Infinity

by YourEvilNemisisBwahaha

Rincewind and Byrony have been thrown together again! Well, the gods always did like a laugh. Now, they must combine fantastical myth and political reality in a mission to save the Disc from a megalomaniac intent on ruling all! With Enraged Mother Bears!

3. According To Plan

A/N My sincere apologies for the delay, but hopefully this chapter will satisfy all you lovely, lovely people who review me, plague me with PM's and generally guilt- I mean, INSPIRE me into writing. Honestly, I can't thank you enough for the excellent feedback you supply me with. It's the only thing that convinces me to finish this godforsaken thing to the end! Enjoy!

It was dark. No, that was an understatement. It was black. It was so dark that given the amount of cloud cover, there was no chance for any eyes to become used to the nigh. They remained in total blindness. Rowel didn't know what the precise name for the geographical quirk which caused the nights in Istanzia to be as pitch as ink, but he did know one thing…

He liked it.

He crouched over his desk, scribbling furiously on lengths of parchment as one of his tall, thin men stood by patiently. This one differed to all the others, however, because this on lacked the constant air of extreme irritability combined with an intense desire to please. This one was, in fact, Rowel's lawyer, and the employer of all those other tall, thin men who were wandering around the place. It was annoying really, the amount of them that seemed to run into the staff and then never came back. Of course, though this man was their employer, Rowel was his employer, and thus enjoyed a semi-godlike status amongst the ranks of the tall thin men.

The lawyer's name was Craddick, and this did nothing to better his deposition to humanity in general, and to his parents in particular. He did however, admire Rowel in the way that a nuclear physicist admires a vibrating piece of uranium which is in the process of having its atom cells split.

It is said that lawyer's have no sense of humour. This is not true. They're just amused by other things…

Lawyers are the most sane of all the human beings to grace the face of the Disc. Lawyers must contend with the dregs of humanity, with the madness that comes when we release the beast into the red mist of our human angst…

However.

Rowel was not, by any means, insane.

No, Rowel was not insane. He was sane. He was so utterly sane that he had passed through the crystal walls of insanity before he had even registered he was there, and was now through to the other side. He was in the cold, icy calm world of sanity, where everything is as it should be. And if it is not…well then clearly it is your job to make it so.

Craddick saw this, and marvelled at a genius that he could only ever to aspire to. Of course, like all ice in a rapidly heating atmosphere, Rowel would eventually crack…but that could be dealt with later.

"Now." Rowel calmly slid the piece of pare over to Craddick's side of the desk. Having no chair, Craddick leaned over and peered intently at it. He was short sighted, but refused spectacles on the grounds of mere vanity.

"Ah," he said, drawing back surprised. "Very…astute of you, si-"

Rowel shot him a warning look.

"My lord," amended Craddick. "Very astute of you, my lord. Ah…if I am correct, you are going to appeal to the group psychology of the lords and ladies present at this gathering?"

"Mob," said Rowel, as he adjusted the wick of the oil-lamp. "Don't pertain to give them better names then they have already bestowed upon themselves, Craddick. It's a mob, and I am going to mould it to my own means. She thinks she can use rumours to her benefit? She thinks she can use the mass consciousness to fulfil her needs? Well, that just wont do, will it?"

"My lord?" asked Craddick. He had no idea what his employer was talking about.

Rowel smiled. "All it takes is one bad egg, Craddick. One bad egg."

"Just as you say sir," said Craddick.

---

The bad egg in question happened to be Lady Sabrina Quimby, an ancestor to that once famed Ankh-Morpork ruler of old. A past Patrician of Ankh-Morpork, Olaf Quimby was noted for his interest in honest and accurate descriptions as well as proper standards for everything, particularly metaphor. As Patrician, he used his power to enforce laws against creative exaggeration in writing. For example, no bard was allowed to say of a hero that "all men spoke of his prowess" on pain of death; he should instead add that some people spoke ill of the hero and that still others did not know of him at all. As far as standardization was concerned, Quimby instituted the Ankh-Morpork Bureau of Measurements, in which is kept the standardized Blunt Stick (originally a Sharp one was on display as well, but very few things were found worse than a poke in the eye with it), the recipe for the Pie that It May be As Nice As, Two Short Planks and the stone used in the original Moss-Gathering Trials. This Bureau is maintained by the current Patrician, Lord Havelock Vetinari, on the grounds that the sort of people whose minds work like this ought to be kept busy, or they might do anything.

Anyway.

Lady Sabrina Quimby was by no means a direct ancestor to this Patrician, but she was direct enough to realize the possible benefits to be gained by being the bearer of a once famed name.

She was, at the moment, sitting on a sunny veranda and fanning herself in a manner which was somewhat more aggressive then the manner employed by the delicate ladies of that day. She was also glaring out onto the smooth grounds of Winslow Manor, where a number of the younger nobles had begun a game of croquet.

Craddick smoothly sat down beside her. "Might I enquire as to how her ladyship is enjoying the game?"

Sabrina barely looked at him. "Her ladyship would enjoy the game a lot more, if certain individuals of lower birth-status didn't deign to impose upon her time."

Believe it or not, Rincewind would know Lady Sabrina if he saw her. When he had wormed his way into the group conversation at the ball, she was the one who cut off Master Sebastian Hudsley in his defense of Byrony Winslow. She was the one with the pointed nose and the sharp face. She also had deep, golden blonde hair, which was teased into one of the most popular styles of the day. She was in fact quite attractive, in a sharp kind of way, but her intense nature tended put off possible suitors. Both her parents were dead, her father before her mother, and both had given her different advice on how to continue the family line.

Her mother had told her to follow her heart, to wish upon a star and to always be true to herself…

Her father had told her that only the finest breeding would do, looks and good teeth if possible, and if he didn't weigh up in her eyes, well, then she could take weigh of his money-bag and see if that tipped the scales any better.

Sabrina had taken both parents advice to heart, and as the years passed, she became more and more convinced that she would never find a suitor that would fulfill the requirements as specified by both parents…

And then she met Sebastian.

He was everything she could have hoped for, and more. From the moment she saw him, she had been entranced with that chisled jaw, those stely eyes, those handsome features. Once she had become acquainted with him, she then realized that a kind heart beat behind them.

Oh, so he wasn't the brightest spoon in the drawer! So what? That didn't matter. She loved him, and had loved him from the moment on the step when she had slipped and he had caught her…

So, she had attached herself to him like a limpet. She more or less became his older, wiser sister despite the fact that she was five years younger then him. They were rarely seen apart at social gatherings, and it was more or less assumed at this stage that they would be married, simply because everyone knew that a Quimby girl would get her own way…and the gods knew that the Hudsley boy wouldn't have the wits to ask any other young woman to enter the contract of matrimony anyway. He was nice, of course, but dim. Added to that was the disgrace their families would come under if it transpired that there was no sign of matrimony on the horizon, though they traipsed around all the balls together.

So, it would seem that they were to be married, especially after some very encouraging yet pointed remarks from Sebastian's mother.

But Sabrina didn't want it to seem.

She wanted him to ask her.

She wanted him to want her the way she wanted him.

She sat there on the veranda and watched as he played croquet with some other men and some simpering girls. She loved him, but she could never feel like she was anything other then a killjoy. She was the one who told him when certain actions might be unseemly for a future lord. She was the one who stood by his shoulder and advised him during the diplomatic situations. She…

She was the one who had decided that Byrony was not a good friend to have. When she had heard him defend the Lady Winslow at the ball, a vile acid had risen to her throat. He was friends with her, apparently. They went horse riding together whenever Byrony was in Quirm.

That night, she consoled herself with the thought that though he may want Byrony, he needed her. He needed someone sensible. Dependable. Byrony was none of those things.

Sabrina had conversed with Byrony long enough to know that she was flighty and somewhat irresponsible. Little did Byrony know, but Sabrina was actually sharp enough to catch the mocking glances she occasionally cast upon the upper class, and she didn't like it one bit. Perhaps Byrony was mocking them for there social order and the way they looked down on others, but wasn't she doing the same thing herself? Wasn't she, in turn, looking down upon them? Sabrina wanted to slap her, but that wasn't generally the done thing at a ball.

Byrony had no considerations for the feelings of those she didn't considerer to be worthy of her personal attention.

Byrony would leave Sebastian standing by himself at a ball. She would go off and do some other silly thing, like hide in the gardens, with no thought to how it affected the people around her. Her poor Uncle would have to explain to everyone where she had gone, the host of the party would have to laugh it off nervously over forced titters of social degradation, and Sebastian would be left standing alone. Alone with no one to tell him which fork to use, or what it meant when a diplomat told him that things in that particular region were "…complicated."

Sebastian never understood the meaningful pauses. Sabrina had tried them on him enough times to know that for certain.

She scowled again, a sight that would make the faint of heart flee. That scowl was a sign that her acerbic tongue was about to let loose.

"Such a shame isn't it," said Craddick mildly. "That Lady Winslow cannot be here."

Sabrina declined to comment. Quite frankly, she couldn't give a damn if the Lady Winslow fell down a deep hole and never came back up. Sabrina was much more interested in the political meaning of this entire event. Everyone knew that the elections for Istanzia were coming up, and everyone was very much not saying anything about it, but in rather ingenious and diplomatic ways.

Craddick examined his fingernails in a genteel manner. He had no fear of this hissy little madam. Spend thirty minutes in a room containing one angry Rowel and you pretty much lose fear of everything.

"Such a shame," he sighed. "What bad luck."

Sabrina's ears pricked. "What are you talking about?"

Craddick frowned, his faced filled with honest perplexity. No one can lie like a man without a conscience. "Why, for her Ladyship to be sick, of course!"

"Is she sick?"

"Well, I had assumed so! Why else would she be missing the truly delightful festivities that this political drive has to offer?"

Suddenly, Craddick had Sabrina's attention. "What did you just say?"

"Well, I mean, I'm sure it's not my place to speak of her ladyship's health…not my place in the slightest…"

"No, forget that. What were you saying about a political drive?"

Here, Craddick affected an air of hesitance. "Well, I thought…personally…that the entire event has been somewhat directed toward the support of Istanzia? You know, the true princess of Istanzia, whatever that means in today's politics," he scoffed.

Sabrina looked sharply at him. "It could mean a lot, actually, taking the general disposition of the voting populace into account."

Craddick cursed inwardly. She hated Byrony, but she was also no fool. "Well, I wouldn't know anything about that, m'Lady. Though I have heard…"

"Yes?"

"Someone saw her leave."

"Leave where?"

"Leave the grounds, m'Lady. And by my count…she hasn't returned.

He watched the expression on Sabrina's face change from suspicion to realisation. Of course there were rumors. There were always rumors.

Could it really be that simple? wondered Craddick. Could this woman's support of the crown of Istanzia be turned to Rowel simply because she disliked Byrony?

The cogs in Sabrina's mind were turning, whirring furiously. She lived for this sort of thing, for the political intrigue to be unearthed from the wriggling mass that was politics. If she had been a bookie, she would have been the type that always knew which horse was going to finish first and everyone knew it. Sabrina was considered to be the last word in the politics of the Disc, an unusual hooby for a woman, but everyone reasoned that since she wasn't actually involved then no harm could come of it. What they didn't reale was that by being the last word in politics, Sabrina had managed to not only beome involved, but was now, in fact, a key player. By being the last word in politics, she had the status to indirectly influence the outcom of certain political drives simply by being the source of most of the upper-class's information.

Before this, the race between the Princess and Rowel had been even-odds. The people were leaning towards the crown, in a desperate attempt to regain the glory days of the past, but Rowel had offered them what no self-respecting citizen could deny: A place in the history books. Obviously, there was some military element to be expected (or so Sabrina suspected) but that was only to be expected.

And now… Byrony was helping the princess?

She wasn't helping Rowel, that much was for certain. If that was the case, Rowel would have had her glued onto his arm like the sticky little slug he was. Sabrina didn't like Rowel. You'd be hard pressed to find someone who did.

So. Byrony wanted the Princess to win. Well, the Princess would win anyway, wouldn't she? I mean, whatever Byrony was doing, it couldn't possibly have any affect upon the votes of the citizens of Istanzia, could it?

And Sabrina so wanted Byrony to fail…

"Talk," she commanded, no longer upholding the pretence that Craddick was merely an uninformed servant. "And if you are very good, then perhaps I shall listen."

---

A long, long way away, a group of people sat around a fire.

They were the few and the chosen. Noble individuals who set out on a quest of greatness giving no thought to their personal safety.

The fate of the Disc rested upon their shoulders, no doubt filling them with something akin to a great awe mixed with foreboding dread...

"I'm just saying that any person whose idea of heaven isn't filled with scantily clad dancing girls is clearly doing it wrong."

"Doing what wrong?" asked Twoflower, interested.

"Life," said Byrony firmly, as she twisted the rabbit over the fire. It was in the early morning, and they were taking a little break. She had set up a snare little over twenty minutes ago, and the fruits of her labour were now sizzling nicely.

Three of the four jewels needed to access the Orb had been found and accounted for, and this had been accomplished in such a short space of time that Byrony was becoming almost unbearably smug. A diamond had been located in a fissure which seemed to crack open just to allow an exhilarated, over-excited Twoflower to squeeze through to procure it, and Conina had lithely scaled the small mountain presented to them in order to obtain a milky opal.

Byrony had been soaked through, Twoflower had come out covered in earth and Conina had been windswept and shivering.

On learning that he would be the one who would be dealing with the element of 'fire' Rincewind's reply had been: "Typical."

Now, they were in high spirits, working towards their final goal. The Orb was located at the centre of the forest, in a cave cleverly hidden from those not in possession of the jewels. As soon as they recovered the last jewel, all that was left was to pick up the Orb and head back home.

"I just can't believe counting endless stars is where you want to spend your time on the immortal plane, Rincewind," said Conina. "What about palm trees and sherbet and young women and so forth?"

"I don't like sherbet," he said sulkily. "I can't use the straw properly and it goes up my nose."

Conina gave him one of those long, slow looks. "Right… And the young women?"

"Yes, I've always wondered. Do they bring the straws?"

"No, I don't think so…"

"Well. My heaven contains very little of anything but stifling boredom and complete reputation of completely foreseeable tasks, thank you."

"Sounds unbearable," said Byrony cheerfully.

"Oh, I don't know," said Twoflower thoughtfully. "I used to go fishing with my father when I was young. Absolutely nothing ever happened but they were some of the most enjoyable experiences of my life."

"That sounds nice," said Rincewind, helping Conina take the rabbit off the fire. "I like the part where absolutely nothing happens."

"Yes, it's how men of my culture relate to their off-spring."

"By engaging in a vaguely sports-related activity in which they can have conversations without directly looking at one another?"

"Precisely."

"Still though," said Conina, unable to move away from the subject. "Counting stars forever? I think I'd stab myself in the face just to relieve the monotony."

"Can we just let it go? Please?"

"I thought it would be something involving potatoes," Byrony confided to Twoflower.

"Really?"

"Oh yes," she continued knowledgably. "Rincewind has misplaced sexua- mph!" There was a sudden flailing of arms and red robes. When the scuffle ceased, Conina and Twoflower were privy to the sight of a wizard straddling a young woman, who was face up, lying on the ground and livid.

"Now," said Rincewind calmly. "I have my hand over your mouth. I am going to remove said hand when I am sure that you are going to continue this conversation in a manner befitting our current company. Clear?"

"Mph! Mph-mmmph!"

"Not until you agree."

Conina, who was finished stripping the meat off the rabbit, turned to Twoflower. "You know what I love about wizards? It's the air of decorum they seem to carry around with them. I don't know, it's a sort of dignity."

