Interesting Times

just gives this bloodcurdlin' shout and—'

'Cohen, they're all very old men.'

'They're the cream!'

Rincewind sighed.

'Cohen, they're the cheese. Why've you brought them all the way here?'

'Gonna help me steal something,' said Cohen.

'What? A jewel or something?'

''S something,' said Cohen, sulkily. ''S in Hunghung.'

'Really? My word,' said Rincewind. 'And there's a lot of people in Hunghung, I expect?'

'About half a million,' said Cohen.

'Lots of guards, no doubt?'

'About forty thousand, I heard. About three-quarters of a million if you count all the armies.'

'Right,' said Rincewind. 'So, with these half-dozen old men—'

'The Silver Horde,' said Cohen, with a touch of pride.

'What? Pardon?'

'That's their name. Got to have a name in the horde business. The Silver Horde.'

Rincewind turned around. Several of the Horde had fallen asleep.

'The Silver Horde,' he said. 'Right. Matches the colour of their hair. Those that have got hair. So… with this… Silver Horde you're going to rush the city, kill all the guards and steal all the treasure?'

Cohen nodded. 'Yeah… something like that. Of course, we won't have to kill all the guards…'

'Oh, no?'

'It'd take too long.'

'Yes, and of course you'll want to leave something to do tomorrow.'

'I mean they'll be busy, what with the revolution and everything.'

'A revolution too? My word.'

'They say it's a time of portents,' said Cohen. 'They—'

'I'm surprised they've got time to worry about the state of their camping equipment,' said Rincewind.

'You'd be well advised to stay along o' us,' said Ghenghiz Cohen. 'You'll be safer with us.'

'Oh, I'm not sure about that,' said Rincewind, grinning horribly. 'I'm not sure about that at all.'

By myself, he thought, only ordinary horrible things can happen to me.

Cohen shrugged, and then stared around the clearing until his gaze lighted on a slight figure who was sitting a little apart from the rest, reading a book.

'Look at him,' he said, benevolently, like a man pointing out a dog doing a good trick. 'Always got his nose in a book.' He raised his voice. 'Teach? Come and show this wizard the way to Hunghung.'

He turned back to Rincewind. 'Teach'll tell you anything you want to know, 'cos he knows everything. I'll leave you with him. I've got to go and have a talk with Old Vincent.' He waved a hand dismissively. 'Not that there's anything wrong with him, at all,' he said defiantly. 'It's just that his memory's bad. We had a bit of trouble on the way over. I keep telling him, it's rape the women and set fire to the houses.'

'Rape?' said Rincewind. 'That's not very—'

'He's eighty-seven,' said Cohen. 'Don't go and spoil an old man's dreams.'

Teach turned out to be a tall, stick-like man with an amiably absent-minded expression and a fringe of white hair so that, when viewed from above, he would appear to be a daisy. He certainly did not appear to be a bloodthirsty brigand, even though he was wearing a chainmail vest slightly too big for him and a huge scabbard strapped across his back, which contained no sword but held a variety of scrolls and brushes. His chainmail shirt had a breast pocket with three different coloured pens in a leather pocket protector.

'Ronald Saveloy,' he said, shaking Rincewind's hand. 'The gentlemen do rather assume considerable knowledge on my part. Let me see… You want to go to Hunghung, yes?'

Rincewind had been thinking about this.

'I want to know the way to Hunghung,' he said guardedly.

'Yes. Well. At this time of year I'd head towards the setting sun until I left the mountains and reached the alluvial plain where you'll see evidence of drumlins and some quite fine examples of obviously erratic boulders. It's about ten miles.'

Rincewind stared at him. A brigand's directions were usually more on the lines of 'keep straight or past the burning city and turn right when you've passed all the citizens hanging up by their ears'.

'Those drumlins sound dangerous,' he said.

'They're just a type of post-glacial hill,' said Mr Saveloy.

'What about these erratic boulders? They sound like the kind of thing that'd pounce on—'

'Just boulders dropped a long way from home by a glacier,' said Mr Saveloy. 'Nothing to worry about. The landscape is not hostile.'

Rincewind didn't believe him. He'd had the ground hit him very hard many times.

'However,' said Mr Saveloy, 'Hunghung is a little dangerous at the moment.'

'No, really?' said Rincewind wearily.

'It's not exactly a siege. Everyone's waiting for the Emperor to die. These are what they call here '— he smiled — 'interesting times.'

'I hate interesting times.'

The other Horders had wandered off, fallen asleep again or were complaining to one another about their feet. The voice of Cohen could be heard somewhere in the distance: 'Look, this is a match, and this is—'

'You know, you sound a very educated man for a barbarian,' said Rincewind.

'Oh, dear me, I didn't start out a barbarian. I used to be a school teacher. That's why they call me Teach.'

'What did you teach?'

'Geography. And I was very interested in Auriental[15] studies. But I decided to give it up and make a living by the sword.'

'After being a teacher all your life?'

'It did mean a change of perspective, yes.'

'But… well… surely.. the privation, the terrible hazards, the daily risk of death…'

Mr Saveloy brightened up. 'Oh, you've been a teacher, have you?'

Rincewind looked around when someone shouted. He turned, to see two of the Horde arguing nose to nose.

Mr Saveloy sighed.

'I'm trying to teach them chess,' he said. 'It's vital to the understanding of the Auriental mind. But I am afraid they have no concept of taking turns at moving, and their idea of an opening gambit is for the King and all the pawns to rush up the board together and set fire to the opposing rooks.'

Rincewind leaned closer.

'Look, I mean… Ghenghiz Cohen?' he said. 'Has he gone off his head? I mean… just killing half a dozen geriatric priests and nicking some paste gems, yes. Attacking forty thousand guards all by himself is certain death!'

'Oh, he won't be by himself,' said Mr Saveloy.

Rincewind blinked. There was something about Cohen. People caught optimism off him as though it was the common cold.

'Oh, yes. Of course. Sorry. I'd forgotten that. Seven against forty thousand? I shouldn't think you'll have any problems. I'll just be going. Fairly quickly, I think.'

'We have a plan. It's a sort of—' Mr Saveloy hesitated. His eyes unfocused slightly. 'You know? Thing. Bees do it. Wasps, too. Also some jellyfish, I believe… Had the word only a moment ago… er. It's going to be the biggest one ever, I think.'