Wintersmith Read online

Page 9

 

  "Shut up!" Rob yelled. "Ahm ashamed o yez! Its up tae the big wee hag tae marry who she wants tae! Is that no so, gonnagle?"

  "Hmm?" said Billy, looking upward. He caught a snowflake. "I said the big wee hag can wed who she wants, right?" Billy was staring at the snowflake. "Billy?" said Rob. "What?" he said, as if waking up. "Oh…yes. Do ye think she wants tae marry the Wintersmith?"

  "The Wintersmith?" said Rob. "He canna marry anyone. Hes like a spirit—theres nothin tae him!"

  "She danced with him. We saw her," said Billy, catching another flake and inspecting it. "Just girlish high spirits! Anyway, why should the big wee hag think anything o the Wintersmith?"

  "I have reason tae believe," said the gonnagle slowly, as more flakes danced down, "that the Wintersmith is thinkin a lot aboot the big wee hag…. "

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Snowflakes T hey say that there can never be two snowflakes that are exactly alike, but has anyone checked lately? Snow fell gently in the darkness. It piled up on rooftops, it kissed its way between the branches of trees, it settled on the forest floor with a gentle sizzle and smelled sharply of tin. Granny Weatherwax always checked the snow. She stood at her doorway, with the candlelight streaming out around her, and caught flakes on the back of a shovel. The white kitten watched the snowflakes. Thats all it did. It didnt bat them with a paw, it just watched, very intently, each flake spiral down until it landed. Then the kitten would watch it some more, until it was sure the entertainment was over, before it looked up and selected another flake. It was called You, as in "You! Stop that!" and "You! Get off there!" When it came to names, Granny Weatherwax didnt do fancy. Granny looked at the snowflakes and smiled in her not-exactly-nice way. "Come back in, You," she said, and shut the door. Miss Tick was shivering by the fire. It wasnt very big—just big enough. However, there was the smell of bacon and pease pudding coming from a small pot on the embers, and beside the small pot was a much larger one from which came the smell of chicken. Miss Tick didnt often get chicken, so she lived in hope. It had to be said that Granny Weatherwax and Miss Tick did not get on well with each other. Senior witches often dont. You could tell that they didnt by the way they were extremely polite all the time. "The snow is early this year, Mistress Weatherwax," said Miss Tick. "Indeed it is, Miss Tick," said Granny Weatherwax. "And so…interesting. Have you looked at it?"

  "Ive seen snow before, Mistress Weatherwax," said Miss Tick. "It was snowing all the way up here. I had to help push the mail coach! I saw altogether too much snow! But what are we going to do about Tiffany Aching?"

  "Nothing, Miss Tick. More tea?"

  "She is rather our responsibility. "

  "No. Shes hers, first and last. Shes a witch. She danced the Winter Dance. I saw her do it. "

  "Im sure she didnt mean to," said Miss Tick. "How can you dance and not mean it?"

  "Shes young. The excitement probably ran away with her feet. She didnt know what was going on. "

  "She should have found out," said Granny Weatherwax. "She should have listened. "

  "Im sure you always did what you were told when you were almost thirteen, Mistress Weatherwax," said Miss Tick with just a hint of sarcasm. Granny Weatherwax stared at the wall for a moment. "No," she said. "I made mistakes. But I didnt make excuses. "

  "I thought you wanted to help the child?"

  "Ill help her to help herself. That is my way. Shes danced into the oldest Story there is, and the only way out is through the other end. The only way, Miss Tick. " Miss Tick sighed. Stories, she thought. Granny Weatherwax believes the world is all about stories. Oh well, we all have our funny little ways. Except me, obviously. "Of course. Its just that shes so…normal," Miss Tick said aloud. "When you consider what shes done, I mean. And she thinks so much. And now that shes come to the attention of the Wintersmith, well…"

  "She fascinates him," said Granny Weatherwax. "Thats going to be a big problem. "

  "Which she will have to solve. "

  "And if she cant?"

  "Then shes not Tiffany Aching," said Granny Weatherwax firmly. "Ah, yes, shes in the Story now, but she dont know it! Look at the snow, Miss Tick. They say that no two snowflakes are alike. How could they know something like that? Oh, they thinks theyre so smart! Ive always wanted to catch em out. An I have done! Go outside now, and look at the snow. Look at the snow, Miss Tick! Every flake the same!" Tiffany heard the knocking and opened the tiny bedroom window with difficulty. Snow had built up on the sill, soft and fluffy. "We didna want tae wake ye," said Rob Anybody, "but Awfly Wee Billy said you ought tae see this. " Tiffany yawned. "What am I looking for?" she muttered. "Catch some o yon flakes," said Rob. "No, not on yer hand—theyll melt tae soon. " In the gloom Tiffany felt around for her diary. It wasnt there. She looked on the floor, in case shed knocked it off. Then a match flared as Rob Anybody lit a candle, and there was the diary, looking as though it had always been there but, she noticed, also being suspiciously cold to the touch. Rob looked innocent, a sure sign of guilt. Tiffany saved the questions for later and poked the diary out of the window. Flakes settled on it, and she lifted it closer to her eyes. "They look just like any ordin—" she began, and then stopped, and then said, "Oh, no…this must be a trick!"

