Sourcery

He turned and fled into the University, skirts flapping around his knees, until he reached the bursar's study. He hammered on the door, which creaked open.

'Ah. It's, um, Rincewind, isn't it?' said the bursar, without much enthusiasm. 'What's the matter?'

'We're sinking!'

The bursar stared at him for a few moments. His name was Spelter. He was tall and wiry and looked as though he had been a horse in previous lives and had only just avoided it in this one. He always gave people the impression that he was looking at them with his teeth.

'Sinking?'

'Yes. All the rats are leaving!'

The bursar gave him another stare.

'Come inside, Rincewind,' he said, kindly. Rincewind followed him into the low, dark room and across to the window. It looked out over the gardens to the river, oozing peacefully towards the sea.

'You haven't been, um, overdoing it?’ said the bursar.

'Overdoing what?' said Rincewind, guiltily.

'This is a building, you see,' said the bursar. Like most wizards when faced with a puzzle, he started to roll himself a cigarette. 'It's not a ship. There are ways of telling, you know. Absence of porpoises frolicking around the bows, a shortage of bilges, that sort of thing. The chances of foundering are remote. Otherwise, um, we'd have to man the sheds and row for shore. Um?'

'But the rats-'

'Grain ship in harbour, I expect. Some, um, springtime ritual.'

'I'm sure I felt the building shaking, too,' said Rincewind, a shade uncertainly. Here in this quiet room, with the fire crackling in the grate, it didn't seem quite so real.

'A passing tremor. Great A'Tuin hiccuping, um, possibly. A grip on youself, um, is what you should get. You haven't been drinking, have you?'

'No!'

'Um. Would you like to?'

Spelter padded over to a dark oak cabinet and pulled out a couple of glasses, which he filled from the water jug.

'I tend to be best at sherry this time of day,' he said, and spread his hands over the glasses. 'Say, um, the word — sweet or dry?'

'Um, no,' said Rincewind. 'Perhaps you're right. I think I'll go and have a bit of rest.'

'Good idea.'

Rincewind wandered down the chilly stone passages. Occasionally he'd touch the wall and appear to be listening, and then he'd shake his head.

As he crossed the quadrangle again he saw a herd of mice swarm over a balcony and scamper towards the river. The ground they were running over seemed to be moving, too. When Rincewind looked closer he could see that it was because it was covered with ants.

These weren't ordinary ants. Centuries of magical leakage into the walls of the University had done strange things to them. Some of them were pulling very small carts, some of them were riding beetles, but all of them were leaving the University as quickly as possible. The grass on the lawn rippled as they passed.

He looked up as an elderly striped mattress was extruded from an upper window and flopped down on to the flagstones below. After a pause, apparently to catch its breath, it rose a little from the ground. Then it started to float purposefully across the lawn and bore down on Rincewind, who managed to jump out of its way just in time. He heard a high-pitched chittering and caught a glimpse of thousands of determined little legs under the bulging fabric before it hurtled onward. Even the bedbugs were on the move, and in case they didn't find such comfortable quarters elsewhere they were leaving nothing to chance. One of them waved at him and squeaked a greeting.