The Light Fantastic (Discworld 2)

'I thought—'

'Really don't try to sell them insurance, that always upsets them.'

'But they're priests!' wailed Twoflower. Rincewind paused.

'Yes,' he said. That's the whole point, isn't it?'

At the far side of the outer circle some sort of procession was forming up.

'But priests are good kind men,' said Twoflower. 'At home they go around with begging bowls. It's their only possession,' he added.

'Ah,' said Rincewind, not certain he understood. This would be for putting the blood in, right?'

'Blood?'

'Yes, from sacrifices.' Rincewind thought about the priests he had known at home. He was, of course, anxious not to make an enemy of any god and had attended any number of temple functions and, on the whole, he thought that the most accurate definition of any priest in the Circle Sea Regions was someone who spent quite a lot of time gory to the armpits.

Twoflower looked horrified.

'Oh no,' he said. 'Where I come from priests are holy men who have dedicated themselves to lives of poverty, good works and the study of the nature of God.'

Rincewind considered this novel proposition.

'No sacrifices?' he said.

'Absolutely not.'

Rincewind gave up. 'Well,' he said, 'they don't sound very holy to me.'

There was a loud blarting noise from a band of bronze trumpets. Rincewind looked around. A line of druids marched slowly past, their long sickles hung with sprays of mistletoe. Various junior druids and apprentices followed them, playing a variety of percussion instruments that were traditionally supposed to drive away evil spirits and quite probably succeeded.

Torchlight made excitingly dramatic patterns on the stones, which stood ominously against the green-lit sky. Hubwards, the shimmering curtains of the aurora coriolis began to wink and glitter among the stars as a million ice rystals danced in the Disc's magical field.

'Belafon explained it all to me,' whispered Twoflower. We're going to see a time-honoured ceremony that celebrates the Oneness of Man with the Universe, that was what he said.'

Rincewind looked sourly at the procession. As the druids spread out around a great flat stone that dominated the centre of the circle he couldn't help noticing the attractive if rather pale young lady in their midst. She wore a long white robe, a gold torc around her neck, and an expression of vague apprehension.

'Is she a druidess?' said Twoflower.

'I don't think so,' said Rincewind slowly.

The druids began to chant. It was, Rincewind felt, a particularly nasty and rather dull chant which sounded very much as if it was going to build up to an abrupt crescendo. The sight of the young woman lying down on the big stone didn't do anything to derail his train of thought.

'I want to stay,' said Twoflower. 'I think ceremonies like this hark back to a primitive simplicity which—'

Unless it was stuffed with rocks,' said the astrologer, in a wretched and, as it turned out, entirely unsuccessful attempt to lighten the mood.

'But come down he must – somewhere. Where? we ask ourselves.'

'Where?' said the astrologer loyally.

'And immediately a course of action suggests itself to us.'

'Ah,' said the astrologer, running in an attempt to keep up as the wizard stalked across The Two Fat Cousins.

'And that course is . . .?'

The astrologer looked up into two eyes as grey and bland as steel.