Discworld - The Fifth Elephant Part 19

"You shouldn't've traded the horse for those snowshoes back at the last place," said Gaspode.

"The poor thing was done in. Anyway, it wasn't exactly a trade. The people wouldn't come down out of the chimney. They did did say to take anything we wanted." say to take anything we wanted."

"They said said to take everything, only spare their lives." to take everything, only spare their lives."

"Yes. I don't know why. I smiled at them."

There was a doggy sigh.

"Trouble is, see, you could carry me on the horse, but this is deep snow and I am a little doggie. My problems are closer to the ground. I hope I don't have to draw you a picture."

"I've got some spare clothes in my pack. I might be able to make you a...coat-"

"A coat wouldn't do the trick."

Another howl began, quite close this time.

The snow was falling a lot faster. The hissing of the fire turned into a sizzle. Then it went out.

Gaspode was not good at snow. It was not a precipitation he normally had to face. In the city, there was always somewhere warm if you knew where to look. Anyway, snow only stayed snow for an hour or two, and then it became brown slush and was trodden into the general slurry of the streets.

Streets. Gaspode really missed missed streets. He could be wise on streets. Out here, he was dumb on mud. streets. He could be wise on streets. Out here, he was dumb on mud.

"Fire's gone out," he said.

There was no answer from Carrot.

"Fire's gone out, I said..."

This time there was a snore.

"Hey, you can't go to sleep!" Gaspode whined. "Not now now. We'll freeze freeze to death." to death."

The next voice in the howl seemed only a few trees away. Gaspode thought he could see dark shapes in the endless curtain of snow.

"...if we're lucky," he mumbled. He licked Carrot's face, a move that usually resulted in the lickee chasing Gaspode down the street with a broom. There was merely another snore.

Gaspode's mind raced.

Of course, he was a dog, and dogs and wolves...well, they were the same, right? Everyone knew that. So-oo, said a treacherous inner voice...maybe it wasn't exactly Gaspode and Carrot in trouble. Maybe it was only Carrot. Yeah, right on, brothers! Let us join together in wild runs in the moonlight! But first, let us eat this monkey!

On the other paw...

He'd got hard pad, soft pad, the swinge, licky end, scroff, mange and something rather strange on the back of his neck that he couldn't quite reach. Gaspode somehow couldn't imagine the wolves saying Hey, he's one of us! Hey, he's one of us!

Besides...while he'd begged, fought, tricked and stolen, he'd never actually been a Bad Dog.

You needed to be a moderate good theological disputant to accept this, especially since a fair number of sausages and prime cuts had disappeared from butchers' slabs in a blur of gray and a lingering odor of lavatory carpet, but nevertheless Gaspode was clear in his own mind that he'd never crossed the boundary from merely being a Naughty Boy. He'd never bitten a hand that fed him.*He'd never done It on the carpet. He'd never shirked a Duty. It was a b.u.g.g.e.r, but there you were. It was a dog thing.

He whined when the ring of dark shapes closed in.

Eyes gleamed.

He whined again, and then growled as unseen fanged death surrounded him.

This was clearly impressing no one, not even Gaspode.

He wagged his tail nervously.

"Just pa.s.sin' through!" he said, in a strangulatedly cheerful voice. "No trouble to anyone!"

There was a definite feeling that the shadows beyond the snowflakes were getting more crowded.

"So...have you had your holidays yet?" he squeaked.

This also did not appear to be well received.

Well, this was it, then. Famous Last Stand. Plucky Dog Defends His Master. What a Good Dog. Shame there'd be no one left to tell anyone...

He barked "Mine! Mine!" and leapt snarling toward the nearest shape.

A huge paw swatted him out of the air and then pinned him down, spread-eagled, in the snow.

He looked up past white fangs and a long muzzle into eyes that seemed familiar...

"Hmine," growled the wolf. It was Angua. growled the wolf. It was Angua.

The coaches slowed to a walk on a road that was rough with potholes under the unbroken snow, every one a wheel-breaking trap in the dark.

Vimes nodded to himself when he saw lights flickering beside the road a few miles into the pa.s.s. On either side, old landslides had formed banks of scree, down which the forests had spilled.

He dropped quietly off the back of the coach and vanished into the shadows.

The leading coach stopped at a log which had been dropped across the road. There was some movement, and then the driver swung himself down into the mud and set off at a dead run back down the pa.s.s.

