Mort

'Did you hit me?' he said, gently testing his jaw.

'Yes.'

'Oh.'

He looked at the sky, as though it could remind him about things. He had to be somewhere, soon, he recalled. Then he remembered something else.

Thank you,' he said.

'Any time, I assure you.' Ysabell made it to her feet and tried to brush the dirt and cobwebs off her dress.

'Are we going to rescue this princess of yours?' she said diffidently.

Mort's own personal, internal reality caught up with him. He shot to his feet with a strangled cry, watched blue fireworks explode in front of his eyes, and collapsed again. Ysabell caught him under the shoulders and hauled him back on his feet.

'Let's go down to the river,' she said. 'I think we could all do with a drink.'

'What happened to me?'

She shrugged as best she could while supporting his weight.

'Someone used the Rite of AshkEnte. Father hates it, he says they always summon him at inconvenient moments. The part of you that was Death went and you stayed behind. I think. At least you've got your own voice back.'

'What time is it?'

'What time did you say the priests close up the pyramid?'

Mort squinted through streaming eyes back towards the tomb of the king. Sure enough, torchlit fingers were working on the door. Soon, according to the legend, the guardians would come to life and begin their endless patrol.

He knew they would. He remembered the knowledge. He remembered his mind feeling as cold as ice and limitless as the night sky. He remembered being summoned into reluctant existence at the moment the first creature lived, in the certain knowledge that he would outlive life until the last being in the universe passed to its reward, when it would then be his job, figuratively speaking, to put the chairs on the tables and turn aU the lights off.

He remembered the loneliness.

'Don't leave me,' he said urgently.

'I'm here,' she said. 'For as long as you need me.'

'It's midnight,' he said dully, sinking down by the Tsort and lowering his aching head to the water. Beside him there was a noise like a bath emptying as Binky also took a drink.

'Does that mean we're too late?'

'Yes.'

'I'm sorry. I wish there was something I could do.'

There isn't.'

'At least you kept your promise to Albert.'

'Yes,' said Mort, bitterly. 'At least I did that.'

Nearly all the way from one side of the Disc to the other. . . .

There should be a word for the microscopic spark of hope that you dare not entertain in case the mere act of acknowledging it will cause it to vanish, like trying to look at a photon. You can only sidle up to it, looking past it, walking past it, waiting for it to get big enough to face the world.