The Fifth Elephant

'Where's Detritus?'

'Polishing his helmet, sir!' said Cheery, on the point of panic.

'What the hell is he wasting time with that for?'

'Er, er, because we're supposed to leave for the coronation in ten minutes, sir?'

'Oh, yes...'

'Lady Sybil told me to come and find you. In a very distinct tone of voice, sir.'

At that point Lady Sybil's voice boomed along the corridor. 'Sam Vimes! You come here!'

'That one, sir,' Cheery added helpfully.

Vimes trailed into the bedroom. Sybil was wearing another blue dress, a tiara and a firm expression.

'Is it a posh do?' said Vimes. 'I thought if I put on a clean shirt—'

'Your official dress uniform is in the dressing room,' said Sybil.

'It was rather a long day yesterday—'

'This is a coronation, Samuel Vimes. It is not a come-as-you-are! Go and get dressed, quickly. Including, and I don't want to have to say this twice, the helmet with the feathers.'

'But not the red tights,' said Vimes, hoping against hope. 'Please?'

'The red tights, Sam, go without saying.'

'They go at the knees,' said Vimes, but it was the grumble of the defeated.

'I'll ring for Igor to come and help you.'

'Things will have come to a pretty pass when I can't put my own tights on, dear, thank you.'

Vimes dressed hurriedly, listening for... anything. Some creak in the wrong place, perhaps.

At least this was a Watch uniform, even if it did have buckled shoes. It included a sword. The duking outfit didn't allow for one, which had always struck Vimes as amazingly stupid. You got made a duke for being a fighter, and then they gave you nothing to fight with.

There was a tinkle of glass back in the bedroom, and Lady Sybil was astonished to see her husband enter at a run with his sword raised.

'I dropped the top of a scent bottle, Sam! What's up with you? Even Angua says he's probably miles away and in no shape to cause trouble! Why're you so nervy?'

Vimes put down the sword and tried to relax.

'Because our Wolfgang's a damn bottle covey, dear. I know the sort. Any normal person, they crawl off if they get a beating. Or they have the sense to stay down, at least. But sometimes you get one who just won't let go. Eight-stone weaklings who'll try to headbutt Detritus. Evil little bantamweight bastards who'll bust a bottle on the bar and try to attack five watchmen all at once. You know what I mean? Idiots who'll go on fighting long after they should stop. The only way to put 'em down is to put 'em out.'

'I think I recognize the type, yes,' said Lady Sybil, with an irony that failed to register with Sam Vimes until some days later. She picked some lint off his cloak.

'He's going to be back. I can feel it in my water,' mumbled Vimes.

'Sam?'

'Yes?'

'Can I have your attention for a couple of minutes? Wolfgang is Angua's problem, not yours. I really need to talk to you very quietly for a little while without you running off after werewolves.' She said it as if this was a minor character flaw, like a tendency to leave his boots where people could trip over them.

'Er, they run after me,' he pointed out.

'But there's always people being found dead or trying to kill you—'

'I don't ask them to, dear.'

'Sam, I'm going to have a baby.'

Vimes's head was full of werewolves and his automatic husbandly circuitry cut in ready to respond with 'Yes, dear,' or 'Choose any colour you like,' or 'I'll get someone to sort it out.' Fortunately his brain itself had its own sense of self-preservation and, not wishing to be inside a skull that was stowed in by a bedside lamp, rewrote Sybil's words in white-hot fire across his inner eyeball and then went and hid.

That's why the response came out as a weak 'What? How?'

'The normal way, I hope.'

Vimes sat down on the bed. 'And... not right now?'

'I very much doubt it. But Mrs Content says it's definite, and she's been a midwife for fifty years.'

'Oh.' Some more brain functions crept back. 'Good. That's... good.'

'It'll probably take a while to sink in.'

'Yes.' Another neuron lit up. 'Er, everything will be all right, will it?'

'What do you mean?'

'Er, you're rather, you're not as... you...'

'Sam, my family have been bred for breeding. It's an aristocratic tradition. Of course everything will be all right.'

'Oh. Good.'

Vimes sat and stared. His head felt like some vast sea that had just been parted by a prophet. Where there should have been activity there was just bare sand and the occasional floundering fish. But huge steep waves were tottering on either side, and in a minute they would crash down and cause cities to flood a hundred miles away.

More glass tinkled, somewhere downstairs.

'Sam, Igor's probably just dropped something,' said Sybil, seeing his expression. 'That's all. Probably just knocked over a glass.'

There was a snarl and a scream, abruptly cut off.

Vimes leapt off the bed. 'Lock the door after me and push the bed against it!' He paused for a moment in the doorway. 'Without straining yourself!' he added, and ran for the stairs.

Wolfgang was trotting across the hall.

He was different this time. Wolf ears sprouted from a head that was still human. His hair had grown around him like a mane. Patches of fur were tufted on his skin, and were mostly streaked with blood.

The rest of him... was having trouble deciding what it was. One arm was trying to be a paw.

Vimes reached for his sword and remembered that it was back on the bed. He rummaged in his pockets. He knew the other thing was here, he remembered picking it up off the dressing table...

His fingers closed on his badge. He held it out.

'Stop! In the name of the law!'

Wolfgang looked up at him, one eye glowing yellow. The other was a mess.

'Hello, Civilized,' he growled. 'You wait for me, hey?'

He ducked into the corridor that led to the room where Carrot lay. Vimes tried to catch him up, saw claw- tipped fingers curl around the door and haul it out of its frame.

Carrot was reaching for his sword—

And then Wolfgang was flying backwards under the full weight of Angua. They landed back in the hall, a rolling ball of fur, claws and teeth.

When werewolf fights werewolf, there are advantages to either shape. It's an eternal struggle to get a position where hands beat claws. And body shapes have lives of their own, a dangerous attribute if it is allowed to act unchecked. A cat's instinct is to jump on something that moves, but this is not a correct action if what is moving has a fizzing fuse. The mind has to fight its own body for control and the other body for survival. Mix this together, and the noise suggests that there are four creatures in the whirling ball of rage. And each one of them has brought several friends. And none of them like any of the others.

A shadow made Vimes spin around. Detritus, in shining armour, was aiming the Piecemaker over the banister.

'Sergeant! No! You'll hit Angua too!'

'Not a problem, sir,' said Detritus, ' 'cos it won't kill 'em, so all we have to do, see, is sort out der bits dat are Wolfgang an' belt him over der head when he gets himself back together—'

'If you fire that in here his bits will be mixed up with our bits and there won't be big bits! Put the damn thing down!'