Ponder Stibbons fought his way through the throng. He knew his more senior fellows when they were feeling helpful. They were like a glass of water to a drowning man.
‘Give him air!’ he protested.
‘How do we know if he needs any?’ said the Dean.
Ponder put his ear to the fallen youth's chest.
‘He's not breathing!’
‘Breathing spell, breathing spell,’ muttered the Chair of Indefinite Studies. ‘Er… Spolt's Forthright Respirator, perhaps? I think I've got it written down somewhere—’
Ridcully reached through the wizards and pulled out the black-clad man by a leg. He held him upside down in his big hand and thumped him heavily on the back.
He met their astonished gaze. ‘Used to do this on the farm,’ he said. ‘Works a treat on baby goats.’
‘Oh, now, really,’ said the Dean, ‘I don't—’
The corpse made a noise somewhere between a choke and a cough.
‘Make some space, you fellows!’ the Archchancellor bellowed, clearing an area of table with one sweep of his spare arm.
‘Hey, I hadn't had any of that Prawn Escoffe!’ said the Lecturer in Recent Runes.
‘I didn't even know we had any,’ said the Chair of Indefinite Studies. ‘Someone, and I name no names, Dean, shoved it behind the soft-shelled crabs so they could keep it for themselves. I call that cheap.’
Teatime opened his eyes. It said a lot for his constitution that it survived a very close-up view of Ridcully's nose, which filled the immediate universe like a big pink planet.
‘Excuse me, excuse me,’ said Ponder, leaning over with his notebook open, ‘but this is vitally important for the advancement of natural philosophy. Did you see any bright lights? Was there a shining tunnel? Did any deceased relatives attempt to speak to you? What word most describes the—’
Ridcully pulled him away.
‘What's all this, Mr Stibbons?’
‘I really should talk to him, sir. He's had a near-death experience!’
‘We all have. It's called “living”,’ said the Archchancellor shortly. ‘Pour the poor lad a glass of spirits and put that damn pencil away.’
‘Uh… This must be Unseen University?’ said Teatime. ‘And you are all wizards?’
‘Now, just you lie still,’ said Ridcully. But Teatime had already risen on his elbows.
‘There was a sword,’ he muttered.
‘Oh, it's fallen on the floor,’ said the Dean, reaching down. ‘But it looks as though it's— Did I do that?’
The wizards looked at the large curved slice of table falling away. Something had cut through everything wood, cloth, plates, cutlery, food. The Dean swore that a candle flame that had been in the path of the unseen blade was only half a flame for a moment, until the wick realized that this was no way to behave.
The Dean raised his hand. The other wizards scattered.
‘Looks like a thin blue line in the air,’ he said, wonderingly.
‘Excuse me, sir,’ said Teatime, taking it from him. ‘I really must be off.’
He ran from the hall.
‘He won't get far,’ said the Lecturer in Recent Runes. ‘The main doors are locked in accordance with Archchancellor Spode's Rules.’
‘Won't get far while holding a sword that appears to be able to cut through anything,’ said Ridcully, to the sound of falling wood.
‘I wonder what all that was about?’ said the Chair of Indefinite Studies, and then turned his attention to the remains of the Feast. ‘Anyway, at least this joint's been nicely carved.’
‘Bu-bu-bu—’
They all turned. The Bursar was holding his hand in front of him. The cut surface of a fork gleamed at the wizards.
‘Nice to know his new present will come in handy,’ said the Dean. ‘It's the thought that counts.’
Under the table the Blue Hen of Happiness relieved itself on the Bursar's foot.
THERE ARE… ENEMIES, said Death, as Binky galloped through icy mountains.
‘They're all dead—’
OTHER ENEMIES. YOU MAY AS WELL KNOW THIS. DOWN IN THE DEEPEST KINGDOMS OF THE SEA, WHERE THERE IS NO LIGHT, THERE LIVES A TYPE OF CREATURE WITH NO BRAIN AND NO EYES AND NO MOUTH. IT DOES NOTHING BUT LIVE AND PUT FORTH PETALS OF PERFECT CRIMSON WHERE NONE ARE THERE TO SEE. IT IS NOTHING EXCEPT A TINY YES IN THE NIGHT. AND YET… AND YET… IT HAS ENEMIES THAT BEAR ON IT A VICIOUS, UNBENDING MALICE, WHO WISH NOT ONLY FOR ITS TINY LIFE TO BE OVER BUT ALSO THAT IT HAD NEVER EXISTED. ARE YOU WITH ME SO FAR?
