Guards! Guards!

whore-son who tries to take it away, by the Lord Harry.” Apart from anything else, this was rather short. He’d spent a long time drafting something longer and more in keeping with the spirit of the times, and was having some trouble remembering it.
    He was also being put off by the goat, which was watching him with loyal interest.
    “Get on with it!” Wonse hissed, from his position behind the throne.
    “All in good time,” the high priest hissed back. “This is a coronation, I’ll have you know. You might try to show a little respect.”
    “Of course I’m showing respect! Now get on—”
    There was a shout, off to the right. Wonse glared into the crowd.
    “It’s that Ramkin woman,” he said. “What’s she up to?”
    People around her were chattering excitedly now. Fingers pointed all the same way, like a small fallen forest. There were one or two screams, and then the crowd moved like a tide.
    Wonse looked along the wide Street of Small Gods.
    It wasn’t a raven out there. Not this time.

    The dragon flew slowly, only a few feet above the ground, wings sculling gracefully through the air.
    The flags that crisscrossed the street were caught up and snapped like so much cobweb, piling up on the creature’s spine plates and flapping back along the length of its tail.
    It flew with head and neck fully extended, as if the great body was being towed like a barge. The people on the street yelled and fought one another for the safety of doorways. It paid them no attention.
    It should have come roaring, but the only sounds were the creaking of wings and the snapping of banners.
    It should have come roaring. Not like this, not slowly and deliberately, giving terror time to mature. It should have come threatening. Not promising.
    It should have come roaring, not flying gently to the accompaniment of the zip and zing of merry bunting.

    Vimes pulled open the other drawer of his desk and glared at the paperwork, such as there was of it. There wasn’t really much in there that he could call his own. A scrap of sugar bag reminded him that he now owed the Tea Kitty six pence.
    Odd. He wasn’t angry yet. He would be later on, of course. By evening he’d be furious. Drunk and furious. But not yet. Not yet. It hadn’t really sunk in, and he knew he was just going through the motions as a preventative against thinking.
    Errol stirred sluggishly in his box, raised his head and whined.
    “What’s the matter, boy?” said Vimes, reaching down. “Upset stomach?”
    The little dragon’s skin was moving as though heavy industry was being carried on inside. Nothing in Diseases of the Dragon said anything about this . From the swollen stomach came sounds like a distant and complicated war in an earthquake zone.
    That surely wasn’t right. Sybil Ramkin said you had to pay great attention to a dragon’s diet, since even a minor stomach upset would decorate the walls and ceiling with pathetic bits of scaly skin. But in the past few days…well, there had been cold pizzas, and the ash from Nobby’s horrible dog-ends, and all-in-all Errol had eaten more or less what he liked. Which was just about everything, to judge by the room. Not to mention the contents of the bottom drawer.
    “We really haven’t looked after you very well, have we?” said Vimes. “Treated you like a dog, really.” He wondered what effect squeaky rubber hippos had on the digestion.
    Vimes became slowly aware that the distant cheering had turned to screams.
    He stared vaguely at Errol, and then smiled an incredibly evil smile and stood up.
    There were sounds of panic and the mob on the run.
    He placed his battered helmet on his head and gave it a jaunty tap. Then, humming a mad little tune, he sauntered out of the building.
    Errol remained quite still for a while and then, with extreme difficulty, half-crawled and half-rolled out of his box. Strange messages were coming from the massive part of his brain that controlled his digestive system. It was demanding certain things that he couldn’t put a name to. Fortunately it was able to describe them in minute detail to the complex receptors in his enormous nostrils. They flared, subjecting the air of the room to an intimate examination. His head turned, triangulating.
    He pulled himself across the floor and began to eat, with every sign of enjoyment, Carrot’s tin of armor polish.

    People streamed past Vimes as he strolled up the Street of Small Gods. Smoke rose into the air from the Plaza of