- a continuing celebration of -

Fifty Years of Pratchett

© 2023 Duleigh Lawrence-Townshend. All rights reserved. The author asserts the right to be identified as the author of this story for all portions not previously copyrighted by Terry Pratchett. This story or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a review or commentary. If you see this story on any website other than Literotica.com, it has been copied without the author's permission.

This is a work of love, a fan fiction. Many of these characters are the creation of Sir Terry Pratchett, as is the multiverse in which they live. If you would like to find out which of these characters is or is not a creation of Terry, please contact this author. This tale was not written to steal the fame that Sir Terry rightfully earned, but to enjoy one more romp in the shadow of Cori Celesti and remind the world of what we lost on March 12, 2015.

"One day I'll be dead and THEN you'll all be sorry."

- Terry Pratchett, 28 Nov 1992 on alt.fan.pratchett

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ENCHANTRESS 4

Turtle Eclipse of the Sun

{With parenthetical annotations}

There are minor drawbacks when your planet is a disc sitting on the back of four elephants that stands on the back of a turtle that is flying in space. Sometimes one elephant will have an itch. If it's an itchy back, he'll just rub his back against the disc you're standing on, you probably won't notice it. But if he has an itchy ear, they'll shake their heads, and that causes minor earthquakes. People on other forms of planets have to worry about plate tectonics, but in a proper disc shaped world, you only have to worry about one plate, the one you're living on.

Some astrotheorists have concluded that there are round worlds in the universe, almost perfectly spherical, and they're trapped in an orbit around a star and not the other way around, as is normal. These astrotheorists believe that not only do these spherical round worlds exist, but they're populated by people! "Impossible!" announced one of the leading scientific minds of the universe, Dr. Mustrum Ridcully, (DThau, DM, BS, DMn, DG, DD, DMPhil, DMS, DCM, DW & BElL.*) Archchancellor of the Unseen University.

"I agree that spherical 'round worlds' exist," said Doctor Ridcully, "but it is simply impossible that they would be populated by rational beings. Walking for any length of time in a straight line would bring you right back around to where you started. A circumstance likely to cause madness in anyone who has ever experienced it. Imagine: no elephants to hold your world steady, no turtle to carry you safely through the stars. Instead, your little sphere is caught in an endless, dreary orbit... dreadful, simply dreadful!"

(*Doctor of Thaumatology, Doctor of Magic, Bachelor of Sortilege, Doctor of Magianism, Doctor of Gramarye, Doctor of Divination, Doctor of Magical Philosophy, Doctor of Morbid Spellbinding, Doctor of Condensed Metaphysics, Doctor of Wizardry, Bachelor of Eldritch Lacemaking)

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Looking up from the brand-new Discworld Almanac (Year of the Querulous Megapode), Nick Worblehat-Stein, the young Duke of Wægn, asked his wife, "You've been to round worlds, do people go insane walking in a straight line on round worlds?"

"We've been through this. Yes, people go insane on round worlds, but not for reasons that Ridcully mentions. I read that article too," said his wife Octavia, the Duchess of Wægn. She looked up from their nursing son, "people on the round world I was fostering on would go to jail if they couldn't walk a straight line."

Nick loves the Discworld Almanac, so much information! So much entertainment! And such soft paper! "It says there's going to be a turtle roll in spring!"

"Yes, dear, a comet or something."

"Yes! Comet Cobbler Joining I-Ecks." Nick is one of the very few people to have ever seen the great space turtle A'Tuin, he actually flew in space with A'Tuin. Ever since he actually got to see A'Tuin and save the entire world from being eaten, Nick has been a "space nut" and he looks for any news regarding his giant friend.

"That's nice, dear, now hang the almanac in the privy, we have Hogswatch to get ready for."

"Yes, dear..." Nick shouldn't complain. They have a magically heated outhouse, the only one in the Ramtop mountains. The snow swirled around outside as he hung the Almanac on the nail on the privy then he watched the snow fall on his farm before going back into the cottage. It's Hogswatch time in the mountains!

Hogswatch! That merry, mystical time of joy and happiness celebrated in the cabbage covered Sto Plains, the craggy Ramtop Mountains, mysterious Überwald and all places in between. It's even celebrated on the lost continent of XXXX. The joy of the approaching holiday encompassed the mountain communities of the tiny kingdom of Lancre and adding to the joy of the Duke and Duchess of Wægn, a son! He will turn one month old when the Hogfather comes down the chimney on Hogswatch Eve. When the word got out that the Duke and Duchess returned from foreign parts with a baby, everyone had to go to their cottage to see the baby and hear the tales.

Gifts and food baskets filled the house and very often visitors arrived with garland or other Hogswatch decorations to brighten up the holiday. The mountain people opened their hearts to Nick and Octavia, their generosity brought tears of gratitude to the new parents. The people of Tallywiffle County listened over and over to their stories of how Marlon was born, never tiring of the story and not believing a single word. Tales of foreign parts, dragons, pirates, searching armies, escaping from dangerous creatures, it was so preposterous! But why would their duke and duchess lie to them? Then they laid the most unbelievable tale on the people of Lancre. They said that they knew practically nothing of Hogswatch.

How is such a thing possible? Hogswatch is a nearly universal holiday for over half of the people who live on the discworld. For Octavia she knew a little about it but not every foster family she lived with celebrated it. She usually spent the holiday with her stepfather, an orangutan (due to a magical accident) and they spent the holiday at the Unseen University library eating bananas and banana cream pie.

Pommeraie de la Montesquieu "Nick" Worblehat-Stein, Duke of Wægn, is royalty, but he's not posh. He was born in the gutter, and it went downhill from there. For young Pommy Stein, Hogswatch was the day the pennies stop. He grew up a street urchin, and he begged for pennies and picked through garbage to survive. During the Hogswatch holiday shopping season, the people of Ankh-Morpork were generous with their pennies, but on Hogswatch Day the pennies stopped. People didn't go out that day, then after that they were their normal grouchy, miserly selves for another year. It was confusing to a motherless six-year-old boy who was abandoned by his father, and the only thing that kept him alive through those wet, miserable Ankh-Morpork winters was an old wool blanket and his best friend, a talking dog.

Queen Magrat heard those stories from Nick and Octavia themselves and decided that she would not allow that in her royal court. The Duke and Duchess of Wægn must revel in the holiday joy. In fact, she enlisted the help of a talking dog. Gaspode, Nick's best friend, became a spy for the queen, telling her what Nick and Octavia needed most for Hogswatch. "Yer highness, the only complaint other than the baby interrupting their mating pattern, is that they don't want to go to official functions because they don't know what to wear."

"Thank you doggy, you were a great help," and the queen handed Gaspode his pay, a raw steak.

Not long after the birth of Marlon and their return to Creel Springs, Queen Magrat had a Royal Baby shower for the next Duke of Wægn. The men and women of the court gathered, the women in the Queen's chambers, the men in the castle drawing room, which looked remarkably like a corner pub. Gaspode was welcome in both celebrations. The men were throwing darts and tossing back ale when Nick stood up to the line to throw. He's already scored 475 points, he just needs 26 to win. "Are you ready for the holidays in your little cottage, yer grace?" asked Lord Harcourt, the exchequer of the kingdom. Lord Harcourt may be in his 80s but he can still add, subtract and hold his pint.

"We have a tree and a dozen fairies and Octavia is decorating the living room to mimic the great hall and throne room with pine boughs and glitter." Then he threw a five, a one, and a double ten to win. Darts was Nick's top skill, he fed himself for a couple of years through his play.

"And what else, my boy?" asked Lord Baltimore, head of intelligence for the king and the only other duke in the kingdom. He governed the Duchy of Pellingham on the rimward side of Lancre. Like Wægn, the Duchy of Pellingham was long and narrow, a buffer-zone between Lancre and the rest of the discworld. Nick liked Lord Baltimore, their duchies were nearly identical and, like Nick, Lord Baltimore actively encouraged the witches in his duchy and he even financed their coven gatherings.

Nick looked surprised. "There's more?"

"There's more?" echoed a small wire-haired terrier curled up in front of the fireplace.

"My dear lad, there is so much more!" chuckled Lord Cadence, Baron of Thrash and Prime Minister. Thrash is the Barony widdershins of Wægn that contains the now all important train station in Hot Dang.

"You act like you've never seen a Hogswatch before," said Lord Laird, lead lord in the house of lords and the Count of Glasnost.

"Not in our neighborhood," growled Gaspode, now getting up and stretching.

"To be honest, no. We didn't celebrate Hogswatch in the Shades," said Nick. He wasn't sure if the dignified gentlemen of the court knew that the Shades were the darkest slums on the disk. Nick never said much about his life before meeting Octavia. He's not ashamed of growing up an orphan in the streets of Ankh-Morpork. In that school of hard knocks, he earned the highest honors; he lived. These powdered, pompous lords who grew up eating from China with silver utensils would never understand eating from trash cans with your fingers, homelessness, begging for pennies, and watching childhood friends die in the gutter.

"There's so much more," said Lord Slipspring, viscount of Stormchester and head of security. "The household decorations simply set the stage!" Nick didn't like Slipspring, he's always pushing the king to build up a larger standing army to protect the borders. He was always claiming that foreign agents were aching to invade Lancre for its natural resources. The primary natural resource in Lancre is lumber. There is one small iron mine, two coal mines, a salt mine, and several exploratory mines up on Copperhead Mountain. Other than that, there are potatoes and steep roadways. Just to raise the ire of Lord Slipspring, Nick would always counter his arguments with a cry to spend the security money on local police, based on Ankh-Morpork's Night Watch, to end the thieves and bandits that line up on dark roads waiting for travelers. While Lord Slipspring envisions enemy battalions at the border, there are actual bandits in the forests preying on innocent farmers and other travelers.

"We only have three rooms in our cottage, living room, nursery, and bedroom," said Nick, still confused at the lords' call for more. "Are we to decorate the outhouse also?"

They were not laughing at the idea of decorating the outhouse; they were laughing at the thought of living in a three-room cottage, and the only people not laughing at that remark were Nick and King Verance II. The king was raised here in this castle but he and Queen Magrat have been guests at Nick's cottage and found it to be filled with love, laughter and fellowship and he much preferred spending a night on the couch in Nick and Octavia's cottage instead of a moment in any of the cold, stone mansions of the rest of his court. In fact, most of the members of his court owned a second house in Lancre, Nick instead would run (or fly) the twenty miles to the castle when summoned.

"The Wednesday before Hogswatch is Woodpile Wednesday. That's when you share the extra wood from your woodpile with those in need," said the King. "But don't look so crestfallen. I know you, Sir Nick, you'd share your wood pile until your family freezes. This year you need to monitor how much wood your family uses in a winter, so you know what you can afford to share next year."

"Wise advice," said Nick, who was upset with himself that he missed the opportunity to share with his people.

"There are the Hogswatch cards," said Lord Baltimore, "The idea is to hand out gaily decorated postcards to your neighbors and friends. It would give you a chance to check up on your people in need. How did you not know this?"

"I grew up in Ankh-Morpork," said Nick.

"There is no excuse for ignorance, m'boy," said Lord Cadence, the Prime Minister, as he puffed himself up.

"But in this case, we'll make an exception," said Lord Harcourt, the exchequer, the kingdom's treasurer. Nick liked him because he worked actively with Nick to straighten out the mess that previous holders of his title had made of the Wægn accounts. Through hard work, they discovered that the Duchy had a substantial sum of money in its account and Nick has some ideas of how to improve the Duchy in particular, the center of the duchy, Tallywiffle county. "Let's start with the King's dinner," continued Lord Harcourt, "are you planning to wear the same denim and flannel outfit that you grace us with normally?"

"It's what I got," said Nick defensively. It's true, all he has are denim trousers and flannel shirts and the occasional wool kilt. They last, they're warm, and none of his patients worried that their witch delivered their baby in blue denim rather than black wool like a normal witch. Nick was once told that a rich man didn't have to worry about what to wear, so as far as Nick is concerned, he's fabulously wealthy.

Actually, Nick and Octavia are quite wealthy, but they were raised without money, so they leave the gold they accumulated alone for their children. In their mountain, Bear Mountain, lies a redoubt that only he and Octavia can access, and in there is a stash of gold coins and ingots that they earned from acting as interim emperor and empress of the Agatean Empire. For the Agateans, they earned the average wage of a middle management professional and were paid in solid gold Agatean coin because gold is so abundant there. If they were the true emperor and empress, they would have been paid in a wildly more valuable coin in Agatea, tin. Agatean coins are not legal outside of Agatea, but they are solid gold, so Nick and Octavia could take them to an assayer and sell them for their gold content, converting them to Ankh-Morpork dollars. On average, each coin is worth $1,550 Ankh-Morpork dollars, or three times the annual wages of a working man in the kingdom of Lancre.

"Don't worry, your grace, if you ask the hog father, he will bring you a new set of clothing for Hogswatch," chided Lord Cadence.

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The next day was a cold, snowy day. Three men emerged from Nick and Octavia's bookstore in Creel Springs carrying a couch on their heads. They weren't movers, they weren't even from the area. They were from the far fabled continent of XXXX, or Four Ecks and they got to Creel Springs through the scientific marvel known as L-Space.

Have you ever gone to one of those awesome old bookstores that have a treasure every few feet of shelf space to keep your interest? Did you every stay longer than you allowed time and lost yourself in the stacks where more and more written marvels called to you? You were teetering on the edge of L-Space. If you had a few years of Library Science training and maybe a small bit of magical knowledge to help you navigate, you could have gone anywhere!

L-Space is based on the Scientific principle that Knowledge = Power, and Books = Knowledge, therefore Books = Power. Like Plutonium, if you put a large amount of books in one location, they reach out to each other and marvelous things happen. Given enough power you will find your collection of books is connected to another collection, and another and another because all proper libraries and collections are connected to each other, and with proper navigation you can read any book that ever was or ever will be written, and travel anywhere ending up at any time. A good bookstore is merely a genteel black hole that can read.

The fellows carrying the couch on their heads followed Nick, whose arms were loaded with packages as he lead the way to his cottage. The lead couch bearer tapped on the front door of the little cottage and when it opened, he cried, "G'day mate! Any chance we can find a drop of Hogswatch cheer?"

"BRUCE!" shrieked Octavia joyfully. "Come in! Come in!" Laughing, she hugged her Exian friend. It was Bruce Dinkum, the Head Librarian at the Bugarup University library and a couple of helpers who also had the name Bruce. The couch in question was the ancient and most honorable throne of the Agatean Empire. Instead of following the Bruces into the cottage, Nick ducked through an access door and found himself under the cottage where they stored the food and their canned goods. He left the packages, grabbed a box, and carried it upstairs.

"Here you go mates," called Nick. The box was a case of Exian beer, ice cold.

"Ahh, right, you are mate!" said Bruce with a smile as Nick opened a can and handed it to him.

"This comes at a price," said Nick as he handed the can to Bruce.

"Bloody hell! Ok, what is it?"

"You join us for dinner on Hogswatch evening and bring Sheila."

"You charge me a mighty high price for a beer that you took out of me own library. All right, mate, we'll be there. What's on the menu?"

Nick shrugged. "Pork?" Pork is on every Hogswatch menu, but Octavia said cheerily, "the queen is keeping the menu secret."

"Queen...? Aww crikey mate! I'm going to have to wear a clean shirt?" He set his beer down and gently lifted Marlon out of Octavia's hands. "Well... if I get to snuggle with this little squirt, it'll be worth it." Marlon was wearing a festive red jumper with white trim and a little Hogswatch piglet was embroidered on the front.

"Wait until you see the decorations," said Octavia as Bruce, Bruce, and Bruce, with Marlon in his arms, sat down on the throne of the Agatean Empire. "They really go crazy, it's amazing. We were just there, and the castle was covered with decorations, but the queen said they were only half done decorating. And our gate house is free. Axemir and Eryri are on their honeymoon, so if you and Shelia want to stay the night, the house is open."

"Shelia may go for that."

Nick went back outside to finish helping with the animals while the Bruces watched out the window at the snow swirling around. Apparently it doesn't snow in Four Ecks. "Bloody hell!" gasped Bruce. "Shiela is not going to believe this."

"We'll treat you to a horse-drawn sleigh ride," said Octavia as she began to prepare dinner.

Finally, Nick came back into the cottage with a half dozen eggs and a quart of milk. "Would you chaps like to stay for dinner?" Nick asked.

"No, oi have to get back to the library and these chaps have to get back to class before somebody notices that they're missing."

"Students?" asked Nick.

"Na, they're professors."

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The next day Nick spent delivering Hogswatch cards to the people of Creel Springs and visiting with his neighbors and the children he delivered as the county witch. He ended up with "The Boys" at the blacksmith shop, watching Trei fashion bits of metal into functioning tools. "G'day yer grace," said Trei as he noticed out of the corner of his eye that Nick had joined his audience. "How is fatherhood treating you?"

"It has definitely interrupted my sleep schedule."

All the Boys chuckled knowingly. "So, he was born at home, eh?"

"No, he was born in a bamboo forest in Agatea," said Nick, knowing they wouldn't believe him, but it was the truth. He was born one month before Hogswatch Eve on Ember Thirty Second, Year of the Chartreuse Beagle.

"I saw that you bought a couch for the wife for Hogswatch," asked Trei between blows of the hammer. "I saw them delivering it yesterday."

"Uh, actually, we stole that. It's the ancient and most honorable throne of the Agatean emperor. We dropped it off in front of a library in Four Ecks and the head librarian brought it the rest of the way."

The Boys were laughing uproariously. Nick tells the best stories. Nick gave up trying to convince them that he was telling the truth when they asked him a question about his activities. He just told the story as it happened and reveled in their side splitting laughter. Trei believes him, but the rest would chuckle whenever they met. Nick supposed it was best that their Duke entertained them instead of angered them. "Yer grace," said Ninian McKenna, the only member of The Boys younger than Nick. "Is it true that you covered our taxes this year out of your pocket?"

"Yes," said Nick. "The books for this duchy were so convoluted I had no idea who owed what. I asked the king how much money we owed him, and he told me, and we had the money, so I paid. This year Hogswatch is a tax holiday."

"Thank you so much sir... me mam, she said she couldn't have made it if you hadn't..."

"It probably won't happen again," sighed Nick. He patted Ninian on the back.

Just then the afternoon coach from Lancre Town to the railroad station at Hot Dang stopped near them and a couple that was waiting in front of the bookstore climbed on, but the coachman opened the boot and took out several large boxes, gayly wrapped for Hogswatch and came over to The Boys with his arms full. "Is the Duke of Wægn here?"

"That would be me," said Nick.

"These are for you." And he handed Nick the boxes.

"Holy smokes!" gasped Nick.

"Quite a family you have there, yer grace," said Trei. "Looks like they remembered you this year."

"We just have Octavia's dad," said Nick.

"I hear your family was much larger than that, yer grace," said Sieffre Merrick, the senior member of The Boys. "Young Ninian, why don't ye help the duke with his Hogswatch largess."

"Aye, Mr. Merrick," said Ninian and he took half the boxes from Nick and said, "after you, your grace."

"Thank you, Mr. McKenna," said Nick.

"It's just Ninian, your grace."

"Fair enough. Thank you for your help." They walked up the hill to Nick and Octavia's cottage when Ninian began to chuckle. "Care to share Ninian?"

"Well, your grace, I was raised to believe that dukes, and counts, and kings and such were huge hulking men with money coming out of their ears and names as long as your arm. We have the best duke ever, and he's no taller than my little brother, and his name is Nick."

Nick truly is short, five foot three but he carries himself like he's six foot tall or better. He has black unruly hair, a well trimmed beard to hide some scars but a scar on the right cheek shows through the beard. He wears a crockelgator eye patch on his left eye to cover the empty socket, but the Prime Minister of the Agatean Empire gave him a false eye made out of pure gold at their first meeting.

"Well, if it makes you feel any better, my true name is Pommeraie de la Montesquieu Worblehat-Stein. I was called Nick by our Duchess because she thought Pommeraie de la Montesquieu wasn't becoming for a partner of hers."

Duchess Octavia isn't tall herself, she's five foot six and highly voluptuous. Long silky black hair to her waist, large round breasts, a narrow waist that has recovered quite nicely from childbirth, and sexy round hips. But to Nick the sexiest thing about Octavia is her smile and her beautiful brown eyes.

"Is it true that you've been to Four Ecks, your grace?" asked Ninian.

"Aye, many times, I got this scar in Four Ecks," he traced a slim line through his close-cropped beard where hair wouldn't grow. "And I lost this eye in Four Ecks and got it replaced with gold in Agatea." Nick tapped the crockelgator skin eyepatch over his left eye. Occasionally he'll flip up the patch to reveal a solid gold eyeball that works as good if not better than his real eye. He just wears the eyepatch because he thinks it makes him look tough. His eye patch is no obstacle for that magic gold eye, he can see through the patch. He can see through most things and to him, his beautiful wife is naked most of the time.

Traveling to places like Four Ecks and Agatea is considered a lifetime of travel in the Lancre mountains. As Ninian listened, mouth agape, Nick continued, "we have friends in Four Ecks and we visit quite often. A good friend from there will be spending Hogswatch with us."

"How... how do you...?"

"Don't forget, the duchess is a wizard, she's very powerful. It can save on travel expenses." This was just to end the questions. They've rarely used Octavia's powers to travel, she prefers to use L-Space to move about space and time or to fly if they have to. Using her powers to teleport gives her a headache.

When they reached the cottage, Octavia had seen them coming and opened the door for them. "What is all this?" she gasped as they brought the large boxes in. "Just put them on Marlon's couch." They set the packages on the ancient and most honorable throne of the Agatean Emperor and Octavia handed Nick a towel to wipe the snow off of the boxes. When she took the towel off her shoulder, she revealed that she was nursing Marlon, but Ninian was more interested in the couch.

"This isn't new at all."

"It's about 700 years old," said Octavia. "There's probably still some bamboo leaves stuck underneath from the night Marlon was born.

Ninian lay on the floor and looked underneath. "Is this a bamboo leaf?" He extended a long skinny leaf that looked like a weeping willow leaf but was much longer.

"Yes, it is."

"There are some huge gouges on the inside of the legs."

"Dragon claws," said Octavia.

"Really? So is it true? Mr. Merrick tells me that you hallucinate, then think you can change shape."

"I have magic that lets me change shape," said Nick. Then he became a Labrador Retriever for a few moments. When he returned to human shape he said, "didn't you hear them talking about me turning into a horse and running off to check on someone?"

"So you really did fly from Hunghung City to Four Ecks?"

"Yes we did," said Octavia then handed Ninian a large gingerbread pig, still oven warm, but it had magically appeared in her hand.

"Wow, thank you Duchess." Ninian's eyes grew wide when he saw the cookie appear in her hand. "I have to be leaving now." He took his leave and headed out into the snow as Octavia turned to look at all the gifts that appeared in her house.

"Who are these all from?" she asked.

Nick just shook his head. "They have tags, but the tags don't say who sent them." He tried to find room under their tiny tree for the five large boxes and it almost looked comical when he finished.

"This one is asleep," said Octavia, indicating the baby at her breast. "Do you think we can..." she smiled and waggled an eyebrow at her young husband.

"We can sure try!" quietly they crept upstairs and gently lay Marlon in his bassinet, then they turned to each other and kissed sweetly. It seemed like it's been weeks since they could do this. They crawled into bed and kissed again, and within minutes, they were both fast asleep.

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AM&SP HR Station, Hot Dang, Lancre

Train Number 7, the Ramtops Challenger, the glamor girl of the Ankh-Morpork & Sto Plains Hygienic Railway eased into Hot Dang station dead on time at 2:00 PM. It only allowed twenty-five minutes for passengers bound for Überwald to get off and Ankh-Morpork bound passengers to get on the train. A fueled and ready locomotive would be coupled to Number 7 for its trip back to Ankh-Morpork as Number 8. For passengers wanting to continue on further, train #27 would continue to Überwald, the country was so demanding, the mountains so steep that everything past Hot Dang would require a narrow-gauge train to negotiate the mountain vastness, and that was #27's job.

Indy De Veen needed to visit her ailing sister in Smaltzburg, but she was terrified to travel alone. However, the gentleman that sat down next to her was very nice and quite polite, and his stories made the miles fly by. Finally, the train pulled into Hot Dang station where her son and his wife would pick her up. "It was so nice to talk with you, sir," said Mrs. De Veen to the rider sitting next to her. "Some men you meet on the train are such animals! Thank you for being a perfect gentleman."

"Ook."

"And a Happy Hogswatch to you too!"

The Librarian handed the lady her bag from the overhead bin, then shrugged on his greatcoat and plopped on a derby hat. It wasn't the best fitting hat that he has ever owned, but it makes him look rakish. Outside, the snow swirled around and he hurried off the platform and ducked into the station, where a tiny coal fire did its best to heat the large waiting room. Hogswatch travelers milled about, and the station was bedlam until the call to board #8 to Ankh-Morpork was called and many people left the waiting room.

The Librarian saw his bag on the luggage dolly, and he grabbed it and headed for the 'street' side of the station. As he stepped back out into the swirling snow, he heard the familiar and much missed cry of "Daddy!" There was a beautiful white sleigh with red pinstripes and red cushions on the seat. Pairs of oil lamps glowed front and back and they were decorated with red bows and pine boughs. A dark-colored horse pulled it up to the curb and inside the sled was his most precious possession, his stepdaughter.

Nick handed the reins to Octavia and hopped out. He dashed up to The Librarian, took his small case, and said, "Thank you so much for coming. It's warmest if you sit between us."

"Ook."

"Yes, sir!" Nick placed the suitcase in the small boot and got back into the sleigh just in time to witness The Librarian get his first look at his grandson.

"You can hold him daddy," said Octavia, "you held me just fine when I was the same age... see? He likes you."

"Ook," said the librarian, overwhelmed with emotion. There was even a tear in his eye.

"People say that all the time," said Nick as he got into the sleigh and pulled the warm blanket over them. "Personally, I think he really is smiling at you." With a flick of the reins, Nick called, "Let's go home, Trixie!" and with a jingle of sleigh bells they were off. They wove through the bustle of Hot Dang, a growing town with nearly a hundred permanent residents. There were several sawmills in town and what was forested a couple of years ago was now an open lot with logs and lumber stacked neatly, waiting for a train to take them to a growing city.

Soon they were out in the countryside and the road wound through the forests of tall pines, climbing hills and dipping into valleys. The snow was building up on tree branches, giving the entire forest the peaceful look of a Hogswatch card. The Librarian was telling a wonderful story of the Archchancellor's cat when Nick noticed that a tree ahead was leaning; it was jerking; it was falling; it was going to hit them. "Hold up girl," called Nick to his horse. He pulled back on the reins to stop Trixie; the sled also has a brake and Nick pulled back on that lever and the brake skid dug into the snow, dragging the sleigh to a stop just before the tree hit them. Trixie jumped in fear and snorted; the tree just missed her.

Nick turned to his left and asked Octavia, "Are you ok?" just then an arrow punched solidly into his right shoulder. Nick bellowed in pain and as he did, the bellow changed into something deeper, throatier, angrier. An enormous wolf rocketed out of the sleigh from where Nick was sitting and charged into the woods. The Librarian was not one to let a good fight go and he raced after Nick. The screams of men could be heard over the barking, snarling of the wolf.

"AAAAAHHHHH!!! RUN!"

"Get it off me!"

"It's got my leg!"

"He's got a monkey helping him!"

"Make it stop! Make it stop! Make it stop!"

That's when Octavia realized she was alone with the baby in the sleigh. She hugged Marlon closer to her and threw up a ward around the sleigh and Trixie, then she hid as best as she could under the heavy quilt as the sound of the fight went on. She heard her father's orangutan battle cry; she heard the shrieking bellow of the Four Ecksian dingaroo, then with a shriek of terror, the sounds of the fight ended.

Slowly, Nick and her father emerged from the woods. Nick clutched his injured shoulder as they approached the sleigh. He also had two longbows and two quivers of arrows slung on his left shoulder. Octavia removed the protective ward, and when she did, all the snow that accumulated on top of it fell on her, causing Nick and the librarian to start laughing despite their pain. "Ha. Ha. Very funny. What the hell was all that?"

"Ook."

"Are you sure they were after Nick?"

"The way they were talking, it sounded like a plan to take me out and grab Marlon." Nick winced in pain as Octavia pulled his blood-soaked jacket back and examined the wound. "If they had Marlon, they could control you."

As the Librarian held the fussy little Marlon, Octavia checked Nick's wounds. She placed a finger in the arrow hole and said, "Stop fidgeting, it's only going to hurt worse when I..."

Suddenly, the smell of burning flesh filled the air. "YEOW! SHIT!"

