Tiffany Aching Complete Collection, page 61
This was going to be a very strange night.
People died. It was sad, but they did. What did you do next? People expected the local witch to know. So you washed the body and did a few secret and squelchy things and dressed them in their best clothes and laid them out with bowls of earth and salt beside them (no one knew why you did this bit, not even Miss Treason, but it had always been done) and you put two pennies on their eyes “for the ferryman” and you sat with them the night before they were buried, because they shouldn’t be left alone.
Exactly why was never properly explained, although everyone got told the story of the old man who was slightly less dead than everybody thought and got up off the spare bed in the middle of the night and got back into bed with his wife.
The real reason was probably a lot darker than that. The start and finish of things was always dangerous, lives most of all.
But Miss Treason was a wicked ol’ witch. Who knew what might happen? Hang on, Tiffany told herself; don’t you believe the Boffo. She’s really just a clever old lady with a catalogue!
In the other room Miss Treason’s loom stopped.
It often did. But this evening the sudden silence it made was louder than usual.
Miss Treason called out: “What do we have in the larder that needs eating up?”
Yes, this is going to be a very odd night, Tiffany told herself.
Miss Treason went to bed early. It was the first time Tiffany had ever known her not to sleep in a chair. She’d put on a long white nightdress, too, the first time Tiffany had seen her not in black.
There was a lot still to do. It was traditional that the cottage should be left sparkling clean for the next witch, and although it was hard to make black sparkle, Tiffany did her best. Actually, the cottage was always pretty clean, but Tiffany scraped and scrubbed and polished because it put off the moment when she’d have to go and talk to Miss Treason. She even took down the fake spiderwebs and threw them on the fire, where they burned with a nasty blue flame. She wasn’t sure what to do with the skulls. Finally, she wrote down everything she could remember about the local villages: when babies were due, who was very ill and what with, who was feuding, who was “difficult,” and just about every other local detail she thought might be helpful to Annagramma. Anything to just put off the moment. . . .
At last there was nothing for it but to climb the narrow stairs and say: “Is everything all right, Miss Treason?”
The old woman was sitting up in bed, scribbling. The ravens were perched on the bedposts.
“I’m just writing a few thank-you letters,” she said. “Some of those ladies today came quite a long way and will be having a chilly ride back.”
“‘Thank you for coming to my funeral’ letters?” asked Tiffany weakly.
“Indeed. And they’re not often written, you may be sure of that. You know the girl Annagramma Hawkin will be the new witch here? I am sure she would like you to stay on. At least for a while.”
“I don’t think that would be a good idea,” said Tiffany.
“Quite,” said Miss Treason smiling. “I suspect the girl Weatherwax has arrangements in mind. It will be interesting to see how Mrs. Earwig’s brand of witchcraft suits my silly people, although it may be best to observe events from behind a rock. Or, in my case, under it.”
She put the letters aside, and both the ravens turned to look at Tiffany.
“You have been here with me only three months.”
“That’s right, Miss Treason.”
“We have not talked, woman to woman. I should have taught you more.”
“I’ve learned a lot, Miss Treason.” And that was true.
“You have a young man, Tiffany. He sends you letters and packages. You go into Lancre Town every week to send letters to him. I fear you live not where you love.”
Tiffany said nothing. They’d been through this before. Roland seemed to fascinate Miss Treason.
“I was always too busy to pay attention to young men,” said Miss Treason. “They were always for later and then later was too late. Pay attention to your young man.”
“Erm . . . I did say he’s not actually my—” Tiffany began, feeling herself start to blush.
“But do not become a strumpet like Mrs. Ogg,” said Miss Treason.
“I’m not very musical,” said Tiffany uncertainly.
Miss Treason laughed. “You have a dictionary, I believe,” she said. “A strange but useful thing for a girl to have.”
“Yes, Miss Treason.”
“On my bookshelf you will find a rather larger dictionary. An Unexpurgated Dictionary. A useful thing for a young woman to have. You may take it, and one other book. The others will remain with the cottage. You may also have my broomstick. Everything else, of course, belongs to the cottage.”