Rincewind ignored her. "Are we ready to rejoin the adults?" he asked Byrony.

"Mmph mphmph mmphm mmmph mph!"

"Threatening to kill me is doing nothing to increase your chances."

"Hurry up and apologise, Byrony," Conina said irritably.

"Yes, you're lunch is getting cold," called Twoflower, his mouth full.

Rolling her eyes, Byrony nodded.

"Yes, you agree that it's doing nothing to increase your chances or yes I agree to leave the topic of conversation I was previously pursuing?"

"Mph."

"Good enough for me."

Rincewind got up and hauled Byrony to her feet. Together, they sat beside Conina and Twoflower and began dividing up strips of meat.

"One day, Rincewind. One day you'll accept the truth," said Byrony matter-of-factly, holding out her plate as Rincewind layered strips of rabbit onto it.

"I sat on you once. I will do it again."

"Acceptance is the first step."

"Oh? Is the second step locking it away and never speaking of it again?"

Conina smiled to herself. Twoflower was looking anxious, but these arguments were daily occurrences between the young woman and the wizard. Conina knew that they enjoyed them, and she half-suspected that they were held for her own and Twoflowers amusement.

"Can't argue with the truth, Rincewind!"

"In my experience, you can argue with anything."

"Yes, I argue very well," Byrony told the others haughtily. "I am a fine and stimulating debater on various topics"

Rincewind nodded. "Just ask any of her remaining friends."

"I can win an argument on any topic against any opponent," Byrony continued loudly, pretending to ignore him.

"People know this and steer clear of her at parties. Often as a sign of great respect, they don't even invite her."

"What are you, the avatar of annoyance?"

"This is coming from the young woman who decided to sing the entirety of the Hedgehog song all morning?"

"The timing felt right."

"For that song? The timing is never right."

Conina shared out more meat. "Enough you two. Ye gods, will you ever shut up?"

"Perhaps you should just make up and say sorry?" suggested Twoflower timorously.

"He started it."

"You started it!"

"Wha- you sat on me!"

"Only after you-"

"Enough!" shoutedTwoflower. A few birds flew away, and Rincewind and Byrony looked shamefaced. "Now that is enough!"

"But he-"

"Don't make me come over there young lady! Now, I have had quite enough of this nonsense. You are both to apologise and shake hands. I mean really, if you don't start to behave, then I am turning this adventuring troupe around and we are going straight back to the manor! Now apologise!"

Rincewind and Byrony limply shook hands and muttered something that may or may not have been 'S'ry'.

Satisfied, Twoflower nodded. "Now, if I hear another word out of either of you, there will be no more quest to save the entirety of the Disc. Eat your lunch."

As they tucked into their meal, Conina looked at Twoflower with admiration. "How did you manage to do that?"

"Raise two children and you may see for yourself."

"Ah. Well, now that we're all calm, why don't we get back to the more serious matters. We're getting very near to the end of this whole thing, and I was wondering Byrony, could you give us a little more history on the Orb?"

"Why?" said Rincewind. "Like you said, it's nearly over. Why would you want to give the rest of us more memories to repress?"

Conina resisted the urge to throttle him. "Humour me, why don't you."

Byrony nodded. "All right. You know that the Orb was originally used to bring exceptional harvests to the people of Istanzia-"

"So, it's a fertility charm?" suggested Twoflower.

Byrony shook her head, irritated at the interruption. "No, much more powerful. Its origins are a bit hazy, but we pretty sure that it's a highly magical object. It's a bringer of life. It could take completely dry seeds and germinate them from nothing. There is one recorded instance, back before they invented spelling, where it apparently 'brought thee fickly cattle back to lyfe'."

"But it's out of magic now?" asked Conina.

"Ye-ess…"

Rincewind sighed. "All right. Now tell us the bit that you're not telling us."

"Fine. Pay attention, because I'm not repeating this." Byrony leaned forward. "The Orb was stolen and hidden by a rebel group, yes? Well, the leader of that rebel group was actually a high priestess dedicated to the care of the Orb."

"But…then why did she want to take it from the royal family?" asked Twoflower, frowning. "Wasn't the orb passed down through their line?"

"Oh sure it was, it's the latest princess's birth-right. But listen to this: Uncle Havelock found a transcript of the oath the priestess took, and it had a major loophole."

"What?"

"She only had to vow to protect the Orb. There was no mention of any alliance to the crown whatsoever."

"So that means," Conina said slowly, "that she did what she thought was best for the Orb, not the country."

Byrony nodded, tossing a scrap of meat into the air and neatly catching it in her mouth. "Exactly. There's pretty strong evidence that she and her followers sort of worshipped it like a god. My best guess is that the Orb needs time to…I don't know. Re-charge? The royal family were going to tap it dry in their attempts to regain the throne, and she wasn't about to let that happen."

"So she hid it away so that someone pure of heart would find it!" exclaimed Twoflower.

"Not exactly. She was a sly bitch, that one. I believe her exact words were 'so that anyone who deserves it will find it.'"

"What does that mean?" protested Rincewind. "I get a lot of things I don't deserve. What does deserving it have to do with anything?"

"I really don't know. I expect we shall find out."

"Unfortunately, I agree," said Rincewind gloomily.

"Well, I guess we'll just keep-" Conina began, but then she broke off. "Twoflower! I told you not to bring that!"

Guiltily, Twoflower paused in picking up the large rock that had fallen from his rucksack. He had taken it from the rock-face that had held the air-opal. "It's just a souvenir. It's not every day that a man goes into an enchanted rock face to find a mythical source of power, you know."

"Yes, it only happens to me every other week," Byrony heard Rincewind say under his breath.

"It's a lump of rock," said Conina witheringly. They were all getting a little tired of Twoflower's tourism. He had taken pictures of every damn thing that was in the least bit magical- which was almost everything in this forest- and also insisted on taking iconographs of them performing completely uninteresting tasks, claiming that they would be treasured memories later in life.

Conina and Byrony admitted that, yes, that time when Rincewind slipped and rolled down that steep gulley into the gorse bushes was indeed going to be a most treasured memory, but an iconograph of them dealing with irate horses? Not so much.

"I mean," she went on, "if it had some sort of magical ability, then I'd understand, but you are carrying around a lump of rock!"

"There's a rune on it!"

"I think that's dirt…" said Byrony, peering at the large stone in Twoflowers's hand. "Yep. Definitely dirt."

"It's a dead weight."

"It's a keep-sake!"

"Look, it comes right off if you rub it with your thumb..."

"We have a long way to go yet, and you're going to carry around a big stone in your bag?"

Twoflower didn't respond but returned the rock to his rucksack, his lips compressed into a thin line.

Conina sighed. "Fine. Keep it. It will never be useful for absolutely anything ever, but what do I care? You can put over your fireplace when you return home."

"That's just what I intend to do," said Twoflower firmly.

Conina snapped. "It's just a lump of rock!"

Rincewind grabbed her shoulders and made calming noises. "All right, let's all calm down, shall we? Let's take a minute to ourselves. Byrony? Take Twoflower away for him to have a minute to himself."

Trying not to laugh, and failing miserably, Byrony went over to the horses with a sulky Twoflower.

"Deep breaths," Rincewind informed Conina. "Take deep breaths. You know, you and I have much more in common then we realise."

"Too true," huffed Conina, massaging her temples with her eyes closed. "How's it going with Byrony?"

Rincewind froze in the process of scraping off the leftovers into the fire. "I beg your pardon? Did I just miss a large and extremely inappropriate section of this conversation? How did we go from you having a nervous breakdown to- to that."

Conina didn't say anything, she just made a twirling motion with her index finger.

"We're just friends," said Rincewind firmly.

"Oh, don't start that again-"

"No, don't you start that again. This is none of your business anyway."

"Don't you think it's a little strange the way I knew that you two were in love instantly?"

"We're not-"

"I mean, it just came to me, in a flash of inspiration! Almost like someone wants me to be influential in your relationship."

"Well that thought is just too ghastly to even consider…"

"You can't be just friends. It would be an affront to the laws of romance." Rincewind stared in horrified fascination at the woman before him. Conina, a woman he had once seen stab a man in the face with some hairdressers scissors, was becoming quickly obsessed with his love life.

"When you first saw her," she continued, "did you by any chance hear an orchestra? Singing birds? Did everything go all misty and glowy?"

"Er-" said Rincewind. "No."

"Well, what was your first thought?"

Rincewind remembered that day, back in the library and the subsequent trip to the Watch-house. "I think it was something like 'Bugger, I'm in trouble now'."

Conina looked at him, her head to one side. "You know…for you, that might have actually been quite romantic."

"Can we just drop this?" growled Rincewind. "Can we just drop it, let it smash on the ground and say to ourselves we'll fix it later then put it away in a dusty cupboard and never speak of it again?"

"Absolutely not. Don't you want to be happy?"

"At this point, I'd settle for deaf. Listen, what you're trying to do? It's not going to happen."

"But I can help you."

Rincewind allowed himself a tiny glimmer of hope. "How?"

"Well," Conina said thoughtfully, "maybe you should try going in a different direction about it."

Rincewind threw his arms into the air. "Why didn't I think of that before?" he said, clapping himself in the forehead dramatically. "Oh, all I have to do is go in a different direction! I see it now…everything has become so much clearer…"

"Shut up," Conina ordered. "Do you want me to help you or would you rather sit around making sarcastic comments?"

"I can't have both?"

"This is love Rincewind. You can't just- just- dismiss it!"

"You know, there's a very fine line between love and nausea. Did you know that? I've discovered that. The whole butterflies-in-the-stomach thing is just a fancy way of saying intestine churning nervousness. People don't really talk about it, but it's true. Poets don't seem to capture that aspect of love very well. I've never read a poem that went 'Oh my love is like a comet, I get so nervous that I -'"

"Rincewind! This is exactly what I mea-" Conina stopped, and picked up one of the rucksacks around the fire. There was a piece of material hanging out of it, which was revealed to be a long dark-green cloak.

"Ah," said Rincewind knowledgably. "Taking other people's thing that don't belong to you? That is what we call stealing. Now, I'm not saying you shouldn't steal, but that cloak happens to belong to-"

"Is this Byrony's?" interrupted Conina, her voice strange.

"That's right, so what I'm saying is, put it back now and she'll be none the wiser. She likes that cloak. Her uncle gave it to her." Conina stood up and put the cloak on. "She really likes that cloak," repeated Rincewind. "I mean really likes it. Take it off now before she sees you, is what I mean."

"Watch this," said Conina excitedly. "I've seen one of these before." She pulled the hood up. Instantly, all her discerning features were disguised. It was an odd experience for anyone watching and later they wouldn't have been able to describe her at sword point. The eye seemed to slide over her, as if it wasn't really sure she was there. Her height seemed to vary, and her features were blurred. Rincewind had to fight off the overpowering feeling that he was alone in the clearing.

"Yes, yes," he snapped irritably. "It does that. Come on, take it off before Byrony sees you or there'll be no end to her whining."

"You knew about this?" said Conina incredulously as she stuffed it back into Byrony's rucksack.

"Of course. How do you think Byrony kept sneaking out of the palace in Ankh-Morpork? Well, the first time anyway. She had permission after that."

"I don't really know what you're talking about. And I don't really care," she added, as Rincewind opened his mouth to explain. "I can't believe she kept this quiet from us!"

"Er- I knew already."

"I can't believe you both kept this quiet from us!"

"Look, think about this," said Rincewind reasonably. "What good is a cloak of disguise going to work in a forest where there's no-one here to see us?"

"Well, it would be nice to know we had the option."

"The option of one person being a shapeless figure? It's not like it's a cloak of invisibility. What do you want us to do? Have one person wear it and the rest of us saunter along with them past the enemy saying 'don't shoot, we're with him'?"

"How does it work?"

"Well…" Rincewind had taken more University exams then he had eaten hot dinners. He had, on the other hand, passed University exams more times then he had spontaneously grown wings and floated into the air. The moral of the story was that he didn't exam well. Despite this, some of it must have sunk in, because he seemed to have a fairly extensive magical knowledge, recognizing various spells, magical artifacts and concepts throughout his escapades. The fact that there was no one from the University handily wandering by at the exact time that this happened always struck Rincewind as being highly unfair.

"Well, it looks to me,"he said, taking the cloak back out and holding it up, "like Gideon's Baffling Concealment was cast, the spell was frozen in the air and then woven into the fabric of the cloak. Very difficult.

"Wizards can do that?"

"You'd have to use another spell to freeze it, another to bind it…I'd imagine that someone was paid a lot of money at some point. The cloak then conceals the wearer, covering all major distinguishing characteristics."

"But it doesn't turn them invisible?" she said.

Rincewind rushed to the cloak's defence. "Well, not specifically invisible, but if you were being viewed from afar enemy eyes would just see some person in a cloak. They probably wouldn't even notice you were there. Their eyes would just glaze over you. That's what Gideon's Baffling Concealment does, except this is a permanent spell."

"Well done Rincewind," said a voice behind them. They twisted around and saw Byrony standing there, hands on hips. "A fine and well-informed answer. Pity it's totally wrong."

"Conina took it out! I told her to put it back! I was just explaining! I- what do mean wrong?"

Byrony pulled the modulator out of her shirt by its gold chain and gave it a jingle. "Enchantress, remember? Right now this baby is soaking it all up, but a month ago if that cloak was magical it would have been toast. As in I literally would have turned it into toast. I went through a phase," she said by way of explanation.

It wasn't.

"Then…how does it work? Did Vetinari tell you?"

Byrony shrugged. "He had it made, but he has no idea. I've had it since I was six and I have no idea. But I know one thing."

"What's that?"

Byrony snatched the cloak off him and wrapped it around her. "I really, really like this cloak. No touching. Last chance."

Byrony wandered off to get Twoflower, leaving a peeved Rincewind and a bemused Conina behind.

"I told you," said Rincewind waspishly.

"Rincewind?"

"Put it back, I said, but noooo-"

"Rincewind?"

"Yes?"

"Why don't you follow your own advice and drop it and leave it alone." Conina stood up, and pulled her sword out of the ground where she had stuck it. "Well, onto the next jewel, I guess. Come on wizard, let's find out what you're made of."

"I know what I'm made of. Flesh, blood and bits that are easily cut off," said Rincewind glumly. "And I am most definitely worried that today I'm going to see exactly that."

Conina swung the sword, causing it to flash in the morning sun. "Oh sure, we could all die at any moment. But you have to admit, it lends a very exciting tone to the day, doesn't it?"

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.

---

The witches leaned back from the bowl of ink.

"Well!" said Nanny Ogg brightly. "They seem to be gettin' along fine, don't they? Only one more jewel to go. This is cause," she stood up and made her way over to a cabinet, "for celebration. Wine, Esme?"

"No," said Granny Weatherwax. She was still musing over the ink.

"Port? Whiskey? Rum? We gots lots! I tell you, you'd know this was Byrony's house, the amount of drink in the place." Nanny settled into a chair, a generous glass of port in hand. "Looks like I had a good influence on the girl," she said satisfactorily.

"Gytha," said Granny thoughtfully. "You remember that cloak of hers?"

Nanny looked up. "That ol' thing? 'Course I remember it! Wouldn't let go of it, the first time she came to Lance. Wore it all the time. That would be just after her parents died, of course. Why?"

"Oh…no reason."

"Poor mite. Only six years old, she was. Imagine losing your parents, being turfed out of your house and told you can't live there anymore 'cos you'll make it all blow up, all at six years of age. That's scarring, that is."