"...cauterize the wound. What happened to the arrow?"

"That hurt, ouch," Nick gave Octavia a kiss and continued, "I pulled it out of my shoulder and stuck it in the ass of one guy."

"You're lucky you're not dead," moaned Octavia as she peppered his face with kisses.

"But look, I got two great new bows and three dozen arrows for Hogswatch. We can go hunting together!" He handed her one other thing, a leather pouch bulging with Ankh-Morpork coins. "Now I know what my life is worth," he whispered in her ear.

"You dumbshit, get in the sleigh. We're going to Midpoint Station." She handed Marlon to her father, then gave the tree that had fallen across the road an angry glare. With a bang, the tree bounced a foot into the air and fell to the ground, cut in sixteen-inch-long segments. The segments crawled off the road and stacked themselves up neatly next to a tree and the sleigh proceeded onward with The Librarian, ooking his approval of Octavia's method of clearing the road.

Midpoint Station is a small posting for watchmen halfway between Hot Dang and Creel Creek and there was one officer and two watchmen on duty. The young lieutenant recognized Nick and Octavia immediately when they entered the station. "Room ten hut!" shouted the lieutenant at the desk as they entered.

"Ook."

"Dad is right," said Nick. "You're the only one in the room. You don't have to call the room to attention."

"Duke's orders, sir," said the Lieutenant. He held a salute so tight his arm began to quiver.

"Do you recognize who I am, Lieutenant?" growled Nick.

"You're the Duke, sir."

"I'm the Duke," said Nick, "and I never ordered that."

"The other guy..." started the young officer, referring to the previous duke, that was stark raving mad. Octavia put a calming hand on his shoulder.

"The other guy is gone, relax," she said, and the lieutenant finally relaxed.

"Here's the new duke's rules," said Nick. "Relax, do your job right, and everyone goes home alive."

"Much better than the old guy sir, how can I help you?"

"Find the guys that tried to kill me."

Immediately, the lieutenant went back into panic mode, but Nick talked him through his job. "Get a crime report form, find a sharp pencil, take down whatever we say. Let's start with Bandits attempt to kill the Duke."

"Two miles widdershins you'll find a pile of cut wood," said Octavia. "Behind that is where the bandits laid in wait. They fell a tree across the road and when we stopped, they shot the duke with an arrow."

The station officer, a young lieutenant that practically melted in Octavia's angry glare, had heard that the duke's wife was a practitioner of magic, and he was terrified that she would turn him into a newt if he messed up this investigation. Nick tried to reassure the young lieutenant that he wouldn't be crawling on his belly soon. "I was angry, so I took off after the bandits. There's three of them. We roughed them up pretty good, and the snow is deep, so there shouldn't be much problem with finding them."

"Ook," added the Librarian.

"Right..." said the Lieutenant as he wrote down the Librarian's addition to the report, "follow... the... blood trails. Got it." The lieutenant was feeling better. Doing the job settled his nerves and got him back on track. "Sergeant Prescott!"

A young patrolman emerged from the back room. "Sir!"

"It appears that bandits tried to kill the duke. Two miles widdershins, look for a woodpile on the side of the road."

"Aye aye, sir!"

"And take patrolman Schultze. She may be able to use her nose."

"Aye sir!"

The lieutenant turned to the Duchess. "Patrolman Schultze is from Überwald, she's werewolfish, her nose should lead her right to our bandits."

After turning over the weapons and the purse full of blood money as evidence, they got back into the sleigh and headed home, not as jolly as before. By the time they got to the house, Nick was shaking and weak and he couldn't get out of the sleigh. "I think that arrow was poisoned."

The librarian produced several arrows that he kept and handed them to Octavia, who carried them with the baby and rushed into the cottage, followed by her dad and the farmhand Dexter, who helped carry Nick in the house. They laid him down on the Agatean throne and covered him up, and he began to shiver. As Octavia conjured a fire in the fireplace to warm the house up, the librarian retired to the kitchen and carefully studied the arrow tips. He sniffed them and held them up to the afternoon light coming through the window. Wordlessly Octavia conjured a warm fire in the oven and the Librarian went to work.

"Ook."

"Kettleman's Guide to Poisons, Hallucinogens, and Party Tricks," said Octavia, and she closed her eyes and with a poof, the book her father requested was in her hands. She handed the book to her stepdad, who nodded and made another request.

"Ook."

"Reversing the Unreversible, by Gladimeyer Hornsby." Another poof and she handed the thick tome to her dad. He nodded and made one last request.

"Ook."

"Where's My Cow, by Sir Terry Pratchett?" With a little pop, a slim children's book with pasteboard covers appeared in her hands. "You need this?"

"Ook!"

"Yes dad, you're right, I will." Fighting back the tears, she scooped up Marlon, who was making little noises that were winding up to a squeal of loneliness. She sat on the floor hugging Marlon tight, leaning back on the couch that Marlon was born on, where his father laid and shivered. She opened the book and started to read. "Where's my cow? Is that my cow? It goes BAAA, that's not my cow, it is a sheep..." the plot was thin, but Marlon truly enjoyed it.

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

Midpoint Watch Station, Lancre

Sergeant Preston Prescott and Patrolman Annabell Schultze raced down the road on a dog sled until they found pine boughs scattered in the road and a neat stack of stove length pine logs on the side of the road. They staked out the dogs and began their investigation with the woodpile. Each piece of wood was exactly sixteen inches long, perfect for a stove or fireplace, except for the largest piece that was obviously cut with a hatchet.

Both watchmen were in their winter kit, parka, parka pants, mukluks, wool and rabbit fur hat, large rabbit's fur mittens, helmet, and breastplate. Patrolman Schultze sniffed the air and said, "There's not a human around for miles," and they both slipped off their heavy breastplates but kept them close by.

"Such perfect cuts! It's like this wood was sanded and varnished after being cut," said mousy little Patrolman Schultze. Schultze is "werewolvish" meaning that Schultze is one half werewolf. Her grandmother is a very powerful werewolf, but it's highly unlikely that Annabelle will ever change. Still, she retains the nose, the eyes and the hearing of a full-blooded werewolf. She can smell everything about a crime scene, including the cologne the murderer wore the day before yesterday.

Prescott and Schultze studied the scene at the roadside, the stacked up wood, the stump the bandits cut the tree from, then a big find, the hatchet. Schultze could smell the sweat and the salt of the man who wielded the hatchet. Without thinking, she took a quick lick and thought for a moment. "He was afraid."

"He was a bandit. What was he afraid of?"

"I don't think these were bandits, Sarge," said the little patrolman. "Bandits aren't afraid. They're mostly selfish, lazy, and stupid; I think these chaps were targeting the duke."

"What makes you think that Patrolman Schultze?"

"They didn't drop the tree until they were sure that this was the Duke's sleigh. When they shot the duke, they hit his right shoulder, away from the Duchess, trying to avoid hitting her..."

"Or the child," Sergeant Prescott finished her sentence for her. They've been finishing each other's sentences a lot lately; they're going to have to keep an eye on that around the station house. "Look at these prints! What do you make of them?"

"Wolf!" said Schultze, but instead of pondering where a wolf came from, she checked the other set of tracks. "Ape! It smells like that fellow that was with the Duke and Duchess at the station house." She followed the tracks and one could see where the bandits realized the error that they made. "Big fight here, three people, one wolf... you can see where the ape enters the fight... lots of blood, they clearly didn't count on the wolf... here's where the bandits gave up the fight and ran away..."

"They got away cleanly," said Sergeant Prescott, observing the footprints. Three sets of footprints with two blood trails heading off into an open fen. They followed the prints for a long time, then suddenly the prints disappeared. "What the hell?" Both cops jogged to the site, but the prints just ended, leaving behind an arrow. Schultze leaned in and sniffed, then scooped up a bit of snow and tasted it, but nothing.

"I don't understand," she said as they looked around.

Now the light began to fade, the tiny sun was setting behind the mountain, and the way that the slow light on discworld went, it could have set already. This could be lazy light trying to catch up with sunset. As they got back to the fight scene with the arrow they found, Annabelle smelled something and dug up a small metal box from under the snow. Preston opened it revealed a gray metal chain. Immediately Patrolman Schultze felt nauseous and fell to her knees. "Close that box, please!"

"What is it?" asked Sergeant Prescott as he sealed it back up.

"Octiron, very magical stuff. It makes magic users stop using magic by overpowering them, but it's deadly poisonous to magic creatures like a werewolf."

"So if they looped it around the Duke's neck he wouldn't be able to change, and if they put it on the duchess she's be helpless."

"Helpless or dead," said Schultze. "She's not just a magic user, she's a source of magic, a sourceress."

"What kind of powers does the child have?" Preston was wondering why they would go through all this trouble to grab the child.

"It doesn't matter, if they have the baby, they control the parents," said Annabelle. "It's almost a way of life in Überwald."

"Feeling better?" asked Sergeant Prescott as he crouched down to where Patrolman Schultze was kneeling.

"Yeah, I just noticed these giant rabbit prints..." she leaned over and got a whiff of pure dingaroo pheromones. "Oh, my..." she said in a tiny voice. "This ain't rabbit..." The pheromones wound around in her head, loosening her libido, then they shot straight to her clit. Another whiff and her tiny breasts began to swell, her nipples hardened to three times their length, her clit began to tingle, everything began to ache for a cock, even her ass felt receptive. She pushed herself up on her hands and feet and followed the footprints as they paralleled the ape prints heading back to the sleigh. "This is..." her head spun madly. These pheromones brought scenes to her mind, scenes of running wild on the Four Ecksian outback, with nothing to do but kill and fuck. Kill and fuck. Awash in a bath of blood and sperm, she could barely tell if she was in a winter forest or a hot arid desert.

Now she could only gasp, her hands were shuddering, her pussy felt hot... and empty. It needed to be filled, hard and fast. It clenched at something that wasn't there. The sensation was too much. With a tiny scream, she dashed under a huge lone pine tree. The branches drooped down and provided a circular shelter free of snow. Schultze dashed up to the tree trunk, dropped her breastplate, threw off her mittens, yanked down her parka pants and bent over and clutched the tree trunk. "NOW PRESTON!" she snarled in a voice that Sergeant Prescott could not disobey.

Preston dropped his breast plate and mittens, hauled down his parka pants freeing his erection and stepped up to his tiny partner, her cute, sweet little ass was on full display and he could smell her excitement, a benefit of being bitten by someone who is werewolvish.

"FUCK ME!"

His cock slid gently into her tight little pussy and he grabbed her hips as he eased into her steamy depths. "NOW!" This was not a time for foreplay or gentle canoodling. He pulled back and slammed into her cunt as hard as he could. Her tiny body absorbed the thrust, and she demanded, "MORE!"

Now her helmet fell off, taking the warm fur cap with it and her blond hair spilled out and she continued to cry in that voice that Preston couldn't resist, "YES! HARDER!"

The sound of their bodies slapping together filled the woods and Annabelle's shrieks scared off birds of prey as they grew closer and closer to orgasm. Preston began to feel the wild need of his tiny wolfling and fucked savagely, his cock brutalizing her pussy and with each slamming thrust she screamed for more. Their delicious agony rose higher and higher. There was nothing in their minds other than the need to mate.

Finally, with a warbling shriek from both, they found themselves tied together. His cock grew a slight knot at the base and her pussy clamped down around him {There are benefits to werewolfishness} locking them together as their orgasm wrecked their nervous systems. They twitched and jerked as megawatt jolts of sexual satisfaction rocketed through their bodies and brains. Finally, their bodies relaxed, and they sank to their knees in the bed of pine needles, panting, his cock still locked in her vice tight pussy that squeezed every drop of his sperm from him.

Finally, his cock softened and began to ease out of her, and the couple gasped over and over. They've had some wild encounters before, they've even tied together on occasion, but nothing that even came close to that. Finally free, they cuddled together, still panting.

"What was it that got to you?" panted Preston.

"I don't know, but I would like to ask the duke," the tiny woman grinned.

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

"The duke has been poisoned," started Octavia's letter to the King. She wrote a quick summary of what happened and posted it, sending a copy to Midpoint Station. An exact copy of her letter ended up on the king's writing table and on the desk of the duty officer of Midpoint station manned by young Lieutenant Young. With a sigh of relief, both the king and the lieutenant read that the duke will pull through and, according to the librarian, the duke will recover to have a happy Hogswatch. "To reply, add your comments to this page and tap your quill three times," ended the message from the duchess.

Lieutenant Young added what he was briefed on by the investigative team, the confusion of footprints, the three sets running off, then disappearing, the octiron chain. He added that Patrolman Schultze would like to talk to the Duke about the footprints she found. He tapped his pen on the document three times and the page shimmered, then in the duchess' hand the words "Message sent," appeared.

Lieutenant Young leaned back and closed his eyes. Just a few more hours until Sergeant Prescott relieves him and he can get a nap. Then the King's reply quickly appeared on the document. Lieutenant Young's shoulders sagged as he read a direct order from the king and he sent the reply. "Yes Sire. Right away."

A few minutes later, he tapped on Sergeant Prescott's door. He heard a rustling, then Preston said, "Yes?"

The lieutenant opened the door a few inches and saw Preston laying on his cot puffing on a cigarette and said, "Sergeant Prescott, fall out in full gear in twenty minutes; have your dress uniform with you."

"Yes, sir."

"And that goes for you too, Patrolman Schultze."

"Yes sir," came Annabelle's tiny voice from behind Preston. When the door closed, she peeked up from behind Preston and said, "How did he know?"

"Probably by the way that you smoke and I don't," said Preston as he handed her cigarette back to her.

They fell out with their cold weather gear, breastplates, helmets, truncheons, lanterns, bells, whistles, and their dress uniforms. "Sign here," said the Lieutenant and once they signed the document, he was holding out he handed them swords. "You also have the parade sleigh and Billy. Don't forget the bells."

"Yes sir," both were still confused as to what was going on.

"Hurry up, Creel Springs isn't getting any closer."

"Sir, if I may, what is the nature of this assignment?" asked Preston Prescott.

"The king has demanded a protection detail be assigned to the Duke and Duchess of Wægn, and the Duchess of Wægn has selected you two."

"Why us?" asked Annabell in her mousy little voice.

"Because she has reviewed your report, and it appears that one or both of you knows your way around a magic wand."

"Uhhh... there's no such thing, sir," said Preston.

"My point exactly. Head turnwise for about an hour to Creel Springs, turn right at the water mill, they'll have a light on for you."

"It will be midnight when we get there."

"The duchess is awake and waiting for the Hogfather and for you. Now go."

It wasn't too bad, with their gear stowed, including the octiron chain with instructions to give that to the duchess and no one else. They were soon hooking up Billy, a lively black stallion that Annabell was terrified of. They topped off the oil in the sleigh's large oil lamps, placed the collar of bells on Billy and soon they were on their way, gliding smoothly through the pitch black forests of the Duchy of Wægn. The oil lamps shone a bright light all about them and soon they were snuggling under the warm blanket.

"Is Überwald like this too?"

"It's much nicer here," said Annabelle.

"Why is it nicer here?"

"None of my relatives are looking around here to kill us."

"You say the sweetest things."

And all too soon they were in Creel Springs, the hamlet barely any larger than Midpoint, the home of the Duke and Duchess of Wægn. They turned at the water mill and went up the hill, the forest getting darker and darker around them, then suddenly they were in a wide open meadow, a small house was situated at the edge of the forest, and past that a cottage with barn, sheds and bunkhouse behind the cottage.

Candles glowed in the windows of the cottage as they stopped. "Come in, come in," said the duchess as she opened the door for them. "Put your stuff over there. Bertie and Dexter will stable your horse."

Even disheveled and in an old flannel robe, she was the most beautiful woman Preston had ever seen, which earned him an elbow in the ribs from Annabelle. The duchess must have noticed it, because she broke into a huge grin. "I'm Sergeant Preston Prescott and this is patrolman Annabelle Schultze. We are from the Midpoint squad and we're here to provide protection. Is there anything you need before..."

"No, we're fine for now. The duke should be fully recovered by morning. I will put a ward around the house, so we should be able to sleep once your horse is in the stall. It's just tomorrow at the castle I'm worried about."

"We should be..." Annabelle was saying something, but she stopped and sniffed. There was something in the air... something terrifying. "Ma'am, I'm going to have to ask you to get behind me." Annabelle looked frightened, but she picked up her truncheon and a candle and began to follow her nose.

"Werewolvish," Preston whispered to the duchess, who nodded.

"SHHH! It's close," Annabelle whispered hoarsely. Slowly, she crept up the stairs, following her nose. At the top of the stairs she turned left and slid back a curtain and on the bed lay a black 250 pound Bang Galore tiger curled up and cradling a tiny baby. Annabelle gasped and tried to catch her breath; dread coursed through her little body.

Curled up on the bed next to the massive man eating cat was a small wire hair terrier that looked up at Annabelle and said, "Come on, in or out. We're trying to get some sleep here."

The tiny police officer fell back in shock and Octavia caught her. Preston looked and the smile on the Duchess' face told it all. "Patrolman, that is the duke. When he's feeling bad, he finds the body of the Bang Galore tiger most comforting, and it's really nice to snuggle with. Little Marlon loves it. The dog is Gaspode, he's the duke's friend."

"I... I... I..." sputtered Annabell.

"Shhhh," hissed Gaspode, "Come on lady!" he growled. "I just got the kid to sleep." He lay his muzzle on his paws. "Fuckin' werewolves," the dog muttered under his breath before going back to sleep.

"Behind you in the nursery is my dad, just so you're not surprised," whispered Octavia and she opened the curtain on the nursery. Annabelle saw a large ape curled up on a cot, peering at her from under his blanket. "Let's go downstairs." When they reached the kitchen Octavia asked, "Would either of you like tea?"

"Y-yes, please." The sight of the huge black tiger had terrified the tiny woman. While sitting at the table, Octavia took the kettle between her hands and soon the water was boiling. She poured it into the ready teapot and took a small pebble and held it over a small bell, then let it go. The pebble didn't move.

"Wow," gasped Preston as he peered at the hovering pebble in the candlelight.

"It's a timer," said Octavia. "When the bell rings, the tea is ready." She got up and grabbed a few mugs and returned. Annabelle still looked terrified and Preston was still looking at a pebble that was hovering above a bell. "Are you shitting me? Put your arm around her, she needs your comfort!" Octavia sat down and shook her head. "Fucking men," she muttered. Normally Octavia wouldn't talk like that, but this night her manners are gone. Both police officers looked utterly shocked. "She's terrified sergeant, comfort your... what's the matter?"

"You... you know police language?" It was beyond the pale that someone with breeding and title should swear like a cop, and both police officers were shocked.

"I know all kinds of crap," smiled Octavia, which shocked the two again. "Look, if you're expecting a pair of blue bloods playing real people for the sake of the kiddies on Hogswatch eve in a rented cottage, forget it. Nick and I are real people. We're a pair of orphans who came up the hard way. Nick had it harder than me. His dad abandoned him on the streets in the Shades of Ankh-Morpork at five years old and he was stealing bricks when I found him..."

"Henceforth the name Nick?"

"Correct." Suddenly the pebble fell and hit the bell with a clear "Ding!" A sleepy fairy called out from the other side of the room, "Tea's on!"

"That's Moonbeam. She loves tea. Just make sure she isn't in your mug when you take a sip." Octavia set out a bottle of milk and a bowl of sugar and some honey as the little fairy fluttered over and sat down on a stack of napkins. But she rolled over onto her side and went to sleep. "They were singing most of the night. It helped calm Nick and the baby." She gave a sad smile. "This is our first Hogswatch."

"Your first?" asked Preston, but they were interrupted by whinnying from Billy. "I should go help settle him down." The police sergeant got up and pulled on his parka and stepped out into the snow.

"Really?" asked Annabelle. "Your first Hogswatch?"

"Our first together. Dad and I used to celebrate in his library. We'd eat bananas and banana cream pie, and that was it. To Nick it was the day his father..." she caught herself, then said, "it was the day people stopped giving pennies to young beggars, so he's not happy about it." Octavia looked through the window to make sure that Preston was busy. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Yeah," said Annabelle, terrified that such a beautiful, powerful woman would want to ask her a question.

"Did you... y'know... give him a little bite?"

Annabelle blushed furiously. "Yes... but it was consensual! We talked and talked about it for weeks, then one night I said, 'Here's your chance to say no' and he never did."

"You know, this is a witch's cottage," smiled Octavia. "The witch that lives here would be happy to make it real." For a werewolf, a bite is analogue to marriage. It just takes willpower and dedication to make it work, considering the promiscuous nature of werewolves.

"Would she? D'ya think? We never get the time or nothing!" Suddenly, her mind was filled with dreams of a Hogswatch Day wedding.

"Well, if your sergeant is good with it, the witch would be happy to perform your wedding. Come, give me a hand." Octavia led Annabelle near the fireplace, then moved a rug, opened a trapdoor in the floor, and lowered herself through the hole. "Here, grab these!" and she started to hand gift wrapped packages up through the trapdoor. Octavia eventually found the boxes that Nick put in the cellar and handed those up, then she handed Annabelle a basket full of oranges, bananas, grapefruit, and pears.

Annabelle stared wide eyed at the basket full of fruit as Octavia worked her way out of the cellar. "That was stupid. I could have levitated my way out of the basement."

"Why didn't you?"

"I didn't use magic while I was pregnant because we didn't know what would happen to the baby, so I'm out of practice. And the fruit is for dad's breakfast. We picked it for him yesterday." As they arranged the packages under the tiny tree, a few of the fairies lit up so they could see what they were doing, then when Preston returned after settling Billy down Octavia said, "I'm going to bed, we'll be up when we get up. You two talk and if you agree, we'll ask the witch tomorrow." She took the turnips off the end table and returned them to the bin in the kitchen, then before heading upstairs she drank the small glass of sherry that was left for the Hogfather. "Nite, and thank you," she said as she went upstairs.

Soon it was dark. All the fairies were asleep and all the candles blown out. The fire burned low, but the house remained warm and soon Annabelle and Preston snuggled on a couch that they would never believe was 700 years old.

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

The sun was fully up when Nick came down the stairs with Marlon cradled in his left arm, his right arm in a sling. He was followed by Octavia and the Librarian both in bathrobes. As he appeared, the fairies on the tree and fireplace mantle began flashing different colors and they began singing the sweet old Hogswatch Carole "The Snow on the Holly."

"Look!" Nick said to Marlon, "The Hogfather was here! He gave your turnips to his boars and drank daddy's good sherry. And look! Your stocking is full and the fairies are singing. You sit on the nice policeman's lap while daddy gets your stocking." He placed Marlon in Anabelle's lap, then grabbed Marlon's stocking. "Honey?"

"Yes dear," called Octavia.

"Why are there two cops in our living room?"

"Because you were poisoned and almost died yesterday."

"Oh, right. Sorry." He scooped up Marlon from a giggling Annabelle and said, "Say hi to the nice policeman" and waved Marlon's tiny hand up and down as he sat in a rocking chair with a pained wince. "I don't remember much after getting home, but dad here teaches magical chemistry..."

"Ook."

"Professor of Applied Thaumati... Thaumalogi... I can't pronounce it, but dad whipped up a counter potion which brought me through. Thank you again, dad." He nodded acknowledging the salute from the banana munching Librarian. "Did you guys see the tiger?" They both nodded, and Annabelle giggled nervously. "The missus likes it. I change to the tiger to settle her nerves." He pretended to ignore the glare from Octavia, which caused Annabelle to giggle more.

Octavia moved through the living room with a tray of mugs of hot cocoa, a treat that Nick had never had before and she couldn't wait to see his reaction. She said to Annabelle, "Did you two talk?" the little wolfling nodded excitedly. "And?"

"We want to."

Octavia gave Nick a mug of cocoa and said, "Honey? Think you have a wedding in you for today?"

Nick was entranced by the cocoa and she had to ask him twice. "I think I can whip something up," he said between sips.

"You're the witch?" asked Preston.

"Yeah, that's how we got this place rent free."

"What's that little building out the back door?" asked Annabelle.

"Silly little wolfling, that's the outhouse," laughed Octavia.

"No, the other one."

"Other one?" Octavia got up to look and peeked outside. "MY SAUNA! YOU REMEMBERED!" With a squeal, she descended on Nick, covering his face with kisses. Sometime during that horrible night, the farmhands put up the sauna that Nick built in secret.

It was a wonderful Hogswatch morning full of love and laughter, and the two policemen felt at home with these two royals they were assigned to protect. Everyone got to step into the blazing hot sauna and Octavia told them, "It will feel SO much better naked."

The librarian gave Nick a Mountain Dulcimer, a four string instrument held in the lap and played like a guitar, and he gave Octavia an autoharp. He tapped both on the forehead, magically instilling the knowledge to play their instruments. Nick smiled and said to a fairy, "Give me a D." The fairy sang the single note that Nick tuned his dulcimer to. "Now an A," again she sang and soon Nick had all four strings in key. Soon Nick and Octavia began to play "The Snow on Mount Craggy" a wonderful old Ramtop ballad that fits in with the Hogswatch season. The fairies sang along, flying in joy with the happy old song.

"Oh thank you, dad," Nick hugged the orangutan that was now cuddling Marlon. "Thank you for the instruments and the knowledge."

The little lord Marlon received lots of clothing and a few baby toys, but being one month old, he was only interested in being held and nursing his fill.

The large boxes that Nick and Ninian carried from the day coach to the cottage were from the king and queen of Lancre. They gave Octavia a robe of office, a dark, dark red velvet robe/dress with stars and moons and a matching pointy wizard's hat and a matching pair of slippers. Nick received a Lancre officer's uniform, riding boots, sky blue breeches, silver waistcoat, and a bright red jacket with tails and an officer's cap. Both received a sash that was bedecked with medals and that they had earned in their year of service, along with the Lancre Medal of Honor, on a gold ribbon to be worn at the throat.

"I guess the queen is tired of us showing up at the castle in coveralls," said Nick.

"She's mentioned that in the past," said Octavia as she modeled her hat and studied herself in a mirror.

Nick gave Octavia a beautiful necklace and set of earrings that looked like they were taken from an ancient pyramid in the fabled land of Djelibeybi. The gold and enamel jewelry made Octavia look like a queen of old. One could picture her standing in front of a new pyramid, a thousand slaves bowing to her.

In return, she gave Nick a pocket watch crafted by the gnomes of Überwald. It had second hand, minute hand, hour hand, day hand, and month hand and showed the year in Standard notation and Ankh-Morpork. {The Ankh-Morpork year is 800 days long, the standard year is 400 days long. It's complex.} The hands and numbers would glow softly in the dark when the watch was held in the palm of the hand, and every twelve hours it would wind itself. "So that's why you've been sewing watch pockets on all of my clothing."

Octavia nodded happily and opened her next gift, a bottle of expensive Klatchian perfume. "Are you saying I stink?" she said as she eased into Nick's lap.

"Yep, and now you'll stink pretty."

After they finished kissing. "You clean up and I'll get breakfast started," said Octavia. She got up and headed into the kitchen, which was in the corner behind the fireplace. Marlon was already asleep in Nick's good arm as the Librarian got up and collected all the wrapping paper. He wound it up into a tight ball along with flattened boxes as he collected the scraps, then carried it to Octavia who waved her hand over the wad of paper which suddenly tightened until the paper and pasteboard became a log which he put on the fire.

"We try not to waste anything," said Nick as the Librarian set up the crystal chess board that Nick and Octavia gave him on the coffee table.

"Oh, I have something that the king ordered me to bring here," said Sgt. Prescott as he opened his duffel bag. "It's not a gift," and he drew out the small box that they found yesterday.

"What is it?" asked Octavia from the kitchen as she started to lay out ingredients for breakfast.

"An octiron chain. We found it last night. The bandits had it and dropped it when the Duke, uhhh, had words with them."

"Get that out of this house!" said Octavia, her voice shaking.

"The king said I should give it to you." He started to open the box, but Nick stopped him.

"Sergeant, this house is magical. Don't open that."

"I need to..."

"Your mission is accomplished, now get that away from me! And don't get it near the baby!" Octavia was nearly hysterical.

"Follow me," said Nick as he pulled on a pair of boots. He led Preston out into the bright sunny Hogswatch morning. The sunlight was blinding as it reflected off the newly fallen snow. "I had taken the shape of an eagle and bandits put Octiron on my leg," said Nick as they headed toward the barn.

"I was stuck in an eagle's body for months until the duchess shot my leg off and set me free." In the barn, they checked on the horses. Trixie and Billy seemed to like each other; they were snorting and nickering to each other in their stalls.

"Morning, yer grace!" came a voice from the barn.

"Good morning Alphie. Alphie, this is Sergeant Preston from the Highway Watch."

