The door was so hard that the wood was like stone with a grain. Someone had once thought hard about the maximum amount of force a really determined mob would be able to apply, and had then overdesigned.
It hung open.
“But we heard her put the bars across!” wailed Nanny.
A variously colored lump was sprawled in front of the door. Igor knelt down and picked up a limp paw.
“They kill Thcrapth! The bathtardth!”
“They’ve got Magrat and the babby!” snapped Nanny.
“He wath my only friend!”
Nanny’s arm shot out and, despite his bulk, Igor was lifted up by his collar.
“You’re going to have one very
serious
enemy really
soon
, my lad, unless you help us out right
now
! Oh, for heaven’s sake…” With her spare hand she reached into her knickerleg and produced a large crumpled handkerchief. “Have a good blow, will you?”
There was a noise like a foghorn being trodden on.
“Now, where would they take them? The place is swarming with righteous peasants!” said Nanny, when he’d finished.
“He wath alwayth ready with hith waggy tailth and hith cold nothe—” Igor sobbed.
“
Where
, Igor?”
Igor pointed with his finger, or at least one that he currently owned, to the far door.
“That goeth to the vaultth,” he said. “An’ they can get out through the iron gate down in the valley. You’ll never catch them!”
“But it’s still bolted,” said Agnes.
“Then they’re thtill in the cathtle, which ith thtupid—”
He was interrupted by several huge organ chords, which made the floor rumble.
“Any of the Escrow folk big musicians?” said Nanny, lowering Igor.
“How do I know?” said Agnes, as another couple of descending chords brought dust down from the ceiling. “They wanted to hammer a stake in me and boil my head! That is
not
the time to ask them to give a little whistle!”
The organ piped its summons once more.
“Why’d they stay?” said Nanny. “They could be dug in deep somewhere by now—Oh…”
“Granny wouldn’t run,” said Agnes.
“No, Granny Weatherwax likes a showdown,” said Nanny, grinning artfully. “And they’re thinkin’ like her. Somehow, she’s making them think like
her
…”
“
She
thinks like her, too,” said Agnes.
“Let’s hope she’s had more practice, then,” said Nanny. “Come on!”
Lacrimosa pulled an organ stop marked “Ghastly Face at Win-dow” and was rewarded with a chord, a crash of thunder and a slightly mechanical scream.
“Thank goodness we don’t take after your side of the family, Father, that’s all I can say,” she said. “Although I suppose it could be fun if we could arrange some sort of mechanical linkage to the torture chamber. That certainly wasn’t a very realistic scream.”
“This is ridiculous,” said Vlad. “We’ve got the child. We’ve got the woman. Why don’t we just leave? There’re plenty of other castles.”
“That would be running away,” said the Count.
“And surviving,” said Vlad, rubbing his head.
“We don’t run,” said the Count. “And—No, step back, please…”
This was to the mob, which was hovering uncertainly just inside the doors. Mobs become uncertain very quickly, in view of the absence of a central brain, and in this case the hesitation was caused by the sight of Magrat and the baby.
Vlad had a bruise on his forehead. A push-and-go wooden duck on wheels can cause quite a lot of damage if wielded with enough force.
“Well done,” said the Count, cradling baby Esme on one arm. Magrat writhed to escape the grip of his other hand, but it clamped her wrist like steel. “You see? Absolute obedience. It’s just as in chess. If you take the Queen, you’ve as good as won. It doesn’t matter if a few pawns are lost.”
“That’s a very nasty way to talk about Mother,” said Vlad.
“I am very attached to your mother,” said the Count. “And she’ll find a way to return, in the fullness of time. A voyage will be good for her health. Some fisherman will find the jar and next thing you know she’ll be back with us, fat and healthy—Ah, the inestimable Mrs. Ogg…”
“Don’t you go smarming me!” snapped Nanny, pushing her way through the bewildered crowd. “I’m fed up with you smarming at me smarmily as if you were Mister Smarm! Now you just free the both of them or—”
“Ah, so quickly we get to
or
,” sighed the Count. “But
I
will say: you will all leave the castle, and then we shall see. Perhaps we shall let the Queen go. But the little princess…Isn’t she charming? She can remain as our guest. She’ll brighten the place up—”
“She’s coming back to Lancre with us, you bastard!” screamed Magrat. She twisted in the Count’s grip and tried to slap him, but Agnes saw her face whiten as his hand tightened on her wrist.
