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Vimes would wonder, later, if the details even mattered.
In an hour or so, he’d lean against the ragged cold of a stone wall, cupping his hand around the end of his cigar as he lit it. It would take him a few tries, since his blood-splattered hands would still be shaking.
But in the moment, it was the details he noticed first.
The glint of light off a revealed blade.
The dust kicked up by Vetinari’s cape as he spun neatly out of the way.
The shadow of the second assassin stretching up from the rafters.
The bands on the feather of the crossbow bolt.
The screams of the crowd as Vetinari stumbled backward a step, almost like he was still dancing, like the party was still happening.
He wasn’t fast enough, wasn’t close enough to do anything but catch the Patrician as he tipped, throwing himself between the threats and a figure that seemed suddenly almost fragile.
He needn’t have bothered - the second assassin was already turning to flee and the first was quite surprised to discover a black-handled dagger protruding from his heart.
Vetinari never fell, the only body thudding to the floor that of his assassin. He caught himself against Vimes’s outstretched arm and righted himself, expression sharp as flint.
“No need to stop the party on my account,” he said, lending the phrase an ominous tone it didn’t own and waving the arm that didn’t have a crossbow bolt embedded in the shoulder.
The band started back up again, if reluctantly, and the crowd visibly forced their attention back to the suddenly banal affair of drinks, bosoms, and political alliances.
“Sir,” Vimes said, only he wasn’t exactly certain where to take the sentence, so he let the honorific hang bleakly.
“My office,” Vetinari said, squeezing his arm with a vise-like grip. Vimes put a supportive hand on his waist, and Vetinari murmured again. “Not in a hurry, if you please.”
“You’re ridiculous,” Vimes grated out. He forced his steps to slow, hyper-aware of the sound of blood dripping onto the polished wooden floor of the ballroom. “You’re going to have to have this place cleaned,” his mouth continued, without any apparent input from his brain. Vetinari gave him a tight smile.
“The palace cleaning staff are well-compensated and familiar with the many ways to remove bloodstains,” he said, and it should have sounded like a threat but it just sounded tired. Vimes risked a glance sideways and was alarmed to discover the paleness of the face next to his.
“Who was it?” he asked.
“Not foreign agents,” Vetinari murmured. “They were local. Not assassins from the college, I’d recognise them.”
Did it matter who it was, this time? Did it matter to what end their conspiracy had aimed, why this particular group thought the Patrician needed to be taken off the board? They’d done this dance enough times that it almost felt irrelevant. No, not irrelevant - insulting.
Vimes caught himself. He was just tired. That’s all this was. The doors swung shut behind them and the noise of the party ebbed away.
“Can we move a little faster, now?” Vimes snapped, and Vetinari actually stumbled slightly.
“Perhaps we’d better,” he said, sounding slightly dazed. “I appear to be losing blood somewhat faster than I’d estimated.” Vimes glanced around the hallway, empty except for the occasional blank-faced palace servant, and made a choice. With a quick shift, he took most of the Patrician’s weight and made a beeline to the office. The doors were opening as they arrived, Drumknott behind them.
“Put him on the couch,” the clerk said, less frazzled than Vimes had been expecting. “How much blood has he lost?”
“I dunno, a couple mugs?” Vimes said, settling the Patrician on the couch.
“Mugs?” Vetinari asked, sounding mildly scandalised. Drumknott, all business, shut the doors firmly and bolted them.
“There’s scissors on the table,” he said, and Vimes grimaced before picking them up. He hesitated, wondering for a moment if he should ask permission, but then Vetinari’s head tipped back against the couch as he made a small noise of pain and Vimes found himself cutting away fabric and reaching for the clean bandage Drumknott was handing him. The crossbow bolt was smaller than usual, and the entry would looked ragged.
“Damn them,” Vimes hissed. “It’s barbed. It’ll have to come out the back. Drumknott, is there an Igor in the palace?”
“We have one in the basement,” Drumknott said, a touch too readily. His face had started to lose some color. “He likes the scorpion pits.”
”Oh?” Vetinari said, trying to lift his head. “Perhaps I should put an extra pit in.”
“Run and get him,” Vimes said grimly.
“What are you going to do?” Drumknott asked.
Vimes set his jaw.
“I’m going to put a new hole in the Patrician,” he said grimly. “And hope to all hell that he survives it so I don’t end up running this place.” Drumknott blanched further and left at a run through what had previously appeared to be a bookshelf.
“This is going to hurt, Sir,” Vimes warned.
“Promises, promises,” Vetinari murmured absently.
