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She sighed. It was going to be a busy day. She had been in many houses where death had recently visited, and always the lady of the house, if there was one, would be shining anything that shined and cleaning everything that could be cleaned. And so, with rags and polishing cloths, Tiffany Aching cleaned everything that was already spick and span clean: it was a kind of unspoken mantra – the world had gone bad, but at least the grate had been polished and now had a fire ready to light in it.
All the time, like a statue, there was You, staring at her. Did cats know about death? she wondered. What about the cats of witches? Especially . . . what about Granny Weatherwax’s cat?
Tiffany tidied that thought away for now, and started on the kitchen, burnishing anything that could be burnished, and yes, it shone. She was cleaning things already clean, but the algebra of mourning required the effort of getting all the death out of the house; and there was no shrinking from it: you cleaned everything, regardless.
She’d finished in the kitchen and the scullery, leaving everything so bright that her eyes watered, and then there was nothing for it but to go upstairs. On her hands and knees, with bucket and brush and rags and grease – that is, elbow grease – Tiffany cleaned and cleaned until her knuckles were red and she was satisfied.
But that wasn’t the end of it: there was Granny’s small wardrobe, with its few well-worn and serviceable dresses hanging in there, along with a cloak. All black, of course. Tucked away on a shelf was the Zephyr Billow Cloak Tiffany herself had given Granny – unworn, as far as she could see, but kept carefully, like a special possession. She felt her eyes begin to prickle . . .
Beside the bed were Granny Weatherwax’s boots. Good, serviceable boots, Tiffany thought. And Granny had hated waste. But . . . to actually wear them? She was going to find it hard enough to follow in Granny’s footsteps. She swallowed. She was sure she could find a good home for the boots. In the meantime, well, she poked forward a toe and pushed them out of sight, beneath the bed.
Then of course there was the kitchen garden and, above all, the herbs. Tiffany found a pair of heavy gloves in the scullery – you didn’t go into Granny’s herbs without heavy gloves until they knew you. Granny had foraged, bartered and been given herbs from just about everywhere, and she had Rotating Spinach, and Doubting Plums, Ginny Come Nether, Twirlabout, Tickle My Fancy Root, Jump in the Basin and Jack-go-to-bed-and-never-get-up, Daisy-upsy-Daisy and Old Man Root. There was a clump of Love Lies Oozing by the Jack by Moonlight and a very active Maiden’s Respite. Tiffany did not know what all of them were for; she would have to ask Nanny Ogg. Or Magrat Garlick, who – like her husband Verence, the King of Lancre – was very enthusiastic about herbs.fn1 Though unlike her husband, Magrat did actually know her Troubling Tony from her Multitude Root.
It was never easy being a witch. Oh, the broomstick was great, but to be a witch you needed to be sensible, so sensible that sometimes it hurt. You dealt with the reality – not what people wanted. The reality right now was suddenly You, meowing and banging her head against Tiffany’s legs, demanding food, which she then ignored completely when Tiffany went back into the kitchen and placed a dish of it down for her on the floor.
Tiffany went outdoors again and fed the chickens, let the goats out to graze, had a word with the bees and then thought, I’ve
done my bit. The place is spotless, the bees are happy, even the lean-to is clean. If Nanny can come in and feed the animals, keep an eye on You, then I can go back home for a few days . . .
Reaching the Chalk after a flight that was long and, sadly, very wet, since the rain was teeming down,fn2 she flew to the house of young Milly Robinson, the Feegles clinging on behind, under and actually on her in their usual style.
Milly’s two baby boys looked well fed, but the little girl – baby Tiffany – didn’t. Unfortunately Witch Tiffany was used to this sort of thing, especially when the mothers weren’t very clever or had bossy mothers and thought feeding the boys was the main thing in life. It was why, just after the baby’s birth, she had whispered that spell into the baby’s ear. A simple tracking magic, so she would know if any harm befell the little girl. Just a precaution, she had told herself at the time.
There was no use getting nasty about all this, so she took the young woman aside and said, ‘Milly, listen. Yes, your boys have to be straight and strong when they grow up, but my mother always used to say to me: Your son’s your son until he takes a wife, but your daughter is your daughter all of your life. And I think that’s right enough. You help your mother out still, don’t you? And she helps you. So fair shares for the little girl is the right thing to do. Please.’ Then, because the carrot – or in this case, the breast milk – sometimes needed to be accompanied by the stick, she added sternly, the pointy hat making her seem older and wiser than she would otherwise appear, ‘I shall be watching after her interests.’ A little bit of menace often did the trick, she had learned. And, of course, she would watch.