“That’s very bad language for a queen,” said the Count. “And I am still very strong, even for a vampire. But you’re right. We shall
all
go back to Lancre. One big happy family, living in the castle. I must say this place is losing its attractions. Oh, don’t blame yourself, Mrs. Ogg. I’m sure others will do that for you—”
He stopped. A sound that had been on the edge of hearing was getting louder. It had a rhythmic, almost tinny sound.
The crowd parted. Granny Weatherwax walked forward, slowly stirring
“No milk in this place,” she said, “Not to be wondered at, really. I sliced a bit of lemon, but it’s not the same, I always think.”
She laid the spoon in the saucer with a clink that echoed around the hall, and gave the Count a smile.
“Am I too late?” she said.
The bolts rattled back, one by one.
“…’th gone too far,” Igor muttered. “The old marthter wouldn’t…”
The door creaked back on lovingly rusted hinges. Cool dry air puffed out of the darkness.
Igor fumbled with some matches and lit a torch.
“…it’th all very well wanting a nithe long retht, but thith ith a dithgrathe…”
He ran along the dark corridors, half rough masonry, half sheer naked rock, and reached another chamber which was completely empty apart from a large stone sarcophagus in the center, on the side of which was carved
MAGPYR
.
He stuffed the torch into a bracket, removed his coat, and after considerable pushing heaved the stone lid aside.
“Thorry about thith, marthter,” he grunted as it thudded to the ground.
Inside the coffin, gray dust twinkled in the torchlight.
“…coming up here, mething everything up…” Igor picked up his coat and took a thick wad of material out of his pocket. He unrolled it on the edge of the stone. Now the light glinted off an array of scalpels, scissors and needles.
“…threatening little babieth now…
you
never done that…only adventurouth femaleth over the age of theventeen and looking good in a nightie, you alwayth thed…”
He selected a scalpel and, with some care, nicked the little finger of his left hand.
A drop of blood appeared, swelled and dropped onto the dust, where it smoked.
“That one’th for Thcrapth,” said Igor with grim satisfaction.
By the time he’d reached the door white mist was already pouring over the edge of the coffin.
“I’m an old lady,” said Granny Weatherwax, looking around sternly. “I’d like to sit down, thank you so very much.”
A bench was rushed forward. Granny sat, and eyed the Count.
“What were you saying?” she said.
“Ah, Esmerelda,” said the Count. “At last you come to join us. The call of the blood is too strong to be disobeyed, yes?”
“I hope so,” said Granny.
“We’re all going to walk out of here, Miss Weatherwax.”
“You’re not leaving here,” said Granny. She stirred the tea again. The eyes of all three vampires swiveled to follow the spoon.
“You have no choice but to obey me. You know that,” said the Count.
“Oh, there’s always a choice,” said Granny.
Vlad and Lacrimosa leaned down on either side of their father. There was some hurried whispering. The Count looked up.
“No, you
couldn’t
have resisted it,” he said. “Not even you!”
“I won’t say it didn’t cost me,” said Granny. She stirred the tea again.
There was more whispering.
“We
do
have the Queen and the baby,” said the Count. “I believe you think highly of them.”
Granny raised the cup halfway to her lips. “Kill ’em,” she said. “It won’t benefit you.”
“Esme!” snapped Nanny Ogg and Magrat together.
Granny put the cup back in the saucer. Agnes thought she saw Vlad sigh. She could feel the pull herself…
I know what she did,
whispered Perdita. So do I, thought Agnes.
“He’s bluffing,” Granny said.
“Oh? You’d like a vampire queen one day, would you?” said Lacrimosa.