“What?”
“ Proceed , Commander.”
Vimes took a deep breath, leaning the Patrician forward and pulling the freed fabric away to reveal the back of his shoulder. He took a hold on the end of the arrow, bloody feathers slick beneath his hands. He would have to miss the shoulder blade, but the angle seemed right for it.
“Sorry,” he muttered, and slammed his hand forward as quickly as he could. Vetinari jerked at the motion, a strangled shout dying in his throat, but a metallic point emerged with a thin rivulet of blood.
“I shouldn’t take it all the way out until the Igor is here,” Vimes said, and Vetinari gave him an oddly calm little smile.
“How shall we pass the time?” he asked, and Vimes snorted.
“Aren’t you chipper?” he said. “I guess you usually are. My men said you made very friendly small talk after you’d been shot, when you’d finished identifying all my guards.” He watched Vetinari’s eyes narrow as he worked his way through the sentence, thoughtful despite his breath coming in short, controlled bursts.
“Pain has a certain… overriding effect…” Vetinari said. “Makes it harder to… keep up appearances. And you do have very interesting Watchmen.”
Vimes raised an eyebrow. Vetinari had been like that when poisoned, too. A little freer with his compliments, a little quicker to smile, blatantly curious about new people (and Nobby).
He wondered briefly if the ‘Havelock’ Sybil had grown up with had been more like that, before he’d picked up the mask of Patrician.
Speaking of masks, while the Patrician was talking so freely…
“Sir,” Vimes said, trying again to slow the bleeding. “Why are you so reckless with your safety?”
“They need to remember,” Vetinari murmured. “Un quod sanguinat, moritur.” Vimes bit his lip as he translated.
“That which… bleeds..? dies?” He was suddenly livid with fury. “Are you saying you do this on purpose? So the city can see you’re, what, human?”
“Mortal,” Vetinari said, letting his eyes slide closed. “Replaceable. Not a god, not a fact.”
“And that’s important enough to risk your life?” Vimes snapped. Vetinari’s expression shuttered a little, lost some of the open-eyed curiosity.
“It’s everything. I am a tyrant, Vimes. The city cannot grow to idolize me and forgive my mistakes. I will not be made the tool of my city’s destruction.”
“But you would let us become the tool of yours?” Vimes asked. He could feel his heart thudding hard against his chest, but couldn’t tell if it was fear or anger driving it.
“You are of the right bloodline for it,” Vetinari said, his voice noticeably fainter. “Does that bother you? To be so inextricably linked to Old Stoneface?”
“You- where is that damned Igor?!” Vimes said.
“Here, thir,” said a mildly aggrieved voice from behind him. Vimes managed not to jump through careful self-control and the knowledge that he was holding pressure on a potentially lethal wound.
“I forgot that you do that,” he said. “He’s bleeding badly. The arrow is barbed.”
“I thee that, thir,” the Igor said. “Thtep back, pleathe.” Vimes stepped back, surprised to find that his palms missed the reassurance of Vetinari’s shallow breathing. Igor glanced at the arrow for a second and nodded approvingly.
“Very good, thir,” he said encouragingly. “Almost there.”
With one quick motion he shoved the arrow forward and caught the shaft with his other hand, ripping the arrow out and throwing it to one side.
Just as quickly, he brought two enormous bandages to each side of the wound and pressed them firmly together. Vetinari did not react, which Vimes took to mean he’d finally passed out.
“Hold these,” Igor said firmly, his voice a little less raspy than usual. Vimes took over applying pressure as Igor took a little bottle out of a black bag and shook it gently. It was connected to a very thin tube and a needle.
“What is that?” Vimes asked, against his better judgement.
“Blood,” Igor said simply. “He’s lost too much. We can keep it fresh for a while and give it to a new host.”
“He’s not a vampire,” Vimes objected, despite being only 70% or so sure that was true.
“Oh, it workth on anyone,” Igor said, regaining his lisp and sounding entirely too pleased about this blood magic. He held the bottle up and slid the needle into the Patrician’s wrist.
They were all silent for a time. Vimes could feel the shallow breaths of the Patrician stabilising slightly and hear the faint motion of liquid in the bottle.
“Hmmm,” Igor eventually said. “Perhaps thome kind of thtand to avoid having to hold the bottle up.”
When half the bottle was gone, Vetinari began to stir.
“Thtay thtill, thir,” Igor said.
“Stay still,” Vimes echoed, eying the needle in his his wrist.
“The excitement of the palace Igor does not seem to bode terribly well for my prognosis,” Vetinari said weakly. Vimes cracked a smile for the first time since the party.