"Thank ye kindly for the new boots and the box of cigars," said Alphie as he puffed his stogie. "How's the arm?"

"I'm fine, and thank you for your loyalty. Do we have any Salts of Crinix?"

"Aye m' lord. It works great on hoof rot."

"We'll need that and an old tea tin." Soon they had the required items and Nick pulled a bucket of water from the well. "Put that chain in the tea tin," said Nick, and Preston took out the lightweight chain. It didn't look threatening looking unless you were a small dog that didn't want to be put on a leash. He placed the chain in the tea tin and set the tin down on the snow. Nick liberally sprinkled the sulfuric looking yellow powder that is the Salts of Crinix on the chain, then filled the tin with water. "Get back!" he warned.

The three retreated to the barn and peeked out through knotholes in the door. "What's supposed to happen, gov'nor?" asked Alphie.

Steam rose from the tea tin as it sank into the snow. Occasionally, a pop could be heard and a spark would fly out from the tea tin. Soon the tin was deep in the snow and sparks popped regularly from the tea tin shaped hole in the snow, then with a loud CRACK! A cyclone of smoke and vapors roared from the hole with an ear splitting whoosh. It looked like a huge skyrocket was pointing downward and was trying to push the disk down harder onto the elephants. The whoosh became a roar as the vapors shooting out of the hole burned with an eye piercing green flame. Suddenly, with a whoomph! The show was over.

"What the hell was that?" asked Dexter as he came out from the bunkhouse to see what the noise and smoke was all about.

"Just getting rid of some octiron," said Nick as they examined the hole in the snow.

"Wow, I didn't realize how dangerous that stuff was," said Preston.

"It was pure..." said Nick sadly. "It would have killed the duchess."

"Come get breakfast!" Annabelle cried from the back door and soon Nick and Preston joined Annabelle and Octavia for eggs, hash browns, bacon, sausage, baked tomato, sauteed mushrooms, baked beans, toast with marmalade, coffee and apple juice. The Librarian was in orangutan heaven with bananas, apples, grapes, grapefruit and oranges, all freshly picked from their garden yesterday, Nick and Octavia claimed.

<><><><><>

Later that afternoon Nick ducked into the bunkhouse and the guys were getting their Hogswatch dinner together, a huge ham, potatoes, corn, and a beautiful Hogswatch cake that Octavia and Nick made for them. They had the big iron stove hot and were getting ready to cook. "We're going to be heading to the palace soon, are you guys ok?" The four hands turned and broke into grins.

"Who replaced our boss with broken a tin soldier?"

"Whoo hoo! Very pretty!"

"That puts the grace in 'your grace!'"

Nick was in the uniform that the king and queen gave him for Hogswatch, and he looked like a tin soldier and the sling made him look broken. Octavia cast a spell on the uniform, making it fit perfectly no matter what shape Nick was in. If he gained weight or lost a limb, the uniform would adjust itself to fit correctly. "It was a Hogswatch gift," said Nick.

"A likely story," said Dexter, which caused three of the four former bandits to laugh.

"It's very sharp, your grace," said Bertie, the largest of the group.

"We'll be heading to the palace soon; no idea when we'll be back. And the gate house will be manned for the next few weeks."

"Aye-aye!"

Nick headed back to the cottage, feeling every bit of the tin soldier. Luckily, the hat had a low crown and was not tall like the toy tin soldiers he has seen. Back at the cottage, he met Sgt. Prescott as he stood on the patio nervously pacing. "Second thoughts?"

"No, your grace. Just worried about what the lieutenant is going to say."

"What can he say?"

"He's made it perfectly clear that he's not happy about a couple under his command."

"The king wants to open another Highway Watch barracks in Tallywiffle county, which is centered on this cottage. Would you be interested in a posting here?"

"What would that entail?"

"Patrolling the main road from the bridge over Schist Creek, up through Creel Springs turnwise to Stomp, and the Lancre Town Road from the main road to the summit on Breeders Peak."

"Sounds like a lot of road."

"Yeah, it's not all flatland like the Midpoint barracks, it's bandit land, so I'm sure there would be a bit more manning. How long have you been a sergeant?" Nick asked.

"Six years."

"If I promised you a promotion to Lieutenant would you take command of the barracks?"

"In a heartbeat, your grace... if Annabelle agrees."

"Let's go see what is in her heart." Nick tapped on the door. "Are you ready in there?"

"Ook!"

"Ok, here we come," he turned the handle and entered and Nick's eyes were drawn to Octavia in the beautiful wizard's gown.

"How do I look?" she asked, turning side to side. She brought things to wizardry that no other wizard has ever brought before, like large breasts, cleavage, a narrow waist, sexy round hips, and a million-dollar smile. All Nick could see was the shine of joy in her beautiful brown eyes.

"That hat looks so cute on you," grinned Nick.

"I was hoping for hot," pouted Octavia.

"The rest of the gown does that." Nick stood behind her and helped her put on her new Djelibeybi inspired necklace. She held up her thick mane of hair while he coupled the clasp. "Where's the star of the show?"

"Annabelle? Are you ready?"

"Coming!" She slowly came down the stairs in her police uniform. Like Preston, she wore a blue and white jacket, but instead of blue slacks, she was wearing a long blue pleated skirt. She added a white veil to the uniform, and in her arms was Marlon, who was happily gnawing on his fist.

"Is that a hint?" Nick whispered in Octavia's ear.

"I don't know, but Marlon really likes her."

Annabelle stepped up next to Preston and smiled as he lifted the veil off her face. Their eyes met, his hazel eyes meeting her dark brown eyes, and they leaned in closer. They suddenly caught themselves and turned nervously to Nick. "Oh, you guys can kiss. This isn't a church; we can do whatever we want in our wedding. We can build a snowman for our ceremony or wait for summer and get nekkid and do this up to our necks in the pond."

This started Annabelle giggling and caused Preston to blush, so Nick felt like he touched on something in their past. He took Marlon out of Annabelle's arms and said, "Sorry buddy, you've already done one wedding this month," and he handed the baby to the Librarian, who happily climbed up into a rocking chair with his grandson.

"He was already in a wedding?" asked Preston.

"Yes, we had a couple of dwarves get married right where you are standing a few weeks ago. They were dear friends, and Eryri wouldn't put the baby down. But this should be fun, you're my first humans."

"Mostly human," said Annabelle with a slight giggle.

"Ok, important part number one, Annabelle, are you marrying Preston of your own free will? You're not being forced, you're not doing this to win a bet, you just want to partner with Preston Prescott forever?"

Nick's question caused Annabelle to giggle even more. "Yes, I want to marry him."

"Now Preston, I heard rumor our wolfling may have nipped you. If this is true, you need to concentrate. Are you doing this of your own free will? You're not being forced, coerced, or enchanted into this, are you sure that want to partner with Annabelle Schultze forever of your own free will?"

"I wanted to marry her long before she bit me."

Nick gave them a big, relaxing smile. "Ok, first hurdle surmounted, we're a third of the way there, now the tough one, ready?" The nervous couple nodded. "Ok, hold hands, now give me your free hand, now just relax..." They joined hands in a circle and now Nick could feel familial distinctions, which with mountain people are important.

Towns in the mountains are small and isolated, families can be large, and soon everyone in town is a cousin. It's up to the witch to determine how close of a cousin they are. Finding no familial connection in a couple in the Ramtop mountains is indeed rare, so the rule is if the couple are third cousins or closer, the wedding is off.

"I don't know if you two realize it, but you have a common relative, Goodie Hays. She was the witch in Bent Plow, a little town in Wousterwickshire, a duchy turnwise from here. She was Annabelle's great-great-aunt on her father's side, and a sixth cousin to Preston's maternal great grandmother, so you two are just barely related." They opened their eyes and saw Nick smiling broadly. "The wedding is still on. Now we come to the third hurdle. Honey?"

Octavia opened the door, and Nick stepped out of the way. "This is it; this is your last chance to walk away. The door is open, you can run, I'll trip who is ever chasing you."

The lovers looked even more determined, so Octavia closed the door and Nick continued. He joined their hands, so they were standing face to face. "Now look into each other's eyes and tell them that you love them."

"I love you," the two watchmen said.

"Now kiss... and... you're married. You can stop kissing whenever you want." But hearing the Duke of Wægn, witch to Tallywiffle county, say they're married caused their passion to soar. They couldn't hold each other close enough. "I'll notify the castle that you were married on the very first day of the year, and you'll need to go to Lancre Town on a Wednesday to meet with the King and Queen and the King will enter your marriage into the rolls."

They finally ended their kiss to see the Librarian sniff back tears of joy, while Gaspode grumbled, "another good wolf bites the dust."

"That's it?" asked Annabelle, who spent much of her life in Überwald.

"Yep, mountain weddings aren't fancy or frivolous. You can add fancy by throwing a party for your friends later."

"Nick and I were married right where you're standing. We were the only living person here," said Octavia.

"There was your witch," said Preston.

"Yes and no," said Nick, "she was dead, her ghost performed the ceremony."

"Oh, go on!" laughed Annabelle.

Octavia lit a candle on the small table next to the empty rocking chair and slowly the image of Nana Partridge, the former witch in the area, appeared. "We just had a wedding, Nana; how did I do?" asked Nick.

The ghost looked up from her knitting and smiled, "You did quite well, and your couple looks so beautiful. Policemen too! My, my is Creel Springs growing!"

"Thank you Nana," cried Octavia. "Happy Hogswatch." And she blew out the candle and the ghost went back to her knitting as she faded from sight..

Not long later, the police sleigh was waiting outside the cottage for them. Billy was a powerful horse that could pull a full sleigh, but this was a trip over the mountain. It was a long trip to the summit, and he was going to need help. Alphie and Bertie rigged a double tree hitch to the sleigh and soon Trixie and Billy were hitched up and ready to go. They loaded up and headed down to the bookstore where Nick showed them around until Bruce and Sheila Dinkum arrived, emerging from the bookshelves. "How did you get here?" asked a startled Preston.

"Why it's bloody magic, mate," grinned Bruce as he shook hands with the young policeman. "Crikey mate, these youngsters remind me of you two about one year and a few thousand miles ago," he grinned at Nick and Octavia.

"What do you mean by that?" asked Annabelle.

"In the past year, the duke and duchess have had some adventures. It put some miles on their smiles." Bruce had an infectious smile, and he was right; Nick and Octavia have had some adventures and the innocent twenty somethings were dour politicians now.

They stepped outside and piled into the waiting sleigh; then they started through Creel Springs showing Preston and Annabelle the homes of the different residents. Bruce and Sheila Dinkum have never seen snow before and were shocked at how cold it is, but both were taken by the beauty of the snow as it started to gently swirl down from the heavens. "Oh my, just like a Hogswatch card!" gasped Sheila as the rhythmic jingle from the bells around Billy's neck caused her to breakout singing "A Horse and a Sleigh" a cheery winter carol much loved by children. Soon, they were all singing.

Give me a horse and a sleigh on a cold winter day

and bells that jing-jingle as we head on our way...

Jing jingling, jing jingling, jing jingling hey!

Jing jingling, jing jingling, jingle all the way.

"Those bells are darling," said Shelia. "Just like the songs!"

As they turned off the main road onto the Lancre Town road, Nick pointed out an abandoned farmhouse and barn at the corner of the two roads. "I'd like to put the Watch barracks here," said Nick. "Then you could mount patrols on both roads."

"The barn is a little run down," said Annabelle. "I don't think Billy will like it."

Small talk continued as they snuggled under the blankets and kept warm. Nick had a flask of hard cherry cider to warm the insides and the sleigh made its way up the mountain. Thick forest came right up to the edge of the road and the road began to switch back as it climbed the mountain. "We were attacked by highwaymen there twice," said Octavia pointing at a snow covered rock. "There were a bunch of armed soldiers hiding on that curve waiting for us just last month."

"Ook."

"You're right sir, there's plenty of call for us," said Preston.

Soon they reached the peak of Breeders Peak Pass. "This is the border sergeant. To your left is Lancre Town, to the right is the Duchy of Wægn and Tallywiffle County. Lancre Town has their own watch that patrols to the peak here. I want a watch for the farmers and businessmen of the hubward side of the kingdom."

Preston and Annabelle were amazed at the area their patrol would cover. Far away, an opening in the forest appeared with a large frozen pond, cottage, two small houses and an enormous barn. It was the Duke and Duchess's farm and they hugged each other, so happy to call that distant sight their home.

"What do we do with highway men when we catch them?" asked Annabelle.

"What did you do with them at Midpoint Station?"

Annabelle and Preston looked at each other for a moment. "I don't know. We never caught anyone."

"Ooohhh, have I got someone to introduce to you," said Octavia.

They descended from Breeders Peak pass into the biggest party in the kingdom. The entirety of Lancre Town was decorated, and the people were celebrating. Several bands marched throughout the town playing one Hogswatch carol after another. Beer tents, cider tents, and wine tents were erected in several parks and dozens of hogs, deer, and calves were roasting on spits everywhere. Every pond and stream was an ice skating rink and couples skated arm in arm while teams waited for their chance to play ice hockey by lantern light.

"What fun!" exclaimed Shelia. "This makes our beach barbeque look like tea and crumpets with grand ma-ma." Heads turned as the large, gaily decorated police sleigh slid past with a second row of riders.

"Too right! If it wasn't so blasted cold!" agreed Bruce.

"I was told that these parties go on until Saint Holger's day," said Octavia. Saint Holger's day is two weeks away on the last day of the month of Ick.

Finally, Nick directed Preston to head up to the castle on the hill overlooking town. "There's going to be two lines heading up to the castle. Stay to the right and go through the portcullis." Preston followed his direction and soon they found themselves at the entrance marked "Nobility & Guests Only."

"Bloody hell, mate!" laughed Bruce. "You're bleedin' peerage?"

"Kind of, only Marlon is. I'm just holding the title for him."

Young men in festive uniforms greeted the sleighs and carriages, helping riders out of their seats, and hostlers took the teams and sleighs back to the stables. "Good evening Captain Ogg!" said Octavia as Sean Ogg, the head of palace security, stepped forward to help her and Marlon out of the sleigh.

"Good evening your grace, how is the young duke this evening?"

"He's marvelous. Thank you for asking. This is Preston and Annabelle Prescott. They will be manning the new Highway Watch station in Creel Springs."

"Good luck!" said Sean with a smile. Sean is a kind soul unless you appear to be a threat to the royal family.

"How's your mom, Sean?" asked Nick.

"She's actually considerin' to act her age, if you can believe it, yer grace." Sean's mom, Gytha, known to everyone as Nanny, is probably the most senior witch on the disk. She's a spry soul stuck in a 90-year-old body, but she doesn't let that slow her down.

Nick led the group into the castle, and they checked their coats and hats. The two policemen looked resplendent in their dress uniforms, but Nick and Octavia looked incredible. The Lancre Medal of Honor, held by a golden ribbon at their throats, required a salute from soldiers and nobility. The soldiers were quite dutiful with the salutes, but a salute from a noble was rare. Nick carried a curious Marlon cradled in his left arm so that Octavia could have a free hand to shake hands and return salutes. Her left hand was filled with her wizard's staff, a six foot tall length of sapient pearwood named Virga, atop of which rested the Eye of Knute, a softball sized gem that looked like a piercing eyeball. The white of the eye was ivory, the pupil was lapis lazuli, and the iris was a jet black diamond. Like the two young policemen, her staff searched the crowd for threats.

There was no doubt that this was the event of the year. The palace was filled with royalty from all over the Ramtop mountains. Several mountain kingdoms sent envoys and representatives and the Duke of Wægn was looking for the expected representative from Ankh-Morpork.

The palace was festooned with decorations to celebrate the season. After tonight, the palace will be swamped with tourists who come to see the beautiful decorations. The beautiful decor made it difficult for Annabelle and Preston to keep their eyes on the crowd looking for potential hazards. A string octet played beautiful seasonal adagios at the center of the great hall and couples danced close together to the music. Nick, Octavia, and the Librarian, along with their police escort, moved among the revelers.

A popular romantic waltz started up, and Nick, Octavia, and Marlon started dancing. Bruce and Shelia stepped out on the floor and joined the dance. "Sir, we can't..." Sergeant Prescott protested, but Nick said, "Sergeant, we're going to dance all night until you and your wife dance with us... it's your wedding night!" With a chuckle, Annabelle and Preston began to dance too. It was magic for all three couples, twirling around the floor with the orchestra playing holiday themed waltzes. The decorations made the morbid old castle look positively joyful.

"Ah, the young duke!" cried a slightly drunken voice after the dance was over. "You make quite the nattily dressed nanny. And the police! Are you under arrest?"

"Preston, Annabelle, this Lord Slipspring. He's the Viscount of Stormchester and head of national security. No, he's not your boss. If anyone in this building other than the king is your boss, it is me. Lord Slipspring, may I introduce Lieutenant Preston Prescott and Sergeant Annabelle Prescott, they are the nucleus of the Lancre Highway Watch. My people are tired of being robbed, and these two and their friends are going to help us with that."

The drunken Count laughed and patted Nick on the shoulder. "I thought they stopped being robbed when you took over the duchy, lad."

"Lord Slipspring, less than two months ago, we delivered two prisoners who attacked us on the Lancre Town road. I'd like to know..."

"Bullies, ruffians. They will do their time."

"They were armed soldiers that attacked in force!"

In a drunken whisper, Lord Slipspring said, "It's very dangerous to be an honest man these days. Keep your eyes open and a hand on your coin purse." With that, Lord Slipspring staggered off into the crowd.

"I don't trust him," muttered Annabelle as she sniffed the air with her tiny but accurate nose. "He looked drunk, he sounded drunk, but he smells of tea."

"Take no notice of him, m'boy," said an amiable Lord Harcourt, the Earl of Mallburg and exchequer of the kingdom. "He sees thieves and enemy forces behind every rock. We're living in the most peaceful period this kingdom has ever had!"

"I hope to keep it that way," said Nick, trying not to mention that he and Octavia have been attacked over six times in the past year. "I see a guest I've been wanting to speak to," said Nick as an excuse to move away from his fellow lord.

"Duke Worblehat-Stein! And Duchess! And Professor Horace Worblehat! So good to see you!" cried Lady Sybil Deirdre Olgivanna Vimes.

"Ook."

"You are looking marvelous yourself," said the Duchess of Ankh. "But I must see your grandson! Oh, how precious!" She immediately washed over Nick and Marlon like an overjoyed tsunami. She was a hurricane of taffeta, a tornado of genteel manners, and a powerhouse of optimism. Huge, solid, and cheerful, Sybil Vimes was born the richest woman in Ankh-Morpork and in her wisdom she married the most dower, pessimistic little man on the disc, Samuel Vimes, commander of the city Night Watch. Like Nick, he was born a gutter rat, living on the street in the most wicked part of the city. He learned to think and live like a criminal, which made him such an effective cop. One would think that he would get lost in the wake of his overpowering wife, but the Duke of Ankh was a power unto himself. They were the perfect couple.

"C'm here, kid," Vimes growled at Preston and Annabelle. "Are you Nick and Octavia's guard?"

"Yes, sir," they said in unison.

"That's not just a pretty uniform? You're real cops?"

"Yes, sir."

"You're looking all wrong. Don't worry about these stuffed wigs. They don't have the guts to dirty their hands with wet work. It's the hired hands to watch for, the waiters, the guards, the faceless individuals, the ones that can be bought. You need to have a nose for danger..."

"I do," interrupted Annabelle. That stopped Vimes cold. A petite cutie like Annabelle should be selling cookies in a high end bakery, not playing police girl.

"I see you found our newlyweds," said Octavia as she entered the conversation. Although she adores showing off her Marlon, this little bit of freedom from him, the very first since his birth, was refreshing. Let dad and grandpa show off the baby; Octavia wants a martini!

"Lady Worblehat-Stein, it is good to see you. How was your last trip to Agatea?"

"Lord Vimes!" said Octavia cheerfully. "It was delightful! We got to see the city of Hunghung, we met with some locals in a darling village called Nit Noi, and I got to give birth in the middle of a bamboo forest."

"You kids have all the fun. I was just talking to your security team."

"Don't put my little sister down," said Octavia, putting her hands on tiny Annabelle's shoulders. "She's werewolfish and truly has a nose for trouble. Her husband appears to be a true cop. Nick wants to build a force around them to patrol the highways in our little duchy. What do you think?"

Sam gave the two watchmen a piercing stare, "What happened with Nick on the widdershins end of the Main Road?" Sam has only heard rumors, but these two didn't need to know that. Acting like he memorized every word of their report, he glared at them.

Preston started by saying, "Sir, the investigation is ongoing so I cannot..."

"Good answer, for the king," interrupted Sam. "I'm not the king, I'm a cop. What did you see?"

"Three assailants," started Annabelle. "They were nervous. I smelled their fear on everything they touched, even through their gloves. They dropped the tree on the road at the last moment to ensure that all persons in the sleigh were confused and they didn't get the wrong sleigh. They shot the duke in the right shoulder, the shoulder away from the duchess. I believe they were purposely trying to kill Nick but were avoiding Octavia."

"Why do you think that?"

"The arrow was poisoned, but not enough poison to kill with a grazing hit. Then we found a length of octiron chain," said Preston. "We believe they were going to throw the chain on Octavia and run off with the baby while she was incapacitated."

"With the baby in their possession, they could have forced Octavia to do anything," said Anabelle.

"What was their biggest mistake?" asked Sam.

"In my opinion, they didn't put enough poison on the arrow," said Annabelle. "If they put just a little more on it, he would have been sicker, distracting the duchess and the librarian. But, if they put too much on it and killed him right away, they would have ignited the wrath of the duchess."

Sam looked Annabelle and Preston up and down with a frown, then turned to Octavia. "I'll send you two patrolmen, a detective, and someone who can start recruiting and training cops. Maybe more, I'll see what Carrot can afford. You might have to wait for after the weather to break, but we will get you up and running before spring."

"Thank you, your grace," said Octavia and she graced Sam with her thousand-watt smile. She knew Annabelle and Preston were good cops the minute she met them, and Nick's dream of a safer Wægn was becoming a reality.

Soon, the guests were called to their tables. Nick and Marlon led his family, guests and bodyguards to the table which was next to the king's table and the decorations were a festive dream. Both Octavia and Sheila gasped at the beauty of the setting, the crystal! The silver! The holiday inspired China! Even the napkins were a holiday dream, embroidered with holly and evergreen. It was a Hogswatch dream come true. "The king!" gasped Shelia. "We're sitting next to the king!"

With a smile, King Verance led Queen Magrat to Nick's table, and all started to rise but the King said, "Sit, please, we come to welcome our guests." He turned to Shelia and bowed and said, "What a delightful accent! Where do you join us from?" and he gently took her hand.

Shelia looked the king in the eye, opened her mouth, and nothing came out. As he shook hands with the queen, Bruce laughed and cried, "Bloody gob smacked! Twenty years of wedded bliss and this is the first time I've seen me mate shut down. We come from Four Ecks, or as we call it Ecksas. Pleased ta meecha Miss Queen. 'm name is Bruce."

"Ah they call it 'The Land Way Over' do they not?" asked Magrat.

"Sure they do. If I may ask, yer highnessness, how did ye get the name Magrat?" asked Bruce.

"Oh, when I was born and my mother filled out the birth certificate and misspelled Margaret."

Bruce laughed loud and long, eventually shaking hands with the king. However, Shelia remained silent until the royal couple returned to their seats. "The king! I shook hands with the king! HE kissed me cheek!" The whole table broke up laughing, then she said to her husband, "Give me your napkin." He handed it to her, and she stuffed it in her purse.

"Why did you take my napkin?"

"I don't want them to think that I took it," said Shelia. Nick signaled the waiter and got Bruce another napkin. All were still chuckling over Shelia's reaction.

The King rose and gave his standard Hogswatch day address and, after a chant from the local druid temple monks, the lucky diners tucked in for a pork feast. They started with marinated leeks in a bacon and mustard vinaigrette, fava bean soup with spinach and ham, pork chops in a tangy yellow sauce, lard fried potato fritters, Quirmian pork sausage with mushroom gravy, pork rissoles with ham and peach chutney, Lancre oysters {only for the brave} and for dessert, lard pie. {Round worlders: think of a pie made of Oreo centers} As usual there was breast of quail and whole pheasant stuffed with apple for those keeping kosher.

Being served first, Nick and Octavia's table finished first and they could sip coffee as the King stood to start his annual Hogswatch speech. Being the first day of the year, Hogswatch is highly important. It sets the tone for the rest of the year. Nick and Octavia weren't paying attention, they were chatting with Bruce and Sheila and making jokes about the more senior court members. They almost missed it when the king said, "Now I would like to introduce you to our newest court members, our new Lord of Health and Safety, Sir Pommeraie de la Montesquieu Worblehat-Stein and the new Court Wizard, the Damme Octavia Worblehat-Stein, the Duke and Duchess of Wægn."

Nick and Octavia stood up and waved to the crowd, but the king gestured for them to join him on the dais, so Nick took Marlon out of Shelia's arms and up they went. Preston gestured to Annabelle, who nodded and joined Nick and Octavia at the dais. There was a bit of discussion, not much, when the king says "Give us five minutes" you give him five minutes. Nick stood up to the lectern and said, "Hi, I'm Pommeraie de la Montesquieu Worblehat Stein, and this is my wife Octavia, our son Marlon, and our daughter Annabelle. I am a witch, she is a wizard, Marlon is a baby and when she grows up, Annabelle wants to be a detective. For those of you that don't know us," Nick put his arm around Octavia, more for support than affection, he was shaking so badly he thought his medals would fall off, "we are the Duke and Duchess of Wægn, governors of Tallywiffle county, protectors of Bear Mountain, and emperor and empress of the Agatean Empire."

That got such a laugh that he relaxed some. "You're doing marvelous," said Octavia and she gave him a kiss on the cheek.

"When Octavia and I first met she was a magical student, and I was hired to steal bricks from a burned down fire brigade, which is how I got my name Nick." The crowd began laughing, which only encouraged Nick, so he continued, "That is the truth. I'm not raised from royalty, neither of us are. Our police guard has more royal blood than we do. A year ago, we fell in love with each other, then we fell in love with Lancre. We were looking for a witch named Nanny Partridge and somehow we ended up with her cottage and her practice. I am the only male witch in existence and my darling wife is the only female wizard in existence, which makes us rare, and it makes you wonderful for knowing us."

Nick noticed that Preston was moving away from the table and Annabelle was pointing at something. Before Nick could say another word, Octavia stepped away from him and threw up her arms and a protective ward appeared around them. Nick saw a few sparkles in front of him, like he was looking at a window. "When the king convinced me..." he started, Annabelle tried to shove in front of him and he heard a "TINK!" and a foot in front of him, a small, pointed metal shaft was motionless in midair, pointing straight at his heart.

Nick leaned over and considered the tiny shaft. He reached out to touch it, but before he could recognize it as a poison dart Octavia yelled "Mien ära!" (go away) and he, Marlon, and Annabelle disappeared. The ward she threw up crackled with energy and she glared at the dart. Was it poison? There's one sure way to tell... "Tagasta Saatjale!" every wizard in the room knew that little spell which means "Return to Sender." The little dart rocketed back to where it came from and, shocked, Octavia saw someone she knew slump to the floor. She turned to the King and Queen and raised her hands shouting "Mien voodisse!" (Go to bed) and the king and queen disappeared only to reappear in their chambers.

Octavia dropped her ward and dashed to the young man dressed as a waiter who was lying on the floor dying. Her shoulders slumped and her heart sagged when she recognized him. It was the young man from Creel Creek that impressed Nick with his kindness and curiosity, Ninian McKenna.

"Ninian!" she cried. "Why did you try to kill Nick?"

"Fuck you," he hissed as he died.

King Verance and Queen Magrat found themselves in their royal bedchamber. They shook their heads to clear the fuzziness that a magic spell brings on the non-magical. "She truly was a good choice for court wizard," said Magrat.

"What the hell happened?" demanded the king, who was laughing at Nicks's impromptu speech, then suddenly their bedchamber appeared around them.

"I'm not sure, but Octavia was very upset about something. She made Nick and that guard disappear, and now we're here." Verance rose, strode across the room, and grabbed the door handle. When the door opened, his normal bodyguard, a knight named Essex, blocked him. "Please stay, your highness, until we hear that the threat is gone."

Preston and Octavia did what they could with Ninian, but he died quickly. The tube that he launched the dart with was still in his left hand, and there were several more darts in his pocket.

"Oh gods," groaned Octavia. "Nick counted him as a friend."

"Who was he?" asked Sam Vimes.

"He was just a laborer in Creel Springs," said Octavia, fighting back the tears. "He hung out at the blacksmith's shop with the men and..." she groaned and said, "He was in my house two days ago!"

"Ook."

