Hogfather

NO.

‘There’s no magic that’ll stop the sun coming up!’

I WISH I WAS AS CLEVER AS YOU.

Susan stared down out of sheer annoyance, and saw something below.

Small dark shapes moved across the whiteness, running as if they were in pursuit of something.

‘There’s … some sort of chase …’ she conceded. ‘I can see some sort of animals but I can’t see what they’re after—’

Then she saw movement in the snow, a blurred, dark shape dodging and skidding and never clear. Binky dropped until his hooves grazed the tops of the pine trees, which bent in his wake. A rumble followed him across the forest, dragging broken branches and a smoke of snow behind it.

Now they were lower she could see the hunters clearly. They were large dogs. Their quarry was indistinct, dodging among snowdrifts, keeping to the cover of snow-laden bushes— A drift exploded. Something big and long and blue-black rose through the flying snow like a sounding whale.

‘It’s a pig!’

A BOAR. THEY DRIVE IT TOWARDS THE CLIFF. THEY’RE DESPERATE NOW.

She could hear the panting of the creature. The dogs made no sound at all.

Blood streamed onto the snow from the wounds they had already managed to inflict.

‘This … boar,’ said Susan. ‘… It’s …’

YES.

‘They want to kill the Hogf—’

NOT KILL. HE KNOWS HOW TO DIE. OH, YES … IN THIS SHAPE, HE KNOWS HOW TO DIE. HE’S HAD A LOT OF EXPERIENCE. NO, THEY WANT TO TAKE AWAY HIS REAL LIFE, TAKE AWAY HIS SOUL, TAKE AWAY EVERYTHING. THEY MUST NOT BE ALLOWED TO BRING HIM DOWN.

‘Well, stop them!’

YOU MUST. THIS IS A HUMAN THING.

The dogs moved oddly. They weren’t running but flowing, crossing the snow faster than the mere movement of their legs would suggest.

‘They don’t look like real dogs …’

NO.

‘What can I do?’

Death nodded his head towards the boar. Binky was keeping level with it now, barely a few feet away.

Realization dawned.

‘I can’t ride that!’ said Susan.

WHY NOT? YOU HAVE HAD AN EDUCATION.

‘Enough to know that pigs don’t let people ride them!’

MERE ACCUMULATION OF OBSERVATIONAL EVIDENCE IS NOT PROOF.

Susan glanced ahead. The snowfield had a cut-off look.

YOU MUST, said her grandfather’s voice in her head. WHEN HE REACHES THE EDGE THERE HE WILL STAND AT BAY. HE MUST NOT. UNDERSTAND? THESE ARE NOT REAL DOGS. IF THEY CATCH HIM HE WON’T JUST DIE, HE WILL … NEVER BE …

Susan leapt. For a moment she floated through the air, dress streaming behind her, arms outstretched …

Landing on the animal’s back was like hitting a very, very firm chair. It stumbled for a moment and then righted itself.

Susan’s arms clung to its neck and her face was buried in its sharp bristles. She could feel the heat under her. It was like riding a furnace. And it stank of sweat, and blood, and pig. A lot of pig.

There was a lack of landscape in front of her.

The boar ploughed into the snow on the edge of the drop, almost flinging her off, and turned to face the hounds.

There were a lot of them. Susan was familiar with dogs. They’d had them at home like other houses had rugs. And these weren’t that big floppy sort.

She rammed her heels in and grabbed a pig’s ear in each hand. It was like holding a pair of hairy shovels.

‘Turn left!’ she screamed, and hauled.

She put everything into the command. It promised tears before bedtime if disobeyed.

To her amazement the boar grunted, pranced on the lip of the precipice and scrambled away, the hounds floundering as they turned to follow.

This was a plateau. From here it seemed to be all edge, with no way down except the very simple and terminal one.

The dogs were flying at the boar’s heels again.

Susan looked around in the grey, lightless air. There had to be somewhere, some way …

There was.

It was a shoulder of rock, a giant knife-edge connecting this plain to the hills beyond. It was sharp and narrow, a thin line of snow with chilly depths on either side.

It was better than nothing. It was nothing with snow on it.

The boar reached the edge and hesitated. Susan put her head down and dug her heels in again.

Snout down, legs moving like pistons, the beast plunged out onto the ridge. Snow sprayed up as its trotters sought for purchase. It made up for lack of grace by sheer manic effort, legs moving like a tap dancer climbing a moving staircase that was heading down.

‘That’s right, that’s right, that’s—’

A trotter slipped. For a moment the boar seemed to stand on two, the others scrabbling at icy rock. Susan flung herself the other way, clinging to the neck, and felt the dragging abyss under her feet.

There was nothing there.

She told herself, He’ll catch me if I fall, he’ll catch me if I fall, he’ll catch me if I fall …

Powdered ice made her eyes sting. A flailing trotter almost slammed against her head.

An older voice said, No, he won’t. If I fall now I don’t deserve to be caught.

The creature’s eye was inches away. And then she knew …