“Thank you very much, Miss Treason. I’d like to take that book about mythology.”
“Ah, yes. Chaffinch. A very good choice. It has been a great help to me and will, I suspect, be of particular assistance to you. The loom must stay, of course. Annagramma Hawkin will find it useful.”
Tiffany doubted this. Annagramma wasn’t very practical at all. But it was probably not the time to say so.
Miss Treason leaned back against the cushions.
“They think you wove names into your cloth,” said Tiffany.
“That? Oh, it’s true. There’s nothing magical about it. It’s a very old trick. Any weaver can do it. You won’t be able to read it, though, without knowing how it was done.” Miss Treason sighed. “Oh, my silly people. Anything they don’t understand is magic. They think I can see into their hearts, but no witch can do that. Not without surgery, at least. No magic is needed to read their little minds, though. I’ve known them since they were babes. I remember when their grandparents were babes! They think they’re so grown-up! But they’re still no better than babies in the sandpit, squabbling over mud pies. I see their lies and excuses and fears. They never grow up, not really. They never look up and open their eyes. They stay children their whole lives.”
“I’m sure they’ll miss you,” said Tiffany.
“Ha! I’m the wicked ol’ witch, girl. They feared me, and did what they were told! They feared joke skulls and silly stories. I chose fear. I knew they’d never love me for telling ’em the truth, so I made certain of their fear. No, they’ll be relieved to hear the witch is dead. And now I shall tell you something vitally important. It is the secret of my long life.”
Ah, thought Tiffany, and she leaned forward.
“The important thing,” said Miss Treason, “is to stay the passage of the wind. You should avoid rumbustious fruits and vegetables. Beans are the worst, take it from me.”
“I don’t think I understand—” Tiffany began.
“Try not to fart, in a nutshell.”
“In a nutshell I imagine it would be pretty unpleasant!” said Tiffany nervously. She couldn’t believe she was being told this.
“This is no joking matter,” said Miss Treason. “The human body only has so much air in it. You have to make it last. One plate of beans can take a year off your life. I have avoided rumbustiousness all my days. I am an old person and that means what I say is wisdom!” She gave the bewildered Tiffany a stern look. “Do you understand, child?”
Tiffany’s mind raced. Everything is a test! “No,” she said. “I’m not a child and that’s nonsense, not wisdom!”
The stern look cracked into a smile. “Yes,” said Miss Treason. “Total gibberish. But you’ve got to admit it’s a corker, all the same, right? You definitely believed it, just for a moment? The villagers did last year. You should have seen the way they walked about for a few weeks! The strained looks on their faces quite cheered me up! How are things with the Wintersmith? All gone quiet, has it?”
The question was like a sharp knife in a slice of cake, and arrived so suddenly that Tiffany gasped.
“I woke up early and wondered where you were,” said Miss Treason. It was so easy to forget that she used other people’s ears and eyes all the time, in an absentminded sort of way.
“Did you see the roses?” asked Tiffany. She hadn’t felt the telltale tickle, but she hadn’t exactly had much time for anything but worry.
“Yes. Fine things,” said Miss Treason. “I wish I could help you, Tiffany, but I’m going to be otherwise occupied. And romance is an area where I cannot offer much advice.”
“Romance?” said Tiffany, shocked.
“The girl Weatherwax and Miss Tick will have to guide you,” Miss Treason went on. “I must say, though, that I suspect that neither of them has jousted much in the lists of love.”
“Lists of love?” said Tiffany. It was getting worse!
“Can you play poker?” Miss Treason asked.
“Pardon?”
“Poker. The card game. Or Cripple Mr. Onion? Chase My Neighbor Up the Passage? You must have sat up with the dead and dying before?”
“Well, yes. But I’ve never played cards with them! Anyway, I don’t know how to play!”
“I’ll teach you. There’s a pack of cards in the bottom drawer of the dresser. Go and fetch them.”