Granny Weatherwax wasn't listening. Throughout this whole event, she had been uncertain whether or not to trust Vetinari with regards to Byrony's welfare. A part of her had suspicions that he was merely using her for the Greater Good, as it were. Granny disliked people who thought in capitals.

But he had given her that cloak, eh? The cloak she wouldn't let go of? Unbidden, a memory surfaced of a young Byrony, her hair a mass of curls, running around the place scaring the chickens with this long cloak dragging behind her…

"Aren't there big animals in that forest?" asked Nanny suddenly. "When I heard it was forn, I read up about this place in my almanac. 'Fearsome wild beasts', it said."

"I'd imagine so," said Granny, still remembering.

"Oh lor'. Huge hairy things that leap out on travellers. Imagine if they jumped out on Byrony and the rest. We should try and protect them, you know"

"Oh? What happened to no meddling?"

"Well, yes, only it said in the almanac that quite a lot of them are extinct already."

There was no response from Granny, who was still travelling back through the years in her mind.

"Esme?"

Granny pulled back out of the memory. "Yes? What?"

"I'm worried."

Granny raised her eyebrows. "Go on."

"I was talking to Shirleen who said that Darren met Burtram who was in charge of the wicks on the third floor candles who said that-"

Granny waved impatiently. There was something about Nanny Ogg that made people want to open up and be friends with her. Whether it was her easy-going nature or the way her face creased up like an old apple when she smiled, she had the ability to know everything about you within three minutes of conversation. And not only that, she'd also know about your Mam's troubles and have just the ointment for it, not to mention Shirleens experiences with that bloke from around the corner. Nanny Ogg could get a statue to break down and tell her how it really felt about pigeons.

"People're disappearin'," she finished earnestly. "The whole place is on edge!"

Winslow Manor was, of course, stately. It practically came with the deeds for the place. However, it still had that one minor detail which all large buildings such as these seem to have in common: It was a swan.

A swan glides gracefully across tranquil and peaceful waters. It is the metaphor of all that is slim, slender and possibly ballet-like in this world, which does explain why a glorified duck had an entire two hours dedicated to it and why people were willing to watch young girls imitate it's death. (I mean really, would you watch a young woman in a leotard imitate the death of a cow? Possibly that happens somewhere, and it's labeled as 'modern art'.) The point is, however, that while a swan may appear tranquil and graceful on the surface, you can bet that a hell of a lot of hard work is going on right below the surface. Otherwise everything would ground to a halt and sink.

Which is why Granny paused.

"Disappearin' how?"

"Goin' out to do their jobs and not coming back, that's how."

"But this place is huge. I heard lots of people get lost-"

"Yeah, but we're talking about some of the serious old-timers, here! Shirleen was scared stiff!"

"Then why aint the staff leaving?"

"This is their home, they been living here their whole lives. And all those nasty men 'o Rowel's are everywhere too."

Granny nodded. "I know. They're sealing up the passageways. Snooping around. Can't stand people who snoop."

Nanny, whose eyes wandered over to the bowl full of ink, chose not to comment.

Granny seemed to be musing over something, but then she sat up with a small shake of her head as if to clear it.

"People disappearin', you say?"

"You just know those creepy men in those suits're doing it."

Granny smiled grimly. "Well, I can't be having with that."

---

The funny thing was, it wasn't even dark.

The head Chef hummed to himself as he descended a flight of stairs, happily aware that no one had demanded access to his pantry in, oh gosh, over a week now. This was a good thing too. The pantry was overflowing at this point, what with the amount of meat the games-men insisted upon stuffing it with. One would almost think they were up to something.

He continued down, happily 'pomm-pomming' away, as he relished the idea of steak with a new type if cinnamon tartar sauce. It was a new idea of Damon's, and one of many. Perhaps it was time to let the lad take over…

Again, his thoughts turned to Byrony, and he wished the protection of any Gods that were paying attention over her. He didn't know what precisely what she was doing but-

There.

A creak to the left.

And the left was a wall…

The head Chef only had a split second to react before a dark figure emerged from a suddenly revealed doorway, and he felt the thin but strong fingers clasp around his throat. They clenched hard, and forced him down on his knees, his normally ruddy face turning puce. As the last breath was forced from his lungs, they pushed him down the staircase, confident in their handiwork.

His last thoughts, as he hurdled down steps which were pleasingly lit in the light of the day, revolved around one thing alone:

Dear Lord, I hope that soufflé turns out well because Julia isn't as patient as she should be damn you Rowel you can't get all the doors-

Incidently, it was Juliawho found him a little later.

Her screams echoed out into brightly lit courtyard, and sent the peacocks soaring.

---

It was early afternoon, and the Patrician of the most powerful city on the disc was having a glass of diplomatic sherry with the ArchChancellor of one of the most esteemed centers of learning ever established.

Vetinari leaned forward. "It seems that we may have a problem."

"I'll say," grimaced Ridcully, peering into his glass. "Where the devil did you get this stuff?"

"I was not referring to sherry."

"Neither was I. I like sherry. I can drink sherry. This stuff is brown vinegar."

Vetinari coughed, and Ridcully looked up. "Oh, a more serious problem, is it?"

"Rowel is making his move."

"Ah."

"It would seem that he has established to his satisfaction that Byrony is nowhere on the grounds."

"And this would enable him to…do what, exactly?"

"Alert other people to this fact. Make them wonder why. Plant the seeds of discontent. A lot of the people here are going to be very influential in the upcoming Istanzian elections. Who they choose to back will foretell the outcome, not to mention the fact that they need to willingly testify as witnesses to the Princess regaining her claim to the throne with the Orb."

"But when she has the throne, won't she be in power then?"

"No, a mere figurehead. However, she will still run in the elections, making use of the sudden surge of nationalism that will sweep the country once this occurs."

"But…what does this have to do with Byrony?"

"She has previously publically expressed her support for the princess. An unwise act, but we could not foresee that it would lead to this. And, obviously, the princess has been using this opportunity to canvass her cause."

"So…"

"Rowel is now out to ruin Byrony's reputation. His initial plan was to marry her, but I believe that he has come to terms with the impossibility of that plan. If he convinces the nobles here that Byrony is currently on some underhanded propaganda quest for the opposing side, he will gain quite a lot of support. Even more if he can convince them that this whole thing is just some kind of rally to win votes for the princess."

"I see," said Ridcully slowly, swilling the sherry around in its glass. "The Horsemen of Panic, eh? Denial, Misinformation, Rumor and Gossip, I daresay. But, er, what do you want me to do about it?"

Vetinari looked at him over steepled fingers. "Rowel is also planning for their return with the Orb. His…employees are currently roaming the Manor at night, blocking the passageways in the wall. There are spies everywhere, searching for evidence that Byrony is more then just a socialite. They're also disposing of the more loyal of the staff."

"Dispose- oh."

"Indeed. The ruination of Byrony's reputation would have further repercussions. She is essential in many of our oversea alliances. Do you remember when Klatch threatened war last year?"

"Of course!" Ridcully chuckled. "The bloody blighters pulled back pretty fast once they knew that we had all the co-ordinates of their bases!"

Vetinari raised an eyebrow. "And how do you think we procured those?"

"Well, I- er-"

"The Lady Winslow happened to be traveling through Klatch at the time, and was invited to dine with the Commander of the Klatchian army. Apparently the Commander doesn't keep quite as close an eye on his guest as could be advised. Have you seen her set of lock-picks? She's quite proud of them."

"I have indeed," said Mustrum Ridcully thoughtfully. "How about that, eh?"

"Quite. If word gets out about this, the careful persona she has spent years creating will vanish. Would you be likely to follow a simpering society girl to the bathroom?"

"Well, no. That's a very inappropriate question, by the way."

"How about someone whom you knew to be a spy," continued Vetinari, ignoring him. "Would you have them followed then?"

"Wouldn't trust the damn blighter anyway."

"There you have it. Certain…aspects of Byrony's persona need to be kept from the public eyes."

"No to mention the fact that she could blow us all to smithereens if she didn't have that little box on a chain!" said Ridcully cheerfully. "Well then, I see the problem, but what exactly am I supposed to do about it?"

"The spies need to be removed-"

"Oh, well, no problem there. The Dean's been dying to try another one of those fireballs and-"

"In such a manner that will not alert the guests to the fact that there is anything out of the ordinary occurring."

"Ah. Fireballs are out then."

Vetinari nodded. "I would think," he said firmly, "that fireballs are most definitely out."

---

Now it was dark.

Now it was, in fact, the very dead of night.

Craddick viewed the men in front of him with some distaste. There were not as many men as there had been in the beginning, but there were still more then enough to continue according to plan.

(On a side note, those men who hadn't been disposed of by Hinkle, actually fell prey to some rather…ingenious booby traps in hidden in the secret passage-ways they were attempting to block. Byrony's father had been a brilliant inventor, but it was her mother who had the unusual sense of humor. They didn't find one mans head for days.)

With a quick jerk of his head, he dismissed them. The scattered quickly and silently, moving like shadows.

Craddick smiled a thin, serpentine smile to himself.

It had begun, and now it was about to end.

He was certainly right about that, though perhaps not in the exact manner he had envisaged.

---

Along the dark corridor, there was not a whisper of sound save for the rustling of curtains in front of an open window and occasional movements from behindone of the bedroom doors. At least, not a whisper of sound until a rather large party of grumbling wizards rounded a corner, staffs held at the ready.

Things had happened rather quickly. It wasn't that the prospect of the end of the world was concentrating the wizard's minds unduly, because that is a general and universal danger that people find hard to imagine, much less take upon themselves to stop. But the Patrician was being rather sharp with people, and that is a specific and highly personal danger that people have no problem relating to at all.

The Dean was always his best at times like this. He led the way down the huge hallways, prodding with his staff into dark corners and going 'Hut! Hut!' under his breath.

"What is it we're doing again?" the Lecturer in Recent Runes asked irritably. It was quite late, and the wizards were men who liked their sleep.

"We're to pick off any men we see attemptin' to kill anyone or fiddlin' with the walls," explained the ArchChancellor, while shifting the leather sack he was carrying to a more comfortable position under his arm.

There was a pause.

"So we're lumping carpenters and murderers in the same category now, are we?" asked the Chair of Indefinite Studies. "Never did like them anyway. Too quick with a saw, I always felt."

"No, they're the same people."

"Really?" said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. "By jove. A band of murderous carpenters, eh?"

"Is it carpenters who fix walls though? I thought that was masonry."

"Always thought they'd snap. Staring at wood all day long? What kind of life is that?"

"No, they're trying to block up the passageways."

"What passageways?"

"Try to keep up Senior Wrangler, there's a good man."

"No talking!" hissed the Dean, and leapt around a corner into the next hallway, staff held protectively in front of him. "Hah!" he screamed, and then looked disappointed.

Some way a little behind, the Librarian, Ponder Stibbons and the Bursar were meandering along, not taking the whole situation very seriously.

The Librarian wasn't taking it seriously because he really didn't have much interest in the current proceedings, and because he too was quite annoyed at being dragged out to wander the halls. Not because he was sleeping, however. The eighth largest library on the Disc was calling to have its recent additions catalogued, and he had been looking forward to it. However, the faculty had decided to take advantage of the one member who could theoretically twist a man's actual head off his actual shoulders using elbow power alone.

Ponder Stibbons wasn't taking things seriously because he rather suspected that the wizards were up against some highly trained professionals, and he rather doubted that they were about to be caught be a bunch of elderly men who squabbled and complained their way down the darkened halls. He was of the opinion that these men would just quietly move away and let the wizards go past. If this was not the case, and they attacked the wizards, then he was well-off at the back of things in any case.

The Bursar wasn't taking things seriously because he was currently occupying another planet. One with fluffy pink clouds and happy little bunnies.

Suddenly, there was a commotion up ahead, with much flurrying of robes, and a sudden bright light. As it died down, Ponder hurried forward.

"Now listen, Dean," came the ArchChancellor's voice from ahead, absolutely radiating with reasonableness. "We had a talk about this, you remember? We're to do this quietly and with the minimum amount of fuss."

Ponder peered ahead, and saw that the wizards were clustered around something which was giving off black smoke.

"The minimum amount of fuss Dean, which excludes fire-balls, the screaming of the word 'yo' and any damage in the form of scorch marks to the surrounding area. And I know that this is a very dangerous Dean, and that we're to be on our guard at all times, but could you please explain the manner in which you felt, Dean, that this perfectly ordinary tapestry posed a threat?"

Ridcully held up what Ponder now identified as a smoking black rag.

The Dean muttered something inaudible.

"What was that?"

"…saw it move."

"I see. And you didn't think that this was perhaps to do with the fact the there is a window open directly to your left?"

"That's what they want us to think."

"No Dean, that is not what they want us to think, owing to the fact, Dean, the fact that there was no one behind the tapestry."

"Oh dear," said Ponder, blinking owlishly as he took in the discernable markings on the fabric. "A Ming dynasty tapestry? They're priceless."

"This one certainly is," said the Chair of Indefinite Studies cheerfully. "I wouldn't pay sixpence for it!"

"Thank you for your contribution, Chair. Gentlemen," Ridcully held up his hands. Or at least, the hand not currently holding a leather sack. "We need to begin to take this seriously. We are here, in the dead of night when innocents are slumbering-"

"Yes, they are," said the Lecturer in Recent Runes meaningfully, in a tone of voice which suggested that he'd prefer to be among them.

"And it is up to us to carry out- did any of you hear that?"

When someone says this, the most sensible thing to do would be to fall immediately silent, so as to hear the sound in question all the better. However, it is an unwritten rule that in these situations, people tend to do exactly the opposite. Naturally, the wizards were no exception.

"What?"

"What noise?"

"I didn't hear anything."

"Yes, well, you're going deaf."

"How dare you! My hearing is as fine as the next man's!"

"Only if the next man is a post."

"I'll have you know that I -"

Ridcully hissed, and waved his arms for them to be quiet. Miraculously, the faculty fell silent, though one or two continued on their barely audible grumbled rants.

Edging forward quietly, he moved slowly around the corner at the end of the hallway and-

"HA- Oh, I'm terribly sorry madam!"

"Mustrum Ridcully," came a voice. All the wizards stood up a little straighter just for hearing it. "You have exactly three seconds to explain what damn-fool thing you're up to," said Granny Weatherwax icily, as she straightened her hat. "And help me pick up these hat-pins while you do."

"Well- that is, my good woman, I believe I have every right to demand the same thing-"

"I aint your good anything," snapped Granny. "What're a bunch of elderly fools doin' wanderin' the halls of this place? Don't you know how easy it is to get lost?"

"Well- we- that is- are you lost?"

"No I aint," said Granny firmly. And this was true. She knew where she was, and it wasn't her fault if nowhere else did. "Now tell me, what do you lot think you're doing?"

"Er- well…" The faculty of the Unseen University watched with horrified fascination as the ArchChancellor tried to untie his tongue. The he suddenly got a grip. "We, madam, have been hired by the Patrician of Anhk-Morpork to take care of some…details. You see, the thing is, the girl who owns this place is actually-"

Granny waved a hand irritably. "Yes, yes, I know about Byrony. So you're hunting those men too are you?"

Ridcully's eyebrows shot up so far that they almost disappeared into his hairline. "Yes, we are. What- er, what method have you been using?"

"Gytha and I caught one on the third floor," she sniffed. "They bin killing people, you know that?"

"Yes. And blocking up the passages."

Granny nodded. "Byrony'll need those to get back in with the Orb."

"I say," said someone loudly. They turned to see the entire faculty puffed up to full stature. "What in blazes is going on?" said someone (the Dean) loudly.

