‘You really haven’t got any scruples, have you, Nanny?’ said Agnes.
‘No,’ said Nanny simply. ‘This is Lancre we’re talkin’ about. If we was men, we’d be talking about layin’ down our lives for the country. As women, we can talk about laying down.’
‘I just don’t want to hear this,’ said Magrat.
‘I ain’t asking her to do what I wouldn’t do,’ said Nanny.
‘Really? Then why-‘
‘Because no one wants me to do it,’ said Nanny. ‘But if I was fifty years younger I reckon I could have Sonny Jim bitin’ turnips by midsummer.’
‘You mean just because she’s a woman she should use sexual wiles on him?’ said Magrat. ‘This is so . . . so . . . well, it’s so Nanny Ogg, that’s all I can say.’
‘She should use any vale she can lay her hands on,’ said Nanny. ‘I don’t care what Granny said, there’s always a way. Like the hero in Tsort or wherever it was, who was completely invincible except for his heel and someone stuck a spear in it and killed him. . .’
‘What are you expecting her to do, prod him all over?’
‘ ‘I never understood that story, anyway,’ said Nanny. ‘I mean, if I knew I’d got a heel that would kill me if someone stuck a spear in it, I’d go into battle wearing very heavy boots-‘
‘You don’t know what he’s like,’ said Agnes, ignoring the diversion. ‘He looks at me as if he’s undressing me with his eyes.’
‘Eyes is allowed,’ said Nanny.
‘And he’s laughing at me all the time! As if he knows I don’t like him and that adds to the fun!’
‘Now you get into that castle!’ Nanny growled. ‘For Lancre! For the King! For everyone in the country! And if he gets too much, let Perdita take over, ‘cos I reckon there’s some things she’s better at!’
In the shocked silence there was a faint clinking noise from Nanny’s sideboard.
Magrat coughed. ‘J-just like the old days,’ she said. ‘Arguing all the time.’
Nanny stood up and unhooked a cast-iron saucepan from the beam over the kitchen range.
‘You can’t treat people like this,’ said Agnes sullenly.
‘I can,’ said Nanny, tiptoeing in the direction of the sideboard. ‘I’m the other one now, see?’
Ornaments flew and shattered as she brought the saucepan down hard, bottom upwards.
‘Got you, you little blue devil!’ she shouted. ‘Don’t think I didn’t see you!’
The saucepan rose. Nanny leaned her weight on the handle but it still moved slowly along the dresser, rocking slightly from side to side, until it reached the edge.
Something red and blue dropped on to the floor and started moving towards the closed door.
At the same time Greebo shot past Agnes, accelerating. And then, just as he was about to spring, he changed his mind. All four feet extended their claws at the same time and bit into the floorboards. He rolled, sprang on to his feet, and started to wash himself.
The red and blue blur hit the door and picked itself up, becoming a blue man, six inches tall, with red hair. He carried a sword about the same size as himself.
‘Ach, hins tak yer scaggie, yer dank yowl callyake!’ he screamed.
‘Oh, it’s you,’ said Nanny, relaxing. ‘Do you want a drink?’
The sword was lowered slightly, but with a
definite hint that it could be raised again at a moment’s notice.
“tazit?’
Nanny reached down to the crate by her chair and sorted through the bottles.
‘Scumble? My best. Vintage,’ she said.
The wee man’s tiny eyes lit up. ‘Las’ Tuesda?’
‘Right. Agnes, open that sewing box and pass me a thimble, will you? Come away here, man,’ said Nanny, uncorking the bottle well away from the fire and filling up the thimble. ‘Ladies, this here’s . . . let’s see them tattoos . . . yeah, this here’s one of the Nac mac Feegle. The little bastards comes down and raids my still about once a year. I reckon I recognize the pattern.’
‘Pings, yow graley yinl Suz ae rikt dheu,’ said the blue man, taking the thimble.
‘What is he?’ said Magrat.
‘They’re gnomes,’ said Nanny.
The man lowered the thimble. ‘Pictsies!’
‘Pixies, if you insist,’ said Nanny. ‘They live up on the high moors over towards Uberwald-‘
‘Ach! Bae, yon snae rikt speel, y’ol behennit! Feggersl Yon ken sweal boggin bludsuckers owl dhu tae-‘
Nanny nodded while she listened. Halfway through the little man’s rant she topped up his thimble.