‘Well, yes, but—’
GOOD. NOW, IMAGINE WHAT THEY THINK OF HUMANITY.
Susan was shocked. She had never heard her grandfather speak in anything other than calm tones. Now there was a cutting edge in his words.
‘What are they?’ she said.
WE MUST HURRY. THERE IS NOT MUCH TIME.
‘I thought you always had time. I mean… whatever it is you want to stop, you can go back in time and—’
AND MEDDLE?
‘You've done it before…’
THIS TIME IT IS OTHERS WHO ARE DOING IT. AND THEY HAVE NO RIGHT.
‘What others?’
THEY HAVE NO NAME. CALL THEM THE AUDITORS. THEY RUN THE UNIVERSE. THEY SEE TO IT THAT GRAVITY WORKS AND THE ATOMS SPIN, OR WHATEVER IT IS ATOMS DO. AND THEY HATE LIFE.
‘Why?’
IT IS… IRREGULAR. IT WAS NEVER SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN. THEY LIKE STONES, MOVING IN CURVES. AND THEY HATE HUMANS MOST OF ALL. Death sighed. IN MANY WAYS, THEY LACK A SENSE OF HUMOUR.
‘Why the Hog—’
IT IS THE THINGS YOU BELIEVE WHICH MAKE YOU HUMAN. GOOD THINGS AND BAD THINGS, IT'S ALL THE SAME.
The mists parted. Sharp peaks were around them, lit by the glow off the snow.
‘These look like the mountains where the Castle of Bones was,’ she said.
THEY ARE, said Death. IN A SENSE. HE HAS GONE BACK TO A PLACE HE KNOWS. AN EARLY PLACE…
Binky cantered low over the snow.
‘And what are we looking for?’ said Susan.
YOU WILL KNOW WHEN YOU SEE IT.
‘Snow? Trees? I mean, could I have a clue? What are we here for?’
I TOLD YOU. TO ENSURE THAT THE SUN COMES UP.
‘Of course the sun will come up!’
NO.
‘There's no magic that'll stop the sun coming up!’
I WISH I WAS AS CLEVER AS YOU.
Susan stared down out of sheer annoyance, and saw something below.
Small dark shapes moved across the whiteness, running as if they were in pursuit of something.
‘There's… some sort of chase…’ she conceded. ‘I can see some sort of animals but I can't see what they're after—’
Then she saw movement in the snow, a blurred, dark shape dodging and skidding and never clear. Binky dropped until his hooves grazed the tops of the pine trees, which bent in his wake. A rumble followed him across the forest, dragging broken branches and a smoke of snow behind it.
Now they were lower she could see the hunters clearly. They were large dogs. Their quarry was indistinct, dodging among snowdrifts, keeping to the cover of snow-laden bushes.
A drift exploded. Something big and long and blue-black rose through the flying snow like a sounding whale.
‘It's a pig!’
A BOAR. THEY DRIVE IT TOWARDS THE CLIFF. THEY'RE DESPERATE NOW.
She could hear the panting of the creature. The dogs made no sound at all.
Blood streamed onto the snow from the wounds they had already managed to inflict.
‘This… boar,’ said Susan. ‘It's …’
YES.
‘They want to kill the Hogf—’
NOT KILL. HE KNOWS HOW TO DIE. OH, YES… IN THIS SHAPE, HE KNOWS HOW TO DIE. HE'S HAD A LOT OF EXPERIENCE. NO, THEY WANT TO TAKE AWAY HIS REAL LIFE, TAKE AWAY HIS SOUL, TAKE AWAY EVERYTHING. THEY MUST NOT BE ALLOWED TO BRING HIM DOWN.
‘Well, stop them!’
YOU MUST. THIS IS A HUMAN THING.
The dogs mo
ved oddly. They weren't running but flowing, crossing the snow faster than the mere movement of their legs would suggest.
‘They don't look like real dogs…’
NO.
‘What can I do?’
Death nodded his head towards the boar. Binky was keeping level with it now, barely a few feet away.
Realization dawned.
‘I can't ride that!’ said Susan.
WHY NOT? YOU HAVE HAD AN EDUCATION.
‘Enough to know that pigs don't let people ride them!’
MERE ACCUMULATION OF OBSERVATIONAL EVIDENCE IS NOT PROOF.
Susan glanced ahead. The snowfield had a cut-off look.