"It appears, gentlemen," said Ridcully carefully, "that we have acquired a sudden and valuable asset to this team."

The wizards looked at Granny Weatherwax. Then they looked at the hat. Then they opened their mouths and took deep breaths-

"Wotcher! This place isn't half bendy, eh?" said Nanny Ogg appearing around a corner like some sort of demon full of good-nature. "What's going on here then?"

"We're…teaming up with these gentlemen, 'parently," sniffed Granny. "I only hope they won't be a burden, truth be told."

Nanny nodded gravely, but there was a twinkle in her eye. "Ah well, we'll soldier on, eh?"

At this point, the wizards unfroze. "ArchChancellor," hissed the Senior Wrangler, "I really must protest!"

"Indeed! Witches?! This is a new low for the University and no doubt about it!"

"Atrocious behaviour!"

"Simply despicable. D'you hear they dance around in their drawers?"

"I won't have myself associated with it, I tell you!"

"I shall resign! I shall resign and write a petition! A petition and a hunger strike! A petition, a hunger strike and a-"

"ENOUGH!" bellowed Ridcully. There was a deathly silence. "Gentlemen, these fine ladies are also in the employment of Lord Vetinari. Added to this, I would wager that they know quite a bit more about the situation at hand then all of you combined. We are going to work with them, and we are also going to follow their orders. And the next man who complains is going to get my boot down his throat. Does that sound doable?"

There was a heavy silence… and then the hallway was filled with a chorus of assents.

"Absolutely."

"No problem."

"Oh yes, definitely doable."

"Completely viable."

"Viable, right enough."

"That's the stuff to give the troops."

"What is?"

"Well…tinned rations? Decent weapons? Good boots? That sort of thing."

"What's that got to do with anything?"

"Don't ask me. He was the one who started talking about giving stuff to the troops!"

"Will you lot shut up? No one's giving anything to the troops!"

"Oh, shouldn't they have something? I hear the pantry is packed with the result of the ArchChancellors hobbies."

"Look, it was just a figure of speech, all right? I just meant I was fully in agreement. It's just colourful language. Good grief, you surely can't think that I'm suggesting giving stuff to troops at this time of night!"

"Maybe in the morning then?"

Ponder rolled his eyes. It's because their minds are so often involved with deep and problematic matters, he told himself, that their mouths are allowed to wander around making a nuisance of themselves.

"Right," said Granny, authority reverberating off the word. "You lot, pay attention. At this point in time, there's really only one place that needs to protectin'. Up on the fourth floor, there's a balcony overlooking a mural on the ground floor set into the wall on the outside. T'aint a mural at all, tis a secret door. They're trying to block that off tonight."

"Wha- How do you know all that?"

A hat-pin gleamed in the light of the moon as Granny held it up. She smiled evily. "It's amazin' what you can get people to tell you, aint that right Gytha?"

Nanny nodded. "Not quite how I'd go about it, but he spilled the beans, sure enough."

"Well," said Ridcully uncertainly, "clearly we have no time to lose! To the fourth floor!"

It really must be pointed out, that the Dean did rather have his heart set on blasting a fireball at a miscreant, and was, in fact, covered in dark-green face paint for the very occasion. This was the reasoning behind his overwhelming urge to arrive at the scene first. So… in a very …interesting fashion, the wizards came to a halt at the balcony on the fourth floor.

"Aaargh!"

"Dean, let go!"

"I can't breath!"

The Dean struggled to the front and aimed his staff at the chiffon curtains, that were blowing gently on the breeze.

"Say the word Alpha One, and I'll blast the situation to smithereens."

Ridcully wandered up and patted him on the shoulder. "I think that'll be all Dean, thank you." He waggled his eyebrows at Granny. "Good chap, but gets a bit over-enthusiastic, you know?"

Granny gave him a Look, and pushed forward out onto the balcony. She took a sharp intake of breath which hissed in the still night. "There," she said quietly. "Look at 'em."

They all leaned over the balcony to survey the scene presented before them. At the very bottom of the outside wall, there was a swarm of black-clad men clamouring against the stone. They were like insects, beetles or ants, crowding around the mural, their long pale fingers gripping, prying and pulling. There was at least twenty, and all held some form of weapon, though some of these were, in fact, the crowbars they were planning on using as a last resort if the door couldn't be opened. In reality, that was unlikely to happen. These men knew what they were doing. It would only be a matter of time before they found their way in.

"By jove," said the Senior Wrangler nervously. "How're we going to deal with that lot? In a completely non-flammable manner," he added hastily as the Dean opened his mouth hopefully.

"Ahah!" said Ridcully, rasing a finger aloft.

"By gor'," said Nanny fervently, staring apprehehnsively at the scene below. "You better be able to back that up."

"Er- I can? We do in fact have, dear ladies, a plan prepared which deals with this eventuality."

He fished a pair of gloves out of his hat.

"What is that?" Nanny asked, as Ridcully pulled a bottle out of the leather sack he had been toting.

"Wow-Wow Sauce. Nicely matured, too."

The wizards spread like an opening flower. One moment, they were gathered around Ridully, the next they were standing close to various items of heavy furniture which, in this house, comprised mostly of very uncomfortable chairs.

"Finest condiment known to man," continued Ridcully cheerfully. "A happy accompaniment to meat, fish, fowl, eggs and many types of vegetable dishes. It's not safe to drink it when the sweat's still condensing on the bottle, though..." He peered at the bottle and then rubbed at it, causing a glassy, squeaky noise. "On the other hand," he said brightly, "we're not really looking for something safe, are we?"

"That's dangerous?" said Granny. "We're carryin' around something that could blow up in your hands?!"

"Oh no, I assure you, we are completely safe."

"If it's completely safe," said Nanny in a very intense tone of voice, "then why are all those wizards backing away slowly and trying to climb under things?"

"Ah…well, of course it's safe, but sometimes…well, you never know."

"Sometimes you know," said Granny, in warning tones. "In fact, I think I know quite a lot that I didn't used to know. It's amazin' what you do end up knowing, I sometimes think. I often wonder what new things I'll know."

"Well, you never know."

"Mustrum Ridcully, you tell me about that sauce this instant!"

"Look, these fellows just seem to have taken against it for some reason," said the ArchChancellor defensively.

"Yes, I prefer a sauce that doesn't mean you mustn't make any jolting movements for half an hour after using it," muttered the Dean from under a coffee table.

"And that can't be used for breaking up small rocks," said the Senior Wrangler.

"Or getting rid of tree-trunks," said the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

"And which isn't actually outlawed in three countries," said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

"I wouldn't mind tryin' some of that," said Nanny cheerfully.

"We're just using it on those blighters down there," said Ridcully irritably. "Not that this bottle wouldn't be totally safe if, for example, placed on your average dinner table just in time for the main course."

"Well," said Granny, peering over the side of the balcony, "If you're throwing it, you had better throw it soon. I think they got enough for a crowbar-hold."

Nodding, Ridcully threw the bottle.

There was a crash as the Chair of Indefinite Studies and the Senior Wrangler tried to get under the same table.

The bottle flew majestically through though air, turning over and over, leaking bright red condiment in its wake.

It landed amongst a rather perplexed group of Rowel's men, who took one (completely ineffecient) step backwards when faced with the threat of a shattered bottled of spicy flavoured condiment, which was, for some reason, bubbling.

"Whose bloody idea was this?" sneered one, as the entire group took that all-too-important step forwards…

And then…

Well, a written description hardly does it justice.

There was a sound that was rather akin to the auditory experience of a dog sneezing backwards.

And then…

Well, it had been quite a large bottle.

Not only did the sauce explode, but the ground underneath the sauce explded, and then burning flecks of the condiment flew through the air, sizzling when coming into contact with any exposed skin

Looking up from the shrieking, writhing figures below them, Granny Weatherwax stared at Ridcully.

"You eat that?"

"It tastes very fine on cold pork, I'll have you know."

"What'll we do with them that's left?" asked Nanny, indicating those men below who still had their heads, functioning body parts, the skin on their face or the full use of their eyes.

"I feel, ArchChancellor, that at this time it would be prudent to-"

"No damn fireballs, Dean!"

"Well then what shall we use?" asked the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

Ridcully stroked his beard, and there was a gleam in his eye. Anyone who knew him, knew that he was a hunting man.

"Oh, pretty much anything else, I should imagine."

---

They had procured the final jewel, and spirits were light amongst the members of what Byrony insisted referring to as 'Team Amazing'.

They had climbed down into the cave of the fire-ruby, and faced eagles which seemed to soar through the air made of fire and pillars of flame which inconveniently shot from the ground at whatever bit you happened to be standing on. This was nothing, however, to the fact that Rincewind had climbed through those pillars of flame to the top of the small hill in the centre of the cavern and succeeded in snatching the glistening ruby from its pedestal.

He had whimpered constantly throughout, of course, but Byrony and Twoflower insisted that this didn't detract from the daring deed. Conina had declined to comment.

They had all emerged tired, sweaty and covered in soot, except for Rincewind who had been tired, sweaty, singed and covered in soot. Interestingly, he had burnt off his eyebrows again which had just begun to grow back after the ill-fated game of Exclusive-Possession.

After that, it was the group consensus that they deserved a small break to refresh themselves before the continued on their way to thwart the maniac in his attempt to achieve disc-domination.

"Ye gods," groaned Conina, toweling her hair dry as she came back from the waterfall. "I cannot wait until I can have a real bath again."

"I know," agreed Byrony, "that was- ow, Rincewind! Owww!"

"Well, if you'd only stop squirming," said Rincewind irritably. He was seated cross-legged behind Byrony, who was clutching her knees, and attempting to drag a comb through her wet hair. "How am I supposed to get the tangles if you keep leaning away?"

Byrony clutched her head. "Okay! It's fine now! You can stop!"

"Don't be ridiculous, you've a knot the size of an apple back here. Hold still-"

"Owww!"

Conina threw the towel onto a branch for it to dry. "I mean, that waterfall was freezing and washing in streams is so awkward…"

Twoflower and Rincewind nodded solemnly. They agreed it was awkward, but not in the way that Conina meant. It's a universal law that women everywhere take longer in the bathroom then men, and it would seem that when the bathroom in question is a stream somewhere in a giant forest, this is no exception. Twoflower and Rincewind had to hang around, shuffling their feet and making the smallest talk imaginable while waiting for the ladies to return.

"Owww!!"

"Stay still!"

"Aaargh, you're pulling bits out!"

"You know, Byrony," said Conina thoughtfully. "Your hair would be a lot easier to manage if I gave it a trim. What do you think? I could just take a little off."

Byrony looked at Conina.

She looked at Conina's sword.

"I was lying," she told Rincewind. "This doesn't hurt a bit."

"Very glad to hear it."

Conina scowled. "Why does no one want to get their hair cut?!"

"Cut by you," supplied Rincewind helpfully, as he yanked the comb through the knots. "No one wants to get their hair cut by you."

"Business not going too well?" asked Twoflower sympathetically.

"It should pick up a bit," she said, avoiding his eyes. "We have some bills… actually we have a lot of bills… But I suppose that won't be much of a problem. Especially now that it seems I've come into some inheritance," she added acidly.

"I shouldn't think there's much call for the Empress to cut hair, your majesty."

Conina rolled her eyes. "I suppose not. You should have seen Nijel when I told him about it. He almost choked on a legume."

There was a pause in which everyone stared at her.

"That's a vegetable," she explained.

"Oh," said Twoflower carefully. "That…makes more sense."

"Does it?" asked Rincewind.

Conina picked up her sword. "Well, I guess I'll scout on ahead for a bit. Just to see what's coming up. What should I be looking for."

"Oh, ow some sort of ow cave with a blocked entrance," said Byrony, vaguely waving a hand to her left. "Don't even try looking for it I say. Try to spot it using your peripheral vision."

"This whole legend thing is fun, isn't it?" said Twoflower happily. He was sorting through his iconographs, slotting them into sections in a book.

"No really," said Byrony enthusiastically. "I bet that if you close your eyes and go walking through the- Ow! Rincewind, you're tearing off my scalp!"

Conina took the opportunity to exit quickly.

She wandered along through the forests, listening to the wind shake the trees and the distant sound of bird-song, relishing the quiet.

She hadn't been kidding when she had said that there were bills. She and Nijel were barely breaking even at the moment. For some reason, no one wanted to become patrons of 'Harebut's Hero Supplies and Hairdressers.' She couldn't think why. And they did have bills. Lots of bills, because Nijel couldn't, no matter how hard she tried to convince him, get his head around the fact that heroes thought the word credit meant 'free'.

Becoming an Empress would solve a lot of problems…but she didn't want to be an Empress… She wanted to be a hairdresser.

There was a fairly large difference between the two professions.

Worrying to herself, and completely absorbed in her own thoughts, Conina wandered through the forest. After a while she came upon a clearing, and stopped. She didn't walk into it, she just stayed in the shadows observing.

After a while, she returned to the camp with a thoughtful look on her face. The other three were packed and ready to go, and Byrony was helping Twoflower strap his completely non-magical rock to the outside of his rucksack.

"Ready to go, Conina?" she asked.

"No enraged mother bears up ahead, are there?" Twoflower added, chuckling.

Conina paused. "Not…exactly," she said slowly.

Rincewind's head jerked up.

"What do you mean not exactly?!"

---

The four crouched behind the bushes on the edge of a fairly large clearing. In the clearing was (in no order of importance) a swarm of butterflies, a very large cave with two stone and ornately carved doors blocking the entrance, about forty or so heavily armed men- each of whom resembled a troll in leather and some daffodils.

"I believe," Rincewind said slowly, "that at one point I mentioned getting jumped out on and stabbed? You owe me a dollar, Winslow."

"We didn't get jumped on!"

"Yes, but the distinct possibility has presented itself, hasn't it? Hah, you said that this wouldn't happen, I recall."

"Do you ever get tired of being right, Rincewind?"

"It's been less of a treat lately, I'll admit it."

"You know, you're so scared of dying that you're not really living."

"Yes, well, life is constantly trying to kill me. As are other people, gods, stones and some types of flowers."

"Enough," hissed Conina. "Get a grip you two! Byrony, do you know these people?"

"Know them?" she snorted. "I spent my teenage years despising them. They're Rowel's private army, if you don't mind. He's probably sent them to stop us."

"Oh no," said Twoflower. "That means he knows we're here!"

Rincewind threw his hands up to heaven. "And that he knew we were coming here longer then we knew we were coming here! Or at least," he added acidly, "longer then some of us knew we were coming here." He was still smarting over Twoflower being more aware of the quest's proceedings then he was.

Conina unsheathed her sword grimly, staring at the large group of men. "Okay, the plan is-"

"There's a plan?"

"I didn't see a plan."

"We have a plan?"

"The plan is," continued Conina loudly, "to dispose of this squad in as efficiently and quietly as possible. We don't need them to raise the alarm and attract other groups of armed men to their defence."

"No we don't need that at all," agreed Rincewind fervently.

"Glad you feel the same," said Conina. "So why don't you get Twoflower get over to a corner somewhere out of harms way?"

"Good thinking," said Byrony, as she raised her sword to shoulder height. "Because guess what's coming this way in about three minutes?"

Twoflower began to protest, but Rincewind clamped a hand over his mouth. "Er- I realise that you two ladies have more experience in hand-to-hand combat then I could shake a stick at but-" They waited politely. "But could you be, you know, careful?"

After a short and heavy pause, Byrony held up her sword. "Rincewind, do you see this?"

Rincewind nervously eyed the treacherously sharp yet notched blade that was inches away from his Adam's apple. "Is that a trick question?"

