He glanced at the bird gloves hanging on their hooks. He was good at rearing young birds. He could get them eating out of his hand. Later on, of course, they just ate his hand.
Yes. Catch it young and train it to the wrist. It’d have to be a Champion hunting bird.
Hodgesaargh couldn’t imagine a phoenix as quarry. For one thing, how could you cook it?
. . . and in the darkest corner of the mews, something hopped on to a perch . . .
Once again Agnes had to run to keep up as Nanny Ogg strode into the courtyard, elbows pumping
furiously. The old lady marched up to a group of men standing around one of the barrels and grabbed two of them, spilling their drinks. Had it not been Nanny Ogg, this would have been a challenge equal to throwing down a glove or, in slightly less exalted circles, smashing a bottle on the edge of a bar.
But the men looked sheepish and one or two of the others in the circle even scuffled their feet and made an attempt to hide their pints behind their backs.
‘Jason? Darren? You come along of me,’ Nanny commanded. ‘We’re after vampires, right? Any sharp stakes around here?’
‘No, Mum,’ said Jason, Lancre’s only blacksmith. Then he raised his hand. ‘But ten minutes ago the cook come out and said, did anyone want all these nibbly things that someone had mucked up with garlic and I et ’em, Mum.’
Nanny sniffed and then took a step back, fanning her hand in front of her face. ‘Yeah, that should do it all right,’ she said. ‘If I give you the signal, you’re to burp hugely, understand?’
‘I don’t think it’ll work, Nanny,’ said Agnes, as boldly as she dared.
‘I don’t see why, it’s nearly knocking me down.’
‘I told you, you won’t get close enough, even if it’ll work at all. Perdita could feel it. It’s like being drunk.’
‘I’ll be ready for ’em this time,’ said Nanny. ‘I’ve learned a thing or two from Esme.’
‘Yes, but she’s-‘ Agnes was going to say ‘better at them than you’, but changed it to ‘not here . . .’
‘That’s as may be, but I’d rather face ’em now than explain to Esme that I didn’t. Come on.’
Agnes followed the Oggs, but very uneasily. She wasn’t sure how far she trusted Perdita.
A few guests had departed, but the castle had laid on a pretty good feast and Ramtop people at any social level were never ones to pass up a laden table.
Nanny glanced at the crowd and grabbed Shawn, who was passing with a tray.
‘Where’s the vampires?’
‘What, Mum?’
‘That Count . . . Magpie. . .’
‘Magpyr,’ said Agnes.
‘Him,’ said Nanny.
‘He’s not a . . . he’s gone up to . . . the solar, Mum. They all have- What’s that smell of garlic, Mum?’
‘It’s your brother. All right, let’s keep going.’
The solar was right at the top of the keep. It was old, cold and draughty. Verence had put glass in the huge windows, at his queen’s insistence, which just meant that now the huge room attracted the more cunning, insidious kind of draught. But it was the royal room – not as public as the great hall, but the place where the King received visitors when he was being formally informal.
The Nanny Ogg expeditionary force corkscrewed up the spiral staircase. She advanced across the good yet threadbare carpet to the group seated around the fire.
She took a deep breath.
‘Ah, Mrs Ogg,’ said Verence, desperately. ‘Do join us.’
Agnes looked sideways at Nanny, and saw her face contort into a strange smile.
The Count was sitting in the big chair by the fire, with Vlad standing behind him. They both looked very handsome, she thought. Compared to them Verence, in his clothes that never seemed to fit right and permanently harassed expression, looked out of place.
‘The Count was just explaining how Lancre will become a duchy of his lands in Uberwald,’ said Verence. ‘But we’ll still be referred to as a kingdom, which I think is very reasonable of him, don’t you agree?’
‘Very handsome suggestion,’ said Nanny.
‘There will be taxes, of course,’ said the Count. ‘Not onerous. We don’t want blood – figuratively speaking!’ He beamed at the joke.
