“You been studyin’ this, Shawn?” she inquired. “I’ve got five years’ worth of Bows and Ammo, Mum,” said Shawn reproachfully.
“Give it a try, then. If you think it’ll work.” Trembling with excitement, Shawn climbed on to a table, drew his sword with his good hand, and banged it on the planks until people were silent. He made a speech.
He pointed out that their king had been captured and their prospective queen had gone out to save him. He pointed out their responsibility as loyal subjects. He pointed out that other people currently not here but at home hiding under the bed would, after the glorious victory, wish they’d been there too instead of under the aforesaid bed which they were hiding under, you know, the bed he’d just mentioned. In fact it was better that there were so few here to face the enemy, because that meant that there would be a higher percentage of honour per surviving head. He used the word “glory” three times. He said that in times to come people would look back on this day, whatever the date was, and proudly show their scars, at least those who’d survived would show their scars, and be very proud and probably have drinks bought for them. He advised people to imitate the action of the Lancre Reciprocating Fox and stiffen some sinews while leaving them flexible enough so’s they could move their arms and legs, in fact, probably it’d be better to relax them a bit now and stiffen them properly when the time came. He suggested that Lancre expected everyone to do their duty. And urn. And uh. Please?
The silence that followed was broken by Nanny Ogg, who said, “They’re probably considering it a bit, Shawn. Why don’t you take Mr. Wizard here up to his room and help him with his crossbow?”
She nodded meaningfully in the direction of the stairs.
Shawn wavered, but not for long. He’d seen the glint in his mother’s eye.
When he’d gone. Nanny climbed up on the same table.
“Well,” she said, “it’s like this. If you go out there you may have to face elves. But if you stops here, you definitely have to face me. Now, elves is worse than me, I’ll admit. But I’m persistent.”
Weaver put up a tentative hand.
“Please, Mrs. Ogg?”
“Yes, Weaver?”
“What exactly is the action of the Reciprocating Fox?”
Nanny scratched her ear.
“As I recall,” she said, “its back legs go like this but its front legs go like this.”
“No, no, no,” said Quamey the storekeeper. “It’s its tail that goes like that. Its legs go like this.”
“That’s not reciprocating, that’s just oscillating,” said someone. “You’re thinking of the Ring-tailed Ocelot.”
Nanny nodded.
“That’s settled, then,” she said.
“Hold on, I’m not sure-”
“Yes, Mr. Quamey?”
“Oh . . . well. . .”
“Good, good,” said Nanny, as Shawn reappeared. “They was just saying, our Shawn, how they was swayed by your speech. Really pussiked up.”
“Cor!”
“They’re ready to follow you into the jaws of hell itself, I expect,” said Nanny.
Someone put up their hand.
“Are you coming too, Mrs. Ogg?”
“I’ll just stroll along behind,” said Nanny.
“Oh. Well. Maybe as far as the jaws of hell, then.”
“Amazing,” said Casanunda to Nanny, as the crowd filed reluctantly toward the armoury.
“You just got to know how to deal with people.”
“They’ll follow where an Ogg leads?”
“Not exactly,” said Nanny, “but if they know what’s good for ’em they’ll go where an Ogg follows.”
Magrat stepped out from under the trees, and the moor land lay ahead of her.
A whirlpool of cloud swirled over the Dancers, or at least, over the place where the Dancers had been. She could make out one or two stones by the flickering light, lying on their side or rolled down the slope of the hill.
The hill itself glowed. Something was wrong with the landscape. It curved where it shouldn’t curve. Distances weren’t right. Magrat remembered a woodcut shoved in as a place marker in one of her old books. It showed the face of an old crone but, if you stared at it, you saw it was also the head of a young woman; a nose became a neck, an eyebrow became a necklace. The images seesawed back and forth. And like everyone else, she’d squinted herself silly trying to see them both at the same time.
The landscape was doing pretty much the same thing. What was a hill was also at the same time a vast snowbound panorama. Lancre and the land of the elves were trying to occupy the same space.
The intrusive country wasn’t having it all its own way. Lancre was fighting back.
There was a circle of tents just on the cusp of the warring landscapes, like a beachhead on an alien shore. They were brightly collared. Everything about the elves was beautiful, until the image tilted, and you saw it from the other side. . .
Something was happening. Several elves were on horseback, and more horses were being led between the tents.
It looked as though they were breaking camp.
The Queen sat on a makeshift throne in her tent. She sat with her elbow resting on one arm of the throne and her fingers curling pensively around her mouth.
There were other elves seated in a semicircle, except that “seated” was a barely satisfactory word. They lounged; elves could make themselves at home on a wire. And here there was more lace and velvet and fewer feathers, although it was hard to know if it meant that these were aristocrats-elves seemed to wear whatever they felt like wearing, confident of looking absolutely stunning.[42]
Every one of them watched the Queen, and was a mirror of her moods. When she smiled, they smiled. When she said something she thought was amusing, they laughed.
Currently the object of her attention was Granny Weatherwax.
“What is happening, old woman?” she said.
“It ain’t easy, is it?” said Granny. “Thought it would be easy, didn’t you?”
“You’ve done some magic, haven’t you? Something is fighting us.”
“No magic,” said Granny. “No magic at all. It’s just that you’ve been away too long. Things change. The land belongs to humans now.”
“That can’t be the case,” said the Queen. “Humans take. They plough with iron. They ravage the land.”
“Some do, I’ll grant you that. Others put back more’n they take. They put back love. They’ve got soil in their bones. They tell the land what it is. That’s what humans are for. Without humans, Lancre’d just be a bit of ground with green bits on it. They wouldn’t even know they’re trees. We’re all down here together, madam – us and the land. It’s not just land anymore, it’s a country. It’s like a horse that’s been broken and shod or a dog that’s been tamed. Every time people put a plough in the soil or planted a seed they took the land further away from you,” said Granny. “Things change.”
Verence sat beside the Queen. His pupils were tiny pinpoints; he smiled faintly, permanently, in a way very reminiscent of the Bursar.
“Ah. But when we are married,” said the Queen, “the land must accept me. By your own rules. I know how it works. There’s more to being a king than wearing a crown. The king and the land are one. The king and the queen are one. And I shall be queen.”
She smiled at Granny. There was an elf on either side of her and. Granny knew, at least one behind her. Elves were not given to introspection; if she moved without permission, she’d die.
“What you shall be is something I have yet to decide,” said the Queen. She held up an exquisitely thin hand and curled the thumb and forefinger into a ring, which she held up to her eye.
“And now someone comes,” she said, “with armour that doesn’t fit and a sword she cannot use and an axe she can hardly even lift, because it is so romantic, is it not? What is her name?”
“Magrat Garlick,” said Granny.
“She is a mighty enchantress, is she?”
“She’s good with herbs.”
The Queen laughed.
“I could kill her from here.”
“Yes,” said Granny, “but that wouldn’t be much fun, would it? Humiliation is the key.”
The Queen nodded.
“You know, you think very much like an elf.”
“I think it will soon be dawn,” said Granny. “A fine day. Clear light.”
“Not soon enough,” The Queen stood up. She glanced at King Verence for a moment, and changed. Her dress went from red to silver, catching the torchlight like glittering fish scales. Her hair unraveled and reshaped itself, became corn blond. And a subtle ripple of alterations flowed across her face before she said, “What do you think?”
She looked like Magrat. Or, at least, like Magrat wished she looked and maybe as Verence always thought of her. Granny nodded. As one expert to another, she recognized accomplished nastiness when she saw it.