Sourcery

'And what would humans be without love?'
Rare, said Death.

He sighed again. People were always trying this sort of thing. On the other hand, it was quite interesting to watch, and at least this was a bit more original than the usual symbolic chess game, which Death always dreaded because he could never remember how the knight was supposed to move.

The vermine is a small black and white relative of the lemming, found in the cold Hublandish regions. Its skin is rare and highly valued, especially by the vermine itself; the selfish little bastard will do anything rather than let go of it.

This was the type of thief that could steal the initiative, the moment and the words right out of your mouth.

These weren't the normal city watch, cautious and genially corrupt. These were walking slabs of muscle and they were absolutely unbribable, if only because the Patrician could outbid anyone else.

After that one thing sort of led to another and pretty soon everyone was fighting to get something - either away, out or even.

It wasn't blood in general he couldn't stand the sight of, it was just his blood in particular that was so upsetting.

Of course, Ankh-Morpork's citizens had always claimed that the river water was incredibly pure in any case. Any water that had passed through so many kidneys, they reasoned, had to be very pure indeed.

'My father always said that death is but a sleep,' said Conina.
'Yes, the hat told me that,' said Rincewind, as they turned down a narrow, crowded street between white adobe walls. 'But the way I see it, it's a lot harder to get up in the morning.'

'My father always said that it was pointless to undertake a direct attack against an enemy extensively armed with efficient projectile weapons,' she said.
Rincewind, who knew Cohen's normal method of speech, gave her a look of disbelief.
'Well, what he actually said,' she added, 'was never enter an arsekicking contest with a porcupine.'

The Hashishim, who derived their name from the vast quantities of hashish they consumed, were unique among vicious killers in being both deadly and, at the same time, inclined to giggle, groove to interesting patterns of light and shade on their terrible knife blades and, in extreme cases, fall over.

A popular spell at the time was Pelepel's Temporal Compressor, which on one occasion resulted in a race of giant reptiles being created, evolving, spreading, flourishing and then being destroyed in the space of about five minutes, leaving only its bones in the earth to mislead forthcoming generations completely.

The truth isn't easily pinned to a page. In the bathtub of history the truth is harder to hold than the soap, and much more difficult to find...

'I don't trust this man,' said Nijel. 'I try not to judge from first impressions, but I definitely think he's up to no good.'
'He had you thrown in a snake pit!'
'Perhaps I should have taken the hint.'

Wizards didn't kill ordinary people because a) they seldom noticed them and b) it wasn't considered sporting and c) besides, who'd do all the cooking and growing food and things. And killing a brother wizard with magic was nigh-well impossible on account of the layers of protective spells that any cautious wizard maintained about his person at all times.[*]
[*] Of course, wizards often killed each other by ordinary, non-magical means, but this was perfectly allowable and death by assassination was considered natural causes for a wizard.

Some people think this is paranoia, but it isn't. Paranoids only think everyone is out to get them. Wizards know it.

'I'm not going to ride on a magic carpet!' he hissed. 'I'm afraid of grounds!'
'You mean heights,' said Conina. 'And stop being silly.'
'I know what I mean! It's the grounds that kill you!'

There was a respectful silence, as there always is when large sums of money have just passed away.

Many people who had got to know Rincewind had come to treat hi

Mort

Scientists have calculated that the chance of anything so patently absurd actually existing are millions to one. But magicians have calculated that million-to-one chances crop up nine times out of ten.

What is your name?
'Uh,' said Mort. 'Mortimer...sir. They call me Mort.'
What a coincidence, said the skull.

'And he goes around killing people?' said Mort. He shook his head. 'There's no justice.'
Death sighed. No, he said...There's just me.

He saw his life stretching out in front of him like a nasty black tunnel with no light at the end of it.
...He'd been wrong, there was a light at the end of the tunnel, and it was a flamethrower.

'It would seem that you have no useful skill or talent whatsoever' he said.
'Have you thought of going into teaching?'

Knowledge = Power = Energy = Matter = Mass.

Death was standing behind a lectern, poring over a map. He looked at Mort as if he wasn't entirely there.
You haven't heard of the Bay of Mante, have you? he said.
'No, sir,' said Mort.
Famous shipwreck there.
'Was there?'
There will be, said Death, if I can find the damn place.

His father regarded him critically.
"Very nice," he said, "for the money."
"It itches," said Mort, "I think there's things in here with me."
"There's thousands of lads in the world'd be very thankful for a nice warm--" Lezek paused, and gave up -- "garment like that, my lad."
"I could share it with them?" Mort said hopefully.

You don't see people at their best in this job, said Death.

"Look, I'll be frank," he said. "I could point you in the direction of a great brothel."
"I've already had lunch," said Mort vaguely.

"I've--we've got a special on Cutwell's Shield of Passion ointment," said the face, and winked in a startling fashion. "Provides your wild oats while guaranteeing a crop failure, if you know what I mean."

(That was a cinematic trick adapted for print.Death wasn't talking to the princess. He was actually in his study, talking to Mort. But it was quite effective, wasn't it? It's probably called a fast dissolve, or a crosscut/zoom. Or something. An industry where the senior technician is called a Best Boy might call it anything.)

History always has a few tricks up its frayed sleeve. It's been around a long time.

Go away, Mort thought. His subconcious was worrying him. It appeared to have a direct line to parts of his body that he wanted to ignore at the moment.

The light fantastic

Weems might have had a room-temperature IQ, but he knew idiocy when he saw it.
Early to rise, early to bed, makes a man healthy, wealthy and dead.
'Dead?' said Rincewind, In the debating chamber of his mind a dozen emotions got to their feet and started shouting. Relief was in full spate when Shock cut in on a point of order and then Bewilderment, Terror and Loss started a fight which was ended only when Shame slunk in from next door to see what all the row was about.
Ankh-Morpork! Pearl of cities! This is not a completely accurate description, of course — it was not round and shiny — but even its worst enemies would agree that if you had to liken Ankh-Morpork to anything, then it might as well be a piece of rubbish covered with the diseased secretions of a dying mollusc.

Equal Rites

She was already learning that if you ignore the rules people will, half the time, quietly rewrite them so that they don't apply to you
It is well known that a vital ingredient of success is not knowing that what you're attempting can't be done.
One reason for the bustle was that over large parts of the continent other people preferred to make money without working at all, and since the Disc had yet to develop a music recording industry they were forced to fall back on older, more traditional forms of banditry.
It was a small village, and wouldn't have shown up on a map of the mountains. It barely showed up on a map of the village.