A Hat Full Of Sky (23 page)

The light died. Rob Anybody was still hanging in the threads, but all his hair had come unplaited and stood out from his head in a great red ball. He looked stunned.

“I could just
murrrder
a kebab,” he said.

Tiffany lowered him to the ground, where he swayed slightly; then she put the rest of the shamble in her pocket.

“Thank you, Rob,” she said. “But I want you
to go now. It could get…serious.”

It was, of course, the wrong thing to say.

“I’m no’ leavin’!” he snapped. “I promised Jeannie to keep ye safe! Let’s get on wi’ it!”

There was no arguing. Rob was standing in that half crouch of his, fists bunched, chin out, ready for anything and burning with defiance.

“Thank you,” said Tiffany, and straightened up.

Death is right behind us, she thought. Life ends, and there’s death, waiting. So…it must be close. Very close.

It would be…a door. Yes. An old door, old wood. Dark, too.

She turned. Behind her, there was a black door in the air.

The hinges would creak, she thought.

When she pushed it open, they did.

So-oo…she thought, this isn’t exactly
real
. I’m telling myself a story I can understand, about doors, and I’m fooling myself just enough for it all to work. I just have to keep balanced on that edge for it to go on working, too. That’s as hard as not thinking about a pink rhinoceros. And if Granny Weatherwax can do that, I can too.

Beyond the door, black sand stretched away under a sky of pale stars. There were some
mountains on the distant horizon.

You must help us through
, said the voices of the hiver.

“If you’ll tak’ my advice, you’ll no’ do that,” said Rob Anybody from Tiffany’s ankle. “I dinna trust the scunner one wee bitty!”

“There’s part of me in there. I trust that,” she said. “I did say you don’t have to come, Rob.”

“Oh, aye? An’ I’m tae see ye go through there alone, am I? Ye’ll not find me leavin’ ye now!”

“You’ve got a clan and a wife, Rob!”

“Aye, an’ so I willna dishonor them by lettin’ yer step across Death’s threshold alone,” said Rob Anybody firmly.

So, thought Tiffany as she stared through the doorway,
this
is what we do. We live on the edges. We help those who can’t find the way….

She took a deep breath and stepped across.

Nothing much changed. The sand felt gritty underfoot and crunched when she walked over it, as she expected, but when it was kicked up, it fell back as slowly as thistledown, and she hadn’t expected that. The air wasn’t cold, but it was thin and prickly to breathe.

The door shut softly behind her.

Thank you
, said the voices of the hiver.
What do we do now?

Tiffany looked around her, and up at the stars. They weren’t ones that she recognized.

“You die, I think,” she said.

But there is no “me” to die,
said the voices of the hiver.
There is only us.

Tiffany took a deep breath. This was about words, and she knew about words. “Here is a story to believe,” she said. “Once we were blobs in the sea, and then fishes, and then lizards and rats, and then monkeys, and hundreds of things in between. This hand was once a fin, this hand once had claws! In my human mouth I have the pointy teeth of a wolf and the chisel teeth of a rabbit and the grinding teeth of a cow! Our blood is as salty as the sea we used to live in! When we’re frightened, the hair on our skin stands up, just like it did when we had fur. We
are
history! Everything we’ve ever been on the way to becoming us, we still are. Would you like the rest of the story?”

Tell us
, said the hiver.

“I’m made up of the memories of my parents and grandparents, all my ancestors. They’re in the way I look, in the color of my hair. And I’m made up of everyone I’ve ever met who’s changed the way I think. So who is ‘me’?”

The piece that just told us that story
, said the
hiver.
The piece that’s truly
you.

“Well…yes. But you must have that too. You know you say you’re ‘us’—who is it saying it? Who is saying you’re not you? You’re not different from us. We’re just much, much better at forgetting. And we know when not to listen to the monkey.”

You’ve just puzzled us,
said the hiver.

