The Last Hero (the discworld series) Read online

  The wizards stared at the blackboard. Then, as one wizard, they turned to Ponder Stibbons, who was scribbling in his notebook.

  ‘What was that about, Ponder?’

  Ponder stared at his notes. Then he stared at Leonard. Then he stared at Ridcully.

  ‘Er… yes. Possibly. Er… if you fall over the edge fast enough, the… world pulls you back… and you go on falling but it's all round the world.’

  ‘You're saying that by falling off the world we – and by we, I hasten to point out, I don't actually include myself – we can end up in the sky?’ said the Dean.

  ‘Um… yes. After all, the sun does the same thing every day…’

  The Dean looked enraptured. ‘Amazing!’ he said. ‘Then… you could get an army into the heart of enemy territory! No fortress would be safe! You could rain fire down on to—’

  He caught the look in Leonard's eye.

  ‘—on to bad people,’ he finished, lamely.

  ‘That would not happen,’ said Leonard severely. ‘Ever!’

  ‘Could the… thing you are planning land on Cori Celesti?’ said Lord Vetinari.

  ‘Oh, certainly there should be suitable snowfields up there,’ said Leonard. ‘If there are not, I feel sure I can devise some appropriate landing method. Happily, as you have pointed out, things in the air have a tendency to come down.’

  Ridcully was about to make an appropriate comment, but stopped himself. He knew Leonard's reputation. This was a man who could invent seven new things before breakfast, including two new ways with toast. This man had invented the ball-bearing, such an obvious device that no one had thought of it. That was the very centre of his genius – he invented things that anyone could have thought of, and men who can invent things that anyone could have thought of are very rare men.

  This man was so absent-mindedly clever that he could paint pictures that didn't just follow you around the room but went home with you and did the washing-up.

  Some people are confident because they are fools. Leonard had the look of someone who was confident because, so far, he'd never found a reason not to be. He would step off a high building in the happy state of mind of someone who intended to deal with the problem of the ground when it presented itself.

  And might.

  ‘What do you need from us?’ said Ridcully.

  ‘Well, the… thing cannot operate by magic. Magic will be unreliable near the Hub, I understand. But can you supply me with wind?’

  ‘You have certainly chosen the right people,’ said Lord Vetinari. And it seemed to the wizards that there was just too long a pause before he went on, ‘They are highly skilled in weather manipulation.’

  ‘A severe gale would be helpful at the launch…’ Leonard continued.

  ‘I think I can say without fear of contradiction that our wizards can supply wind in practically unlimited amounts,’ said the Patrician. ‘Is that not so, Archchancellor?’

  ‘I am forced to agree, my lord.’

  ‘Then if we can rely on a stiff following breeze. I am sure—’

  ‘Just a moment, just a moment,’ said the Dean, who rather felt the wind comment had been directed at him. ‘What do we know of this man? He makes… devices, and paints pictures, does he? Well, I'm sure this is all very nice, but we all know about artists, don't we? Flibbertigibbets, to a man. And what about Bloody Stupid Johnson? Remember some of the things he built?4 I'm sure Mr da Quirm draws lovely pictures, but I for one would need a little more evidence of his amazing genius before we entrust the world to his… device. Show me one thing he can do that anyone couldn't do, if they had the time.’

  ‘I have never considered myself a genius,’ said Leonard, looking down bashfully and doodling on the paper in front of him.

  ‘Well, if I was a genius I think I'd know it—’ the Dean began, and stopped.

  Absent-mindedly, while barely paying attention to what he was doing, Leonard had drawn a perfect circle.

  Lord Vetinari found it best to set up a committee system. More of the ambassadors from other countries had arrived at the university, and more heads of the Guilds were pouring in, and every single one of them wanted to be involved in the decision-making process without necessarily going through the intelligence-using process first.

  About seven committees, he considered, should be about right. And when, ten minutes later, the first sub-committee had miraculously budded off, he took aside a few chosen people into a small room, set up the Miscellaneous Committee, and locked the door.

  ‘The flying ship will need a crew, I'm told,’ he said. ‘It can carry three people. Leonard will have to go because, to be frank, he will be working on it even as it departs. And the other two?’

