“But what if a man comes in?”
“Oh, I won’t mind,” said Nanny dismissively. “I won’t be embarrassed.”
“I think there may be objections,” said Agnes, trying to ignore the mental picture just conjured up. Nanny had a pleasant grin, but there had to be times when you didn’t want it looking at you.
“We’ve got to do something. Supposing Granny were to turn up now, what would she think?” said Nanny.
“We could just ask,” said Agnes.
“What? ‘Hands up all vampires’?”
“Ladies?”
They turned. The young man who had introduced himself as Vlad was approaching.
Agnes began to blush.
“I think you were talking about vampires,” he said, taking a garlic pasty from Agnes’s tray and biting into it with every sign of enjoyment. “Could I be of assistance?”
Nanny looked him up and down.
“Do you know much about them?” she said.
“Well, I am one,” he said. “So I suppose the answer is yes. Charmed to meet you, Mrs. Ogg.” He bowed, and reached for her hand.
“Oh no you don’t!” said Nanny, snatching it away. “I don’t hold with bloodsuckers!”
“I know. But I’m sure you shall in time. Would you like to come and meet my family?”
“They can bugger off! What was the King thinking of?”
“Nanny!” snapped Agnes.
“What?”
“You don’t have to shout like that. It’s not very…polite. I don’t think—”
“Vlad de Magpyr,” said Vlad, bowing.
“—is going to bite my neck!” shouted Nanny.
“Of course not,” said Vlad. “We had some sort of bandit earlier. Mrs. Ogg is, I suspect, a meal to be savored. Any more of these garlic things? They’re rather piquant.”
“You what?” said Nanny.
“You just…killed someone?” said Agnes.
“Of course. We are vampires,” said Vlad. “Or, we prefer, vampyres. With a ‘y.’ It’s more modern. Now, do come and meet my father.”
“You actually killed someone?” said Agnes.
“Right! That’s it!” snarled Nanny, marching away. “I’m getting Shawn and he’s gonna come back with a big sharp—”
Vlad coughed quietly. Nanny stopped.
“There are several other things people know about vampires,” he said. “And one is that they have considerable control over the minds of lesser creatures. So forget all about vampires, dear ladies. That is an order. And do come and meet my family.”
Agnes blinked. She was aware that there had been…something. She could feel the tail of it, slipping away between her fingers.
“Seems a nice young man,” said Nanny, in a mildly stunned voice.
“I…he…yes,” said Agnes.
Something surfaced in her mind, like a message in a bottle written indistinctly in some foreign language. She tried, but she could not read it.
“I wish Granny were here,” she said at last. “She’d know what to do.”
“What about?” said Nanny. “She ain’t good at parties.”
“I feel a bit…odd,” said Agnes.
“Ah, could be the drink,” said Nanny.
“I haven’t had any!”
“No? Well, there’s the problem right there. Come on.”
They hurried into the hall. Even though it was now well after midnight, the noise level was approaching the pain threshold. When the midnight hour lies on the glass like a big cocktail onion, there’s always an extra edge to the laughter.
Vlad gave them an encouraging wave and beckoned them over to a group around King Verence.
“Ah, Agnes and Nanny,” said the King, “Count, may I present—”
“Gytha Ogg and Agnes Nitt, I believe,” said the man the King had just been talking to. He bowed. For some reason a tiny part of Agnes was expecting a somber-looking man with an exciting widows’ peak hairstyle and an opera cloak. She couldn’t think why.
This man looked like…well, like a gentleman of independent means and an inquiring mind, perhaps, the kind of man who goes for long walks in the morning and spends the afternoons improving his mind in his own private library or doing small interesting experiments on parsnips and never, ever, worrying about money. There was something glossy about him, and also a sort of urgent, hungry enthusiasm, the kind you get when someone has just read a really interesting book and is determined to tell someone all about it.
