++++ In chap. 1, Archchancellor Mustrum Ridcully cast a devious spell on Lord Vetinari, who was instantly turned into a small black chess figure. Or so it seemed…. Warning: This is a long chapter, so make any potty stops or snack runs now. And thanks for all the great reviews so far! p.s. Please forgive any strange formatting below. I'm still trying to perfect this html conversion thing.+++++
Chapter 2: A sense of beat
The front hooves slammed against the frozen ground, slid a little as they scrambled to get in line with the hind legs, and the black horse sped off down the road.
Its rider clutched the reins in one hand, a sword in the other, and wondered why he hadn't fallen off yet. Lord Havelock Vetinari couldn't remember the last time he rode a horse. This fast anyway. The snow-covered fields on either side rushed away to the misty horizon. It was night. It was cold.
With some difficulty, Lord Vetinari sheathed the sword. He'd always found swords too bulky and dramatic compared to the subtle yet effective knife. But the slim knives he was accustomed to would have slipped out of his hands now… due to the gauntlets. They were just one part of the armour he wore – arm cuffs, shin guards, and when he looked down, a breastplate.
He also wore chain mail with a hood. When he twisted in the saddle, he saw a helmet hanging from it by a leather strap. Two saddlebags flapped with a sloshing sound against the horse's haunches.
So…
He was dressed as a knight and he was on a horse that seemed to know where it was going. Which was just as well because Lord Vetinari didn't. He was in some place decidedly not Ankh-Morpork, a place he reasoned to be 1) another country, 2) another time or 3) another dimension. As a ruler in the Discworld, he'd developed a nose for these things and so opted for option number 3. But instead of a dimension of palm trees, sunshine and surf, he'd apparently landed in one made up only of darkness and snow. What luck.
Now that Lord Vetinari had assessed the situation, he allowed himself to get really bloody furious about it.
Ridcully had taken his hand. His eyes had glowed.
It was just like that time long ago, that memory Lord Vetinari squeezed down into the tightest corner of his brain, when the wizards had got out of hand and he'd spent some time – he wasn't sure exactly how much – as a yellow lizard staring out at the world from a pickle jar.* The spell had surprised him then too. One moment he was the most powerful ruler on the Disc. The next, he had the urge to catch flies with his tongue.
Vetinari shook off the memory and tried to concentrate on the issue at hand. How long until the spell wore off? Hours? Days? When it happened, when the Patrician returned to Ankh-Morpork with a cool head and his proper clothing, there would be a reassessment of the relationship between the city authorities and the leadership of Unseen University. Yes, he would certainly hatch a subtle and cunning plan.
But not right now.
His head ached. It wasn't from riding, which to his surprise seemed perfectly natural to him now, his bad leg giving no indication of the stiffness and pain it usually had. And it wasn't from the cold wind that braced his face and whistled in his ears.
It was more…a vague confusion that grew as he rode through the night. He wasn't quite feeling himself. The after-effects of the magic, no doubt.
In the distance, one red and one green eye stared out of the darkness. The horse reduced its speed and followed the road until Vetinari heard a faint, rapid beat that sounded like hundreds of clapping hands and stomping feet.
After a curve in the road and a short gallop over a hill, he saw the barn. It was massive, made of stone topped with thatch. Two lanterns hung over the door, one tinted green, the other red. Vetinari rode down the hill and reined up where various horses, mules, donkeys, cows, sheep, goats, a few ducks and some carts were parked at one of the barn walls.
The spurs on his boots clanged as they hit the frozen ground. It was strange; his legs didn't feel like a strawberry wobbler. They felt strong, stronger than they had in years.
He left his sword belt thrust under a saddle strap, slung the saddlebag over his shoulder and went around to the front of the barn. Over the wooden doors hung a sign written in a script Lord Vetinari didn't recognize. He blinked once, and the letters seemed to clear. "Enter Ye Only that Bring Yer Own, Saith the Lord."
A roar of laughter erupted from inside the barn.
Contrary to what many people in Ankh-Morpork thought, Lord Vetinari rather liked parties. He had a talent for nursing a single drink for hours while smiling at and listening to the other guests. He never forgot what Lord So-and-So or Guild President Whatshisname said while under the influence. The next day, as the hangovers descended, they remembered that he had been there, smiling, nodding and storing every word they'd said in the file cabinet of his mind.
Lord Vetinari pushed open the barn doors. The smell inside pushed back.
The regular inhabitants of the barn, who were milling about outside with Vetinari's horse, had left behind their farmyard smells. They mingled now with the scent of hundreds of largely unwashed people, many of them dancing in a circle in the middle of the barn floor. Someone had rigged up an indoor grill and had recently burned the offerings. There was also a reek of alcohol, a kind too strong to have been brewed in an indoor still. All of this might have bothered Vetinari but he was a native of Ankh-Morpork, where the stench was a mark of civic pride.
