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It had finally come to this.
He had faced several more than slightly annoyed vampires, encountered hungry werewolves, and even seriously detained one or two over excited zombies, although he always stayed to help them reattach whatever extraneous parts of their bodies he had detached once they calmed down(1). But now, one of the greatest and most dangerous challenges of his career had finally emerged…
…the man holding the tray beamed at him over the objects upon it…
…being confronted with Ankh Morpork's 'hot sausages inna bun'.
It was time to deploy his second most secret weapon. He knew it was below the belt, but in this case he was willing to make an exception. And the beauty of it was, people never suspected it.
Well. Almost never.
He smiled serenely back at the man holding the tray.
"Tell me, have you ever thought of letting Om into your life?"
(2)Fortunately for all the various human heroes pitched against overwhelming odds in various Undead horror thrillers, the zombies don't seem to have worked this out just yet, having apparently not gotten much further than the thought processes of groaning and lurching and a rather odd desire for brains. Rather like vampires and their habit of clinging to the tradition of spelling their names backwards to avoid detection, the practice of which grows stale almost as quickly as an accent where the letter 'w' doesn't seem to exist.
There were lots of people in the main office of the Pseudopolis Yard Watch House. That wasn't what surprised him; such was always the case, even at night. What surprised him was that for once the ratio of humans outdid the ratio of people that weren't human, and most of the humans weren't in Watch uniform, but in ordinary, if slightly bedraggled, clothes.
Correction, make that very bedraggled. On average, the crowd looked as if it had walked into a treacle mine.(3)
This also causes a problem with warding off bystanders – for some reason, it is very hard to take a sign that says 'Run, don't walk from – The Treacle' seriously.
Ah.
Vimes mentally shook his head, as he came to a halt by the desk. "Morning, Cheery. What's this one done?"
Cheery at once snapped to attention, or as well as she could while sitting on a rather wobbly tall chair. "Accused by several witnesses of instigating a riot, sir!"
"I didn't!" The man in black swivelled around to stare up at him, revealing, as Vimes had rather suspected, an Omnian priest's collar; but rather surprisingly showing himself to be unexpectedly young. Constable Visit himself was just shy of thirty, but this one didn't look as if he was much older than twenty at the most. "Commander, I've already told the officer everything that happened! The street vendor propositioned me with his…"
He paused for thought as he no doubt mentally searched for an appropriate word, though still managing to do it with a certain amount of hysteria.
"…sausages, and I merely offered him a religious pamphlet. Then he started screaming and running away, and then everyone else started yelling, and a cart of something got turned over, and the next thing I knew I was being dragged in here!"
Vimes sighed. He'd seen it all before. More than once.
"You must understand, Mister…?"
"Oats. I am the Quite Reverend Mightily Oats." The young man seemed to hear the unasked question, despite Vimes not saying a single word. "Mightily-Praiseworthy-Are-Ye-Who-Exalteth-Om Oats."
"Well, Mister Oats," Vimes went on, all the while thinking that no one should be part of a religion which dictated that such crimes against human endurance be pulled off at the font, or whatever this lot used, from time to time, even if it was shorter in Omnian, "people in this city seem to have developed an allergic reaction to other people coming up to them in the street and offering them pamphlets, especially ones of a religious nature. Nothing against you, you understand. It was just self-defence."
The priest nodded. "I rather suspect it was." Now that he had stopped being slightly hysterical, he didn't seem too offended by the fact that nobody appeared to want his teachings, a first in Vimes's experience of Omnism. "I didn't rely on him being used to it, though. I usually count on them not seeing it coming. Am I in any trouble, sir?" he added, more anxiously.
"Shouldn't think so. There are far worse ways to cause a riot than by threatening with religious pamphlets, hard though it may be to accept it. I think we'll let you off with a reprimand, over-doing self defence. Just don't do it again, all right? At least, not while you're still within the city walls."
"Very well, Commander. Can I have my things back, please?"
Vimes only now noticed that Cheery was violently shaking her head and, by the look of exasperation on her face, or at least as much of her face as he could see around her beard, that she had been trying to get his attention with the tactic for the past minute or so. He paused for thought.
"Something wrong with returning his belongings, Sergeant? Anything we need to give him a receipt for?" Surely a priest wouldn't be carrying anything particularly sharp?
