Thud! (Discworld 34)

People were saying that when this was all over they"d seal the cave. Too many people in a living cave killed it in some way, the dwarfs said. And then the kings would be left in the dark to finish their game in, with luck, peace.

Water dripping on a stone, changing the shape of the world one drop at a time, washing away a valley ...

Yes, well, Vimes had added to himself. But it"d never be that simple. And for every new generation you"d have to open it again, so that people could see that it was true.

Today, though, it was open for Sam and Young Sam, who was wearing a fetching woolly hat with a bobble on it.

Brick and Sally were on duty, along with a couple of dwarfs and two more trolls, all watching the stream of visitors and one another. Vurms covered the ceiling. The game gleamed. What would Young Sam remember? Probably just the glitter. But it had to be done.

The players were genuine, on that at least both sides agreed. The carvings on Diamond were accurate, the armour and jewellery on Bloodaxe were just as history recorded. Even the long loaf of dwarf bread that he carried into battle, and which could shatter a troll skull, was by his side. Dwarf scholars had, with delicacy and care and the blunting of fifteen saw blades, removed a tiny slice of it. Miraculously, it had turned out still to be as inedible now as the day it was baked.

A minute was about enough for this historic moment, Vimes decided. Young Sam was at the grabbing age, and he"d never hear the end of it if his son ate an historic monument.

"Can I have a word, lance-constable?" he said to Sally, as he turned to go. "The guard changes in a minute."

"Certainly, sir," said Sally. Vimes strolled off to a corner of the cavern and waited until Nobby and Fred Colon marched in at the head of the relief.

"Glad you joined, lance-constable?" he said, as she hurried up.

"Very much, sir!"

"Good. Shall we go up to the daylight?"

She followed him up the slope and into the damp warmth of Koom Valley, where he sat down on a boulder. He looked at her while Young Sam played at his feet.

He said: "Is there anything you"d like to say to me, lance-constable?"

"Should there be, sir?"

"I can"t prove anything, of course," said Vimes. "But you are an agent of the Low King, aren"t you? You"ve been spying on me."

He waited while she considered the options. Swallows swooped overhead in squadrons.

"I, er, wouldn"t put it quite like that, sir," she said eventually. "I was

keeping an eye on Hamcrusher and I"d heard about the mining, and then when it all started to heat up-"

"-becoming a watchman seemed a good idea, right? Did the League know?"

"No! Look, sir, I wasn"t spying on you-"

"You told him I was headed for Koom Valley. And the night we arrived, you went for a little fly-around. Just stretching your wings?"

"Look, this isn"t my life!" said Sally. "I"d joined the new force in Bonk. We"re trying to make a difference up there! I did want to come to Ankh-Morpork anyway, because, well, we all want to. To learn, you know? How you manage to do it? Everyone speaks highly of you! And then the Low King summoned me and I thought, where"s the harm? Hamcrusher has caused trouble up there, too. Er ... I never actually told you a lie, sir."

"Rhys already knew about the Secret, right?" said Vimes.

"No, sir, not as such. But I think he had some reason to suspect there was something down there."

"Then why didn"t he just go and look?"

"Dwarfs digging around in Koom Valley? The trolls would, er, go spare, sir."

"But not if the dwarfs were merely investigating why a copper from Ankh-Morpork was chasing some fleeing criminals into the caves, right? Not if the copper was good ol Sam Vimes, who everyone knows is as straight as an arrow even if he"s not the sharpest knife in the drawer. You can"t bribe Sam Vimes, but why bother when you can pull the wool over his eyes?"

"Look, sir, I know how you must feel, but ... well, there"s your little boy there, playing in Koom Valley, with trolls and dwarfs all round, and they"re not fighting. Right? I didn"t lie, I just ... liaised a little. Wasn"t it worth it, sir? Hah, you really worried them when you went to the wizards! Shine hadn"t left the city! Rhys had to fly him in by night! All they really did was follow your lead. The only person who fooled you was me, and it turns out I wasn"t very good at it. They needed you, sir. Look around and say it wasn"t worth it

A hundred yards away, a house-sized rock rumbled across the stone, pushed and steered by a dozen trolls, dropped into a sinkhole and blocked it like an egg in a cup. There was a cheer.