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No-one could remember seeing [Vetinari] handle a weapon, and a flash of unaccustomed insight told Sergeant Colon that this was not in fact a comforting thought at all. They said he'd been educated at the Assassins' School, but no-one remembered what weapons he'd learned. He'd studied languages. And suddenly, with him in front of you, this didn't seem like the soft option.
...a man even the Assassins' Guild was frightened of...
'Didn't know you could juggle, sir,' Colon whispered to Lord Vetinari.
'You mean you can't, sergeant?'
'Nossir!'
'How strange. It's hardly a skill, is it? One knows what the objects are and where they want to go. After that it's just a case of letting them occupy the correct positions in time and space.'
'You're dead good at it, sir. Practise often, do you?'
'Until today, I've never tried.' Lord Vetinari looked at Colon's astonished expression. 'After Ankh-Morpork, sergeant, a handful of flying melons present a very minor problem indeed.'
'I feel certain I ought to be wearing more chains,' said Vetinari, as they paused in the doorway and looked at the assembled crowd. [On being arrested.]
You need a special kind of mind to rule a city like Ankh-Morpork, and Lord Vetinari had it. But then, he was a special kind of person.
He baffled and infuriated the lesser merchant princes, to the extent that they had long ago given up trying to assassinate him and now merely jockeyed for position amongst themselves... While other lords dined on larks stuffed with peacocks' tongues, Lord Vetinari considered that a glass of boiled water and half a slice of dry bread was an elegant sufficiency.
It was exasperating. He appeared to have no vice that anyone could discover. You'd have thought, with that pale, equine face, that he'd incline towards stuff with whips, needles and young women in dungeons. The other lords could have accepted that. Nothing wrong with whips and needles, in moderation. But the Patrician apparently spent his evenings studying reports and, on special occasions, if he could stand the excitement, playing chess.
He wore black a lot. It wasn't particularly impressive black, such as the best assassins wore, but the sober, slightly shabby black of a man who doesn't want to waste time in the mornings wondering what to wear. And you had to get up very early in the morning to get the better of the Patrician; in fact, it was wiser not to go to bed at all.
But he was popular, in a way. Under his hand, for the first time in a thousand years, Ankh-Morpork operated. It might not be fair or just or particularly democratic, but it worked... It was said that he would tolerate absolutely anything apart from anything that threatened the city. (And mime artists. It was a strange aversion, but there you are. Anyone in baggy trousers and a white face who tried to ply their art anywhere within Ankh's crumbling walls would very quickly find themselves in a scorpion pit, on one wall of which was painted the advice: Learn The Words.)
Lord Vetinari had been locked up in his own dungeons. He hadn't put up much fight, apparently. Just smiled at everyone and went quietly.
A sense of terrifying admiration overcame [Vimes.]
He wondered what it was like in the Patrician's mind. All cold and shiny, he thought, all blued steel and icicles and little wheels clicking along like a huge clock. The kind of mind that would carefully consider its own downfall and turn it to advantage.
Vimes' meeting with the Patrician ended as all such meetings did, with the guest going away in possession of an unfocused yet nagging suspicion that he'd only just escaped with his life.
'Hmm?' said Vetinari. William had thought that Vimes had a blank look, but he'd been wreathed in smiles compared to his lordship when Lord Vetinari wanted to look blank.
'Vetinari dead would be more dangerous than Vetinari alive.' - [Likely because he'd return with the Toaster brigade and proceed to fuck shit up.]
Lord Vetinari was supposed to have tried to kill someone, and that didn't make sense, if only because the person he had tried to kill was apparently still alive.
...a man even the Assassins' Guild was frightened of...
'Didn't know you could juggle, sir,' Colon whispered to Lord Vetinari.
'You mean you can't, sergeant?'
'Nossir!'
'How strange. It's hardly a skill, is it? One knows what the objects are and where they want to go. After that it's just a case of letting them occupy the correct positions in time and space.'
'You're dead good at it, sir. Practise often, do you?'
'Until today, I've never tried.' Lord Vetinari looked at Colon's astonished expression. 'After Ankh-Morpork, sergeant, a handful of flying melons present a very minor problem indeed.'
'I feel certain I ought to be wearing more chains,' said Vetinari, as they paused in the doorway and looked at the assembled crowd. [On being arrested.]
You need a special kind of mind to rule a city like Ankh-Morpork, and Lord Vetinari had it. But then, he was a special kind of person.
He baffled and infuriated the lesser merchant princes, to the extent that they had long ago given up trying to assassinate him and now merely jockeyed for position amongst themselves... While other lords dined on larks stuffed with peacocks' tongues, Lord Vetinari considered that a glass of boiled water and half a slice of dry bread was an elegant sufficiency.
It was exasperating. He appeared to have no vice that anyone could discover. You'd have thought, with that pale, equine face, that he'd incline towards stuff with whips, needles and young women in dungeons. The other lords could have accepted that. Nothing wrong with whips and needles, in moderation. But the Patrician apparently spent his evenings studying reports and, on special occasions, if he could stand the excitement, playing chess.
He wore black a lot. It wasn't particularly impressive black, such as the best assassins wore, but the sober, slightly shabby black of a man who doesn't want to waste time in the mornings wondering what to wear. And you had to get up very early in the morning to get the better of the Patrician; in fact, it was wiser not to go to bed at all.
But he was popular, in a way. Under his hand, for the first time in a thousand years, Ankh-Morpork operated. It might not be fair or just or particularly democratic, but it worked... It was said that he would tolerate absolutely anything apart from anything that threatened the city. (And mime artists. It was a strange aversion, but there you are. Anyone in baggy trousers and a white face who tried to ply their art anywhere within Ankh's crumbling walls would very quickly find themselves in a scorpion pit, on one wall of which was painted the advice: Learn The Words.)
Lord Vetinari had been locked up in his own dungeons. He hadn't put up much fight, apparently. Just smiled at everyone and went quietly.
A sense of terrifying admiration overcame [Vimes.]
He wondered what it was like in the Patrician's mind. All cold and shiny, he thought, all blued steel and icicles and little wheels clicking along like a huge clock. The kind of mind that would carefully consider its own downfall and turn it to advantage.
Vimes' meeting with the Patrician ended as all such meetings did, with the guest going away in possession of an unfocused yet nagging suspicion that he'd only just escaped with his life.
'Hmm?' said Vetinari. William had thought that Vimes had a blank look, but he'd been wreathed in smiles compared to his lordship when Lord Vetinari wanted to look blank.
'Vetinari dead would be more dangerous than Vetinari alive.' - [Likely because he'd return with the Toaster brigade and proceed to fuck shit up.]
Lord Vetinari was supposed to have tried to kill someone, and that didn't make sense, if only because the person he had tried to kill was apparently still alive.