Cheery gave him a look which he had come to recognise very well, despite the beard, as: You'll see. Then she leaned over the side of the chair, which rocked dangerously, and hauled a bag which he hadn't noticed before up from the floor, to set carefully down on the desk in front of her.
Vimes did see. He saw very well. His eye was particularly caught by the shine of sunlight upon the well forged metal, tracing along the length of the object that protruded from the pack.
Maybe it wasn't the pamphlets that scared Dibbler off after all.
"That's…that's a big axe, Mister Oats," he managed after a few moments. It was big. And sharp. It was an axe that any dwarf would have wept to hold, and that any other being, except perhaps a troll, would go to pieces at the sight of – more specifically two, especially if the said dwarf had swung it at the spot the shorter officers were so often accused of eyeballing.
"Oh yes!" Oats patted the blade of the weapon. "I've had it for quite a long time, now. I keep it for use on my flock."
Vimes stared.
"Mostly it's only to get them to sit still during the sermons, but occasionally I have to use it to cut something off."
Vimes continued to stare.
"Usually it's just a toe or finger, to get the message across, but I always make sure the blade's sharp enough to take off an arm or a leg, just in case."
The stare did not abate, but rather increased.
"I've even had to cut off a few heads, sometimes." The young man had a satisfied smile on his face.
Vimes was wondering what to define the young man as when he filled out the form for his 'detainment'. 'A religiously crazed maniac' didn't seem to quite cut it – after all, there were a lot of those in the city every day, using the codenames of priests, and they hadn't been snapped up yet, even if they did restrict cutting people apart or open to the sacrifice table.(4)
(5)It also gave the priests the chance to tell the truth at least once in a while – they could say 'This won't hurt a bit' with absolute sincerity, even while holding a sharp pointy implement at the time. A trait which every single person prays their dentist possesses.
"What?"
Oats blinked. "I've spent the last three years in Uberwald, Commander. If I'm going to preach to old fashioned vampires and werewolves, it would be more useful if they had heads to listen with, yes?"
"Überwald? But…I wasn't aware…" Vimes was aware that Cheery was doing her best to hide a grin, which with the thickness of her beard meant that she was doing a very good job; but it was the principle of the thing. "I wasn't aware that missionaries were sent there very often," he managed feebly, even though he knew that Oats could tell that what he really meant was: Ye gods, man, do you have a death wish? Or did you just do something to really piss your superiors off?
But then again, he had done something. This skinny young man, with a slight indent on his face near his nose which had obviously once been the site of a rather impressive boil, had obviously shown that he knew how to use that very, very sharp axe on the table to best effect.
Oats the Vampire-slayer?
"Well…strictly speaking, they aren't. I was sent to the kingdom of Lancre at first, but…ah…after a little while there, I felt Überwald needed me more."
Something went ding in Vimes' head.
"Oh, really? Did you spend much time there?" It was, he had to admit, barefaced prompting, but at least it got the job done without any arsing about.
"There were times when I thought I might well end my days there, but I, er, have a feeling that's not what you mean." The young man looked slightly alarmed at his sudden change in attitude.
"Well," Vimes tried, with a little desperation – these countries were so small you could practically throw a rock across them after all; everyone knew everyone else, however short an amount of time you'd been there, surely? - "you wouldn't happen to come across anyone called E. Weatherwax, would you?"
He was rewarded by the sudden stiffening of the priest's spine, and a change in expression. When he spoke, it was as if some previously unheard timbre of his voice had finally woken up and come into play.
"Ah. I think it is Mistress Weatherwax to whom you refer."
"You know her then?"
"Oh, yes. I know her. I know her very well." Oats looked at him with a new, sharper gaze than before. Vimes had to shake off the distinct feeling that there were two sets of eyes in the face, overlaid, and both pairs were scrutinizing him like stink. "Why do you ask?"
Because she sent me a clacks telling me answers I need to understand the questions to. Because I have a nasty idea that she knows more about this business than I do, and she's living over five hundred bloody miles away. Because I want to know how she knows what she knows…
"I've heard of her," was all he said. "But not much. Who is she?"
"She is a witch, Commander. An extremely powerful one, as well. I am surprised that you can have heard of her without knowing that."
"Yes, well. IsaidI hadn'theard much of her." Vimes took a step forward, and leaned down so that he was more on a level with Oats's face. "You say she's powerful, Mr. Oats. How powerful?"
