Men at Arms (Discworld 15)

He wriggled under a couple of bodies and emerged in the circle. Big Fido turned his red-eyed gaze on him.

'And Gaspode, too,' said the poodle. 'I might have known.'

'You leave her alone,' said Gaspode.

'Oh? You'll fight us all for her, will you?' said Big Fido.

'I got the Power,' said Gaspode. 'You know that. I'll do it. I'll use it.'

'There's no time for this!' snarled Angua.

'You won't do it,' said Big Fido.

'I'll do it.'

'Every dog's paw'll be turned against you—'

'I got the Power, me. You back off, all of you.'

'What power?' said Butch. He was drooling.

'Big Fido knows,' said Gaspode. 'He's studied. Now, me an' her are going to walk out of here, right? Nice and slow.'

The dogs looked at Big Fido.

'Get them,' he said.

Angua bared her teeth.

The dogs hesitated.

'A wolf's got a jaw four times stronger'n any dog,' said Gaspode. 'And that's just a ordinary wolf—'

'What are you all?' snapped Big Fido. 'You're the pack! No mercy! Get them!'

But a pack doesn't act like that, Angua had said. A pack is an association of free individuals. A pack doesn't leap because it's told – a pack leaps because every individual, all at once, decides to leap.

A couple of the bigger dogs crouched . . .

Angua moved her head from side to side, waiting for the first assault . . .

A dog scraped the ground with its paw . . .

Gaspode took a deep breath and adjusted his jaw.

Dogs leapt.

'SIT!' said Gaspode, in passable Human.

The command bounced back and forth around the alley, and fifty per cent of the animals obeyed. In most cases, it was the hind fifty per cent. Dogs in mid-spring found their treacherous legs coiling under them—

'BAD DOG!'

—and this was followed by an overpowering sense of racial shame that made them cringe automatically, a bad move in mid-air.

Gaspode glanced up at Angua as bewildered dogs rained around them.

'I said I got the Power, didn't I?' he said. 'Now run!'