“Allow me to present the Countess de Magpyr,” he said. “These are the witches I told you about, dear. I believe you’ve met my son? And this is my daughter, Lacrimosa.”
Agnes met the gaze of a thin girl in a white dress, with very long black hair and far too much eye makeup. There is such a thing as hate at first sight.
“The Count was just telling me how he is planning to move into the castle and rule the country,” said Verence. “And I was saying that I think we shall be honored.”
“Well done,” said Nanny. “But it you don’t mind, I don’t want to miss the weasel man…”
“The trouble is that people always think of vampires in terms of their diet,” said the Count, as Nanny hurried away. “It’s really rather insulting. You eat animal flesh and vegetables, but it hardly defines you, does it?”
Verence’s face was contorted in a smile, but it looked glassy and unreal.
“But you do drink human blood?” he said.
“Of course. And sometimes we kill people, although hardly at all these days. In any case, where exactly is the harm in that? Prey and hunter, hunter and prey. The sheep was designed as dinner for the wolf, the wolf as a means of preventing overgrazing by the sheep. If you examine your teeth, sire, you’ll see that they are designed for a particular kind of diet and, indeed, your whole body is constructed to take advantage of it. And so it is with us. I’m sure the nuts and cabbages do not blame you. Hunter and prey are all just part of the great cycle of life.”
“Fascinating,” said Verence. Little beads of sweat were rolling down his face.
“Of course, in Uberwald everyone understands this instinctively,” said the Countess. “But it is rather a backward place for the children. We are so looking forward to Lancre.”
“Very glad to hear it,” said Verence
“And so kind of you to invite us,” she went on. “Otherwise we could not have come, of course.”
“Not exactly,” said the Count, beaming at his wife. “But I have to admit that the prohibition against entering places uninvited has proved curiously…durable. It must be something to do with ancient territorial instincts. But,” he added brightly, “I have been working on an instructional technique which I’m sure will, within a few years—”
“Oh, don’t let’s go through all that dull stuff again,” said Lacri-mosa.
“Yes, I suppose it can sound a little tedious,” said the Count, smiling benevolently at his daughter. “Has anyone any more of that wonderful garlic dip?”
The king still looked uneasy, Agnes noticed. Which was odd, because the Count and his family seemed absolutely charming and what they were saying made perfect sense. Everything was perfectly all right.
“Exactly,” said Vlad, beside her. “Do you dance, Miss Nitt?” On the other side of the hall, the Lancre Light Symphony Orchestra (cond. S. Ogg) was striking up and out at random.
“Ur…” She stopped it turning into a giggle. “Not really. Not very well…”
Didn’t you listen to what they were saying? They’re vampires!
“Shut up,” she said aloud.
“I beg your pardon?” said Vlad, looking puzzled.
“And they’re…well, they’re not a very good orchestra…”
Didn’t you pay any attention to what they were saying at all, you useless lump?
“They’re a very bad orchestra,” said Vlad.
“Well, the King only bought the instruments last month and basically they’re trying to learn together—”
> Chop his head off! Give him a garlic enema!
“Are you all right? You really know there are no vampires here, don’t you…”
He’s controlling you! Perdita screamed. They’re…affecting people!
“I’m a bit…faint from all the excitement,” Agnes mumbled. “I think I’ll go home.” Some instinct at bone-marrow level made her add, “I’ll ask Nanny to go with me.”
Vlad gave her an odd look, as if she wasn’t reacting in quite the right way. Then he smiled. Agnes noticed that he had very white teeth.
“I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone like you, Miss Nitt,” he said. “There’s something so…inner about you.”
That’s me! That’s me! He can’t work me out! Now let’s both get out of here! yelled Perdita.
“But we shall meet again.”
Agnes gave him a nod and staggered away, clutching at her head. It felt like a ball of cotton wool in which there was, inexplicably, a needle.
She passed Mightily Oats, who’d dropped his book on the floor and was sitting groaning with his head in his hands. He raised it to look at her.
