of all of them is like trying to use a very big video recorder with no freeze button or tape counter. It's usually easier just to wait and see.
   One day he'd have to go and look.
   Right here and now, insofar as the words can be employed about an outside of space and time, matters were not progressing well. Eric seemed marginally more likeable, which wasn't acceptable. He also appeared to have changed the course of history, although this is impossible since the only thing you can do to the course of history is facilitate it.
   What was needed was something climactic. Something really soul-destroying.
   The Demon King realised he was twirling his moustaches.

   The trouble with snapping your fingers is that you never knew what it would lead to...
   Everything around Rincewind was black. It wasn't simply an absence of colour. It was a darkness that flatly denied any possibility that colour might ever have existed.
   His feet weren't touching anything, and he appeared to be floating. There was something else missing. He couldn't quite put his finger on it.
   "Are you there, Eric?" he ventured.
   A clear voice nearby said: "Yes. Are you there, demon?"
   "Ye-ess."
   "Where are we? Are we falling?"
   "I don't think so," said Rincewind, speaking from experience. "There's no rushing wind. You get a rushing wind when you're falling. Also your past life flashes before your eyes, and I haven't seen anything I recognise yet."
   "Rincewind?"
   "Yes?"
   "When I open my mouth no sounds come out."
   "Don't be - " Rincewind hesitated. He wasn't making any sound either. He knew what he was saying, it just wasn't reaching the outside world. But he could hear Eric. Perhaps the words just gave up on his ears and went straight to his brains.
   "It's probably some kind of magic, or something," he said. "There's no air. That's why there no sound. All the little bits of air sort of knock together, like marbles. That's how you get sound, you know."
   "Is it? Gosh."
   "So we're surrounded by absolutely nothing," said Rincewind. "Total nothing." He hesitated. "There's a word for it," he said. "It's what you get when there's nothing left and everything's been used up."
   "Yes. I think it's called the bill," said Eric.
   Rincewind gave this some thought. It sounded about right. "Okay," he said. "The bill. That's where we are. Floating in absolute bill. Total, complete, rock-hard bill."

   Astfgl was going frantic now. He had spells that could find anyone anywhere, anywhen, and they weren't anywhere. One minute he was watching them on the beach, the next... nothing.
   That left only two other places.
   Fortunately he chose the wrong one first.

   "Even some stars would be nice," said Eric.
   "There's something very odd about all this," said Rincewind. "I mean, do you feel cold?"
   "No."
   "Well do you feel warm?"
   "No. I don't feel anything much, really."
   "No hot, no cold, no light, no heat, no air," said Rincewind. "Just bill. How long have we been here?"
   "Don't know. Seems like ages, but..."
   "Aha. I'm not sure there's any time, either. Not what you'd call proper time. Just the kind of time people make up as they go along."
   "Well, I didn't expect to see anybody else here," said a voice by Rincewind's ear.
   It was a slightly put-upon voice, a voice made for complaining in, but at least there was no hint of menace. Rincewind let himself float around.
   A little rat-faced man was sitting cross-legged, watching him with vague suspicion. He had a pencil behind one ear.
   "Ah. Hallo," said Rincewind. "And where is here, exactly?"
   "Nowhere. S'whole point, innit?"
   "Nowhere at all?"
   "Not yet."
   "All right," said Eric. "When is it going to be somewhere?"
   "Hard to say," said the little man. "Looking at the pair of you, and taking one thing with another, metabolic rates and that, I'd say that this place is due to become somewhere in, well, give or take a bit, in about five hundred seconds. "He began to unwrap the pack in his lap. "Fancy a sandwich while we're waiting?"
   "What? Would I - " At this point Rincewind's stomach, aware that if his brain was allowed to make the running it was in danger of losing the initiative, cut in and prompted him to say, "What sort?"
   "Search me. What sort would you like it to be?"
   "Sorry?"
   "Don't mess about. Just say what sort you'd like it to be."
