Thief of Time - Sense

Lobsang blinked and shook his head. Lu-Tze grabbed his arm.

'You felt something again?'

'Ugh... like having a tooth out in my brain,' said Lobsang, rubbing his head. He pointed. 'It came from over there.'

'A pain came from over there?' said Lu-Tze. He glared at the boy. 'Like last time? But we've never found a way of detecting which way-'

He stopped and rummaged in his sack. Then he used the sack to sweep snow off a flat boulder.

'Well see what-'

Glass house.

This time Lobsang could concentrate on the tones that filled the air. Wet finger on a wineglass? Well, you could start there. But the finger would have to be the finger of a god on the glass of some celestial sphere. And the wonderful, complex, shifting tones did not simply fill the air, they were the air.

The moving blur beyond the walls was getting closer now. It was just beyond the closest wall, then it found the open doorway... and vanished.

Something was behind Lobsang. He turned. There was nothing there that he could see, but he felt movement and, for just a moment, something warm brushed his cheek...

'-the sand says,' said Lu-Tze, tipping the contents of a small bag onto the rock.

The coloured grains bounced and spread. They did not have the sensitivity of the Mandala itself, but there was a blue bloom in the chaos.

He gave Lobsang a sharp look.

'It's been proved that no one can do what you just did,' he said. 'We've never found any way of detecting where a disturbance in time is actually being caused.'

'Er, sorry.' Lobsang raised a hand to his cheek. It was damp. 'Er, what did I do?'

'It takes a huge-' Lu-Tze stopped. 'Ankh-Morpork's that way,' he said. 'Did you know that?'

'No! Anyway, you said you had a feeling things would happen in Ankh-Morpork!'

'Yes, but I've had a lifetime of experience and cynicism!' Lu-Tze scooped the sand back into its bag. 'You're just gifted. Come on.'

***

The Thief of Time - p168-169