"Who do you think is going to come out of this missing an essential limb or two," said Byrony reasonably. "Us or them?"

Rincewind, who had overcome his sudden and unexplained need to be manly, was immediately drenched in a stealth attack of memory, in which Conina reduced a ship-full of pirates to pulpy masses, Byrony shot a cross-bow at anyone that looked sideways at her and Rincewind stood in the background looking perfectly content with the fact that he wasn't involved.

"Good luck!" Rincewind called cheerfully as he dragged Twoflower over to a nice, shady spot that was out of range of the two very-much-ready-to-fight teams. The fact that one of those teams was made up of two young women and the other of about a dozen angry men armed to the teeth did nothing to even up the odds.

Conina and Byrony sauntered out grinning to meet the leather clad hoard of men.

Yes, right, fine. Rincewind had been worried about them for a nano-second or two. Well, if they were as good as they used to be, then he wasn't going to have anything to worry about for much longer…

The two sides squared up, the girls on one side and the men on the other. Once they caught sight of them, the soldiers began to grin and leer. Once they caught sight of their weapons, however, they began leering uncertainly, as if waiting for the punch line of a difficult joke. One of them bellowed something in that complicated language the military had, and then they were suddenly all at arms and coaxing as many metallic sounding noises out of their cross-bows as they could.

"I think we're meant to be scared," Byrony whispered loudly to Conina. "Would it hurt their feelings if we weren't scared?"

"We know why you're here," said one of them loudly. "We're going to let you get the Orb and then you're going to give it to us."

"You know, I just can't see that happening," said Byrony, honestly puzzled. "Why would we do that?"

"Because then we wouldn't have to hurt you," he grinned. "And I'd be lying if I said we didn't want to."

"Calm down, calm down," said Conina irritably. "No-one's going to get hurt. Metaphorically, at least."

"Hehehe," chuckled the most heavily scarred man. Given that this wasn't an actual army, none of the men had pips or indications of command. It was probably safe to go by scarring, which meant that this guy had to be the leader. "I like a girl with spirit!"

There was a very tense silence.

The Byrony tilted her head in Conina's direction. "Did he actually just say…"

"I think he did," she replied, not taking her eyes off the men before her.

Then, after a beat, they both burst into peals of laughter.

"If I …had a dollar…for every time!" gasped Byrony, tears of laughter running down her cheeks. Conina couldn't even talk, she was laughing so hard. She just leaned on Byrony's shoulder, clutching her side with the hand that wasn't wielding an instrument of death.

The men just stood there, casting furtive glances at their leader every now and then, who was slowly turning the most remarkable shade of puce.

"Oh gods…say it again, go on," Byrony told the scarred man in between gales of laughter. "Say it one more time." In reply, he slowly drew his sword.

It didn't really have the desired expect. Instead of abruptly ceasing to laugh and becoming terrified at the imminent death that they were now facing, the two women merely made feeble attempts to curtail their hysteria so as not to hurt his feelings.

As their peals of laughter tapered off into giggles, they too hefted up their swords. "We are taking the Orb," said Conina carefully, a sly grin still lingering on her face. "And then when we leave, we'll be doing it over your dead bodies."

"Damn straight," the man growled. "We're gonna-"

"No," Conina interrupted impatiently. "I mean we are literally going to be doing it over your dead bodies."

At this moment in time, Twoflower tugged frantically at Rincewind's robe. "We're not going to let them fight are we? I mean, two young ladies against all these men?!"

"I know," said Rincewind, mesmerised by the scene unfolding in front of him. "It hardly seems fair, does it?"

There was a change in the air, and a definite feeling that something was about to happen.

Conina nudged Byrony. "Shall we get on with it then? You have the honours."

Byrony waved her sword around a bit, and then cheerfully issued what was possibly the most casual war-cry in the history of the Disc:

"All right then lads, bring it on!"

Twoflower looked on in horror as Byrony and Conina squared up to the leather-clad hulking mountains. "But it will be a terrible slaughter!" he cried.

"'Fraid so," said Rincewind ruefully. "Mint? I always have some in my pocket you know. It's strange. Never know why. Probably there's some mystic rule that goes with it."

And then…

They attacked.

The fighting was a fast and furious affair, but it really was quite one-sided. The two women worked with intense precision, planting debilitating kicks, hacks to throats and punches that nearly sent the nose on the receiving end out the back of the skull, not to mention the whizzing, decapitating things that were their swords. All activity on the part of the soldiers, (no matter how hard the punch was thrown, no matter how quickly the blade flew past) was wasted, as the target was always- without any obvious effort- not there. At first, their opponents started off grinning at the temerity of these young girls attacking them, and then rapidly passed through various stages of puzzlement, doubt, concern and abject gibbering terror as they apparently became the centre of a flashing, tightening circle of steel.

"You know," said Rincewind, speaking loudly to be heard over the screams. "Is it just me or has this whole thing been too easy?"

"What?" said Twoflower distractedly.

"Don't you think this should have been a little more difficult? I mean, these are Rowel's guards, they're not actually here to protect the Orb. If they hadn't been here, we could have just wandered in."

"Uh, well this is a legend so…Hey, look at what she's doing with his-"

"I'm just saying this because that weird priestess thought that she was hiding her god, you know? You'd think she would have made a bit of effort."

"What? Eh? Oh…I suppose so. We had to get the stones didn't we? Maybe it was information that was only to be passed down to the worthy. She… she's going to be killed. She's going to be killed! She's going to be- How did she do that?"

"That's what I'm saying! It should only have been passed to the people who were supposed to find the Orb, so why do we have it?" It was no use. Twoflower was slack-jawed and wide-eyed, watching Conina and Byrony dispense with the last of the soldiers. Sighing, Rincewind turned to watch the fight as well. Though normally he wouldn't have stayed around in an area where two dangerous groups were fighting for a big clock, he supposed there was a type of grace to the whole thing. It was like a dance really.

Albeit a dance with more then the regular amount of sharp things.

At last, all that was left were two panting figures standing amongst lots of fallen shapes.

Twoflower began to clap and Rincewind, rolling his eyes, followed suit. "Stay where you are!" begged the tourist, fumbling with his bag. "I have to get a picture of the two of you!"

Conina was peering at her arm. "I'm out of practise. I think one scratched me."

"Move together there," instructed Twoflower. "Right beside that pile of soldiers."

Byrony flung one arm around Conina's shoulders, the other still holding the sword propped on her shoulder. "Say 'Orb'!"

Laughing, Conina hooked an arm around her waist. "No, no, say 'Easy!'"

"How about 'violence is the answer'?" suggested Rincewind.

"Who knew that the two of us would actually end up friends?" said Byrony wonderingly, ignoring him.

"Oh, I always knew you two would get on like a house on fire," said Rincewind firmly.

"Really?"

"Absolutely. Screams, flames, people running for safety…"

Twoflower pressed the button and took the picture of the two laughing women.

"That'll be one for a frame, I think," he said happily, waiting for the glass to come out of the slot in the front of the machine.

"Hey, what are these?" Conina was holding up something she had picked off the body of a soldier. It looked like a large pistol crossbow, steely and sleek.

"Horsebows?" said Byrony fervently, like a child opening a wonderful Hogswatch present. "That, my dear Conina, is what you get for leading an honest and sober life."

"All the guards have them."

"Evil looking things," said Twoflower, eying the weapon nervously.

"Let's take two each!" said Byrony enthusiastically. She was now holding one in each hand and making happy little pewpewpew noises.

"Not a chance," said Rincewind firmly. "This is like you're bloody crossbow all over again."

"But this is precision! This is modern! I swear, I'll hardly shoot anything at all!"

"Rincewind is right," said Conina. "For once, anyway," she added.

"Hey!"

"We don't need these. We're almost done and they would just weigh us down on the way home."

"You may not need one, but I feel that having on of these would really validate me emotionally."

"Put it down."

"But-"

"What I don't understand is," said Twoflower suddenly, "if they had those bows then why didn't they shoot us where we stood?"

"They wanted us alive, I guess," said Byrony, casting longing glances at the bow in question. "You heard that guy, they wanted us to get the Orb and then they were going to take it from us."

"No, Twoflower has a point," said Rincewind. "For once anyway," he added smugly.

"Hey!"

"Rincewind, that was mean."

"I agree, Rincewind that was uncalled for. Apoligise to Twoflower."

"What?! You- he- fine! I'm sorry! But he does have a point. Why not kill us, loot the jewels from our quickly cooling corpses and use them to access the cave while we slowly begin to rot in the background?"

"Nice imagery," said Byrony thoughtfully.

"I give such things a lot of thought."

"Well, I suppose there's only one way to find out." Suddenly Byrony pounced on the body of a young solider and gripped the back of his neck.

Conina looked shocked. "Byrony, what are you-" The corpse screamed.

"Hah!" she yelled, pinching harder. "I thought I saw you move! The old 'playing dead on the battlefield trick', eh?"

"Please don't kill me," the soldier whimpered. "You stabbed me in the leg!"

"Oh good. Means you can't run away." He squeaked in fear and she pinched harder again, accessing a nerve in his neck which sent sharp shooting pain down through all the pressure points in his system. "Now, you're going to help us, yes? Just say aaargh."

"Aaaargh!"

"Good man." She let go, and the soldier slumped back, panting. "Why did you need us to get the Orb?"

"Doesn't work…" He was passing out with pain. Byrony slapped him.

"Go easy!" protested Twoflower.

"Ten minutes ago he came at her with a broadsword," said Conina witheringly. "He didn't look like he was planning on going easy."

"Hit him again," suggested Rincewind.

"It only works for you four!" the soldier said hurriedly, aware of the pain that his not-too-distant-future could hold. "The four of you! The cave only opens for you! Don't hit me again!"

"It…really? Because we were the ones who first touched the stones or-"

"No, just opens for…you…" He passed out.

There was a silence.

"Hit him again," said Rincewind firmly.

"Nah," she said, poking the unconscious man's face. "Leave him alone. Guy got stabbed in the leg and intravenously tortured all in the one day. He deserves some rest."

"What if he wakes up and goes back to Rowel?"

"We could kill him now," said Conina evenly. "That would take care of it."

Twoflower gasped. "That's- you can't do that!"

"Why not?" she asked calmly. Rincewind and Byrony glanced worriedly at each other.

Twoflower spluttered. "Well for one thing, he's injured!"

"Right. Like Byrony said, he's an easy target."

"Ah." Byrony held up a finger. "Actually, I said he couldn't run away."

"Right, so he's an easy target."

"No, so he can't run to tell Rowel. Conina we don't have to kill him."

"We killed the rest of them!"

"She has a point," Rincewind murmured. Byrony elbowed him in the ribs.

"He's a liability!" Conina continued. "I was hired to fulfill this mission and damn you, I won't let this-"

"Talk some sense into her," Byrony hissed to Rincewind as Conina raged on.

He gave her a Look. "People holding large bits of sharp metal can see sense whenever they feel like it. It's not my place to intrude, I'm sure."

Twoflower coughed. "You know, I have the answer to this problem."

"You do?"

"Yes I do…" He rummaged in one of the bags. "Now where did I see…Tah-dah!" Twoflower straightened up, holding a length of rope.

"Excellent," said Byrony happily. "Come on, let's tie him up."

"I am not happy about this," Conina stated, as Rincewind and Byrony dragged the soldier over to a tree, and Twoflower followed. "He could get loose."

"Relax. Rincewind knows lots of knots."

"Yes," said Rincewind vaguely, propping the young man against the tree. "It's a wonderful skill I picked up during all those times I was incarcerated."

"No, I'll tie him up," said Conina, taking the rope from Twoflower. "There's no way I am even letting the chance that he might escape occur."

"Fine, fine…"

"And we're tying him up behind those trees."

"Whatever you say…"

"We can't risk him seeing how we get into the cave."

"No problem, even though he can't see in any way by reason of being unconscious…"

"Rincewind, stop being patronising or so help me I will do something very painful."

"Painful for you or to me?"

"I'll give you one guess."

"Ah."

They tied up the soldier's body to a tree just a little inside the forest, so that there was a nice big oak right in his line of vision. Conina tied some of the knots so tight that he started going purple until Twoflower made her loosen them again. When they were finished, they made their way back to the clearing.

"Well, now that we've done that," continued Rincewind, edging away from a body. "We need to-" Suddenly, Byrony collapsed onto the ground with a curse. "What's wrong?! What's wrong?!"

"Nothing," she panted, her teeth gritted. "Just- my ankle. The fight… didn't really help. It's fine, it's fine."

"Your ankle? The dislocated one?"

"No, Rincewind the other one. Of course the dislocated one!" Gingerly, she stood up, and they all saw how her leg shook violently when taking her weight.

"Uh," said Twoflower. "Maybe we should-"

"I'm fine!" she snapped. "Come on, we need to look at the cave." Limping, she made her way across the clearing, and began inspecting its entrance for a way in.

"Stubborn, isn't she?" said Conina mildly.

"You," said Rincewind fervently, "do not know the half of it."

"Can't you say something to her?" asked Twoflower worriedly.

"Oh, of course, because she listens to everything I say-"

"Calm down," said Conina. "Look, leave her alone for now. The sooner we find the Orb, the sooner she'll get medical attention."

"Conina has a point," said Twoflower. "It can't be that bad if she can still walk, anyway."

"I suppose…"

Just then, Byrony's voice rang across the clearing. "Maybe everyone should take a look at this..." She sounded strange.

They all followed her over to the front of the cave, its giant stone entrance looming over them, very much sealed. But there was something…

Twoflower reached out and pressed his hand against the rock. "Is- is this metal?"

Byrony nodded. "Yes. Yes it is. Got it in one. The entire entrance to the cave is metal. It's not even a real cave."

Conina looked shocked. "The- then what is it? A decoy? Have we come all this way for nothing?"

"I don't know…look at this." She pointed to a bronze plaque bolted to the face of the 'rock'. It was written in a language that seemed to be made up mainly of dots and squiggles, and there were five small hollows underneath the words, the one at the centre slightly bigger then the rest.

"What does that say?" asked Twoflower nervously.

"I," said Byrony, "have no idea. None. No clue in the slightest. Rincewind, on the other hand, knows just about every language there ever is. The ones worth speaking, anyway. Rincewind?"

They all waited for a moment as Rincewind peered at the language carved into the bronze.

"Sodomy non sapiens," muttered Rincewind under his breath.

"What does that mean?"

"Means I'm buggered if I know. I don't think I've ever- wait, hang on…"

He moved in closer to the writing. Byrony was right; he did have a gift for languages. He could, for example, scream for mercy in nineteen languages, and just scream in another forty-four. He could speak Chimeran, Trob, High Borogravian, Vanglemesht, Sumtri and even Black Oroogu, a language with no nouns and only one adjective, which is obscene. He was definitely sure that he had never come across this language before, but it seemed to be a sort of blend of lots of different ones. That one was the Agatean for butterfly/travel, and that one was Klatchian, he was sure…and the whole thing looked like it was supposed to rhyme, so if you take that into account then that symbol probably meant tall…

The others watched silently as Rincewind, concentrating furiously and with his tongue poking out one side of his mouth, scribbled on a piece of paper with a stub of pencil he had found in his pocket. Slowly… slowly… he deciphered what was written on the plaque.

"Do you think he's-" began Conina.

"Shhh!" hissed Byrony.

Finally, Rincewind stepped back, scanning what he had written.

"Do you understand it?" asked Twoflower worriedly. Rincewind's expression was almost as strange as Byrony had sounded when she realised the cave was metal.

He cleared his throat. "Yes, it's just a bit…it's kind of…maybe you should all just… look."

He held out the paper, and they all gathered around.