   "Oh?" Rincewind stared at him. "Well, if you've got egg and cress -"
   "Let there be egg and cress, sort of  thing," said the little man. He reached into the package, and proffered a white triangle to Rincewind.
   "Gosh," said Rincewind. "What a coincidence."
   "It should be starting any minute now," said the little man. "Over - not that they've got any proper directions sorted out yet, of course, not them - there."
   "All I can see is darkness," said Eric.
   "No you can't," said the little man, triumphantly. "You're just seeing what there is before the darkness has been installed, sort of thing." He gave the not-yet-darkness a dirty look. "Come on," he said. "Why are we waiting, why-eye are we waiting?"
   "Waiting for what?" said Rincewind.
   "Everything."
   "Everything what?" said Rincewind.
   "Everything. Not everything what. Everything, sort of thing."

   Astfgl peered through the swirling gas clouds. At least he was in the right place. The whole point about the end of the universe was that you couldn't go past it accidentally.
   The last few embers winked out. Time and space collided silently, and collapsed.
   Astfgl coughed. It can get so very lonely, when you're twenty million light years from home.
   "Anyone there?" he said.
   YES.
   The voice was right by his ear. Even demon kings can shiver.
   "Apart from you, I mean," he said. "Have you seen anybody?"
   YES.
   "Who?"
   EVERYONE.
   Astfgl sighed. "I mean anyone recently."
   IT'S BEEN VERY QUIET, said Death.
   "Damn."
      WERE YOU EXPECTING SOMEONE ELSE?
   "I thought there might be someone called Rincewind, but -" Astfgl began.
   Death's eyesockets flared red. THE WIZARD? he said.
   "No, he's a dem -" Astfgl stopped. For what would have been several seconds, had time still existed, he floated in a state of horrible suspicion.
   "A human?" he growled.
   IT IS STRETCHING THE TERM A LITTLE, BUT YOU ARE BROADLY CORRECT.
   "Well I'll be damned!" Astfgl said.
   I BELIEVE YOU ALREADY ARE.
   The Demon King extended a shaking hand. His mounting fury was over-ridding his sense of style; his red silk gloves ripped as the talons unfolded.
   And then, because it's never a good idea to get on the wrong side of anyone with a scythe, Astfgl said, "Sorry you've been troubled," and vanished. Only when he judged himself out of Death's extremely acute hearing did he scream his rage.
   Nothingness uncoiled its interminable length through the draughty spaces at the end of time.
   Death waited. After a while his skeletal fingers began to drum on the handle of his scythe.
   Darkness lapped around him. There wasn't even any infinity any more.
   He attempted to whistle a few snatches of unpopular songs between his teeth, but the sound was simply sucked into nothingness.
   Forever was over. All the sands had fallen. The great race between entropy and energy had been run, and the favourite had been the winner after all.
   Perhaps he ought to sharpen the blade again?
   No.
   Not much point, really.
   Great roils of absolutely nothing stretched into what would have been called the distance, if there had been a space-time reference frame to give words like "distance" any sensible meaning any more.
   There didn't seem to be much to do.
   PERHAPS IT'S TIME TO CALL IT A DAY. He thought.
   Death turned to go but, just as he did so, he heard the faintest of noises. It was to sound what one photon is to light, so weak and feeble that it would have passed entirely unheard in the din of an operating universe.
   It was a tiny piece of matter, popping into existence.
   Death stalked over to the point of arrival and watched carefully.
   It was a paperclip.11
   Well, it was a start.
   There was another pop, which left a small white shirt-button spinning gently in the vacuum.
   Death relaxed a little. Of course, it was going to take some time. There was going to be an interlude before all this got complicated enough to produce gas clouds, galaxies, planets and continents, let alone tiny corkscrew-shaped things wiggling around in slimy pools and wondering whether evolution was worth all the bother of growing fins and legs and things. But it indicated the start of an unstoppable trend.
   All he had to do was be patient, and he was good at that. Pretty soon there'd  be living creatures, developing like mad, running and laughing in the new sunlight. Growing tired. Growing old.
