Terry Pratchett - Thud

It sounded like gibberish to Vimes, so he ignored it. Some of the aches had gone, although his head still hammered. There was an empty feeling, everywhere. He just wanted to sleep.

`Is that clock right?'

`I'm afraid it is, Sybil.'

`I'll just go outside and wait for him, then. I'll have the book ready,' said Lady Sybil. `He won't let anything stop him, you know.' `I'm sure he won't,' said Bunty.

`Although things can be very treacherous in the lower valley at

this time of-' her husband began, and was fried into silence by his

wife's stare.

It was six minutes to six.

'Ob oggle oog soggle!'

It was a very little, watery sound, and came from somewhere in

Vimes's trousers. After a few moments, enough time to recollect that

he had both hands and trousers, he reached down and with a strug

gle freed the Gooseberry from his pocket. The case was battered

and the imp, when Vimes had got the flap open, was quite pale. 'Ob ogle soggle!'

Vimes stared at it. It was a talking box. It meant something. 'Woggle soggle lob!'

Slowly, Vimes tipped the box up. Water poured out of it.

`You weren't listening! I was shouting and you weren't listening!'

the imp whined. `It's five minutes to six! Read to Young Sam!' Vimes dropped the protesting box on his chest and stared up at

the pale stars.

`Mus' read to Young Sam,' he murmured, and shut his eyes. They snapped open again. `Got t' read to Young Sam!'

The stars were moving. It wasn't the sky! How could it be the sky?

This was a bloody cave, wasn't it?

He rolled over and got to his feet in one movement. There were

more stars now, drifting along the walls. The vurms were moving with a purpose. Overhead they had become a glowing river.

Although they were flickering a little, the lights were also coming back on in Vimes's head. He peered into what was now no longer blackness but merely gloom, and gloom was like daylight after the darkness that had gone before.

`Got to read to Young Sam. .: he whispered, to a cavern of giant stalactites and stalagmites, all gleaming with water, `... to read to Young Sam...'

Stumbling and sliding through shallow pools, running across the occasional patch of white sand, Vimes followed the lights.

Sybil tried not to look at the worried faces of her host and hostess as she crossed their hall. The minute hand on the grandfather clock was nearly on the 12, and trembling.

She threw open the front door. There was no Sam there, and no one galloping down the road.

The clock struck the hour. She heard someone step quietly beside her.

`Would you like me to read to the young man, madam?' said Willikins. `Perhaps a man's voice would-'

`No, I'll go up,' said Sybil quietly. `You wait here for my husband. He won't be long.'

`Yes, madam.'

`He'll probably be quite rushed.'

`I shall usher him up without delay, madam.' `He will be here, you know!'

`Yes, madam.'

`He will walk through walls!'

Sybil climbed the stairs as the chimes ended. The clock was a wrong clock. Of course it was!

Young Sam had been installed in the old nursery of the house, a rather sombre place full of greys and browns. There was a truly frightening rocking-horse, all teeth and mad glass eyes.

The boy was standing up in his cot. He was smiling, but it faded into puzzlement as Sybil pulled up a chair and sat down next to him.

`Daddy has asked Mummy to read to you tonight, Sam,' she announced brightly. `Won't that be fun!'

Her heart did not sink. It could not. It was already as low as any heart could go. But it curled up and whimpered as she watched the little boy stare at her, at the door, at her again, and then throw back his head and scream.

Vimes, half limping and half running, tripped and fell into a shallow pool. He found he'd stumbled over a dwarf. A dead one. Very dead. So dead, in fact, that the dripping water had built a small stalagmite on him, and with a film of milky stone had cemented him to the rock against which he sat.

`Got to read to Young Sam,' Vimes told the shadowy helmet earnestly.

A little way away, on the sand, was a dwarf's battle-axe. What was going on in Vimes's mind was not exactly coherent thought, but he could hear faint noises up ahead and an instinct as old as thought decided there was no such thing as too much cutting power.

He picked it up. It was covered with no more than a thin coat of rust. There were other humps and mounds on the cavern floor which, now that he came to look at them, might all be-

No time! Read book!

At the end of the cavern the ground sloped up, and had been

made treacherous by the dripping water. It fought back, but the axe

helped. One problem at a time. Climb hill! Read book! And then the screaming started. His son, screaming. It filled his mind.

They will burn ...

A staircase floated in his vision, reaching endlessly upwards into darkness. The screaming came from up there.

Feet slithered. The axe bit into the milky stone. Weeping and cursing, sliding at every step, Vimes struggled to the top of the slope.

A new, huge cave spread out below. It was busy with dwarfs. It looked like a mine.

There were four of them only a few feet away from Vimes, whose vision was full of rocking lambs. They stared at this sudden, bloody, swaying apparition, which was dreamily waving a sword in one hand and an axe in the other.

They had axes, too. But the thing glared at them and asked: `Where's ... my ... cow?'

They backed away.

`Is that my cow?' the creature demanded, stepping forward unsteadily. It shook its head sadly.

`It goes, "Baaaa!` it wept. `It is ... a sheep...

Then it fell to its knees, clenched its teeth and turned its face upwards, like a man tortured beyond his wits, and beseeching the gods of fortune and the tempest, screamed:

`That! Is!! Not!!! My!!!! Cow!!!!!'

The cry echoed around the cavern and broke through mere rock, so great was the force behind it, melted mere mountains, screamed across the miles ... And in the sombre nursery Young Sam stopped crying and looked around, suddenly happy but puzzled, and said, to his despairing mother's surprise, 'Co!'

The dwarfs backed away down the slope. Overhead, the vurms were still pouring in, outlining the invader against their greenwhite glow.

`Where's my cow? Is that my cow?' it

demanded, following them.

In every part of the cavern dwarfs had stopped work. There was hesitancy in the air. This was only one man, after all, and the thought in many minds was: what is someone else going to do about this? It had not yet progressed to: what am Igoing to do about this? Besides, where was the cow? There were cows down here?

`It goes, "Neigh!" It is a horse! That's not my cow!'

Dwarfs looked at one another. Where was the horse, then? Did you hear a horse? Who else is down here?

The four guards had retreated to the cavern for advice and reorientation. There were a number of deep-downers there, clustered in frantic conversation and watching the approaching man.

In Vimes's strobing vision there were fluffy bunnies, too, and quacky ducks...

He had dropped to his knees again, and was staring at the ground, and crying.

Half a dozen shrouded dark guards stepped out from the group. One of them carried, ahead of him, a flame weapon, and advanced on the figure cautiously. The flame of its little pilot light was the brightest thing in the cave.

The figure looked up, the light reflected red in its eyes, and growled: `Is that my cow?'

Then it threw the axe overarm, full at the guard. It struck the flame weapon, which exploded.

`It goes, "Hruuugh!"'

'Hg!!' said Young Sam, as his mother hugged him and stared blankly at the wall.

Burning oil fountained across the dark. Some of it splashed on Vimes's arm. He slapped at it. There was pain, intense pain, but he knew this only in the same way that he knew the moon existed. It was there, but it was a long way off and didn't affect him very much.