There will be a man with eyes of glass,

There will be a warrior, strong and tall,

One will be one who travels alone

And one will be one who shall lose it all.

These are the ones who deserve this task

These are they who shall bring it back.

Silence.

"Oh dear," said Twoflower faintly.

"Is this about us?" Conina exploded. "Is this a thousand-year-old prophecy about us?"

"I don't- I mean- well, it looks like it, doesn't it?" said Byrony, nonplussed. "Twoflower has glasses. Conina you're the warrior…"

"But both you and Rincewind travel the Disc," said Twoflower squinting at the page. "I wonder which of you is going to lose it all?"

Rincewind shivered. "See? Told you."

"I can't believe you translated it. Rincewind, that was actually quite brilliant," said Byrony admiringly.

"Well, it was nothing really…"

"Can we please stay with the situation at hand?" Conina asked, fuming. "I am not comfortable with this!"

"I think it's a good thing," said Twoflower mildly. "It's fate. It means we're meant to take the Orb. The priestess wouldn't want to stop us if we were meant to take it." The suddenly seemed to dawn on him. "Wait…I'm in this- that means I really am a legend! Oh my…"

"He's exactly right Conina," said Byrony firmly. "This is a good thing."

"If you say so," she sighed, as Byrony began to open the pouch on her belt.

"All we need to do is to put the jewels in those little grooves and we'll see the entrance," she said triumphantly.

"Er-" said Rincewind.

"See? There's little symbols for the elements over them, so everyone go in front of one."

"Is it just me or-"

"We had better do it at the same time," said Conina. "You never know."

Byrony nodded. "Good idea. On three then. Here, everyone take their stone."

They all shuffled into position.

"Has anyone else seen-" started Rincewind.

"Ready? Now!" In one movement, Conina, Twoflower, Rincewind and Byrony all pushed the jewels into the slots designed to accommodate them.

They all stood quickly back and looked expectantly at the giant doors…

Which…absolutely failed to rumble open impressively in every respect imaginable.

"Damn," muttered Byrony. "What else are we supposed to do?"

"That's what I've been trying to tell you." said Rincewind impatiently. "There's another space, look." He pointed to a slightly larger space in the middle of the four jewel-filled ones. "We need another jewel!"

Everyone turned and looked at Byrony, who was staring at the space with her mouth open.

"Byrony?" said Conina warningly.

"Uh…" She began laughing nervously. "So guess what?"

---

The Princess of Istanzia chewed her lip anxiously as she surveyed the maps. "And if he gains control of Betrek, what then?"

The commander of her army sighed. "He'll have the full force of Istanzia's military on his side at this point, so I wouldn't think it would take too much effort for him to extend his control over Ushistan and Smale. After that, it is but one small step to the invasion of Omnia. Once he has that power behind him, an attack on Ank-Morpork is almost inevitable. And one he has Anhk-Morpork-"

"He has the disc," she finished grimly. "All bases of trading, the main currency capital…not to mention the busiest port on the Disc."

"Yes, you majesty."

Her pale face flushing with anger, Princess Emmaline pushed the red hair from her face. "Vetinari knows Rowel cannot come to power," she stated firmly. "He has as much riding on this as we do, gentlemen. I have full confidence in the team he deployed to find the Orb."

There was silence, in the small room, which was mostly filled with the table full of maps and figurines. The men in there shuffled nervously in front of the piercing and powerful gaze of the young woman before them.

"And even if they fail," she continued, with a steely eye on each of them, "there is still the fact that this is an election, in which I have every chance of winning."

No one seemed to be able to tell her that telling people that they were toiling away in the fields for nothing wasn't exactly winning her votes, not to mention the fact that she was so utterly, utterly intense…

And not one of the military leaders wished to point out that in some cases, Rowel could actually seem quite charming from a distance and had, in fact, won over quite a lot of the electorate…

But she didn't need to be told that.

She all ready knew.

Emmaline slumped over the maps, her thin arms supporting her shaking frame. "This- this cannot happen," she choked, as her finger stabbed at a red-filled map of a Rowel-ruled world. "It will be a time of- of blood and clockwork and metal and glass-cases and it cannot happen." She looked up, her pale face marred with red blotches of fury. "Do you understand me?"

Dumbfounded, her generals nodded.

"Good. Then we are agreed. We will fight, what ever the outcome." She stood tall, dawing upon a thousand years of heriditary pride. "Whatever the outcome, we shall fight for the people."

And she began to roll up the maps.

---

It was depressing, thought Rincewind. The entire situation was depressing.

It had transpired that Byrony had no idea where the final jewel was supposed to be, nor even that there had been fifth jewel in the first place.

They had stood around looking shocked until she had said: "Well bugger this for a lark!" and proceeded to saw open the metal side of the cave using her sword. Inside, to their amazement, there had been all manner of joints and levers and mechanics.

Now she was on her back half-way stuck into the hole she had created with an assortment of tools laid out on the grass beside her. Every so often clanking and angry muttering would issue forth.

Conina, Twoflower and Rincewind were sprawled out on the grass a little further away. Conina was blowing a dandelion, Twoflower was sorting his iconographs and Rincewind was wondering how long it was until lunch time.

"What will we do," asked Twoflower suddenly, "if she can't get it to open?"

"Panic?" said Rincewind hopefully.

"We'll go back to the manor," said Conina firmly. "We'll need to warn Vetinari and help stop Rowel from achieving disc-domination."

A little time went by. The cursing became louder.

"She doesn't sound like she's having much success," said Twoflower uncertainly. "What's she trying to do again?"

"She's trying to get the mechanics to do what they would have done if we had the right jewel to slot in."

"Right. And how's she doing that?"

"Well, it sounds as if she's trying to do that by hitting it repeatedly with a wrench, but I'm sure I don't know."

"Maybe we should see if she needs help," said Rincewind wearily, as there was a loud clang and a yelp.

They got up and meandered over to the pair of legs sticking out of the hole. "Byrony?" called Conina. "Are you all right in there?" The sound of metal being scraped together issued forth.

"Bugger off! This is hard enough as it is, and-" There was a scraping noisel ike a gear being forced into life. "Wait! I have it! Quick! Give me a three-eighths Gripley! Quick!"

They all looked at each other. Conina shrugged and Twoflower looked bewildered. Rincewind looked down. A variety of different tools were scattered around the grass. He selected a piece of shaped metal at random and placed it in Byrony's impatient outstretched hand. It was drawn inside.

"Wha- I said a Gripley! This isn't a-" there was the tearing, crinkling noise of metal giving away- "my thumb, my thumb you made me-" and the sound of metal being very distressed indeed filled the clearing "-now the ratchet spring's snapped off the trunnion armature-" there was a clang "-aaargh, aaargh, aaargh, that was my head-" then a loud thump. "Aaargh!"

Then everything went quiet.

"Uh," said Twoflower, watching Byrony's legs writhe in pain. "I think you gave her the wrong one"

"You think?" said Conina drily.

There was a series of thumps and twanging noises as the top half of the human extricated itself from the machinery. Byrony was streaked with oil down one side and rose like an angry wraith.

"This," she hissed, waving the silver twisty tool, "is not a three-eighths Gripley. This," she bent down and picked up a very similar looking and only slightly less twisty tool, "is a three-eighths Gripley. It stops the elliptical cam from gradually sliding up the beam shaft and catching on the flange rebate while I work on it, because you know where it ends up otherwise?"

"Um, where?"

"On my head!!!"

"Have you fixed it yet?" asked Conina impatiently.

Byrony shot her a poisonous look, and crawled back into the dark hole.

"Let's take that as 'I'm close'," suggested Rincewind.

"We don't have time for this," exclaimed Conina, exasperated. "We need to tell Vetinari that we've failed!"

"Give Byrony a chance. She knows what she's doing."

"I don't think she understands-"

"She knows what she's doing," repeated Rincewind angrily. "You've led us for the most part and we followed your orders, but Byrony is the real leader of this troupe when it comes to this sort of thing. She knows more about these things then you ever will."

They glowered at one another. Twoflower shuffled nervously.

"I can hear you both, by the way." Byrony's voice echoed out from the darkness. "Just thought you ought to know."

Conina took a deep breath. "Listen, Byrony-"

But suddenly Byrony was scrambling out of the structure, grinning. "I did it! I am amazing! The doors are going to open! Move!"

Quickly, they all assembled before the giant doors, craned up expectantly and-

And then the floor gave way

---

High over the Disc, on a spire of green ice ten miles high which rises through the clouds, the all the gods whose eyes had been fixed on a playing board drew in a sharp breath.

The Lady smiled, her bright green eyes glowing form within. "I believe that the next turn in yours, Lord."

Fate drummed his fingers on the table, his chin resting on his other hand. The fact that they were playing with a new twist to the game meant that it was nearly impossible to tell who was winning, right up until someone won.

"Remember, no cheating, Lady."

"But who would cheat Fate?" she asked with a smile.

"No one. And yet everyone tries. Pass me the dice."

Fate rolled.

The gods leaned in…

A six. A three. A five.

"Ah. A good roll, do you agree?"

She nodded with the merest inclination of her head. So far, they had been neck-to-neck.

"Well then, let us see where our brave heroes are heading, shall we?" Fate waved a hand over the board. As one, the gods saw where the four were were to go next, and what lay in store for them.

"It would seem that what happens next shall determine the winner of the game," Fate said, mildly.

"So it would seem," the Lady said quietly. It had been a good roll.

Fate scooped up the dice and glanced at her.

"Unless," he added, "you wish to resign?"

She shook her head.

"Play."

"You realise what will happen?"

"Play."

"As you wish."

And the gods leaned in once more…

---

It was utterly dark.

There had been a painful confusion of mud and tunnels and sliding dirt. Rincewind assumed- or the small part of him that wasn't gibbering with fear assumed- that they were underneath the 'cave'. Which had been a decoy after all it seemed. If someone had tried to blast their way through those doors, what would they have found? An empty room with 'Nyer nyer nyer nyer nyer!' written on the wall? Then he remembered what Byrony was saying about the High Priestess being a sly bitch, and reasoned that it probably would have been something a bit more unpleasant.

"I think I'm having a heart-attack," Rincewind informed the world in general

No reply. Where was everyone else?

Reaching out carefully, in case he felt something, he felt for something to feel.

"If that hand isn't attached to someone's arm," Byrony's voice warned, "there is going to be trouble."

"It's me," said Rincewind, relieved and still clutching her knee. "Are the others all right?"

There was a small groan from somewhere to his left, and someone coughed and spluttered as though they had been winded.

"Oh ye gods," moaned Conina. "I think I landed on a rock." There was no response from Twoflower, only hacking coughs. "Rincewind, how are you sounding so intact?"

"I dropped and rolled a lot of the way. And I'm used to falling. Used to unexpected falling. Used to every situation which results in falling, really."

"I think my spine is broken."

"Yes well, I'm having a heart attack."

Twoflowers coughs petered off. "I think I'm all right now."

"No, no, no," insisted Rincewind. "You have a punctured lung. And whose fault is this?"

"Why, yes," said Conina, catching on. "Whose bright idea was it to try and get in without the jewel again?"

"Gosh," said Rincewind, scratching under his hat. "Let me see, who was it that suggested this again? Goodness me, I cannot think."

"All right, all right," said Byrony at ground level irritably. "I'm sorry, okay? I didn't know it was going to do that. All right? Are we all alright?"

"Well, I suppose my spine might just be fractured," said Conina. Rincewind heard her stand up.

"Rincewind, how's your heart attack?" asked Byrony.

"It may be easing off a little."

"Twoflower? Punctured lung?"

"Oh, um, yes its fine now, thanks."

"Good. That's good. It's good that everyone is okay."

There was a pause that contained no sounds whatsoever of Byrony getting to her feet.

"Okay…so, shall we go then?" hinted Conina, just as Rincewind realised he was getting very a bad feeling in his gut.

"Ah. Well, there's the thing. I'm…I'm going to…I'm going to- gods I can't believe I'm saying this- I'm going to need Rincewind to carry me."

Rincewind's blood went cold. "What happened?" he asked through numb lips.

"Don't panic would you! I just sort of…landed on my ankle. Yes, the dislocated one. It just stings a bit."

"Stings a bit?"

"Yes, honestly, it's really not that-" The torches in the tunnel chose that exact moment to flicker to life. "Bad," finished Byrony resignedly as they all gasped in horror.

Byrony had slid her boot off, and the lower part of her leg was exposed. One slender piece of bone was now protruding out of her inner left ankle, the flesh a ragged gash around it. Blood seeped slowly out and trickled down her foot. Her face was white in the dim octarine light.

"Not that bad!?"

"In my defense it did not look this bad in the dark."

"Does it really hurt?" asked Twoflower, his eyes fixed on the piece of white bone sticking out from the red.

"Nooo," scoffed Byrony. "I just can't…I just don't think I can…" For a moment, she hung her head, panting deeply as she tried to regain control of the pain.

Rincewind sighed, bent down and scooped her up into his arms. "All right," he said quietly. "Which way are we going?"

"Follow the torches," Byrony instructed. Her voice didn't shake at all, but Rincewind could see the dark circles forming under her eyes again. "They'll lead us there."

Silently, they began walking along the dirt tunnel. There was no metal down here, and the air was damp and filled with an earthy taste. The torches flickered eerily, and it was best not to ask who had put them there, or how they had been lit…

Of course, Byrony being Byrony, she eventually started to talk. "You know, this is really the last stretch of the whole quest. It'll be easy. We'll probably just pick up the Orb and go. We'll probably just have to…answer a riddle or something. It'll be a cinch- Rincewind, why do you keep saying 'hah' under your breath?"

"Do I?" asked Rincewind grimly.

Despite the fact that Rincewind's cynicism was practically the fifth member of the group, the other three actually felt rather at ease around it. Many people who had got to know Rincewind had come to treat him as a sort of two-legged miner's canary, and tended to assume that if Rincewind was still upright and not actually running then some hope remained.

"You know," continued Byrony, "maybe we should have an evacuation plan."

"Run away," said Rincewind firmly.

"What, is that it?" asked Conina from the front of the line.

"Fine, run away as fast as you can."

"But where to?!" said Twoflower.

Rincewind sighed. He'd tried to make his basic philosophy clear time and time again, and people never got the message. "Don't worry about to. In my experience, to always takes care of itself. The important word is away."

Byrony shifted in his arms. "If I'm getting heavy, drop me."

"Oh yes? Onto your broken ankle which doesn't hurt at all?" asked Rincewind testily.

Byrony had the decency to look embaressed. "Would you look at all these torches!" she exclaimed, changing the subject. "We're all lucky I'm wearing my modulator. All these lamps are lit by magic! I'd guess that the machinery is triggered by magic too… I tell you, if I didn't have my modulator on, this place would be a smoky hole in the ground!"

"Good riddance to it," said Conina moodily. She had taken a torch off the wall and was leading the way through the tunnel.

"I think that it's wonderful," said Twoflower dreamily. "I can't believe I'm actually a key member in a legend that will save the world! Maybe we'll have sagas written about us! We shall be immortal through the tales of our great deeds! We the few, the lone and the brave…wandering down an endless labyrinth in the depths of an underground cave."

Rincewind huffed impatiently "Yes, but is it safe, that's what I want to know." Some people achieved immortality by great deeds of cruelty or derring-do. Some achieved immortality by amassing great wealth. But Rincewind had long ago decided that he would, on the whole, prefer to achieve immortality by not dying.

