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The shape in front of Esk bent forward.
“Esme Weatherwax?” it asked.
“The very same,” said Granny. “Still selling thunder drops and penny wishes, Hilta? How goes it?”
“All the better for seeing you,” said the shape. “What brings you down from the mountains, Esme? And this child - your assistant, perhaps?”
“What's it you're selling, please?” asked Esk. The shape laughed.
“Oh, things to stop things that shouldn't be and help things that should, love,” it said. “Let me just close up, my dears, and I will be right with you.”
The shape bustled past Esk in a nasal kaleidoscope of fragrances and buttoned up the curtains at the front of the stall. Then the drapes at the back were thrown up, letting in the afternoon sunlight.
“Can't stand the dark and fug myself,” said Hilta Goatfounder, “but the customers expect it. You know how it is.”
“Yes,” Esk nodded sagely. “Headology.”
Hilts, a small fat woman wearing an enormous hat with fruit on it, glanced from her to Granny and grinned.
“That's the way of it,” she agreed. “Will you take some tea?”
They sat on bales of unknown herbs in the private corner made by the stall between the angled walls of the houses, and drank something fragrant and green out of surprisingly delicate cups. Unlike Granny, who dressed like a very respectable raven, Hilts Goatfounder was all lace and shawls and colours and earrings and so many bangles that a mere movement of her arms sounded like a percussion section falling off a cliff. But Esk could see the likeness.
It was hard to describe. You couldn't imagine them curtseying to anyone.
“So,” said Granny, “how goes the life?”
The other witch shrugged, causing the drummers to lose their grip again, just when they had nearly climbed back up.
“Like the hurried lover, it comes and goe-” she began, and stopped at Granny's meaningful glance at Esk.
“Not bad, not bad,” she amended hurriedly. “The council have tried to run me out once or twice, you know, but they all have wives and somehow it never quite happens. They say I'm not the right sort, but I say there'd be many a family in this town a good deal bigger and poorer if it wasn't for Madame Goatfounder's Pennyroyal Preventives. I know who comes into my shop, I do. I remember who buys buckeroo drops and ShoNuff Ointment, I do. Life isn't bad. And how is it up in your village with the funny name?”
“Bad Ass,” said Esk helpfully. She picked a small clay pot off the counter and sniffed at its contents.
“It is well enough,” conceded Granny. “The handmaidens of nature are ever in demand.”
Esk sniffed again at the powder, which seemed to be pennyroyal with a base she couldn't quite identify, and carefully replaced the lid. While the two women exchanged gossip in a kind of feminine code, full of eye contact and unspoken adjectives, she examined the other exotic potions on display. Or rather, not on display. In some strange way they appeared to be artfully half-hidden, as if Hilts wasn't entirely keen to sell.
“I don't recognise any of these,” she said, half to herself. “What do they give to people?”
“Freedom,” said Hilts, who had good hearing. She turned back to Granny. “How much have you taught her?”
“Not that much,” said Granny. “There's power there, but what kind I'm not sure. Wizard power, it might be.”
Hilts turned around very slowly and looked Esk up and down.
“Ah,” she said, “That explains the staff. I wondered what the bees were talking about. Well, well. Give me your hand, child.”
Esk held out her hand. Hilta's fingers were so heavy with rings it was like dipping into a sack of walnuts.
Granny sat upright, radiating disapproval, as Hilts began to inspect Esk's palm.
“I really don't think that is necessary,” she said sternly. “Not between us.”
“You do it, Granny,” said Esk, “in the village. I've seen you. And teacups. And cards.”
Granny shifted uneasily. “Yes, well,” she said. “It's all according. You just hold their hand and people do their own fortune-telling. But there's no need to go around believing it, we'd all be in trouble if we went around believing everything.”