  "Aye? Well, ye could call it that," said Rob. "But its his trick, ye ken. " Tiffany stared at falling flakes drifting in the light of the candle. Every one of them was Tiffany Aching. A little, frozen, sparkling Tiffany Aching. Downstairs, Miss Treason burst out laughing. The doorknob on the door to the tower bedroom was rattled angrily. Roland de Chumsfanleigh (pronounced Chuffley; it wasnt his fault) carefully paid it no attention. "What are you doing in there, child?" said a muffled voice peevishly. "Nothing, Aunt Danuta," said Roland, without turning around from his desk. One of the advantages of living in a castle was that rooms were easy to lock; his door had three iron locks and two bolts that were as thick as his arm. "Your father is calling out for you, you know!" said another voice, with even more peeve. "He whispers, Aunt Araminta," Roland said calmly, carefully writing an address on an envelope. "He only cries out when you set the doctors on him. "

  "Its for his own good!"

  "He cries out," Roland repeated, and then licked the flap on the envelope. Aunt Araminta rattled the doorknob again. "You are a very ungrateful child! You will starve, you know! We will get the guards to batter this door down!" Roland sighed. The castle had been built by people who did not like to have their doors battered down, and anyone trying to do that here would have to carry the battering ram up a narrow spiral staircase with no room at the top to turn around, and then find a way to knock down a door four planks thick and made of oak timbers so ancient, it was like iron. One man could defend this room for months, if he had provisions. He heard some more grumbling outside and then the echo of the aunts shoes as they went down the tower. Then he heard them screaming at the guards again. It wouldnt do them much good. Sergeant Roberts and his guards* were edgy about taking orders from the aunts. Everyone knew, though, that if the Baron died before the boy was twenty-one, the aunts would legally run the estate until he was. And while the Baron was very ill, he was not dead. It was not a happy time to be a disobedient guard, but the sergeant and his men survived the anger of the aunts by being, when their orders justified it, deaf, stupid, forgetful, confused, ill, lost, or—in the case of Kevin— foreign. For now, Roland kept his excursions for the small hours, when no one was around and he could pillage the kitchen. Thats when he went in to see his father. The doctors kept the old man dosed with something, but Roland held his hand for a while for the comfort that it gave. If he found jars of wasps or leeches, he threw them into the moat. He stared at the envelope. Perhaps he ought to tell Tiffany about this, but he didnt like to think about it. It would worry her and she might try to rescue him again, and that wouldnt be right. This was something he had to face. Besides, he wasnt locked in. They were locked out. While he held the tower, there was a place where they couldnt poke and pry and steal
. Hed got what was left of the silver candlesticks under his bed, along with what remained of the antique silver cutlery ("gone to be valued," theyd said) and his mothers jewel box. Hed been a bit late finding that; it was missing her wedding ring and the silver-and-garnet necklace his grandmother had left to her. But tomorrow hed get up early and ride over to Twoshirts with the letter. He liked writing them. They turned the world into a nicer place, because you didnt have to include the bad bits. Roland sighed. It would have been nice to tell Tiffany that in the library hed found a book called Sieges and Survival by the famous general Callus Tacticus (who invented "tactics," which was interesting). Whod have thought such an ancient book could be so useful? The general had been very firm about having provisions, so Roland had plenty of small potatoes, large sausages, and heavy dwarf bread, which was handy to drop on people. He glanced across the room, where there was a portrait of his mother that he had carried up from the cellar where they had left it ("waiting to be cleaned," they said). Right beside it, if you knew what you were looking for, an area of wall about the size of a small door looked lighter than the rest of the stones. The candlestick next to it looked slightly lopsided, too. There were lots of advantages to living in a castle. Outside, it began to snow. The Nac Mac Feegles peered out at the fluffy flakes from the thatch of Miss Treasons cottage. By the light that managed to leak out from the grubby windows below, they watched the tiny Tiffanys whirl past. "Say it wi snowflakes," said Big Yan. "Hah!" Daft Wullie snatched a spiraling flake. "Ye gotta admit hes done the wee pointy hat really well," he said. "He must like the big wee hag a lot. "

  "It disna make any sense!" said Rob Anybody. "Hes the Winter! Hes all the snow an ice an storms an frosts. Shes just a wee big girl! Ye canna say thats an ideal match! Whut do ye say, Billy? Billy?" The gonnagle was chewing the end of his mousepipes while staring at the flakes with a faraway look in his eyes. But somehow Robs voice broke into his thoughts, because he said: "Whut does he ken aboot people? Hes no as alive as a wee insect, yet hes as powerful as the sea. An hes sweet on the big wee hag. Why? Whut can she be tae him? Whut will he do next? I tell ye this: Snowflakes is just the beginning. We must watch oot, Rob. This may become verra bad…. " Up in the mountains, 990,393,072,007 Tiffany Achings landed lightly on the old packed snow on a ridge and began an avalanche that carried away more than a hundred trees and a hunting lodge. This wasnt Tiffanys fault. It wasnt her fault that people slipped on packed layers of her, or couldnt open the door because she was piled up outside it, or got hit by handfuls of her thrown by small children. Most of her had melted by breakfast time the next day, and besides, no one noticed anything strange except witches who dont take peoples word for things, and a lot of kids no one listened to. Even so, Tiffany woke up feeling very embarrassed. Miss Treason didnt help at all. "At least he likes you," she said while she ferociously wound up her clock. "I wouldnt know about that, Miss Treason," said Tiffany, really not wanting this conversation at all. She was washing the dishes at the sink, her back to the old woman, and she was glad that Miss Treason could not see her face—and, if it came to it, that she couldnt see Miss Treasons face, either. "What will your young man say about it, I wonder?"