'In a necromancy department? What kind of girls do they get?'
'No, it's because when they graduate they get to wear the hooded black robe and the skull ring. I think the term one of them used was "babe magnet".'
'But I thought wizards aren't allowed to marry?'
'Marriage?' said Hicks. 'Oh, I don't think they think about that!
'We never did in my day!' shouted Flead, who was being shaken back and forth as the circle was dragged through the crowds. 'Can't you blast some of these people with Black Fire, Hicks? You're a necromancer, for the sake of the seven hells! You are not supposed to be nice! Now I can see what's going on I think I shall have to spend a lot more time in the department!'
'Could I have a quiet word?' whispered Moist to Hicks. 'The lads can manage by themselves, can't they? Tell them to catch us up at the big golem.'
He hurried on, and was not at all surprised to find Hicks hurrying to catch him up. He pulled the not-really-a-necromancer into the shelter of a doorway and said: 'Do you trust your students?'
'Are you mad?'
'It's just that I have a little plan to save the day, the downside of which is that Professor Flead will no longer, alas, be available to you in your department.'
'By unavailable you mean... ?'
'Alas, you would never see him again,' said Moist. 'I can tell that would be a blow.'
Hicks coughed. 'Oh dear. He wouldn't be able to come back at all?'
'I think not.'
'Are you sure?' said Hicks carefully. 'No possibility?'
'I'm pretty sure.'
'Hm. Well, of course it would indeed be a blow.'
'A big blow. A big blow,' Moist agreed.
'I wouldn't want him... hurt, of course.'
'Anything but. Anything but,' said Moist, trying not to laugh. We humans are good at this curly thinking, aren't we, he thought.
'And he has had a good innings, when all's said and done.'
'Two of them,' said Moist, 'when you come to think about it.'
'What do you want us to do?' said Hicks, against the distant shouts of the ghostly professor berating the students.
'There's such a thing, I believe, as... an insorcism?'
'Those? We're not allowed to do those! They're totally against university rules!'
'Well, wearing the black robe and the skull ring has got to count for something, hasn't it? I mean, your predecessors would turn in their dark coffins if they thought you wouldn't agree to the minor naughtiness I have in mind...' And Moist explained, in one simple sentence.
Louder shouts and curses indicated that the portable circle was almost upon them.
'Well, doctor?' said Moist.
A complex spectrum of expressions chased one another across Dr Hicks's face. 'Well, I suppose...'
'Yes, doctor?'
'Well, it'd be like sending him to Heaven, right?'