Carpe Jugulum

flared and Igor lit a torch.
    “We’re near the cathle,” he said.
    “Whose?”
    “The Magpyrth.”
    “We’re near the vampires’ castle?”
    “Yeth. I think the old marthter did thomething to the road here. The wheelth alwayth come off, ath thure ath eggth ith eggth. Bringth in the vithitorth, he thed.”
    “It didn’t occur to you to mention it?” said Nanny, climbing out and giving Magrat a hand.
    “Thorry. It’th been a buthy day…”
    Nanny took the torch. The flames illuminated a crude sign nailed to a tree.
    “‘Don’t go near the Castle!!’” Nanny read. “Nice of them to put an arrow pointing the way to it, too.”
    “Oh, the marthter did that,” said Igor. “Otherwithe people wouldn’t notice it.”
    Nanny peered into the gloom. “And who’s in the castle now?”
    “A few thervantth.”
    “Will they let us in?”
    “That’th not a problem.” Igor fished in his noisome shirt and pulled out a very big key on a string.
    “We going to go into their castle ?” said Magrat.
    “Looks like it’s the only place around,” said Nanny Ogg. heading up the track. “The coach is wrecked. We’re miles from anywhere else. Do you want to keep the baby out all night? A castle’s a castle. It’ll have locks. All the vampires are in Lancre. And—”
    “Well?”
    “It’s what Esme would’ve done. I feels it in my blood.”
    A little way off something howled. Nanny looked at Igor.
    “Werewolf?” she said.
    “That’th right.”
    “Not a good idea to hang around, then.”
    She pointed to a sign painted on a rock.
    “‘Don’t take thi ƒ quicke ƒ t route to the Ca ƒ tle,’” she read aloud. “You’ve got to admire a mind like that. Definitely a student of human nature.”
    “Won’t there be a lot of ways in?” said Magrat, as they walked past a sign that said: DON’T GO NERE THE COACH PARK , 20 YDS. ON LEFT .
    “Igor?” said Nanny.
    “Vampireth uthed to fight amongtht themthelveth,” said Igor. “There’th only one way in.”
    “Oh, all right, if we must,” said Magrat, “You take the rocker, and the used nappy bag. And the teddies. And the thing that goes round and round and plays noises when she pulls the string—”
    A sign near the drawbridge said LA ƒ T CHANCE NOT TO GO NEAR THE CA ƒ TLE , and Nanny Ogg laughed and laughed.
    “The Count’s not going to be very happy about you, Igor,” she said, as he unlocked the doors.
    “Thod him,” he said. “I’m going to pack up my thtuff and head for Blintth. There’th alwayth a job for an Igor up there. More lightning thtriketh per year than anywhere in the mountainth, they thay.”
    Nanny Ogg wiped her eye. “Good job we’re soaked already,” she said. “All right, let’s get in. And, Igor, if you haven’t been thtraight with us, sorry, straight with us, I’ll have your guts for garters.”
    Igor looked down bashfully. “Oh, that’th more than a man could pothibly hope for,” he murmured.
    Magrat giggled and Igor pushed open the door and hurriedly shuffled inside.
    “What?” said Nanny.
    “Haven’t you noticed the looks he’s been giving you?” said Magrat, as they followed the lurching figure.
    “What, him ?” said Nanny.
    “Could be carrying a torch for you,” said Magrat.
    “I thought it was just to see where he’s going!” said Nanny, a little bit of panic in her voice. “I mean, I haven’t got my best drawers on or anything!”
    “I think he’s a bit of a romantic, actually,” said Magrat.
    “Oh, I don’t know, I really don’t,” said Nanny. “I mean, it’s flattering and everything, but I really don’t think I could be goin’ out with a man with a limp.”
    “Limp what?”
    Nanny Ogg had always considered herself unshockable, but there’s no such thing. Shocks can come from unexpected directions.
    “I am a married woman,” said Magrat, smiling at her expression. And it felt good, just once, to place a small tintack in the path of Nanny’s carefree amble through life.
    “But is…I mean, is Verence, you know, all right in the—”
    “Oh yes. Everything’s…fine. But now I understand what your jokes were about.”
    “What, all of them?” said Nanny, like someone who’d found all the aces removed from their favorite pack of cards.
    “Well, not the one about the priest, the old woman and the rhinoceros.”
    “I should just about hope so!” said Nanny. “I didn’t understand that one until I was forty!”
    Igor limped back.
    “There’th jutht the