“Had one once, in Lancre,” said Granny, conversationally. “Poor woman got bitten by one of you people. Got by on blue steak and such. Never laid a tooth on anyone, the way I heard it. Griminir the Impaler, she was.”
“The
Impaler
?”
“Oh, I just said she wasn’t a bloodsucker. I didn’t say she was a nice person,” said Granny. “She didn’t mind shedding blood, but she drew the line at drinking it. You don’t have to, neither.”
“You know
nothing
about
true
vampires!”
“I know more’n you think, and I know about Gytha Ogg,” said Granny. Nanny Ogg blinked.
Granny Weatherwax raised the teacup again, and then lowered it. “She likes a drink. She’ll
tell
you it has to be the best brandy…” Nanny nodded affirmation “…and that’s certainly what she
desires
, but really she’ll settle for beer just like everyone else.” Nanny Ogg shrugged as Granny went on: “But you wouldn’t settle for black puddings, would you, because what you really drink is power over people. I know you like I know myself. And one of the things I know is that you ain’t going to hurt a hair of that child’s head. Leastways,” and here Granny absentmindedly stirred the tea again, “if she had any yet, you wouldn’t. You can’t, see.”
She picked up the cup and carefully scraped it on the edge of the saucer. Agnes saw Lacrimosa’s lips part, hungrily.
“So all I’m really here for, d’you see, is to see whether you get justice or mercy,” said Nanny. “It’s just a matter of choosing.”
“You really think we wouldn’t harm
meat
?” said Lacrimosa, striding forward. “Watch!”
She brought her hand down hard toward the baby, and then jerked back as if she’d been stung.
“Can’t do it,” said Granny.
“I nearly broke my arm!”
“Shame,” said Granny calmly.
“You’ve put some…something magical in the child, have you?” said the Count.
“Can’t imagine who’d think I’d do such a thing,” said Granny, while behind her Nanny Ogg looked down at her boots. “So here’s my offer, you see. You hand back Magrat and the baby and we’ll chop your heads off.”
“And that’s what you call justice, is it?” said the Count.
“No, that’s what I call mercy,” said Granny. She put the cup back in the saucer.
“For goodness’ sake, woman, are you going to drink that damn tea or not?”
roared the Count.
Granny sipped it, and made a face.
“Why, what
have
I been thinkin’ of? I’ve been so busy talking, it’s got cold,” she said, and daintily tipped the contents of the cup onto the floor.
Lacrimosa groaned.
“It’ll probably wear off soon,” Granny went on, in the same easy voice. “But until it does, you see, you’ll not harm a child, you’ll not harm Magrat, you hate the thought of drinking blood, and you won’t run because you’ll never run from a challenge…”
“
What
will wear off?” said Vlad.
“Oh, they’re strong, your walls of thought,” said Granny dreamily. “I couldn’t get through them.”
The Count smiled.
Granny smiled, too. “So I didn’t,” she added.
The mist rolled through the crypt, flowing along the floor, walls and ceiling. It poured up the steps and along a tunnel, the billows boiling ahead on one another as though engaged in a war.
An unwary rat, creeping across the flagstones, was too late. The mist flowed over it. There was a squeak, cut off, and when the mist had gone a few small white bones were all that remained.
Some equally small bones, but fully assembled and wearing a black hooded robe and carrying a tiny scythe, appeared out of nowhere and walked over to them. Skeletal claws tippy-tapped on the stone.
“Squeak?” said the ghost of the rat pathetically.
S
QUEAK
, said the Death of Rats. This was really all it needed to know.
“You wanted to know where I’d put my self,” said Granny. “I didn’t go anywhere. I just put it in something alive, and you took it. You invited me in. I’m in every muscle in your body and I’m in your head, oh yes. I was in the
blood
, Count. In the blood. I ain’t been vampired. You’ve been Weatherwaxed. All of you. And you’ve always listened to your blood, haven’t you?”
The Count stared at her, open mouthed.
The spoon dropped out of her saucer and tinkled onto the floor, raising a wave in a thin white mist. It was rolling in from the walls, leaving a shrinking circle of black and white tiles in the middle of which were the vampires.
