I Shall Wear Midnight (41 page)

The Duchess smiled, but it was a strange little smile. If smiles had a colour, it would have been green. ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘That was, er’ – she paused, swaying a little – ‘very kind of her.’ She coughed. ‘I am so glad that you and my daughter appear to be close chums and I would like to tender you my apologies for any hastiness on my part in recent days. I would also very much like to tender you and the hard-working staff here my apologies for what may have appeared to be high-handed behaviour, and I trust you will accept that these stemmed from a mother’s determination to do the very best for her child.’ She spoke very carefully, the words coming out like children’s coloured building blocks, and between the blocks – like mortar – were the unspoken words:
Please, please, don’t tell people I was a dancer in a music hall. Please!

‘Well, of course, we’re all on edge,’ said Tiffany. ‘Least said, soonest mended, as they say.’

‘Regrettably,’ said the Duchess, ‘I don’t think I said least.’ Tiffany noticed that there was a large wine glass in her hand, and it was almost empty. The Duchess watched Tiffany for a while and then continued, ‘A wedding almost straight after a funeral, is that right?’

‘Some people think that it’s bad luck to move a wedding once it’s planned,’ said Tiffany.

‘Do you believe in luck?’ said the Duchess.

‘I believe in not having to believe in luck,’ said Tiffany. ‘But, your grace, I can tell you in truth that at such times the universe gets a little closer to us. They are strange times, times of beginnings and endings. Dangerous and powerful. And we feel it even if we don’t know what it is. These times are not necessarily good, and not necessarily bad. In fact, what they are depends on what
we
are.’

The Duchess looked down at the empty glass in her hand. ‘For some reason, I think I should be taking a nap.’ She turned to head towards the stairs, nearly missing the first step.

There was a burst of laughter from the other end of the hall. Tiffany followed the Duchess, but stopped to tap Letitia on the shoulder.

‘If I was you, I’d go and talk to your mum before she goes upstairs. I think she’d like to talk to you now.’ She bent down and whispered in her ear, ‘But don’t tell her too much about what Nanny Ogg said.’

Letitia looked about to object, saw Tiffany’s expression, thought better of it and intercepted her mother.

And now, suddenly, Granny Weatherwax was at Tiffany’s side. After a while, as if addressing the air, Granny said, ‘You have a good steading here. Nice people. And I’ll tell you one thing.
He
is near.’

Tiffany noticed that the other witches – even Long Tall Short Fat
Sally – were now lining up just behind Granny Weatherwax. She was the focus of their stares, and when a lot of witches are staring at you, you can feel it like the sun. ‘Is there something you want to say?’ said Tiffany. ‘There is, isn’t there?’

It wasn’t often, and in fact now Tiffany came to think of it, it wasn’t
ever
that she had seen Granny Weatherwax look worried.

‘You are certain that you can best the Cunning Man, are you not? I see you don’t wear midnight yet.’

‘When I am
old
, I shall wear midnight,’ said Tiffany. ‘It’s a matter of choice. And Granny, I know why you are here. It is to kill me if I fail, isn’t it?’

‘Blast it,’ Granny Weatherwax said. ‘You are a witch, a good witch. But some of us think that it might be best if we
insisted
on helping you.’

‘No,’ said Tiffany. ‘My steading. My mess. My problem.’

‘No matter what?’ said Granny.

‘Definitely!’

‘Well, I commend you for your adherence to your position and wish you … no, not luck, but certainty!’ There was a susurration among the witches and Granny snapped sharply, ‘She has made her decision and that, ladies, is
it
.’

‘No contest,’ said Nanny Ogg with a grin. ‘I very nearly pity him. Kick him in the— Kick him anywhere you can, Tiff!’

‘It’s your ground,’ said Mrs Proust. ‘How can a witch do anything but succeed on her own home ground?’

Granny Weatherwax nodded. ‘If you have let pride get the better of you, then you have already lost, but if you grab pride by the scruff of the neck and ride it like a stallion, then you may have already won. And now I think it’s time for you to prepare, Miss Tiffany Aching. Do you have a plan for the morning?’

Tiffany looked into the piercing blue eyes. ‘Yes. Not to lose.’

‘That’s a good plan.’

Mrs Proust shook Tiffany with a hand that was prickly with warts and said, ‘By happy accident, my girl, I think I should go and slay a monster myself …’

29
You had been a sad little white kitten when Tiffany had given her to the old witch. Now she was a queen, far more snobbish than the Duchess. She must have recognized Tiffany because she graciously condescended to blink at her and then look away as if bored. There were never any mice in Granny’s cottage these days; You just stared at them until they realized how worthless they were and slunk away.

BURNING THE KING

T
IFFANY KNEW SHE
wouldn’t go to sleep that night, and didn’t try. People sat together in little groups, talking, and there was still food and drink on the tables. Possibly because of the drink, the people didn’t actually notice how fast the food and drink were disappearing, but Tiffany was certain she could hear faint noises in the beams high above. Of course, witches were proverbially good at stuffing food into their pockets for later, but probably the Feegles outdid them by sheer numbers.

Tiffany moved aimlessly from group to group, and when the Duchess finally left to go upstairs, she didn’t follow her. She was quite emphatic to herself that she wasn’t following. She just happened to be going in the same direction. And, when she darted across the stone floor to reach the door of the Duchess’s room, just after it closed behind the woman, she wasn’t doing this in order to eavesdrop. Certainly not.