“Er…miss, have you anything that might help my head?” he said. “It really is…rather painful…”
“The queen makes up some sort of headache pills out of willow bark,” Agnes panted, and hurried on.
Nanny Ogg was standing morosely with a pint in her hand, a hitherto unheard-of combination.
“The weasel juggler didn’t turn up,” she said. “Well, I’m going to put out the hard word on him. He’s had it in showbusiness in these parts.”
“Could you…help me home, Nanny?”
“So what if he got bitten on the essentials, that’s all part of—Are you all right?”
“I feel really awful, Nanny.”
“Let’s go, then. All the good beer’s gone and I’m not stoppin’ anyway if there’s nothin’ to laugh at.”
The wind was whistling across the sky when they walked back to Agnes’s cottage. In fact there seemed more whistle than wind. The leafless trees creaked as they passed, the weak moonlight filling the eaves of the woods with dangerous shadows. Clouds were piling in, and there was more rain on the way.
Agnes noticed Nanny pick up something as they left the town behind them.
It was a stick. She’d never known a witch to carry a stick at night before.
“Why have you got that, Nanny?”
“What? Oh? Dunno, really. It’s a rattly old night, ain’t it…?”
“But you’re never frightened of anything in Lan—”
Several things pushed through the bushes and clattered onto the road ahead. For a moment Agnes thought they were horses, until the moonlight caught them. Then they were gone, into the shadows on the other side of the road. She heard galloping among the trees.
“Haven’t seen any of those for a long time,” said Nanny.
“I’ve never seen centaurs at all except in pictures,” said Agnes.
“Must’ve come down out of Uberwald,” said Nanny. “Nice to see them about again.”
Agnes hurriedly lit the candles when she got into the cottage, and wished there were bolts on the door.
“Just sit down,” said Nanny, “I’ll get a cup of water, I know my way around here.”
“It’s all right, I—”
Agnes’s left arm twitched. To her horror it swung at the elbow and waved its hand up and down in front of her face, as if guided by a mind of its own.
“Feeling a bit warm, are you?” said Nanny.
“I’ll get the water!” panted Agnes.
She rushed into the kitchen, gripping her left wrist with her right hand. It shook itself free, grabbed a knife from the draining board, and stabbed it into the wall, dragging it so that it formed crude letters in the crumbling plaster:
VMPIR
It dropped the knife, grabbed at the hair on the back of Agnes’s head, and thrust her face within inches of the letters.
“You all right in there?” Nanny called from the next room.
“Er, yes, but I think I’m trying to tell me something—”
A movement made her turn. A small blue man wearing a blue cap was staring at her from the shelves over the washcopper. He stuck out his tongue, made a very small obscene gesture, and disappeared behind a bag of washing crystals.
“Nanny?”
“Yes, luv?”
“Are there such things as blue mice?”
“Not while you’re sober, dear.”
“I think…I’m owed a drink, then. Is there any brandy left?”
Nanny came in, uncorking the flask.
“I topped it up at the party. Of course, it’s only shop-bought stuff, you couldn’t—”
Agnes’s left hand snatched it and poured it down her throat. Then she coughed so hard that some of it went up her nose.
“Hang on, hang on, it’s not that weak,” said Nanny.
Agnes plonked the flask down on the kitchen table.
“Right,” she said, and her voice sounded quite different to Nanny, “My name is Perdita and I’m taking over this body right now.”
Hodgesaargh noticed the smell of burnt wood as he ambled back to the mews but put it down to the bonfire in the courtyard. He’d left the party early. No one had wanted to talk about hawks.
The smell was very strong when he looked in on the birds and saw the little flame in the middle of the floor. He stared at it for a second, then picked up a water bucket and threw it.
The flame continued to flicker gently on a bare stone that was awash with water.
Hodgesaargh looked at the birds. They were watching it with interest; normally they’d be frantic in the presence of fire.