YOU MUST, said her grandfather's voice in her head. WHEN HE REACHES THE EDGE THERE HE WILL STAND AT BAY. HE MUST NOT. UNDERSTAND? THESE ARE NOT REAL DOGS. IF THEY CATCH HIM HE WON'T JUST DIE, HE WILL… NEVER BE…
Susan leapt. For a moment she floated through the air, dress streaming behind her, arms outstretched…
Landing on the animal's back was like hitting a very, very firm chair. It stumbled for a moment and then righted itself.
Susan's arms clung to its neck and her face was buried in its sharp bristles. She could feel the heat under her. It was like riding a furnace.
And it stank of sweat, and blood, and pig. A lot of pig.
There was a lack of landscape in front of her.
The boar ploughed into the snow on the edge of the drop, almost flinging her off, and turned to face the hounds.
There were a lot of them. Susan was familiar with dogs. They'd had them at home like other houses had rugs. And these weren't that big floppy sort.
She rammed her heels in and grabbed a pig's ear in each hand. It was like holding a pair of hairy shovels.
‘Turn left!’ she screamed, and hauled.
She put everything into the command. It promised tears before bedtime if disobeyed.
To her amazement the boar grunted, pranced on the lip of the precipice and scrambled away, the hounds floundering as they turned to follow.
This was a plateau. From here it seemed to be all edge, with no way down except the very simple and terminal one.
The dogs were flying at the boar's heels again.
Susan looked around in the grey, sightless air. There had to be somewhere, some way…
There was.
It was a shoulder of rock, a giant knife-edge connecting this plain to the hills beyond. It was sharp and narrow, a thin line of snow with chilly depths on either side.
It was better than nothing. It was nothing with snow on it.
The boar reached the edge and hesitated. Susan put her head down and dug her heels in again.
Snout down, legs moving like pistons, the beast plunged out onto the ridge. Snow sprayed up as its trotters sought for purchase. It made up for lack of grace by sheer manic effort, legs moving like a tap dancer climbing a moving staircase that was heading down.
‘That's right, that's right, that's—’
A trotter slipped. For a moment the boar seemed to stand on two, the others scrabbling at icy rock. Susan flung herself the other way, clinging to the neck, and felt the dragging abyss under her feet.
There was nothing there.
She told herself, He'll catch me if I fall he'll catch me if I fall, he'll catch me if I fall…
Powdered ice made her eyes sting. A flailing trotter almost slammed against her head.
An older voice said, No, he won't. If I fall now I don't deserve to be caught.
The creature's eye was inches away. And then she knew…
… Out of the depths of eyes of all but the most unusual of animals comes an echo. Out of the dark eye in front of her, someone looked back…
A foot caught the rock and she concentrated her whole being on it, kicking herself upward in one last effort. Pig and woman rocked for a moment and then a trotter caught a footing and the boar plunged forward along the ridge.
Susan risked a look behind.
The dogs still moved oddly. There was a slight jerkiness about their movements, as if they flowed from position to position rather than moved by ordinary muscles.
Not dogs, she thought. Dog shapes.
There was another shock underfoot. Snow flew up. The world tilted. She felt the shape of the boar change when its muscles bunched and sent it soaring as a slab of ice and rock came away and began the long slide into darkness.
Susan was thrown off when the creature landed, and tumbled into deep snow. She flailed around madly, expecting at any minute to begin sliding.
Instead her hand found a snow-encrusted branch. A few feet away the boar lay on its side, steaming and panting.
She pulled herself upright. The spur here had widened out into a hill, with a few frosted trees on it.
The dogs had reached the gap and were milling round, struggling to prevent themselves slipping.
They could easily clear the distance, she could see. Even the boar had managed it with her on its back. She put both hands around the branch and heaved; it came away with a crack, like a broken icicle, and she waved it like a club.
‘Come on,’ she said. ‘Jump! Just you try it! Come on!’
One did. The branch caught it as it landed, and then Susan spun and brought the branch around on the upswing, lifted the dazed animal off its feet and out over the edge.
For a moment the shape wavered and then, howling, it dropped out of sight.
She danced a few steps of rage and triumph.
‘Yes! Yes! Who wants some? Anyone else?’
The other dogs looked her in the eye, decided that no one did, and that there wasn't. Finally, after one or two nervous attempts, they managed to turn, still sliding, and tried to make it back to the plateau.
A figure barred their way.
