The Light Fantastic

philosopher Ly Tin Weedle “Why are you here?” and the reply took three years.
    What is far more important is an event happening way overhead, far above A’Tuin, the elephants and the rapidly expiring wizard. The very fabric of time and space is about to be put through the wringer.

    The air was greasy with the distinctive feel of magic, and acrid with the smoke of candles made of a black wax whose precise origin a wise man wouldn’t inquire about.
    There was something very strange about this room deep in the cellars of Unseen University, the Disc’s premier college of magic. For one thing it seemed to have too many dimensions, not exactly visible, just hovering out of eyeshot. The walls were covered with occult symbols, and most of the floor was taken up by the Eightfold Seal of Stasis, generally agreed in magical circles to have all the stopping power of a well-aimed halfbrick.
    The only furnishing in the room was a lectern of dark wood, carved into the shape of a bird—well, to be frank, into the shape of a winged thing it is probably best not to examine too closely—and on the lectern, fastened to it by a heavy chain covered in padlocks, was a book.
    A large, but not particularly impressive, book. Other books in the University’s libraries had covers inlaid with rare jewels and fascinating wood, or bound with dragon skin. This one was just a rather tatty leather. It looked the sort of book described in library catalogues as “slightly foxed,” although it would be more honest to admit that it looked as though it had been badgered, wolved and possibly beared as well.
    Metal clasps held it shut. They weren’t decorated, they were just very heavy—like the chain, which didn’t so much attach the book to the lectern as tether it.
    They looked like the work of someone who had a pretty definite aim in mind, and who had spent most of his life making training harness for elephants.
    The air thickened and swirled. The pages of the book began to crinkle in a quite horrible, deliberate way, and blue light spilled out from between them. The silence of the room crowded in like a fist, slowly being clenched.
    Half a dozen wizards in their nightshirts were taking turns to peer in through the little grille in the door. No wizard could sleep with this sort of thing going on—the build-up of raw magic was rising through the University like a tide.
    “Right,” said a voice. “What’s going on? And why wasn’t I summoned?”
    Galder Weatherwax, Supreme Grand Conjuror of the Order of the Silver Star, Lord Imperial of the Sacred Staff, Eighth Level Ipsissimus and 304th Chancellor of Unseen University, wasn’t simply an impressive sight even in his red nightshirt with the hand-embroidered mystic runes, even in his long cap with the bobble on, even with the Wee Willie Winkie candlestick in his hand. He even managed to very nearly pull it off in fluffy pompom slippers as well.
    Six frightened faces turned toward him.
    “Um, you were summoned, lord,” said one of the underwizards.
    “That’s why you’re here,” he added helpfully.
    “I mean why wasn’t I summoned before ?” snapped Galder, pushing his way to the grille.
    “Um, before who, lord?” said the wizard.
    Galder glared at him, and ventured a quick glance through the grille.
    The air in the room was now sparkling with tiny flashes as dust motes incinerated in the flow of raw magic. The Seal of Stasis was beginning to blister and curl up at the edges.
    The book in question was called the Octavo and, quite obviously, it was no ordinary book.
    There are of course many famous books of magic. Some may talk of the Necrotelicomnicon, with its pages made of ancient lizard skin; some may point to the Book of Going Forth Around Elevenish, written by a mysterious and rather lazy Llamaic sect; some may recall that the Bumper Fun Grimoire reputedly contains the one original joke left in the universe. But they are all mere pamphlets when compared with the Octavo, which the Creator of the Universe reputedly left behind—with characteristic absentmindedness—shortly after completing his major work.
    The eight spells imprisoned in its pages led a secret and complex life of their own, and it was generally believed that—
    Galder’s brow furrowed as he stared into the troubled room. Of course, there were only seven spells now. Some young idiot of a student wizard had stolen a look at the book one day and one of the spells had escaped and lodged in his mind. No one