   Death sat back. He could wait.
   Whenever they needed him, he'd be there.

   The Universe came into being.
   Any created-again cosmogonist will tell you that all the interesting stuff happened in the firs couple of minutes, when nothingness bunched together to form space and time and lots of really tiny black holes appeared and so on. After that, they say, it became just a matter of, well, matter. It was basically all over bar the microwave radiation.
   Seen from close by, though, it had a certain gaudy attraction.
   The little man sniffed.
   "Too showy," he said. "You don't need all that noise. It could just as easily have been a Big Hiss, or a bit of music."
   "Could it?" said Rincewind.
   "Yeah, and it looked pretty iffy around the two picosecond mark. Definitely a bit of ropey filling-in. but that's how it goes these days. No craftsmanship. When I was a lad it took days to make a universe. You could take pride in it. Now they just throw it together and it's back on the lorry and away. And, you know what?"
   "No?" said Rincewind weakly.
   "They pinches stuff off the site. They finds someone nearby who wants to expand their universe a bit, next thing you know they've had it away with a bunch of firmament and flogged it for an extension somewhere."
   Rincewind stared at him.
   "Who are you?"
      The man took the pencil from behind his ear and looked reflectively at the space around Rincewind. "I makes things," he said.
   "What sort of things?"
   "What sort of things would you like?"
   "You're the Creator?"
   The little man looked very embarrassed. "Not the. Not the. Just a. I don't contract for the big stuff, the stars, the gas giants, the pulsars and so on. I just specialise in what you might call the bespoke trade." He gave them a look of defiant pride. "I do all my own trees, you know," he confided. "Craftsmanship. Takes years to learn how to make a tree. Even the conifers."
   "Oh," said Rincewind.
   "I don't get someone in to finish them off. No sub-contracting, that's my motto. The buggers always keep you hanging about while they're installing stars or something for someone else. "The little man sighed. "You know, people think it must all be very easy, creating. They think you just have to move on the face of the waters and wave your hands a bit. It's not like that at all."
   "It isn't?"
   The little man scratched his nose again. "You soon run out of ides for snowflakes, for example."
   "Oh."
   "You start thinking it'd be a doddle to sneak in a few identical ones."
   "You do?"
   "You think to yourself, `There's a billion trillion squillion of them, no-one's going to notice`. But that's where professionalism comes in, sort of thing."
   "It does?"
   "Some people" - and here the creator looked sharply at the unformed matter still streaming past - "think it's enough to install a few basic physical formulas and then take the money and run. A billion years later you got leaks all over the sky, black holes the size of your head, and when you pray up to complain there's just a girl on the counter who says she don't know where the boss is. I think people appreciate the personal touch, don't you?"
   "Ah," said Rincewind. "So... when people get struck by lightning... er... it's not just because of all that stuff about electrical discharges and high points and everything... er... you actually mean it?"
   "Oh, not me. I don't run the things. It's a big enough job just building 'em, you can't expect me to operate them as well. There's a load of other universes, you know," he added, a slight note of accusation in his voice. "Got a list of jobs as long as your arm."
   He reached underneath him and produced a large, leatherbound book, which he had apparently been sitting on. It opened with a creak.
   Rincewind felt a tugging at his robe.
   "Look," said Eric. "This isn't really... Him, is it?"
   "He says it is," said Rincewind.
   "What are we doing here?"
   "I don't know."
   The creator glared at him. "A little quiet there, please," he said.
   "But listen," hissed Eric, "if he really is the creator of the world, that sandwich is a religious relic!"
   "Gosh," said Rincewind weakly. He hadn't eaten for ages. He wondered what the penalty was for eating a venerated object. It was probably severe.
   "You could put it in a temple somewhere and millions of people would come to look at it."
   Rincewind cautiously levered up the top slice of bread.
   "It's got no mayonnaise in it," he said. "Will that still count?"