"Commander, the first time I met her, she was bitten by a rather strong vampire-"
"What? She's a vampire?" That would be just perfect, if his only lead was supplied by a bloody vampire…
"No, Commander," Oats said patiently. "I didn't say she was a vampire. I just said she was bitten by one."
"What's the difference?"
"The difference is, is that she didn't become one. She fought off the call of the blood, by sheer bloody stubbornness. She refused to let it take her over." Oats sat back. "So it didn't."
There was silence.
"Let me get this straight," Vimes heard himself say, after it seemed that nothing else was coming. "You're telling me that this woman fought against a vampire's influence, even after she'd been bitten, even after they'd drunk her blood, even after they'd got inside her head – and she won?"
Oats grinned. "Not only that; she turned the tables on them. She let them drink from her to get inside their heads. When she was finished with them, every single one of them was craving tea. Tea, Commander!" Oats shook his head slightly, in admiration. "And there were…other things she did, as well."
Vimes leant forward further, putting both hands on the arm rests of the chair, so that his nose practically touched Oats's. "Do you know where I can contact her?"
Its title was 'WHAT NOT TO WEAR – A GUIDE TO MAKING YOUR WEDDING DAY THE HAPPIEST AND MOST STYLISH DAY OF YOUR LIFE'.
A lot of the garments it advertised were trimmed with foamy lace.
Hmm.
She turned a page, glancing at the engagement ring on her finger as she did so. She often did that, simply to make sure that this wasn't all some great big delusion. Or rather that it was, because she was certain that if she were in her right senses, there would be no way on the Discworld that that particular ring would be on that particular finger.
Still, it was.
It had come as a surprise to everyone who knew her, and not least the one who had offered the ring to her in the first place, that she had actually accepted the piece of jewellery onto her finger at all.(6) But that was life; sometimes it kicked you in the teeth, at other times it inspired you to accept the suit of others so that you could always have an excuse for kicking them in the teeth.
"Come in, Stanley," Miss. Dearheart said, hastily shoving the catalogue into her desk drawer. It was bad enough that her mother had effectively blackmailed her into even considering wearing such repulsive dresses as were displayed in the hated catalogue; she didn't need the people she worked with, let alone her husband-to-be, to find out.
After all, it would be extremely hard to run an efficient postal and clacks service if all her colleagues had died of multiple heart attacks.
Stanley opened the door just as she slammed the drawer shut. He looked faintly agitated. Then again, he always looked faintly agitated if he was away from his stamps for too long. Moist said that at least it was an improvement from the pins – if any 'Little Moments' came around, it was better to get hit in the face with a sack of stamps. Not much better, but better. "Commander Vimes is here to see you, Miss-going-to-be-Mrs-Lipwig!"
Normally anyone who called her that would have spent the next few weeks limping from a casually aimed stab to the foot from a stiletto heel; but Miss. Dearheart was rather fond of Stanley – or as fond as she could be of anything without progressing to her next stage of affection, which most people (save the aforementioned golden clothed be-winged Post Master) never saw; so she simply nodded and said, "Thank you, Stanley. Show him in." A stray thought made her add, "And don't tell Mr. Lipwig that the Commander's here, will you? I think he has enough on his plate already."
"Oh, he knows, Miss-going-to-be-Mrs-Lipwig. He did turn a funny colour when he saw the Commander come in. In fact, it was the exact shade of the paper that they used for the base of the first Penny stamps-"
"Thanks, Stanley, that is all. Just go and find Mr. Lipwig. Try to get him back to his normal colour."
As Stanley shuffled out again, he was passed in the doorway by a man Miss. Dearheart had seen once or twice, if only in the newspaper, but had never had the privilege of actually speaking to. She felt all that little more self-actualised by the fact that she was now about to embark upon a conversation by a man who all who followed the way of sarcasm and cynicism should rightly bow down and worship. Compared to him, she willingly admitted, if only to herself, she was probably no more than a novice in the art.
The thin, grizzled man in rusty armour made his way to the desk, paused in front of it, and gave her the once over.
The two shared a glance. It was a glance which said a lot. For one, it established both of them as members of that secret club which is so secret it doesn't even have a name (though if it did have one, it would probably be CNN(7)) let alone a book of rules, but which nevertheless instructs its disciples to be as sarcastic and vicious as they possibly can – presumably so that no one will ever stay around long enough to find out about their wonderful organisation.
"How much would a clacks to Lancre cost?"
"To you?" She couldn't resist.
"Of course to me."
