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'It's themist, is it?' The landlord looked at the wall, which was quite eency in Mort's voice unsettled him He would have preferred the normal scaly monsters Aright across the room! Can't you feel it?'

The custo them uneasy One or two of the, rather like an icy tingle, but it could have been indigestion

Mort backed away, and then gripped the bar He shivered for a moment

'Look,' said the landlord, 'a joke's a joke, but --'

'You had a green shirt on before!'

The landlord looked down There was an edge of terror in his voice

'Before what?' he quavered To his astonishment, and before his hand could complete its surreptitious journey towards the blackthorn stick, Mort lunged across the bar and grabbed hireen shirt, haven't you?' he said 'I saw it, it had little yellow buttons!'

'Well, yes I've got two shirts' The landlord tried to draw himself up a little 'I'm a man of means,' he added 'I just didn't wear it today' He didn't want to kno Mort knew about the buttons

Mort let hi in different places! Where's the ed!'

He ran out through the door and there was a muffled cry from outside He dashed back, wild-eyed, and confronted the horrified crowd

'Who changed the sign? Son!'

The landlord nervously ran his tongue across his lips

'After the old king died, you mean?' he said

Mort's look chilled him, the boy's eyes were two black pools of terror

'It's the name I mean!'

'We've – it's always been the sa desperately at his customers for support 'Isn't that so, lads? The Duke's Head'

There was a ree Then he turned and ran outside again

The listeners heard hoof beats in the yard, which grew fainter and then disappeared entirely, just as though a horse had left the face of the earth

There was no sound inside the inn Men tried to avoid one another's gaze No-one wanted to be the first to adht he had just seen

So it was left to the landlord to walk unsteadily across the rooers across the fa wooden surface of the door It was solid, unbroken, everything a door should be

Everyone had seen Mort run through it three tiht for height, rising nearly vertically with his hooves thrashing the air and his breath curling away behind hi on with knees and hands and mostly illpower, his face buried in the horse's mane He didn't look down until the air around hiravy

Overhead the Hub Lights flickered silently across the winter sky Below --

-- an upturned saucer, hts through it Clouds were drifting through it

No He watched carefully Clouds were certainly drifting into it, and there were clouds in it, but the clouds inside ispier and htly different direction and, in fact, didn't seem to haveelseoh yes, the Hub Lights They gave the night outside the ghostly hen of it under the do into a piece of another world, alrafted on to the Disc The weather was slightly different in there, and the Lights weren't on display tonight