Lords And Ladies

by Pratchett, Terry

  ‘Miss Magrat?’

  ‘Ask her,’ said the elf, ‘if there is any food and water in there.’

  ‘Miss, they say—’

  One of the elves jerked him away. Two of them took up station either side of the doorway, and one put his pointed ear to it.

  Then it knelt down and peered through the keyhole, taking care not to come too near the metal of the lock.

  There was a sound no louder than a click. The elf remained motionless for a moment, and then keeled over gently, without a sound.

  Shawn blinked.

  There was about an inch of crossbow bolt sticking out of its eye. The feathers had been sheared off by its passage through the keyhole.

  ‘Wow,’ he said.

  The armoury door swung open, revealing nothing but darkness.

  One of the elves started to laugh.

  ‘So much for him,’ it said. ‘How stupid … Lady? Will you listen to your warrior?’

  He gripped Shawn’s broken arm, and twisted.

  Shawn tried not to scream. Purple lights flashed in front of his eyes. He wondered what would happen if he passed out.

  He wished his mum was here.

  ‘Lady,’ said the elf, ‘if you—’

  ‘All right,’ said Magrat’s voice, from somewhere in the darkness. ‘I’m going to come out. You must promise not to hurt me.’

  ‘Oh, indeed I do, lady.’

  ‘And you’ll let Shawn go.’

  ‘Yes.’

  The elves on either side of the doorway nodded at each other.

  ‘Please?’ Magrat pleaded.

  ‘Yes.’

  Shawn groaned. If it had been Mum or Mistress Weatherwax, they’d have fought to the death. Mum was right – Magrat always was the nice soft one …

  … who’d just fired a crossbow through a keyhole.

  Some eighth sense made Shawn shift his weight. If the elf relaxed his grip for just one second, Shawn was ready to stagger.

  Magrat appeared in the doorway. She was carrying an ancient wooden box with the word ‘Candles’ on the side in peeling paint.

  Shawn looked hopefully along the corridor.

  Magrat smiled brightly at the elf beside him. ‘This is for you,’ she said, handing over the box. The elf took it automatically. ‘But you mustn’t open it. And remember you promised not to hurt me.’

  The elves closed in behind Magrat. One of them raised a hand, with a stone knife in it.

  ‘Lady?’ said the elf holding the box, which was rocking gently in its hands.

  ‘Yes?’ said Magrat, meekly.

  ‘I lied to you.’

  The knife plunged towards her back.

  And shattered.

  The elf looked at Magrat’s innocent expression, and opened the box.

  Greebo had spent an irritating two minutes in that box. Technically, a cat locked in a box may be alive or it may be dead. You never know until you look. In fact, the mere act of opening the box will determine the state of the cat, although in this case there were three determinate states the cat could be in: these being Alive, Dead, and Bloody Furious.

  Shawn dived sideways as Greebo went off like a Claymore mine.

  ‘Don’t worry about him,’ said Magrat dreamily, as the elf flailed at the maddened cat. ‘He’s just a big softy.’

  She drew a knife out of the folds of her dress, turned, and stabbed the elf behind her. It wasn’t an accurate thrust, but it didn’t have to be. Not with an iron blade.

  She completed the movement by daintily raising the hem of her dress and kicking the third elf just under the knee.

  Shawn saw a flash of metal as her foot retreated under the silk again.

  She elbowed the screaming elf aside, trotted into the doorway, and came back with a crossbow.

  ‘Shawn,’ she said, ‘which one hurt you?’

  ‘All of them,’ said Shawn, weakly. ‘But the one fighting Greebo stabbed Diamanda.’

  The elf pulled Greebo off his face. Green-blue blood was streaming from a dozen wounds and Greebo hung on to its arm as he was flailed against the wall.

  ‘Stop it,’ said Magrat.

  The elf looked down at the bow, and froze.

  ‘I will not beg for mercy,’ it said.

  ‘Good,’ said Magrat, and fired.

  That left one elf rolling in circles on the flagstones, clutching at its knee.

  Magrat stepped daintily over the body of another elf, vanished into the armoury for a moment, and came back with an axe.

  The elf stopped moving, and focused all its attention on her.

