Eric - Terry Pratchett [1]
This was because he’d rigged up a few ropes and rings in one of the sub-basements of the Unseen University Library—the one where they kept the, um, erotic* books. In vats of crushed ice. And he was dreamily dangling in the chilly vapor above them.
All books of magic have a life of their own. Some of the really energetic ones can’t simply be chained to the bookshelves; they have to be nailed shut or kept between steel plates. Or, in the case of the volumes on tantric sex magic for the serious connoisseur, kept under very cold water to stop them from bursting into flames and scorching their severely plain covers.
The Librarian swung gently back and forth above the seething vats, dozing peacefully.
Then the footsteps came out of nowhere, raced across the floor with a noise that scraped the raw surface of the soul, and disappeared through the wall. There was a faint, distant scream that sounded like ogodsogodsogods, this is IT, I’m gonna DIE.
The Librarian woke up, lost his grip, and flopped into the few inches of tepid water that was all that stood between The Joy of Tantric Sex with Illustrations for the Advanced Student, by A Lady, and spontaneous combustion.
And it would have gone badly for him if the Librarian had been a human being. Fortunately, he was currently an orangutan. With so much raw magic sloshing around in the Library it would be surprising if accidents did not happen sometimes, and one particularly impressive one had turned him into an ape. Not many people get the chance to leave the human race while still alive, and he’d strenuously resisted all efforts since to turn him back. Since he was the only librarian in the universe who could pick up books with his feet, the University hadn’t pressed the point.
It also meant that his idea of desirable female companionship now looked something like a sack of butter thrown through a roll of old inner tubes, and so he was lucky to get away with only mild burns, a headache, and some rather ambivalent feelings about cucumbers, which wore off by tea-time.
In the Library above, the grimoires creaked and rustled their pages in astonishment as the invisible runner passed straight through the bookshelves and disappeared, or rather, disappeared even more…
Ankh-Morpork gradually awoke from its slumber. Something invisible and yelling at the top of its voice was passing through every part of the city, dragging in its wake a trail of destruction. Wherever it went, things changed.
A fortune-teller in the Street of Cunning Artificers heard the footsteps run across her bedroom floor and found her crystal ball had turned into a little glass sphere with a cottage in it, plus snowflakes.
In a quiet corner of the Mended Drum tavern, where the adventuresses Herrena the Henna-Haired Harridan, Red Scharron and Diome, Witch of the Night, were meeting for some girl talk and a game of canasta, all the drinks turned into small yellow elephants.
“It’s them wizards up at the University,” said the barman, hastily replacing the glasses. “It oughtn’t to be allowed.”
Midnight dropped off the clock.
The Council of Wizardry rubbed their eyes and stared blearily at one another. They felt it oughtn’t to be allowed too, especially since they weren’t the ones that were allowing it.
Finally the new Archchancellor, Ezrolith Churn, suppressed a yawn, sat up straight in his chair, and tried to look suitably magisterial. He knew he wasn’t really Archchancellor material. He hadn’t really wanted the job. He was ninety-eight, and had achieved this worthwhile age by carefully not being any trouble or threat to anyone. He had hoped to spend his twilight years completing his seven-volume treatise on Some Little Known Aspects of Kuian Rain-making Rituals, which were an ideal subject for academic study in his opinion since the rituals only ever worked in Ku, and that particular continent had slipped into the ocean several thousand years ago.* The trouble was that in recent years the lifespan of Archchancellors seemed to be a bit on the short side, and the natural ambition of all wizards