Men at Arms

“Yes, yes, the good old days. Towerin' spires and pennants and chivalry and all that,” said Viscount Skater. “Ladies in pointy hats. Chappies in armour bashin' one another and whatnot. But, y'know, we have to move with the times—”

“It was a golden age,” said Edward.

My god, thought Lord Rust. He actually does believe it.

“You see, dear boy,” said Lady Selachii, “a few chance likenesses and a piece of jewellery—that doesn't really add up to much, does it?”

“My nurse told me,” said Viscount Skater, “that a true king could pull a sword from a stone.”

“Hah, yes, and cure dandruff,” said Lord Rust. “That's just a legend. That's not real. Anyway, I've always been a bit puzzled about that story. What's so hard about pulling a sword out of a stone? The real work's already been done. You ought to make yourself useful and find the man who put the sword in the stone in the first place, eh?”

There was a sort of relieved laughter. That's what Edward remembered. It all ended up in laughter. Not exactly at him, but he was the type of person who always takes laughter personally.

Ten minutes later, Edward d'Eath was alone.

They're being so nice about it. Moving with the times! He'd expected more than that of them. A lot more. He'd dared to hope that they might be inspired by his lead. He'd pictured himself at the head of an army—

Blenkin came in at a respectful shuffle.

“I saw 'em all off, Mr Edward,” he said.

“Thank you, Blenkin. You may clear the table.”

“Yes, Mr Edward.”

“Whatever happened to honour, Blenkin?”

“Dunno, sir. I never took it.”

“They didn't want to listen.”

“No, sir.”

“They didn't want to l-isten.”

Edward sat by the dying fire, with a dog-eared copy of Thighbiter's The Ankh-Morpork Succesfion open on his lap. Dead kings and queens looked at him reproachfully.

And there it might have ended. In fact it did end there, in millions of universes. Edward d'Eath grew older and obsession turned to a sort of bookish insanity of the gloves-with-the-fingers-cut-out and carpet slippers variety, and became an expert on royalty although no-one ever knew this because he seldom left his rooms. Corporal Carrot became Sergeant Carrot and, in the fullness of time, died in uniform aged seventy in an unlikely accident involving an anteater.

In a million universes, Lance-Constables Cuddy and Detritus didn't fall through the hole. In a million universes, Vimes didn't find the pipes. (In one strange but theoretically possible universe the Watch House was redecorated in pastel colours by a freak whirlwind, which also repaired the door latch and did a few other odd jobs around the place.) In a million universes, the Watch failed. In a million universes, this was a very short book.

Edward dozed off with the book on his knees and had a dream. He dreamed of glorious struggle. Glorious was another important word in his personal vocabulary, like honour.

If traitors and dishonourable men would not see the truth then he, Edward d'Eath, was the finger of Destiny.

The problem with Destiny, of course, is that she is often not careful where she puts her finger.

Captain Sam Vimes, Ankh-Morpork City Guard (Night Watch), sat in the draughty anteroom to the Patrician's audience chamber with his best cloak on and his breastplate polished and his helmet on his knees.

He stared woodenly at the wall.

He ought to be happy, he told himself. And he was. In a way. Definitely. Happy as anything.

He was going to get married in a few days.

He was going to stop being a guard.

He was going to be a gentleman of leisure.

He took off his copper badge and buffed it absent-mindedly on the edge of his cloak. Then he held it up so that the light glinted off the patina'd surface. AMCW No.177. He sometimes wondered how many other guards had had the badge before him.

Well, now someone was going to have it after him.

This is Ankh-Morpork, Citie of One Thousand Surprises (according to the Guild of Merchants' guidebook). What more need be said? A sprawling place, home to a million people, greatest of cities on the Discworld, located on either side of the river Ankh, a waterway so muddy that it looks as if it is flowing upside down.

And visitors say: how does such a big city exist? What keeps it going? Since it's got a river you can chew, where does the drinking water come from? What is, in fact, the basis of its civic economy? How come it, against all probability, works?

Actually, visitors don't often say this. They usually say things like “Which way to the, you know, the… er… you know, the young ladies, right?”

But if they started thinking with their brains for a little while, that's what they'd be thinking.

The Patrician of Ankh-Morpork sat back on his austere chair with the sudden bright smile of a very busy person at the end of a crowded day who's suddenly found in his schedule a reminder saying: 7.00-7.05, Be Cheerful and Relaxed and a People Person.

“Well, of course I was very saddened to receive your letter, captain…”