Hogfather

     The oh god slumped to his knees.

     '...  and there's ... that  drink, you know, there's  a  worm  in the bottle ...'

     'Oh, me ...'

     '... and ... there's an empty glass,  a big one, can't quite see what it contained, but  there's  a paper umbrella in it.  And some cherries  on a stick. Oh, and an amusing little monkey.'

     'ooohhh ...'

     '... of course, there's a lot of other bottles too,'  said Ridcully, cheerfully. 'Different coloured drinks, mainly. The sort made from  melons  and  coconuts and chocolate and suchlike,  don'tcherknow. Funny thing is, all the glasses on the table are pint mugs ...'

     Bilious fell forward.

     'All right,' he murmured. 'I'll drink the wretched stuff.'

     'It's not quite ready yet,' said Ridcully. 'Ah, thank you, Modo.'

     Modo tiptoed in, pushing a trolley. There was a large metal bowl on it, in which a small bottle stood in the middle of a heap of crushed ice.

     'Only just made this for  Hogswatch dinner,' said Ridcully. 'Hasn't had much time to mature yet.'

     He put down the crystal and fished a pair  of heavy  gloves out  of his hat.

     The wizards  spread  like  an  opening flower.  One  moment  they  were gathered around Ridcully, the next they were standing close to various items of heavy furniture.

     Susan  felt she  was present at a  ceremony  and hadn't  been  told the rules.

     'What's that?' she said, as Ridcully carefully lifted up the bottle.

     'Wow-Wow Sauce,' said Ridcully. 'Finest condiment known to man. A happy accompaniment to  meat, fish, fowl, eggs and many types of vegetable dishes. It's  not safe  to drink  it when  sweat's still condensing on  the  bottle, though.' He peered at the bottle,  and then rubbed at it, causing a glassy, squeaky noise. 'On the other hand,' he said brightly, 'if it's a kill-or-cure remedy then we are, given that the patient is practically  immortal, probably on to a winner.'

     He placed. a thumb over the cork and shook the bottle vigorously. There was a crash as the Chair of Indefinite Studies and the Senior Wrangler tried to get under the same table.

     'And these fellows  seem to have taken  against it for some reason,' he said, approaching the beaker.

     'I  prefer  a sauce that doesn't  mean  you mustn't  make  any  jolting movements for half an hour after using it,' muttered the Dean.

     'And  that can't be used for breaking up small rocks,'  said the Senior Wrangler.

     'Or getting rid of tree roots,' said the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

     'And which isn't actually outlawed in three cities,' said  the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

     Ridcully  cautiously uncorked  the  bottle. There was  a brief  hiss of indrawn air.

     He allowed a few drops to splash into the beaker. Nothing happened.

     A more  generous helping  was allowed  to  fall.  The  mixture remained irredeemably inert.

     Ridcully sniffed suspiciously at the bottle.

     'I wonder if I added enough grated wahooni?' he said, and then upturned the sauce and let most of it slide into the mixture.

     It merely went gloop.

     The  wizards began to stand up  and  brush themselves  off, giving  one another the  rather  embarrassed grins of people who  know that they've just been part of a synchronized makinga-fool-of-yourself team.

     'I  know  we've had that asafoetida rather a long time,' said Ridcully. He turned the bottle round, peering at it sadly.

     Finally he  tipped it up for the last  time and thumped it  hard on the base.

     A trickle of sauce arrived on the lip of the bottle and glistened there for a moment. Then it began to form a bead.

     As if drawn  by invisible  strings, the  heads of the wizards turned to look at it.

     Wizards wouldn't be wizards if they couldn't see a  little way into the future.

     As the bead swelled and started to  go pearshaped they turned and, with a surprising turn of speed for men so wealthy in years and waistline, began to dive for the floor.

     The drop fen.

     It went gloop.

     And that was all.

     Ridcully, who'd been standing like a statue, sagged in relief.

     'I don't know,' he said,  turning away,  'I wish you fellows would show some backbone ...'

     The fireball lifted him off his feet. Then it rose to the ceiling where it   spread  out  widely  and  vanished  with  a  pop,  leaving a perfect chrysanthemum of scorched plaster.

     Pure white light filled the room. And there was a sound.

TINKLE. TINKLE. FIZZ.

     The wizards risked looking around.

     The beaker  gleamed.  It was filled with a liquid  glow, which  bubbled gently and sent out sparkles like a spinning diamond.

     'My word ...' breathed the Lecturer in Recent Runes.

     Ridcully picked himself up off the floor. Wizards tended  to roll well, or in any case are well. padded enough to bounce.

     Slowly,  the flickering.  brilliance  casting their long shadows on the walls, the wizards gravitated towards the beaker.

     'Well, what is it?' said the Dean.