Terry Pratchett owns all Discworld stuff.
1) There have been edits done to the earlier chapters, since I've finally read the book. There were major-ish tweaks to the last two chapters.
2) There, that's the last of Lobsang, pretty much. He was necessary, and he was necessary before I'd read Thief of Time; I'm sorry if he's dreadfully out of character.
EDIT 07/10/12: Better hinting with Hiddles and Igor.
Lord Downey copped out. He was happy to cop out. Eager, even. That scag Vetinari (low though it be thought!) had left a huge Downey-shaped loophole, and Downey dove through it headfirst.
"If the Patrician was that obvious about what is to happen after your … return," Downey said carefully, "Then he clearly has plans for you. I have doubts that they involve your immediately taking up Guild work again."
Teatime's expression took on that cast of slightly disappointed bewilderment that Downey found familiarly disturbing. "I can't imagine what," Teatime mused. "What else could I be fit for?"
A noose? was the sarcastic, strictly mental response. Downey said aloud, "You will have to address that question to Lord Vetinari. I am not privy to all his plans." Fewer, even, than he was willing to admit, but Downey hoped that the plans they were talking about involved a Bonk philosopher, dried frog pills, and, for a preference, Fourecks.
Teatime's gaze suddenly sharpened, and Downey couldn't keep from recoiling just a bit. Not for the first time, he worried that Teatime's odd glass eye allowed him to view others' thoughts. It was bad enough that Ventinari seemed to do it without the aid of magic. Downey could do without a lad who enjoyed killing a little too much knowing what Downey thought of him.
"I do hope Susan returns soon. We have so much to do. The sooner we start, the sooner we finish," Teatime said.
Downey really didn't know what to say to that, and he was a man unaccustomed to being at a loss for words. Manners dictated the asking of open questions. Keep the other fellow talking; this way, he couldn't pump you for information while you were doing it to him. Morbid curiosity – more literally in this case than in most – presented manners with a few questions to ask.
"Tell me, Mr. Tayahtimee, what is it like, post-inhumation?"
"Frightfully dull, sir. At least, at first."
Lobsang had taken her hand and dragged her out of the front door. He'd had to turn the knob to open it, which was something only Albert had really had to do, and that only five years ago at the most recent. The black-and-white surroundings had blurred, flickered blue, and then resolved into a colorfully bucolic mountain scene. Susan blinked around, breathing in the scent of spring flowers.
"Did you take us forward or back?" she asked.
"The spring after the Assassin died," was the uncharacteristically curt answer. Lobsang sighed and rubbed at his face. "Your grandfather is about to collect one of our monks, Lark, and the Abbot is going to keep him talking ten minutes." And when one of the monks gave a time, they meant exactly that.
Susan frowned, considering the History Monks and their attitude toward coincidence. "Officially, then."
"Yes. C'mon." He took her hand, and the scenery blurred again. This time, she led the way back into Death's home, making certain to use the doorknob. Sometimes – more and more often, now – she forgot to do so.
Once in the library, she quickly located the appropriate canyon-like aisle of autobiographies. The books, writing themselves, whispered, filling the air with a dry hiss. It was sort of like the lifetimer room, but louder.
JONATHAN TEATIME, she said, properly, holding out her hands. A volume several inches thick thwapped into her palms from above. It was followed by a shorter, fatter paperback marked "Translations."
"He comes with a dictionary?" she demanded.
Behind her, Lobsang huffed. "Yes, yes, very complex. Can we go now? Death can be distracted only for so long."
"I have one more stop to make, and then we're off."
"Of course we are."
Susan asked Lobsang to hold the books. She brought into being a linen tablecloth and spread it out on the floor; she took back the books and wrapped the cloth around them. "I'm not very comfortable with stealing autobiographies from my grandfather. Sneaking in and reading them is one thing, but taking them…"
Lobsang shrugged. "It happens. If it makes you feel any better, this is why he's locked you out of the library just before you head out to find the Assassin's body. And then, of course, there's the horse theft."
"Binky? Fantastic." She picked up the bundle. It was heavy enough that she had to clutch it close to her chest; her arms were going to fall off if she had to haul these things around much. Binky would be needed for certain, then. She headed off toward the stables.
"Lobsang?"
"Yes?"
