Guards! Guards! (Discworld 8)

Wonse had a glass of water.

“Which brings us on to a further matter of some delicacy which I am sure that well-travelled, broad-minded gentlemen such as yourselves will have no difficulty in accepting,” he said. The hand holding the glass was beginning to shake.

“I hope it will also be understood by the population at large, especially since the king will undoubtedly be able to contribute in so many ways to the well-being and defence of the city. For example, I am sure that the people will rest more contentedly in their beds knowing that the dr-the king is tirelessly protecting them from harm. There can, however, be ridiculous ancient . . . prejudices . . . which will only be eradicated by ceaseless work ... on the part of all men of good will.”

He paused, and looked at them. The head assassin said later that he had looked into the eyes of many men who, obviously, were very near death, but he had never looked into eyes that were so clearly and unmistakably looking back at him from the slopes of Hell.

He hoped he would never, he said, ever have to look into eyes like that again.

“I am referring,” said Wonse, each word coming slowly to the surface like bubbles in some quicksand, “to the matter of ... the king's . . . diet.”

There was a terrible silence. They heard the faint rustle of wings behind them, and the shadows in the corners of the hall grew darker and seemed to close in.

“Diet,” said the head thief, in a hollow voice.

“Yes,” said Wonse. His voice was almost a squeak. Sweat was dripping down his face. The head assassin had once heard the word “rictus” and wondered when you should use it correctly to describe someone's expression, and now he knew. That was what Wonse's face had become; it was the ghastly rictus of someone trying not to hear the words his own mouth was saying.

“We, er, we thought,” said the head assassin, very carefully, “that the dr- the king, well, must have been arranging matters for himself, over the weeks.”

“Ah, but poor stuff, you know. Poor stuff. Stray animals and so forth,” said Wonse, staring hard at the tabletop. “Obviously, as king, such makeshifts are no longer appropriate.”

The silence grew and took on a texture. The councillors thought hard, especially about the meal they had just eaten. The arrival of a huge trifle with a lot of cream on it only served to concentrate their minds.

“Er,” said the head merchant, “how often is the king hungry?”

“All the time,” said Wonse, “but it eats once a month. It is really a ceremonial occasion.”

“Of course,” said the head merchant. “It would be.”

“And, er,” said the head assassin, “when did the king last, er, eat?”

“I'm sorry to say it hasn't eaten properly ever since it came here,” said Wonse.

“Oh.”

“You must understand,” said Wonse, fiddling desperately with his wooden cutlery, “that merely waylaying people like some common assassin-”

“Excuse me-” the head assassin began.

“Some common murderer, I mean-there is no ... satisfaction there. The whole essence of the king's feeding is that it should be, well... an act of bonding between king and subjects. It is, it is perhaps a living allegory. Reinforcing the close links between the crown and the community,” he added.

“The precise nature of the meal-” the head thief began, almost choking on the words. “Are we talking about young maidens here?”

“Sheer prejudice,” said Wonse. “The age is immaterial. Marital status is, of course, of importance. And social class. Something to do with flavour, I believe.” He leaned forward, and now his voice was pain-filled and urgent and, they felt, genuinely his own for the first time. “Please consider it!” he hissed. “After all, just one a month! In exchange for so much! The families of people of use to the king, Privy Councillors such as yourselves, would not, of course, even be considered. And when you think of all the alternatives ...”

They didn't think about all the alternatives. It was enough to think about just one of them.

The silence purred at them as Wonse talked. They avoided one another's faces, for fear of what they might see mirrored there. Each man thought: one of the others is bound to say something soon, some protest, and then I'll murmur agreement, not actually say anything, I'm not as stupid as that, but definitely murmur very firmly, so that the others will be in no doubt that I thoroughly disapprove, because at a time like this it behooves all decent men to nearly stand up and be almost heard . . .

But no-one said anything. The cowards, each man thought.

And no-one touched the pudding, or the brick-thick chocolate mints served afterwards. They just listened in flushed, gloomy horror as Wonse's voice droned on, and when they were dismissed they tried to leave as separately as possible, so that they didn't have to talk to one another.

Except for the head merchant, that is. He found himself leaving the palace with the chief assassin, and they strolled side by side, minds racing. The chief merchant tried to look on the bright side; he was one of those men who organise sing-songs when things go drastically wrong.

“Well, well,” he said. "So we're privy councillors now. Just fancy.''

“Hmm,” said the assassin.