“Is this like gambling? My father said that people shouldn’t gamble.”
Miss Treason nodded. “Good advice, my dear. Don’t worry. The way I play poker isn’t like gambling at all. . . .”
When Tiffany awoke with a jolt, playing cards sliding off her dress and onto the floor, the cold gray light of morning filled the room.
She peered at Miss Treason, who was snoring like a pig.
What was the time? It was six at least! What should she do?
Nothing. There was nothing to do.
She picked up the Ace of Wands and stared at it. So that was poker, was it? Well, she hadn’t been too bad at it, once she’d worked out that it was all about making your face tell lies. For most of the time the cards were just something to do with your hands.
Miss Treason slept on. Tiffany wondered if she should get some breakfast, but it seemed such a—
“The ancient kings of Djelibeybi, who are buried in pyramids,” said Miss Treason from the bed, “used to believe that they could take things with them into the next world. Such things as gold and precious stones and even slaves. On that basis, please make me a ham sandwich.”
“Er . . . you mean . . . ?” Tiffany began.
“The journey after death is quite a long one,” said Miss Treason, sitting up. “I may get hungry.”
“But you’ll just be a soul!”
“Well, perhaps a ham sandwich has a soul, too,” said Miss Treason, as she swung her skinny legs out of the bed. “I’m not sure about the mustard, but it’s worth a try. Hold still there!” This was because she had picked up her hairbrush and was using Tiffany as a mirror. The fiercely concentrated glare a few inches away was as much as Tiffany could bear on a morning like this.
“Thank you—you may go and make the sandwich,” said Miss Treason, laying the brush aside. “I will now get dressed.”
Tiffany hurried out and washed her face in the basin in her room; she always did that after the eyeballing, but she’d never plucked up the courage to object, and now certainly wasn’t the time to start.
As she dried her face, she thought she heard a muffled sound outside and went over to the window. There was frost on—
Oh, no . . . oh . . . no . . . no! He was at it again!
The frost ferns spelled the word “Tiffany.” Over and over.
She grabbed a rag and wiped them off, but the ice only formed again, thicker.
She hurried downstairs. The ferns were all over the windows, and when she tried to wipe them off, the rag froze to the glass. It creaked when she pulled at it.
Her name, all over the window. Over all the windows. Maybe over all the windows in all the mountains. Everywhere.
He’d come back. That was dreadful!
But also, just a bit . . . cool. . . .
She didn’t think the word, because as far as Tiffany knew the word meant “slightly cold.” But she thought the thought, even so. It was a hot little thought.
“In my day young men would just carve the girl’s initials on a tree,” said Miss Treason, coming down the stairs one careful step at a time. Too late, Tiffany felt the tickle behind her eyes.
“It’s not funny, Miss Treason! What shall I do?”
“I don’t know. If possible, be yourself.”
Miss Treason bent down creakily and opened her hand. The seeing-eye mouse hopped down onto the floor, turned, and stared at her with tiny black eyes for a moment. She prodded it with a finger. “Go on, off you go. Thank you,” she said, and then it scuttled off to a hole.
Tiffany helped her upright, and the old witch said: “You’re starting to snivel, aren’t you.”
“Well, it’s all a bit—” Tiffany began. The little mouse had looked so lost and forlorn.
“Don’t cry,” said Miss Treason. “Living this long’s not as wonderful as people think. I mean, you get the same amount of youth as everyone else, but a great big extra helping of being very old and deaf and creaky. Now, blow your nose and help me on with the ravens’ perch.”
“He might still be out there . . .” Tiffany mumbled as she eased the perch onto the thin shoulders.
Then she rubbed at the window again and saw shapes and movement.
“Oh . . . they came . . .” she said.
“What?” said Miss Treason. She stopped. “There’s lots of people out there!”
“Er . . . yes,” said Tiffany.
“What do you know about this, my girl?”
“Well, you see, they kept asking when—”
“Fetch my skulls! They mustn’t see me without my skulls! How does my hair look?” said Miss Treason, frantically winding up her clock.
