Maquis

The maquis is an untempting semi-arid scrubland made up of thorny, sharp, un-nutritious and inhospitable vegetation. It spreads out over a substantial part of the duchy of Quirm, andsm as luck would have it, is right on the best, in fact the only, route for the railway to take from Ankh-Morpork. Only the marginalised and desperate live there, and those who would fight a guerilla war against ever-encroaching authority. Moist von Lipwig and various associate enter the Maquis to negotiate with one and drive out the other.