Hogfather

The wizard tried not to meet anyone's gaze.

‘I made a misjudgement to do with a wager,’ he said.

‘Lost a bet, you mean?’ said Chickenwire.

‘I paid up on time,’ said Sideney.

‘Yes, but Chrysoprase the troll has this odd little thing about money that turns into lead the next day,’ said Teatime cheerfully. ‘So our friend needs to earn a little cash in a hurry and in a climate where arms and legs stay on.’

‘No one said anything about there being magic in all this,’ said Peachy.

‘Our destination is… probably you should think of it as something like a wizard's tower, gentlemen,’ said Teatime.

‘It isn't an actual wizard's tower, is it?’ said Medium Dave. ‘They got a very odd sense of humour when it comes to booby traps.’

‘No.’

‘Guards?’

‘I believe so. According to legend. But nothing very much.’

Medium Dave narrowed his eyes. ‘There's valuable stuff in this… tower?’

‘Oh, yes.’

‘Why ain't there many guards, then?’

‘The… person who owns the property probably does not realize the value of what… of what they have.’

‘Locks?’ said Medium Dave.

‘On our way we shall be picking up a locksmith.’

‘Who?’

‘Mr Brown.’

They nodded. Everyone — at least, everyone in ‘the business’, and everyone in ‘the business’ knew what ‘the business’ was, and if you didn't know what ‘the business’ was you weren't a businessman — knew Mr Brown. His presence anywhere around a job gave it a certain kind of respectability. He was a neat, elderly man who'd invented most of the tools in his big leather bag. No matter what cunning you'd used to get into a place, or overcome a small army, or find the secret treasure room, sooner or later you sent for Mr Brown, who'd turn up with his leather bag and his little springy things and his little bottles of strange alchemy and his neat little boots. And he'd do nothing for ten minutes but look at the lock, and then he'd select a piece of bent metal from a ring of several hundred almost identical pieces, and under an hour later he'd be walking away with a neat ten per cent of the takings. Of course, you didn't have to use Mr Brown's services. You could always opt to spend the rest of your life looking at a locked door.

‘All right. Where is this place?’ said Peachy.

Teatime turned and smiled at him. ‘If I'm paying you, why isn't it me who's asking the questions?’

Peachy didn't even try to outstare the glass eye a second time.

‘Just want to be prepared, that's all,’ he mumbled.

‘Good reconnaissance is the essence of a successful operation,’ said Teatime. He turned and looked up at the bulk that was Banjo and added, ‘What is this?’

‘This is Banjo,’ said Medium Dave, rolling himself a cigarette.

‘Does it do tricks?’

Time stood still for a moment. The other men looked at Medium Dave. He was known to Ankh-Morpork's professional underclass as a thoughtful, patient man, and considered something of an intellectual because some of his tattoos were spelled right. He was reliable in a tight spot and, above all, he was honest, because good criminals have to be honest. If he had a fault, it was a tendency to deal out terminal and definitive retribution to anyone who said anything about his brother.

If he had a virtue, it was a tendency to pick his time. Medium Dave's fingers tucked the tobacco into the paper and raised it to his lips.

‘No,’ he said.

Chickenwire tried to defrost the conversation. ‘He's not what you'd call bright, but he's always useful. He can lift two men in each hand. By their necks.’

‘Yur,’ said Banjo.

‘He looks like a volcano,’ said Teatime.

‘Really?’ said Medium Dave Lilywhite. Chickenwire reached out hastily and pushed him back down in his seat.

Teatime turned and smiled at him.

‘I do so hope we're going to be friends, Mr Medium Dave,’ he said. ‘It really hurts to think I might not be among friends.’ He gave him another bright smile. Then he turned back to the rest of the table.

‘Are we resolved, gentlemen?’

They nodded. There was some reluctance, given the consensus view that Teatime belonged in a room with soft walls, but ten thousand dollars was ten thousand dollars, possibly even more.

‘Good,’ said Teatime. He looked Banjo up and down. ‘Then I suppose we might as well make a start.’

And he hit Banjo very hard in the mouth.

Death in person did not turn up upon the cessation of every life. It was not necessary. Governments govern, but prime ministers and presidents do not personally turn up in people's homes to tell them how to run their lives, because of the mortal danger this would present. There are laws instead.

But from time to time Death checked up to see that things were functioning properly or, to put it another and more accurate way, properly ceasing to function in the less significant areas of his jurisdiction.

And now he walked through dark seas.

Silt rose in clouds around his feet as he strode along the trench bottom. His robes floated out around him.

There was silence, pressure and utter, utter darkness. But there was life down here, even this far below the waves. There were giant squid, and lobsters with teeth on their eyelids. There were spidery things with their stomachs on their feet, and fish that made their own light. It was a quiet, black nightmare world, but life lives everywhere that life can. Where life can't, this takes a little longer.

Death's destination was a slight rise in the trench floor. Already the water around him was getting warmer and more populated, by creatures that looked as though they had been put together from the bits left over from everything else.

Unseen but felt, a vast column of scalding hot water was welling up from a fissure. Somewhere below were rocks heated to near incandescence by the Disc's magical field.

Spires of minerals had been deposited around this vent. And, in this tiny oasis, a type of life had grown up. It did not need air or light. It did not even need food in the way that most other species would understand the term.

It just grew at the edge of the streaming column of water, looking like a cross between a worm and a flower.

Death kneeled down and peered at it, because it was so small. But for some reason, in this world without eyes or light, it was also a brilliant red. The profligacy of life in these matters never ceased to amaze him.

He reached inside his robe and pulled out a small roll of black material, like a jeweller's toolkit. With great care he took from one of its pouches a scythe about an inch long, and held it expectantly between thumb and forefinger.

Somewhere overhead a shard of rock was dislodged by a stray current and tumbled down, raising little puffs of silt as it bounced off the tubes.

It landed just beside the living flower and then rolled, wrenching it from the rock.

Death flicked the tiny scythe just as the bloom faded …

The omnipotent eyesight of various supernatural entities is often remarked upon. It is said they can see the fall of every sparrow.

And this may be true. But there is only one who is always there when it hits the ground.

The soul of the tube worm was very small and uncomplicated. It wasn't bothered about sin. It had never