‘Yes?’
‘It sounds silly, but it was in an old book.’
‘Well?’
‘They find single-minded people easier to control.’
‘Single-minded?’ said Agnes suspiciously. More carts rolled past.
‘It doesn’t sound right, I know. You’d think strong minded people would be harder to affect. I suppose a big target is easier to hit. In some of the villages, apparently, vampire hunters get roaring drunk first. Protection, you see? You can’t punch fog.’
So we’re fog? said Perdita. So’s he, by the look of him. . .
Agnes shrugged. There was a certain bucolic look to the faces of the cart drivers. Of course, you got that in Lancre too, but in Lancre it was overlaid by a mixture of guile, common sense and stubborn rock-headedness. Here the eyes behind the faces had a switched-off look.
Like cattle, said Perdita.
‘Yes,’ said Agnes.
‘Pardon?’ said Oats.
‘Just thinking aloud. . .’
And she thought of the way one man could so easily control a herd of cows, any one of which could have left him as a small damp depression in the ground had it wanted to. Somehow, they never got around to thinking about it.
Supposing they are better than us, she thought. Supposing that, compared to them, we’re just-
You’re too close to the castle! snapped Perdita. You’re thinking cow thoughts.
Then Agnes realized that there was a squad of men marching behind the carts. They didn’t look at all like the carts’ drivers.
And these, said Perdita, are the cattle prods.
They had uniforms, of a sort, with the black and white crest of the Magpyrs, but they weren’t a body of men that looked smart in a uniform. They looked very much like men who killed other people for money, and not even for a lot of money. They looked, in short, like men who’d cheerfully eat a puppy sandwich. Several of them leered at Agnes when they went past, but it was only a generic leer that was simply leered on the basis that she had a dress on.
More wagons came up behind them.
‘Nanny Ogg says you must take time by the foreskin,’ Agnes said, and darted forward as the last wagon rumbled past.
‘She does?’
‘I’m afraid so. You get used to it.’
She caught the back of the cart and pulled herself up, beckoning him hastily to follow.
‘Are you trying to impress me?’ he said as she hauled him on board.
‘Not you,’ she said. And realized, at this point, that what she was sitting on was a coffin.
There were two of them in the back of the cart, packed around with straw.
‘Are they moving the furniture in?’ said Oats.
‘Er . . . I think . . . it might . . . be occupied,’ said Agnes.
She almost shrieked when he removed the lid. The coffin was empty.
‘You idiot! Supposing there was someone in there!’
‘Vampires are weak during the day. Everyone knows that,’ said Oats reproachfully.
‘I can . . . feel them here . . . somewhere,’ said Agnes. The rattling of the cart changed as it rumbled on to the cobblestones of the courtyard.
‘Get off the other one and I’ll have a look.’
‘But supposing-‘
He pushed her off and raised the lid before she could protest further. ‘No, no vampire in here, either,’ he said.
‘Supposing one’d just reached out and grabbed you by the throat!’
‘Om is my shield,’ said Oats.
‘Really? That’s nice.’
‘You may chortle-‘
‘I didn’t chortle.’
‘You can if you want to. But I’m sure we are doing the right thing. Did not Sonaton defeat the Beast of Batrigore in its very cave?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘He did. And didn’t the prophet Urdure vanquish the Dragon of Sluth on the Plain of Gidral after three days’ fighting?’
‘I don’t know that we’ve got that much time-‘
‘And wasn’t it true that the Sons of Exequial beat the hosts of Myrilom?’
‘Yes?’
‘You’ve heard of that?’
‘No. Listen, we’ve stopped. I don’t particularly want us to be found, do you? Not right now. And not by those guards. They didn’t look like nice men at all.’
They exchanged a meaningful glance over the coffins, concerning a certain inevitability about the immediate future.
‘They’ll notice they’re heavier, won’t they?’ said Oats.
‘Those people driving the carts didn’t look as though they notice anything very much.’
Agnes stared at the coffin beside her. There was some dirt in the bottom, but it was otherwise quite clean and had a pillow at the head end. There were also some side pockets in the lining.