Igor pushed his way through the crowd until he was alongside Nanny.
“It’th all right,” he said, “I couldn’t let it go on, it wath dithgratheful…”
The mist rose in a boiling tower, there was a moment of discontinuity, a feeling of sliced time, and then a figure stood behind Vlad and Lacrimosa. He was rather taller than most men, and wearing evening dress that might have been in style once upon a time. His hair was streaked with gray and brushed back over his ears in a way that gave the impression his head had been designed for its aerodynamic efficiency.
Beautifully manicured hands gripped the shoulders of the younger vampires. Lacrimosa turned to scratch him, and cowered when he snarled like a tiger.
Then the face returned to something closer to human, and the newcomer smiled. He seemed genuinely pleased to see everyone.
“Good morning,” he said.
“Another bloody vampire?” said Nanny.
“Not any old vampire,” said Igor, hopping from one foot to the other. “It’th the old marthter! Old Red Eyeth ith back!”
Granny stood up, ignoring the tall figure firmly holding the two suddenly docile vampires. She advanced on the Count.
“I know all about what you can and can’t do,” she said, “because you let me in. An’ that means you can’t do what I can’t do. An’ you think just like me, the difference bein’ I’ve done it longer and I’m better’n you at it.”
“You’re
meat
,” snarled the Count. “Clever
meat
!”
“And you
invited
me in,” said Granny. “I’m not the sort to go where I’m not welcome, I’m sure.”
In the Count’s arms the baby started to cry. He stood up.
“How
sure
are you that I won’t harm this child?” he said.
“I wouldn’t. So you can’t.”
The Count’s face contorted as he wrestled with his feelings and also with Magrat, who was kicking him in the shins.
“It could have worked…” he said, and for the first time the certainty had been drained from his voice.
“You mean it could have worked for you!” shouted Agnes.
“We are vampires. We cannot help what we are.”
“Only animals can’t help what they are,” said Granny. “Will you give me the child now?”
“If I…” the Count began, and then straightened up. “No! I don’t have to bargain! I
can
fight you, just as you fought me! And if I walk out of here now, I don’t think there’s anyone who’ll dare stop me. Look at you…all of you…and look at me. And now look at…him.” He nodded at the figure holding Vlad and Lacri-mosa as still as statues. “Is
that
what you want?”
“Sorry…who is this we’re supposed to be looking at?” said Granny. “Oh…Igor’s ‘old master’? The old Count Magpyr, I believe.”
The old Count nodded gracefully. “Your servant, madam,” he said.
“I doubt it,” said Granny.
“Oh, no one minded
him
,” said Piotr, from among the Escrow citizens. “He only ever came around every few years and anyway if you remembered about the garlic he wasn’t a problem. He didn’t expect us to
like
him.”
The old Count smiled at him.
“You look familiar. One of the Ravi family, aren’t you?”
“Piotr, sir. Son of Hans.”
“Ah yes. Very similar bone structure. Do remember me to your grandmother.”
“She passed away ten years ago, sir.”
“Oh really? I am so sorry. Time goes so quickly when you’re dead.” The old master sighed. “A very fine figure in a nightdress, as I recall.”
“Oh,
he
was all right,” said someone else in the crowd. “We got a nip every now and again but we got over it.”
“That’s a familiar voice,” said the vampire. “Are you a Veyzen?”
“Yessir.”
“Related to Arno Veyzen?”
“Great-granddaddy, sir.”
“Good man. Killed me stone dead seventy-five years ago. Stake right through the heart from twenty paces. You should be proud.”
The man in the crowd beamed with ancestral pride.
“We’ve still got the stake hung up over the fireplace, yer honor,” he said.
“Well done. Good man. I like to see the old ways kept up—”
Count Magpyr screamed.
“You can’t possibly prefer
that
? He’s a
monster
!”
“But he never made an appointment!” shouted Agnes, even louder. “I bet he never thought it was all just an
arrangement
!”
Count Magpyr was edging toward the door with his hostages.