‘Ah, right,’ she said, when he seemed to have finished. ‘Well, he says the Nac mac Feegle have been forced out by the vampires, see? They’ve been driving out all the. . .’ her lips
moved as she tried out various translations ‘. . . old people. . .’
‘That’s very cruel!’ said Magrat.
‘No . . . I mean . . . old races. The people that live in . . . the corners. You know, the ones you don’t see around a lot . . . centaurs, bogeys, gnomes-‘
‘Pictsies!’
‘Yeah, right . . . driving ’em out of the country.’
‘Why should they do that?’
‘Probably not fashionable any more,’ said Nanny.
Agnes looked hard at the pixie. On a scale of ethereal from one to ten he looked as if he was on some other scale, probably one buried in deep ocean sludge. The blueness of his skin, she could see now, was made up of tattoos and paint. His red hair stuck out at all angles. His sole concession to the temperature was a leather loincloth. He saw her looking at him.
‘Yist, awa’ fra’ yeeks, ye stawking gowt that’ya! Bigjobs!’
‘Er, sorry,’ said Agnes.
‘Good language, ain’t it?’ said Nanny. ‘A hint o’ heather and midden. But when you’ve got the Nac mac Feegle on your side you’re doing okay.’
The pixie waved the empty thimble at Nanny.
‘Ghail o’ bludy “lemonade”, callyake I’
‘Ah, no foolin’ you, you want the real stuff,’ said Nanny. She pulled back a chair cushion, and produced a black glass bottle with its cork held on by wire.
‘You’re not giving him that, are you?’ said Magrat. ‘That’s your medicinal whisky!’
‘And you always tell people it’s strictly for external use only,’ said Agnes.
‘Ah, the Nac mac Feegle are a hard-headed race,’ said Nanny, handing it down to the tiny man. To Agnes’s amazement, he grasped a bottle bigger than himself with insolent ease. ‘There you go, man. Share it with your mates, ‘cos I know they’re around here somewhere.’
There was a clink from the dresser. The witches looked up. Hundreds of pixies had simply appeared among the ornaments. Most of them wore pointed hats that curved so that the point was practically pointing down, and they all carried swords.
‘Amazin’ how they can just fade into the foreground like that,’ said Nanny. ‘That’s what’s kept ’em so safe all these years. That and killin’ most people who saw ’em, of course.’
Greebo, very quietly, went and sat under her chair.
‘So . . . you gentlemen have been turned out by the vampires, have ye?’ said Nanny, as the bottle bobbed through the throng. A roar went up.
‘Blaznet!’
‘Ach, yon weezit fash’ deveel!’
‘Arnoch, a hard tickut!’
‘Bigjobs!’
‘I daresay you can stop in Lancre,’ said Nanny, above the din.
‘Just a moment, Nanny-‘ Magrat began.
Nanny waved a hand at her hurriedly. ‘There’s that island up on the lake,’ she went on, raising her voice. ‘It’s where the herons nest. Just the place, eh? Lots of fish, lots of hunting up the valley.’
The blue pixies went into a huddle. Then one of them looked up.
‘Priznae? Yowl’s nae brennit, moy ghail!’
‘Oh, you’d be left to yourself,’ said Nanny. ‘But no stealing cattle, eh?’
‘These steal cattle?’ said Agnes. ‘Full-size cattle? How many of them does it take?’
‘Four.’
‘Four?’
‘One under each foot. Seen ’em do it. You see a cow in a field, mindin’ its own business, next minute the grass is rustlin’, some little bugger shouts, “Hup, hup, hup,” and the poor beast goes past voom! without its legs movin’,’ said Nanny. ‘They’re stronger’n cockroaches. You step on a pixie, you’d better be wearing good thick soles.’
‘Nanny, you can’t give them the island! It doesn’t belong to you!’ said Magrat.
‘It doesn’t belong to anyone,’ said Nanny.
‘It belongs to the King!’
‘Ah. Well, what’s his is yours, so give ’em the island and Verence can sign a bit o’ paper later on. It’s worth it,’ Nanny added. ‘A rent of not stealing our cows is well worth it. Otherwise you’ll see cows zippin’ around very fast. Backwards, sometimes.’
‘Without their legs moving?’ said Agnes.
‘Right!’
‘Well-‘ Magrat began.
‘And they’ll be useful,’ Nanny added, lowering her voice. ‘Fighting’s what they like best.’
‘Whist, yon fellaight fra’ aquesbore!’
‘Drinkin’s what they like best,’ Nanny corrected herself.