Wintersmith Read online

Page 31

 

  "Whut? Crivens!" Rob scurried back to the end of the word and plonked down a small e. "Twelve!"

  "Ye can count all ye want tae, mistress," said Rob, flinging down the pencil, "but thats all the marmalade there is!" This got another cheer. "An heroic effort, Mr. Anybody," said Granny. "The first thing a hero must conquer is his fear, and when it comes to fightin, the Nac Mac Feegles dont know the meanin of the word. "

  "Aye, true enough," Rob grunted. "We dinna ken the meanin o thousands o wurds!"

  "Can you fight a dragon?"

  "Oh, aye, bring it on!" He was still angry about the marmalade. "Run up a high mountain?"

  "Nae problemo!"

  "Read a book to the very end to save your big wee hag?"

  "Oh, aye. " Rob stopped. He looked cornered. He licked his lips. "How many o them pagey things would that be?" he said hoarsely. "Hundreds," said Granny. "Wi wurds on both sides?"

  "Yes, indeed. In quite small writing!" Rob crouched. He always did that when he was cornered, the better to come up fighting. The mass of Feegles held their breath. "Ill do it!" he announced grimly, clenching his fists. "Good," said Granny. "Of course you would. That would be heroic—for you. But someone must go into the Underworld to find the real Summer Lady. That is a Story. It has happened before. It works. And he must do it in fear and terror like a real Hero should, because a lot of the monsters he must overcome are the ones in his head, the ones he brings in with him. Its time for spring, and winter and its snow is still with us, so you must find him now. Youve got to find him and set his feet on the path. The Path That Goes Down, Rob Anybody. "

  "Aye, we ken that path," said Rob. "His name is Roland," said Granny. "I reckon you should leave as soon as it is light. " The broomstick barreled through the black blizzard. Sticks usually went where the witches wanted them to go, and Tiffany lay along the broom, tried not to freeze to death, and hoped it was taking her home. She couldnt see anything except darkness and rushing snow that stung her eyes, so she lay with the hat pulled down to streamline the stick. Even so, snowflakes struck her like stones and piled up on the stick. She had to flail around every few minutes to stop things from icing up. She did hear the roar of the falls below and felt the sudden depth of air as the stick glided out over the plains and began to sink. She felt cold to the bone. She couldnt fight the Wintersmith, not like Annagramma could. Oh, she could plan to do it, and go to bed determined, but when she saw him… …iron enough to make a nail…. The words hung around in her head as the stick flew on and she remembered the old rhyme shed heard years ago, when the wandering teachers came to the village. Everyone seemed to know it: Iron enough to make a nail, Lime enough to paint a wall, Water enough to drown a dog, Sulfur enough to stop the fleas, Poison enough to kill a cow, Potash enough to wash a shirt, Gold enough to buy a bean, Silver enough to coat a pin, Lead enough to ballast a bird, Phosphor enough to light the town, And on, and on… It was a kind of nonsense, the sort that you never remember being taught but always seem to have known. Girls skipped to it, kids dib-dibbed it to see who was O-U-T out. And then one day a traveling teacher, who like all the others would teach for eggs, fresh vegetables, and clean used clothing, found he got more to eat by teaching things that were interesting rather than useful. He talked about how some wizards had once, using very skillful magic, worked out exactly what a human being was made of. It was mostly water, but there were iron and brimstone and soot and a pinch of just about everything else, even a tiny amount of gold, but all cooked up together somehow. It made as much sense to Tiffany as anything else did. But she was certain of this: If you took all that stuff and put it in a big bowl, it wouldnt turn into a human no matter how much you shouted at it. You couldnt make a picture by pouring a lot of paint into a bucket. If you were human, you knew that. The Wintersmith wasnt. The Wintersmith didnt…. He didnt know how the song ended, either. The words went around and around her mind as the borrowed broom plunged onward. At one point Dr. Bustle turned up, with his reedy, self-satisfied voice, and gave her a lecture on the Lesser Elements and how, indeed, humans were made up of nearly all of them but also contained a lot of narrativium, the basic element of stories, which you could detect only by watching the way all the others behaved…. You run, you flee. How do you like this, sheep girl? You stole him from me. Is he all that you hoped for? The voice came out of the air right beside her. "I dont care who you are," muttered Tiffany, too cold to think straight. "Go away…. " Hours went by. The air down here was a bit warmer, and the snow not so fierce, but the cold still got through, no matter how much clothing you wore. Tiffany fought to stay awake. Some witches could sleep on a broomstick, but she didnt dare try in case she dreamed she was falling and woke up to find that it was true but soon wouldnt be. But now there were lights below, fitful and yellow. It was probably the inn at Twoshirts, an important navigation point. Witches never stayed at inns if they could help it, because in some areas that could be dangerous, and in any case most of them inconveniently required you to pay them money. But Mrs. Umbridge, who ran the souvenir shop opposite the inn, had an old barn around the back and was what Miss Tick called FTW, or Friendly To Witches. There was even a witch sign, scratched on the barn wall where no one who wasnt looking for it would find it: a spoon, a pointy hat, and one big schoolmistressy checkmark. A pile of straw had never seemed more wonderful, and inside two minutes Tiffany was inside the straw. At the other end of the little barn Mrs. Umbridges pair of cows kept the air warm and smelling of fermented grass. It was a dark sleep. She dreamed of Annagramma taking off the De-Luxe Mask and revealing her face, and then taking her face off to show Granny Weatherwaxs face underneath…. And then: Was it worth a dance, sheep girl? You have taken my power and I am weak. The world will become frost. Was it worth a dance? She sat up in the pitch-black barn and thought she saw a writhing glow in the air, like a snake. Then she fell back into the darkness and dreamed of the Wintersmiths eyes.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Even Turquoise C lang-clonk! Tiffany sat bolt upright, straw tumbling off her. But it was only the sound of a handle clanging on the side of a metal pail. Mrs. Umbridge was milking her cows. Pale daylight shone through the cracks in the walls. She looked up when she heard Tiffany. "Ah, I thought one of my ladies mustve arrived in the night," she said. "Want some breakfast, dear?"

