Guards! Guards! (Discworld 8)

“No, sir,” said the captain, repressing a comment that if you wanted to find a really forsaken, out of the way place then the Shades would fit the bill pretty well.

“Besides,” said Lord Vetinari, “one would imagine that someone would have noticed, wouldn't you agree?”

The captain nodded at the wall and its dreadful frieze. “Apart from them, you mean, sir?”

could hear footsteps. Somewhere off to their left, there was a snigger.

“We must form a square,” said the captain. They all tried to form a point.

“Hey! What was that?” said Sergeant Colon.

“What?”

“There it was again. Sort of a leathery sound.”

Captain Vimes tried not to think about hoods and garrotting.

There were, he knew, many gods. There was a god for every trade. There was a beggars' god, a whores' goddess, a thieves' god, probably even an assassins' god.

He wondered whether there was, somewhere in that vast pantheon, a god who would look kindly on hard-pressed and fairly innocent law-enforcement officers who were quite definitely about to die.

There probably wasn't, he thought bitterly. Something like that wasn't stylish enough for gods. Catch any god worrying about any poor sod trying to do his best for a handful of dollars a month. Not them. Gods went overboard for smart bastards whose idea of a day's work was prising the Ruby Eye of the Earwig King out of its socket, not for some unimaginative sap who just pounded the pavement every night . . .

“More sort of slithery,” said the sergeant, who liked to get things right.

And then there was a sound-

-perhaps a volcanic sound, or the sound of a boiling geyser, but at any rate a long, dry roar of a sound, like the bellows in the forges of the Titans-

-but it was not so bad as the light, which was blue-white and the sort of light to print the pattern of your eyeballs' blood vessels on the back of the inside of your skull.

They both went on for hundreds of years and then, instantly, stopped.

The dark aftermath was filled with purple images and, once the ears regained an ability to hear, a faint, clinkery sound.

The guards remained perfectly still for some time.

“Well, well,” said the captain weakly.

After a further pause he said, very clearly, every consonant slotting perfectly into place, “Sergeant, take some men and investigate that, will you?”

“Investigate what, sir?” said Colon, but it had already dawned on the captain that if the sergeant took some men it would leave him, Captain Vimes, all alone.

“No, I've a better idea. We'll all go,” he said firmly. They all went.

Now that their eyes were used to the darkness they could see an indistinct red glow ahead of them.

It turned out to be a wall, cooling rapidly. Bits of calcined brickwork were falling off as they contracted, making little pinging noises.

That wasn't the worst bit. The worst bit was what was on the wall.

They stared at it.

They stared at it for a long time.

It was only an hour or two till dawn, and no-one even suggested trying to find their way back in the dark. They waited by the wall. At least it was warm.

They tried not to look at it.