The Light Fantastic

The librarian looked at it mournfully, and then flopped down heavily on the floor. Trymon found a soft hand poked gently into his and the librarian led the way, waddling sadly between the bookshelves. It was like holding a little leather glove.

Around them the books sizzled and sparked, with the occasional discharge of undirected magic flashing over to the carefully-placed earthing rods nailed to the shelves. There was a tinny, blue smell and, just at the very limit of hearing, the horrible chittering of the dungeon creatures.

Like many other parts of Unseen University the library occupied rather more space than its outside dimensions would suggest, because magic distorts space in strange ways, and it was probably the only library in the universe with Mobius shelves. But the librarian’s mental catalogue was ticking over perfectly. He stopped by a soaring stack of musty books and swung himself up into the darkness. There was the sound of rustling paper, and a cloud of dust oated down to Trymon. Then the librarian was back, a slim volume in his hands.

‘Oook,’ he said.

Trymon took it gingerly.

The cover was scratched and very dog-eared, the gold of its lettering had long ago curled off, but he could just make out, in the old magic tongue of the Tsort Valley, the words: Iyt Gryet Teymple hyte Tsort, Y Hiystory Myistical.

‘Oook?’ said the librarian, anxiously.

Trymon turned the pages cautiously. He wasn’t very good at languages, he’d always found them highly inefficient things which by rights ought to be replaced by some sort of easily understood numerical system, but this seemed exactly what he was looking for. There were whole pages covered with meaningful hieroglyphs.

‘Is this the only book you’ve got about the pyramid of Tsort?’ he said slowly.

‘Oook.’

‘You’re quite sure?’

‘Oook.’

Trymon listened. He could hear, a long way off, the sound of approaching feet and arguing voices. But he had been prepared for that, too.

He reached into a pocket.

‘Would you like another banana?’ he said.

The forest of Skund was indeed enchanted, which was nothing unusual on the Disc, and was also the only forest in the whole universe to be called—in the local language—Your Finger You Fool, which was the literal meaning of the word Skund.

The reason for this is regrettably all too common. When the first explorers from the warm lands around the Circle Sea travelled into the chilly hinterland they filled in the blank spaces on their maps by grabbing the nearest native, pointing at some distant landmark, speaking very clearly n a loud voice, and writing down whatever the bemused man told them. Thus were immortalised in generations of atlases such geographical oddities as Just A Mountain, I Don’t Know, What? and, of course, Your Finger You Fool.

Rainclouds clustered around the bald heights of Mt. Oolskunrahod (‘Who is this Fool who does Not Know what a Mountain Is’) and the Luggage settled itself more comfortably under a dripping tree, which tried unsuccessfully to strike up a conversation.

Twoflower and Rincewind were arguing. The person they were arguing about sat on his mushroom and watched them with interest. He looked like someone who smelled like someone who lived in a mushroom, and that bothered Twoflower.

‘Well, why hasn’t he got a red hat?’

Rincewind hesitated, desperately trying to imagine what Twoflower was getting at.

‘What?’ he said, giving in.

‘He should have a red hat,’ said Twoflower. ‘And he certainly ought to be cleaner and more, more sort of jolly. He doesn’t look like any sort of gnome to me.’

‘What are you going on about?’

‘Look at that beard,’ said Twoflower sternly. ‘I’ve seen better beards on a piece of cheese.’

‘Look, he’s six inches high and lives in a mushroom,’ snarled Rincewind. ‘Of course he’s a bloody gnome.’

‘We’ve only got his word for it.’

Rincewind looked down at the gnome.

‘Excuse me,’ he said. He took Twoflower to the other side of the clearing.

‘Listen,’ he said between his teeth. ‘If he was fifteen feet tall and said he was a giant we’d only have his word for that too, wouldn’t we?’

‘He could be a goblin,’ said Twoflower defiantly.

Rincewind looked back at the tiny figure, which was industriously picking its nose.

‘Well?’ he said. ‘So what? Gnome, goblin, pixie—so what?’

‘Not a pixie,’ said Twoflower firmly. ‘Pixies, they wear these sort of green combinations and they have pointy caps and little knobbly antenna thingies sticking out of their heads. I’ve seen pictures.’

‘Where?’

Twoflower hesitated, and looked at his feet. ‘I think it was called the "mutter, mutter, mutter." ‘

‘The what? Called the what?’

The little man took a sudden interest in the backs of his hands.

‘The Little Folks’ Book of Flower Fairies,’ he muttered.

Rincewind looked blank.

‘It’s a book on how to avoid them?’ he said.