As he moved inside, people smiled at him and waved or called out "Halloo, milord!" They were people used to being out in the weather, faces that had been drenched by rain, dried by sun and frozen by ice. The men wore green vests and the women red dresses with a hat or ribbons in their hair.
Lord Vetinari was slightly disoriented by the cheerful greetings. None of the people in the barn bowed to him, none gave him a courtly nod, none rushed out of his line of sight in hopes of avoiding his glance. That was the usual way of it in Ankh-Morpork. The people here seemed positively happy to see him.
An old woman bounded up to him and shoved a wooden mug into his gauntlet.
"There y'are, milord!" she cried. "Drink this up. It'll put hair on yer chest and nipples on yer head."
"It hasn't seemed to have achieved that with you, good woman," Vetinari said, "unless there is something under your hat I would be very alarmed to see."
The old woman chuckled and relieved him of his saddlebags. "I see ye brought yer own," she said. She pulled a bottle out of the bag and uncorked it. "Wine. Not my thing but the toffs might like it." The woman and the saddlebags disappeared into the crowd.
Lord Vetinari delicately sniffed at the contents of the cup the woman had given him. His eyes watered. Other bits of him did too. It was quite possibly 100 degrees in the barn.
He carefully set the cup aside and moved off to a relatively quiet corner to see to his armour. This was not as easy as he would have liked. The gauntlets had to go first, then the arm cuffs, which meant undoing buckles with one hand. Once that was accomplished, he had trouble reaching the buckles on the sides of his breastplate. Twisting in the thing was like moving around in a soup can.
A woman holding a cup that contained a lemon slice and a paper umbrella watched Vetinari for a while with a little smile of amusement on her face. She finally separated herself from the crowd.
"Let me help you, sir," she said.
She stooped and began unbuckling the shin plates.
"That is kind of you, madam, but I don't need help," Vetinari said.
The woman made quick work of the second shin plate, began on the breast plate buckles and started humming a little tune. She had the air of someone enjoying that feeling of invincibility that comes after a few strong drinks. It's the feeling that has inspired such fateful words as, "Sure I can drive! What could happen?"
The woman noticed the wrinkles of disapproval between Vetinari's arched eyebrows and the decidedly downward tilt to the corners of his mouth and then did what no one in Ankh-Morpork save the wizards would do. She ignored them. Metaphorically speaking, she reached for the car keys.
"Don't call me madam," she said as she tugged on a buckle. "I'm Alexandra. From down Taylorsville way."
"Delighted, madam," said Lord Vetinari. "But I do believe I can undo the –"
"I know who you are, you know." She flashed him a quick smile and went on to the last buckle. "You've been sent by the king to preside over the Lottery. We don't get too many knights around otherwise. We've got, oh, practically the whole valley here this year. Mr. Smiggins counted 500 people earlier, the biggest festival ever." She rapped the breast plate with her knuckles. "There you are, sir. All finished."
Lord Vetinari set the breast plate aside. He pulled off the chain mail and discovered that he was wearing a suit of dark green trimmed in red. The heat in the barn was at least bearable now.
"Better?" Alexandra asked.
"Yes, madam, thank you." He looked at her thoughtfully for a moment. "May I ask you a question?"
"Sure."
"How would you rate your grasp of world geography?"
"On a scale of one to ten with ten being I know the capitol of every nation and one being I don't know where we are now, I'd say….seven."
"Really? That could be helpful. Then may I also ask if you have, by any chance, heard of Ankh-Morpork?"
The laughter started somewhere deep in Alexandra's chest. Vetinari could practically see it working its way up her throat, blossoming to her mouth and settling in her eyes. She tossed back her head and let the laughter take her.
"Ankh-Morpork?" she gasped after a moment. "It sounds like…it…" She wiped a tear from her eye and then noticed Vetinari's icy stare. "It…well…No, sir. I've never heard of a place called…that." She pressed her lips together but a giggle still escaped. "Is it a country?"
"A city, actually," said Vetinari. Ankh-Morpork wasn't just a city, it was his city. He was sure of it. But he suddenly couldn't remember exactly why. The pain in his head flared up, and he put a thin hand to his temple.
"I do apologize for laughing, sir," said Alexandra, noticing the pain that crossed his face. "It's just that, well, there's a certain disease only transmitted by—"
Vetinari held up a hand. "No need to explain, madam. No doubt the name sounds…foreign to you." He sighed, and the headache subsided. "It does appear I no longer need your assistance. Don't let me keep you from the festivities."
"Glad to help, sir. And don't you worry about leaving your armour here while you dance. No one will dare steal it."
"I hadn't intended to dance."
"No?" Alexandra smiled brightly. "It's Lottery Night. Dancing is tradition." She grasped Vetinari's hand and pulled him toward the dance floor.
The other couples made room for them. The people danced in two rows, men on one side, women on the other. There was much clapping and knee slapping and skipping around while holding hands or linking elbows. It was synchronized to the beat set by the fiddle and the banjo.
