The tiny moon orbiting the disc slowly spun through its never-ending cycle

Cognizant

The tiny moon orbiting the disc slowly spun through its never-ending cycle. The night was darker than usual the moonlight barely penetrated the vast cloud cover. Over the country of Lancre all was quiet. The villagers were all sleeping and the creatures scurried about their business not making a sound. Not even a coven was present on the moors and mountainsides. Now that was unusual. But now, above the cloud cover in the stillness of the night was something even more unusual. Across the moon's light a silhouette flew, briefly. The dragon beat it's wings, flew past the moon again, purely for dramatic reasons, and swooped below the clouds. The ground below whizzed past, patchworks of fields, stitching of rivers and stains of houses.  Above the hills stood the unstable castle of Lancre surrounded by the deep treacherous moat. The dragon flew past the towers. There was an almighty crash, a funny beating noise, a couple of bangs and a sad little splosh.  At the bottom of the moat, the dragon sat up and shook his head. He was sure that tower wasn't there before. In fact he was sure he wasn't there before.

******

'Would you bloody well let go?!'

        

           'Now, now Nanny,' tutted Agnes, 'you know you shouldn't swear at patients.'

          ' I said she could hold my hand for reassurance not bloody break it!' replied Nanny over the din.

          The pregnant mother lay in the straw, clutching Nanny Ogg and chewing on a pencil. The three women shared the stable with a flock of chickens, two goats and a donkey that were all standing around watching with interest.

          'Just try and distract her,' called Nanny Ogg.

Agnes looked lost for a minute as she thought of a good conversation.

          'Err, well, so you don't know who the father is?'

Nanny Ogg gave her a stare that could have broken down doors.

          'Brilliant,' she muttered and went to help the mother who explained to her through gasps for air.

' There was no father,' she faltered, ' I just found out, just like that.'

'It's alright,' said Nanny Ogg soothingly, ' you don't need to make excuses to us, don't worry yourself about it,'

'But t-,' she started,

'Anyway, lets sort you out, here, why don't you hold Agnes hand a minute?'

          The whole village celebrated the new birth and the mother was given time to rest as the baby was handed around the woman who all made funny 'cooing' noises in hope the baby would laugh at them and no-one else. His mother had named him Ritcsh and he was instantly adored. By the wayside the three witches stared at the gathering of people. Granny Weatherwax eyed the child suspiciously,

          'You say she doesn't know who the father is?' she murmured to Nanny.

          'No, she didn't seem to have a clue,'

          'Well we've either got a bad liar or she's telling the truth,'

          Granny turned to Nanny,

'o.k. Go on then, I can see you've been itching to do it for ages, just don't make too much of a fuss.'

          Nanny Ogg whooped with delight and went to pinch the little cherubs fat little cheeks. Granny sighed, there was definitely something wrong with the lad, she could feel it in her bones.

         

          ' I can feel it in my bones, I don't need this bloody calculator to tell me things you know lad,'

          Ponder Stibbons stared at Archchancellor Ridcully with a look of disgust,

          'It's not a calculator, it's a very sophisticated computer, called Hex by the way, and it detected a massive surge of raw magic over a million thaums powerful about four hours ago.'

          Ridcully stared back,

          'I know,'

          Ponder sighed, trying to get one over the Archchancellor was like trying to eat soup with chopsticks. Though not for lack of trying,

          ' Of course, of course, but the thing is, where did the magic come from and why did the magic come from?'

          Ponder went over the speech in his head,

          'I meant why did it appear from? I mean why did it came? O sod it, you know what I mean,'

          'Yes Mr.Stibbons, but, I'm afraid I don't have the answer to those questions, but, I do know what we are going to do about them,'

          ' And that is?'

          'Nothing, we always end up finding out one way or another we may as well just lay back and wait for a catastrophic disaster of reality-bending proportions,'

          'As usual,' sighed Ponder, ' as usual.'

******

          'Wasn't he a sweetie?'

'Yes Nanny.'

'So cute with his little hands just gripping you like that,'

'Yes Nanny.'

'And the way he gurgled and laughed at me when I pulled that face.'

' Well I think I would have gurgled if you pulled that face at me,'

'And the way he was sick all over Agnes, wasn't that sweet?'

'Nanny?'

' Yes Granny,'

' Shut up.'  

There was silence as the trio of witches marched through the woods on their way to Granny's house. Eventually they arrived at the clearing and entered by the back door.  Granny and Nanny sat down as Agnes started the fire and put the teapot on. They sat there in an embarrassed silence until a tapping at the window awoke them from their trance. Granny sighed.

'Bloody bird,' she complained, walking over to the window. She undid the catch and the bird flew over to the table.  It stared at the trio for a while, cocked its head on one side and with a cry of, 'Bombs away!' crapped on the table.

'He just spoke!' screamed Agnes,

'He can speak?' murmured Nanny in astonishment

'Sod that!' shouted Granny, 'E' crapped on my table!'

'Language old women,' cackled the Raven, ' you'll do yourself a mischief jumping up and down like that, it's not as if I aimed for that deep impossible to scrape out groove in the table.'

' Of course not you daft crow! That was accidental yes, yes of course, but the point is why are you back so soon? You've found something out all ready surely not.'

'Hang on, hang on,' interrupted Nanny, ' I get the feeling me and Agnes have missed something here.'

'Well,' Granny smiled in a mischievous way, ' as soon as that baby thing was born I could sense something was wrong and set down to some 'borrowing'. The animals are more in tune with the ways of the Disc you see and I came across the Raven here,' she nodded her head in his direction, ' a marvel I dare say and managed to bring him back here after some thoughtful 'persuasion' and have been talking to him ever since.'

'Wow,' Agnes sighed in admiration, ' this Raven can talk? Pretty impressive and what did he know of the Disc, of its ancient cultures, what did he teach you?'

'He showed me were a fine patch of Furrowgred Mushrooms were growing.'

'And?' Nanny commented.

'What do you mean and? Those things are bloody rare you know!' Granny snorted, ' anyway that's not the point since he knew about the Disc about as much as I know about cabbages I've sent him spying on the mother and child.'

'You can't do that!' protested Nanny

'Too late.' Came the reply.