Susan paused for a moment, because confronting people about emotions wasn't something she usually did. Her parents had been so aggressively practical that even emotions were muted in favor of reason. But Susan's curiosity and utter stubbornness were stronger. "Look, I know you're doing your job, here. It's probably inconvenient. But you've been terribly short with me today." She paused again before soldiering on. "And it's been months since your last note. Are you angry with me?"
"No." His tone, which was in that hinterland between frustrated and sullen, indicated that he was being exactly, precisely accurate. He was not angry with her.
"But you are angry."
Lobsang sighed. "Not anymore, not really. Things happen, and I'm not happy about them. But I knew I'd lose you; I figured it out earlier this year – your 'this year'. I…" He rubbed the back of his neck "I didn't want to torture myself. And I can't tell you any more than that. I couldn't tell you why I stopped writing then, either. Spoilers, you know."
While Susan was still speechless – she was stuck on the "I'd lose you" part – Lobsang turned and took her in a quick hug. "We'll still be friends," he told her with infuriating certainty. "But we both have jobs to do, and if we hang around for another two minutes, Death is going to catch us."
Well, that was enough to get Susan moving. Or, it was at least enough to get her tangle of emotions blamed on her grandfather, even though it was unfair.
Binky whickered at them over the half-door of his box. It was the work of moments for Susan to get his bridle on. It took even less time for her to shift her clothing to more appropriate attire. She chose trousers and low-heeled boots this time. The last time she'd had an adventure with Binky, it had been the Hogswatchnight she'd killed Teatime; while she liked the cold, she didn't like it quite as intimately as all that. And running up and down the steps of the Tooth Fairy's castle in fashionable high-heeled ankle boots had been a mistake she'd regretted for weeks afterward.
"Binky knows where and when to go," Lobsang told her. "He'll come back here, and I'll get you back to the right time." He grinned. "Then you'll have to figure out how to get out again."
The Igor insisted on being called "Master." He also insisted on the consciousness answering to the name Hiddlesham. The consciousness had just barely regained its proper sense of touch and the ability to walk; it didn't recall a name, so Hiddlesham worked.
Igor had him – and it unquestionably was a him; the Trouser Accident and resultant Changing Incident and Zipper Tragedy had proven it beyond doubt – turn the body on the slab onto its belly.
The body was lukewarm to the touch, as though it were… well, naked on a stone slab. Just not dead. The body breathed, it grew hair that needed trimming, it made messes that needed cleaning about eight hours after the Master injected it with a nutritive fluid. But it just lay there, waiting for the Igor/Master to apply science to it. Now that Hiddlesham had gotten it turned over, he saw that there was a shaved patch on the back of the head, which allowed for the couplings that connected it to the wires and the wall.
Once he had gotten Hiddlesham upright and functioning acceptably, the Master had rambled at him in classic mad-scientist style. "Incredible brain. Broken, surely, but how did they break it? Can it be repaired? I'd love to know what happened to the eye. I heard through the grapevine that he put in a magic one, the mad boy. Love to know where to find that, too. If I bring him back, I'll get all the information I want."
The Master held out a hand with huge knuckles and opened and shut it quickly. Hiddlesham had found out that this meant, "Give me what you have, boy, and be quick about it." Hiddlesham held out his fist, which he now saw had a washrag in it.
"The other one." The Master sounded like he was still had a pretty good hold on his temper. Sometimes he lost it. Hiddlesham proffered the other hand, revealing something like a short-bladed knife. The Master took it from him and said, "Good boy. I'll make a competent aide of you yet – reclaim a little of what you were." He moved around the head of the slab, ducking under the wires that still connected the body's head to a panel on the wall. This panel, Hiddlesham had found, was off limits. It was off limits to the tune of a good electrocuting. That had led to the Trouser Accident, and he didn't like to repeat it.
The Master brought the blade up to the body's head. "Suppose we start with the occipital lobe," he said.
That's funny, the consciousness that was now Hiddlesham thought. He'd known that the Master was an Igor at first glance, all those weeks ago. He'd known how they patched themselves for ages and ages using other people's body parts; he'd known they all were named Igor or Igorina if they were girls. He knew that he thought they were really interesting; it was hard to forget that powerful an emotion. It seemed to be all he had now.
It just hadn't occurred to Hiddlesham until now that the Master had been obsessively avoiding the 'S' sound.
Don't Igors usually lisp their esses?
Hiddlesham wasn't about to ask. There were worse things than the Zipper Tragedy. He wasn't sure what or how, but there just were.