  ‘Now,’ said Magrat, conversationally, ‘I’m not going to lie to you about your chances, because you haven’t got any. I’m going to ask you some questions. But first of all, I’m going to get your attention.’

  The elf was expecting it, and managed to roll aside as the axe splintered the stones.

  ‘Miss?’ said Shawn weakly, as Magrat raised the axe again.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Mum says they don’t feel pain, miss.’

  ‘No? But they can certainly be put to inconvenience.’

  Magrat lowered the axe.

  ‘Of course, there’s armour,’ she said. ‘We could put this one in a suit of armour. How about it?’

  ‘No!’

  The elf tried to pull away across the floor.

  ‘Why not?’ said Magrat. ‘Better than axes, yes?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘It is like being buried in the earth,’ hissed the elf. ‘No eyes, no ears, no mouth!’

  ‘Chain-mail, then,’ said Magrat.

  ‘No!’

  ‘Where is the king? Where is everyone?’

  ‘I will not say!’

  ‘All right.’

  Magrat vanished into the armoury again, and came back dragging a suit of chain-mail.

  The elf tried to scramble away.

  ‘You won’t get it on,’ said Shawn, from where he lay. ‘You’ll never get it over its arms—’

  Magrat picked up the axe.

  ‘Oh, no,’ said Shawn. ‘Miss!’

  ‘You will never get him back,’ said the elf. ‘She has him.’

  ‘We shall see,’ said Magrat. ‘All right, Shawn. What shall we do with it?’

  In the end they dragged it into a storeroom next to the dungeon and manacled it to the bars of the window. It was still whimpering at the touch of the iron as Magrat slammed the door.

  Shawn was trying to keep at a respectful distance. It was the way Magrat kept smiling all the time.

  ‘Now let’s have a look at that arm of yours,’ she said.

  ‘I’m all right,’ said Shawn, ‘but they stabbed Diamanda in the kitchen.’

  ‘Was it her I heard screaming?’

  ‘Uh. Partly. Uh.’ Shawn stared down in fascination at the dead elves as Magrat stepped over them.

  ‘You killed them,’ he said.

  ‘Did I do it wrong?’

  ‘Um. No,’ said Shawn cautiously. ‘No, you did it … quite well, really.’

  ‘And there’s one in the pit,’ said Magrat. ‘You know … the pit. What day is it?’

  ‘Tuesday.’

  ‘And you clean it out on … ?’

  ‘Wednesdays. Only I missed last Wednesday because I had—’

  ‘Then we probably don’t need to worry about it. Are there any more around?’

  ‘I … don’t think so. Uh. Miss Queen?’

  ‘Yes, Shawn?’

  ‘Could you put the axe down, please? I’d feel a lot better if you put the axe down. The axe, Miss Queen. You keep swinging it about. It could go off at any second.’

  ‘What axe?’

  ‘The one you’re holding.’

  ‘Oh, this axe.’ Magrat appeared to notice it for the first time. ‘That arm looks bad. Let’s get down to the kitchen and I’ll splint it. Those fingers don’t look good, either. Did they kill Diamanda?’

  ‘I don’t know. And I don’t know why. I mean, she was
helping them.’

  ‘Yes. Wait a moment.’ Magrat disappeared one more time into the armoury, and came back carrying a sack. ‘Come on. Greebo!’

  Greebo gave her a sly look, and stopped washing himself.

  ‘D’you know a funny thing about Lancre?’ said Magrat, as they sidled down the stairs.

  ‘What’s that, miss?’

  ‘We never throw anything away. And you know another thing?’

  ‘No, miss.’

  ‘They couldn’t have painted her from life, of course. I mean, people didn’t paint portraits in those days. But the armour … hah! All they had to do was look. And you know what?’

  Shawn suddenly felt frightened. He’d been scared before, but it had been immediate and physical. But Magrat, like this, frightened him more than the elves. It was like being charged by a sheep.

  ‘No, miss?’ he said.

  ‘No-one told me about her. You’d think it’s all tapestry and walking around in long dresses!’

  ‘What, miss?’

  Magrat waved an arm expressively.

  ‘All this!’

  ‘Miss!’ said Shawn, from knee level.