"Ok," sighed Octavia and she took a couple of darts and folded them up in a napkin and put them in her purse. Suddenly, there were people around Octavia and Preston demanding answers, and Sir Samuel Vimes helped push the crowd back. Octavia recognized Lord Cadence, the prime minister and Lord Laird the lead lord in the house of lords, they {were supposed to} represent the common man in all matters of government but truth be told, the king and queen do a better job of that.

"Get up there and calm this crowd down," hissed Octavia.

"And say what?" sputtered Lord Laird.

"I got an idea. Try the truth. You've never attempted that before." Lord Laird glared at Octavia. He never liked her, and now his dislike was growing by leaps and bounds. "Get up there before I put you up there!" she snarled.

"I'd like to see you..." and suddenly Lord Laird and Lord Cadence were standing at the lectern gazing out at the large, rich, influential, voting crowd.

Lord Laird knew nothing about addressing a crowd, he's never spoken to any more than five extremely rich patrons to be elected the Lead Lord in the house of Lords, but Lord Cadence was a wordsmith, he could sell a snakeskin back to the snake that just shed it.

"Thank you for your indulgence in our little bit of theater," he said to the crowd. "This was to show you that our court wizard is a Lancre woman through and through, and our king and queen are safe from all peril. Thank you to the beautiful Octavia Worblehat-Stein, the Duchess of Wægn, and Leftennant Preston Prescott of the Wægn Highway Watch. Give them a hand!"

As Octavia supervised the removal of Ninian's body, the entire crowd stood and applauded. Without a break, Lord Cadence continued, "In this most jolly yet solemn time of the year where we are focused on family and friends..." He would continue on, talking about nothing for the next forty-five minutes.

"Bloody hell! What was that?" demanded Bruce as he and Shelia caught up to Octavia.

"Someone tried to kill Nick," said Octavia. Then she frowned as a guard brought a waiter up to Octavia in a choke hold.

"We got da one dat choo pointed out, Duchess."

Octavia waved Virga over the squirming waiter and her staff simply said, "Right rear trouser pocket." The waiter fought harder and the huge guard nearly broke his neck as Octavia extracted a blowgun and a packet of four darts from his pocket.

"I don't know where that came from!" gasped the waiter.

"He's lying," said Virga, "he made them and he made the poison."

"I want one of those sticks," said Sam as Virga picked the subject's brain.

"Take this one to Mr. Morose downstairs," said Octavia. "Tell Mr. Morose that we want everything."

"Yes, mum," said the guard as he dragged off the squirming waiter. Mr. Morose was King Verance's Chief Examiner. He examined every thought in a subject's head and had a multitude of methods of extracting those thoughts and verifying their veracity. It is said that many of the men and women he questioned survived the experience, but no one was ever quite able to point out those survivors.

Octavia gathered Bruce, Sheila, and the Librarian together. "I'm sorry, but I have work to do. I'll get you down to the bookstore where you can make your way home."

"It was a delightful party," said Shelia as they made their way to the coat check.

"Too right!" agreed Bruce, "But mind ye, I'm still a cold beer and a hot prawn on the barbie kinda bloke."

"We'll have plenty of summer cookouts," laughed Octavia as they got their overcoats.

"Ook?"

"Don't worry about Nick and Marlon, daddy. I put them someplace safe. We'll come visit soon."

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

"Where the hell are we?" muttered Nick. They were in a pitch black room, normally his left eye, the golden magical eye, can see in the dark but this room is 100% dark, there is no light at all for him to pick out.

"There's a bed behind you," said Annabelle.

Nick moved back slightly, and his legs bumped into something. He reached back and found it was indeed a bed, and he sat down. "This is worse than being blindfolded," he muttered, which for Nick was true, he can see through blindfolds. As he sat glumly, Marlon became fussy. He started with a tiny double cough, then started wailing. "It's ok little fellow, daddy's here." Luckily, Marlon was wearing a dress type sleeper so Nick could reach inside and check inside his rubber pants and check his diaper. The little guy was soaked.

"Hang on, daddy can fix this, I have the tools and the skills." Now Marlon was wailing, the darkness was terrifying the little guy, then Nick remembered... the horror that he repressed and hid... he remembered the cold dark night, Hogswatch eve when his father... No! No man could do that! But Nick ended up soaking from the icy rain and covered in garbage. He untangled himself, bruised and battered, then in terror he started running in different directions, calling for "Daddy!" shrieking in terror. Ivo Stein was a mean shitty father that beat his mom Catrin bloody, but Ivo was his daddy. Ivo was gone... Pommy was alone, terrified and freezing in a cold wet hate filled city... hungry... lonely... and soon to be near death.

Happy Hogswatch.

Annabelle heard Marlon crying, but she also heard something else. She finally found the box of matches and lit the candle stub on the dresser and in the dim light she saw Nick clutching Marlon to him tightly, both of them crying their eyes out. "Never... I'll never leave you..." Nick was gasping when he could get the words out... "You're my baby boy... you're my gift of love... daddy will never leave you."

He fought back the tears as he changed the baby's diaper. The horror of twenty years on the streets without love stabbed at his heart, but this tiny bundle of joy, totally dependent on him, helped so much. Slowly the Nick got control of his tears as he finished Marlon's diaper and put the rubber pants back on him. He did a pretty good job changing it in the absence of light. He found a bottle in Marlon's "Possibles Bag" and the little guy latched on to the rubber nipple and drank thirstily at the goat's milk. "I'm sorry," Nick muttered. "I have some dark corners in my past, and when Marlon got scared, it reminded me of the night I..."

"You what?" asked the little police sergeant as she sat next to Nick.

The memories coming back... Hogswatch eve, twenty years ago... Ivo Stein hired a cab and said he and Pommy were going to go see Hogfather. Instead, Ivo abandoned his son in the shades to live in squalor and filth. They stopped and Ivo told his son, "get out" but Nick was terrified so he threw Nick out of the cab so hard that the five-year-old boy was knocked unconscious and Ivo ran away like a coward in the night... Nick lived in the gutter, eating out of garbage cans, getting beaten up almost daily until... Nick turned to Annabelle, his eyes still red from crying, and said, "I was abandoned by my father. If I ever do anything horrible to Marlon, if I ever raise my hand to him in anger, you are under orders to kill me."

Ignoring his orders, Annabelle asked, "What happened to your father?"

Nick almost smiled. "He was a drunken gambler and a thief so bad that the guild wouldn't take him in. I looked him up... he died in agony a few years after he threw me away like a bit of rubbish. He was stabbed with a filthy knife in a bar fight at the Mended Drum." He sniffed and said, "I tried to find my mom, but he scared her away for good. I would love to show Marlon to her and say, 'look what I did mom, look at this marvelous little man.'" The tears threatened to come again, but he fought them off as his hungry little boy drank himself sleepy. Nick took the bottle away from the infant and patted his back until he belched. Then Nick put the rubber nipple in his mouth and he slurped more. As soon as his tummy was full and burped properly, he was asleep. Nick lay him down on the bed and tucked two pillows around him.

"How did you get out of the slums?"

"A female wizard picked me up, brushed me off, and gave me a job. Speaking of female wizards, where did she put us?"

"My bedroom at Grandma's house," groaned Annabelle. "If we're real quiet, maybe grandma won't know we're here." A snarl at the door let them know Annabelle was being a bit too optimistic. With a bang, the door flew open and a huge Timberwolf leaped into the room, but Annabelle felt the bed jerk and a monstrous gray wolf sprang to meet the Timberwolf and drove it back into the hallway. They snarled and snapped at each other; snarls filled the air and spittle flew as the canines tried to get an advantage on the other. Eventually, the gray wolf flipped the Timberwolf onto its back and it found the gray wolf's teeth were at its throat.

With a snarling gray wolf at its throat, the Timberwolf slowly transformed into an elegant, slim woman with milk white skin, jet black hair, and burgundy red lips which matched her eyes. Nick transformed back to his body, his hands holding the woman's wrists. "Hello Lucricia."

"Porter Strongback ze bush vitch. Ven did you learn such a trick? Did someone nibble at your neck?"

"Grandma? That's my boss!" cried Annabelle.

"You're the werewolf grandmother I've heard so much about?" said Nick as he helped Lucricia von Überwald to her feet.

"Nonsense little one, you work for ze Duk uf Wægn, ziz iz Porter Strongback, a common..." she saw Nick grinning and said, "No!"

"Yes!"

"Ze kink appointed you duk?"

"Yes, and your granddaughter is in charge of my personal security."

"Mein Got!" Lucricia shook her head, causing her ebony mane to shake. "Sche is not a verevolf... sche ist volfling."

"Yes, she's already blocked two attempts on my life."

"Mine little tomboy?"

"GRANDMA! I hate when you call me that," groaned Annabelle who was now holding Marlon.

"Und you haf a child?" gasped Lucricia.

"That's Marlon, he's my son. I married her this afternoon..."

"YOU MARRIED MINE ENKELIN?" shrieked Lucricia.

"Yes, I married her to a wonderful man, another cop who is now her commanding officer," said Nick, almost glad that he got a rise out of the only woman on the disk who is werewolf and vampire. He took Marlon from Annabelle as he continued, "I'm also a witch, so I check for familial relation and perform weddings."

"Are zey related?"

"Slightly. They're both related to Goody Hays."

Lucricia nodded when he mentioned the old witch, then she got upset. "Ok, now, vhy are you here?" demanded Lucricia. Nick could see her canine teeth growing. "Und vy shouldn't I drink your blood?"

"We're here because Octavia sent us somewhere she thought was safe. She thinks very highly of you. And if you bite me, Octavia may not like it."

"Fine, fine," sighed Lucricia. Follow me, "ve vill haf tea."

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

There was a gentle tap at the bedchamber door and King Verance called, "Come in!"

The door opened, and Octavia entered with a tea tray. "I brought tea." She set it on a table and poured a cup for the king and queen. "A man with a blowgun shot a poisoned dart at Nick." She placed the first cup in front of Queen Magrat. Protocol says the King should be served first, but in private, King Verance always deferrers to the mother of his children.

"I was able to throw up a ward, a wall like glass except it will catch the projectile, be it a dart, arrow, crossbow bolt, even a stone from a sling." She placed a cup in front of the king and said, "Nick and I knew the attacker. He was in our house before Hogswatch. I don't know who he worked for and I don't know what information he passed on before he died tonight."

"What makes you think he is working for someone?" asked the king.

"We were attacked in the mountains a month and a half ago by armed soldiers. We were attacked by three men two nights ago. We were attacked by two, maybe more tonight. Somebody wants Nick dead, and they want something from me... I hope Mr. Morose can find something." The wizard actually looked afraid. "I don't want to raise my children in a glass bubble."

"I'm sure he can, but the records of what he could get the soldiers to admit to have disappeared."

"Then whoever is behind this has agents inside the castle," muttered Octavia. She frowned and said, "I believe it's safe to join the dinner now. Lord Laird is entertaining the people.

"Good gawds," groaned King Verance, and he got up to leave, but Octavia was already gone. She appeared in the foyer and got her coat, then she disappeared again and reappeared in the police sleigh as Preston drove the sleigh up to Breeders Peak pass.

As the King and Queen returned to their dinner, Octavia wrestled her way under the warm quilt in the front seat of the police sleigh as they crested the top of Breeders Peak. "Hold up here," said Octavia to Preston, and they stopped on the road that ran along the broad, flat top of the mountain pass. Down below them, lost in the swirl of snow, the Duchy of Wægn began to celebrate the new year with fireworks. "Nick wanted to see this..." she sighed.

"It's bloody beautiful," said Sheila from the back seat as they watched the colorful display below them. Fireworks of all colors bloomed above every home and farm in the duchy.

"Ook!"

"Our people save up all year to buy fireworks... This year they could afford this because we declared a tax holiday..." She sniffed when she remembered handing that sack of coins to the king. "Nick loves these people so much we gave almost every penny we had to the king to pay their taxes for them... That's the man I married..." It was the most money either of them had ever seen, and with it, they bought their people some peace of mind and for some the first happy, Happy Hogswatch. "Nick wants to do a big public display for them next year, so the families that don't have the money to spend on fireworks can celebrate too."

"Oi heard of a wizard in Quirm who specializes in fireworks. Gandy something is his name. Oi'll get you his address," said Bruce.

"Thank you for your offer to stay the night, but Bruce and I want to get back to our warmth. It was a beautiful evening," said Shelia. "Dinner with the King of Lancre!" she shook her head with a smile. ALL of the faculty wives back at Bugarup University will hear of this night.

"Let's head down, Preston," said Octavia and using the fireworks to light the road, they made their way down into the valley.

They dropped The Librarian, Shelia and Bruce off at the bookstore with fond goodbyes and assurances that Nick, Marlon, and Annabelle were perfectly safe, and fond kisses for her dad, the visitors returned home via L-Space. Octavia and Preston then headed up the hill and put the sled in the shed on the side of the barn and the horses in their stables. "Come on, let's go get your honeymoon cottage warmed up, then we'll go get your bride."

"Yes, Ma'am."

The gate house was a small one-room cabin made of logs and inside lined with rough cut boards. The double layer of wood made it warm and cozy inside. The cabin had a small iron stove for heat and cooking, a sink with a well pump and a small icebox. With a snap of her fingers Octavia cleaned the bed linen and ignited the fire in the stove as Preston put dishes away and found a bottle of wine to celebrate with. "You don't go through a lot of matches at your house, do you?" asked Preston as the oil lamp on the table lit by itself.

"Here," said Octavia and a bottle of champagne and two glasses appeared on the table along with a tray of cheese, sausage, and fruit. "Let's go get your bride."

Preston suddenly found himself in a large barroom, four people were playing an intense game of cards on a poker table in the corner while a man with three arms that looked like he was stitched together from leftover body parts {Preston had no idea how right he was} was manning the bar. "Welcome to Überwald marthter. Would you like thomthing to drink?" the stitched together man said.

"Uhhh... I..."

"I think he needs a cup of coffee, Igor. It's his wedding night," said Nick from the poker table without looking up from his hand. He had Marlon in the crook of his arm and he showed his hand to the baby. "What do you think, this one?" Marlon looked away, disinterested. "Ok then it's this one!" he slapped a three of clubs onto the table.

Low queen Blodwyn Rhysdottir, regent and lord of all dwarves, scooped up the card, placed it in her hand, then laid out her cards. "Gin!"

"Seriously Pommeraie," sighed Lucrecia as she sipped her Bloody Mary. "Vill you effer learn zis game?"

"No disrespect, sir, but you really suck at this game," said Annabelle. "That's the third win you gave her!"

"We're not playing for mining rights," rumbled Queen Rhysdottir. "He never loses when his mountain is at stake."

Looking up, Annabelle noticed Preston standing in the center of the room looking utterly confused. "Honeeeeey!" she squealed and dashed into his arms. "You're safe!" After a kiss, she said, "Let me introduce you. This is Igor, he's grandmama's librarian, butler, and bartender. Like all Igors, he's a self-made man, and he makes a wicked martini. This aunty Blodwyn, she's the low queen of all the dwarves, she's the lowest queen in the land."

"Lowest?"

"Yeah, people look up, so their king is above them. You know, like a High King. Dwarves tunnel and look down, so their queen is beneath them. She's the Low Queen."

"Pleased to meet you," said Preston, barely surviving the Queen's bone-crushing handshake.

"Grandmama, this is my husband Preston Prescott, honey, this is the woman that raised me, Lucrecia von Überwald, my grandmother."

They shook hands, and he said, "Do I know you?"

"I am your Captain Angua's aunt. However, I am how you say, zee vite scheep uf ze family." As they shook hands, Lucricia looked at her granddaughter and said, "You did gif him a bite! Good girl!"

Annabelle practically glowed in the praise from her grandmother and she snuggled closer to Preston. Then Lucrecia glared at Preston with her hypnotic red and black eyes. "You vill inschure zat no harm comes to my little Annabelle. Sche iz all I haf of her mother. Zat ist all I vill say on zat subject."

"I will protect her with my life, ma'am."

"Goot answer."

Meanwhile Octavia was seated on Nick's lap snuggling her baby while their friend Blodwyn gruffly said, "I do not envy your position. There is a cancer in Verance's court. The good news is they are not paying attention to King Verance and Queen Magrat right now. The bad news is that they are looking at you. They think if they can get the duke out of the way and blackmail the duchess into doing their bidding, they can steal the throne of Lancre and turn on Überwald."

"Turn on Überwald? Lancre isn't a military power. If we put every man in the field, we could barely take out the weakest neighbor," said Nick.

"You underestimate your men. Lancre could easily take their neighbors, then the unaffiliated Ramtop kingdoms will fall or join you one by one, their resources becoming yours and soon Überwald falls."

Nick started shuddering. "I don't want this, not on top of everything else."

"We must play the hand we are delt, my friend," rumbled Blodwyn. "You need to realize more than your mining rights are at stake. This is for the soul of your people."

"It was such a good day four hours ago..." he muttered.

Meanwhile, Annabelle gestured and urged Octavia to come speak to her. Demurely covering her nursing son with a cloth that matched her dress as she rose and walked to Annabelle, who wanted to remain out of earshot of the Duke. "Something is wrong. When we appeared here, the baby started crying, then the duke started crying, horrible heart breaking sobs... he tried to cover up, but when I lit a candle, you could tell he was heartbroken over something."

Octavia's lips tightened when she realized what night it was... Hogswatch. Last Hogswatch they were in Bruce Bockschecker's hunting station in XXXX running from Dingaroos and falling deeper and deeper in love. They never even noticed that the holiday came and went. Nick had spent most of December healing after being trampled by a herd of sheep and being gnawed on by a dingaroo. They survived the holiday season by running away from it. "Nick had a terrible childhood; he and I will see to it that our children will never experience something so horrible..."

"Pardon, ma'am, you're royalty, but you live like paupers!"

"Yes, but to us, this is living the high life. We have food on the table and a roof over our head. We intend to ensure that Marlon never spends a hungry night or a lonely day. At the same time, he's not going to grow up a spoiled palace brat."

"And the duke doesn't mind that you're so much more powerful than he is? I mean, he's just a witch..."

"No, he's much more powerful than just a witch. He can't conjure, but he's got other skills besides turning into a dog."

"What's conjuring?" asked the tiny newlywed.

"This," and a flat package appeared in Octavia's hand. She handed it to Annabelle and said, "I'm going to give you a few minutes to open that and get ready. After that, it's up to you." And with that, Annabelle disappeared.

The tiny policeman found herself in a small one-room cabin. The bed was made up, the fire in the stove was warm and a bottle of champagne in a bucket of snow awaited them. Gaining her wits about her, Annabelle opened the package to find a frilly babydoll nightie. "Thank you, boss!" she called out. There was a large pan of water on the stove to humidify the air that the iron stove was drying out. Finding a cloth, Annabelle undressed from her uniform and washed up with the hot water. It felt so good to clean up. All she could smell was herself, she wanted to smell Preston.

She got her nightie on just in time because he soon appeared; his face covered with a look of concern. He saw her and smiled, but he was still concerned. "What's the matter, honey?" asked the tiny wolfling as she stood up on tiptoe for a kiss.

"Our first day on the job and they almost killed our boss," he growled, but Anabelle silenced him with a kiss.

"But they didn't," she said with a smile. "And tomorrow we rest."

"No, tomorrow we will go on a trip. The duchess wants to talk to students."

"What does that mean?" asked the bride as she eased the champagne bottle out of her husband's hands. Without looking at what she was doing, she soon had the foil removed, the cage taken from the cork, and the cork eased out of the champagne bottle with just a little pop. "What?" she said to his surprised look. "We drink a lot of champagne at Grandmama's house. Uncle Igor had me open all the bottles for him while his new arm was healing."

"Thank you for opening that, I've never done it. The duke teaches reading and writing; we'll probably see his young school students," said Preston as Annabelle handed him a glass of champagne and popped a bright purple grape into his mouth. "Mmmm! The grape! So delicious!"

"The duchess said they came from her underground garden, and the wine..."

"She conjured that," said Preston, "I watched."

"No, she stole that from the king's wine cellar." She showed Preston the stamp on the label that said, "Royal Wine Celler."

Preston couldn't believe these past two days, he finally got to go out on an assignment with his lady love and it led him to Hogswatch with the duke and duchess, dinner with the king, a meeting with the top cop in Ankh-Morpork, a royal murder mystery, a mountain wedding, and a private honeymoon suite.

Now Annabelle couldn't hold back and she unbuttoned Preston's uniform jacket. "You're so sexy in this uniform. I've been dying for this moment."

Preston ran his hands over the wolfling, slim yet curvaceous like her grandmother. Annabelle was a tiny sex goddess. Her small, firm breasts were barely a handful, and her nipples were hard and poking against the gossamer fabric of her babydoll nightie. "No! Bad boy!" said Annabelle, slapping his hands away. "I'm not done using you."

She got his jacket and his pants off when she gets his shirt and underwear and he will be naked. She wanted to fuck, and she wasn't letting clothing or romance get in the way. If you want a sweet lover who likes to cuddle and enjoys hours of foreplay, avoid a werewolf or a wolfling. They don't have the patience for that.

Annabelle pushed Preston back onto the large cot where he lay smiling, his erection standing tall. She could smell his pheromones; they called out to her in the dim lamplight. She could nearly see the odors; her sense of smell was so powerful and so accurate. Preston watched as she approached with her eyes closed; a game she loved to play. Gently sniffing, she grew closer and closer and suddenly her mouth opened wide, he could see her long canine teeth in the candlelight, and without aid of her hand or sight, her mouth plunged down and swallowed his cock.

"Good Gawds," groaned Preston as her tongue slathered on the sensitive underside of his cock. She was relentless, and the sensations were mind bending. She's gone down on him before, but never with such hunger. "You're going to make me cum!" he growled.

In response, she scrambled up and lowered her tiny, soaked pussy onto his throbbing cock where she could enjoy that delicious stretching as she sank down on him. "You're not cumming for a while," she said with a grin and she began raising and lowering her pussy on his pole, but she underestimated her excitement. She was soon bouncing wildly, cumming, shrieking and squealing in pleasure and was unaware that he rolled her over and began fucking as hard and as fast as he could.

He was driving her out of her mind, fucking hard and fast, stoking the fire of her orgasm. With a howl, she sank her teeth into his shoulder, sparking his orgasm. As his sperm dove into her pussy, her saliva mixed with his blood making him hers... the wolfling and her mate became one.

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"Annabelle is worried, she said you had a bad time tonight," said Octavia as they settled in for the night. They took off their fancy uniforms of office not to wear them again for weeks or months.

"I'm sorry the memories came back. How could he do that to me? How could any man do that to their own child?" He stopped to fight back the horror of a five-year-old boy awakening to find out that he's been abandoned in the darkest, most dangerous slum on the disc. "I gave Annabelle orders that if I ever do anything like that, she is to kill me. I hope you will do the same." And then the horror of his past crashed down on him even harder. He dropped to his knees and buried his face in his hands and wept for every beaten and abandoned child in the world.

Octavia knelt next to him, his tears igniting her own sorrow. "Honey, look," she put a warm hand on each of his temples and forced him to look her in the eye. She saw both heart shattering sorrow and gut twisting hatred. "Honey, we can't spend the entire month of Ick crying. It won't wash away what he did to you, but I can make it less painful." {Ick is only sixteen days long (2 discworld weeks) compared to all other months of 32 days but it's two weeks of celebration, it's said that Ick was named after the hangovers that two eight day long weeks of celebrating produces, but it's named after Ick, the god of algae and slime mold.}

Slowly the pain eased, the need to shout and release the anger also faded. "I can take it all away," said Octavia, "but I won't. This is a very noble anger and maybe you can make a kingdom where this anger isn't needed anymore."

Nick took a deep breath and let it out, and she was right. The memories are still there, but the thought halting anger is tempered. "Thank you... will it last?"

"Maybe?" She smiled and shrugged her shoulders.

"Well, thank you, and thank you for my baby."

"There are more babies to come. Don't get complacent."

"More?"

"Well, yeah! I waited this long to find the right lover; I'm not quitting sex just because I had a baby." Nick leaned in to kiss again, but Octavia stopped him. "Hang on. There's more."

"What now?"

"The waiter that fired a dart at you..."

"I'm sure we'll find out who it was." Suddenly he realized that she knew who it was. "Who was it?"

She grasped his hands and softly said, "Ninian McKenna."

"Oh gawds..." he sighed as he felt the bile build in his stomach. How could that kid... one of The Boys... he was in this house! Suddenly, he realized that the tea he drank in Überwald wasn't going to stay down. He reached for the rarely used "thunder mug" under the bed and got it out just in time to catch the contents of his stomach.

When he stopped vomiting, he apologized and carried the chamber pot downstairs and washed it out. "How did you find out? Did you talk to him?" he asked as Octavia came up next to him and wrapped her arm around him.

"When I saw the dart stuck in the ward, I got you and Marlon out of there, then I gave the dart a 'return to sender' spell and the man who fired it crumpled. When I got there, he still had the blow tube and several more darts in his hand."

"Did you talk to him?"

"Yes, but he just said, 'fuck you' and died." She kissed Nick's cheek and ruffled his unruly hair. "I'm sorry. I know you liked him.

Nick sadly dried out the chamber pot and sighed. "I got an idea..."

"What?"

"Let's have a better Hogswatch next year."

Octavia clicked her fingers, and they were both naked. The clothing they were wearing was folded neatly on their bed upstairs. "Let's start the year the right way," and she led him out to the sauna. Soon they were warm and sweaty in their little hideaway, her mouth plunging down on his cock over and over.

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The next morning, the honeymooners joined Nick and Octavia for the breakfast that Nick made. Unable to sleep, Nick was up before sunrise baking and served a feast for the hungry honeymooners. "I hope you got a good night's rest, because it's back to work today."

Both Annabelle and Preston looked tired but happy, having made love all night long. "What's up boss?"

"We're going to visit with a couple of students. You're going to need your dress uniforms again... sorry. The duchess will launder them before we leave, and I'm going to need you to carry your truncheons."

"Planning trouble, sir?"

"A little."

After breakfast dishes were done and the baby's bag packed, they headed out. It wasn't too cold, so they walked the mile down to Creel Springs, where Trei Metsker was hard at work. The blacksmith's forge was fired up, and he folded back two sides of his shed because that forge can get extremely hot. As usual, The Boys had gathered to watch Trei make his form of magic with fire and metal. From a distance Nick saw the usual number of guys watching the show, so maybe Octavia was wrong, but when they got closer, they saw that the extra body was Calum McCrory, Trei's son-in-law.

"Hey, yer grace!" said Sieffre Merrick, the senior member of The Boys, 85 years old with a mind as sharp as a razor. "Did the Hogfather bring you the six inches of height that yer mama shorted ya?"

When the laughter died down, Octavia hefted the baby in her arms and said, "I found quite a few inches to use, thank you," which turned the laughter raucous and fired it right back at Sieffre.

"Darlin' I loves ya like a granddaughter, which means I can't take you across m' knee like a daughter," was the old timers rebuttal.

"I love you too, grandpa," and Octavia gave Sieffre a kiss on the cheek. The teasing settled it was time to get down to business. "The duke and I think it's about time we had a few watchmen on the main road and up the Lancre Town road to the pass," Octavia said.

"Hear hear!" cried Trei, whose shop was broken into regularly by bandits.

"Preston and Annabelle are our first watchmen, and hopefully we'll see them often. Annabelle, Preston, this is Sieffre Merrick, they built Creel Springs around him, Trei Metsker, the only man in town with a steady job, his son-in-law Calum McCrory, and these guys are Merle Rorie and Tiernan Brighid, who farm on either side of town."

As The Boys shook hands with Annabelle and Preston, Preston asked, "Does anyone know where Ninian McKenna is?"

"He mentioned getting a job at the palace serving dinner for Hogswatch. Didn't you see him there?"

"I didn't," said Nick truthfully. "Does he have a place in town?"

"Yes," said Sieffre, "He rented my second-floor apartment for three months, paid cash in advance."

"Let's go see if he slept in," said Nick and took Octavia's staff Virga and he led the way across the street to Sieffre's big two-story farmhouse at the corner of Main Street and the road up to Nick and Octavia's cottage. Nick was halfway up the external stairs when he noticed a hasp and padlock on the apartment door. "Who puts a big padlock like that on their apartment?" he asked himself aloud.

"Someone protecting a possession," replied Virga.

Nick turned around and finding a sturdy board leaning against the back shed, he carried it up the stairs with him as Virga hopped up the stairs to Preston's amazement and Annabelle's amusement (Her grandmother has a sapient pearwood tea table that can walk like Virga). He held the board up like a shield and glared at the padlock that suddenly fell to pieces and dropped off the hasp.