  "Please!" Tiffany helped the old woman with her buckets, helped make some butter, patted her very old dog, had beans on toast, and then— "I think Ive got something here for you," said Mrs. Umbridge, heading for the little counter that was Twoshirtss entire post office. "Now where did I—oh yes…. " She handed Tiffany a small bundle of letters and a flat parcel, all held together by an elastic band and covered with dog hairs. She went on talking, but Tiffany barely noticed. There was something about how the carter had broken his leg, poor man, or maybe it was his horse that had broken a leg, poor creature, and one of the blizzards had brought down a lot of trees onto the track, and then the snow had set in so cruelly, dear, that not even a man on foot could get through, and so what with one thing and another the mail to and from the Chalk had been delayed and really there was hardly any of it anyway— All this was a kind of background buzzing to Tiffany, because the letters were all addressed to her— three from Roland and one from her mother—and so was the parcel. It had a businesslike air, and when opened revealed a sleek black box, which itself opened to reveal— Tiffany had never seen a box of watercolor paints before. She hadnt known that so many colors existed in one place. "Oh, a paint box," said Mrs. Umbridge, looking over her shoulder. "Thats nice. I had one when I was a girl. Ah, and its got turquoise in it. Thats very expensive, turquoise. Thats from your young man, is it?" she added, because old women like to know everything, or a little bit more. Tiffany cleared her throat. In her letters shed kept right off the whole painful subject of painting. He must have thought shed like to try it. The colors in her hands gleamed like a trapped rainbow. "Its a lovely morning," she said, "and I think Id better go home…. "
On the chilly river just above the thundering Lancre Falls, a tree trunk was moored. Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg stood on a huge, water-worn stone in the middle of the torrent and watched it. The log was covered in Feegles. They all looked cheerful. Admittedly, certain death awaited them, but it did not involve—and this is important—having to spell anything. "You know, no man has ever gone over these falls and lived to tell the tale," said Nanny. "Mr. Parkinson did," said Granny. "Dont you remember? Three years ago?"