Hodgesaargh was never one to panic. He watched it for a while, and then took a piece of wood and gently touched it to the flame. The fire leapt on to the wood and went on burning.
The wood didn’t even char.
He found another twig and brushed it against the flame, which slid easily from one to the other. There was one flame. It was clear there wasn’t going to be two.
Half the bars in the window had been burned away, and there was some scorched wood at the end of the mews, where the old nestboxes had been. Above it, a few stars shone through rags of mist over a charred hole in the roof.
Something had burned here, Hodgesaargh saw. Fiercely, by the look of it. But also in a curiously local way, as if all the heat had been somehow contained…
He reached toward the flame dancing on the end of the stick. It was warm, but…not as hot as it should be.
Now it was on his finger. It tingled. As he waved it around, the head of every bird turned to watch it.
By its light, he poked around in the charred remains of the nestboxes. In the ashes were bits of broken eggshell.
Hodgesaargh picked them up and carried them into the crowded little room at the end of the mews which served as workshop and bedroom. He balanced the flame on a saucer. In here, where it was quieter, he could hear it making a slight sizzling noise.
In the dim glow he looked along the one crowded bookshelf over his bed and pulled down a huge ragged volume on the cover of which someone had written, centuries ago, the word “Burds.”
The book was a huge ledger. The spine had been cut and widened inexpertly several times so that more pages could be pasted in.
The falconers of Lancre knew a lot about birds. The kingdom was on a main migratory route between the Hub and the Rim. The hawks had brought down many strange species over the centuries and the falconers had, very painstakingly, taken notes. The pages were thick with drawings and closely spaced writing, the entries copied and recopied and updated over the years. The occasional feather carefully glued to a page had added to the thickness of the thing.
No one had ever bothered with an index, but some past falconer had considerately arranged many of the entries into alphabetical order.
Hodgesaargh glanced again at the flame burning steadily in its saucer, and then, handing the crackling p
ages with care, turned to “F.”
After some browsing, he eventually found what he was looking for under “P.”
Back in the mews, in the deepest shadow, something cowered.
There were three shelves of books in Agnes’s cottage. By witch standards, that was a giant library.
Two very small blue figures lay on the top of the books, watching the scene with interest.
Nanny Ogg backed away, waving the poker.
“It’s all right,” said Agnes. “It’s me again, Agnes Nitt, but…She’s here but…I’m sort of holding on. Yes! Yes! All right! All right, just shut up, will y—Look, it’s my body, you’re just a figment of my imagina—Okay! Okay! Perhaps it’s not quite so clear c—Let me just talk to Nanny, will you?”
“Which one are you now?” said Nanny Ogg.
“I’m still Agnes, of course.” She rolled her eyes up. “All right! I’m Agnes currently being advised by Perdita, who is also me. In a way. And I’m not too fat, thank you so very much!”
“How many of you are there in there?” said Nanny.
“What do you mean, ‘room for ten’?” shouted Agnes. “Shut up! Listen, Perdita says there were vampires at the party. The Magpyr family, she says. She can’t understand how we acted. They were putting a kind of…’fluence over everyone. Including me, which is why she was able to break thr—Yes, all right, I’m telling it, thank you!”
“Why not her, then?” said Nanny.
“Because she’s got a mind of her own! Nanny, can you remember anything they actually said?”
“Now you come to mention it, no. But they seemed nice enough people.”
“And you remember talking to Igor?”
“Who’s Igor?”
The tiny blue figures watched, fascinated, for the next half hour.
Nanny sat back at the end of it and stared at the ceiling for a while.
“Why should we believe her?” she said eventually.
“Because she’s me.”
“They do say that inside every fat girl is a thin girl and—” Nanny began.
“Yes,” said Agnes bitterly. “I’ve heard it. Yes. She’s the thin girl. I’m the lot of chocolate.”
Nanny leaned toward Agnes’s ear and raised her voice. “How’re you gettin’ on in there? Everything all right, is it? Treatin’ you all right, is she?”
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