Wyrd sisters by terry pratchett

Wyrd Sisters by Terry Pratchett

Wyrd Sisters

(Starring Three Witches, also kings, daggers, crowns, storms, dwarfs, cats,
Ghosts, spectres, apes, bandits, demons, forests, heirs, jesters, tortures, trolls, turntables, general rejoicing and drivers alarums.)

The wind howled. Lightning stabbed at the earth erratically, like an
Inefficient assassin. Thunder rolled back and forth across the dark, rain
Lashed hills.
The night was as black as the inside of a cat. It was the kind of night,
You could believe, on which gods moved men as though they were
Pawns on the chessboard of fate. In the middle of this elemental storm
A fire gleamed among the dripping furze bushes like the madness in a
Weasel’s eye. It illuminated three hunched figures. As the cauldron
Bubbled an eldritch voice shrieked: ‘When shall we three meet again?’
There was a pause.
Finally another voice said, in far more ordinary tones: ‘Well, I can do
Next Tuesday.’
Through the fathomless deeps of space swims the star turtle Great
A’Tuin, bearing on its back the four giant elephants who carry on their
Shoulders the mass of the Discworld. A tiny sun and moon spin around
Them, on a complicated orbit to induce seasons, so probably nowhere
Else in the multiverse is it sometimes necessary for an elephant to cock
A leg to allow the sun to go past.
Exactly why this should be may never be known. Possibly the Creator
Of the universe got bored with all the usual business of axial inclination,
Albedos and rotational velocities, and decided to have a bit of fun for
Once.
It would be a pretty good bet that the gods of a world like this
Probably do not play chess and indeed this is the case. In fact no gods
Anywhere play chess. They haven’t got the imagination. Gods prefer
Simple, vicious games, where you Do Not

Achieve Transcendence but
Go Straight To Oblivion; a key to the understanding of all religion is that
A god’s idea of amusement is Snakes and Ladders with greased rungs.
Magic glues the Discworld together – magic generated by the turning
Of the world itself, magic wound like silk out of the underlying structure
Of existence to suture the wounds of reality.
A lot of it ends up in the Ramtop Mountains, which stretch from the
Frozen lands near the Hub all the way, via a lengthy archipelago, to thewarm seas which flow endlessly into space over the Rim.
Raw magic crackles invisibly from peak to peak and earths itself in the
Mountains. It is the Ramtops that supply the world with most of its
Witches and wizards. In the Ramtops the leaves on the trees move even
When there is no breeze. Rocks go for a stroll of an evening.
Even the land, at times, seems alive. . .
At times, so does the sky.
The storm was really giving it everything it had. This was its big chance.
It had spent years hanging around the provinces, putting in some useful
Work as a squall, building up experience, making contacts, occasionally
Leaping out on unsuspecting shepherds or blasting quite small oak
Trees. Now an opening in the weather had given it an opportunity to
Strut its hour, and it was building up its role in the hope of being spotted
By one of the big climates.
It was a good storm. There was quite effective projection and passion
There, and critics agreed that if it would only learn to control its thunder
It would be, in years to come, a storm to watch.
The woods roared their applause and were full of mists and flying
Leaves.
On nights such as these the gods, as has already been pointed out,