  ‘There should be an assassin,’ said Lord Downey of the Assassins' Guild.

  ‘No. If Cohen and his friends were easy to assassinate, they would have been dead long ago,’ said Lord Vetinari.

  ‘Perhaps a woman's touch?’ said Mrs Palm, head of the Guild of Seamstresses. ‘I know they are elderly gentlemen, but my members are—’

  ‘I think the problem there, Mrs Palm, is that although the Horde are apparently very appreciative of the company of women, they don't listen to anything they say. Yes, Captain Carrot?’

  Captain Carrot Ironfoundersson of the City Watch was standing to attention, radiating keenness and a hint of soap.

  ‘I volunteer to go, sir,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, I thought you probably would.’

  ‘Is this a matter for the Watch?’ said the lawyer Mr Slant. ‘Mr Cohen is simply returning property to its original owner.’

  ‘That is an insight which had not hitherto occurred to me,’ said Lord Vetinari smoothly. ‘However, the City Watch would not be the men I think they are if they couldn't think of a reason to arrest anyone. Commander Vimes?’

  ‘Conspiracy to make an affray should do it,’ said the head of the Watch, lighting a cigar.

  ‘And Captain Carrot is a persuasive young man,’ said Lord Vetinari.

  ‘With a big sword,’ grumbled Mr Slant.

  ‘Persuasion comes in many forms,’ said Lord Vetinari. ‘No, I agree with Archchancellor Ridcully, sending Captain Carrot would be an excellent idea.’

  ‘What? Did I say something?’ said Ridcully.

  ‘Do you think that sending Captain Carrot would be an excellent idea?’

  ‘What? Oh. Yes. Good lad. Keen. Got a sword.’

  ‘Then I agree with you,’ said Lord Vetinari, who knew how to work a committee. ‘We must make haste, gentlemen. The flotilla needs to leave tomorrow. We need a third member of the crew—’

  There was a knock at the door. Vetinari signalled to a college porter to open it.

  The wizard known as Rincewind lurched into the room, white-faced, and stopped in front of the table.

  ‘I do not wish to volunteer for this mission,’ he said.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ said Lord Vetinari.

  ‘I do not wish to volunteer, sir.’

  ‘No one was asking you to.’

  Rincewind wagged a weary finger. ‘Oh, but they will, sir, they will. Someone will say: hey, that Rincewind fella, he's the adventurous sort, he knows the Horde, Cohen seems to like him, he knows all there is to know about cruel and unusual geography, he'd be just the job for something like this.’ He sighed. ‘And then I'll run away, and probably hide in a crate somewhere that'll be loaded on to the flying machine in any case.’

  ‘Will you?’

  ‘Probably, sir. Or there'll be a whole string of accidents that end up causing the same thing. Trust me, sir. I know how my life works. So I thought I'd better cut through the whole tedious business and come along and tell you I don't wish to volunteer.’

  ‘I think you've left out a logical step somewhere,’ said the Patrician.

  ‘No, sir. It's very simple. I'm volunteering. I just don't wish to. But, after all, when did that ever have anything to do with anything?’

  ‘He's got a point, you know,’ said Ridcully.
‘He seems to come back from all sorts of—’

  ‘You see?’ Rincewind gave Lord Vetinari a jaded smile. ‘I've been living my life for a long time. I know how it works.’

  There were always robbers near the Hub. There were pickings to be had among the lost valleys and forbidden temples, and also among the less prepared adventurers. Too many people, when listing all the perils to be found in the search for lost treasure or ancient wisdom, had forgotten to put at the top of the list ‘the man who arrived just before you’.

  One such party was patrolling its favourite area when it espied, first, a well-equipped warhorse tethered to a frost-shrivelled tree. Then it saw a fire, burning in a small hollow out of the wind, with a small pot bubbling beside it. Finally it saw the woman. She was attractive or, at least, had been conventionally so perhaps thirty years ago. Now she looked like the teacher you wished you'd had in your first year at school, the one with the understanding approach to life's little accidents, such as a shoe full of wee.

  She had a blanket around her to keep out the cold. She was knitting. Stuck in the snow beside her was the largest sword the robbers had ever seen.