Aside from all this, Byrony didn't look well at all. He kept casting furtive glances down at her, and she was growing paler by the minute. Oh no, what about loss of blood? Was she still bleeding? He couldn't see…

Right around then, what with Byrony being back in his arms again, he wondered what had become of his libido. He hadn't heard from it in a while, and thought that maybe it-

So, er, hello.

Damn.

Right, this is all your emotions talking here, okay? I've been outvoted. Look you have to-

Listen, you. This is a completely inappropriate place for you to be popping up. Go on. Bugger off. We'll have a talk later.

No, you don't understand-

Listen, the woman this conversation is revolving around is very seriously injured!

Exactly! That's my point! Your instincts had a vote in this too and they're telling you something, aren't they?! Rincewind, before it's too late, you have to-

"Are you all right?" Rincewind looked down. Byrony was looking up at him with a terribly amused expression. "You look like you're attempting to unravel the secrets of time and space in your head."

"Yes, something like that… How're you doing?"

"Oh, you know," she said vaguely. "All right." Sure you are. And I'm the King of Oorugu, thought Rincewind glumly.

Byrony, on the other hand, was trying very hard not to be pleased with her current situation. She had no right to be pleased, she knew that. Lost in underground tunnels, dislocated ankle, possible end-of-the-disc scenario… But still…

She glanced up at the man who was holding her in his arms…

Rincewind the Wizard.

Socially inept.

Physically awkward.

Surprisingly quick-witted.

Endlessly nervous.

Witheringly sarcastic.

And…undeniably adorable.

"Stop!" called Conina suddenly from the front. "We have reached…a door."

"Duhn duhn duuuuhn!" said Byrony dutifully, mimicking the popular Moving Picture accompaniment to horror-films.

Leaning around Twoflower, Conina gave her a reproachful glance. "It's completely unlocked. Do I just go through?"

Byrony shrugged. "Where else are we going to go?"

Nodding, Conina wrapped her hand around the door handle and twisted. The door, which was wooden and ornately carved, swung open.

"Oh," said Twoflower. That summed it up, really.

Inside the room were thousands upon thousands of flickering candles. It hard a tall dome-like ceiling, and the floor was an intricate pattern of different colored slabs.

The wall was one endless mosaic of different scenes, presumably scenes of the Orb granting life to crops and animals. Set in the wall opposite to the door were four large, long arrows which were point up towards the ceiling.

In the centre of the room, facing the up-right arrows was a long, low, stone table with four small silk-cloth covered mounds. On the ground on the opposite side of the table to the arrows were four circles of tiles set into the floor. Blue, red, white and brown.

"I think," said Byrony slowly. "That we're meant to stand on those circles. Blue for water, I suppose…everyone take the element you had to go through to get a jewel."

"I don't like this," sighed Conina. "It's all getting a little bit too mythic for my liking."

They all walked into the room and Conina and Twoflower took their places.

Rincewind gently set Byrony on her feet on the blue tiles. "Are you sure you're all right? Can you stand?"

"I'll be fine," she said, grinning tiredly. "And you're right beside me if I fall, aren't you? I'll just grab you."

Nodding, Rincewind took his place on the red circle. "You do that."

As soon as all four sets of feet were touching the tiles, some unknown and unseen mechanism began to make a grinding noise, and the arrows at the far end of the room slowly lowered down so that they were now pointing at each person.

"Byrony?" said Rincewind out of the corner of his mouth. "Why the hell do I have a great big sharp piece of metal pointing at me?"

In response, Byrony leaned over the low table in front of them and whipped the silk cloth off whatever it concealed.

It was the Orb.

The others did the same. They all had Orbs too, globes of glass slightly larger then a fist which glowed gently in the dim room. Their colour matched that of the tiled circles they had been placed in front of.

"Great," said Rincewind suspiciously. "Four for one deal, is it? Fantastic. Lets take the lot and go."

"No, it's never that simple," said Twoflower, shaking his head. "In legends, it's never that simple."

"No," sighed Rincewind. "It never is, is it?"

"Obviously we have to choose which one is the real Orb," said Conina hesitantly, "but what are the arrows for?"

Twoflower scratched his head. "Uh, I suppose they're an incentive to choose wisely?"

Rincewind stared at the table in front of him, thinking…

"So, wait," said Conina, pinching her nose and panic rising in her voice. "Does this mean that whoever chooses wrong dies?"

"Not necessarily," said Byrony, trying to sound calm. "The profile of the priestess suggests that the shots would be fired at random. She would have considered the chance of an intelligent person dying for a stupid person's mistake a greater punishment then the stupid person dying for their own mistake."

"What a bitch."

"What happens," said Twoflower slowly. "What happens if, hypothetically I mean, someone were to step off the tiles and just run away?"

"Arrow in the back I'd imagine."

Conina took a deep breath. "So basically what you're saying is that we have a one in four chance of someone dying today?"

"Uh, well, more really, if you take into account that after one person dies, that's only one Orb eliminated-"

"That priestess was a bitch."

Byrony took deep breaths. "All right. All right. Okay, we can assume that the first person who takes the Orb won't be shot. Now it comes down to who- Hang on, does anyone have any straws?"

"You're not serious. Tell me you didn't just say that."

Byrony raised an eyebrow at Conina. "Oh, I beg your pardon, clearly you have a better idea?"

"Well, look at the Orbs! Isn't there any markings or anything?"

"They're globes of glass!" shouted Byrony. "They all look the same! Besides, the Orb disappeared thousands of years ago, and even before that it wasn't exactly handed around for people to take notes!"

Conina put a hand over her eyes. "You're right, you're right. I'm sorry. But this is- I mean, this is suicide."

"I have some pieces of grass in my pocket," said Twoflower. "Here, I cut a short one." He held them up with an expression of determination on his face.

They looked at him.

Byrony suddenly looked sad. "Twoflower…I'm so sorry."

"Don't be silly. It isn't like you stuck those arrows there is it? Now come one, take a piece of grass, there's a good girl." He leaned over, taking care not to lift his feet from the ground and offered her the grass. "Whoever gets the short one chooses an Orb. And, I guess, gets to live a little longer too. Here, take one."

Byrony took one. It was long.

Conina took one. It was long.

"Rincewind?" said Conina. Rincewind was still staring at the Orbs, rubbing his chin.

Four Orbs…

"Rincewind, you need to take a straw," prompted Byrony.

"I- What? Oh…" He leaned over.

Please be the short piece, Byrony thought anxiously as his long thin fingers plucked one from Twoflower's hand. Come on Rincewind, pick the short piece. Oh please pick the short piece. I don't think I could face it if-

She inhaled sharply. It was long.

"Well done Twoflower," said Conina encouragingly.

"Looks like you get to live for this round, eh?" said Byrony in a mock-jovial voice. Why was Rincewind so quiet?

Twoflower looked miserable. "Maybe," he said, "I'll pick the right one and then no one will have to die."

"That'd be nice, certainly," said Rincewind vaguely. Byrony looked at him curiously. About five foot of metallic death could be coming his way and he seemed…distracted. This was not Rincewind-like behaviour.

"All right," she said. "Twoflower, you need to take the first one. Pick an Orb."

"Er- Should I duck?" he asked nervously. "In fact, maybe we should all duck, you know?"

Byrony gave a sharp shake of her head. "You wont have time. Istanzia were messing with weapons back when everyone else was hitting each other with bits of rock. That arrow is going to come out fast. Besides, something tells me that our friend the priestess would have thought of that. There might be something nastier in store. Go on," she smiled, as encouragingly as she could in the circumstances, "pick an Orb, Twoflower."

Twoflower reached out a hand…

Suddenly, Rincewind waved his arms and yelled "WAIT! Stop! I've got it!"

The tension had been so bad in the room that now Byrony felt like she was the one having a heart attack. "What?! What?! What have you got?!"

"I know what it is!" he said earnestly. "It's a shell-game! You know? Like they set up on street corners in Ankh-Morpork? Four nutshells, a ball in one of them and they mix them up and you pick one!"

"Yes," said Conina impatiently. Twoflower wasn't even listening. He was examining the Orbs as if his (or someone else's) life depended on it. "We know Rincewind. One of the Orbs is real, we just have to figure out which one."

"No listen. Outside on the cave there were five slots for jewels." They looked blankly at him. He sighed impatiently. "You three may know legends, but I know a con when I see one. A con-man doesn't choose to play a shell game if there's any possibility of him actually losing. The con isn't in getting you to pick the wrong shell, the con is in getting you to pick a shell at all. "

Conina looked confused, but light was dawning in Byrony's eyes.

Rincewind held up four fingers. "The ball isn't in the first cup." He lowered a finger. "It isn't in the second, or the third." He lowered two more. "The ball isn't even in the fourth cup." He lowered his hand and looked into Byrony's eyes.

"The ball is in the con man's palm the whole time."

Conina gasped. "None of the Orbs are real?"

Byrony's green eyes widened. "But that means that…no matter what we pick, someone will die!"

Then came the most worrying sound that anyone could possibly have chosen to make at that moment.

"Um…"

Their faces frozen, all three turned to Twoflower.

"Does that mean I shouldn't have picked this up?" he said, holding a faintly glowing Orb aloft.

Behind the wall, machinery began to whirr…

---

Nanny Ogg lent back from the table and let out a belch. "S'cuse me." She then reached out and hooked another pork-pie that had been provided for their comfort, and let out a sigh.

Granny Weatherwax, on the other hand, was showing no such signs of contentment. She was gazing out the window with a steely eye, barely touching the cup of tea that was rapidly cooling in her hand.

"I gotta admit," said Nanny, admiring the culinary skill that had seen fit to wrap the gleaming pastry around this fine piece of pork and gravy. "That whole thing with the wizards worked out well, eh? I mean, we knocked out most of Rowels's men, so there's still some passages for Byrony to come through. I suppose he's still spreadin' all that stuff about her, but nothing can be helped there…"

She looked over at her companion, who seemed to be casting vicious glances at an innocent saucer full of ink over on the sideboard.

"Esme," said Nanny reasonably. "You can't watch 'em the whole time."

"Something's wrong," said Granny bluntly.

Nanny Ogg looked instantly disturbed. If Esme Weatherwax said that something was wrong, then something was most definitely wrong. And if something was wrong, then this did not bode well for the political state of the Disc in general. Not that Nanny Ogg cared for the Disc in general. She really only cared about the close bits that would affect her immediate livelihood, i.e the chance that her distillery could be shut down if Lancre was taken over.

Nanny Ogg shook her head. "I hate to say it, but p'raps we ought to cut our losses. At least, we ought to contemplate cutting them. Desperate times call for desperate measures. Rowel is planning something you know. I hears it in the hallways. The amount 'o gossip that's flyin' around, you wouldn't believe. I mean, as long as Byrony survives she can-"

"It aint that easy."

Granny Weatherwax turned to Nanny Ogg. "I been watching her Gytha. Of course," she added. "I aint been meddling. No one could accuse me of meddling"

"No Esme," said Nanny Ogg meekly.

"I'm not one to impose myself."

"No Esme."

"Never invited meself in when I wasn't wanted"

"No Esme."

"Never said a word out of place-"

"I've always said that about you."

"I was talkin' Gytha."

"Sorry."

Silence descended.

Finally Granny turned to Nanny Ogg with a weary expression on her face.

"He loves her, Gytha. I watched 'em both. He loves her.... and I'm pretty damn sure that she loves him."

Nanny Ogg contemplated this. "Oh. Bugger."

"Right."

"She's likely to do something stupid then?"

Granny Weatherwax sighed. "I'm afraid," she said. "You're exactly right."

"When will we set off?"

Granny glanced down at her cup, and at the tealeaves floating to the surface. "We'd better-" Suddenly, she leaped up, her eyes wide. Shocked, Nanny jerked and her drink flew into the air and overturned.

"We need to go now!"

"That was nearly full. That was a nearly full drink," said Nanny reproachfully.

"Come on! Something's going to happen!"

"Best part of a whole glass of-"

"Gytha!"

"Did I say I wasn't coming? I was just pointing out-"

"Now!"

"Can't I just get another before-"

"Gytha! Something is happening!"

"Oh. I'll get the brooms."

---

For Rincewind, time had slowed like treacle.

One of the arrows was going to fire, but which one?

Of course! Suddenly Rincewind realised, the arrow was going to hit him. Why wouldn't it? Every moment in his life had lead up to this. The constant dear-death experiences, the running, the screaming, the dodging, the…well, all the times people had realised that they preferred him dead, basically. He had often wondered (but not too hard, in case it stopped working) how he managed to always stay one step ahead of death, and now he knew.

He was meant to die here. He was meant to die now. It was fate. As Rincewind realised this, a strange and not entirely unpleasant peace came over him. Well, perhaps he was going to die, but it would save the others, wouldn't it?

It would save the woman he loved.

There are worse reasons to die.

He was right of course, but not in the way he imagined. It was Fate, because Fate was winning the game.

It's going to be me, thought Rincewind in a slightly detached way. It's going to shoot me.

Unfortunately, Byrony realised the same thing.

Moving faster then she ever had before, she threw herself in front of the only man who had ever listened, and gripped his robe.

"Rincewind," said Byrony urgently, looking up into his shocked face, and pressing her cold hand to his cheek.

"I'll wait for you, Rincewind. I'll wait for y-"

Before anyone could react, there was a sound that would haunt Rincewind's dreams for the rest of his life. Considering the life that had Rincewind led, and the many unpleasant sounds that he had heard, it was peculiar that this one should cause him to lose so much sleep.

It was a thunk, and the soft shirring of an arrow coming through the air…

Followed by the most singularly unpleasantly organic sound any of the three had ever heard.

There was a gasp.

Byrony fell to the ground.

---

"Well, I didn't think that would happen," said Blind Io, a little startled.

As one, the Gods drew back from the board, letting out sighs of disappointment. It had been a good game, but now it seemed to be over.

Offler, the crocodile god scratched his scales. "Well, I shuppose that wash a shtroke of…well, you know…"

Fate coughed. "It would seem," he said slowly to the Goddess sitting before him "That you have kept your piece. My congratulations. According to the rules set down, my Lady, you have won the Game."

But the Lady didn't move her bright, glowing green eyes from the playing board.

The Gods, as has already been pointed out, play games other than chess with the fates of mortals and the thrones of kings.

And it is important to remember that they always cheat, right up to the end...

She said: "Wait."

---

"Rincewind!" Conina was shaking him urgently, as bits of rock fell from the ceiling, and the room shook around them. "Rincewind, we have to leave!"

The place was old. No one had been inside for hundreds of years and now, ancient metal had been forced into action, grinding against rust that had long since solidified. The shooting of the arrow had caused gears to grind, springs to act and mechanical equations, established hundreds of years ago, to spring into action. The cave was shaking, and lumps of masonry were falling all around, cracking the intricate tiles on the ground.

Rincewind was on his knees, clutching the cold, motionless body, which had once been so full of life in a way that nothing else ever would be.

"The whole place is collapsing!" cried Twoflower. "Rincewind, come on!"

Rincewind muttered something unintelligible.

Conina yanked on his robe. "Come on! We have to run!"

Rincewind looked up at her, and the emptiness in his eyes made her reel away.

"No" he said. "I won't."

---

Back at Winslow Manor, things were going much more accordingly to plan.

One by one, the wizards were picking off Rowel's men.

It was like shooting fish in a barrel really, except that (as the Senior Wrangler pointed out) fish weren't as much fun because they didn't provide a moving target. Now wizards were having the time of their lives popping out behind corners and catching the thin slimy men unawares with obscure spells that hadn't been aired in ages.

The problem was, that in Ankh-Morpork the wizards had a certain understanding with the citizens that no one would be turned into toads on the event of their cheeking a wizard provided that no one would ever cheek a wizard. While this understanding was occasionally breached, it had enough respect in the local community that people would begin to complain should every wizard begin to point his staff at every lay-person who looked at him side-ways.