Figures moved out of the trees. One of them stopped at the door of the first coach and tried the handle.

There was a moment when the world held its breath. The figure must have sensed it, because he was already leaping aside when there was a click and the whole door and its surrounding frame blew outward in a cloud of splinters.

The thing about fires, Vimes had once observed, was that only an idiot got between them and a troll holding a two-thousand-pound crossbow. All h.e.l.l hadn't been let loose. It was merely Detritus. But from a few feet away you couldn't tell the difference.

Another figure reached for the door of the second coach just before Vimes fired out of the darkness and hit his shoulder with a butcher's sound. Then Inigo dived through the window, rolled with unclerklike grace as he hit the ground, rose in front of one of the bandits and brought his hand around, edge first, on the man's neck.

Vimes had seen this trick done before. Usually, it just made people angry. Occasionally, it managed an incapacitating blow.

He'd never seen it remove a head.

"Everybody stop!"

Sybil was pushed out of the coach. Behind her, a man stepped out. He was holding a crossbow.

"Your Grace Vimes!" he shouted. The word bounced back and forth between the cliffs.

"I know you're here, Your Grace Vimes! And here is your lady! And there are many of us! Come out out, Your Grace Vimes!"

Flakes of snow hissed over the fires.

Then there was a whisper in the air followed by a second smack of steel into muscle. One of the hooded figures collapsed into the mud, clutching at its leg.

Inigo slowly got to his feet. The man holding the crossbow appeared not to notice.

"It is like chess, Your Grace Vimes! We have disarmed the troll and the dwarf! And I have the queen! And if you shoot at me, can you be sure I won't have time to fire?"

Firelight glowed on the twisted trees bordering the road.

Several seconds pa.s.sed.

Then the sound of Vimes's crossbow landing in the circle of light was very loud.

"Well done, Your Grace Vimes! And now yourself, if you please!"

Inigo made out the shape that appeared at the very edge of the light, with both hands up.

"Are you all right, Sybil?" said Vimes.

"A bit cold, Sam."

"You're not hurt?"

"No, Sam."

"Keep your hands where I can see them, Your Grace Vimes!"

"And are you going to promise me you'll let her go?" said Vimes.

A flame flickered near Vimes's face, a bright pool in the darkness, as he lit a cigar.

"Now, Your Grace Vimes, why ever should I do that? But I am sure Ankh-Morpork will pay a lot for you!"

"Ah. I thought so," said Vimes. He shook the match out, and the cigar end glowed for a moment. "Sybil?"

"Yes, Sam?"

"Duck."

There was a second filled only with the indrawing of breath, and then, as Lady Sybil dived forward, Vimes's hand came around from behind him in an arc, there was a silken sound, and the man's head was flung back.

Inigo leapt and caught his crossbow as it was dropped, then rolled and came up firing. Another figure staggered.

Vimes was aware of a commotion elsewhere as he grabbed Sybil and helped her back into the coach. Inigo had vanished, but a scream in the dark didn't sound like anyone that Vimes knew.

And then...only the hiss of snow in the fire.

"I...think they're gone, sir," said Cheery's voice.

"Not as fast as us! Detritus?"

"Sir?"

"Are you okay?"

"Feelin' very tactful, sir."

"You two take that coach, I'll take this, and let's get the h.e.l.l out of here, shall we?"

"Where's Mister Skimmer?" said Sybil.

There was another scream from the woods.

"Forget him!"

"But he's-"

"Forget him!"

The snow was falling thicker as they climbed the pa.s.s. The deep snow dragged at the wheels, and all Vimes could see were the darker shapes of the horses against the whiteness. Then the clouds parted briefly, and he wished they hadn't, because here they revealed that the darkness on the left of his wasn't rock any more but a sheer drop.

At the top of the pa.s.s the lights of an inn glowed out onto the thickening snow. Vimes drove the carriage into the yard.

"Detritus?"

"Sir?"

"I'll watch our backs. Make sure this place is okay, will you?"

"Yessir."

The troll jumped down, slotting a fresh bundle of arrows into the Piecemaker. Vimes spotted his intention just in time.

"Just knock knock, Sergeant."

"Right you are, sir."

The troll knocked and entered. The buzz of sound from inside suddenly ceased. Vimes heard, m.u.f.fled by the door, "Der Duke of Ankh-Morpork is coming in. Anyone have a problem with dis? Just say der word." And in the background, the little humming, singing noise the Piecemaker made under tension.