"Blimey! Did you do that?" asked Annabelle.

Nick nodded and said, "Virga taught me... Truncheons at the ready..." then crouching behind the board, he turned the knob and pushed the door open. With a sudden "prang!" and a solid "thwack!" a crossbow bolt slammed into the board he held. Peering in the door, he saw another crossbow set to fire into the apartment, obviously set to shoot anyone that made it past the door and charged in without looking. Nick disarmed it by lifting the bolt out of the crossbow and tucking it into a coat pocket.

"Any other booby traps, Virga?" The softball sized wooden ball on the head of the staff opened, revealing the Eye of Knute, and Virga scanned the apartment and said, "No traps, but there are a few loose floorboards."

The apartment was nearly empty inside. There were two cots with quilts, a small table and two chairs, a couple of rusty frying pans sat on the iron stove, but there were no dishes in the dry sink or cupboard. The only other items in the apartment were some articles of clothing and a long bow and a quiver of arrows that matched what the bandits that attacked Nick on the highway had. On the table were several apothecary bottles containing powders and liquids not used for anything healthful. Nick headed back to the boys with the crossbow bolt he took from the trap and the bow and quiver, leaving Annabelle and Preston to scour the apartment.

As they crossed the street, Nick stopped and actually hugged Virga. "Thank you, my wooden friend."

The Eye of Knute shot open in surprise. Since they met, Nick and Virga were angry with each other. Virga actually convinced Nick to leave Octavia because he was distracting her from her mission. Officially, Virga belongs to Nick because Octavia gave her staff to him, but when she was appointed Court Wizard, she needed a staff, so from that day forward Virga was jointly owned, but Nick rarely touched it. "Why the sudden affection?" asked the staff.

"The Duchess was fiddling with my memories last night and she unlocked a few that I had hidden away. Why have you been allowing me to say that Octavia's dad taught me to read and write? It was you taught me all of that."

"We were not on the best of terms back then."

"Thank you. It truly means a lot."

"I can teach you how to sing."

"Thank you, but I'm doing fine.

"No really, you need help."

"Octavia says I sing nicely."

"You scare the baby..." their bickering continued as they returned to the blacksmith shop.

"Oh shit," Octavia muttered under her breath, seeing her husband trudging back through the snow with the bow and quiver.

"What do you have there gov'ner?" asked Merle as Nick got back.

"It looks like Ninian was a hunter." He showed the crossbow bolt to Octavia and asked, "Is this poisoned?"

She stared hard at it then said, "I don't have daddy's chemical knowledge, but to me it looks to be the same stuff they shot you with the other day."

That caught Trei between blows of his hammer. "Someone shot you, m'lord?"

"Yeah, but my angel fixed me up." Nick bared his shoulder to expose the burns to his flesh from Octavia's emergency cauterization.

"Ow! That looks like it hurt," said Calum.

"Not as much as the arrow... or the poison." Just then, Annabelle and Preston arrived from across the street. "Find anything else?" Nick asked.

Preston held up a small apothecary bottle and a packet of metal darts. "Same stuff he shot at you last night."

Annabelle held up a fat leather coin purse. "We found this under a floorboard. They forgot their blood money."

Ignoring the questions from The Boys, Octavia said, "let's lock up these things in the bookstore, we have a meeting to go to."

After a dipper of ice cold spring water to quench his thirst and help with the jangling nerves, Nick unlocked the bookstore and led the policemen in. "You can leave your parkas here; it's going to be warm where we go." Nick ducked behind a screen and came out a few moments later in what the policemen could only describe as a red and gold high collared dress. "Rule of thumb, if one or both of us are missing and you can get in here, look in this desk drawer. If you see a silver key, then I am dead. If you see a gold key, the Duchess is dead."

Octavia stepped out and showed off a similar dress to Nick's and Nick wrestled Marlon into an infant size version of the same design.

"Wow," said Annabelle as she ran her fingers over the golden dragons on the dress. "That's genuine gold!"

"All the gold embroidery isn't thread, it's gold wire." Nick opened up the diaper bag and took out a small box that was wrapped in a baby blanket. When he opened the box, he peered in and said, "You guys ok?"

"We're fine," said the fairy Sundrop as he fluttered out.

"Sundrop, we all need translators..." before Nick could finish his statement, three more fairies streamed out of the box and all four fluttered over sleepy Marlon and started squabbling. "Girls, Marlon doesn't need a translator..."

"Awwww..." the fairies whined and hovered in front of Nick.

"Just the grownups, one fairy each." Eventually, all had a fairy on their shoulder where they could translate and whisper in their ears. Once everyone had a fairy, they headed back into the depths of the bookstore's collection, further and further back where the books looked like scrolls. They kept going and the books soon looked like bundles of sticks and at that point they stepped out into a wide open room with a polished black marble floor, a couch like the one in Nick and Octavia's cottage, and the walls were hidden behind red silk curtains.

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Imperial Palace, Hunghung City, Agatea

An old man appeared from behind the curtains and walked up to Nick and Octavia and bowed deeply, saying, "Please forgive me for my conduct at our last meeting."

"Lung Mist, you had an empire to care for, we got out ok, and look!" Octavia held the baby so that the old Eunuch could see him. "He was born in a bamboo forest here, so there's some Agatean in our family."

"So beautiful," said the prime minister of the Agatean empire as he gently touched the sleeping baby's hand. In his 80 years, Marlon is the only baby that Lung Mist has ever seen close up. As if breaking a spell, Lung Mist said, "Last payday," and he gestured to the side. Nick recognized the official of the treasury, who came to them and bowed, then handed them two large sacks of Agatean coins.

"This is a lot," said Octavia.

"Last month you made an inspection flight over the turnwise prairies," said Lung Mist, referring to Nick and Octavia's escape from bedlam. "You earn them."

"This sack a gift for the baby," said the man from the treasury holding up a smaller sack that contained 1 and 5 ounce gold ingots.

"Holy shit," whispered Preston as he peeked into the bag.

"It's gold, it's almost play money to them. The real value is copper and tin," said Nick. "That's why we brought so many pennies."

"SHHH!" hissed Octavia as a small Asian boy came out from behind the curtain.

"Greetings Emperor Ying Long, Empress Ying Huanghou. Is that prince Ying Zhizi?"

"Yes it is," and as Nick and Annabelle quickly hustled through L-Space and left the gold in Nick's library under Bear Mountain, Octavia let their little friend Jia hold the lad known in the Agatean empire as Ying Zhizi Marlon, the boy born on the wings of a dragon.

Soon Nick and Annabelle were back, and Jia asked them to sit one last time on the throne of the Agatean empire. Nick and Octavia sat on the throne while Preston and Annabelle stood behind them. The curtain opened and, oddly, the packed audience in the palace was completely silent. They stared at Nick; their nearly identical almond-shaped eyes focused on him. Soon the future emperor's mother entered. Ning was wearing a tight silk dress like Octavia, her ebony hair done up in a knot secured by two sticks. She stood in front of Nick and she slowly sagged to her knees... was there a tear in her eye? She slowly bent forward, supporting herself with her hands, and pressed her forehead to the ground.

"I humbly beg your forgiveness," she started.

"For what?" asked Nick.

"Conspiring against the emperor of the Agatean Empire and the Duke of Wægn."

A rock suddenly developed in Nick's stomach; he expected nothing like this on the day after Hogswatch. "What do you mean, Ning? Speak." When she remained silent, he repeated, "I command you to speak!"

"A wizard asked me to help save both of our kingdoms, he say you were agent of the devil, you must be remove. Jia was right, I was wrong for conspiring. I apologize for my part in the conspiracy."

That explains it! The day before Marlon was born, she demanded that she be returned to Hunghung and she and Jia were arguing all the way from the castle in Lancre Town to the bookstore in Creel Springs. She demanded that Nick and Octavia escort her to the palace and when they got her there she closed their access to L-Space so they couldn't return and became very threatening. Afraid for their lives, Nick used the cover of the confusion caused by a pirate attack to escape.

"Who was the wizard?" asked Nick.

Ning froze, a few sounds came out of her mouth then she said, "I cannot say... the wizard make me not say his name."

"Who was the wizard?" asked Octavia. Nick had never heard this tone of voice from his wife before. It wasn't angry or demanding, at the same time there was no way that Ning could hold back. No secret could survive that voice.

"His name... His name... Nithe Skelm."

When Ning said Nithe Skelm, Octavia tightened, that name was known on several worlds, worlds that she had been trained on. "Was anyone on the court of Lancre involved?" Octavia continued.

"Yes, Orrell Slipspring, Silas Singe, and Placid Cadence." Both Annabelle and Preston worked to memorize all four names, Nick and Octavia knew the last three, and Octavia knew the name Nithe Skelm. It was actually more a title than a name, but the damage to Lancre is great. Ning just named the chief international advisor to the king of Lancre, the head of National Security of Lancre, and the Prime Minister.

The realization that he was here to judge this woman crashed down on Nick like he once crashed down on the previous person to hold the position of emperor. Nick looked up at the petitioners, hundreds of them lining the Great Palace, sitting on the floor behind long and very low tables. Landowners, farmers, shopkeepers and rich, rich men. It was rumored that several men in the room owned a ton of copper each, making them the richest men on the continent. Someone coughed, and the sound cut through the silence like a fart at a funeral.

Jia, Lung Mist, and Octavia stared at Nick. Treason like this deserves... no, it demands the death penalty. Queen Blodwyn was right, there was a cancer in the court of Lancre and it fell to Nick and Octavia to carve it out. He looked down at Ning, her slim body shaped like his dulcimer, for a moment he wondered what sex with the lithe, beautiful woman was like. "Jia," he called and the boy that will soon be emperor came up to him. "Jia, can you confirm what your mother said?"

"Yes, your grace, I heard every word. I was at the meetings."

"Thank you, we need to speak with my king... LUNG MIST!" he called. The new prime minister hurried over and bowed low to hear Nick. "I will pass judgement. When I stand, I want you to tell them all what I tell Ning and Jia. Understand?"

Lung Mist nodded firmly. "Shi da."

"Lung Mist, if you get any of this translation wrong, you too will be found guilty of treason. Do you understand?"

"Shi da."

"And do it loud, everyone must hear."

"Shi da." This time Lung Mist grinned, he likes to yell.

"Sundrop, I want you to tell me if he translates properly."

"Yes boss," said the fairy on his shoulder cheerfully.

Nick slowly rose, trying not to let their stares and the overpowering silence stop him. For the first time, Ning's proper name was heard in public. "Hau Chung Ning, look at me." Nick stoned his heart to this cute little woman, a woman that has been used as a toy by powerful men her entire life.

"Hau Chung Ning, I find you guilty by your own admission of treason against the Duchy of Wægn, treason against the Kingdom of Lancre, and treason against the Agatean Empire. The sentence for any of these charges is death."

When Lung Mist stopped shouting, Nick heard Sundrop's tiny, cheery voice say, "He got it right, boss!"

"Hau Chung Ning, because you were ensorcelled by a powerful wizard, I cannot hold you responsible for your actions, but the gravity of these crimes does not allow me to release you."

Again Nick waited for Lung Mist to stop shouting. "He got it right, boss," came Sundrop's cheery report.

"I sentence you to complete the investigation of these allegations fully, any failure to do so other than by reason of ensorcellment bears the death penalty. When the investigation is complete the remainder of your sentence is to be the servant to the emperor of Agatea for the rest of your life."

Ning looked up at Nick, her heart beating a mile a minute, she's going to live! When Lung Mist was done shouting and they weren't rushed by an angry mob, Nick turned to Jia and said, "Are you ready your majesty?"

"As long as I can turn to you and to King Verance for advice, yes."

Nick and Octavia stepped away from the throne and Nick loudly said, "I return the throne to a son of Agatea." Jia sat on the throne and Nick and Octavia bowed low to him. The crowd didn't need Lung Mist to translate, they understood what just happened and broke into thunderous applause. Lung Mist translated, his heart beating madly in joy, and the curtains closed.

"Thank you, your grace," said Jia, then a young boy grin spread across his face. "Can I still come and play with the magic dog?"

"Any time you want." Nick turned to Lung Mist and said, "I'm going to turn the business over to you. I'm taking Jia out for a walk. Give me security guards to protect the emperor. Come along Ning."

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Hunghung City, Agatea

Ning led the group on their walk down a crowded street in Hunghung city. The street was alive with vendors selling everything that could be worn, eaten, taken home to be cooked, and cooking utensils. Jia was amazed at everything: the items, the people, the smells, and the flavors! Meat, fish and vegetables on sticks with so many different flavors! Nick would pay for something on a stick for himself and Octavia, Jia and Ning and their four security guards with a penny, and the stall keeper would swoon. When they argued that they couldn't make change, and Nick would tell Jia, "Tell him it's a Hogswatch gift."

They found so many cute things for Marlon: dressing gowns and sleepers, blankets and a soft comforter that felt silky smooth called Agatean Mink. Four enormous shopping bags for that were paid for by pennies. They even found a man selling cones of shaved ice with fruit flavoring. "I'm going to sell these in Lancre this summer!" said Nick.

They ended up at a little restaurant that pushed a few tiny tables together so all eight could sit together and when the tiny waitress asked what they wanted, Nick said, "We want your cooks favorite meal," and soon Nick, Octavia, Jia, Ning and their four bodyguards were being fed fried rice, with different dishes containing shrimp, eel, beef and pork. Sweet, tart, savory, amazing flavors that never made it into the diet of the emperor because the emperor never ventured out of his palace.

"Ok, Jia, what was the lesson today?"

"The people!" gasped the little boy. "I've never seen so many people! So many shops and stalls!"

"Absolutely correct, YOUR people. You are the emperor, but it is your job to make sure they can cook and feed people like this every day. You serve them; they do not serve you."

"You're going to be a great king someday," said Octavia as she gave Nick a kiss.

"I'm just happy to be a backwoods duke," said Nick as he paid for the enormous meal with a handful of pennies that overjoyed the restaurant owner. Now he could afford all new furniture!

Arriving back at the Palace, Nick asked Ning, "Is it safe here or is that wizard part of the empire now?"

"It's safe here for now," said Ning, "but if Nithe gets control of Lancre, he will take all the continent. Then he plans to move on Agatea."

"Ok, we're going to set up a meeting with the king and queen of Lancre. I'm going to invite a few other people and I will guide you, Jia, and Lung Mist to the meeting."

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Creel Springs, Lancre

"Sieffre!" called Nick as he and Annabelle strolled up to the morning meeting of The Boys at Trei's blacksmith shop. "Sieffre, you've been holding out on me."

"Aye, on quite a lot of things, young duke, what did you find now?"

"That farm on the corner of Main Street and Lancre Town Road. My records show it belongs to you."

"Aye, and it's going to stay that way."

"I don't want the entire farm, just the corner acre with the rundown house and the collapsing barn to build the Highway Watch Station."

Now, all of The Boys were listening with amused smiles. "I don't want to sell."

"You can donate it to the Duchy of Wægn for a considerable tax credit on all your property taxes, or you can sell it to me for five ounces of gold and I'll donate it to the duchy and take the tax credit."

Nick knew that five ounces of gold was a lot more money than that lot and two buildings were worth, so did Sieffre, but the thought that Nick was offering that much money must mean that the tax credit was sizeable. "I will donate it, but all liability is yours," the old man said.

"SOLD! Let's go see what is going to be your new home, Detective," and Nick led Annabelle to the corner lot. Both buildings were in much better shape than they thought. All windows on the house were intact, the walls were solid, the stove and fireplace were solid, and the basement was dry. The root cellar still had shelves full of jars of canned fruit and vegetables.

The barn was going to need some cleaning before they could stable the horses there, but it shouldn't be too much work. The house needed a coat of paint inside and out, the porch leveled and the barn needed the doors re-hung, and the weeds needed to be cut back.

Back at the cottage, Annabelle was overjoyed. "We have a home, honey! We can raise our children there!" Nobody noticed, but as Annabelle peppered Preston's face with kisses, the wind outside came up.

That night, as the wind began to lift the snow that was on the ground, Annabelle and Octavia became worried about a storm, The Boys were talking about the "Valley Blasters" that roar up the Schist Creek Valley between Bear Mountain and Breeders Peak. Being in a bowl, Lancre Town never noticed them, but from Hot Dang through Creel Springs on up to Stomp, the winds could roar for days. The Valley Blaster that hit that year lasted over a week.

By the next morning, the Valley Blaster was in full force. One could tell that there were few clouds by looking up, you could see the sun trying to peer through the snow, but the wind blew the snow so viciously that you couldn't see forward more than a couple of yards. The cottage shook with every blast of wind and little snowdrifts appeared at every crack the wind could get through. The gatehouse was frigid, and the wind kept blowing the stove fire out, so Preston and Annabelle grabbed all of their clothing and blankets and moved into the cottage with Nick and Octavia.

The cottage was cold, and the only person that didn't mind was Marlon. His parents normally keep him warm. The fairies huddled near the fireplace or the stove and sweaters and blankets were the order of the day. Much of Nick and Octavia's time was spent playing the dulcimer and autoharp and they started to get quite good at their instruments. Even though they had the knowledge, they needed to train their fingers to play the instruments.

Finally, one night Octavia said that it was cold enough for the sauna to feel right. The wind had stopped, but it was bitter cold, all the animals huddled in the barn, Billy and Trixie were moved into the same stall, the rabbits moved into the bunkhouse which the boys said was nice and warm, but the chickens started dying. By morning, they would all be gone.

That night Octavia led Nick out to the sauna and he paused to look up and the stars were incredibly bright, then he ducked into the sauna. "Oh gawds you're right! This feels so good after freezing for days," groaned Nick. "Can we move out here?" The steam coming up from the rocks was thick, you could barely see your hand before your eyes. Nick and Octavia quietly enjoyed the steam, but as the steam dissipated, they noticed Annabelle and Preston sitting on the other side of the sauna.

"No towels!" demanded Octavia.

"What?"

"No towels in my sauna. This is a reserve for pure hedonistic nudity. Come on, off!"

Preston took off his towel, showing his slim but muscular build, but Annabelle clung to her towel. "Come on, take it off or I'll take it away," said Octavia. In response, Annabelle stuck her tongue out at Octavia. "I warned you," said Octavia, who was suddenly holding Annabelle's towel. The wolfling squealed and tried to cover herself with her hands, but Nick poured more water on the steaming hot rocks and the cloud of steam filled the tiny sauna again, allowing Annabelle to think she was hiding.

"Thank you, your grace," sighed Annabelle.

"Oh, you have a darling figure," said Octavia as she leaned back against Nick.

"I'm skinny!" the tiny cop pouted.

"You're darling! Doesn't she look like your lover, darling?"

"Huh? What?" gasped Nick, who was half asleep.

"Doesn't she look like Ning?"

"Her eyes are all wrong, and what are you accusing me of?"

Octavia turned and kissed Nick's chest and said, "You're crazy about Ning. You couldn't have sentenced her to death if she was holding a blood-stained knife."

"I care for Ning and Jia, maybe too much, but I love you and Marlon."

"Good answer," said Octavia as she slid her sweat slick body on to Nick's lap. "Doesn't Annabelle's body resemble Ning?"

"No, Annabelle has a sweet little body that she should be proud of. Ning is covered with scars. She's had a very tough life."

"How can you tell?" asked Preston.

"She told me. Her family was thrown from power by a..."

"That's not what he asked," said Octavia. "He wanted to know how you know she has scars."

"Oh, I uh, can see..."

"What the duke is trying to say," said Octavia, "is that his golden eye can see through cloth. Everyone is naked to him."

"It is NOT a blessing. Fully dressed old people are a blessing."

"You could see me naked the whole time?" demanded Annabelle.

"Yes. But I ignore it."

"You could see my grandmama naked too?" Annabelle's question was almost a shriek.

"Yes."

"Oh," the little wolfling sounded depressed.

"She pads her bra." When he said that, Octavia whooped with laughter and Annabelle broke out into a grin.

"I knew it!"

"I can see all kinds of things with this eye. Most of the time, I'm not sure what I'm seeing, so I've learned to ignore it."

"Like what honey, what are you seeing?"

"It's weird, l see shadows that aren't associated with anything..."

Octavia suddenly looked concerned. "What are the shadows doing?"

"They follow some people, they watch others. They aren't shadows they're completely invisible with invisible outlines. I see them by the way they distort things behind them."

"Are there any in here?" asked Preston.

"No, shadows don't get near the Duchess, but they circle her at a distance." When Nick said that, for Octavia it suddenly got cold inside of her sauna.

"Where did that eye come from?" asked Annabelle as she leaned forward and studied his golden eye.

"Lung Mist put it in. It was the first time we met. I had just crushed a small platoon of guards and they were scared of me and noticed that I lost my eye, so they made a gold eye for me, but it wasn't magic when they put it in."

"May I?" asked Octavia softly and when Nick nodded, she gently touched his gold eye and suddenly she was gone...

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Somewhere Else

"Hello?" called Octavia. She was naked, standing in a long hallway of whitewashed hewn rock. Closed doors lined the hallway, and she guessed that she was in their castle on Bear Mountain.

"No," said a voice, "this refuge is under a desert in what you call Tsort. They are connected, however."

Tsort was a far-flung mysterious desert land of camels and palm trees and massive temples to odd gods and pyramids built to trap time itself. Currently, Tsort's primary source of income was a series of extremely expensive yacht clubs catering to criminals and politicians from all over the disc. "Why Tsort?" she asked.

"We built strongholds everywhere in case we decide to come back. Your husband stumbled on to the one in the Ramtop Mountains."

"Come back from where?" asked Octavia.

"Wherever it is we went to, I suppose. Being an inter-dimensional vagabond is a difficult position to describe to the staunchly three dimensional, but the question is, why are YOU here?"

"I don't know. I was looking at my husband's goldeneye, and I touched it, and now I'm here."

"Ahhh, the one the fairies call Viimane Päkapikk, the elf that is not an elf. Our warrior, that is not a warrior."

"Nick is not a warrior!" demanded Octavia.

"That is just what I said. No, he is not a warrior, until the cost is high enough, that's when he's his most fierce."

"Did you enchant his eye?" Octavia was looking around, trying to find the source of the voice. It seemed to be coming from everywhere.             

"The enchantment came from the same magic he uses to change shape. He is going to need it soon. Tell him to pay attention to the shadows."

"Can I ask a question?" said Octavia.

"You may," said the voice.

"Who are you?" Then suddenly she was back in the sauna, her finger gently touching Nick's golden eye.

"I'm your husband, the father of your child, keeper of your chickens, but I'm failing at that task miserably."

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

Lancre Castle

Mister Morose stropped his razor blade using the leather strop attached to the table his "guest" was strapped to. He would lift the razor and examine the edge, then go back to stropping. Never quite satisfied with his work, he continued to strop as he said, "Now Mister Nutley, we are going to ask one more time. Who hired you to kill the Duke of Wægn?"

Laurence Nutley watched the razorblade travel up and down the leather strop. "Ninian! Ninian McKenna! It was all his idea," the former Laurence Nutley gasped.

"We all know that wasn't the case," said Mister Morose as he handed the razor to Mister Morose, who plucked a hair and sliced it with the razor. Nodding in approval to Mister Morose, Mister Morose advanced on the shrieking would be assassin.

"Skelm!" Laurence Nutley shouted, "It was Nithe Skelm! He gave us the idea; he gave us the money! He said we were back-up if Plan A didn't work."

"So you were Plan B. What is Plan C?" asked Mister Morose as he advanced on Laurence Nutley.

Suddenly, Laurence started screaming and writhing against his bonds. He twisted, screamed in horror and was gone.

Mister Morose looked at Mister Morose in shock; they turned to Mister Morose who was sitting at a desk, pen in hand. "Did you get that?"

"Nithe Skelm. I'm aware of him, he causes a lot of trouble on a lot of worlds."

Mister Morose tore off his blood splattered smock and threw it in a laundry bin. "What are we going to do now?"

"I don't know," said Mister Morose as he adjusted his tiny glasses, "wanna go bowling?"

"You always want to go bowling."

"It's nickel beer night for the women."

Mr. Morose grinned, "I'm in!"

"You guys go ahead," said Mr. Morose. "I have to finish this report or the king will have a fit."

"Ok, we'll catch you later," and Mister Morose and Mister Morose left, leaving Mister Morose behind to complete the paperwork.

Mister Morose is a set of identical triplets, exactly identical. They start questioning the prisoners, working individually. They work in four-hour shifts, changing round the clock, asking identical questions, using the identical methods of "inspiration." After a while, the prisoner sees two Mister Moroses, and eventually a third sitting nearby taking notes. They talk, they always talk. But this time their "guest" disappeared, leaving the smell of sulfur and old sewage... a sure sign of the dungeon dimension.

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

Partridge Cottage, Creel Springs

The blizzard went on for over a week. All the chickens died within the first couple of days of the storm, the rabbits survived happily in the bunkhouse and the four farmhands, Alphie, Carl, Dexter, and Bert loved them too, unfortunately they didn't put the rabbits back in the hutch the way they came out and before the winter was over, the number of rabbits on the farm quadrupled. The rest of the animals, except for Nan, their cow, survived. Nan, however, was old and didn't make it.

Nick spent the storm week calculating the tax burdens of each of his duchy property holders. His work dominated the dinner table, books and documents stacked up in just the right order, but he and Octavia eventually came up with a simplified tax code that made the burden as fair as possible. Comparatively, next year's tax calculations will be a breeze. He also had several births that winter. Two of them were during the blizzard, of course.

When the messenger candle lit up, letting Nick know he was needed, the storm was at its peak. Nick transformed into a Rammerock Mountain Lion to get to their location. Through the barbarian lands rimwards of NoThingfjord and widdershins of Genua and Kythia lie the frigid Rammerock Mountains and there the Rammerock Mountain Lion lives. It is fierce, tireless and has a heavy coat of incredibly soft, pure white hair. Nick got to the remote locations safely, and he delivered the babies, and returned to the cottage alive. The danger was that Octavia fell in love with that fur and Nick was terrified of waking up a bedspread.

When the storm ended, it was sudden. Suddenly, the wind stopped, and the sun came out. The temperatures rose and people emerged to find their world re-arranged. Houses were buried under massive snow drifts and people had to escape through their attics. Nick and Preston went out and checked every single homestead in the duchy looking to see if anyone needed help and he found a few occupied homes completely buried by massive snow drifts. He organized a work team to dig the families out. One family came out shocked to see him. "Yer grace? You are here?"

"Where else should I be?" he asked with a grin as the family emerged from the house for the first time in twelve days.

"The old duke wintered at a beach estate in Farferee."

"It would take most of the autumn to get there!" gasped Nick. Farferee was as far away from Lancre as one could get and still be on the disc. He's going to have to look through the books to see if there're expenditures that would verify this accusation.

The only breaks he took were visits to Lancre Castle for Preston and Annabelle's wedding presentation and the weekly court meetings. Being the only wedding in the month of Ick, Preston and Annabelle's wedding presentation was a warm event held in the Royal Chambers. The newlyweds had lunch with the king and queen and emerged from the chambers with huge smiles, hugging each other tightly. "What did they say?" asked Octavia as they headed back to the cottage.

"Let's just say that we can't wait for hot summer afternoons in the pond," said Preston with a grin. The royal couple loved to relax in the pond and Nick and Octavia were sure they were skinny dipping on hot summer evenings. King Verance may have no sense of humor, but he does appreciate the concept of fun.

At the court meetings, Nick and Octavia remained quiet. Normally. Nick observed his court members more closely than he did the previous year, looking to see if any had a "shadow" worth noticing, and to him there always seemed to be a shadow that hung near one of the three that Ning named, Viscount Slipspring, Baron Singe, and Baron Cadence. Nick found it odd that the three traitors had the lowest ranks in nobility, with Baron being the lowest. Count Slipspring was not a count, he was a viscount, one step up from baron but he insisted on the title Count. The court held no Earls or Marquess, and Nick wondered why that was. Was this merely a game of royal jealousy? The Prime Minister and Lead Lord were elected positions, but the rest were royal appointments. Nick wasn't born to royalty, he was made a duke, the highest rank of nobility other than prince or king for his actions, bypassing the hereditary titles of Marquis, Earl, Viscount and Baron.

"Your highness, we must increase the size of the standing army! My intelligence reports that the Duchy of Wousterwickshire is planning to mobilize their forces this spring!" demanded Orrell Slipspring, the head of National Security.

"Your highness," Nick said as he stood and bowed. He rarely spoke in court meetings, but when he did, he was a firebrand. "I stand in opposition to such a truculent request. The Duchy of Wousterwickshire is in no way planning to mobilize anything. Their entire army is no larger than our current palace guard and they intend to be busy planting their fields. Colonel Handpipe is their commander, and I recently delivered his daughter's baby. We had long talks while waiting and the Duke of Wousterwickshire, Lolar Hampton, was there much of the time. Duke Hampton agrees with me when I say that if anything is a threat to our peace and security, it is the bandits in the hills outside of these palace walls. I would be happy to introduce the members of this court, like Viscount Slipspring to a few bandits. I deal with them every day."