  Intelligent robbers would have started to count up the incongruities here.

  These, however, were the other kind, the kind for whom evolution was invented.

  The woman glanced up, nodded at them, and went on with her knitting.

  ‘Well now, what have we here?’ said the leader. ‘Are you—’

  ‘Hold this, will you?’ said the old woman, standing up. ‘Over your thumbs, young man. It won't take a moment for me to wind a fresh ball. I was hoping someone would drop by.’

  She held out a skein of wool.

  The robber took it uncertainly, aware of the grins on the faces of his men. But he opened his arms with what he hoped was a suitably evil little-does-she-suspect look on his face.

  ‘That's right,’ said the old woman, standing back. She kicked him viciously in the groin in an incredibly efficient if unladylike way, reached down as he toppled, caught up the cauldron, flung it accurately at the face of the first henchman, and picked up her knitting before he fell.

  The two surviving robbers hadn't had time to move, but then one unfroze and leapt for the sword. He staggered back under its weight, but the blade was long and reassuring.

  ‘Aha!’ he said, and grunted as he raised the sword. ‘How the hell did you carry this, old woman?’

  ‘It's not my sword,’ she said. ‘It belonged to the man over there.’

  The man risked a look sideways. A pair of feet in armoured sandals were just visible behind a rock. They were very big feet.

  But I've got a weapon, he thought. And then he thought: sodidhe.

  The old woman sighed and drew two knitting needles from the ball of wool. The light glinted on them, and the blanket slid away from her shoulders and fell on to the snow.

  ‘Well, gentlemen?’ she said.

  Cohen pulled the gag off the minstrel's mouth. The man stared at him in terror.

  ‘What's your name, son?’ said Cohen.

  ‘You kidnapped me! I was walking along the street and—’

  ‘How much?’ said Cohen.

  ‘What?’

  ‘How much to write me a saga?’

  ‘You stink!’

  ‘Yeah, it's the walrus,’ said Cohen evenly. ‘It's a bit like garlic in that respect. Anyway… a saga, that's what I want. And what you want is a big bag of rubies, not unadjacent in size to the rubies what I have here.’

  He upended a leather bag into the palm of his hand. The stones were so big the snow glowed red. The musician stared at them.

  ‘You got – what's that word, Truckle?’ said Cohen.

  ‘Art,’ said Truckle.

  ‘You got art, and we got rubies. We give you rubies, you give us art,’ said Cohen. ‘End of problem, right?’

  ‘Problem?’ The rubies were hypnotic.

  ‘Well, mainly the problem you'll have if you tell me you can't write me a saga,’ said Cohen, still in a pleasant tone of voice.

  ‘But… look, I'm sorry, but… sagas are just primitive poems, aren't they?’ The wind, never ceasing here near the Hub, had several seconds in which to produce its more forlorn yet threatening whistle.

  ‘It'll be a long walk to civilisation, all by yourself,’ said Truckle, at length.

  ‘Without yer feet,’ said Boy Willie.

  ‘Please!’

  ‘Nah, nah, lads, we don't want to do that to the boy,’ said Cohen. ‘He's a bright lad, got a great future ahead of him…’ He took a pull of his home-rolled cigarette and added, ‘up until now. Nah, I can see he's thinking about it. A heroic saga, lad. It'll be the most famousest one ever.’

  ‘What about?’

  ‘Us.’

  ‘You? But you're all ol—’

  The minstrel stopped. Even after a life that had hitherto held no danger greater than a hurled meat bone at a banquet, he could recognise sudden death when he saw it. And he saw it now. Age hadn't weakened here – well, except in one or two places. Mostly, it had hardened.

  ‘I wouldn't know how to compose a saga,’ he said feebly.

  ‘We'll help,’ said Truckle.

  ‘We know lots,’ said Boy Willie.

  ‘Been in most of 'em,’ said Cohen.

  The minstrel's thoughts ran like this: These men are rubies insane. They are rubies sure to kill me. Rubies. They've dragged me rubies all the rubiesrubies.