Lord Vetinari shook his head firmly.
"I really do not dance, madam."
"Everyone dances, sir."
He appeared to think about this a second.
"No… No, I'm quite certain that everyone does not dance. I, for one, do not. Besides, I'm not familiar with this…country art of dancing. It appears everyone knows the steps. I have no inclination to learn them nor do I have an interest in deciphering the meaning of 'dosey-do.'"
"Nonsense," said Alexandra. "All you need is a sense of beat. And dosey-do is when you cross your arms like this and then go around your partner like this."
She demonstrated. Lord Vetinari did not join in.
"Oh, stop being so self-conscious," said Alexandra.
"It is the nature of human beings to be at least somewhat conscious of the self," Vetinari said calmly. "It's healthy. Like tooth powder and regular baths. Things that would clearly benefit the good people here."
Alexandra wrinkled her nose.
"A comment on the hygiene of us country folk," she said. "Ha. Ha. You are witty, aren't you, sir?"
Lord Vetinari thought this called for the extreme arching of both his eyebrows at once. Alexandra didn't notice; she was frowning at his boots.
"You won't dance very well in those spurs," she said. She dropped down, unbuckled Vetinari's spurs and tossed them aside. She bobbed back to her feet and smiled.
"Any other comments you'd like to make before we start, sir?" she said.
Vetinari considered this. "You are a strong-willed, lively and articulate young woman," he said.
"If by that you mean I'm a pig-headed, tiresome gal who won't shut up, thank you. I've been called worse. And let's see…" Alexandra tapped her lips as she thought. "You are an arrogant, condescending nobleman in need of a drink and a bit of fun. No sub-text there, by the way." She winked.
Lord Vetinari stared. Nobody winked at him. Ever.
"This banter has gone on quite long enough, madam," he said. "I mean no disrespect to you or your country customs but —"
"Ah!" Alexandra turned toward the 5-piece band, which consisted of fiddle, banjo, drum, pipe and jug. "They're starting the Roll-in-the-Hay," she said. "You have to know that one, sir. Everybody does." She started to bounce to the music.
Vetinari had not in fact danced in years due to his bad leg and his general aversion to looking like a fool. His leg appeared to be fine now but his pride had not been transformed by Ridcully's magic. Neither had his conviction that one must be at least minimally polite to ladies regardless of social class and inebriation level. There didn't seem to be a polite way to extricate himself from Alexandra or the dance floor.
"If I am to preside over this Lottery or…whatever proud rural tradition that is to happen here," Vetinari said over the music, "I should certainly talk to the municipal head of this area."
"There's time for that later," said Alexandra. She swiped a cup from a serving maid. "Drink a bit of this and you won't be so scared to dance."
"I assure you, madam, it has been several decades since I was scared of anything. I merely think it would be wise to--"
"Relax a little," Alexandra said. "R-E-L-A-X. You've heard of it, haven't you, sir?"
Her smile widened, sopping with encouragement. "Do take a drink."
She held up the cup and Vetinari was reminded of a painting -- for whatever reason he couldn't remember the name or where he'd seen it -- of a sorceress who offered a man a magical draught. The cup of eternal life, of youth, something of the sort.
He really was rather thirsty.
"What is this drink?" he asked.
"We call it Scumble. It's made from apples. Mostly." Her encouraging smile didn't waiver.
Lord Vetinari sniffed at the cup and it did, indeed, smell of apples. It also smelled of turpentine.
"This wouldn't have any effect on either chest hair or nipples, by any chance, would it?" he asked.
Alexandra laughed and made a show of patting at her chest. "I've already had two drinks and it seems like everything's in order," she said. "Drink, sir."
Lord Vetinari was aware that drink was absolutely what he must not do. His head still ached, though just why it did had suddenly slipped his mind. He vaguely remembered that there was some fundamental rule he always followed: a drink offered by a stranger should be tried by at least three reliable personnel before he accepted it.
But what really bothered him was Alexandra's total confidence that he, Lord Vetinari, was no threat to her whatsoever. It was not the kind of interpersonal relationship he was accustomed to.
Besides, he couldn't imagine anyone encouraging him to drink a schnapps-like beverage on the dance floor at a party in Ankh… Vetinari paused a moment. What was the name of the city? Ankh…something. Two syllables. Starts with an M. He'd known it a moment ago. It was right on the tip of his tongue.
His headache was joined by a growing uneasiness. Why couldn't he remember the name of the city? When he thought hard, when he conjured up an idea of "city" in his mind, the name Tallstone surfaced. He felt vaguely that Tallstone lay to the south. It was a city, but… Something wasn't quite right.
He tried to concentrate, but old memories seemed to be slipping away through a sieve in his mind. New memories poured in from out of nowhere.
Lord Vetinari remembered suddenly that it was rude to refuse a drink from a lady.
He took the cup from Alexandra's hands and drank.
* See Sourcery