I Shall Wear Midnight (7 page)

watch ye in my heid, to keep an eye on ye, because somebody must. I know ye know this because ye are clever, and I know that ye pretend to me that ye do not know, just as I pretend not to know that I know, and I am sure that ye know that too, yes?’

‘I might have to work all that out with a pencil and paper,’ Tiffany said, trying to laugh it off.

‘It is nae funny! I can see ye clouded in my heid. Danger around ye. And the worst of it is, I cannae see from whence it comes. And that is not right!’

Just as Tiffany opened her mouth, half a dozen Feegles came scurrying down the tunnel from the mound, carrying a plate between them. Tiffany couldn’t help noticing, because witches always noticed things if they possibly can, that the blue decoration around the edge of the plate looked very much like that on her mother’s second-best dinner service. The rest of the plate was obscured by a large piece of mutton, along with jacket potatoes. It smelled wonderful, and her stomach took over her brain. A witch took her meals where she could, and was happy to get them.

The meat had been cut in half, although the half for the kelda was slightly smaller than the half for Tiffany. Strictly speaking, you cannot have a half that is smaller than the other half, because it wouldn’t be a half, but human beings know what it means. And keldas always had a huge appetite for their size, because they had babies to make.

This wasn’t time to talk anyway. A Feegle offered Tiffany a knife which was, in fact, a Feegle claymore, and then held up a rather grubby tin can with a spoon stuck in it.

‘Relish?’ he suggested shyly.

This was a bit posh for a Feegle meal, although Jeannie was civilizing them somewhat, in so far as you could civilize a Feegle. At least they were getting the right idea. Nevertheless, Tiffany understood enough to be wary.

‘What’s in it?’ she asked, knowing that this was a dangerous question.

‘Oh, wonderful stuff,’ said the Feegle, rattling the spoon in the can. ‘There’s crabapple, there is, and mustard seed and horseradish and snails and wild herbs and garlic and a sprinkling of Johnny-come-lately—’ But he had gabbled one word a bit too quickly for Tiffany’s taste.

‘Snails?’ she interrupted.

‘Oh aye, yes, very nourishing, full of vit’mins and min’rals, ye ken, and those wee pro-teenies, and the nice thing is, with enough garlic, they taste of garlic.’

‘What do they taste of if you
don’t
use garlic?’ said Tiffany.

‘Snails,’ said the kelda, taking pity on the waiter, ‘and I have to say they are good eating, my girl. The boys let them out at night to graze on wild cabbage and dog lettuce. They are quite tasty, and I think ye might approve of the fact that there is no stealing involved.’

Well, that was a good thing, Tiffany had to admit. Feegles did steal, joyously and repeatedly, as much for sport as anything else. On the other hand, to the right people, in the right place, at the right time, they could be
very
generous, and this was, fortunately, happening right now.

‘Even so, Feegles farming?’ she said aloud.

‘Oh no,’ said the spokesfeegle, while his fellows behind him pantomimed insulted distaste by making ‘yuk’ noises and sticking their fingers down their throat. ‘It is nae farming, it is livestock herding, as is suitable for them who is free o’ spirit and likes to feel the wind up their kilt. Mind ye, the stampedes can be a wee bit embarrassing.’

‘Have some, please do,’ the kelda pleaded. ‘It will encourage them.’

In fact, the new Feegle cuisine was quite tasty. Perhaps it’s true what they say, thought Tiffany, that anything goes with garlic. Except custard.

‘Don’t mind my boys,’ said Jeannie when they had both eaten their fill. ‘The times are changing and I think they know it. For ye too. How do ye feel?’

‘Oh, you know. The usual,’ said Tiffany. ‘Tired, flustered and upset. That sort of thing.’

‘Ye work too hard, my girl. I fear ye do not have enough to eat, and I can certainly see ye don’t get enough sleep. When did ye last sleep the night in a proper bed, I wonder? Ye ken that ye must have sleep; ye cannae think properly without some time to rest. I fear ye will soon need all the strength ye can muster. Would ye like me to put the soothings on ye?’

