Episode The Second:

Flight!

In which Magatha gets a Job; we meet Nikephoros; and several things Take Wing.

Part Three

Arms folded, Magatha shot what she wished was an icy glare across at her kidnapper. Unfortunately, the height of the Tower of Art meant its top was very windy indeed, making Magatha's glare rather less icy and more watery and hair-filled.

"Ifill mush argen filleul pahf," she spluttered indignantly.

"I beg your pardon, sweet maid?" The man's voice was a soothing meld of the syrupy and the dusty, like the ash of three Genuan cigarillos dissolved in a pot of honey.

"If thaid," Magatha muttered as she held her hair out of her face, "That you are going to be in a great deal of trouble if you don't get me down from here immediately."

The man frowned. "Now, I don't think you did. You see, your original remark contained significantly fewer words than your second one did. My dear girl, are you sure you are well?"

"Well? After being swung halfway across the bloody city on a rope? Are you completely mad?" The wind whipped a hank of hair from Magatha's grasp and she put up her other hand to hold it in place.

"Darling child-"

"Oh, shit," Magatha cried as the man slunk towards her. "Oh, bugger, no, get away!"

"Pearl of my heart!"

"No! Leave me alone!" Scrabbling backwards-not a wise thing to do, she realised a moment later- Magatha's foot slid and she shot out over the edge. She just had time to see the top of the tower fall away- no, she thought with a kind of dizzy exhilaration, she was the one who was falling- and the stunned face of a rather weedy looking gentleman poised on a window ledge before everything stopped.

Funny, she thought, I don't even remember hitting the ground. . .

Then she realised that the blackness in front of her eyes was in fact the fabric of a very familiar coat sleeve.

"Faugh- what the hell do you think you're doing?" She struggled around until she was upright and looking into her captor's eyes.

The eyes were an unblinking deep blue. They did not blink.

"Why, rescuing you, fair lady." The man seemed surprised at the question. Magatha suddenly became very aware of how tightly he was holding her. And how, despite being far above the ground and an almost equal distance away from any sort of platform or other support, the two of them were no longer falling. That this state of not falling was being achieved entirely without the help of ropes of any kind.

His eyes really were a very deep blue.

"Well, you can. . . you can bloody well. . ." Something shifted inside Magatha's head. "Oh, hell. . ."

G

The first thing he saw was the sunlight, and it sent so much red-hot lightning across his eyeballs that he rolled over and didn't see anything else.

An hour later, he saw the wall. It was the colour of old crusts, and did not produce any lightning whatsoever. Thaddeus was glad. He stood up, wincing in anticipation of the pounding head and grumbling bowels that were sure to result from this complicated manoeuvre.

There was no pain.

Thaddeus checked himself. Of course there was pain. It was just waiting for him to do something stupid like straighten up and pull the curtains.

He straightened up and pulled the curtains. No pain.

He leaned out the open window and stared defiantly in a vaguely sunwards direction. No lightning.

This, Thaddeus decided, was highly unusual. He tried to remember what had happened the evening before. There had been- Carlisle's men, of course. And then nothing. Of course, a great deal of nothing was what one expected after a run-in with Carlisle's encouragers, but Thaddeus was stymied by the fact that he wasn't at all injured. He even still had all his fingers. Not to mention both legs.

What had happened?

A roll of paper hit him over the head. Ah, thought Thaddeus as he was knocked to the floor, the delivery. Of course. It was a new scheme of the Post Office's, delivering the Times every morning to those who had either no time or no ambition to run around after newsboys all day. It was very lucrative, Thaddeus knew that- having the news delivered had become something of a social point for Ankh Morpork's middle class, which these days comprised anyone who could afford- or steal- a decent pair of tidy shoes. Or a nice hat, if you were of the female persuasion. Or not, as the case may be.

Rubbing his head absently- for a few sheets of cheap paper, the thing really could pack a punch- and glanced at the front page.

Then glanced again.

The third time, his eyes locked onto the page and, try as he might, he could not tear them away.

"What in the blazes-?"

---

Well huzzah and hoorah, it's holidays again! Three cheers for the good ol' Easter bunny, wot? Three cheers likewise to the four lovely people who reviewed the last instalment, namely, Nercia Genisis, Tuima, and the delightfully anonymous random pineappleness and yeth. Well done on your rebellion against capitalisation of proper nouns.

Tut tut, Steel Phoenix, putting us on story alert but not reviewing? Scandalous!

Anyway, quite a short instalment this time, but I really didn't want to put anything else in at the moment. Maybe next chapter. In fact, definitely next chapter. Hoorah!

Chocolatechocolatechocolate. . .