“The old bit of our brains that wants to be head monkey, and attacks when it’s surprised,” said Tiffany. “It reacts. It doesn’t think. Being human is knowing when not to be the monkey or the lizard or any of the other old echoes. But when
you
take people over, you silence the human part. You listen to the monkey. The monkey doesn’t know what it needs, only what it wants. No, you are not an ‘us. ’You are an ‘I.’”

I, me
, said the hiver.
I.
Who
am I?

“Do you want a name? That helps.”

Yes. A name….

“I’ve always liked Arthur as a name.”

Arthur,
said the hiver.
I like Arthur too. And if I am, I can stop. What happens next?

“The creatures you…took over, didn’t they die?”

Yes
, said the Arthur.
But we—but I didn’t see what happened. They just stopped being here.

Tiffany looked around at the endless sand. She couldn’t see anybody, but there was something out there that suggested movement. It was the occasional change in the light, perhaps, as if she was catching glimpses of something she was not supposed to see.

“I think,” she said, “that you have to cross the desert.”

What’s on the other side?
asked Arthur.

Tiffany hesitated.

“Some people think you go to a better world,” she said. “Some people think you come back to this one in a different body. And some think there’s just nothing. They think you just stop.”

And what do you think?
Arthur asked.

“I think that there are no words to describe it,” said Tiffany.

Is that true?
said Arthur.

“I think that’s why you have to cross the desert,” said Tiffany. “To find out.”

I will look forward to it. Thank you.

“Good-bye…Arthur.”

She felt the hiver fall away. There wasn’t much sign of it—a movement of a few sand grains, a sizzle in the air—but it slid away slowly across the black sand.

“An’ bad cess an’ good riddance tae ye!” Rob
Anybody shouted after it.

“No,” said Tiffany. “Don’t say that.”

“Aye, but it killed folk to stay alive.”

“It didn’t want to. It didn’t know how people work.”

“That was a fine load of o’ blethers ye gave it, at any rate,” said Rob admiringly. “Not even a gonnagle could make up a load o’ blethers like that.”

Tiffany wondered if it had been. Once, when the wandering teachers had come to the village, she had paid half a dozen eggs for a morning’s education on “
***W
ONDERS OF THE
U
NIVERS
!!***
” That was expensive, for education, but it had been thoroughly worth it. The teacher had been a little bit crazy, even for a teacher, but what he’d said had seemed to make absolute sense. One of the most amazing things about the universe, he had said, was that, sooner or later, everything is made of everything else, although it’ll probably take millions and millions of years for this to happen. The other children had giggled or argued, but Tiffany knew that what had once been tiny living creatures was now the chalk of the hills. Everything went around, even stars.

That had been a very good morning, especially since she’d been refunded half an egg for pointing out that
universe
had been spelled wrong.

Was it true? Maybe that didn’t matter. Maybe it just had to be true enough for Arthur.

Her eyes, the inner eyes that opened twice, were beginning to close. She could feel the power draining away. You couldn’t stay in that state for long. You became so aware of the universe that you stopped being aware of you. How clever of humans to have learned how to close their minds. Was there anything so amazing in the universe as boredom?

She sat down, just for a moment, and picked up a handful of the sand. It rose above her hand, twisting like smoke, reflecting the starlight, then settled back as if it had all the time in the world.

She had never felt this tired.

She still heard the inner voices. The hiver had left memories behind, just a few. She could remember when there had been no stars and when there had been no such thing as “yesterday.” She knew what was beyond the sky and beneath the grass. But she couldn’t remember when she had last slept, properly
slept
, in a
bed.
Being unconscious didn’t count. She closed her eyes, and closed her eyes again—

Someone kicked her hard on the foot.

“Dinna gae to sleep!” Rob Anybody shouted. “Not here! Ye canna gae to sleep
here
! Rise an’ shine!”

Still feeling muzzy, Tiffany pushed herself back onto her feet, through gentle swirls of rising dust, and turned to the dark door.

It wasn’t there.

There were her footprints in the sand, but they went only a few feet and, anyway, were slowly disappearing. There was nothing around her but dead desert, forever.

She turned back to look toward the distant mountains, but her view was blocked by a tall figure, all in black, holding a scythe. It hadn’t been there before.

