donât want to get used to it!â
âYouâve got a strong morphogenic field,â said Champot. âI can tell. I look for these things. Yes. Very strong, I should say.â
âWhatâs that?â
âI was never very good with words, you know,â said Champot. âI always found it easier to hit people with something. But I gather it all boils down to how alive you were. When you were alive, I mean. Something calledââ he paused â âanimal vitality. Yes, that was it. Animal vitality. The more you had, the more you stay yourself, as it were, if youâre a ghost. I expect you were one hundred per cent alive, when you were alive,â he added.
Despite himself, Verence felt flattered. âI tried to keep myself busy,â he said. They had strolled through the wall into the Great Hall, which was now empty. The sight of the trestle tables triggered an automatic reaction in the king.
âHow do we go about getting breakfast?â he said.
Champotâs head looked surprised.
âWe donât,â he said. âWeâre ghosts.â
âBut Iâm hungry!â
âYouâre not, you know. Itâs just your imagination.â
There was a clattering from the kitchens. The cooks were already up and, in the absence of any other instructions, were preparing the castleâs normal breakfast menu. Familiar smells were wafting up from the dark archway that led to the kitchens.
Verence sniffed.
âSausages,â he said dreamily. âBacon. Eggs. Smoked fish.â He stared at Champot. âBlack pudding,â he whispered.
âYou havenât actually got a stomach,â the old ghost pointed out. âItâs all in the mind. Just force of habit. You just
think
youâre hungry.â
âI
think
Iâm ravenous.â
âYes, but you canât actually touch anything, you see,â Champot explained gently. âNothing at all.â
Verence lowered himself gently on to a bench, so that he did not drift through it, and sank his head in his hands. Heâd heard that death could be bad. He just hadnât realized how bad.
He wanted revenge. He wanted to get out of this suddenly horrible castle, to find his son. But he was even more terrified to find that what he really wanted, right now, was a plate of kidneys.
A damp dawn flooded across the landscape, scaled the battlements of Lancre Castle, stormed the keep and finally made it through the casement of the solar.
Duke Felmet stared out gloomily at the dripping forest. There was such a lot of it. It wasnât, he decided, that he had anything against trees as such, it was just that the sight of so much of them was terribly depressing. He kept wanting to count them.
âIndeed, my love,â he said.
The duke put those who met him in mind of some sort of lizard, possibly the type that lives on volcanic islands, moves once a day, has a vestigial third eye and blinks on a monthly basis. He considered himselfto be a civilized man more suited to the dry air and bright sun of a properly-organized climate.
On the other hand, he mused, it might be nice to be a tree. Trees didnât have ears, he was pretty sure of this. And they seemed to manage without the blessed state of matrimony. A male oak tree â heâd have to look this up â a male oak tree just shed its pollen on the breeze and all the business with the acorns, unless it was oak apples, no, he was pretty sure it was acorns, took place somewhere else . . .
âYes, my precious,â he said.
Yes, trees had got it all worked out. Duke Felmet glared at the forest roof. Selfish bastards.
âCertainly, my dear,â he said.
âWhat?â said the duchess.
The duke hesitated, desperately trying to replay the monologue of the last five minutes. There had been something about him being half a man, and . . . infirm on purpose? And he was sure there had been a complaint about the