“It looks nice—”
“Nice? Nice? Are you mad? Mess it up this minute!” Miss Treason demanded. “And fetch my most raggedy cloak! This one’s far too clean! Move yourself, child!”
It took several minutes to get Miss Treason ready, and a lot of the time was spent convincing her that taking the skulls out in daylight might be dangerous, in case they got dropped and someone saw the labels. Then Tiffany opened the door.
A murmur of conversation crashed into silence.
There were people in a crowd all around the door. As Miss Treason stepped forward, it parted to leave a clear path.
To her horror, Tiffany saw a dug grave on the other side of the clearing. She hadn’t expected that. She wasn’t sure what she had expected, but a dug grave wasn’t it.
“Who dug—?”
“Our blue friends,” said Miss Treason. “I asked them to.”
And then the crowd started to cheer. Women hurried forward with big bunches of yew, holly, and mistletoe, the only green things growing. People were laughing. People were crying. They clustered around the witch, forcing Tiffany out to the edge of the crowd. She went quiet and listened.
“We don’t know what we’ll do without you, Miss Treason.” — “I don’t think we’ll get another witch as good as you, Miss Treason!” — “We never thought you’d go, Miss Treason. You brought my ol’ granddad into the world.” —
Walking into the grave, Tiffany thought. Well, that’s style. That is . . . solid gold Boffo. They’ll remember that for the rest of their lives—
“In that case you shall keep all the puppies but one—” Miss Treason had stopped to organize the crowd. “The custom is to give that one to the owner of the dog. You should have kept the bitch in, after all, and minded your fences. And your question, Mister Blinkhorn?”
Tiffany stood up straight. They were bothering her! Even this morning! But she . . . wanted to be bothered. Being bothered was her life.
“Miss Treason!” she snapped, pushing her way through the mob. “Remember you have an appointment!”
It wasn’t the best thing to say, but a lot better than: “You said you were going to die in about five minutes’ time!”
Miss Treason turned and looked uncertain for a moment.
“Oh, yes,” she said. “Yes, indeed. We had better get on.” Then, still talking to Mr. Blinkhorn about some complex problem concerning a fallen tree and someone’s shed, and with the rest of the crowd trailing after her, she let Tiffany walk her gently to the graveside.
“Well, at least you’ve got a happy ending, Miss Treason,” Tiffany whispered. It was a silly thing to say and deserved what it got.
“We make happy endings, child, day to day. But you see, for the witch there are no happy endings. There are just endings. And here we are. . . .”
Best not to think, thought Tiffany. Best not to think you’re climbing down an actual ladder into an actual grave. Try not to think about helping Miss Treason down the ladder onto the leaves that are piled up at one end. Do not let yourself know you’re standing in a grave.
Down here, the horrible clock seemed to clank even louder: clonk-clank, clonk-clank. . . .
Miss Treason trod the leaves down a bit and said cheerfully, “Yes, I can see myself being quite comfortable here. Listen, child, I told you about the books, did I not? And there is a small gift for you under my chair. Yes, this seems adequate. Oh, I forgot . . .”
Clonk-clank, clonk-clank . . . went the clock, sounding much louder down there.
Miss Treason stood on tiptoe and poked her head over the edge of the hole. “Mr. Easy! You owe two months’ rent to the Widow Langley! Understand? Mr. Plenty, the pig belongs to Mrs. Frumment, and if you don’t give it back to her, I shall come back and groan under your window! Mistress Fullsome, the Dogelley family have had Right of Passage over the Turnwise pasture since even I cannot remember, and you must . . . you must . . .”
Clon . . . k.
There was a moment, one long moment, when the sudden silence of the clock not ticking anymore filled the clearing like thunder.
Slowly Miss Treason sagged down onto the leaves.
It took a few dreadful seconds for her brain to start working, and then Tiffany screamed at the people clustered above: “Go back, all of you! Give her some air!”