G
OOD AFTERNOON
, said Death.

T
iffany stared up into a black hood. There was a skull in it, but the eye sockets glowed blue.

At least bones had never frightened Tiffany. They were only chalk that had walked around.

“Are you—?” she began, but Rob Anybody gave a yell and leaped straight for the hood.

There was a thud. Death took a step backward and raised a skeletal hand to his cowl. He pulled Rob Anybody out by his hair and held him at arm’s length while the Nac Mac Feegle cursed and kicked.

I
S THIS YOURS
? Death asked Tiffany. The voice was heavy and all around her, like thunder.

“No. Er…he’s his.”

I
WAS NOT EXPECTING A
N
AC
M
AC
F
EEGLE TODAY
, said Death. O
THERWISE
I
WOULD HAVE WORN PROTECTIVE CLOTHING
,
HA HA
.

“They do fight a lot,” Tiffany admitted. “You
are
Death, aren’t you? I know this might sound like a silly question.”

Y
OU ARE NOT AFRAID
?

“Not yet. But, er…which way to the egress, please?”

There was a pause. Then Death said, in a puzzled voice: I
SN’T THAT A FEMALE EAGLE
?

“No,” said Tiffany. “Everyone thinks that. Actually, it’s the way out. The exit.”

Death pointed, with the hand that still held the incandescently angry Rob Anybody.

T
HAT WAY
. Y
OU HAVE TO WALK THE DESERT
.

“All the way to the mountains?”

Y
ES
. B
UT ONLY THE DEAD CAN TAKE THAT WAY
.

“Ye’ve got tae let me go sooner or later, ye big ’natomy!” yelled Rob Anybody. “And then ye’re gonna get sich a kickin’!”

“There was a door here!” said Tiffany.

A
H
,
YES
, said Death. B
UT THERE ARE RULES
. T
HAT WAS A WAY
IN
, YOU SEE
.

“What’s the difference?

A
FAIRLY IMPORTANT ONE
, I’
M SORRY TO SAY
. Y
OU WILL HAVE TO SEE YOURSELVES OUT
. D
O NOT FALL ASLEEP HERE
. S
LEEP HERE NEVER ENDS
.

Death vanished. Rob Anybody dropped to the sand and came up ready to fight, but they were alone.

“Ye’ll have to make a door oout,” he said.

“I don’t know how! Rob, I told you not to come with me. Can’t
you
get out?”

“Aye. Probably. But I’ve got to see ye safe. The kelda put a geas on me. I must save the hag o’ the hills.”

“
Jeannie
told you that?”

“Aye. She was verra
definite
,” said Rob Anybody.

Tiffany slumped down onto the sand again. It fountained up around her.

“I’ll never get out,” she said. How to get in, yes,
that
wasn’t hard….

She looked around. They weren’t obvious, but there were occasional changes in the light, and little puffs of dust.

People she couldn’t see were walking past her. People were crossing the desert. Dead people, going to find out what was beyond the mountains…

I’m eleven, she thought. People will be upset. She thought about the farm, and how her mother and father would react. But there wouldn’t be a body, would there? So people would hope and hope that she’d come back and was just…missing, like old Mrs. Happens in the village, who lit a candle in the window every night for her son who’d been lost at sea thirty years ago.

She wondered if Rob could send a message—but what could she say? “I’m not dead, I’m just stuck”?

“I should have thought of other people,” she said aloud.

“Aye, weel, ye did,” said Rob, sitting down by her foot. “Yon Arthur went off happy, and ye saved other folk fra’ being killed. Ye did what ye had to do.”

Yes, thought Tiffany. That’s what we have to do. And there’s no one to protect you, because
you’re
the one who’s supposed to do that sort of thing.

But her Second Thoughts said: I’m
glad
I did it. I’d do it again. I stopped the hiver killing anyone else, even though we led it right into the Trials. And that thought was followed by a space. There should have been another thought, but she was too tired to have it. It had been important.