“No,” he said, “this is
not
how it’s going to happen. If anyone really believes that I won’t harm my charming hostages, perhaps you will try to stop me? Does
anyone
really believe that old woman?”
Nanny Ogg opened her mouth, caught Granny’s eye, and shut it again. The crowd parted behind the Count as he dragged Magrat toward the door.
He walked into the figure of Mightily Oats.
“Have you ever thought of letting Om into your life?” said the priest. His voice trembled. His face glistened with sweat.
“Oh…you
again
?” said the Count. “If I can resist her, little boy,
you
are not a problem!”
Oats held his ax before him as if it were made of some rare and delicate metal.
“Begone, foul fiend—” he began.
“Oh, dear me,” said the Count, thrusting the ax aside. “And don’t you learn anything, you stupid man? Little stupid man who has a little stupid faith in a little stupid god?”
“But it…lets me see things as they are,” Oats managed.
“Really? And you think
you
can stand in my way? An ax isn’t even a holy symbol!”
“Oh.” Oats looked crestfallen. Agnes saw his shoulders sag as he lowered the blade.
Then he looked up, smiled brightly and said, “Let’s make it so.”
Agnes saw the blade leave a gold trail in the air as it swept around. There was a soft, almost silken sound.
The ax dropped onto the flagstones. In the sudden silence, it clanged like a bell. Then Oats reached out and snatched the child from the vampire’s unresisting hands. He held her out to Magrat, who took her in shocked silence.
The first sound after that was the rustle of Granny’s dress as she stood up and walked over to the ax. She nudged it with her foot.
“If I’ve got a fault,” she said, contriving to suggest that this was only a theoretical possibility, “it’s not knowing when to turn and run. And I tends to bluff on a weak hand.”
Her voice echoed in the hall. No one else had even breathed out yet.
She nodded at the Count, who’d slowly raised his hands to the red wound that ran all around his neck.
“It was a
sharp
ax,” she said. “Who says there’s no mercy in the world? Just don’t nod, that’s all. And someone’ll take you down to a nice cold coffin and I daresay fifty years’ll just fly past and maybe you’ll wake with enough sense to be stupid.”
There was a murmur from the mob as they came back to life. Granny shook her head.
“They want you deader than that, I see,” she said, as the Count gazed ahead of him with frozen, desperate eyes and the blood welled and seeped between his fingers. “An’ there’s ways. Oh yes. We could burn you to ashes and scatter them in the sea—”
This met with a general sigh of approval.
“—or throw ’em up in the air in the middle of a gale—”
This got a smattering of applause.
“—or just pay some sailor to drop you over the edge.” This even got a few whistles. “Of course, you’d come back alive again, I suppose, one day. But just floating in space for millions of years, oh, that sounds very boring to me.” She raised a hand to silence the crowd.
“No. Fifty years to think about things, that’s about right. People need vampires,” she said. “They helps ’em remember what stakes and garlic are for.”
She snapped her fingers at the crowd. “Come on, two of you take him down to the vaults. Show some respect for the dead—”
“That’s not enough!” said Piotr, stepping forward. “Not after all he—”
“Then when he comes back you deal with him yourself!” snapped Granny loudly. “Teach your children! Don’t trust the cannibal just ’cos he’s usin’ a knife and fork! And remember that vampires don’t go where they’re not invited!”
They backed away. Granny relaxed a little.
“This time round, it’s up to me. My…choice.” She leaned closer to the Count’s horrible grimace. “You tried to take my mind away from me,” she said, in a lower voice. “And that’s everything to me. Reflect on that. Try to
learn
.” She stood back. “Take him away.”
She turned away, to the tall figure. “So…you’re the old master, are you?” she said.
“Alison Weatherwax?” said the old master. “I have a good memory for necks.”
Granny froze for a second.
“What? No! Er…how do you know the name?”
“Why, she passed through here, what, fifty years ago. We met briefly, and then she cut off my head and stuck a stake in my heart.” The Count sighed happily. “A very spirited woman. You’re a relative, I presume? I lose track of generations, I’m afraid.”