“He’s here helping, not collecting,” Vimes said.
“Ah, very good.” Vetinari opened his eyes, regarding the room with bright curiosity. Vimes saw his gaze linger over the bloody crossbow bolt and the Igor’s bag.
“You know,” he said brightly. “I’ve always been curious. How do you store the organs you transplant to others? For instance, say you’d taken my heart..?”
Vimes leaned against the wall of the palace, gazing out from the balcony. There was a faint wind, enough to keep the air moving and not crossing the river to carry the smell of filth. He cupped his hand around the end of his cigar as he tried to light it, dropping the first two matches. He pretended not to notice the blood on his hands.
“He’ll be fine,” he told the wind. It tugged at his clothes, unimpressed. “He’s always fine.”
The city fell away below him, lights stretching off into the distance. Flickering firelight, reedy lantern-light, and even the unearthly glow of the University on the horizon.
It wasn’t quite the same view as from the office - you couldn’t see the Shades as well from here. And wasn’t that just perfect, an office for the ruler of Ankh-Morpork facing its most dangerous slum.
He’d seen the Patrician staring down Death again, a common enough occurrence he was starting to wonder if he should be jealous. The thought struck him as unreasonably funny - probably the effect of the adrenaline crash. He chuckled to himself and blew smoke out over the city.
“What do you see?” Vimes parroted.
“A city reminded,” Vetinari said, melting out of the shadows.
“You should absolutely still be in bed,” Vimes said, without turning his head at all.
“Oh?” Vetinari said. “And you’ve always taken medical advice, have you?” Vimes acknowledged this point by grunting and stepping slightly to the side to make room at the railing.
A second later, there was a faint presence at his side and thin fingers next to his on the railing.
“It’s not just your life you’re risking,” Vimes said. “Some of us prefer you alive.”
“Ideally,” Vetinari agreed. “I aim to be slightly more inconvenient dead than alive.”
“I am not talking-” Vimes said, turning to face Vetinari and throwing his cigar down, “-about convenience.” Their faces were surprisingly close together like this. Vimes’s breath made a faint cloud between them.
“Then what, pray tell, are you talking about?” Vetinari asked. There was just the faintest hint of a teasing edge to his tone. Vimes leaned forward, closing the space between them, and Vetinari smiled and met him.
The kiss tasted like blood and cigar ash, but the wind picked up and Vimes folded an arm protectively around Vetinari and huffed.
“Enough of this,” he said gruffly. “Let’s get you out of the cold and resting properly.”
“I don’t recall you issuing me orders in your duties,” Vetinari said lightly, but he didn’t stab Vimes with anything as he herded him back inside so he couldn’t have been too annoyed.
Back at the party, drinks were flowing freely and tongues were wagging at the departure of the mildly impaled Patrician and the Duke of Ankh.
Well, some tongues. The train workers, never one to turn down free booze, were finishing off a rowdy drinking song:
“… a rambling wreck from ‘Morpork Tech, and a hell of an engineer!” [1] Localized cheers went up at the end of the song, possibly from people celebrating that they’d stopped singing.
But trouble was brewing amongst a group of socialites (and Nobby, who was using them as cover to continue sneaking food off the buffet).
“Can’t you all see?” Lady Rust shrieked, pointing at the door. “They’re having some kind of.. of… illicit tryst!” Eyes started turning, although with some reluctance.
And then Nobby did what might, looking back on his lifetime, be the smartest thing he ever did.
“Well, obviously,” he called loudly, rolling his eyes. “What, did you just find out?”
“Yes, why did you think we called Vimes his terrier?” snorted the head of the Merchant’s Guild, who was speaking far more freely after the several sherries Sybil had talked him into. Faint laughter rose up around them, and to Lady Rust’s horror it mostly seemed directed at her.
“This is… improprietous! Scandalous! This is…”
“This is Ankh-Morpork,” Lord Vetinari said from behind her with an amused sort of calm. He was leaning heavily on his cane but did seem notably unruffled and upright. “And, I won’t hesitate to remind you, a tyranny.”
“Think on the bright side,” scoffed one of the various onlookers. “He could have married a troll.” Nobby memorized his face for the Commander’s inevitable questions later, but the laughter did begin to break the ice.
With the grace of an improvised but well-oiled machine, the City ground its way through another night.
- This wasn’t originally a Morporkian song. It hadn’t even originated on the Disc, but had snuck in through some temporal trouser leg and, in the grand tradition of such songs, was gleefully wreaking havoc on the local music ecosystem