   The creator cleared his throat, and began to read aloud.

   Astfgl surfed across the entropy slope, an angry red spark against the swirls of interspace. He was so angry now that the last vestiges of self-control were slipping away; his jaunty cap with its stylish hornlets had become a mere wisp of crimson dangling from the tip of one of the great coiled ramshorns that framed his skull.
   With a rather sensuous ripping noise the red silk across his back tore open and his wings unfolded.
   They are conventionally represented as leathery, but leather wouldn't survive more than a few seconds in that environment. Besides, it doesn't fold up very well.
   These wings were made of magnetism and shaped space, and spread out until they were a faint curtain against the incandescent firmament and they beat as slowly as the rise of civilisations.
   They still looked batlike, but that was just for the sake of tradition.
   Somewhere around the 29th millennium he was overtaken, quite without noticing, by something small and oblong and probably even angrier than he was.

   Eight spells go to make up the world. Rincewind knew that well enough. He knew that the book which contained them was the Octavo, because it still existed in the library of the Unseen University - currently inside a welded iron box at the bottom of a specially-dug shaft, where its magical radiations could be kept under control.
   Rincewind had wondered how it had all started. He'd imagined a sort of explosion in reverse, with interstellar gases roaring together to form Great A'Tuin, or at least a roll of thunder or something.
   Instead there was a faint, musical twang, and where the Discworld hadn't been, there the Discworld was, as if it had always been hiding somewhere the whole time.
   He also realised that the feeling of falling he had so recently learned to live with was one he was probably going to die with, too. As the world appeared beneath him it brought this aeon's special offer - gravity, available in a choice of strengths from your nearest massive planetary body.
   He said, as so often happens on these occasions, "Aargh."
   The creator, still sitting serenely in mid-air, appeared beside him as he plummeted.
   "Nice clouds, don't you think? Done a good job on the clouds," he said.
   "Aargh." Rincewind repeated.
   "Something the matter?"
   "Aargh."
   "That's humans for you," said the creator. "Always rushing off somewhere." He leaned closer. "It's not up to me, of course, but I've often wondered what it is that goes through your heads."
   "It's going to be my feet in a minute!" screamed Rincewind.
   Eric, falling alongside him, tugged at his ankle. "That's not the way to talk to the creator of the universe!" he shouted. "Just tell him to do something, make the ground soft or something!"
   "O, I dunno if I could do that," said the creator. "It's causality regulations. I'd have the Inspector down on me like a ton of, a ton of, a ton of weight," he added. "I could probably knock you up a really spongy bog. Or quicksand's very popular at the moment. I could do you a complete quicksand with marsh and swamp en suite, no problem."
   "!" said Rincewind.
   "You're going to have to speak up a bit, I'm sorry. Wait a moment."
   There was another harmonious twanging noise.
   When Rincewind opened his eyes he was standing on a beach. So was Eric. The creator floated nearby.
   There was no rushing wind. He hadn't go so much as a bruise.
   "I just wedged a thingy in the velocities and positions," said the creator, noticing his expression. "Now: what was it you were saying?"
   "I rather wanted to stop plunging to my death," said Rincewind.
   "Oh. Good. Glad that's sorted out, then." The creator looked around distractedly. "You haven't seen my book around, have you? I thought I had it in my hand when I started." He sighed. "Lose me own head next. I done a whole world once and completely left out the fingles. Not one of the buggers. Couldn't get 'em at the time, told myself I could nip back when they were in stock, completely forgot. Imagine that. No-one spotted it, of course, because obviously they just evolved there and they didn't know there ought to be fingles, but it was definitely causing them deep, you know, psychological problems. Deep down inside they could tell there was something missing, sort of thing."
   The creator pulled himself together.
   "Anyway, I can't hang about all day," he said. "Like I said, I've got a lot of jobs on."
   "Lots?" said Eric. "I thought there was only one."