  Magrat looked down.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Please put the axe down!’

  ‘Oh. Sorry.’

  Hodgesaargh spent his nights in a little shed adjoining the mews. He too had received an invitation to the wedding, but it had been snatched from his hand and eaten in mistake for one of his fingers by Lady Jane, an ancient and evil-tempered gyrfalcon. So he’d gone through his usual nightly routine, bathing his wounds and eating a meal of stale bread and ancient cheese and going to bed early to bleed gently by candlelight over a copy of Beaks and Talons.

  He looked up at a sound from the mews, picked up the candlestick, and wandered out.

  An elf was looking at the birds. It had Lady Jane perched on its arm.

  Hodgesaargh, like Mr Brooks, didn’t take much interest in events beyond his immediate passion. He was aware that there were a lot of visitors in the castle and, as far as he was concerned, anyone looking at the hawks was a fellow enthusiast.

  ‘That’s my best bird,’ he said proudly. ‘I’ve nearly got her trained. She’s very good. I’m training her. She’s very intelligent. She knows eleven words of command.’

  The elf nodded solemnly. Then it slipped the hood off the bird’s head, and nodded towards Hodgesaargh.

  ‘Kill,’ it commanded.

  Lady Jane’s eyes glittered in the torchlight. Then she leapt, and hit the elf full in the throat with two sets of talons and a beak.

  ‘She does that with me, too,’ said Hodgesaargh. ‘Sorry about that. She’s very intelligent.’

  * * *

  Diamanda was lying on the kitchen floor, in a pool of blood. Magrat knelt beside her.

  ‘She’s still alive. Just.’ She grabbed the hem of her dress, and tried to rip it.

  ‘Damn the thing. Help me, Shawn.’

  ‘Miss?’

  ‘We need bandages!’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Oh, stop gawping.’

  The skirt tore. A dozen lace roses unravelled.

  Shawn had never been privy to what queens wore under their clothes, but even starting with certain observations concerning Millie Chillum and working his way up, he’d never considered metal underwear.

  Magrat thumped the breastplate.

  ‘Fairly good fit,’ she said, defying Shawn to point out that in certain areas there was quite a lot of air between the metal and Magrat. ‘Not that a few tucks and a rivet here and there wouldn’t help. Don’t you think it looks good?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Shawn. ‘Uh. Sheet iron is really you.’

  ‘You really think so?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Shawn, inventing madly. ‘You’ve got the figure for it.’

  She set and splinted his arm and fingers, working methodically, using strips of silk as bandages. Diamanda was less easy. Magrat cleaned and stitched and bandaged, while Shawn sat and watched, trying to ignore the insistent hot-ice pain from his arm.

  He kept repeating, ‘They just laughed and stabbed her. She didn’t even try to run away. It was like they were playing.’

  For some reason Magrat shot a glance at Greebo, who had the decency to look embarrassed.

  ‘Pointy ears and hair you want to stroke,’ she said, vaguely. ‘And they can fascinate you. And when they’re happy they make a pleasing noise.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Just thinking to myself.’ Magrat stood up. ‘Okay. I’ll build up the fire and fetch a couple of crossbows and load them up for you. And you keep the door shut and let no-one in, d’you hear? And if I don’t come back … try and go somewhere where there’s people. Get up to the dwarfs at Copperhead. Or the trolls.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘I’m going to see what’s happened to everyone.’

  Magrat opened the sack she’d brought down from the armoury. There was a helmet in it. It had wings on, and to Shawn’s mind was quite impractical.35 There were also a pair of mail gloves and a choice assortment of rusty weaponry.

  ‘But there’s probably more of those things out there!’

  ‘Better out there than in here.’

  ‘Can you fight?’

  ‘Don’t know. Never tried,’ said Magrat.

  ‘But if we wait here, someone’s bound to come.’

  ‘Yes. I’m afraid they will.’

  ‘What I mean is, you don’t have to do this!’

  ‘Yes I do. I’m getting married tomorrow. One way or the other.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Shut up!’

