The Light Fantastic

The astrologer looked at the notes, and his forehead wrinkled. He crossed the room and pulled out a wide drawer full of charts. He read the notes again. He picked up a complicated pair of compasses and made some passes across the charts. He picked up a small brass astrolobe and cranked it carefully. He whistled between his teeth. He picked up a piece of chalk and scribbled some numbers on a blackboard.

Trymon, meanwhile, had been staring out at the new star. He thought: the legend in the Pyramid of Tsort says that whoever says the Eight Spells together when the Disc is in danger will obtain all that he truly desires. And it will be so soon!

And he thought: I remember Rincewind, wasn’t he the cruffy boy who always came bottom of the class when we were training? Not a magical bone in his body. Let me get him in front of me, and we’ll see if we can’t get all eight—

The astrologer said ‘Gosh’ under his breath. Trymon spun around.

‘Well?’

‘Fascinating chart,’ said the astrologer, breathlessly. His forehead wrinkled. ‘Bit strange, really,’ he said.

‘How strange?’

‘He was born under The Small Boring Group of Faint Stars which, as you know, lies between The Flying Moose and The Knotted String. It is said that even the ancients couldn’t find anything interesting to say about the sign, which—’

‘Yes, yes, get on with it,’ said Trymon irritably.

‘It’s the sign traditionally associated with chess board makers, sellers of onions, manufacturers of plaster images of small religious significance, and people allergic to pewter. Not a wizard’s sign at all. And at the time of his birth the shadow of Cori Celesti—’

‘I don’t want to know all the mechanical details,’ growled Trymon. ‘Just give me his horoscope.’

The astrologer, who had been rather enjoying himself, sighed and made a few additional calculations.

‘Very well,’he said. ‘It reads as follows: "Today is a good tine for making new friends. A good deed may have unforeseen consequences. Don’t upset any druids. You will soon be going on a very strange journey. Your lucky food is small cucumbers. People pointing knives at you are probably up to no good. PS, we really mean it about druids".’

Druids?’ said Trymon. ‘I wonder...’

‘Are you all right?’ said Twoflower. Rincewind opened his eyes.

The wizard sat up hurriedly and grabbed Twoflower by the shirt.

‘I want to leave here!’ he said urgently. ‘Right now!’

‘But there’s going to be an ancient and traditional ceremony I’

‘I don’t care how ancient! I want the feel of honest cobbles under my feet, I want the old familiar smell of cesspits, I want to go where there’s lots of people and fires and roofs and walls and friendly things like that! I want to go home!’

He found that he had this sudden desperate longing for the fuming, smoky streets of Ankh-Morpork, which was always at its best in the spring, when the gummy sheen on the turbid waters of the Ankh River had a special iridescence and the eaves were full of birdsong, or at least birds coughing rhythmically.

A tear sprang to his eye as he recalled the subtle play of light on the Temple of Small Gods, a noted local landmark, and a lump came to his throat when he remembered the fried fish stall on the junction of Midden Street and The Street of Cunning Artificers. He thought of the gherkins they sold there, great green things lurking at the bottom of their jar like drowned whales. They called to Rincewind across the miles, promising to introduce him to the pickled eggs in the next jar.

He thought of the cosy livery stable lofts and warm gratings where he spent his nights. Foolishly, he had sometimes jibed at this way of life. It seemed incredible now, but he had found it boring.

Now he’d had enough. He was going home. Pickled gherkins, I hear you calling...

He pushed Twoflower aside, gathered his tattered robe around him with great dignity, set his face towards that area of horizon he believed to contain the city of his birth, and with intense determination and considerable absentmindedness stepped right off the top of a thirty-foot trilithon.

Some ten minutes later, when a worried and rather contrite Twoflower dug him out of the large snowdrift at the base of the stones, his expression hadn’t changed.

Twoflower peered at him.

‘Are you all right?’ he said. ‘How many fingers am I holding up?’

‘I want to go home!’

‘Okay.’

‘No, don’t try and talk me out of it, I’ve had enough, I’d like to say it’s been great fun but I can’t, and—what?’

‘I said okay,’ said Twoflower. ‘I’d quite like to see Ankh-Morpork again. I expect they’ve rebuilt quite a lot of it by now.’

It should be noted that the last time the two of them had seen the city it was burning quite fiercely, a fact which had a lot to do with Twoflower introducing the concept of fire insurance to a venial but ignorant populace. But devastating fires were a regular feature of Morporkian life and it had always been cheerfully and meticulously rebuilt, using the traditional local materials of tinder-dry wood and thatch waterproofed with tar.