Tiffany yawned again. ‘Thank you for offering, Jeannie,’ she said, ‘but I don’t think I need them, if it’s all the same to you.’ There was a pile of greasy fleeces in the corner that had probably not long before belonged to sheep who had decided to say goodbye to the cruel world and commit suicide. They looked very inviting. ‘I had better go and see to the girl.’ Tiffany’s legs did not seem to want her to move. ‘Still, I expect she is as safe as houses in a Feegle mound.’

‘Oh, no,’ said Jeannie softly as Tiffany’s eyes shut. ‘Much,
much
safer than houses.’

When Tiffany was actually snoring, Jeannie walked slowly up and into the mound itself. Amber was curled up near the fire, but Rob Anybody had stationed some of the older and wiser Feegles around her. This was because the evening fighting was going on. The Nac Mac Feegle fought as often as they breathed, and generally at the same time. It was by way of being a way of life, in a way. Besides, when you were only a few inches tall, you had the whole world to fight and so you might as well learn early.

Jeannie sat down by her husband and watched the brawling for a while. Young Feegles were bouncing off the walls, their uncles and one another. Then she said, ‘Rob, do ye think we are bringing our boys up properly?’

Rob Anybody, who was sensitive to Jeannie’s mood, glanced across at the sleeping girl.

‘Oh aye, no doubt about it—Hey, did ye no’ see that? Slightly-more-wee-than-wee-Jock-Jock kicked Daft Wullie in the pog! Wonderful dirty fightin’, and he’s still only three inches high!’

‘He is going to make a grand warrior one day, Rob, that’s true enough,’ said Jeannie, ‘but …’

‘I always tell them,’ Rob Anybody went on excitedly as the young Feegle flew over their heads, ‘that the way to success is always to attack only people who are much bigger than ye are! Important rule!’

Jeannie sighed as another young Feegle smacked into the wall, shook his head and rushed back into the fight. It was almost impossible to hurt a Feegle. Any human who tried to stamp on a Feegle would find that the little man he thought was under his boot was now in fact climbing up his trouser leg, and after that the day could only get worse. Besides, if you saw one Feegle, there were probably many more around that you hadn’t spotted, and they had certainly spotted
you
.

Perhaps the bigjobs have bigger problems because they’re bigger than us, the kelda thought. She sighed inwardly. She would never let her husband know this, but sometimes she did wonder whether a young Feegle might profitably be taught something like, well, accountancy. Something that didnae mean ye had to bounce off the walls, and didnae mean you had to fight all the time. But then, would he still be a Feegle?

‘I’m feared for the big wee hag, Rob,’ she said. ‘Something is wrong.’

‘She wanted to be a hag, lassie,’ said Rob. ‘Now she has to dree her weird, same as us. She is a bonny fighter, ye ken. She kissed the Lord of the Winter to his death and banged the Queen o’ the Elves with a frying pan. And I mind the time that invisible beastie
got into her heid, and she wrestled it and sent it away. She fights.’

‘Oh, I ken that well enough,’ said the kelda. ‘She kissed the face o’ winter and made springtime come again. It was a great thing that she did, sure enough, but she had the mantle of the summer about her. It was that power she dealt to him, not just her own. She did it well, mind, I can think of none who would have done it better, but she must beware.’

‘What enemy can she have that we cannae face with her?’ Rob asked.

‘I cannae tell,’ said the kelda, ‘but in my heid, it seems like this. When she kissed the winter, it shook me to my roots; it seemed like it shook the world and I cannae but wonder that there might be those who stirred in their slumber. You mak’ certain, Rob Anybody, to keep more than one eye on her.’

THE REAL SHILLING

T
IFFANY WOKE HUNGRY
and to the sound of laughter. Amber was awake and, against all probability, happy.

