Soul Music

here?”
    Sometimes Lord Vetinari wondered what had happened to Mr. Hong. Everyone knew, of course. In general terms. But not exactly what .
    What a city. In the spring, the river caught fire. About once a month, the Alchemists’ Guild exploded.
    He walked back to his desk and made another brief note. He was rather afraid that he was going to have to have someone killed.
    Then he picked up the third movement of Fondel’s Prelude in G Major and settled back to read.

    Susan walked back to the alley where she’d left Binky. There were half a dozen men lying around on the cobbles, clutching parts of themselves and moaning. Susan ignored them. Anyone trying to steal Death’s horse soon understood the expression “a world of hurts.” Binky had a good aim. It would be a very small, very private world.
    “The music was playing him, not the other way round,” she said. “You could see. I’m not sure his fingers even touched the strings.”
    SQUEAK.
    Susan rubbed her hand. Satchelmouth had turned out to have quite a hard head.
    “Can I kill it without killing him?”
    SQUEAK.
    “Not a hope,” the raven translated. “It’s all that’s keeping him alive.”
    “But grandda…but he said it’ll end up killing him anyway!”
    “It’s a big wide wonderful universe all right,” said the raven.
    SQUEAK.
    “But…look, if it’s a…a parasite, or something like that,” said Susan, as Binky trotted skyward, “what’s the good of it killing its host?”
    SQUEAK.
    “He says you’ve got him there,” said the raven. “Drop me off over Quirm, will you?”
    “What does it want him for?” said Susan. “It’s using him, but what for?”

    “Twenty-seven dollars!” said Ridcully. “Twenty-seven dollars to get you out! And the sergeant kept grinning all the time! Wizards arrested! ”
    He walked along the row of crestfallen figures.
    “I mean, how often does the Watch get called in to the Drum?” said Ridcully. “I mean, what did you think you were doing?”
    “mumblemumblemumble,” said the Dean, looking at the floor.
    “I’m sorry?”
    “mumblemumbledancingmumble.”
    “Dancing,” said Ridcully levelly, walking back along the row. “That’s dancing, is it? Banging into people? Throwin’ one another over yer shoulders? Twirling around all over the place? Not even trolls act like that (not that I’ve got anything against trolls mind you marvelous people marvelous people) and you’re supposed to be wizards . People are supposed to look up to you and that’s not because you’re somersaulting over their heads, Runes, don’t think I didn’t notice that little display, I was frankly disgusted. The poor Bursar has had to have a lie down. Dancing is…round in circles, don’tcherknow, Maypoles and suchlike, healthy reels, perhaps a little light ballroom… not swinging people round like a dwarf with a battle ax (mind you salt of the earth dwarfs I’ve always said so). Do I make myself clear?”
    “mumblemumblemumbleeveryonewasdoingitmumble,” said the Dean, still looking at the floor.
    “I never thought I’d say this to any wizard over the age of eighteen, but you’re all gated until further notice!” shouted Ridcully.
    Being confined to the campus was not much of a punishment. The wizards usually distrusted any air that hadn’t hung around indoors for a while, and mostly lived in a kind of groove between their rooms and the dining table. But they were feeling strange.
    “mumblemumbledon’tseewhymumble,” mumbled the Dean.
    He said, much later on, on the day when the music died, that it must have been because he’d never been really young, or at least young while just being old enough to know he was young. Like most wizards, he’d begun his training while still so small that the official pointy hat came down over his ears. And after that he’d just been, well, a wizard.
    He had the feeling, once again, that he’d missed out on something somewhere. He’d never really realized it until the last couple of days. He didn’t know what it was. He just wanted to do things. He didn’t know what they were. But he wanted to do them soon. He wanted…he felt like a lifelong tundra dweller when he wakes up one morning with a deep urge to go water-skiing. He certainly wasn’t going to stay indoors when there was music in the air…
    “mumblemumblemumblenotgonnastayindoorsmumble.”
    Unaccustomed feelings surged through him. He wanted to disobey! Disobey everything! Including the law of