It hadn't been there a moment ago but it looked permanent now. It seemed to have been made of snow, three balls of snow piled on one another. It had black dots for eyes. A semi-circle of more dots formed the semblance of a mouth. There was a carrot for the nose.
And, for the arms, two twigs.
At this distance, anyway.
One of them was holding a curved stick.
A raven wearing a damp piece of red paper landed on one arm.
‘Bob bob bob?’ it suggested. ‘Merry Solstice? Tweetie tweet? What are you waiting for? Hogswatch?’
The dogs backed away.
The snow broke off the snowman in chunks, revealing a gaunt figure in a flapping black robe.
Death spat out the carrot.
HO. HO. HO.
The grey bodies smeared and rippled as the hounds sought desperately to change their shape.
YOU COULDN'T RESIST IT? IN THE END? A MISTAKE, I FANCY.
He touched the scythe. There was a click as the blade flashed into life.
IT GETS UNDER YOUR SKIN, LIFE, said Death, stepping forward. SPEAKING METAPHORICALLY, OF COURSE. IT'S A HABIT THAT'S HARD TO GIVE UP. ONE PUFF OF BREATH IS NEVER ENOUGH. YOU'LL FIND YOU WANT TO TAKE ANOTHER.
A dog started to slip on the snow and scrabbled desperately to save itself from the long, cold drop.
AND, YOU SEE, THE MORE YOU STRUGGLE FOR EVERY MOMENT, THE MORE ALIVE YOU STAY… WHICH IS WHERE I COME IN, AS A MATTER OF FACT.
The leading dog managed, for a moment, to become a grey cowled figure before being dragged back into shape.
FEAR, TOO, IS AN ANCHOR, said Death. ALL THOSE SENSES, WIDE OPEN TO EVERY FRAGMENT OF THE WORLD. THAT BEATING HEART. THAT RUSH OF BLOOD. CAN YOU NOT FEEL IT, DRAGGING YOU BACK?
Once again the Auditor managed to retain a shape for a few seconds, and managed to say: you cannot do this, there are rules!
YES. THERE ARE RULES. BUT YOU BROKE THEM. HOW DARE YOU? HOW DARE YOU?
The scythe blade was a thin blue outline in the grey light.
Death raised a thin finger to where his lips might have been, and suddenly looked thoughtful.
AND NOW THERE REMAINS ONLY ONE FINAL QUESTION, he said.
He raised his hands,
and seemed to grow. Light flared in his eye sockets. When he spoke next, avalanches fell in the mountains.
HAVE YOU BEEN NAUGHTY… OR NICE?
HO. HO. HO.
Susan heard the wails die away.
The boar lay in white snow that was now red with blood. She knelt down and tried to lift its head.
It was dead. One eye stared at nothing. The tongue lolled.
Sobs welled up inside her. The tiny part of Susan that watched, the inner baby-sitter, said it was just exhaustion and excitement and the backwash of adrenalin. She couldn't be crying over a dead pig.
The rest of her drummed on its flank with both fists.
‘No, you can't! We saved you! Dying isn't how it's supposed to go!’
A breeze blew up.
Something stirred in the landscape, something under the snow. The branches on the ancient trees shook gently, dislodging little needles of ice.
The sun rose.
The light streamed over Susan like a silent gale. It was dazzling. She crouched back, raising her forearm to cover her eyes. The great red ball turned frost to fire along the winter branches.
Cold light slammed into the mountain peaks, making every one a blinding, silent volcano. It rolled onward, gushing into the valleys and thundering up the slopes, unstoppable…
There was a groan.
A man lay in the snow where the boar had been.
He was naked except for an animal skin loincloth. His hair was long and had been woven into a thick plait down his back, so matted with blood and grease that it looked like felt. And he was bleeding everywhere the hounds had caught him.
Susan watched for a moment, and then, thinking with something other than her head, methodically tore some strips from her petticoat to bandage the more unpleasant wounds.
Capability, said the small part of her mind. A rational head in emergencies.
Rational something, anyway.
It's probably some kind of character flaw.
The man was tattooed. Blue whorls and spirals haunted his skin, under the blood.
He opened his eyes and stared at the sky.
‘Can you get up?’
His gaze flicked to her. He tried moving and then fell back.
Eventually she managed to pull the man up into a sitting position. He swayed as she put one of his arms across her shoulders and then heaved him to his feet. She did her best to ignore the sting, which had an almost physical force.
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