Book 1 - Page 30 (1/2)

The lens was approaching now along the very lip of the rimfall. The island not only got higher as it neared the Edge. It got narrower too, so that the lens was able to remain over water until it was very near the city. The parapet along the edgewise cliff was dotted with gantries projecting into nothingness. The lens glided smoothly towards one of them and docked with it as smoothly as a boat might glide up to a quay. Four guards, with the same moonlight hair and nightblack faces as Marchesa, were waiting. They did not appear to be armed, but as Twoflower and Rincewind stumbled on to the parapet they were each grabbed by the arms and held quite firmly enough for any thought of escape to be instantly dismissed.

Then Marchesa and the watching hydrophobic wizards were quickly left behind and the guards and their prisoners set off briskly along a lane that wound between the s.h.i.+p-houses. Soon it lead downwards, into what turned out to be a palace of some sort, halfhewn out of the rock of the cliff itself. Rincewind was vaguely aware of brightly-lit tunnels, and courtyards open to the distant sky. A few elderly men, their robes covered in mysterious occult symbols, stood aside and watched with interest as the s.e.xtet pa.s.sed. Several times Rincewind noticed hydrophobes - their ingrained expressions of self-revulsion at their own body-fluids was distinctive- and here and there trudging men who could only be slaves. He didn’t have much time to reflect on all this before a door was opened ahead of them and they were pushed, gently but firmly, into a room. Then the door slammed behind them.

Rincewind and Twoflower regained their balance and stared around the room in which they now found themselves.

“Gosh,” said Twoflower ineffectually, after a pause during which he had tried unsuccessfully to find a better word.

“This is a prison cell?” wondered Rincewind aloud.

“All that gold and silk and stuff,” Twoflower added. “I’ve never seen anything like it!”

In the centre of the richly decorated room, on a carpet that was so deep and furry that Rincewind trod on it gingerly lest it be some kind of s.h.a.ggy, floor-loving beast, was a long gleaming table laden with food. Most were fish dishes, including the biggest and most ornately-prepared lobster Rincewind had ever seen, but there were also plenty of bowls and platters piled with strange creations that he had never seen before. He reached out cautiously and picked up some sort of purple fruit crusted with green crystals.

“Candied sea urchin,” said a cracked, cheerful voice behind him. “A great delicacy.”

He dropped it quickly and turned around. An old man had stepped out from behind the heavy curtains. He was tall, thin and looked almost benign compared to some of the faces Rincewind had seen recently.

“The puree of sea cuc.u.mbers is very good too,” said the face, conversationally. “Those little green bits are baby starfish.”

“Thank you for telling me,” said Rincewind weakly.

“Actually, they’re rather good,” said Twoflower, his mouth full. “I thought you liked seafood?”

“Yes, I thought I did,” said Rincewind. “What’s this wine - crushed octopus eyeb.a.l.l.s?”

“Sea grape,” said the old man.

“Great,” said Rincewind, and swallowed a gla.s.sful. “Not bad. A bit salty, maybe.”

“Sea grape is a kind of small jellyfish,” explained the stranger. “And now I really think I should introduce myself. Why has your friend gone that strange colour?”

“Culture shock, I imagine,” said Twoflower. “What did you say your name was?”

“I didn’t. It’s Garhartra. I’m the Guestmaster, you see. It is my pleasant task to make sure that your stay here is as delightful as possible.” He bowed. “If there is anything you want you have only to say.”

Twoflower sat down on an ornate mother-of-pearl chair with a gla.s.s of oily wine in one hand and a crystallised squid in the other. He frowned.

“I think I’ve missed something along the way,” he said. “First we were told we were going to be slaves-“

“A base canard!” interrupted Garhartra.

“What’s a canard?” said Twoflower.

“I think it’s a kind of duck,” said Rincewind from the far end of the long table. “Are these biscuits made of something really nauseating, do you suppose?”

“-and then we were rescued at great magical expense-“

“They’re made of pressed seaweed,” snapped the Guestmaster.

“-but then we’re threatened, also at a vast expenditure of magic-“

“Yes, I thought it would be something like seaweed,” agreed Rincewind. “They certainly taste like seaweed would taste if anyone was m.a.s.o.c.h.i.s.tic enough to eat seaweed.”

“-and then we’re manhandled by guards and thrown in here-“

“Pushed gently,” corrected Garhartra.

“-which turned out to be this amazingly rich room and there’s all this food and a man saying he’s devoting his life to making us happy,” Twoflower concluded. “What I’m getting at is this sort of lack of consistency.”

“Yar,” said Rincewind. “What he means is, are you about to start being generally unpleasant again? Is this just a break for lunch?”

Garhartra held up his hands rea.s.suringly.

“Please, please,” he protested. “It was just necessary to get you here as soon as possible. We certainly do not want to enslave you.

Please be rea.s.sured on that score.”