Then there was only one person she wanted to talk to; and the rain was getting harder still as her stick drifted down towards the Feegle mound on the hill, Rob and the other Feegles toppling off as she approached. Daft Wullie made a spectacularly bad landing, head first into the gorse, and a rabble of young Feegles rushed up joyously to unscrew him.
There were a couple of Rob’s older sons lounging around outside the entrance. They were scrawny, even by Feegle standards, with barely a wisp of beard hair between them and impractically low-slung spogs knocking about their knees, their kilts hung low on their skinny hips. To Tiffany’s amazement, she could see the top bands of coloured pants riding high above them. Pants? On a Feegle? The times were indeed changing.
‘Pull yon kilts up, lads!’ Rob muttered as they pushed their way past.
The kelda was in her chamber, surrounded by Feegle babies, all rolling around on a floor covered with the fleeces of sheep gone to another land. And the first words she said were, ‘I know . . .’ She sighed and added, ‘It’s grieving I am, but the wheel takes all in time.’ Her face crinkled into a huge smile. ‘It’s happy I am to see you as leader of the witches, Tiffan.’
‘Well, thank you,’ said Tiffany. How did Jeannie know? she wondered for a moment. But every kelda used the way of the hiddlins to see things past, present and future . . . and it was a secret known only to the keldas, passed down one to the other.
She understood too that although Jeannie was very small, she was someone to whom she could tell every secret, in the assurance that it would never be passed on to anyone. And now she hesitantly said, ‘Jeannie, I don’t think I could ever fill her boots.’
‘Really?’ said the kelda sharply. ‘Dinna you think Esmerelda Weatherwax may nae have kenned the same thing when the position was gi’n to her? Do ye suppose yon hag then said, Nae me. I’m nae guid enough?’ The wise little pictsie was looking at Tiffany as if she was some kind of specimen, a new plant perhaps, and then she lowered her voice and said, ‘I ken well enough that ye will be a guid leader.’
‘Though only the first amongst equals rather than a leader,’ Tiffany added. ‘At least, I’m sure that’s what the other witches think . . .’ Her voice trailed off, her doubts hanging in the air.
‘Is that so?’ said the kelda. She went quiet for a moment, then said softly, ‘Ye who kissed the spirit of winter and sent him packing, aye. Yet I ken that ye have in front of ye something less easy, Tiffan. There is a change coming in the heavens, and ye will need to be there.’ Her voice grew even more sombre and her small eyes were fixed on Tiffany now. ‘Be aware, Tir-far-thóinn; this is a time of transition,’ she said. ‘Mistress Weatherwax is nae longer wi’ us, and her goin’ leaves a . . . hole that others willnae fail to see. We mus’ watch the gateways, and ye mus’ tak’ great care. For them ye don’t wish to know might be seeking ye out.’
It was good to be home, Tiffany thought, when at last she arrived there. Back at her parents’ farm – it was even called Home Farm – back where her mother cooked a hot dinner every night. Back where she could sit at the big wooden kitchen table, which was scarred by generations of Achings, and become a little girl again.
But she wasn’t a little girl any more. She was a witch. One with two steadings to look after. And over the next week as she flew back and forth from the Chalk to Lancre, from Lancre to the Chalk, in weather that seemed to be enjoying a competition to be the wettest ever for the time of year, it seemed to her that she was always arriving late, wet and tired. People were nearly always polite – to her face, anyway, and certainly to the pointy hat – but she could tell from what they didn’t say that somehow, indefinably, whatever she did, it wasn’t quite enough. She got up earlier every day and went to bed later, but it still wasn’t enough.
She needed to be a good witch. A strong witch. And in between the carrying and the healing, the helping and the listening, she could feel sudden prickles of alarm run up and down her body. Jeannie had warned her that something dreadful might be coming . . . Would she be up to the job? She didn’t even think she was doing very well with all the usual stuff.
She couldn’t be Granny Weatherwax for them in Lancre.
And it was getting harder and harder to be Tiffany Aching for the Chalk.
Even at home. Even there. She struggled in wearily one night, longing for food, peace and her bed, and as her mother pulled a huge pot from the big black oven and placed it in the centre of the table, a family row was just starting.
‘I met Sid Pigeon outside the Baron’s Arms today,’ her brother Wentworth, a strapping lad not quite old enough for the pub yet, but certainly old enough to hang around outside, was saying.
‘Sid Pigeon?’ Mrs Aching wondered.
