Strangely enough the rainfall and harvests in the next few years were almost supernaturally abundant, and this led to a research team being despatched to the islands by the Minor Religions faculty of Unseen University. Their verdict was that it only went to show.
The fire, driven by the wind, spread out from the Drum faster than a man could walk. The timbers of the Widdershin Gate were already on fire when Rincewind, his face blistered and reddened from the flames, reached them. By now he and Twoflower were on horseback—mounts hadn’t been that hard to obtain. A wily merchant had asked fifty times their worth, and had been left gaping when one thousand times their worth had been pressed into his hands.
They rode through just before the first of the big gate timbers descended in an explosion of sparks Morpork was already a cauldron of flame.
As they galloped up the red-lit road Rincewind glanced sideways at his travelling companion currently trying hard to learn to ride a horse.
Bloody hell, he thought. He’s alive! Me too. Who’d have thought it? Perhaps there is something in this reflected-sound-of-underground—spirits? It was a cumbersome phrase. Rincewind tried to get his tongue round the thick syllables that were the word in Twoflower’s own language.
“Ecolirix?” he tried. “Ecro-gnothics? Echo-gnomics?”
That would do. That sounded about right.
Several hundred yards downriver from the last smouldering suburb of the city a strangely rectangular and apparently heavily-waterlogged object touched the mud on the widdershin bank. Immediately it sprouted numerous legs and scrabbled for a purchase.
Hauling itself to the top of the bank the Luggage-streaked with soot, stained with water and very very angry—shook itself and took its bearings. Then it moved away at a brisk trot, the small and incredibly ugly imp that was perching on its lid watching the scenery with interest.
Bravd looked at the Weasel and raised his eyebrows.
“And that’s it,” said Rincewind, “The Luggage caught up with us, don’t ask me how. Is there any more wine?”
The Weasel picked up the empty wineskin.
“I think you have had just about enough wine this night,” he said.
Bravd’s forehead wrinkled.
“Gold is gold,” he said finally. “How can a man with plenty of gold consider himself poor? You’re either poor or rich. It stands to reason—”
Rincewind hiccupped. He was finding Reason rather difficult to hold on to. “Well,” he said, “what I think is, the point is, well, you know octiron?”
The two adventurers nodded. The strange iridescent metal was almost as highly valued in the lands around the Circle Sea as sapient pearwood, and was about as rare. A man who owned a needle made of octiron would never lose his way, since it always pointed to the Hub of the Discworld, being acutely sensitive to the disc’s magical field; it would also miraculously darn his socks.
“Well, my point is, you see, that gold also has its sort of magical field. Sort of financial wizardry. Echo-gnomics.” Rincewind giggled.
The Weasel stood up and stretched. The sun was well up now, and the city below them was wreathed in mists and full of foul vapours. Also gold, he decided. Even a citizen of Morpork would, at the very point of death, desert his treasure to save his skin. Time to move.
The little man called Twoflower appeared to be asleep. The Weasel looked down at him and shook his head.
“The city awaits, such as it is,” he said. “Thank you for a pleasant tale, Wizard. What will you do now?”
He eyed the Luggage, which immediately backed away and snapped its lid at him.
“Well, there are no ships leaving the city now,” giggled Rincewind. “I suppose we’ll take the coast road to Quirm. I’ve got to look after him, you see. But look, I didn’t make it—”
“Sure, sure,” said the Weasel soothingly. He turned away and swung himself into the saddle of the horse that Bravd was holding. A few moments later the two heroes were just specks under a cloud of dust, heading down towards the charcoal city.
Rincewind stared muzzily at the recumbent tourist. At two recumbent tourists. In his somewhat defenceless state a stray thought, wandering through the dimensions in search of a mind to harbour it, slid into his brain.
“Here’s another fine mess you’ve got me into,” he moaned, and slumped backwards.
“Mad,” said the Weasel.
Bravd, galloping along a few feet away, nodded.
“All wizards get like that,” he said. “it’s the quicksilver fumes. Rots their brains. Mushrooms, too “
“However—” said the brown-clad one. He reached into his tunic and took out a golden disc on a short chain. Bravd raised his eyebrows.
“The wizard said that the little man had some sort of golden disc that told him the time,” said the Weasel.
“Arousing your cupidity, little friend? You always were an expert thief, Weasel.”
“Aye,” agreed the Weasel modestly. He touched the knob at the disc’s rim, and it flipped open.
The very small demon imprisoned within looked up from its tiny abacus and scowled. “It lacks but ten minutes to eight of the clock,” it snarled. The lid slammed shut, almost trapping the Weasel’s fingers-
With an oath the Weasel hurled the time-teller far out into the heather, where it possibly hit a stone. Something, in any event, caused the case to split; there was a vivid octarine flash and a whiff of brimstone as the time being vanished into whatever demonic dimension it called home.
“What did you do that for?” said Bravd, who hadn’t been close enough to hear the words.
“Do what?” said the Weasel. “I didn’t do anything. Nothing happened at all. Come on—we’re wasting opportunities! “
Bravd nodded. Together they turned their steeds and galloped towards ancient Ankh, and honest enchantments.
The Sending of Eight
Prologue
The Discworld offers sights far more impressive than those found in universes built by Creators with less imagination but more mechanical aptitude. Although the disc’s sun is but an orbiting moonlet, its prominences hardly bigger than croquet hoops, this slight drawback must be set against the tremendous sight of Great A’Tuin the Turtle, upon Whose ancient and meteor-riddled shell the disc ultimately rests. Sometimes, in His slow journey across the shores of infinity, He moves His countrysized head to snap at a passing comet.
But perhaps the most impressive sight of all—if only because most brains, when faced with the sheer galactic enormity of A’Tuin, refuse to believe it—is the endless Rimfall, where the seas of the disc boil ceaselessly over the Edge into space.