“Granddaughter,” said Granny weakly.
“There’s a phoenix outside the castle, Igor tells me…”
“It’ll leave, I expect.”
The Count nodded. “I’ve always rather liked them,” he said, wistfully. “There were so many of them when I was young. They made the nights…pretty. So pretty. Everything was so much simpler then…” His voice trailed off, and then came back louder. “But now, apparently, we’re in
modern times
.”
“That’s what they say,” murmured Granny.
“Well, madam, I’ve never taken too much notice of them. Fifty years later they never seem so modern as all that.” He shook the younger vampires like dolls. “I do apologize for my nephew’s behavior. Quite out of keeping for a vampire. Would you people from Escrow like to kill these two? It’s the least I could do.”
“Ain’t they your relatives?” said Nanny Ogg, as the crowd surged forward.
“Oh yes. But we’ve never been much of a species for playing happy families.”
Vlad looked imploringly at Agnes, and reached out to her.
“You wouldn’t let them kill me, would you? You wouldn’t let them do this to me? We could have…we might…you
wouldn’t
, would you?”
The crowd hesitated. This sounded like an important plea. A hundred pairs of eyes stared at Agnes.
She took his hand.
I suppose we could work on him,
said Perdita. But Agnes thought about Escrow, and the queues, and the children playing while they waited, and how evil might come animal sharp in the night, or grayly by day on a list…
“Vlad,” she said gently, looking deep into his eyes, “I’d even hold their coats.”
“A fine sentiment but that ain’t happenin’,” said Granny, behind her. “You take ’em away, Count. Teach ’em the old ways. Teach ’em stupidity.”
The Count nodded, and grinned toothily.
“Certainly. I shall teach them that to live you have to rise again—”
“Hah! You don’t
live
, Count. The phoenix lives. You just don’t know you’re dead. Now get along with you!”
There was another moment sliced out of time and then a flock of magpies rose up from where the three vampires had been, screaming and chattering, and disappeared in the darkness of the roof.
“There’s hundreds of them!” said Agnes to Nanny.
“Well, vampires can turn into things,” said Nanny. “Everyone knows that, who knows anything about vampires.”
“And what do three hundred magpies mean?”
“They mean it’s time to put covers on all the furniture,” said Nanny. “And that it’s time for me to have a very big drink.”
The crowd began to break up, aware that the show was over.
“Why didn’t she just let us wipe them out?” hissed Piotr by Agnes’s ear. “Death’s too good for them!”
“Yes,” said Agnes.” I suppose that’s why she didn’t let them have it.”
Oats hadn’t moved. He was still staring straight ahead of him, but his hands were shaking. Agnes led him gently to a bench, and eased him down.
“I killed him, didn’t I,” he whispered.
“Sort of,” said Agnes. “It’s a bit hard to tell with vampires.”
“There was just nothing else to do! Everything just went…the air just went gold, and there was just this one moment to do something—”
“I don’t think anyone’s complaining,” said Agnes.
You’ve got to admit he’s quite attractive,
whispered Perdita.
If only he’d do something about that boil…
Magrat sat down on the other side of Oats, clutching the baby. She breathed deeply a few times.
“That was very brave of you,” she said.
“No, it wasn’t,” said Oats hoarsely. “I thought Mistress Weather-wax was going to do something…”
“She did,” said Magrat, shivering. “Oh, she did.”
Granny Weatherwax sat down on the other end of the bench and pinched the bridge of her nose.
“I just want to go home now,” she said. “I just want to go home and sleep for a week.” She yawned. “I’m dyin’ for a cuppa.”
“I thought you’d made one!” said Agnes. “You had us slavering for it!”
“Where’d I get tea here? It was just some mud in water. But I know Nanny keeps a bag of it somewhere on her person.” She yawned again. “Make the tea, Magrat.”
Agnes opened her mouth, but Magrat waved her into silence and then handed her the baby.
“Certainly, Granny,” she said, gently pushing Agnes back into her seat. “I’ll just find out where Igor keeps the kettle, shall I?”