   "Oh, no. There's masses of them," said the creator, beginning to fade away. "That's quantum mechanics for you, see. You don't do it once and have done. No, they keep on branching off. Multiple choice they call it, it's like painting the - painting the - painting something very big that you have to keep on painting, sort of thing. It's all very well saying you just have to change one little detail, but which one, that's the real bugger. Well, nice to have met you. If you need any extra work, you know, an extra moon or something - "
   "Hey!"
   The creator reappeared, his eyebrows raised in polite surprise.
   "What happens now?" said Rincewind.
   "Now? Well, I imagine there'll be some gods along soon. They don't wait long to move in, you know. Like flies around a - flies around a - like flies. They tend to be a bit high-spirited to start with, but they soon settle down. I suppose they take care of all the people, ekcetra." The creator leaned forward. "I've never been good at doing people. Never seem to get the arms and legs right." He vanished.
   They waited.
   "I think he's really gone this time," said Eric, after a while. "What a nice man."
   "You certainly understand a lot more about why the world is like it is after talking to him," said Rincewind.
   "What're quantum mechanics?"
   "I don't know. People who repair quantums, I suppose."
   Rincewind looked at the egg and cress sandwich, still in his hand. There was still no mayonnaise in it, and the bread was soggy, but it would be thousands of years before there was another one. There had to be the dawn of agriculture, the domestication of animals, the evolution of the breadknife from its primitive flint ancestry, the development of dairy technology - and, if there was any desire to make a proper job of it, the cultivation of olive trees, pepper plants, salt pans, vinegar fermentation processes and the techniques of elementary food chemistry - before the world would see another on like it. It was unique, a little white triangle full of anachronisms, lost and all alone in an unfriendly world,
   He bit it anyway. It wasn't very nice.
   "What I don't understand," said Eric, "is why we are here."
   "I take it that isn't a philosophical question," said Rincewind, "I take it you mean: why are we here at the dawn of creation on this beach which has hardly been used?"
   "Yes. That's what I meant."
   Rincewind sat down on a rock and sighed. "I think it's pretty obvious, isn't it?" he said. "You wanted to live forever."
   "I didn't say anything about travelling in time," said Eric. "I was very clear about it so there'd be no tricks."
   "There isn't a trick. The wish is trying to be helpful. I mean, it's pretty obvious when you think about it. `Forever` means the entire span of space and time. Forever. For Ever. See?"
   "You mean you have to sort of start at Square One?"
   "Precisely."
   "But that's no good! It's going to be years before there's anyone else around!"
   "Centuries," corrected Rincewind gloomily. "Millennia. Iains. And then there's going to be all kinds of wars and monsters and stuff. Most of history is pretty appalling, when you look hard at it. Or even not very hard."
   "But what I meant was, I just wanted to go on living for ever from now," said Eric frantically. "I mean, from then. I mean, look at this place. No girls. No people. Nothing to do on Saturday nights..."
   "It won't even have any Saturday nights for thousands of years," said Rincewind. "Just nights."
   "You must take me back at once," said Eric. "I order it. Avaunt!"
   "You say that one more time and I will give you a thick ear," said Rincewind.
   "But all you have to do is snap your fingers!"
   "It won't work. You've had your three wishes. Sorry."
   "What shall I do?"
   "Well, if you see anything crawl out of the sea and try to breathe, you could try telling it not to bother."
   "You think this is funny, don't you?"
   "It is rather amusing, since you mention it," said Rincewind, his face expressionless.
   "The joke's going to be wearing pretty thin over the years, then," said Eric.
   "What?"
   "Well, you're not going to go anywhere, are you? You'll have to stay with me."
   "Nonsense, I'll - " Rincewind looked around desperately. I'll what? He thought.
   The waves rolled peacefully up the beach, not very strongly at the moment because they were still feeling their way. The first high tide was coming in, cautiously. There was no tideline, no streaky line of old seaweed and shells to give it some idea of what was expected of it. The air had the clean, fresh smell of air that has yet to know the effusions of a forest floor or the ins and outs of a ruminant's digestive system.