"What were you doing birthing a child in Wousterwickshire?" demanded Viscount Slipspring. "You're the witch of Tallywiffle county."

"Infants know no boundaries. I was touring the turnwise region of Wægn when a rider came and asked for my assistance." Nick turned and faced Slipspring and said, "I'd rather listen to the cries of a newborn than the blithering of a warmonger."

"Are you making an accusation, Duke Worblehat-Stein?"

"I am merely pointing out the obvious, Viscount Slipspring. Every week you demand more and more soldiers, but as of yet, you have failed to present any reason to feed, clothe, house, and train those soldiers."

Slipspring fumed. He demanded to be addressed as Count rather than Viscount, but Nick refuses to do that. Now Baron Placid Cadence, the Prime Minister, rose to support Viscount Slipspring, "Your highness, the house of commons has voted on this measure and by a measure of 47 to 44 passed..."

"CALL THE QUESTION!" called Octavia. To call the question is to demand the results of a roll call vote. Too often Baron Cadence has come before the king and said that a voice vote, a vote of yays or nays, had a numerical value. Many votes are voted down in a voice vote, but the Prime Minister is reporting them incorrectly to the king and regardless of the actions of the parliament, the king's word is law.

"Your highness, the court wizard dares to question my word? How do we not know that she will ensorcel me?" demanded Baron Cadence.

"Pardon, your highness, may I have a word with the Prime Minister?"

"Please do Sir Pommeraie."

Nick turned to Baron Cadence and stood almost touching him. Nick is five foot three and Baron Cadence is six foot tall, but when Nick's ire is up, he stands taller than the baron. Nick said softly, "Both the Duchess and I were there with Crown Princess Esmeralda to observe the vote. It was voted down almost unanimously. Now what say you... baron?" and he stepped away.

Lord Cadence did a slow burn, his face turned red, and he glared at Nick, then he glared at the King, the Queen, and Crown Princess Esmeralda who was playing "Goo-goo Eyes" with Marlon, who she was holding. She smiled smugly back at the prime minister. "Apologies, your highness," said Baron Cadence, "but I cannot find my notes from the vote tally. I withdraw my objection."

"You mean that you withdraw your support of Viscount Slipspring's ill-advised request," said Nick.

"Sir Pommeraie," the king spoke in a harsh tone, "There is a time and a place."

"My humble apologies, your highness," said Nick and he bowed deeply.

"You have made an enemy," whispered Cadence, "a powerful enemy."

"When you see him," said Nick softly, "tell him I'm ready for him." And he turned his back on Baron Cadence.

"That is all, gentlemen, until next Thursday we are adjourned. Sir Pommeraie! Damme Octavia! To my quarters, we will discuss respect and how this process is to be held." With that, the king stomped off.

Fifteen minutes later in the King and Queen's quarters Nick and King Verance were sipping a pint of ale with Queen Magrat who was sipping "Floral Ale" and Octavia was playing darts against Princess Esmirelda. Marlon snoozed happily in Annabelle's arms; the first hints of a baby bump were pressing against her uniform. Behind her stood proud future papa. Now Preston has the honor of guarding the Duke and Duchess of Wægn and his own family.

"As soon as the winter breaks and we can get a start on the Watch House, we will have the meeting," said Nick as he sipped his ale.

"Keep us informed." King Verance gestured to the barman for another pint, then he remembered, "I'm supposed to be lecturing you on protocol. You're skirting the fringes of insubordination, but it appears that you know where the line is drawn."

"I've heard rumors of a line," Nick responded as he passed the fresh pint to his king. "Mister Cadance was lying, as was Slipspring. I couldn't believe their gall! To attempt to build up the military for their own personal reasons!"

"What reasons would those be?" asked Queen Magrat.

"Insurrection," said Nick.

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

Duchy of Wægn Highway Watch House #1

Construction of the new watch house started as soon as the temperatures rose. A fire was lit in the stove of the old farmhouse and work began. Offices were built. Now, when entering the front door, you're walking up to the desk sergeant's counter. The first item that was completed was the commander's apartment, a common room with a stove for heat and cooking and three rooms off that. Annabelle and Preston moved in as soon as the paint dried and the fumes didn't get to them. While all this was going on, the "volunteers" from Ankh-Morpork were scheduled to show up.

Detective Sergeant Cheery Littlebottom, an openly female dwarf of the Ankh-Morpork watch, got off the day coach at the bookstore with constable Slumnut, a human in his 20s, Sergeant Sally von Humpeding, a vampire and a "black ribboner" who refuses to drink human blood. With them was Angua von Überwald, a captain in the force. They looked around the tiny mountain village of Creel Springs. Spring was starting to show its presence, snow was starting to melt and run through the ditches that lined Main Street. Nothing looked open except for the blacksmith shop where the blacksmith labored at an iron bar he was pounding on with all his might. Sparks flew as Cheery walked up and said, "Excuse me, can you tell me where the Watch house is?"

The blacksmith glanced over his shoulder quickly and said, "It's right where you left it," and went back to work.

"EXCUSE ME?" snarled Captain Angua. She didn't like her little friend ignored for any reason.

Trei straightened up and eyed up the four watchmen, especially the dwarf Cheery. "I apologize. I thought you were someone else."

"Someone else?" demanded Daf Slumnut. "How can you mistake a female dwarf for anyone else?"

"When you get to the Watch house, you will understand. It's just up at that intersection. Oh, by the way. Can you give this to Nick?" and he handed Constable Slumnut a small wooden crate containing several heavy iron items. "They are waiting on that," and he went back to hammering on the iron bar.

Muttering under his breath about the heavy work going to the lowest ranking, Daf grumbled as they walked the few yards to a large farmhouse that appeared to be a beehive of activity. The sound of hammering and sawing could be heard as people walked in and out with boards and furniture. They entered the front door and found a proper watch style front desk with a proper watch style bell. Angua rang the bell and a few people glanced their way, but a loud high-pitched squeal rang through the building, "ANGGY!!!"

"Squeaky?" said Angua to the blond-haired tornado that rocketed through the busy workers and slammed into the Captain with a bone crushing body hug. "What are you doing here, Squeaky?"

"I'm a detective."

"I detect you're going to have a baby," said Angua with a sniff.

"In autumn! The duke thinks around Sektober!"

"Does your grandmother know?" Annabelle's grandmother is Angua's great aunt.

"Yes! She's wild about it and can't wait to be a great grandmother. She loves my husband Preston; she says I bit him just right."

"I can't wait to meet him." Angua could only laugh at her young cousin's joyful outlook.

Just then, a tall, slim human wearing old, rag-tag clothing covered in paint splatters and spots appeared from a back room. "Captain von Überwald? I'm Lieutenant Preston Prescott, commander of the Creel Springs Watch House. We've been working to get the bunkhouse ready for you." Annabelle stood next to him and wrapped her arm around him. A wag of her eyebrows wordlessly told her cousin Angua that this was the father of her baby.

"I'll be happy to see it."

"Excuse me," said Constable Slumnut. "Where is Nick? I have a gift for him from the blacksmith."

"He's out back working on the barn, come on Anggy, we'll show you around," said Annabelle.

As Annabelle started to show the Ankh-Morpork cops the new watch house, Daf Slumnut went looking for this Nick character to give him the ever heavier crate of metal parts. He stepped outside and walked around back to the huge wooden barn. Six men were working on the immense doors, preparing to replace the hinges. "Hey gramps, is Nick around here?"

"He's upstairs," said the bystander, who was clearly in his 80s.

"Thanks old timer," which caused a "harrumph!" from the old guy, and he went in search of Nick.

"YOU! LOUDMOUTH!" someone yelled. Daf looked around. "YEAH YOU! GET YOUR ASS UP HERE!" Daf looked up and there was a short, darkhaired man wearing an eyepatch standing at a door on the upper loft, glaring at him. When Constable Slumnut began to mosey toward the barn to find a path to the upper loft, "NOW LOUDMOUTH!"

He hurried into the barn, hearing the snickers from the men behind him. At the top of a ladder, the short man was waiting for him. Before Daf could say anything, the man tore into him. "That man you called gramps and Old Timer donated that house, this barn, and the land it stands on to the Duchy of Wægn so policemen can live and work here. In Lancre, we don't go around belittling each other, we work together. Now you get your ass down there, apologize to Mr. Sieffre for your mouth, and get to work on that door. We've been waiting for those hinges."

"I'm supposed to..."

"NOW! Get to work or by god I'll see you on the next train to Ankh-Morpork tied up in the baggage car with a note telling Duke Vimes to keep his help, I can hire better trained monkeys from the zoo!"

"Ook!" agreed an orangutan that was listening as he rigged a pulley in the rafters.

Mortified, Daf Slumnut made his way down to the front of the barn where the men were no longer sniggering, they were doubled over in laughter at his expense. "Way to go city boy!" laughed a local. "First day on the job and you piss off the Duke of Wægn."

"Wha?"

"Sieffre Merrick is like a dad to the duke, and you go call the duke's favorite names."

"Oh crap," groaned Daf. "This stuff for Nick, is Nick here?" which caused even more laughter.

"Nick just chewed ten pounds off of your ass!"

A huge man, tears of laugher streaming from his eyes, put a hand on Daf's shoulder. "Come on city boy, we'll show you how to rehang a barn door.

Inside the watch house, Cheery, Angua and Annebelle watched the events from the porch. "Your trainee is acting up again, Sally," said Cheery.

"Oh lord, now what did Daf do now?" groaned Sergeant Sally von Humpeding.

"He just pissed off the duke," said Annebelle, who explained what happened. The vampire cop was not happy.

"I'll go talk to Mister Merrick, she sighed and headed over to the man who watched the progress on the barn work.

"Let me show you the lab," said Annabelle, and she led Angua and Cheery to a back room that had just been painted. It still reeked of paint, but it looked clean and sterile. A dwarf was working on a sink pump. There were several worktables set up like you would see in a chemistry classroom. They all have sinks with hand pumps for water.

"Try it again," came a voice from beneath the counter.

The dwarf began to work the pump handle and soon clear water began to flow. "You got it!"

The person that was under the counter stood and grinned, causing Cheery to break into a grin, another openly female dwarf! She was wearing rouge and eye makeup just like Cheery. That must be why the blacksmith said what he did. "Cheery, Angua, this is Axemir and Eryri Stronginthehead, the duke and duchess' good friends. They have a small mine on the back of Bear Mountain.

"Aye! If the snow ever melts. We can't abide a mine on a living mountain without a clear exit," said Axemir.

"Living mountain?" asked Angua. After years of friendship with Cheery, she thought she knew all dwarven idioms.

"She's still a young mountain, still twists and turns in her sleep," said Eryri, who, like Cheery, was overjoyed to find another openly female dwarf. Just then Octavia stepped into the room. She had a paintbrush in one hand and Marlon in the other.

After introductions Octavia said, "I hate to dash off, but the king and queen are here. Duty calls." She handed the paintbrush to Eryri and the baby to Annabelle and she took off the floppy men's clothing she had on to protect her blouse and skirt. "Ready Annabelle?"

"Aye ma'am," and they stepped out of the lab and walked over to the barn.

"I guess it falls on us to familiarize you with the area," said Axemir. "The Duke and Duchess are going to be busy for a while and we have instructions."

Eryri was at the window and gestured for the cops to come over. They looked out and there were two posh fops looking around at the bustling workers. "That's Lord Singe and Lord Slipspring. They're on the king's court and not to be trusted. They're working to militarize the army and the watches; we're working to stall them until the Duke and Duchess can figure out how to stop them."

"If they ask for the duke, duchess, king, or queen, be honest," said Eryri. "I saw the duchess step outside with the baby, I saw the duke in the hayloft."

"Where are they?" asked Cheery.

"I saw the duchess step outside with the baby. Last I saw the duke he was in the hayloft," said Axemir. "I haven't seen the king or queen, but I was told they were here."

"I get it," said Angua. "Why doesn't somebody show us the area that we're going to patrol?"

One moment King Verance and Queen Magrat were in the barn with Nick, Octavia, the librarian, and their bodyguards, then a moment later they were in Nick's bookstore. "Is everybody ok?" asked Nick, not everyone can handle Octavia's transporting.

"Where are the wolfling and your baby?" asked Queen Magrat.

"They stayed behind," said Octavia. "Transporting hurts the babies."

"Ook."

"Ok your highness, we're going to Agatea, then to the meeting, Dad is going to Ankh-Morpork first." And they headed into L-Space.

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

Somewhere in the Tezuman Empire

The Librarian led Sam Vimes and Havelock Vetinari, the top city policeman and the man who actually ran the city, arguably the two most powerful men in Ankh-Morpork, through the maze of bookshelves. They went in at the Unseen University library and came out somewhere completely different. Everything about this library shouted "Foreign" to Sam. The chairs were too low, the tables too narrow, the books too big and the air too humid. The foreign walls were made with large foreign stone blocks with foreign pictogram carvings. Then the librarian led them out onto a balcony where they could see for hundreds of miles.

They were deep in the Tezuman jungles and high up in a Tezumanian pyramid and below them sprawled the city of Poxalotl. This was an entirely odd place for a library large enough and powerful enough to delve into L-Space, especially because the entire nation is illiterate and their national religion is slaughtering virgins. The fact is that the Tezuman people don't understand books; they don't have time for books, they're too busy fighting back the fast-growing jungle. However, every explorer that they cut the heart out of had many books in their belongings. Because the explorers spent hours staring at the books, the Tezumanians thought that the books were deities. The Tezumanian high priests collected all the books and placed them in a specific tomb in their great pyramid and eventually the collection reached L-Space.

It was hot, it was humid, the air itself felt like it was carrying incurable diseases. The Tezuman jungle was home to mosquitos the size of hummingbirds, and bloodthirsty hummingbirds the size of chickens. The Tezuman language had 154 words for mold, 163 words for mildew, and 1078 words for foot rot.

In an empty room next to the library the players assembled, King Verance and Queen Magrat, Lolar Hampton the Duke of Wousterwickshire, Havelock Vetinari, Sam Vimes the Duke of Ankh, Blodwyn Rhysdottir Low Queen of the Dwarves, Ladies Serafine and Lucricia von Überwald (werewolves) and Lady Margolotta Crassina von Überwald (vampire).

A week before the meeting, Serafine and Lucricia von Überwald had tea with Annabelle. Flush with her pregnancy, Annabelle was anxious to get this talk over because all Serafine and Lucricia ever seem to do is fight. "Ve vant you to know firsht unt foremost iz zat ve luf you, ja?"

"Yes grandma, I understand." Annabelle knew that anytime a grandmother-granddaughter speech starts like that, it always ends in tears.

"I haven't been fully honest vit you, you are not a halflink. Your mother vas my daughter Liana, and Liana vas vhat ve call ein yennork, she could not change from her human schape to a volf."

"I know that."

"Vat your grantmother ist trying to say," said Sarafine, Angua's mother, "Your father ist mine son Andrei, und he ist das yennork."

"I... I... my mother and father are first cousins?"

"Ist not problem in verevolf society, but both of your parents were yennork, vich means you are yennork also... probably... maybe. That ist vy ve tell you are halfling," said her grandmother, "ve did not vant you to be angry if your monthly change didn't happen. You are full verevolf, you chust can't change."

"Thank you," she said. Now she was confused. She was happy being a halfling, but now... her dad was Andri? Andri was a yennork, and he was stuck as a wolf. Her mother was a yennork stuck as a human and... eeewww. Annabelle started to feel her lunch come up. Andri was driven off by his own brother Wolfgang, did Wolfgang kill her mother? On the bright side, Angua isn't her cousin anymore, Angua is her aunt.

Überwald families are complex.

They gathered around a long, low conference table and were served mounds of fruit and a cup of cold chocolate, an invigorating but bitter drink. "Beyond the obvious, I wish we were not here," said King Verance. He called this meeting, so he gets the straightforward part, a few words of introduction. Anything beyond that is too horrible to consider. "Events over the past six months have led myself and my closest advisors, along with the emperor of the Agatean Empire, Jia Hau Chung and his mother Ning Hau Chung, to believe that a round world darkness is spreading across our land."

"My government is already infected with this nightmare. Our friend, her royal lowness Blodwyn Rhysdottir, has called it a cancer and it must be cut out. I called this meeting to make you aware of the threat, and to let you know that we are desperately attempting to cut out this cancer right now. If we are unsuccessful, you will know by the way Lancre has suddenly armed itself and went on the march. When that happens, you will also know that I am dead. I will not allow my beloved kingdom to become a threat to my neighbors and my friends. Queen Magrat and I have pledged our lives to this cause..."

"What threat are you talking about?" said Havelock. "It's stifling hot here, too hot to dance around the subject if you please." Havelock Vetinari never asks a question he doesn't know the answer to. He was just tired of the heat. He had to get this meeting moving forward.

King Verance looked uncomfortable and said, "Nithe Skelm."

Several people in the room went pale. "Scheiße," whispered Lucrecia von Überwald. Her niece, Serafine von Überwald, the head of the werewolves, looked horrified. "Scheiße, ja."

"Merde," gasped Lady Margolotta. Anything that can truly terrify a vampire must be something to avoid.

"Dermo," groaned Lolar Hampton. "This is a fairy tale! I cannot be true!"

"What are we talking about?" demanded Sam Vimes. "Does this have anything to do with the attacks on Duke Worblehat-Stein?"

"It has everything to do with them," said Lady Octavia.

"I'm going to let the Duchess of Wægn fill you in on the background. She has formal training on the threat."

Octavia stood up dressed in a white blouse and a simple denim coverall/skirt. She looked like a young, beautiful farmwife. One would not suspect that she was the most powerful magical being on the discworld. "The vast majority of my magical training occurred off world in round world schools. I spend six years at the foremost boarding school for wizards, witches, and warlocks. An entire semester was dedicated to the study of Nithe Skelm. Skelm started in a world that was nearly devoid of magic, to do anything beyond the sleight of hand required vast amounts of preparation and study. Not happy with simple card tricks and the occasional pigeon in a hat, Skelm began to consort with demons. In exchange for the souls of his parents, they transported him to a different round world with more intrinsic magic."

"On his new word he learned to gain magical power by instilling fear in people. Once he terrorized the population and plundered all that he wanted, he moved on to a new world. Each world he moved to became easier and easier to find magic, and his methods of instilling fear and terror became polished. Records show him emerging from the dungeon dimension and following a pattern. Starting with a small peaceful principality, he takes over the government, then rises militarily. He invades neighboring countries, builds up his forces using their resources and moves on to the next country. He continues this pattern until nothing is left, then he moves on to the next planet."

"Nithe Skelm is active in our world right now. This is a magically rich world, and he's drunk with power. He's infiltrated the Lancre government. If he gains full control, he will invade Wousterwickshire then threaten the surrounding duchy's to join or be trampled. He will then invade Überwald. Once he takes Überwald, he will sweep rimward through the Sto Plains and take Ankh-Morpork and their resources. After that, the world is his. In two years' time, he will step back into the dungeon dimension and search for a new world to plunder, leaving the survivors here to eke out a living on the bones of what remains."

"How do we know this is true?" asked Duke Hampton. "I'm not calling you a liar, but I don't want what you're saying to be the truth."

"You're absolutely right to despise our message," said Nick, standing up next to Octavia. "But he's not attacking at the top, he's taking over our government. He has three members of the court in his pocket, two more and he gains a majority. He collects weak, greedy people, people who despise their station in life and feel that they were somehow slighted, the baron that believes he should be a viscount, the viscount that knows he should be an earl. Then suddenly a common man appears and becomes a marquis or duke and moves to the front of the line and jealousy takes over. I appeared out of nowhere a year ago and the king has a new hero and friend."

"So you think there are going to be attempts on your life?" asked Havelock Vetinari.

"There have been multiple attempts on my life, I was taken captive and sold to the Agatean empire, I was attacked by bandits multiple times on my own roads, in the month of Ember armed troops lay in wait for me on my own main road, in early December we were held captive in Agatea, on Hogswatch Eve I was shot with a poison arrow, on Hogswatch day I was shot at with a poison dart at the Kings dinner. The next day, I entered a booby trapped building. As for the veracity, would you take the word of a ruler?"

"What do you have in mind?"

Young Jia rose and bowed to the assembly. "I am Jia Hau Chung, emperor of the Agatean empire. In the months of Spune, Sektober, and Ember of last year, I was a student of King Verance. I was approached by three members of his court who tried to convince me that the Duke of Wægn was trying to take over the government and had to be killed. I did not believe them but my mother did, and she met with Nithe Skelm and was enchanted by him and believed his accusations. In December she tried to kill Duke Worblehat-Stein and the Duchess." The young man bowed and sat down next to his weeping mother. They had to believe a ruler. It's how things work, in a court of discworld law, you cannot disbelieve the royal ruler of a government.

For a long moment the room was silent, then Lolar Hampton said, "Why don't you just arrest him? I'm sure that a few hours with Mr. Morose would convince him to find a new world to pollute."

"He's not in communication with people he doesn't own. And when he's somewhere observing a meeting, for example, he isn't completely there," said Octavia. "He's physically somewhere. We are guessing that he doesn't stay in his body."

"If we found his body, could we kill it?" asked Lucricia Von Überwald.

"Sure, I guess, but I'm sure he's taken safety measures to prevent that.

"Vot about vampires?" asked her niece, Serafine von Überwald.

"We don't know what his body can tolerate," said Nick. "We got to find something he's touched; we have a pretty good sniffer on our team. If we can track him down, we may convince him to move on."

"Vot iff he says nein?" asked Serafine.

"Then I kill him."

The meeting didn't go much longer. After hearing Jia's testimony, they all realized that there was a problem. Of course, they all knew about Nick's problems. They all had intelligence and were briefed every time a high placed noble anywhere on the disc was in trouble. Usually the trouble was a drunken shouting match heard by the wrong people, or being caught with a mistress, or caught accepting bribes from the wrong family member, but multiple murder attempts? The Librarian was getting ready to lead Havelock and Sam back to Ankh-Morpork when Nick came up to Sam. "Is there a betting line on me in Ankh-Morepork?"

"Right now, it's five to one against you surviving until July."

"Put this on me. My son is going to start walking in December, I'm not going to miss it." He handed Sam a five-ounce gold ingot.

"They won't take this bet," said Sam.

"If they don't, then they don't have a hair on their ass."

A crafty grin spread across Sam's face. That was an expression from the depths of the shades. "Where in the shades are you from?" he asked.

"Monkey street, but I got a promotion. When my father threw me away, he did it on Peach Pie street. If I got picked up by the watch, they didn't put me in jail, they just dumped me out on Treacle Mine Road and the next day I was back on Peach Pie street."

Monkey street was in the depths of the shades, a true wasteland, populated by drunks, drug addicts, prostitutes, their Johns, and the Stein family, Nick and his parents. He never knew why his father chose to live there and it's painful to Nick knowing that his mother got off Monkey street the way she did, but he hopes and prays every night that she was alive and healthy. Peach Pie street, where he spent most of his time after being thrown away like garbage, was relatively safe.

Sam smiled sadly. Peach Pie street is where the small boys hid, the easy prey, the kids that the big kids used for punching practice, the little kids they used to see if their knife was sharpened properly. Nick and his friends hid near the Unseen University, that's where he met a puppy named Gaspode. Many of his friends got sick from the magical radiation, but the trash cans were always filled with large pieces of food from the Wizards four daily meals. "We've come a long way, haven't we, your grace?"

"Yes, your grace, we have. Now I have a promise I made to Marlon that I have to keep."

"And that promise is...?"

"To spend my life not acting like my father.

Sam flipped that gold ingot a few times, then put it in his pocket. He knew a few bookies that would take this bet.

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

Nick, Octavia, King Verance, Queen Magrat, and Preston stepped out of the bookstore as the sun sank below Breeders Peak. It was cooling off fast and ice was crusting over puddles. They walked to the Watch House and saw the work that was done; the porch was jacked up level and propped up, the doors on the barn hanging straight and a new hasp and bolt securing it. Lights were glowing in the Watch House, so they went in to find a feast in progress. The new arrivals from Ankh-Morpork were seated at the head of a long table and were being told stories of "Life With Nick" by Annabell, Axemir and Eryri, and The Boys.

"Where's my baby?" demanded Octavia, but she found him asleep in Trei Metsker's lap as Trei and his wife Erin sat in rocking chairs listening to the stories.

"He took the little lad from Annabelle when we got here so she could prepare dinner and he hasn't put him down," said Erin.

Marlon's little eyes bugged out when he saw Mommy. he started kicking his legs and his mouth tried to form a smile around the nipple on the bottle "Grandpa" Trei was holding but he went back to nursing on the bottle. "Come on, little man, it's been a busy day. Daddy wants to go home."

Angua was thinking about the nature of their threat, not the bullies and ruffians on the mountain, but about the murder attempts on the Duke's life. When she could get Preston and Annabelle alone to talk, the details sounded like an old Überwald folktale, a horror story told to scare the children into bed. Daba Yaryar was an evil Überwaldian witch who lived in her large iron pot. The pot had feet and legs like it was made of sapient pearwood and she would chase down children and pull them into the pot with her where they would be cooked.

The problem with Daba Yaryar was that she wasn't actually in this dimension. She shifted in and out, which made it quite difficult to catch her because she could shift dimensions and get away. That won't work in reality. It takes so much energy to shift dimensions just once that it left the person shifting exhausted and unable to shift back for a long time. That's why the easiest way to shift dimensions is to rip a hole open and step through, the rip will heal itself and you're there, but that only lets you into the dimension next door, and for the discworld the dimension next door is the dungeon dimension.

What if someone did make a deal with the beasts in the dungeon dimension? What if a wizard said, "let me live at the edge of your space and I'll feed you innocent souls"? Nick considered this possibility; he's going to ask Octavia and his father-in-law to look in on it.

Nick and Octavia walked back to the cottage with their "usual bodyguards," Axemir and Eryri, who just got back from their honeymoon, touring the mines of Bonk, in the Schmalzberg region of Überwald. "It was beautiful," said Eryri, "the Rat Clock on the Rat Haus, the chocolate museum, and we went in almost every mine that offered a tour! As we were going through Schmalzberg, the dwarf capitol, two guards come up to us and escorted us to the palace where we had lunch with the low queen Blodwyn Rhysdottir!"

"I wonder who could have arranged that," said Axemir looking at his human friends.

"I hear that she likes to entertain newlyweds," said Octavia as she adjusted her shawl around Marlon.

"I'm told she's nice people... I mean dwarf," said Nick.

"Well, it was the highlight of the tour, thank you."

"Don't thank us, we were having tea with the Hogfather. Just a nice, peaceful holiday at home."

"It's going to be nice tonight, no running around, no worrying about the weather, we can just get some sleep," said Octavia as she stepped up onto the porch. "Gaspode?"

The little dog was laying in front of the door on his side panting. "Gaspode! What's wrong?" asked Nick as he dropped to his knees and began to examine his lifelong friend. Damn! All of his witchcraft medical training was for farm animals and humans. Small dogs weren't included.

Gaspode looked up at him weakly, "Don't know," the poor dog gasped "found a bone by the porch and I munched on that..." then his head lay back down. Nick scooped up his oldest friend, his very first friend, the friend that kept him alive in the dark days of living on the streets and carried him into the house where he sat with the poor dog on his lap.

<><><><>

Eryri arrived at the watch house out of breath. "We need a nose!"

"What?" laughed Harry Neumann. "you need a nose?" The village cobbler has been working on the donated police carriage and saddles since daybreak and, like everyone else, was a bit punchy. The cops broke out the wine to share with their new neighbors and the party was just getting underway when Eryri burst in.

"Nick thinks someone poisoned Gaspode."

"Gaspode?" gasped Annabelle, and suddenly she was gone, sprinting to the cabin. Only her cousin Angua could keep up with her. They were at the cottage in just a few minutes, tapping on the door. Octavia let them in and they saw Nick on the ancient and most honorable throne of the Agatean Empire holding Gaspode in his lap, wrapped up in a warm towel.

"What's the matter, boy?" asked Annabelle as she began to touch his muzzle.

"I feel awful," groaned Gaspode.

"He talks?" whispered Angua.

"Yeah," Annabelle glared at her aunt. "You do too."

"Yeah but I don't... I mean..." Angua met Gaspode months ago, the day Nick was found and freed from captivity, he told her that he wouldn't speak to her without a lawyer and she swore it was a trick that Sam pulled on her.

"He said he found a bone near the porch, that's the only thing he ate today," said Nick.

