That was a far more likely explanation.

There had been an unusual conjunction of circumstances.

By exactly a million to one chance there had been someone watching, studying, looking for the right tools for a special job.

And here was Rincewind.

It was almost too easy.

So Rincewind opened his eyes. There was a ceiling above him; if it was the floor, then he was in trouble.

So far, so good.

He cautiously felt the surface he was laying on. It was grainy, woody in fact, with the odd nail-hole. A human sort of surface.

His ears picked up the crackle of a fife and a bubbling noise, source unknown.

His nose, feeling that it was being left out of things, hastened to report a whiff of brimstone.

Right, so where did that leave him? Lying on a rough wooden floor in a firelit room with something that bubbled and gave off sulphurous smells. In his unreal, dreamy state he felt quite pleased at this process of deduction.

What else?

Oh, yes.

He opened his mouth and screamed and screamed and screamed.

This made him feel slightly better.

He lay there a bit longer. Though the tumbled heap of his memories came the recollections of mornings in bed when he was a little boy, desperately subdividing the passing time into smaller and smaller units to put off the terrible moment of getting up and having to face all the problems of life such as, in this case, who he was, where he was, and why he was.

"What are you?" said a voice on the edge of his consciousness.

"I was coming to that," muttered Rincewind.

The room oscillated into focus as he pushed himself up on his elbows.

"I warn you," said the voice, which seemed to be coming from a table, "I am protected by many powerful amulets."

"Jolly good," said Rincewind. "I wish I was."

Details began to distil out of the blur. It was a long, low room, one end of which was occupied by an enormous fireplace. A bench all down one wall contained a selection of glassware apparently created by a drunken glassblower with hiccups, and inside its byzantine coils coloured liquids seethed and bubbled. A skeleton hung from a hook in a relaxed fashion. On a perch beside it someone had nailed a stuffed bird. Whatever sins it had committed in life, it hadn't deserved what the taxidermist had done to it.

Rincewind's gaze swept across the floor. It was obvious that it was the only sweeping the floor had had for some time. Only around him had space been cleared among the debris of broken glass and overturned retorts for -

A magic circle.

It looked an extremely thorough job. Whoever had chalked it was clearly aware that its purpose was to divide the universe into two bits, the inside and the outside.

Rincewind was, of course, inside.

"Ah," he said, feeling a familiar and almost comforting sense of dread sweep over him.

"I adjure and conjure thee against all aggressive acts, o demon of the pit," said the voice from, Rincewind now realised, behind the table.

"Fine, fine," said Rincewind quickly. "That's all right by me. Er. It isn't possible that there has been the teeniest little mistake here, could there?"

"Avaunt!"

"Right!" said Rincewind. He looked around him desperately. "How?"

"Don't you think you can lure me to my doom with thy lying tongue, o fiend of Shamharoth," said the table. "I am learned in the ways of demons. Obey my every command or I will return thee unto the boiling hell from which you came. Thou came, sorry. Thou came'st, in fact. And I really mean it."

The figure stepped out. It was quite short, and most of it was hidden by a variety of charms, amulets and talismans which, even if not effective against magic, would have protected it against a tolerably determined sword thrust. It wore glasses and had a hat with long sidepieces that gave it the air of a short-sighted spaniel.

It held a sword in one shaking hand. It was so heavily etched with sigils that it was beginning to bend.

"Boiling hell, did you say?" said Rincewind weakly.

"Absolutely. Where the screams of anguish and the tortured torments -"

"Yes, yes, you've made your point," said Rincewind. "Only, you see, the thing is, in fact, that I am not a demon. So if you would just let me out?"

"I am not fooled by thy outer garb, demon," said the figure. In a more normal voice it added, "Anyway, demons always lie. Well-known fact."

"It is?" said Rincewind, clutching at this straw. "In that case, then - I am a demon."

"Aha! Condemned out of your own mouth!"

"Look, I don't have to put up with this," said Rincewind. "I don't know who you are or what's happening, but I'm going to have a drink, all right?"

He went to walk out of the circle, and went rigid with shock as sparks crackled up from the runic inscriptions and earthed themselves all over his body.

"Thou mays'nt - thou maysn't - thou mays'n't -" The conjurer of demons gave up. "Look, you can't step over the circle until I release you, right? I mean, I don't want to be unpleasant, it's just that if I let you out of the circle you will be able to resume your true shape, and a pretty awful shape it is too, I expect. Avaunt!" he added feeling that he wasn't keeping up the tone.

"All right. I'm avaunting. I'm avaunting," said Rincewind, rubbing his elbow. "But I'm still not a demon."

"How come you answered the conjuration, then? I suppose you just happened to be passing through the paranatural dimensions, eh?"

"Something like that, I think. It's all a bit blurred."

"Pull the other one, it has got bells on." The conjurer leaned his sword against a lectern on which a heavy book, dripping bookmarks, lay open. Then he did a mad little jig on the floor.

"It's worked!" he said. "Heheh!" He caught sight of Rincewind's horrified gaze and pulled himself together. He gave an embarrassed cough, and stepped up to the lectern.

"I really am not -" Rincewind began.

"I had this list here somewhere," said the figure. "Let's see, now. Oh, yes. I command you - thee, I mean - to, ah, grant me three wishes. Yes. I want mastery of the kingdoms of the world, I want to meet the most beautiful woman who has ever lived, and I wan to live forever." He gave Rincewind an encouraging look.

"All that?" said Rincewind.

"Yes."

"Oh, no problem," said Rincewind sarcastically. "And then I get to have the rest of the day off, right?"

"And I want a chest full of gold, too. Just to be going on with."

"I can see you've got it all thought out."

"Yes. Avaunt!"

"Right, right. Only -" Rincewind thought hurriedly, he's quite mad, but mad with a sword in his hands, the only chance I've got is to argue him out of it on his own terms," - only, d'you see, I'm not a very superior kind of demon and I'm afraid those sort of errands are a bit out of my league, sorry. You can avaunt as much as you like, but they're just beyond me."

The little figure peered over the top of its glasses.

"I see," he said testily. "What could you manage then, do you think?"

"Well, er -" said Rincewind, "I suppose I could go down to the shops and get a packet of mints, or something."

There was a pause.

"You really can't do all those things?"

"Sorry. Look I'll tell you what. You just release me, and I'll be sure to pass the word around when I get back to -" Rincewind hesitated. Where the hell did demons live, anyway? "Demon City," he said hopefully.

"You mean Pandemonium?" said his captor suspiciously.

"Yes, that's right. That's what I meant. I'll tell everyone, next time you're in the real world be sure and look up - what's your name?"

"Thursley. Eric Thursley."

"Right"

"Demonologist. Midden Lane, Pseudopolis. Next door to the tannery," said Thursley hopefully.

"Right you are. Don't you worry about it. Now, if you'll just let me out -"