  "Ah, yes, he lived, certainly, but he was left with a very bad stutter," said Nanny Ogg. "But he wrote it down," said Granny. "He called it My Fall Over the Falls. It was quite interestin. "

  "No one actually told a tale," said Nanny. "That is my point. "

  "Aye, weel, were as light as wee feathers," said Big Yan. "An the wind blowin through the kilt keeps a man well aloft, ye ken. "

  "Im sure thats a sight to see," said Nanny Ogg. "Are ye all ready?" said Rob Anybody. "Fine! Would ye be so good as to untie yon rope, Mrs. Ogg?" Nanny Ogg undid the knot and gave the log a shove with her foot. It drifted a little way and then got caught by the current. "Row, Row, Row Yer Boat?" Daft Wullie suggested. "Whut aboot it?" said Rob Anybody as the log began to speed up. "Why dont we all sing it?" said Daft Wullie. The walls of the canyon were closing in fast now. "Okay," said Rob. "After all, it is a pleasin naut-ickal ditty. And Wullie, yere tae keep yon cheese away fra me. I dinna like the way its lookin at me. "

  "It hasna got any eyes, Rob," said Wullie meekly, holding on to Horace. "Aye, thats whut I mean," said Rob sourly. "Horace didna mean tae try an eat ye, Rob," said Daft Wullie meekly. "An ye wuz sae nice an clean when he spat ye oot. "

  "An hoo come ye ken whut name a cheese has?" Rob demanded, as white water began to splash over the log. "He told me, Rob. "

  "Aye?" said Rob, and shrugged. "Oh, okay. I wouldna argue wi a cheese. " Bits of ice were bobbing on the river. Nanny Ogg pointed them out to Granny Weatherwax. "All this snow is making the ice rivers move again," she said. "I know. "

  "I hope you can trust the stories, Esme," said Nanny. "They are ancient stories. They have a life of their own. They long to be repeated. Summer rescued from a cave? Very old," said Granny Weatherwax. "The Wintersmith will chase our girl, though. " Granny watched the Feegles log drift around the bend. "Yes, he will," she said. "And, you know, I almost feel sorry for him. " And so the Feegles sailed home. Apart from Billy Bigchin they couldnt carry a tune in a bucket, but that minor problem was dwarfed by the major problem, which was that they didnt bother with the idea of singing at the same pitch, or speed, or even with the same words. Also, minor fights soon broke out, as always happened even when Feegles were having fun, and so the sound that echoed among the rocks as the log sped toward the lip of the waterfall went something like: "Rowaarghgently boat ouchgentlydoon boat boat boatiddley boat stream boatlymerrily boatarrgh… CRIVENnnnnns!" And with its cargo of Feegles, the log tipped and disappeared, along with the accompanying song, into the mists. Tiffany flew over the long whaleback of the Chalk. It was a white whale now, but the snow didnt look too deep here. The bitter winds that blew the snow onto the downs also blew it away. There were no trees and few walls to make it drift. As she drew nearer to home, she looked down onto the lower, sheltered fields. The lambing pens were already being set up. There was a lot of snow for this time of year—and whose fault was that?—but the ewes were on their own timetable, snow or not. Shepherds knew how bitter the weather could be at lambing; winter never gave in without a fight. She landed in the farmyard and said a few words to the broomstick. It wasnt hers, after all. It rose again and shot off back to the mountains. A stick can always find its way home, if you know the trick. There were reunions, lots of laughter, a few tears, a general claiming that she had grown like a beanstalk and was already as tall as her mother and all the other things that get said at a time like this. Apart from the tiny Cornucopia in her pocket, shed left everything behind—her diary, her clothes, everything. It didnt matter. She hadnt run away, shed run to, and here she was, waiting for herself. She could feel her own ground under her boots again. She hung the pointy hat behind the door and went and helped the men setting up the pens. It was a good day. A bit of sun had managed to leak through the murk. Against the whiteness of the snow all colors seemed bright, as if the fact that they were here gave them some special brilliance. Old harnesses on the stable wall gleamed like silver; even the browns and grays that might once have appeared so drab seemed, now, to have a life of their own. She got out the box of paints and some precious paper and tried to paint what she was seeing, and there was a kind of magic there, too. It was all about light and dark. If you could get down on paper the shadow and the shine, the shape that any creature left in the world, then you could get the thing itself. Shed only ever drawn with colored chalks before. Paint was so much better. It was a good day. It was a day just for her. She could feel bits of herself opening up and coming out of hiding again. Tomorrow there would be the chores, and people very nervously coming up to the farm for the help of a witch. If the pain was strong enough, no one worried that the witch who was making it go away was someone you last remembered being two years old and running around with only her undershirt on. Tomorrow…might become anything. But today the winter world was full of color.