“Thank you for coming, Rob,” she said. “But when…you can leave, you must go straight back to Jeannie, understand? And tell her I’m grateful she sent you. Say I wish we’d had a chance to get to know each other better.”

“Oh, aye. I’ve sent the lads back anyway. Hamish is waitin’ for me.”

At which point the door appeared, and opened.

Granny Weatherwax stepped through and beckoned urgently.

“Some people don’t have the sense they were born with! Come on, right now!” she commanded. Behind her the door started to swing shut, but she swung around savagely and rammed her boot against the jamb, shouting, “Oh, no you don’t, you sly devil!”

“But…I thought there were rules!” said Tiffany, getting up and hurrying forward, all tiredness sudden gone. Even a tired body wants to survive.

“Oh? Really?” said Granny. “Did you sign anything? Did you take any kind of oath? No? Then they weren’t
your
rules! Quickly, now! And you, Mr. Anyone!”

Rob Anybody jumped onto her boot just before she pulled it away. The door shut with another click, disappeared, and left them in…dead light, it seemed, a space of gray air.

“Won’t take long,” said Granny Weatherwax. “It doesn’t usually. It’s the world getting back into line. Oh, don’t look like that. You showed it the Way, right? Out of pity. Well, I know this path already. You’ll tread it again, no doubt, for some
other poor soul, open the door for them as can’t find it. But we don’t talk about it, understand?”

“Miss Level never—”

“We don’t talk about it, I said,” said Granny Weatherwax. “Do you know what a part of being a witch is? It’s making the choices that have to be made. The hard choices. But you did…quite well. There’s no shame in pity.”

She brushed some grass seed off her dress.

“I hope Mrs. Ogg has arrived,” she said. “I need her recipe for apple chutney. Oh…when we arrive you might feel a bit dizzy. I’d better warn you.”

“Granny?” said Tiffany, as the light began to grow brighter. It brought tiredness back with it, too.

“Yes?”

“What
exactly
happened just then?”

“What do you think happened?”

Light burst in upon them.

Someone was wiping Tiffany’s forehead with a damp cloth.

She lay, feeling the beautiful coolness. There were voices around her, and she recognized the chronic-complainer tones of Annagramma:

“…And she was really making a fuss in
Zakzak’s. Honestly, I don’t think she’s quite right in the head! I think she’s literally gone cuckoo! She was shouting things and using some kind of, oh, I don’t know, some peasant trick to make us think she’d turned that fool Brian into a frog. Well, of course, she didn’t fool
me
for one minute—”

Tiffany opened her eyes and saw the round pink face of Petulia, screwed up with concern.

“Um, she’s awake!” said the girl.

The space between Tiffany and the ceiling filled up with pointy hats. They drew back, reluctantly, as she sat up. From above, it must have looked like a dark daisy, closing and opening.

“Where is this?” she said.

“Um, the First Aid and Lost Children’s Tent,” said Petulia. “Um…you fainted when Mistress Weatherwax brought you back from…from wherever you’d gone.
Everyone’s
been in to see you!”

“She said you’d, like,
dragged
the monster into, like, the Next World!” said Lucy Warbeck, her eyes gleaming. “Mistress Weatherwax told everyone all about it!”

“Well, it wasn’t quite—” Tiffany began. She felt something prod her in the back. She reached
behind her, and her hand came out holding a pointy hat. It was almost gray with age and quite battered. Zakzak wouldn’t have dared try to sell something like this, but the other girls stared at it like starving dogs watching a butcher’s hand.

“Um, Mistress Weatherwax gave you her
hat
,” breathed Petulia. “Her actual
hat
.”

“She said you were a born witch and no witch should be without a hat!” said Dimity Hubbub, watching.

“That’s nice,” said Tiffany. She was used to secondhand clothes.

“It’s only an old hat,” said Annagramma.

Tiffany looked up at the tall girl and let herself smile slowly.

“Annagramma?” she said, raising a hand with the fingers open.

Annagramma backed away. “Oh no,” she said. “Don’t you do that!
Don’t
you do that! Someone stop her doing that!”