She was just in time to hear the beginning of an angry scream, and then Mrs Proust’s voice: ‘Why, Deirdre Parsley! Long time, no

sequins! Can you still high-kick a man’s top hat off his head?’ And then there was silence. And Tiffany left hurriedly, because the door was very thick and someone would be bound to notice if she stood there any longer with her ear pressed to it.

So she went back down in time to talk to Long Tall Short Fat Sally and Mrs Happenstance, who she now realized was blind, which was unfortunate but not – for a witch – too much of a tragedy. They always had a few extra senses to spare.

And then she went down into the crypt.

There were flowers all around the old Baron’s tomb, but not on it because the marble lid was so beautifully made that it would be a shame even to cover it with roses. On the stone, stonemasons had carved the Baron himself, in armour and holding his sword; it was so perfectly done that it looked as if he might, at any moment, get up and walk away. At the four corners of the slab, candles burned.

Tiffany walked to and fro past other dead barons in stone. Here and there was a wife, carved with her hands peacefully folded; it was … strange. There were no gravestones on the Chalk. Stone was too precious. There were burying grounds, and in the castle somewhere was an ancient book of faded maps that showed where people had been put. The only common person to have a memorial, who was in most respects an extremely uncommon person, was Granny Aching; the cast-iron wheels and pot-bellied stove that were all that remained of her shepherding hut would certainly survive for another hundred years. It had been good metal, and the endlessly nibbling sheep kept the ground around it as smooth as a tabletop, and besides, the grease from the sheep’s fleeces as they rubbed up against the wheels were as good as oil for keeping the metal as fine as the day it was cast.

In the old days, before a knight became a knight, he would spend a night in his hall with his weapons, praying to whichever gods were listening to give him strength and good wisdom.

She was sure she heard those words spoken, at least in her head if not in her ears. She turned and looked at the sleeping knights, and wondered if Mrs Proust was right, and stone had a memory.

And what are
my
weapons? she thought. And the answer came to her instantly: pride. Oh, you hear them say it’s a sin; you hear them say it goes before a fall. And that can’t be true. The blacksmith prides himself on a good weld; the carter is proud that his horses are well turned out, gleaming like fresh chestnuts in the sunshine; the shepherd prides himself on keeping the wolf from the flock; the cook prides herself on her cakes. We pride ourselves on making a good history of our lives, a good story to be told.

And I also have fear – the fear that I will let others down – and because I fear, I will overcome that fear. I will not disgrace those who have trained me.

And I have trust, even though I am not sure what it is I am trusting.

‘Pride, fear and trust,’ she said aloud. And in front of her the four candles streamed fire, as if driven by the wind, and for a moment she was certain, in the rush of light, that the figure of an old witch was melting into the dark stone. ‘Oh, yes,’ said Tiffany. ‘And I have fire.’

And then, not knowing exactly why, she said, ‘When I am old, I shall wear midnight. But not today.’

Tiffany held up her lantern and the shadows moved, but one, which looked very much like an old woman in black, faded completely. And I know why the hare leaps into the fire, and tomorrow … No, today, I am leaping into it too. She smiled.

When Tiffany got back in the hall, the witches were all watching her from the stairs. Tiffany had wondered how Granny and Mrs Proust would get on, given that both of them were as proud as a cat full of sixpences. But they seemed to be getting on well enough in a talking-

about-the-weather, the-manners-of-young-people-these-days and the-scandalous-price-of-cheese sort of way. But Nanny Ogg looked unusually worried. Seeing Nanny Ogg looking worried was
worrying
. It was past midnight – technically speaking, the witching hour. In real life every hour was a witching hour, but nevertheless the way the two hands on the clock stood straight up was slightly eerie.

‘I hear that the lads came back from their stag-night fun,’ said Nanny, ‘but it seems to me they’ve forgotten where they left the groom. I don’t think he is going to go anywhere, though. They are pretty certain they took his trousers down and tied him to something.’ She coughed. ‘That’s generally the usual procedure. Technically the best man is supposed to remember where, but they found him and he can’t remember his own name.’

The clock in the hall struck midnight; it was never on time. Each strike may as well have hit Tiffany’s backbone.

And there, marching towards her, was Preston. And it seemed to Tiffany that for quite some time, wherever she had looked, there was Preston, looking smart and clean and – somehow – hopeful.

‘Look, Preston,’ she said. ‘I haven’t got time to explain things, and I’m not certain you would believe them – no, you probably
would
believe them if I told you them. I have to go out there to kill that monster before it kills me.’

‘Then I will protect you,’ said Preston. ‘Anyway, my commander-in-chief might be out there somewhere in the pigsty with a sow sniffing his unmentionables! And I represent the temporal power here!’

‘
You?
’ Tiffany snapped.

Preston stuck out his chest, although it didn’t go very far. ‘As a matter of fact, yes: the lads made me officer of the Watch so that they could all have a drink, and right now the sergeant is in the kitchen, throwing up in the sink. He thought he could outdrink Mrs Ogg!’

He saluted. ‘I’m going out there with you, miss. And you can’t stop me. No offence meant, of course. However by virtue of the power invested in me by the sergeant, in between him throwing up into the sink, I would like to commandeer you and your broomstick to assist me in my search, if that is all right with you?’

It was a dreadful question to ask a witch. On the other hand, it was being asked by Preston. ‘All right then,’ she said, ‘but do try not to scratch it. And there is one thing that I have to do first. Do excuse me.’ She walked a little way over to the open door of the hall and leaned against the cold stonework. ‘I know there are Feegles listening to me,’ she said.