"What did the bone taste like?" asked Annabelle.

"It was venison, fresh venison, but... it tasted like copper," groaned the poor sick dog.

"Should I give him Milk or something?" asked Octavia.

"I always look it up in Reversing the Unreversible, by Gladimeyer Hornsby," said Angua.

"We still have that!" said Octavia, "It's in the kitchen."

"What did it smell like, Gaspode?" Angua was getting into it now.

"Vinegar, not the good stuff," Gaspode stopped to cough, "the stuff you clean pipes with... vinegar and tar... yeah, road tar."

"Got that duchess? Vinegar road tar. Look that up in the olfactory index."

Octavia looked at the back of the thick tome and started flipping around until Angua came in and showed her how to use the table... follow the Vinegar column until it reaches the Road Tar row. The results were Spirits of Coprophagia. "Now turn to the entry for the Spirits of Coprophagia... and it says that it does indeed taste metallic, some say it's like copper."

Together they found that there was no item that could cure the individual, but if the poisoned individual is still alive after 24 hours, they will survive. Octavia's heart sank. Wordlessly, she carried the book to Nick and pointed out the entry. He read it and nodded, then said, "Cheese? Is that all it takes? Bring on the cheese!"

Octavia looked at Nick like he was crazy, but the pleading look on his face begged her to believe him. Cheese was Gaspode's favorite snack. If they didn't have a cure for him, he might as well eat his favorite foods at the end. Octavia brought a platter with pieces of several different cheeses. Gaspode ate a few, then began to wretch. "Not in the house, let's go outside buddy," said Nick and took Gaspode outside where he began to puke up dark bile.

As the dog was heaving, Annabelle and Angua began to sniff around and they soon found a large bone next to the porch. There was a lot of meat on it, but they could tell in the moonlight that the meat was turning green. They took a sniff and looked at each other. They could tell who handled it. Lord Slipspring and Lord Cadence. They put the bone in a bucket and covered it with a plank held in place with a brick, then Angua let out with a howl.

"What was that for?" asked Nick as he carried a confused-looking Gaspode back into the cabin.

"There're wolves and foxes around. I just let them know there's a new bitch in town. They won't come sniffing and find that bone later." Angua then turned to Annabelle and said, "Let's go pup, we have work to do tomorrow."

As they left, Nick settled down on the couch with Gaspode. The look of hurt and confusion on his face touched Octavia. She kissed his forehead and whispered, "shout if you need me." She bundled up their fussy son and headed upstairs while Nick stayed downstairs with the groggy Gaspode.

When the day broke Octavia came downstairs and found Nick sleeping in a rocking chair with a limp Gaspode in his lap. "I'm going to go look for Spirits of Coprophagia," she said as she put Marlon in Nick's arms for a nap. "I shouldn't be long."

"We'll be here." The house started to smell like bread as Octavia pulled on her shawl.

"I made some lunch for you," and she picked her staff, Virga, out of the oliphant foot umbrella holder, then stepped outside.

"Where are we going?" Virga asked soundlessly.

"Our turret," she said and soon they were flying like a witch on her broomstick. They hung low over the trees as they rocketed toward the top of Bear Mountain.

"The duke is a witch, he has a broom," mentioned Virga.

"So?"

"You should convince him to fly it. We could go flying together."

"That would be fun, but he prefers soaring as a bird or a dragon."

"You should learn to do that, then." By that time, they reached the summit of Bear mountain and its mysterious four foot tall circular wall.

"Let's see what we can see..." said Octavia as she set the base of Virga in a hole in the stone floor inside that ring wall. Slowly, the little walled circle began to rise on a pillar of stone, extending from the mountain. During the Sorcerer Wars millennia ago, Bear Mountain was one of the tallest, deadliest sorcerer's towers, but it was defensive in nature. Now a sourceress has taken possession of the power of the mountain and has used it in defense of her family, and she is using it again. Like a telescope, the tower extended into the sky, but Octavia didn't notice. Her mind was far away. She gripped the staff and closed her eyes and Virga opened its enormous eye and they began to look for the Spirits of Coprophagia. First, they saw the bucket in front of their cottage. It glowed with a green tint. Now they began to sweep Wægn, looking for the same glowing green tint. In the areas this side of Breeders Peak, no other occurrences of it could be found. Soon the mountain had risen high enough so that they were looking down into the bowl of Lancre Town.

There she saw two instances of Spirits of Coprophagia. One was clearly in an apothecary, which may have a legitimate use for it. The other was in the basement of a large town house near the palace. "Hmmmm, should we burn it or should we glue it in place?" Octavia thought out loud.

"If you burn it, you may burn down the house," said Virga.

"Good thought, let's just glue it down..."

Down in the cabin, Nick heard a loud siren screaming. The fairies that were singing softly to Gaspode suddenly dashed for hiding spaces while Gula, the house gargoyle, tried to sing along with the siren. "What the hell is that?"

"Momma's getting frisky," said a recovering Gaspode.

"She's gonna shoot! She's gonna shoot!" cried the fairies from behind the trinkets and jars they hid behind.

Nick stood up and stepped out on the porch, baby Marlon in one arm, the other hand was holding a small bottle for the baby, and he looked for the source of the screaming, then he saw a flash of lightning blaze across the blue sky leaving a thin trail of the smoke of scorched air molecules, it streaked from the very top of Bear mountain and blazed rimward toward Lancre Town, a moment after it disappeared behind breeders Peak the sound of a roar mixed with ka-boom! filled the air.

Again, the banshee wailing filled the air, and Nick looked up at the summit of Bear Mountain and saw a ball of white light above the peak. With a roar, the second shot blazed across the sky and split the air with the sound of its passing. When his ears stopped ringing, Nick realized that the siren had stopped. Soon the local birds began chirping again, and he went back into the house and changed Marlon, then laid him down on the couch next to a sleeping Gaspode, made a sandwich with fresh bread, and began to practice his dulcimer.

About an hour later, Octavia returned to the cottage. "Did you have a pleasant flight?" asked Nick.

"Yes, how did you know I was flying?"

"Your cheeks are windburned. See anything cool?"

"Ummm... Eryri and Axemir's mine is still buried under snow but they should be able to dig out the tunnel entrance... the Yeti, Durga, and his wife Jjoti are expecting, they should have a Yetiling in the Autumn, they're getting ready for their summer hibernation... we noticed a pot of Spirits of Coprophagia in a basement in Lancre Town so we glued it closed." She shrugged, "That's about it."

"I saw the shots, was that how you shot my foot off?"

"Kind of, that's how I glued Horatio Tinsmith to the statue in the courtyard of Brazeneck College." She eased into the rocking chair next to him and said, "Come fly with me, the sun is warm, we can have a lovely afternoon."

"If someone will watch Marlon, sure. I'm not wild about flying on that broom, however." Granny Weatherwax left her old broom to Nick, saying that it's the only thing more cantankerous than Nick.

"Why not?"

"It crushes my nuts. Become an eagle, we'll fly together."

In the end, they put Marlon in a stroller and went over to the Watch House to see the progress. The barn was wonderful, they should be able to stable a dozen horses and store several police carriages and a sleigh. There were six saddles for mounted officers and Harry the cobbler took six mismatched, donated saddles, dyed them all black and polished them to a luster, added silver ornaments and now they nearly look like a matched set.

Inside the Watch house all was in order, the bunkhouse was set up, the commander's apartment was warm and inviting, and the front desk area looked like they've been housing policemen for months. "Can we help you?" a young new volunteer asked.

"Just looking," said Nick.

"Then I'm going to have to ask you to step behind the sergeant's desk or step outside."

"Ok, thank you officer... what was your name?"

"Simms sir. And yours?"

"Pommeraie de la Montesquieu Worblehat-Stein, but that's a mouthful. You can call me Nick."

"Thank you, Nick... if you'll step aside, we are quite busy setting up."

"Mind if we watch Constable Simms?"

"Not at all."

They really were busy with furniture being re-arranged, walls being moved and plans on the wall being revised over and over. Then Angua noticed the duke and duchess watching and waiting. "Why are you just..."

"We were asked to watch from out here."

"SIMMS!"

The young constable dashed up to the wily old captain and saluted.

"Constable, why did you ask the Duke and Duchess of Wægn, the founders of the watch house to stand outside?"

"Um, I thought, I didn't, I..."

"We didn't identify ourselves, Captain von Überwald," said Nick, coming to the young man's rescue.

"You're the duke?" the Constable said in a small voice.

"We come to talk about an aerial unit. We both can fly; we can use a broom or feather depending on the circumstances."

"Thank the gods we have a missing child. Most everyone is beating the brush right now."

"Can you watch Marlon?"

Ten minutes later, two Lancre Eagles were fighting for altitude and heading hubward. "How can we see anything from up here?"

"Let your eagle look, just let it know what we're looking for," came Nick's answer and soon Octavia realized that her eagle could see quite a lot of detail down that far. Soon they were flying over the farm that reported the missing girl. "Oh, no..." groaned Nick.

"What?"

"Their farm is near the river. Kids like ice and moving waters."

They were over the river now and suddenly Octavia saw a specter in black shrouds standing on a rock in the river. It lifted an impossibly sharp scythe and swung. Octavia cried, "There!" and began to dive. Nick saw it too and folded his wings back and let himself plunge, opening his wings, braking at the last moment.

Nick found that the little girl's body was pressed up against a rock by the flow of the water. There was no way that she could be alive. He's already snatched a child out of the claws of death, he's not going to do that this time.

"I DESPISE THESE JOBS THE MOST. EVEN MORE THAN KITTENS," said the morose specter as he sadly climbed on his white horse that was standing still a foot above the river. Nick returned to human form and stepped into the river and fought to free the six-year-old from her icy fate, but by the time he wrestled her limp body free, it was far too late. "KEEP AN EYE ON YOUR CHILDREN." Death slowly rode off as a shocked Octavia burst into tears as Nick shook his head, telling her there was no hope for the child.

The search party heard someone approaching and hope shot through each of them, praying for the best, but then they saw the worst. The Duke and Duchess were coming toward them, carrying a small, cold, limp body. A large man broke forth from the party and yelled, "That's my Amy!"

"I'm sorry Harlan," said Nick. "I'm so sorry..." Harlan Weathersmith took the limp body of his daughter from Nick's hands and wailed in agony. The heartbroken farmer carried his youngest home for the last time as Nick and Octavia held on to each other for support.

"If we had been here sooner..." groaned Nick.

"We can't save everyone," said Octavia through her tears.

The young parents clung to each other and wept, terrified like every new parent that greets death and fears that the same fate lies in their child's future. They clung to each other until Nick gave Octavia a kiss. "I need Marlon," he said.

"I need my baby," she said with a sniff and in an instant, two eagles began their flight back to the watch house.

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

The watch was a tremendous success in Wægn and the surrounding area. Due to popular demand, extra patrols were put on the Widdershins End allowing full coverage to Midpoint Station, and the Turnwise End extended patrols reached outward to the barony of Überskeld, whose people were clamoring for a watch of their own. On the treacherous Lancre Town Road as it climbed Breeders Peak, two and three patrols were on the road at any time, either on horseback or on a fast buggy. The duke's travel on the road was always under police watch, especially after Gaspode's poisoning.

Against their bodyguards' wishes, aerial patrols continued and luckily, the next missing child report was a rousing success. Nick and Octavia found the child playing in the woods, completely unaware that he was lost. The look of joy and relief on the parent's faces was worth exposure to the cold wet weather. The farm couple saw Nick and Octavia guiding their son out of the woods and the sight was more than any parent could hope for, and their happiness at the return of the son was the salve that Nick and Octavia's souls needed.

On aerial patrols, Octavia usually rode Virga while Nick escorted her as an eagle. On one occasion, they spotted a police surrey chasing a horseman down the mountain. They dove and flew alongside the cops and Octavia yelled, "What is the problem?"

"He robbed a traveler and stole his horse," said Constable Slumnut, who was training Scott Haven, the miller's son.

"Ok, ease up, we'll stop him and hold him for you," then Octavia and Nick continued down the mountain ahead of the watchmen.

The bandit glanced back over his shoulder and grinned. The police wagon was slowing, he was home free! He dashed on to the switchback ahead and rounded the corner as fast as the horse could carry him, right into the arms of a huge Ramtop bear. The bear was huge and mean and hungry from its long hibernation. The bear plucked the bandit off the saddle of the horse and body slammed him to the muddy road, holding him there with one huge paw. When the police wagon pulled up, the bear was roaring into the face of the bandit, slobber and saliva from the bear's mouth dripped down on to the bandit as the bear roared.

"We have him from here, your grace," said Scott, and the bear took his paw off the bandit and moseyed into the trees. The bandit was babbling in terror as they handcuffed him and piled him into the rear seat of the surrey, and they headed down the mountain telling him, "Good luck guv'ner. The duke has just set up a duchy court, so you get to be one of the first cases heard," said Constable Slumnut.

"He hasn't picked an executioner, he says any job worth doing, is worth doing yourself," said Trainee Haven.

"Most everyone has pled guilty and paid their fine, they were too scared to face him," said Daf Slumnut as they pulled up to a stop where Dame Octavia held the stolen horse.

As Slumnut tied off the horse to the wagon, Scott turned around and said, "They say the duke has it in for bandits 'cause he was robbed on the highway four times last year. Four times! But that shouldn't cloud a man's judgement, should it?"

When they got him to the watch house, Slumnut and Haven led the bandit up to the desk sergeant's desk. "Highway robbery and horse theft," said Slumnut.

"On this day, the accused, Gregory Pineknot, leaped out from behind a tree and knocked the victim off his horse and stole the victim's purse and horse," said Constable Trainee Scott Haven, reading from his notes.

"Hold over until trial," said the desk sergeant on loan from Ankh-Morpork, Fred Colon. "Unless he pleads guilty."

"GUILTY!" shrieked the highwayman.

Fred looked up at a chalkboard with lines and columns, each line marked with a prisoner's task. He drew a check mark in an empty spot. "Barn duty, two weeks. Take him out back, Nobby."

"Two weeks of mucking out stables," said Scott Haven. "You got off easy."

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

It was an unusually warm night; winter was gone and leaves were starting to sprout. Nick was going crazy. He wanted to go somewhere, anywhere, without a police escort. One evening, while sleeping with the window open a bit, the fresh air called to him. "Pssst, Nick, come on," whispered Gaspode, "the mountain is calling us."

Not being able to sleep, Nick slipped out of bed. "Just over to Erin MacClenny's cattle pen and back."

"Ok, come on."

They slipped downstairs and out onto the porch and were trying to decide what Nick should change into. Quietly Octavia slipped out of the cottage and said, "I'm going to be a caribou." She stepped off the porch and changed before their eyes.

"How come she flashes and sparkles when she changes, you just change," asked Gaspode.

"Silly dog, it's because she's a girl." Nick sprung off the porch and dashed after his wife as a caribou as well. Actually, the sparkling showed the difference between the magic that each uses to change. Octavia is a source of magic; she invents the magic on the spot that changes her into an animal which comes with a sparkle. Nick was filled with an ancient Elven magic, so changing into an animal is part of his nature as much as sneezing or shivering on a chilly night.

They bounced and ran through the remaining snow and mud, having a glorious time on a moonless night. It just felt so good to be free! They were almost at Erin MacClenny's farmyard when an owl fluttered down out of a tree and flapped its wings and squawked at Nick. "Thank you Agness!" said Nick and he shouted to Gaspode and Octavia who was far ahead of him "There are men at the cottage!"

"Who told you?" gasped Octavia as they dashed back.

"A witch, Agness Dempsey, she was borrowing an owl." They dashed through the tree line that marks the property line and stopped. Several men were approaching the cottage, making sure to step in footprints in the slushy snow, they were carrying unlit torches. One thug took refuge behind a hay cart and waited for a signal from the leader. Silently a huge Agatean dragon slipped into the air, its golden skin reflecting the dim lights, it's the perfect camouflage for a moonless night.

The thug behind the hay cart was waiting for the signal when he heard a voice. "Hey buddy," said Gaspode behind him. "Got a light?"

"What? Sure, hang on..." He turned and saw a huge rack of deer antlers lowering into battle position.

"That's my baby in there!" said an angry caribou as it gored him.

Gaspode watched in disinterest as a golden Agatean dragon scooped up two thugs, each with a burning torch and flew a mile rimward, dropping them into the millpond from fifty feet up. The thugs crashed through the ice, then after a long time, they surfaced and began fighting their way to the shore. Their noise and screaming alerted the Watch. "What is with these guys?" asked Cheery as she ran up to the pond.

"I caught them trying to set fire to my cottage. I threw their torches into the mill pond to put them out."

"Were the men holding the torches when you threw them in the pond?" asked Angua.

"Come to think of it..." Just then, as the men struggled to shore and began walking toward the cops, they disappeared. At the same time, Gaspode and Octavia watched as the man she gored disappear.

The fourth and final thug was caught by Alphie and Dexter as he ran past the bunkhouse. They led him down to the millpond where people were gathering and he started to scream to the watchmen, "DON'T LET THEM TAKE ME!"

"Buddy, you're under arrest..." started Alphie, but the prisoner continued to scream.

"I'll cooperate! It was all Lord Ca - " and he was gone. Alphie and Dexter looked at each other, confused, then at their empty hands, then back at each other...

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

"You poisoned his dog?" came the voice again.

"As a warning, an enticement to see things our way," said Lord Singe.

"And how is murdering a pet an enticement?"

"He stores a lot of trust in that dog," said Lord Cadence.

"And what did you get for that?"

"Cemented into my house," said Lord Slipspring. He had to replace the door on his townhouse. They couldn't get the cement off the lock.

The voice grew even more angry. "Our forces should be marching into Überwald by now, instead they're rounding up stray bandits!" The dark lord was angry. He was visible as a dark mist.

"We can't get Duke Worblehat-Stein to agree to militarizing his watch force. He has the king's ear. Once he agrees, the other watches will follow, but..."

"BUT? BUT!?! YOU'RE LETTING A GUTTER SNIPE DICTATE POLICY TO THE KING!"

"Sire, I..."

"NOW, it's got to happen NOW. It's already spring, the campaign for Überwald will be late, the other countries will be able to gather their defensive forces."

"The court is an open public forum! We can't move in public view..."

"We will do this my way," snarled the black mist.

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

Cobbler Joining I-Ecks, an Abyssinian type comet, soared through the vastness of space, gaining speed as it neared its home star. Soon it could show off its long tail of gas, but for two more Ankh-Morpork years (1,600 days) that tail would be invisible. In fact Cobbler Joining I-Ecks would be invisible to most living beings, its last pass around its home star caused a nuclear exchange between paranoid nations on the only populated planet in its orbit and there's no one left to watch the show.

At its current course and speed, Cobbler Joining I-Ecks is due to impact Mount Raruaruaha on the island of Nux, part of the island nation of Trob in the middle of the Discworld's great circle sea. Mount Raruaruaha is home to Alohura, the Trobi Goddess of Lightning.

An impact on Trob would shatter the Discworld, kill two of the four great World Elephants and badly wound the world turtle A'Tuin. A'Tuin refuses to let that happen, and she's got a few tricks that have served her and the people of her disc for tens of thousands of years.

She can't wait to show off.

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Nick was in and out of the Watch house all day Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, he had invited the Duke of Wousterwickshire, Lolar Hampton and his aide Colonel Handpipe to review the Watch house and they could start an exchange program for training, but the dignitaries never arrived. They had planned two full days of talks on Tuesday and Wednesday, followed by a visit to the palace in Lancre Town to observe the Royal Court meeting on Thursday. "Has any patrol heard or seen any hint of the contingent from Wousterwickshire?" Nick asked the desk sergeant on Thursday morning. "They were supposed to be here Monday afternoon."

"No, your grace," answered fill-in Desk Sergeant Fred Colon.

"This is not good," muttered Nick as a messenger hurried into the office. "He was supposed to be here Monday."

"Where can I find Duke Hampton?" asked the messenger. "I have an urgent message from the Duchess."

Nick and Fred looked at each other for a long moment, then Fred started blowing his whistle, recalling all watchmen. Meanwhile, Nick asked the messenger when the last time the duke has been seen. As all watchmen in the house and stable trooped into the muster area behind the desk, they were shocked to see their desk sergeant, Ol' Fred Colon, retired from the Ankh-Morpork Night Watch buckling on his breastplate and helmet. He had his truncheon at the ready. "What's the problem, Fred?" asked the Watch commander Lieutenant Prescott as he came downstairs from his apartment.

"We have a missing VIP, the Duke of Wousterwickshire was supposed to be here on Monday, there's been no word of them and now a messenger from Wousterwickshire has come looking for them," said Fred as he began to lower the bars that cover the windows. The Watch House was going on alert.

Lieutenant Prescott began handing out orders and recalled all off duty constables. "Keep in mind that this is a search and rescue, not a search for a wanted man. Neumann and Metsker, I want you on horseback in plain clothes. Use your own horses. Search from the border of Wægn and Überskeld, turnwise all the way to the Duke's house. Be especially careful in the Barony of Überskeld, it's getting politically sketchy up there. Got it?"

"Yes, sir!" and the two took off. Don Neumann and Wayne Metsker had been friends all their lives; they work well together.

"Ok, everyone else. Concentrate on the main road. Keep an eye on the ditches, knock on doors, talk to people. Sergeant Prescott and I need to escort the duke to the palace, so... sir?"

"You should really be here with your men, Lieutenant," said Nick.

"King's orders, sir. Annabelle and I will search the Lancre town road from the watch house to the castle. Fred, you're my #1 on this. Pick your number two and work him hard." Preston was right, the king ordered him to be Nick and Octavia's bodyguard.

"I will be at my farm until we leave for the circus, I mean meeting," said Nick and he left the Watch House.

<><><><><>

Thursday court meetings were a workday affair. Nick and Octavia always showed up in denim and flannel, often with the mud of the fields on their clothing and boots, because they had to be reminded that it was time to go. The more they worked on their little farm, the more they fell in love with it. They now have a dozen tiny chicks where they once had full grown brooding hens, but now they have the entire experience of raising the chickens from three week old chicks. Supposedly, one of those tiny puff balls strutting around and scratching for bugs was a rooster, so the cycle should continue.

However, this Thursday was the last Thursday of the month. They hurried and bathed each other in a big pan in the kitchen, then dried each other off as Marlon sat in the pan and splashed. They hurried with their fancy official uniforms as Preston and Annabelle arrived in the official police surrey. "You look so damn sexy in that robe," grinned Nick. In response Octavia gave him a saucy grin and undid a couple of hidden buttons, exposing a full breast, then wiggled her hips. "When am I going to get sole use of them again?" groaned Nick as he put an arm around his wife and gave her a kiss.

"As soon as your son grows teeth." She raised a fussy five-month-old child to her breast. "Until then, you have to share."

The amount of growth that Marlon has done since that horrible day that they fished poor Amy Weathersmith out of the river has been phenomenal. Nick was there to see every inch, every ounce of growth. Even when he was working in the barn, Marlon came along. He even joined the reading lessons at the bookstore, the hours of painstaking calligraphy, and chatting with The Boys at the blacksmith shop.

That spring they went to every homestead and farm and dropped off the tax expectation, which in some cases was phenomenally less than previous years. One farmer actually had the money for his tax bill, even though the bill wasn't due until Sektober. Preston and Annabelle came along and met with everyone, and the entire Duchy of Wægn was happy to have Watch Constables on patrol. Now they waited outside of Nick and Octavia's cottage for the duke and duchess to stop playing around and get in the surrey.

"Ok, we're on the way," called Nick through the window in response to Annabelle's clattering cowbell. Soon they emerged from the cottage, Nick in his "tin soldier splendor" with glossy black knee high riding boots, sky blue breeches, silver waistcoat and red jacket with tails. He was carrying a baby bag that matched his waistcoat and he carried Octavia's wizard's staff. Octavia was wearing her dark red wizard's robe with shining moons and stars, a matching pointy hat carrying a baby dressed like Nick, except his jacket was made of the same material that Octavia's robe is made from.

As they left with a few hurried instructions to the farm hands, they were off. A surrey is a carriage with two full width seats and quite often it has a top. The police wagon also has a windscreen and roll down canvas sides for the back seat, and a cowbell for chases. It's the top notch police interceptor model.

They climbed the mountain to Breeders Peak pass slowly, combing the woods for any evidence of a traveler having gone off the side of the road. As they rounded a 180-degree turn for a switchback, Nick looked up and saw something. "A horse. I swear I saw a horse standing on the summit of the pass."

"We'll find out when we get there, I suppose," said Prescott, but turning around he saw that Nick was gone. He had changed into a falcon and flew off. Before Octavia could make up an excuse, Nick was back.

"Four armed soldiers and they're waiting for us."

"What should we do?" asked Annabelle, her hand on her pregnant tummy.

"We are doing the king's work, responding to a standing summons from the king. If they interfere, Octavia is authorized to turn them into a newt. Virga, what do you see?"

The softball size knob at the end of the staff opened its enormous eye then reported. "Four soldiers. Bailey Ogg, Cam Tennyson, Kole Abbey, Amery Readdie. They're all young and terrified, it appears."

"I know Bailey Ogg. He's Nanny Ogg's grandson, I don't know the rest."

"Roughians," said Virga, "ne'er-do-wells, imbeciles.

When they reached the top of the pass, the four men surrounded the surrey and ordered them to stop.

Nick stepped out and shouted, "Who said 'stop?' Which one of you?"

"I did," snarled Amery Readdie, the largest of the four. "What are you going to do about it?" Suddenly, the angry young man was a small, confused lizard crouching on a horse's saddle.

"I am the Duke of Wægn, lord of health and safety for the kingdom. I am traveling with the Duchess of Wægn, the court wizard. We are traveling on the king's orders and you are interfering with our travel. Who wants to become a newt next?"

"We were ordered to escort you sir!" said a nervous Bailey Ogg.

"On whose orders?" demanded Nick.

"Lord Slipspring, head of security."

"Does he outrank the king? Does he? Then you may lead us but do not interfere," said Nick, his voice was full of thunder and potential lightning. Soon they were underway again and Amery Readdie was back to normal, except for an annoying case of impotence that he will discover that night. The trip down Breeders Peak and into Lancre Town was uneventful, with no more interference from the boys.

When they got to the castle, Lord Slipspring was furious. He had wanted Nick and Octavia in chains. But these boys escorted them into the castle, up to the throne room and then announced them, "Announcing His grace The Duke of Wægn and her grace the duchess along with the commander of the Wægn Highway Watch Lieutenant Prescott and his wife Sergeant Prescott."

"Get over here. I told you I wanted them in chains!" hissed Viscount Slipspring. The four roughians gathered around the angry lord.

"They didn't want to wear the chains," said Cam Tennyson.

"She turned me into a newt," said Amery Readdie. Viscount Slipspring glared at him until he said, "I got better."

"Go get the other two out of the dungeon and keep them in chains!" snarled Slipspring as he returned to the throne room.

"Is there a problem Slipspring?" asked Duke Worblehat-Stein, making sure he understood that he didn't call Slipspring a lord for a reason.

"Not in the least," the little man grinned. As they entered the vast throne room, the king sat at the head of the table and looked horrible. He was pensive and nervous and he didn't greet anyone as they came in to sit down. The queen wasn't there, neither was Princess Esmeralda.

"We are truly in a quandary, my son," whispered Lord Baltimore, the only other duke on the court. "Lords Slipspring, Cadence, and Singe seem bent on war, you and the wizard, Lord Harcourt and I bent on peace and Lord Laird bent on a full pint of whiskey. He could fall into Slipspring's hands at any time."

Nick looked at Lord Laird, the lead lord in the House of Lords, and he was clearly drunk. "What the hell is going on here?" he muttered. Then he looked at sweet Annabelle, glowing with joy at her upcoming motherhood. He's got to get her out of here, today is going to get ugly. "Annabelle, go out to the carriage and see if you can find my magic wand, I think I left it there. Check under the seat cushions."

"Yes your grace," she said with a smile. It was a long walk back to the stable, a thorough search will take quite a long time considering there's no such thing as a magic wand. With the walk back, they should be finished before she returns. Then he glanced at a worried-looking Octavia. She was carrying Marlon... he should have had Annabelle take Marlon too.

"Your majesty," grinned Lord Cadence, the Prime Minister, "I move that we relocate to the Traitors Court."

"Point of order!" called out Nick. "Your majesty, this meeting is open to the public, our people. Traitors' court is off limits to the public."

The king ignored Nick and said, "Motion approved, let's move."

Traitors court was simply put an outdoor execution chamber. Seven foot tall posts stood three feet apart at one end, a firing squad of archers stood at the other end and four men were tied to the posts. Nick and Octavia strode directly to the posts, and in shock, they recognized the men. It was Lolar Hampton, Duke of Wousterwickshire, Colonel Handpipe, the head of security for Wousterwickshire, and the two young constables sent out to find them, Don Neumann and Wayne Metsker.