“Do you want a
balloon
, Annagramma?” said Tiffany, sliding off the table.

“No! Please!” Annagramma took another step back, holding her arms in front of her face, and fell over a bench. Tiffany picked her up and patted her cheerfully on a cheek.

“Then I shan’t buy you one,” she said. “But
please
learn what
literally
really means, will you?”

Annagramma smiled in a frozen kind of way. “Er, yes,” she managed.

“Good. And then we will be friends.”

She left the girl standing there and went back to pick up the hat.

“Um, you’re probably still a bit woozy,” said Petulia. “You probably don’t understand.”

“Ha, I wasn’t
actually
frightened, you know,” said Annagramma. “It was all for fun, of course.” No one paid any attention.

“Understand what?” said Tiffany.

“It’s her actual
hat
!” the girls chorused.

“It’s like, if that hat could talk, what stories it would have to, you know, tell,” said Lucy Warbeck.

“It was just a joke,” said Annagramma to anyone who was listening.

Tiffany looked at the hat. It was very battered, and not extremely clean. If that hat could talk, it would probably mutter.

“Where’s Granny Weatherwax now?” she said.

There was a gasp from the girls. This was nearly as impressive as the hat.

“Um…she doesn’t mind you calling her that?” said Petulia.

“She invited me to,” said Tiffany.

“Only we heard you had to have known her
for, like, a hundred years before she let you call her that…” said Lucy Warbeck.

Tiffany shrugged. “Well, anyway,” she said, “do you know where she is?”

“Oh, having tea with the other old witches and yacking on about chutney and how witches today aren’t what they were when she was a girl,” said Lulu Darling.

“What?” said Tiffany. “Just having
tea
?”

The young witches looked at one another in puzzlement.

“Um, there’s buns too,” said Petulia. “If that’s important.”

“But she opened the door for me. The door into—out of the…the desert! You can’t just sit down after that and have
buns
!”

“Um, the ones I saw had icing on them,” Petulia ventured nervously. “They weren’t just homemade—”

“Look,” said Lucy Warbeck, “we didn’t really, you know,
see
anything? You were just standing there with this like
glow
around you and we couldn’t get in and then Gran—Mistress Weatherwax walked up and stepped right in and you both, you know,
stood
there? And then the glow went
zip
and vanished and you, like, fell over.”

“What Lucy’s failing to say very accurately,” said Annagramma, “is that we didn’t actually see you go anywhere. I’m telling you this as a friend, of course. There was just this glow, which could have been
anything
.”

Annagramma was going to be a good witch, Tiffany considered. She could tell herself stories that she literally believed. And she could bounce back like a ball.

“Don’t forget, I saw the horse,” said Harrieta Bilk.

Annagramma rolled her eyes. “Oh yes, Harrieta thinks she saw some kind of horse in the sky. Except it didn’t look like a horse, she says. She says it looked like a horse would look if you took the actual horse away and just left the horsiness, right, Harrieta?”

“I didn’t say that!” snapped Harrieta.

“Well, pardon
me
. That’s what it sounded like.”

“Um, and some people said they saw a white horse grazing in the next field, too,” said Petulia. “And a lot of the older witches said they felt a tremendous amount of—”

“Yes, some people thought they saw a horse in a field, but it isn’t there anymore,” said Annagramma in the singsong voice she used when she thought it was all stupid. “That must be very
rare in the country, seeing horses in fields. Anyway, if there really
was
a white horse, it was gray.”

Tiffany sat on the edge of the table, staring at her knees. Anger at Annagramma had jolted her to life, but now the tiredness was creeping back again.

“I suppose none of you saw a little blue man, about six inches high, with red hair?” she said quietly.

“Anyone?” said Annagramma with malicious cheerfulness. There was a general mumbling of “no.”

“Sorry, Tiffany,” said Lucy.

“Don’t worry,” said Annagramma. “He probably just rode away on his white horse!”

This is going to be like Fairyland all over again, thought Tiffany. Even I can’t remember if it was real. Why should anyone believe me? But she had to try.