Now, they were able to let off some steam, as it were.

"Hah! Eat dust, Pig-mother!" screamed the Lecturer in Recent Runes as he sent a rather gaudy looking purple spell in the direction of a rapidly retreating man in a dark suit. He rounded a corner pursued by the spell, and after a moment there was a burst of sequins.

The other wizards clapped appreciatively.

"Seven out of ten," said the Chair of Indefinite Studies approvingly.

"Six and a half," said the Senior Wrangler.

"Ook," said the Librarian.

"Four," said the Dean sulkily. He wasn't allowed to shoot anybody on account of his use of another fireball, which had taken out most of the seventh floor's wallpaper.

The trick was to balance your spell with the large atmosphere of magic already in the vicinity. Though Byrony was still wearing her modulator, this didn't mean that the build up of magic from all her years staying at the manor instantly dissipated, so the wizards had to use their rather questionable genius to locate non-lethal spells which could be used lethally, as it were. And of course, the wizard in charge of this was…

"What next, Stibbons?" said the ArchChancellor cheerily, rolling up his sleeves. "Haven't done this much conjurin' since I was in first year!"

Ponder Stibbons peered at the large lexicon which was resting upon the Bursar's back, and nervously turned a page, aware that if a spell happened to turn every living organism within a three mile radius into a caterpillar, he'd be the one to blame, flares or no flares.

They had polished off quite a few of Rowel's men through the sheer art of guerrilla warfare, and were now merely picking off the rest for sport.

Ponde pushed his glasses up his nose nervously. "Um- might I suggest Spidwell's Obscure Doves, ArchChancellor?"

Ridcully nodded, and grinned. "Obscure doves, eh?" he said, catching sight of a fleeing figure. "This should be interesting!"

He waved his hands and-

Theoretically, doves should have begun to materialise from every biological orifice that the man in black had upon his person, creating an amusing situation with much flapping, running and screaming, but in this case a very disappointing grand total of absolutely nothing happened.

Ridcully peered at his fingers. "Should I have used my staff? Stibbons! What the hell is going on?"

Ponder had already pulled out his thaumometer, and was rubbing it anxiously with a sleeve. "Er- I'm getting a negative reading of magic, ArchChancellor! But- but that can't be right, can it? What could cause a vacuum for magic?"

"A negative reading? Less then one thaum of magic? Can't happen lad. Just isn't possible."

"I assure you ArchChancellor," Ponder said hotly, "that it is happening right now. What could cause this?"

Ridcully scratched under his hat. "Well, I can only think of one thing lad, and that's-" His expression froze. "Oh…oh no…"

"ArchChancellor? What is it?!"

"We need to talk to Vetinari. Now."

---

Just as the great cave seemed to collapse in on itself, sending plumes of dust into the twilight of the evening, three figures ran out, one stumbling a little further behind. They collapsed on the ground just as the cave fell, and all that was left to mark its existence was a suspicious pile of rubble. No doubt, one day legends would be told of what lay beneath that pile, and foolish young men with horses would set off from their homeland to this very spot in an attempt to seek their fortune. For the moment, however, it was simply a marker for a tragedy.

Rincewind scrambled to his feet, his eyes wild. He began hauling rocks, throwing bent metal, scraping away dirt and pushing boulders.

"Rincewind," said Conina uneasily. "Rincewind, what are you doing?"

"We have to get her out," he panted. "Come on and help me! We have to get her out!"

Twoflower gently tried to take his arm, but Rincewind shook him off. "There's still air down there," he muttered to himself as he blindly dug through the rubble. "She'll be fine. Just dig her out and she'll be fine."

He wasn't crying because, hah, there was nothing to cry about! She's down there, but they'd dig her out and she'd be fine! Nothing to it! The arrow wound probably hurt a bit, and that's why she hadn't run out with the rest of them, but doctor Lawn would fix her up in no time! An Igor! They'd get an Igor!

She'd be just fine!

Mindless to the scrape of the sharp rocks, the bent metal and to the cuts he was digging into his hands, Rincewind continued to plough through the rubble, unaware that he was never going to dig down far enough.

Twoflower and Conina watched him in silence.

"We have to stop him. It's so sad."

Conina glanced over, and saw that Twoflower was quietly crying. "She was so young," he continued, shaking his head. "So young and full of life."

"Yes. Also, we have to get back to the manor to tell Vetinari we failed."

Twoflower turned to her, his mouth an O of astonishment. "Byrony's dead," he said. "And that's your first reaction?"

"We have a job to do," she snapped. "We were entrusted to do it. Thousands, maybe millions of people are depending on us. The fate of the disc has been entrusted to us, and we can't sacrifice the disc in the memory of one person who's already dead. Now, I liked her as much as you did but we- ye gods, what's that?"

Suddenly aware that the lecture on duties to the state had taken a fairly odd turn, Twoflower spun around just in time to see two women clothed in midnight descend from the sky. "Witches," he breathed, and wondered if it would be bad taste to take an iconograph.

Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg landed as gracefully as elderly broomsticks and a fine evening breeze would allow, and strode across the clearing to Conina and Twoflower. Well, Granny Weatherwax strode, while Nanny Ogg sort of scuttled at a high speed.

"What's going on?" demanded Granny, eyes narrowed. "I demand to know what's happening. Where's Byrony?"

"Yes, well, so do I!" said Conina defiantly. "Who are you? How do you know Byrony."

Granny paused. "We're…her…"

"Godmothers," said Nanny promptly. "Pleased to meet you luv. My, aren't you a well built young lass!"

"Well?" Granny Weatherwax, who was not to be derailed from her line of investigation, glared at the pair. "Where is she?"

As one, Twoflower and Conina turned to the rubble, where Rincewind was still hopelessly scrabbling.

"Ah," said Granny Weatherwax.

Nanny sighed. "Damn me, but we're too late. The poor girl. I hadn't figured I'd be sayin' goodbye to her at this time of life."

"She's dead then?" asked Granny. "Not just buried?"

Twoflower nodded mournfully. "She was shot with an arrow. It's my fault. The room with the Orb was booby trapped."

Granny's eyes, which seemed to have been looking at something far away, suddenly focused. "You didn't get the Orb?" she asked sharply.

"Er- that is-I mean-"

"We had to choose one Orb," interjected Conina defensively. "One Orb out of a four, and none of them were even the real Orb! We picked the wrong one, and the arrow shot and the whole place collapsed!"

"And it hit Byrony?"

"Well, yes but – "

"Quickly girl, I haven't got all day!"

"That is, it wouldn't have, but – "

"Talk!"

"Rincewind!" Conina blurted. "It was meant to hit Rincewind but then Byrony jumped in front of him and now she's dead!"

Conina sagged with the sadness washing over her. She had faced hoards of barbarians, fought pirates and smugglers and had even walked down the Shades in Ankh-Morpork without breaking a sweat. But none of this, none of it, could have prepared her for being pinned down by Granny Weatherwax's steely glare.

"No Orb." Granny shook her head. "A young girl dead and no Orb. Well, we got to get back to the manor. The weaselly fella is up to something and we need a new plan."

"I said that," said Conina irritably, quickly wiping away what could have been tears. "I said we should do that." But Granny was looking at Rincewind, whose hands were now cracked and bleeding as he shifted the stones.

Suddenly, she walked over to him, watched him for a moment and then grabbed his arm and hauled him out onto the grass. "Come on, you. You're a weaselly man too, good with words in a tight spot to boot. Come on now, good boy."

Rincewind stumbled along, as if he had lost all use of his legs. His eyes, wide and unseeing, cast about wildly. "No, you see, we have to dig. We have to dig and get her out, we-"

"She's dead."

"No, we just have to move some rocks, that's all. She'll be f-"

"She's dead, Rincewind."

"No, but you see, if we get her out she'll be fine, we just-"

The blow was unexpected, and it hit the side of Rincewind's face like a wave crashing onto the shore. He fell to the ground, and looked up at the old woman, shocked that one hand could deliver so much pain. Granny looked at him, and saw some sense creep back into his eyes.

"She won't be fine," she said softly.

"I know," said Rincewind, and he hung his head.

"Come on. We got plenty of ground to cover before we get back to the big house." She turned to the others, who had been watching in silent shock, except Nanny who had seen an opportunity and had taken out her pipe.

"Gytha, you go ahead and warn him who wears all that black-"

"The Patrician?" asked Twoflower.

"That's who I mean," said Granny testily. "Tell him they didn't get the Orb. You two ride on those horses. We got to get there before Rowel does whatever his ratty little fingers are itching to do."

Nanny nodded briskly and climbed onto her broom. "Wait," said Conina. "What about Rincewind?"

"Oh I 'spect he'll fly with me," said Granny airily. "We ought to get there just after Gytha."

Nanny winked at her. "You got a plan Esme?"

"I might do," conceded the witch.

"Well, that's all right then. See you in a mo!" Nanny Ogg flew off into the sky like a rather dumpy raven.

Conina and Twoflower mounted their horses uncertainly. Conina mounted uncertainly because she wasn't at all sure about these two sly old women with their formidable pointed hats. Twoflower mounted uncertainly because he had never been very good at mounting horses in the first place.

They cast one last glance back at Granny Weatherwax and Rincewind.

"Take care of him, won't you?" said Twoflower anxiously. "He acts all cynical, but he's a very delicate soul, really."

Granny Weatherwax and Conina exchanged Looks. It was possibly a very good thing that Rincewind didn't hear that last remark.

"He'll be fine, now be off the pair of you!" Granny waved her hand, and suddenly the horses reared up and galloped away into the quickly darkening woods.

She and Rincewind were left alone. He wasn't crying, he was just…sitting there. Staring at the ground, defeated.

"Shes's really dead?" he asked heavily, not lifting his head.

"Yes."

"I… I wish she wasn't."

"It's likely she feels the same."

Silence.

"Get up." Granny Weatherwax glared down at him, arms folded.

"What's the point? She's dead," said Rincewind hollowly.

"Oh? You think when one person dies, the world stops turnin', do you?"

"She died because of that Orb and we still didn't get it. It's over."

"No. It aint over, not yet. Not by a long shot."

"Rowel will get the throne, or the presidency or whatever, and then he'll get his army," said Rincewind in an empty voice. "Then he'll have the Disc in the palm of his hand."

"No, he won't," said Granny firmly. "The reason being, you're going to stop him."

Rincewind snorted. "Fine. I'll stop him shall I? I'll stop him, the disc will be saved, there'll be speeches parties and parades and dancing and none of it will matter because she'll still be dead."

Silence descended in the peaceful grove. All that could be heard was the faint rustlings of the wind in the leaves, and the distant sound of a tree falling, believing that it was smugly proving that it still made a noise despite the fact that there was none around to hear. It was quite despondent when it discovered, some time later, that there had been two humans in the vicinity at the time, thus disproving its theory.

"I see," said Granny finally. "You're being selfish."

"Selfish?!" spluttered Rincewind, who had expected a different and far more empathetic reaction.

"Abandoning the world for no good reason? I calls that selfish."

"No good reason? No good reason?"

"We have a duty!"

Rincewind fell silent. Somehow that single sentence seemed to make all opposing argument sound weak and petty.

"Later, you will mourn," said Granny. "Later, you'll grieve. Then you'll go on with your life. I know it, I seen it often enough. And at times," she continued, softer now. "At times her absence will hit you, like a blow in the chest, and you'll mourn her again. It'll happen less and less as time goes on, but it will happen. You have all the time in the world."

She looked at him. "Later you will mourn the dead. Give now to the living."

Rincewind shook his head slowly, as if he had no strength left in his soul. "I can't."

Finally Granny's patience, always in short supply, ran out. "Get up off that ground this instant!"

The order bypassed Rincewind's brain and went directly to his legs, which had a strong instinct for self-preservation. Rincewind scrambled upright, and stood quivering at attention.

Granny Weatherwax looked at him.

Looking into Granny's eyes was like looking into a mirror. What you saw looking back at you was yourself, and there was no hiding place.

"Do you think that Byrony died just so you could mope around feeling sorry for yourself?" snapped Granny.

"No miss!"

"It's Mistress! No, she died so you'd go on and save the disc!"

"Yes Mistress!"

"And what are you doing?"

"Er-"

"Being selfish!"

"Being selfish Mistress!"

"Right. Now what are we going to do?"

"Save the disc?"

"And who are we doing it for?"

"We…Byrony…" Rincewind sagged a little, but struggled upright again. He remembered Rowel, how he had clutched Byrony's wrist at the ball. He remembered the butterflies.

Rincewind's jaw tightened. "We're going to destroy that bastard for Byrony."

Granny paused. If you were interested in people… "Because?"

Rincewind closed his eyes, remembering how she had looked in the corridor, with the light streaming around her. Remembering her laugh. Remembering a moment when his hand had touched her skin, and he had felt her heart beating.

"Because I loved her."

Granny nodded, satisfied. It was nice to be right. "Well, what are you waitin' for? Get on the broom."

Rincewind suddenly snapped back to the present.

"Get on the what?"

---

Somewhere, on the other side of nothing, there is a desert. Its sand is dark and fine, and it stretches out beyond infinity. It is always night in this desert, and the dark sky is void of stars.

It is simply black.

Byrony waited patiently.

A door shaped light suddenly appeared, its blue glow sending a beam across the ink stained sand. Through the door stepped a tall, cowled figure, its scythe a thing of terrible beauty, its mere silhouette a nightmare that could strike fear into the hearts of all men…

"Goodness, fancy seeing you here!" said Byrony, straight-faced.

OH NO, said Death, shaking his head, his voice the sound of slabs of lead banging together. I REALLY DON'T HAVE TIME FOR THIS, YOU KNOW. WHAT HAPPENED THIS TIME-

Then suddenly, he looked worried. Or as worried as a skeleton with absolutely no facial expressions can look. He reached into his robe and pulled out a silver egg-timer.

After a small pause, he said OH.

"Yes," sighed Byrony. "Who'd have thought it, eh?"

I THOUGHT- WELL, AFTER THAT TIME IN UBERWALD…

"No. This time I'm really dead."

I SEE. I'M SORRY.

"You're sorry?" said Byrony glumly. "Uncle Havelock will be furious."

WELL, YOU KNOW WHAT YOU MUST DO. YOU MUST WALK THE DESERT.

Byrony took a look around. A soft wind blew, and it was utterly silent. She picked up a handful of fine, black sand and let it seep through her fingers. "No…no I don't think I will," she said.

Death paused. I'M AFRAID YOU MUST.

"I don't think I do, actually. I don't have to walk, do I?" She looked questioningly at Death, who remained stoic.

"No," she said satisfactorily. "I didn't think I did." She settled down on the sand, getting comfortable.

BUT WHAT WILL YOU DO? asked Death, perplexed. This was highly unorthodox. YOU HAVE TO WALK, BYRONY. YOU CAN'T STAY HERE FOREVER.

Byrony looked shocked. "Oh, I'm not staying here forever!" she said. "Ye gods, how boring would that be?! I'd rather be stabbed in the face with a pencil!"

THEN WHAT ARE YOU DOING?

"Well…" Byrony looked up.

In that vast desert, where the sand is as black as night, as fine as water and which stretches on for centuries, the sky is completely black…

Except…

One by one the stars were coming out.

They speckled the night like diamonds scattered across black velvet, twinkling gently in the clear sky.

Smiling, Byrony lay back, crossing her legs and lacing her fingers behind her head. "I'm waiting for someone," she said softly.

And she began to count the stars.