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Cobbler Joining I-Ecks was a big comet, and it was getting close, very close. It was getting dangerously close, but Great A'Tuin bided her time. She knew when to make her move, she couldn't move too soon or she would be hit, and if she moved too late, her beautiful disc would be hit, she's got to move at just the right time. She's been dodging comets for a long time; she knows what she's doing. And besides, she owes a friend a favor.

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

"What in the hell are you doing?" demanded Nick as he and Octavia, accompanied by Sgt Preston, strode down the firing lane to the four men tied to the posts with blindfolds. The watchmen Don and Wayne were beaten severely. Wayne is almost like a brother! His father is the town blacksmith and probably the most honorable man Nick knows. "THESE MEN ARE MY FAMILY!" he shrieked to the crowd at the other end of the firing lane. He started to untie Duke Hampton and Colonel Handpipe, "THESE MEN ARE DIGNITARIES! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?"

Slipspring gestured to the archers who raised their bows. Octavia just frowned, and the archers found themselves standing in an open field. She sent them to Überskeld where it would take several days to walk back to Lancre from there.

Lord Slipspring stepped closer to Nick and said, "These two men were caught invading Lancre, and these two men were spying."

"Duke Hampton and Colonel Handpipe were traveling under MY invitation, Don and Wayne were looking for them under MY orders." He turned to the king and said, "Your Majesty, I charge viscount Slipspring with kidnapping, battery, and attempted murder of nobility."

King Verance looked at Nick and shook his head slowly. He was mouthing words but nothing was coming out.

"Honey," said Octavia, "something is very wrong..."

"Can you get the captives back to the watch house?"

"Here," she handed Nick the baby who would normally be watched by Crown Princess Esme, then she and the four men disappeared.

"You just declared war on Lancre, our troops will be marching on Wægn within the hour." Slipspring was practically dancing with glee, while Lords Cadence and Singe grinned at Nick.

Something behind Slipspring fluttered, then he remembered what Octavia told him in the sauna during that horrible blizzard... "Watch the shadows."

Suddenly Octavia reappeared and said, "let's go."

"No, we have to fix this." Nick handed her Marlon and then changed his eyepatch, taking it off his bad eye and putting it over his good eye. He opened his eyes wide, and it was unnerving for the court to see Nick's golden eye. "Watch the shadows..." He grabbed Slipspring by the collar of his ridiculous gown just as the shadow behind him flashed, and when that happened, Preston, Octavia and Marlon disappeared.

Annabelle, who just returned from the stables, shrieked in horror as her husband, the father of her baby, disappeared. Nick felt a tug as if he was supposed to go too, but he kept his grip on Slipspring. Something snapped in Nick, there were no rules now. He still had Virga in his right hand and he pressed the nob against the side of Slipspring's head. "WHERE DID THEY GO?"

Lord Slipspring shrieked in agony as Virga pillaged his mind and that's when the sky started to darken.

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

The Great A'Tuin smiled to herself. Cobbler Joining I-Ecks was a big comet, and it was coming fast, but her timing was perfect as she lifted her great fore flipper. She was going to put on a show for her friend, for all her people. Ready... Steady...

<><><><><><>֎<><><><><><>

Nick saw the flipper rising above the edge of the rim with that golden eye of his, reaching higher and higher. Who are these people that write the Almanac? They're never wrong! He almost didn't hear Lord Cadence cackle, "Your family is in the dungeon dimension with the king's family."

"YOU SENT A BABY TO THE DUNGEON DIMENSION?" Nick has never hated anything in his life other than his father, but he's learning fast the art of hate. As Slipspring withered under the glare of his solid gold eye, he drew Slipspring closer and closer. 'Where is that flickering shadow?' Thought Nick. He tried to drive the horror of the dungeon dimensions out of his mind. The beasts and demons that populate the dungeon dimensions feed on life, if those people that tried to kill him were taken to the demon dimension, they're dead now. He's got to work fast to rescue Octavia, Marlon, and Preston.

There it is... that telltale unique flicker. "Nithe Skelm! I know where you are from. You're not from here where real magic rules. First, I will take away the sun, then I will set the stars spinning, and then I will take you. Return my people!"

"Who do you think you are, boy?" came a voice from no visible person. The voice began to chuckle.

Suddenly, the sky went black as A'Tuin's flipper reached above the edge of the disc and blotted out the sun and the stars came out - a Turtle Eclipse. "I've been called Savior of the Turtle!" shouted Nick.

A'Tuin's continent size flipper curled and dug into the æther and she began her 360° flip and roll, causing the stars to start to spin across the sky on curved trajectories. Clearly only Nick knows that A'Tuin was rolling to avoid Cobbler Joining I-Ecks. Doesn't anyone read the almanac?

The shadow behind Slipspring was flickering more and more, but Slipspring was fighting against Nick's grasp. "Knock it off," grunted Nick. Slipspring gave Nick a curl lipped grin, causing Nick to kick Lord Slipspring in the "gentleman's legumes."

In agony, Slipspring doubled over, and Nick could see the entire flickering shadow. Without thinking, he used his wizard's staff. Virga is a piece of pure sapient pearwood, the most expensive wood on the disc. It is topped with a jewel the size of a softball more valuable than the entire castle. Virga is a self-aware Master Wizard's staff, it's imbued with two millennia worth of magical knowledge and has more magical power than Nick, but Nick could only think of one way to use all that power.

Sometimes it's hard to keep track of which reality is which. The shadow was indeed flipping back and forth between here and somewhere else, but it's not a dimension, it's a reality. Nithe Skelm discovered that there's more than multiple dimensions, there are countless other realities. In one reality, he's standing in an empty field, the town of Lancre was destroyed ages before or it has yet to exist. The castle in Nick's reality was also an empty field at the top of a rise to Nithe Skelm. He learned that it is so much easier to bounce back and forth between realities than hopping between dimensions. However, he is entirely real in both locations and if someone figures that out...

Nick brought the most powerful wizard's staff ever created, crashing down on the head of the flickering shadow like he was wielding a hockey stick. With a flash and a painful sounding bang Nithe Skelm appeared, a small man with squinty eyes and a large bent nose, he looked like an angry garden gnome. As he crashed into Nick's reality, the sight of the stars spinning slowly across the sky terrified him almost as much as the sight of the giant golden dragon that scooped him up. "APOLOGIZE!" Nick's roar echoed off the palace walls and carried over Lancre Town. He held the hate fueled wizard in the left talon while holding out Nithe Skelm's other hand with his right talon. A white-hot breath of flame at Skelm's hand convinced Nithe Skelm that Nick wanted fast responses.

Annabelle stepped forward in shock, she had returned just as Preston disappeared. Is this angry gnome the cause? "I'm sorry!" the little nightmare cried. "Release me!"

"BRING THEM ALL BACK AND I WILL RELEASE YOU!"

Through the pain of being squeezed by dragon talons and his hand being burned off, Nithe Skelm looked up and saw the stars change directions as A'Tuin started a pirouetting twist, mostly to impress Nick. Suddenly, that view was blocked by the flame from the dragon's mouth. "They're back! They're back! Release me!"

Preston returned to Annabelle's feet, beaten and broken. While he was in the dungeon dimension, he tried to defend Octavia; she was surrounded by beasts that were hungry for her, her magic, and her baby. Weeping, Annabelle kissed her husband, but she looked up when Nick roared, "YOU'RE FREE." He opened his talon and let Nithe Skelm drop.

It happened in slow motion for Annabelle; she saw the little bastard falling, and she knew that he would survive a twenty-foot drop. It wasn't a far enough to fall to kill him. She leaped up and ran as fast as she could; she saw that he was starting to conjure as he fell, and she was going to make sure that he wasn't going to get away! After a couple of strides, it became easier to run with four feet instead of two and she crossed Traitor's Court with distance eating leaps, her tail swinging in the air, her ears flattened back and her teeth exposed as she leaped. With a snarl, she jumped up and got her jaws around Nithe Skelm's neck, just as he was about to disappear.

Nick looked down at the werewolf that savaged the monster that tried to set the disk at war and smiled. He didn't think Annabelle could do it. Turning, he saw Octavia crawling to Preston; her leg was clearly broken, and Marlon was screaming in horror. Quickly returning to his body, he saw that Nithe Skelm brought back several corpses. One of them was the king's son. "GUARDS!" demanded Nick.

"Your grace?" two guards came running.

"Slipspring, Singe and Cadence, gather them up and put them in irons, chain them to a post, then get some wood and build a pyre, and burn that body that the wolf is gnawing on."

"Aye, your grace."

Nithe Skelm dusted off his robes and looked down and the bloody mess that the young wolf was gnawing at. "The poor bastard."

"NO ONE HAS EVER SAID THAT ABOUT YOU." Death swung his scythe, severing the blue line between Nithe Skelm and his body.

"That's it then?" shrieked Skelm. "The most powerful wizard in the multiverse reduced to dog food?"

"YOU SHOULD HAVE STUCK TO CARD TRICKS, PEOPLE LIKED YOU THEN."

Former nobles, Slipspring, Singe and Cadence, were easy to round up, they were gazing at the sky wondering in shock how Nick somehow spun the stars. "Am I the only one that reads the Almanac?" he asked no one in particular. Guards gathered wood from the kitchen and lit a big pyre at the end of the court, then looked at the duke helplessly as the werewolf continued to chew up the body of Nithe Skelm. "ANNABELLE! Come here girl! Good girl!" The werewolf turned to the sound of the voice and looked. "Come get Preston! Come here girl! Preston needs you!" at the sound of Preston's name she began to bound to where he lay, and by the time she got to him she was back in human form.

"You changed!" said Preston weakly. "I'm so proud of you."

"Oh, gods baby, what did they do to you?"

Nick splinted Octavia's leg, and they kissed, fighting to hold back the tears as Marlon shrieked in terror. "Darling, hand me a pacifier." That was when Nick realized he had the baby bag. The strap was over his shoulder the whole time. Placing a "noocher" in Marlon's mouth, it mellowed the shrieking, the sound of his terror and anger came out of his nose as he gnawed on the nipple. "I built a ward around him, they couldn't get to him while I was alive," wept Octavia as she hugged Nick and Marlon. "They clawed and bit the ward, but they couldn't get through." Marlon slowly calmed down as he gnawed on the pacifier, while his mommy and daddy kissed and caressed him.

"I have things to do," Nick said apologetically.

"Go get to work," she said, then she said, "Hey..." and pulled him back for a kiss. "I love it when you save the world."

"You are worth the trouble," he whispered and with one more kiss he started tending to Preston using bandages made from the robes he stripped from viscounts, Slipspring and Laird. "What did you do Preston?" gasped Nick. Preston's legs, arms, wrists were broken.

"The demons..." his eyes were shadows of horror.

"Fix him!" wept Annabelle.

"Let me try," said Octavia and she placed her hands on Preston's temples. "Thank you so much, Preston," muttered Octavia over and over and slowly he began to relax. "I don't know if he'll ever talk about it, but he was a hero. He saved Marlon and me..."

"What... what was it like?" gasped Annabelle.

"It's hell," was all Octavia could get out, and she went back to hugging Marlon.

"I saved the world, but did I save my king?" thought Nick as he splinted Preston's broken wrist. It was grim, the king clung to his daughter Esme, she was clearly mentally affected by her time in the dungeon dimension, his son Exavier lay dead, their youngest, two-year-old Prince Abraam was nowhere to be seen, but where is the queen? "Where is the queen?" cried Nick. "Has anyone seen the queen?"

"She's alive, I can feel her," said Virga.

"Go find Magrat," said Octavia, "the king needs her."

Nick followed Virga's directions and found himself heading downstairs into the dungeon. "Hello?" called Nick, but there was no answer. Finally, he came to a cell that Virga said contained the queen. "Queen Magrat?"

"Who's there?" Queen Magrat asked. She sat up and looked around. "Who is it?"

"It's me, Nick."

"Oh, Sir Pommy!" she got up and stumbled toward the door, her hands held out in front of her to ward off bumping into something.

"They blinded her!" gasped Nick.

"There's no light down here, your grace," said Virga.

"Oh." Nick just remembered that he covered up his good eye. He took his eye patch off and, with his good eye combined with his enhanced eye, he could see everything, but he also recognized that it was dark. "Virga, give her some soft light while I look for a key." Nick wandered around the dungeon for a bit, he found what must be a guard's office with a large key hanging on the wall, the only other thing occupying the office was a skeleton in a partial suit of armor that sat in a chair. "Are you alive or dead?" asked Nick. Sometimes it's necessary to ask.

"I'm not sure, but I am animated."

"Can you walk?"

"Yes." The skeleton stood up and turned to face Nick, and was a bit grumpy. "I've been guarding these cells for two hundred years; I've never heard such insolence... do you ask everyone if they can walk?"

"I'm a witch, I ask everyone questions."

"A witch?!? You're hardly witch material," huffed the skeleton. "A proper witch is a well-aged female. You're but a young buck."

"Don't you believe in equal rites?"

"You have me there, sir witch."

"I am the Duke of Wægn, please call me Sir Nick. In a few minutes, we are going to lock up three nobles that attempted to dethrone the king and throw Lancre into war against Überwald. I would appreciate it if they didn't get much sleep."

The Skeleton gave Nick a lipless grin. "My specialty Sir Nick!"

"I'm going to escort the queen out and reunite her with the king. Please stay here. I'll be back with the key. What's your name?"

"Stan."

"Stan?"

"It's short for Stanislaus."

"I like it. I'm going to insist on some light down here, not a lot, just enough for them to see that you're a... a bit slim."

"I intend to enjoy it."

The cell door opened, and Nick led Magrat out and up the ancient stone stairs. "What happened here?"

"Your highness, I..." Nick couldn't do it. He couldn't form the words that conveyed the experience. "The head of defense tried to plunge Lancre into a war with Überwald. Lords Slipspring, Singe and Cadence teamed up with an evil wizard from a round world."

As they mounted the stairs, Nick stopped at a landing and stopped his mentor. "Ma'am... I have to warn you, the king... he's...... I'm sorry, I can't..."

"I am your queen. I order you to tell me everything." It was the first time Magrat ever had to say something like that.

Ma'am... Exavier is gone, and Esme is... she's not good, ma'am."

"What do you mean, gone?"

"The wizard sent many people to the Dungeon Dimension, including your children. Exavier passed away; several people came back..." Nick was having problems keeping it together.

Magrat held her composure and demanded, "And Abraam?"

"We don't know... he didn't come back."

He led her to the Traitors Court where King Verance sat with his daughter, now talking on a four-year-old level, and the body of his son, Prince Exavier. The king looked up at Magrat and burst into tears. She crouched down and hugged her husband while her twenty-four-year-old daughter, the heir to the throne, babbled baby talk.

Nick recognized a few of the other dead bodies, a couple of nobles, some guards, several members of the household staff, but no Prince Abraam.

"Let's go, Slipspring, Singe, Cadence, I'm going to show you to your new accommodations..." With a pair of guards Nick led the three conspirators down to the dungeon where he locked them up in cells with an empty cell between each of them. "Your jailer, Stan, should be around shortly. Breakfast is gruel, dinner is a gruel sandwich, you get one bucket it will be emptied weekly, please don't spill it."

"Lord Worblehat-Stein, you can't..."

"MISTER Cadence! Until you can produce a healthy, happy Prince Abraam, you will sit here and wonder what happened to your entire family."

"I had no control over Skelm! It wasn't my fault!" His shouts and cries continued as Nick returned to Stan's office.

Nick hung the key up and said, "They're ready for you, Stan."

"This is the best part," chuckled the skeleton. Stan lit his torch and said, "It's the little things that make this job fun." He walked slowly down the corridor and he peeked into the opening of each of the big wooden cell doors. He glared into the cell until he was rewarded with screams of terror.

Returning upstairs, Nick bumped into Baily Ogg, the young guard, and asked, "Where are all the guards?"

"The king gave them the day off; Lord Cadence told us."

"Go tell your Uncle Sean to recall the entire guard. There's been an attempt on the king's life... go!"

Nick returned to the Traitors' Court and sat down next to Octavia, who finally got Marlon to calm down. Soon he started to shake. He held poor Octavia's head on his lap and tried to calm her nerves, but she said, "They need you."

Nick looked over at the king and queen, who were trying to calm their daughter Esme and they were being barraged by questions from nobles and staff. "Damnit..." He got up and stood over Queen Magrat and said, "Excuse me, but the royal family needs their privacy, if you have a question ask..." he looked around for Lord Baltimore the most senior of the royals, but he was gone. "Ask me." He was suddenly barraged with questions. Looking around at the scene, physically and mentally shattered people lie around, mangled corpses, the remains of a well chewed wizard smoked and smoldered on a funeral pyre... "Let's go inside."

In the throne room, Nick glared at the crowd. "If you ask me for something you can handle on your own, you'll spend the night in the dungeon. First question... Anyone?" He was left with a few staff people who wanted to know what the king expected. "We need medical people; the palace must have doctors on call... get them in here. Or get me witches, find Nanny Ogg, get her out of retirement, witches know medicine. Anyone out there in the Traitor's Court who is injured is going to spend as much time here as they need, so start setting up rooms... do we have enough rooms?"

"There are over fifty available rooms, your grace."

"Stretchers, we need stretchers. Beg borrow steal, whatever it takes," said Nick, "and prepare for a royal funeral." The crowd gasped and Nick said, "We lost Prince Exavier and Prince Abraam." The shock ran through the staff, and some ran off weeping. Nick remained firm as tears rolled down his cheek. The memories of Exavier playing with Emperor Jia at his farm were burned into his memory. Little Abraam splashing in his pond with his mother... it's too horrible to recall. "Keep it together Pommy," he told himself.

As the guards started showing up, Nick got them to escort Verance, Magrat and Princess Esmeralda to their apartment. He spent the next few hours providing first aid for whomever needed it and arranging recovery rooms for the injured.

It seemed like it had been days, but eventually the Traitors Court was cleared of the dead and wounded. He threw more wood onto the funeral pyre and spit on the flames. Heading back into the throne room, Nick felt like he had never seen this place before. Somehow it has grown dark, evil. He gazed about the immense room and saw a familiar face at the far end peering in the door; it was Harold Lorechestershire, Steward, Chamberlain, Marshal, and head butler of Lancre Castle.

"The duchess would like to know if you are ready for dinner, your grace."

Nick was so tired, but he was hungry. "Yes."

"Come, your family waits." Harold led Nick to a section of the palace he's never been to before. As they walked Harold said, "His majesty may not recover, he has no progeny. He has no one to leave the throne to when he passes."

"He can adopt an heir," said Nick as Herald led him down a dark hallway. "It's an old Ephebian custom." They turned a dark corner and Herald opened a door. "This is kind of out of the way," said Nick.

"It will be hard to find you, and just in case someone you don't want to see is prowling the palace," said Harold with a knowing smile. "Out the door across the hall is the stable, you can be gone in minutes." And with a bow, Harold was gone. Inside the door was a warm, cheery apartment with two bedrooms, in one bed recovered Preston, in the other bed lay Octavia and Marlon. A central room had a meal laid out for the two couples, and Annabelle was already spoon-feeding Preston.

Nick loaded up a plate with roast beef and vegetables and sat down on the bed and fed his wife. When they were done eating, he curled up around her and Marlon and slowly became a black Bang Galore tiger. His soft fur and resonating purr helped drive the memories of the Dungeon Dimension away.

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The next two weeks were hell on Nick. He was acting as king as far as he was concerned. He answered petitions with the king's permission, and he occasionally flew home to check on his farm and check on the Watch. With their commander and ranking sergeant missing, Nick was sure all would devolve into chaos, but that didn't happen. The constables listened to Fred Colon and Angua von Überwald and came together as a brotherhood.

Nick presided over the Week of National Mourning for the two princes and was the go-to man for all questions. "Where is the king's chief of staff?" demanded Nick.

"Lord Ponder is one of the ones that came back dead," said Harold Lorechestershire.

"Ok, Mrs. Moxie, you're currently in charge of housekeeping?"

"Yes, your grace."

"You are now my chief of Palace Staff. Harold, you are now my aide-de-camp."

"But..."

"No buts, Lancre needs you. Serve or sit in the dungeon, those are the only two options I have available at the moment."

"Yes, sire."

"The people are demanding to see the princes," said Nick. "Let's set up two small white caskets in the main hall and a family portrait between them and let the people pay their respects." Then, turning to Sean Ogg, he said, "Sean, this will probably be toughest on you. Your troops are going to be my go-to guys. I need a guard on each coffin, door guards, and people to control the crowd. The Highway watch is sending an honor guard, they can help. Also, I need you to send someone to the Slipspring, Singe, and Cadence families and let them know that I cannot promise them protection."

"Cannot or will not sire," asked Sean.

Nick just frowned and said, "tell them that they may want to find exile outside of Lancre."

Lords Harcourt and Baltimore helped a lot during the next two weeks, and Octavia helped wherever she could. She created two magic urns that held pure white flames that flickered and sat at the foot of the two small coffins and when someone came up with a wheelchair, Nick wheeled Octavia to the King's apartment where she could spend time with Magrat and Verance. Nick got back to his apartment that evening and found Octavia on the edge of tears. "What's the matter, darling?"

"I tried to ease Esmeralda's pain. I read her memories, and I saw what happened to Abraam."

"What happened?"

"The beasts in the dungeon dimension... they ate him." And with that, she burst into tears. She saw the event from Esmeralda's memory and now she knows why the crown princess has mentally retreated to her childhood. Octavia cried long into the night even with the Bang Galor tiger cuddling her.

Every day Nick went down to the main gallery where the two small caskets were sitting, they were in the middle of the gallery where the band plays during events. There was a line of mourners that wound back and forth, and hundreds of subjects stood in line for hours. The gallery was silent except for stifled weeping and sniffling. He stood watching and hating himself for not preventing this.

"Your majesties," said Nick as he stepped into the king's apartment.

Verance looked up from his lap, his eyes were hollow and dead. "What is it Sir Pommeraie?" asked Queen Magrat.

"Please come with me," said Nick, and he led the couple to the main gallery where, if possible, the lines were even longer. They saw dignitaries from all over the Ramtop mountains and the Sto Plains, then Nick saw the Emperor of the Agatean Empire, young Jia. The young emperor was completely shocked.

"What... what is this?" asked the king softly.

"It's love, sire. The people love you and weep with you."

Verance and Magrat watched the mourners approach the tiny coffins guarded by pure white flames, two guards stood by the coffins, their armor polished to mirror brightness, the men actually fight for the chance to stand guard over their little princes for hours at a stretch. Verance held Magrat close as someone noticed them called out, "We love you, sire!"

When Jia reached the coffins, he threw himself on the ground, weeping. "My brother! My brother!" Weeping just as hard as Jia, Nick scooped up the young emperor and carried him back to his apartment, where they could rest.

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After two weeks, the king called a meeting of the remaining court. The king was cold and businesslike. "First, the barony of Überskeld will become a fiefdom of Wægn, as will the barony of Thrash. Sir Pommeraie, you have the entire hubward side of Lancre to manage."

"Thank you, your majesty," said Nick, not feeling thankful at all. Wægn was now 50% larger, with an added level of bureaucracy.

"I will provide you with the names of the families that will take over. I want Thrash and Überskeld to be run as successfully as the rest of Wægn."

The king wasn't messing around. He looked at Lord Baltimore and said, "The viscountcy of Stormchester is now a fiefdom of Pellingham. I expect our rimward borders to be as secure as our hubward borders. Additionally, I have informed the Parliament and the House of Lords that their replacements for mister Cadence and Viscount Laird will be honest, loyal to the crown, and patriotic to Lancre. If their replacements do not meet these requirements, I will dissolve parliament and the house of lords."

"Your majesty," said Lord Harcourt, Earl of Mallburg, "Lord Laird was not part of the insurrection... was he?"

"No, but he did not rise to the defense of the crown, either. I can't have weaklings in my court."

All members of the coup were removed from royal society, their families were in exile. Dissolving parliament wasn't much of a threat, the people of Lancre want a king to run the country, not a committee. Why else have a king? The people of Wægn enjoy having a competent duke to run their duchy, however, many didn't realize how lucky they were.

"My new head of National Security will be Earl Buckminster Hargrave and my international affairs advisor will be Marquis Nathanaël Cyriaque. They will be joining us next week." Nick smiled when he said that. He knew that Nathanaël had ties to Überwald, he may even be a werewolf, but being married to a cousin of the king, his loyalty to Lancre was not in question.

As the meeting drew to a close, Nick said, "Your highness, Duchess Octavia and I need to return to our home, we need to plan on visiting Thrash and Überskeld, and our chief of detectives says her work is piling up on her."

"Thank you, Duke and Duchess Warblehat-Stein. I'm sure your folks at home are missing you."

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Sam placed an enormous bag full of gold coins in front of Nick. "I placed that bet for you."

Nick looked at the heavy canvas sack and sighed a deep sad sigh. "It's not enough to buy the king's smile back."

"Pommy, you are doing the only thing that a friend can do. You're standing by him through thick or thin. Eventually he'll pry his way out of the nightmare, and maybe the queen will too."

Nick looked at the sack and sipped his drink. "You got some balls on you to bring that much gold into the Mended Drum."

"You could at least buy me a drink."

"Sure," said Nick. "Do you have change for a doubloon?"

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The first day of the month of Spune was hot that year, perfect for a Mole Shouter's Day festival. Mole Shouter's Day is the start of the harvest season and in Wægn they celebrate the day huge. People from all over the Duchy came to the capital village of Creel Springs to celebrate and welcome their new brothers and sisters in the Baronies of Thrash and Überskeld to being part of the Duchy of Wægn. With the addition of those two holdings, Wægn became the largest duchy in the kingdom in land size, but still the smallest in the population. There were games and prizes, a parade, there was a Mole Shouting contest (won by a fellow from Sto Kyl) and a large beer tent where food was served, drink was sold, and the proceeds raised went to the new watch house in Überskeld and funds to move Midpoint watch house from the middle of nowhere to the railroad district of Thrash.

Nick missed much of the celebration. He had a first-time mother in labor and a nervous father in full panic mode, and no amount of soothing could calm him down. He eventually called for a second witch, Matilda Potts, to entertain the husband, Preston Prescott. Octavia showed up with Marlon to help, too.

When Annabelle finally entered the final stages of labor, Nick had Preston hold Annabelle up in a semi-seated position. "That helped a lot," said Nick.

"How many times have you done this?" asked Preston.

"A few," said Nick. In fact, in his first year as a witch, he delivered over a dozen babies. This second year is getting off to a great start. "This is my busy time of year," said Nick. "There's something about Hogswatch day and the entire month of Ick to bring out the babies in Spune. It's almost like a harvest festival."

"Will you shut up!" screeched Annabelle as a huge contraction came over her.

"Here's comes baby, it's got its mother's hair." A movement to his left caused Nick to glance to the left and there on the side of the bed was Marlon, peeking over the side, watching everything. "One last one, Annabelle, give me one last push."

"I can't do it," gasped Annabelle. "I have nothing left."

"You can do it, little girl," said Nick. "I'll help and fill this room with Dingaroo scent, and we'll see what you have left. "

Annabelle glared at Preston with eyes of murder. "You Told Him???" she demanded, then suddenly the last contraction hit.

"Here it comes... here it comes... you have a daughter!" Matilda helped Nick with the umbilical cord, "Give your daughter a name, daddy!"

"Annette!" called Preston through his joyful tears, "her name is Annette!" As little Annette cried in shock and terror, the witches washed up the baby as the little girl cried out her anger and fear.

"That's a magnificent set of lungs on this one!" laughed Nick as he handed the baby to his friends. Annette's crying caused Marlon to start crying too, and he scrambled over to Octavia as fast as he could on hands and knees.

"It's ok, she is just scared, see? She's looking at her mommy now." Marlon took his mother's words to heart, but he gnawed on his thumb and considered the issue. He finally scrambled off his mother's lap and crawled over to the bed where Annabelle and Preston were admiring their new daughter.

He pulled himself up and stood at the side of the bed, taking in everything, his eyes wide and his mouth a little o of surprise. "Do you want to see?" asked Preston, and he lifted Marlon to his lap and Marlon considered the little blond girl laying on Aunt Annabelle's chest. Was she looking at him? Her little hand moved toward Marlon, neither by intent nor by accident. It just moved, and Marlon leaned forward and put his hand on hers.

"Her name is Annette," said Uncle Preston. "I'm sorry, but she won't be able to play for a little while."

Neither Annette nor Marlon knew it at the time, but they had an entire lifetime to play ahead of them.