The Last Hero recap

Cohen the Barbarian, now Emperor of the Agatean Empire and bored beyond bearing, gathers the Silver Horde for one last deed: to carry a barrel of explosive up Cori Celesti to Dunmanifestin, the home of the gods, and return fire to them with interest, in payment for the raw deal handed to humanity. They kidnap a minstrel to write the saga. In Ankh-Morpork the wizards work out that blowing up the gods' home would collapse the magical field that holds the Disc together and kill everything on it within days. Lord Vetinari turns to Leonard of Quirm, who designs a flying machine, the Kite, launched over the Rim and slung around the world to reach the mountain first. Its crew are Leonard, Captain Carrot and Rincewind, with the Librarian stowed away. The Horde climb to the gods, losing one of their number and shedding Evil Harry Dread, who betrays them because his profession requires it. At the peak the minstrel's song changes Cohen's mind; the lit bomb is carried clear and destroyed harmlessly, the Kite is blown as far as the moon, and everyone gets home.

Previously: Cohen the Barbarian is the last and greatest of the Disc's heroes, a man who has spent seventy years robbing temples, killing monsters and outliving everyone who tried to stop him. In his old age he gathered a band of equally ancient veterans, the Silver Horde, and walked into the Forbidden City of the Agatean Empire, where he took the imperial throne simply by sitting on it. He has been Emperor ever since. Elsewhere on the Disc, Ankh-Morpork is governed by Lord Vetinari, its Patrician; Unseen University by Mustrum Ridcully; the City Watch is captained by Carrot Ironfoundersson; and Rincewind, the wizard who cannot do magic, has finally been given a post there after a career of being sent to the most dangerous places on the world against his will. The inventor Leonard of Quirm is kept in comfortable custody because his designs work.

Cohen the Barbarian has been Emperor of the Agatean Empire for some time and has discovered that ruling an empire is mostly sitting down. The heroic age is over, his enemies are all dead, and the world has moved on to a kind of life that has no room for him or for the handful of very old men still with him. So the Silver Horde abdicate and set out on a last expedition, and it is not a raid. They intend to return fire to the gods, with interest: a barrel of Agatean thunder clay carried to Dunmanifestin at the summit of Cori Celesti, where the gods live, in payment for everything the gods have arranged for humanity. On the way they carry off a young minstrel to serve as their bard, on the grounds that a deed nobody sings about might as well not have happened.

Word of what the Horde intend reaches Ankh-Morpork, and the wizards of Unseen University work out the consequence. The Disc's magic exists as a standing wave centred on Cori Celesti; destroy the home of the gods and the wave collapses, the magic drains away, and everything alive on the world dies within days. There is no time to send an army and no road fast enough. Lord Vetinari turns instead to Leonard of Quirm, who proposes something no one has attempted: a flying machine, launched from the very edge of the Disc, carried around and beneath the world by its own fall and driven by dragons, to arrive at the mountain ahead of a party of pensioners on foot. The crew are Leonard, Captain Carrot of the City Watch, and Rincewind, chosen because nobody on the Disc has more experience of surviving things. The Librarian settles the question of his own inclusion by getting aboard.

The Kite goes over the Rim and around the world, and its crew become the first people to see the Discworld from outside: the Rimfall, the elephants, and the shell of Great A'Tuin beneath them. The voyage is cold, cramped and improvised, and the Librarian's strength turns out to be exactly what is needed when the machine is damaged. On the ground the Horde climb toward Dunmanifestin, and the journey costs them. One of their number dies on the road and is buried with the honours of his trade. Evil Harry Dread, the last working Dark Lord on the Disc, who joined them on the clear understanding that his profession obliges him to betray his allies at the decisive moment, duly does so, and is dealt with according to the same rules, which is to say he is allowed to get away. The minstrel, meanwhile, has stopped being frightened and has started composing.

The Horde reach the hall of the gods, set the bomb and light it, and say to the gods' faces what they came to say. The Kite's crew arrive to argue them out of it, and Leonard, waiting, paints the ceiling. What actually stops Cohen is the minstrel, who sings the song he has made of their journey; hearing his own life as a saga, Cohen decides that this is not how it should end. The fuse cannot be extinguished, so the bomb is taken clear of the mountain and destroyed where it can do no harm, and the standing wave that keeps the Disc alive survives. The blast flings the Kite off course as far as the Disc's moon before its crew can begin the journey home, and they come down safely. Leonard goes back to his comfortable confinement, Carrot to the Watch, Rincewind to the University. The Horde, alive again against all expectation and unwilling to go back to a throne, set off toward somewhere nobody has been. The minstrel returns with his song and is made by it.

At the home of the gods the Silver Horde get exactly what they came for, an audience with the people who set the rules, and the bomb is in place with its fuse burning. What stops Cohen is not the gods and not the argument from the crew of the Kite but the minstrel, who has spent the whole journey turning the Horde's last march into a song, and who sings it. Cohen hears what his life sounds like from outside and decides that this is not the ending it needs. The fuse cannot be put out, so the bomb is carried clear and detonated where it will do no harm to the world, and the standing wave of magic that keeps the Disc alive is left intact. The blast throws Leonard's flying machine far off course, and its crew reach the Disc's moon before they can begin the journey home; they get back, and the Kite comes down safely. Leonard returns to his comfortable confinement with a new set of drawings and a ceiling he is quietly proud of, Carrot to the Watch, Rincewind to the University. The Horde survive, decline to go back to an imperial throne, and set off again toward somewhere nobody has been. The minstrel goes home with the only thing he ever really wanted, which is a song worth singing, and becomes famous for it.