Jingo

Hornett.
    “What is it, man?”
    “There’s…er…something going on…”
    There was a column of dust in the distance. Something was approaching fast.
    “One moment,” said General Ashal.
    He came back from his saddle with an ornate metal tube, covered in the curly Klatchian script. He squinted into one end and pointed the other at the cloud.
    “Mounted men,” he said. “Camels and horses.”
    “That’s a Make-Things-Bigger device, isn’t it?” said Lord Rust. “My word, you are up to date. They were invented only last year.”
    “I didn’t buy this, my lord. I inherited it from my grandfather—” The general looked through the eyepiece again. “About forty men, I’d say.”
    “Dear me,” murmured Prince Cadram. “Reinforcements, Lord Rust?”
    “They’ve…the rider in the lead is holding a…a banner, I think, still rolled up—”
    “Certainly not, sire!” said Lord Rust. Behind him, Lord Selachii rolled his eyes.
    “—ah, now he’s unfurling it…it’s…a white flag, sire.”
    “Someone wishes to surrender?”
    The general lowered his telescope. “It doesn’t…I don’t…they seem to be in a great hurry to do so, sire.”
    “Send a squad to apprehend them,” said Prince Cadram.
    “We will do so, too,” added Lord Rust hurriedly, nodding to the lieutenant.
    “Ah, a joint effort,” said the Prince.
    A few seconds later groups of men detached themselves from each army and rode out on an interception course.
    Everyone saw the sudden glints of sunlight from the approaching cloud. Weapons had been drawn.
    “Fighting under a flag of surrender? That’s… immoral !” said Lord Rust.
    “Novel, certainly,” said the Prince.
    The three companies would have met, had it not been that even experts find it hard to judge how much ground a running camel can cover. By the time both commanders realized they should start to turn, they should have already been turning.
    “It seems your people misjudged things, sire,” said Lord Rust.
    “I knew I should have had them led by white officers,” said the Prince. “But…oh dear, it seems your men have been equally unlucky—”
    He stopped. Some confusion had resulted. The foray parties had their instructions, but no one had told them what to do if they ran into the other foray party. And it was composed, after all, of men they were about to fight, and everyone knew they were treacherous greasy towel heads or perfidious untrustworthy sausage-eating madmen. And this was a battlefield. And everyone was frightened and, therefore, angry. And everyone was armed.
    Sam Vimes heard the shouting behind him but had other things on his mind at this point. It is impossible to ride a running camel without concentrating on your liver and kidneys, in the hope that they won’t be pounded out of your body.
    The thing’s legs weren’t moving right, he was sure. Nothing on normal legs could be jolting him around so much. The horizon jerked backward and forward and up and down.
    What was it Ahmed had said?
    Vimes hit the camel hard and yelled, “Huthuthut!”
    It accelerated. The jolts ran together, so that his body was no longer being jolted but was in effect in a permanent state of jolt.
    Vimes thrashed it again and tried to yell, “Huthuthut!” although the word came out more like “Hngngngn!” In any case, the camel found some extra knees somewhere.
    There was more shouting behind him. Turning his head as much as he dared, he saw several of his accompanying D’regs falling behind. He was certain he heard Carrot yell, but he couldn’t be certain because of his own screaming.
    “Stop, you bastard!” he yelled.
    The tent was coming up fast. Vimes slapped the stick down again and hauled on the reins and, clearly now judging with special camel sensitivity that this was the most embarrassing moment to stop, the camel stopped. Vimes slid forward, flung his arms round a neck that was apparently thatched with old doormats, and half fell, half dropped on to the sand.
    Other camels were thudding to a halt around him. Carrot grabbed his arm.
    “Are you all right, sir? That was amazing! You really impressed the D’regs, screaming defiance like that! And you were still shouting for the camel to go faster when it was already galloping!”
    “Gngn?”
    The guards around the tent were hesitating, but that wouldn’t last long.
    The wind caught the white flag on Carrot’s lance, making it snap.
    “Sir, this is all right, isn’t it? I mean, usually a