  They want to give me a big bag ofrubies rubies…

  ‘I suppose I could extend my repertoire,’ he mumbled. A look at their faces made him readjust his vocabulary. ‘All right, I'll do it,’ he said. A tiny bit of honesty, though, survived even the glow of the jewels. ‘I'm not the world's greatest minstrel, you know.’

  ‘You will be after you write this saga,’ said Cohen, untying his ropes.

  ‘Well… I hope you like it…’

  Cohen grinned again. ‘'S not up to us to like it. We won't hear it,’ he said.

  ‘What? But you just said you wanted me to write you a saga—’

  ‘Yeah, yeah. But it's gonna be the saga of how we died.’

  It was a small flotilla that set sail from Ankh-Morpork next day. Things had happened quickly. It wasn't that the prospect of the end of the world was concentrating minds unduly, because that is a general and universal danger that people find hard to imagine. But the Patrician was being rather sharp with people, and that is a specific and highly personal danger and people had no problem relating to it at all.

  The barge, under whose huge tarpaulin something was already taking shape, wallowed between the boats. Lord Vetinari went aboard only once, and looked gloomily at the vast piles of material that littered the deck.

  ‘This is costing us a considerable amount of money,’ he told Leonard, who had set up an easel. ‘I just hope there will be something to show for it.’

  ‘The continuation of the species, perhaps,’ said Leonard, completing a complex drawing and handing it to an apprentice.

  ‘Obviously that, yes.’

  ‘We shall learn many new things,’ said Leonard, ‘that I am sure will be of immense benefit to posterity. For example, the survivor of the MariaPesto reported that things floated around in the air as if they had become extremely light, so I have devised this.’

  He reached down and picked up what looked, to Lord Vetinari, like a perfectly normal kitchen utensil.

  ‘It's a frying pan that sticks to anything,’ he said, proudly. ‘I got the idea from observing a type of teazel, which—’

  ‘And this will be useful?’ said Lord Vetinari.

  ‘Oh, indeed. We will need to eat meals and cannot have hot fat floating around. The small details matter, my lord. I have also devised a pen which writes upside down.’

  ‘Oh. Could you not simply turn the paper up the other way?’

  The line of sledges moved across the snow.

  ‘It's damn cold,’ said Caleb.

  ‘Feeling your age,
are you?’ said Boy Willie.

  ‘You're as old as you feel, I always say.’

  ‘Whut?’

  ‘HE SAYS YOU'RE AS OLD AS YOU FEEL, HAMISH!’

  ‘Whut? Feelin' whut?’

  ‘I don't think I've become old,’ said Boy Willie. ‘Not your actual old. Just more aware of where the next lavatory is.’

  ‘The worst bit,’ said Truckle, ‘is when young people come and sing happy songs at you.’

  ‘Why're they so happy?’ said Caleb.

  ‘'Cos they're not you, I suppose.’

  Fine, sharp snow crystals, blown off the mountain tops, hissed across their vision. In deference to their profession, the Horde mostly wore tiny leather loincloths and bits and pieces of fur and chainmail. In deference to their advancing years, and entirely without comment among themselves, these has been underpinned now with long woolly combinations and various strange elasticated things. They were dealing with Time as they had dealt with nearly everything else in their lives, as something you charged at and tried to kill.

  At the front of the party, Cohen was giving the minstrel some tips.

  ‘First off, you got to describe how you feel about the saga,’ he said. ‘How singing it makes your blood race and you can hardly contain yourself that… you got to tell 'em what a great saga it's gonna be… understand?’

  ‘Yes, yes… I think so… and then I say who you are…’ said the minstrel, scribbling furiously.

  ‘Nah, then you say what the weather was like.’

  ‘You mean like, “It was a bright day”?’

  ‘Nah, nah, nah. You got to talk saga. So, first off, you gotta put the sentences the wrong way round.’

  ‘You mean like, “Bright was the day”?’

  ‘Right! Good! I knew you was clever.’

  ‘Clever you was, you mean!’ said the minstrel, before he could stop himself.

  There was a moment of heart-stopping uncertainty, and then Cohen grinned and slapped him on the back. It was like being hit with a shovel.

  ‘That's the style! What else, now…? Ah, yes… no one ever talks, in sagas. They always spakes.’