   Rincewind had grown up in Ankh-Morpork. He liked air that had been around a bit, had got to know people, had been lived in.
   "We've got to get back," he said urgently.
   "That's what I've been saying," said Eric, with strained patience.
   Rincewind took another bite of the sandwich. He'd looked death in the face many times, or more precisely Death had looked him in the back of his rapidly-retreating head many times, and suddenly the prospect of living forever didn't appeal. There were of course great questions he might learn the answer to, such as how life evolved and all the rest of it, but looked at as a way of spending all your spare time for the next infinity it wasn't a patch on a quiet evening strolling through the streets of Ankh.
   Still, he'd acquired an ancestor. That was something. Not everyone had an ancestor. What would his ancestor have done in a situation like this?
   He wouldn't have been here.
   Well, yes, of course, but apart from that, he would have - he would have used his fine military mind to consider the tools available, that's what he would have done.
   He had: item, one half-eaten egg and cress sandwich. No help there. He threw it away.
   He had: item, himself. He drew a tick in the sand. He wasn't certain what use he could be, but he could come back to that later.
   He had: item, Eric. Thirteen-year-old demonologist and acne attack ground zero.
   That seemed to be about it.
   He stared at the clean, fresh sand for a while, doodling in it.
   Then he said, quietly: "Eric. Come here a moment..."

   The waves were a lot stronger now. They had really got the hang of the tide thing, and were venturing a little ebb and flow.
   Astfgl materialised in a puff of blue smoke.
   "Aha!" he said, but this fell rather flat because there was no-one to hear it.
   He looked down. There were footprints in the sand. Hundreds of them. They ran backwards and forwards, as if something had been frantically searching, and then vanished.
   He leaned nearer. It was hard to make out, what with all the footprints and the effects of the wind and the tide, but just on the edge of the encroaching surf were the unmistakable signs of a magic circle.
   Astfgl said a swearword that fused the sand around him into glass, and vanished.
   The tide got on with things. Further down the beach the last surge poured into a hollow in the rocks, and the new sun beamed down on the soaking remains of a half-eaten egg and cress sandwich. Tidal action turned it over. Thousands of bacteria suddenly found themselves in the midst of a taste explosion, and started to breed like mad.
   If only there had been some mayonnaise, life might have turned out a whole lot different. More piquant, and perhaps with a little extra cream in it.

   Travelling by magic always had major drawbacks. There was the feeling that your stomach was lagging behind. And your mind filled up with terror because the destination was always a little uncertain. It wasn't that you could come out anywhere. "Anywhere" represented a very restricted range of choices compared to the kind of places magic could transport you to. The actual travelling was easy. It was achieving a destination which, for example, allowed you to survive in all four dimensions at once that took the real effort.
   In fact the scope for error was so huge it seemed something of an anti-climax to emerge in a fairly ordinary, sandy-floored cavern.
   It contained, on the far wall, a door.
   There was a forbidding door. It looked as though its designer had studied all the cell doors he could find and had then gone away and produced a version for, as it were, full visual orchestra. It was more of a portal. Some ancient and probably fearful warning was etched over its crumbling arch, but it was destined to remain unread because over it someone else had pasted a bright red-and-white notice which read: "You Don't Have To Be `Damned` To Work Here, But It Helps!!!"
   Rincewind squinted up at the notice.
   "Of course I can read it," he said. "I just don't happen to believe it."
   "Multiple exclamation marks," he went on, shaking his head, "are a sure sign of a diseased mind."
   He looked behind him. The glowing outlines of Eric's magic circle faded and winked out.
   "I'm not being picky, you understand," he said. "It's just that I thought you said you could get us back to Ankh. This isn't Ankh. I can tell by the little details, like the flickering red shadows and the distant screaming. In Ankh the screaming is usually much closer," he added.