‘Seems reasonable to me,’ said Nanny.
‘It is, isn’t it?’ said the Count. ‘I knew it would work out so well. And I am so pleased, Verence, to see your essential modem attitude. People have quite the wrong idea about vampires, you see. Are we fiendish killers?’ He beamed at them. ‘Well, yes, of course we are. But only when necessary. Frankly, we could hardly hope to rule a country if we went around killing everyone all the time, could we? There’d be none left to rule, for one thing!’ There was polite laughter, loudest of all from the Count.
It made perfect sense to Agnes. The Count was clearly a fair-minded man. Anyone who didn’t think so deserved to die.
‘And we are only human,’ said the Countess. ‘Well . . . in fact, not only human. But if you prick us do we not bleed? Which always seems such a waste.’
They’ve got you again, said a voice in her mind.
Vlad’s head jerked up. Agnes felt him staring at her.
‘We are, above all, up to date,’ said the Count. ‘And we do like what you’ve done to this castle, I must say.’
‘Oh, those torches back home!’ said the Countess, rolling her eyes. ‘And some of the things in the dungeons, well, when I saw them I nearly died of shame. So . . . fifteen centuries ago. If one is a vampire then one is,’ she gave a deprecating little laugh, ‘a vampire. Coffins, yes, of course, but there’s no point in skulking around as if you’re ashamed of what you are, is there? We all have . . . needs.’
You’re all standing around like rabbits in front of a fox! Perdita raged in the caverns of Agnes’s brain.
‘Oh!’ said the Countess, clapping her hands together. ‘I see you have a pianoforte!’
It stood under a shroud in a corner of the room where it had stood for four months now. Verence had ordered it because he’d heard they were very modern, but the only person in the kingdom who’d come close to mastering it was Nanny Ogg who would, as she put it, come up occasionally for a tinkle on the ivories.[11] Then it had been covered over on the orders of Magrat and the palace rumour was that Verence had got an ear bashing for buying what was effectively a murdered elephant.
‘Lacrimosa would so like to play for you,’ the Countess commanded.
‘Oh, Mother,’ said Lacrimosa.
‘I’m sure we should love it,’ said Verence. Agnes wouldn’t have noticed the sweat running down his face if Perdita hadn’t pointed it out: He’s trying to fight it, she said. Aren’t you glad you’ve got me?
There was some bustling while a wad of sheet music was pulled out of the piano stool and the young lady sat down to play. She glared at Agnes before beginning. There was some sort of chemistry there, although it was the sort that results in the entire building being evacuated.
It’s a racket, said the Perdita within, after the first few bars. Everyone’s looking as though it’s wonderful but it’s a din!
Agnes concentrated. The music was beautiful but if she really paid attention, with Perdita nudging her, it wasn’t really there at all. It sounded like someone playing scales, badly and angrily.
I can say that at any time, she thought. Any time I want, I can just wake up.
Everyone else applauded politely. Agnes tried to, but found that her left hand was suddenly on strike. Perdita was getting stronger in her left arm.
Vlad was beside her so quickly that she wasn’t even aware that he’d moved.
‘You are a . . . fascinating woman, Miss Nitt,’ he said. ‘Such lovely hair, may I say? But who is Perdita?’
‘No one, really,’ Agnes mumbled. She fought against the urge to bunch her left hand into a fist. Perdita was screaming at her again.
Vlad stroked a strand of her hair. It was, she knew, good hair. It wasn’t simply big hair, it was enormous hair, as if she was trying to counterbalance her body. It was glossy, it never split, and was extremely well behaved except for a tendency to eat combs.
‘Eat combs?’ said Vlad, coiling the hair around his finger.
‘Yes, it-‘
He can see what you’re thinking.
Vlad looked puzzled again, like someone trying to make out some faint noise.
‘You . . . can resist, can’t you?’ he said. ‘I was watching you when Lacci was playing the piano and losing. Do you have any vampire blood in you?’