  She’s going to get killed, Shawn thought. It’s not enough to be able to pick up a sword. You have to know which end to poke into the enemy. I’m supposed to be on guard and she’s going to get killed—

  But—

  But—

  She shot one of them in the eye, right through the keyhole. I couldn’t have done that. I’d have said something like ‘Hands up!’ first. But they were in the way and she just … got them out of her way.

  She’s still going to die. She’s just probably going to die bravely.

  I wish my mum was here.

  Magrat finished rolling up the stained remnant of the wedding dress and stowed it in the sack.

  ‘Have we got any horses?’

  ‘There’s … elf horses in the courtyard, miss. But I don’t think you’ll be able to ride one.’

  It struck Shawn immediately that this wasn’t the right thing to say.

  It was black, and larger than what Magrat had to think of as a human horse. It rolled red eyes at her, and tried to get into position to kick.

  Magrat managed to mount only by practically tethering every leg to the rings in the stable wall, but when she was on, the horse changed. It had the docility of the severely whipped, and seemed to have no mind of its own.

  ‘It’s the iron,’ said Shawn.

  ‘What does it do to them? It can’t hurt.’

  ‘Don’t know, miss. Seems they just freeze up, kind of thing.’

  ‘Drop the portcullis after I’m through.’

  ‘Miss—’

  ‘Are you going to tell me not to go?’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Shut up, then.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘I remember a folksong about a situation just like this,’ said Magrat. ‘This girl had her fiancé stolen by the Queen of the Elves and she didn’t hang around whining, she jolly well got on her horse and went and rescued him. Well, I’m going to do that too.’

  Shawn tried to grin.

  ‘You’re going to sing?’ he said.

  ‘I’m going to fight. I’ve got everything to fight for, haven’t I? And I’ve tried everything else.’

  Shawn wanted to say: but that’s not the same! Going and fighting when you’re a real person isn’t like folksongs! In real life you die! In folksongs you just have to remember to keep one finger in your ear and how to
get to the next chorus! In real life no-one goes wack-fol-a-diddle-di-do-sing-too-rah-li-ay!

  But he said:

  ‘But, miss, if you don’t come back—’

  Magrat turned in the saddle.

  ‘I’ll be back.’

  Shawn watched her urge the sluggish horse into a trot and disappear over the drawbridge.

  ‘Good luck!’ he shouted.

  Then he lowered the portcullis and went back into the keep, where there were three loaded crossbows on the kitchen table.

  There was also the book on martial arts that the king had sent for specially.

  He pumped up the fire, turned a chair to face the door, and turned to the Advanced Section.

  Magrat was halfway down the road to the square when the adrenalin wore off and her past life caught up with her.

  She looked down at the armour, and the horse, and thought: I’m out of my mind.

  It was that bloody letter. And I was frightened. I thought I’d show everyone what I’m made of. And now they’ll probably find out: I’m made of lots of tubes and greeny purple wobbly bits.

  I was just lucky with those elves. And I didn’t think. As soon as I think, I get things wrong. I don’t think I’ll be that lucky again …

  Luck?

  She thought wistfully of her bags of charms and talismans at the bottom of the river. They’d never really worked, if her life was anything to go by, but maybe – it was a horrible thought – maybe they’d just stopped it getting worse.

  There were hardly any lights in the town, and a lot of the houses had their shutters up.

  The horse’s hooves clattered loudly on the cobbles. Magrat peered into the shadows. Once, they’d just been shadows. Now they could be gateways to anything.

  Clouds were pressing in from the Hub. Magrat shivered.

  This was something she’d never seen before.

  It was true night.

  Night had fallen in Lancre, and it was an old night. It was not the simple absence of day, patrolled by the moon and stars, but an extension of something that had existed long before there was any light to define it by absence. It was unfolding itself from under tree roots and inside stones, crawling back across the land.

  Magrat’s sack of what she considered to be essential props might be at the bottom of the river but she had been a witch for more than ten years, and she could feel the terror in the air.

  People remember badly. But societies remember well, the swarm remembers, encoding the information to slip it past the censors of the mind, passing it on from grandmother to grandchild in little bits of nonsense they won’t bother to forget. Sometimes the truth keeps itself alive in devious ways despite the best efforts of the official keepers of information. Ancient fragments chimed together now in Magrat’s head.