   "I think I did very well to get it to work at all," said Eric, bridling. "You're not supposed to be able to run magic circles in reverse. In theory it means you stay in the circle and reality moves around you. I think I did very well. You see," he added, his voice suddenly vibrating with enthusiasm, "if you rewrite the source codex and, this is the difficult bit, you route it through a high-level - "
   "Yes, yes, very clever, what will you people think of next," said Rincewind. "The only thing is, we're, I think it's quite possible that we're in Hell."
   "Oh?"
   Eric's lack of reaction made Rincewind curious.
   "You know," he added. "The place with all the demons in it?"
   "Oh?"
   "Not a good place to be, it's generally felt," said Rincewind.
   Rincewind thought about this. He wasn't, when you got right down to it, quite sure what it was that demons did to you. But he did know what humans did to you, and after a lifetime in Ankh-Morpork this place could turn out to be an improvement. Warmer, at any rate.
   He looked at the door-knocker. It was black and horrible, but that didn't matter because it was also tied up so that it couldn't be used. Beside it, with all the signs of being installed recently by someone who didn't know what they were doing and didn't want to do it, was a button set into the splintered woodwork. Rincewind gave it an experimental prod.
   The sound it produced might once have been a popular tune, possibly even one written by a skilled composer to whom had been vouchsafed, for a brief ecstatic moment, the music of the spheres. Now, however, it just went bing-BONG-ding-DONG.
   And it would be a lazy use of language to say that the thing that answered the door was a nightmare. Nightmares are usually rather daft things and it's very hard to explain to a listener what was so dreadful about your socks coming alive or giant carrots jumping out of hedgerows. This thing was the kind of terrifying thing that could only be created by someone sitting down and thinking horrible thoughts very clearly. It had more tentacles than legs, but fewer arms than heads.
   It also had a badge.
   The badge said: "My name is Urglefloggah, Spawn of the Pit and Loathly Guardian of the Dread Portal: How May I Help You?"
   It was not very happy about this.
   "Yes?" it rasped.
   Rincewind was still reading the badge.
   "How may you help us?" he said, aghast.
   Urglefloggah, who bore a certain resemblance to the late Quezovercoatl, ground some of its teeth.
   "`Hi... there`," it intoned, in the manner of one who has had the script patiently explained to him by someone with a red-hot branding iron. "`My name is Urglefloggah, Spawn of the Pit, and I am your host for today... May I be the first to welcome you to our luxuriously-appointed -`"
      "Hang on a moment," said Rincewind.
   "`-chosen for your convenience -- `," Urglefloggah rumbled.
   "There's something not right here," said Rincewind.
   "`- full regard for the wishes of YOU, the consumer -`," the demon continued stoically.
   "Excuse me," said Rincewind.
   "`- as pleasurable as possible`," said Urglefloggah. It made a noise like a sigh of relief, from somewhere deep in its mandibles. Now it appeared listening for the first time. "Yes? What?" it said.
   "Where are we?" said Rincewind.
   Various mouths beamed. "Quail, mortals!"
   "What? We're in a bird?"
   "Grovel and cower, mortals!" the demon corrected itself, "for you are condemned to everlast - " It paused, and gave a little whimper.
   "There will be a brief period of corrective therapy," it corrected itself again, spitting out each word, "which we hope to make as instructive and enjoyable as possible, with due regard to all the rights of YOU, the customer."
   It eyed Rincewind with several eyes. "Dreadful, isn't it?" it said, in a more normal voice. "Don't blame me. If it was up to me it would be the old burning thingys up the whatsit, toot sweet."
   "This is hell, isn't it," said Eric. "I've seen pictures."
   "You're right there," said the demon mournfully. It sat down, or at least folded itself in some complicated way. "Personal service, that's what it used to be. People used to feel that we were taking an interest, that they weren't just numbers but, well, victims. We had a tradition of service. Fat lot he cares. But what am I telling you my troubles for? It's not as if you haven't got plenty of your own, what with being dead and being here. You're not musicians, are you?"
   "Actually we're not even dea - " Rincewind began. The demon ignored him, but got up and began to plod ponderously down the dank corridor, beckoning them to follow.