‘It’s the easiest way in,’ she said. ‘You get into this one, I’ll get into that one. And, look . . . those people you just told me about . . . Were they real historical characters?’
‘Certainly. They-‘
‘Well, don’t try to imitate them yet, all right? Otherwise you’ll be a historical character too.’
She shut the lid, and still felt there was a vampire around.
Her hand touched the side pocket. There was something soft yet spiky there. Her fingers explored it in fascinated horror and discovered it to be a ball of wool with a couple of long knitting needles stuck through it, suggesting either a very domesticated form of voodoo or that someone was knitting a sock.
Who knitted socks in a coffin? On the other hand, perhaps even vampires couldn’t sleep sometimes, and tossed and turned all day.
She braced herself as the coffin was picked up and tried to occupy her mind by working out where it was being taken. She heard the sound of footsteps on the cobbles, and then the ring of the flagstones on the main steps, echoing in the great hall, a sudden dip
That meant the cellars. Logical, really, but not good.
You’re doing this to impress me, said Perdita. You’re doing it to try to be extrovert and dynamic.
Shut up, Agnes thought.
A voice outside said, ‘Put them down there and puth off.’
That was the one who called himself Igor.
Agnes wished she’d thought of- a weapon.
‘Get rid of me, would they?’ the voice went on, against a background of disappearing footsteps. ‘Thith ith all going to end in tearth. It’th all very well for them, but who hath to go and thweep up the dutht, eh? That’th what I’d like to know. Who’th it hath to pull their headth out of the pickle jarth? Who’th it hath to find them under the ithe? I mutht’ve pulled out more thtaketh than I’ve had wriggly dinnerth . . .’
Light flooded in as the coffin lid was removed.
Igor stared at Agnes. Agnes stared at Igor.
Igor unfroze first. He smiled – he had a geometrically interesting smile, because of the row of stitches right across it – and said, ‘Dear me, thomeone’th been lithening to too many thtorieth. Got any garlic?’
‘Masses,’ Agnes lied.
‘Won’t work. Any holy water?’
‘Gallons.’
‘It-‘
A coffin lid smacked down on Igor’s head, making an oddly metallic sound. He reached up slowly to rub the spot, and then turned around. This time the lid smacked into his face.
‘Oh . . . thit,’ he said, and folded up. Oats appeared, face aglow with adrenaline and righteousness.
‘I smote him mightily!’
‘Good, good, let’s get out of here! Help me up!’
‘My wrath descended upon him like-‘
‘It was a heavy lid and he’s not that young,’ said Agnes. ‘Look, I used to play down here, I know how to get to the back stairs-‘
‘He’s not a vampire? He looks like one. First time I’ve ever seen a patchwork man . . .’
‘He’s a servant. Now, please come-‘ Agnes paused. ‘Can you make holy water?’
‘What, here?’
‘I mean bless it, or dedicate it to Om, or. . . boil the hell out of it, perhaps,’ said Agnes.
‘There is a small ceremony I can-‘ He stopped. ‘That’s right! Vampires can be stopped by holy water!’
‘Good. We’ll go via the kitchens, then.’
The huge kitchens were almost empty. They never bustled these days, since the royal couple were not the sort who demanded three meat courses with every meal, and at the moment there was only Mrs Scorbic the cook in there, calmly rolling out pastry.
‘Afternoon, Mrs Scorbic,’ said Agnes, deciding the best course was to march past and rely on the authority of the pointy hat. ‘We’ve just dropped in for some water, don’t worry, I know where the pump is, but if you’ve got a couple of empty bottles that would be helpful.’
‘That’s right, dear,’ said Mrs Scorbic.
Agnes stopped and turned.
Mrs Scorbic was famously acerbic, especially on the subject of soya, nut cutlets, vegetarian meals and any vegetable that couldn’t be boiled until it was yellow. Even the King hesitated to set foot in her kitchen but, whereas he only got an angry silence, lesser mortals got the full force of her generalized wrath. Mrs Scorbic was permanently angry, in the same way that mountains are permanently large.