Tiffany found out why when she managed to squeeze most of herself into the tunnel that led to the mound. The girl was still lying curled up on one side, but a group of young Feegles were entertaining her with somersaults and handsprings and occasionally tripping one another up in humorous ways.

The laughter was younger than Amber was; it sounded like the chuckle a baby makes when it sees shiny things in pretty colours. Tiffany did not know how the soothings worked, but they were better than anything a witch could do; they seemed to settle people down and make them better from inside their head outwards. They made you well and, best of all, they made you forget. Sometimes, it seemed to Tiffany, the kelda talked about them as if they were alive – living thoughts perhaps, or kindly living creatures that somehow took away the bad things.

‘She’s doing well,’ said the kelda, appearing out of nowhere. ‘She
will bide fine. There will be nightmares as the darkness comes out. The soothings can’t do everything. She’s coming back into herself now, right from the start, and that’s the best thing.’

It was still dark but dawn edged the horizon. Tiffany had a dirty job to do before daylight.

‘Can I leave her here with you for a little while?’ she said. ‘There’s a small task that needs doing.’

I shouldn’t have gone to sleep, she thought as she climbed out of the pit. I should have gone right back! I shouldn’t have left the poor little thing there!

She tugged the broomstick out of the thorn bushes around the mound, and stopped dead. Someone was watching her; she could feel it on the back of her neck. She turned sharply, and saw an old woman all in black, quite tall, but leaning on a walkingstick. Even as Tiffany looked, the woman vanished, slowly, as if evaporating into the scenery.

‘Mistress Weatherwax?’ Tiffany said to the empty air, but that was silly. Granny Weatherwax would not be seen dead with a walkingstick, and certainly wouldn’t be seen alive with one. And there was movement in the corner of her eye. When she spun round again there was a hare, right up on her
⁹
hind legs, watching her with interest and no sign of fear.

It was what they did, of course. The Feegles didn’t hunt them, and the average sheepdog would run out of legs before a hare ran out of breath. The hare had no stuffy burrow to be trapped in; speed was where a hare lived, shooting across the landscape like a dream of the wind – she could afford to sit and watch the slow world go by.

This one burst into flames. She blazed for a moment and then, entirely unharmed, sped away in a blur.

All right, thought Tiffany as the broomstick came free, let’s
approach this from the point of view of common sense. The turf isn’t scorched and hares are not known for bursting into flames, so–She stopped as a tiny trapdoor flicked open in her memory.

The hare runs into the fire
.

Had she seen that written down anywhere? Had she heard it as part of a song? A nursery rhyme? What had the hare got to do with anything? But she was a witch, after all, and there was a job to do. Mysterious omens could wait. Witches knew that mysterious omens were around all the time. The world was always very nearly drowning in mysterious omens. You just had to pick the one that was convenient.

Bats and owls steered effortlessly out of Tiffany’s way as she sped over the sleeping village. The Petty house was on the very edge. It had a garden. Every house in the village had a garden. Most of them had a garden full of vegetables or, if the wife had the upper hand, half vegetables and half flowers. The Petty house was fronted by a quarter of an acre of stinging nettles.

That had always annoyed Tiffany right down to her country boots. How hard would it have been to grub up the weeds and put in a decent crop of potatoes? All they needed was muck, and there was plenty of that in a farming village; the trick was to stop it getting into the house. Mr Petty could have made an effort.

He had been back to the barn, or at least somebody had. The baby was now on top of the heap of straw. Tiffany had come prepared with some old, but still serviceable linen, which was at least better than sacking and straw. But somebody had disturbed the little body, and put flowers around it, except that the flowers were, in fact, stinging nettles. They had also lit a candle in one of the tin-plate candlesticks that every house in the village owned. A candlestick. A light. On a pile of loose straw. In a barn full of tinder-dry hay and more straw. Tiffany stared in horror, and then heard the grunt overhead.
A man was
hanging
from the barn’s rafters.