   "You'd really hate it here if you was musicians. Hate it more, I mean. The walls play music all day long, well, he calls it music, I've got nothing against a good tune, mark you, something to scream along with, but this isn't it, I mean, I heard where we're supposed to all the best tunes, so why've we got all this stuff that sounds like someone turned on the piano and then walked away and left it?"
   "In point of fact -"
   "And then there's the potted plants. Don't get me wrong, I like to see a bit of green around the place. Only some of the lads says these plants aren't real but what I say is, they must be, no-one in their right mind would make a plant that looks like dark green leather and smells like a dead sloth. He says it gives the place a friendly and open aspect. Friendly and open aspect! I've seen keen gardeners break down and cry. I'm telling you, they said it made everything we did to them afterwards seem like an improvement."
   "Dead is not what we -" said Rincewind, trying to hammer the words into a gap in the things endless monotone, but he was too late.
   "The coffee machine, now, the coffee machine's a good one, I'll grant you. We only used to drown people in lakes of cat's pee, wee didn't make them buy it by the cup."
   "We're not dead!" Eric shouted.
   Urglefloggah came to a quivering halt.
   "Of course you're dead," it said. "Else you wouldn't be here. They wouldn't last five minutes." It opened several of its mouths, showing a choice of fangs. "Hur hur," it added. "If I was to catch any live people down here -"
   Not for nothing had Rincewind survived for years in the paranoid complexities of Unseen University. He felt almost at home. His reflexes operated with incredible precision.
   "You mean you weren't told?" he said.
   It was hard to see if Urglefloggah's expression changed, if only because it was hard to know what part of it was expression, but it definitely projected a familiar air of sudden and resentful uncertainty.
   "Told what?" it said.
   Rincewind looked at Eric. "You'd think they'd tell people, wouldn't you?"
   "Tell them wh - argarg," said Eric, clutching his ankle.
   "That's modern management for you," said Rincewind, his face radiating angry concern. "They go ahead and make all these changes, all these new arrangements, and do they consult the very people who form the backbone -"
   "- exoskeleton -" corrected the demon.
   "- or other calcareous or chitinous structure, of the organisation?" Rincewind finished smoothly. He waited for what he knew would have to come.
   "Not them," said Urglefloggah. "Too busy sticking up notices, they are."
   "I think that's pretty disgusting," said Rincewind.
   "D'you know, said Urglefloggah, "they wouldn't let me on the Club 18,000 - 30,000 holiday? Said I was too old. Said I would spoil the fun."
   "What's the netherworld coming to?" said Rincewind sympathetically.
   "They never come down here, you know," said the demon, sagging a bit. "They never tell me anything. Oh yes, very important, only keeping the bloody gate, most important I don't think!"
   "Look," said Rincewind. "You wouldn't like me to have a word, would you?"
   "Down here all hours, seeing 'em in -"
   "Perhaps if we spoke to someone?" said Rincewind.
   The demon sniffed, from several noses at once.
   "Would you?" it said.
   "Be happy to," said Rincewind.
   Urglefloggah brightened a little, but not too much, just in case. "Can't do any harm, can it?" it said.
   Rincewind steeled himself and patted the thing on what he hoped fervently was its back.
   "Don't you worry about it," he said.
   "That's very kind of you."
   Rincewind looked across the shuddering heap at Eric.
   "We'd better go," he said. "So we're not late for our appointment." He made frantic signals over the demon's head.
   Eric grinned. "Yeah, right, appointment," he said. They walked up the wide passage.
   Eric started to giggle hysterically.
   "This is where we run, right?" he said.
   "This is where we walk," said Rincewind. "Just walk. The important ting is to act nonchalant. The important thing is to get the timing right."
   He looked at Eric.
   Eric looked at him.
   Behind them, Urglefloggah made a kind of I've-just-worked-it-out noise.
   "About now?" said Eric.
   "About now I think would do it, yes."
   They ran.