Hogfather (34 page)

“What’s dis about no more Hogfather?” said Banjo.

Teatime pointed to Susan.

“You grab her, Banjo. It’s all her fault!”

Banjo lumbered a few steps in Susan’s direction, and then stopped.

“Our mam said no hittin’ girls,” he rumbled. “No pullin’ dere hair…”

Teatime rolled his one good eye. Around his feet the grayness seemed to be boiling in the stone, following his feet as they moved. And it was around Banjo, too.

Searching, Susan thought. It’s looking for a way in.

“I think I know you, Teatime,” she said, as sweetly as she could for Banjo’s sake. “You’re the mad kid they’re all scared of, right?”

“Banjo?” snapped Teatime. “I said grab her—”

“Our mam said—”

“The giggling excitable one even the bullies never touched because if they did he went insane and kicked and bit,” said Susan. “The kid who didn’t know the difference between chucking a stone at a cat and setting it on fire.”

To her delight he glared at her.

“Shut up,” he said.

“I
bet
no one wanted to
play
with you,” said Susan. “Not the kid with no friends. Kids know about a mind like yours even if they don’t know the right words for it—”

“I
said
shut up!
Get
her, Banjo!”

That was it. She could hear it in Teatime’s voice. There was a touch of vibrato that hadn’t been there before.

“The kind of little boy,” she said, watching his face, “who looks up dolls’ dresses…”

“I
didn’t
!”

Banjo looked worried.

“Our mam said—”

“Oh, to blazes with your mam!” snapped Teatime.

There was a whisper of steel as Medium Dave drew his sword.

“What’d you say about our mam?” he whispered.

Now he’s having to concentrate on three people, Susan thought.

“I bet
no one
ever played with you,” she said. “I bet there were things people had to hush up, eh?”

“Banjo! You do what I tell you!” Teatime screamed.

The monstrous man was beside her now. She could see his face twisted in an agony of indecision. His enormous fists clenched and unclenched and his lips moved as some kind of horrible debate raged in his head.

“Our…our mam…our mam said…”

The gray marks flowed across the floor and formed a pool of shadow which grew darker and higher with astonishing speed. It towered over the three men, and grew a shape.

“
Have you been a bad boy, you little perisher
?”

The huge woman towered over all three men. In one meaty hand it was holding a bundle of birch twigs as thick as a man’s arm.

The thing growled.

Medium Dave looked up into the enormous face of Ma Lilywhite. Every pore was a pothole. Every brown tooth was a tombstone.

“You been letting him get into trouble, our Davey? You have, ain’t you?”

He backed away. “No, Mum…no, Mum…”

“
You need a good hiding, Banjo? You been playing with girls again
?”

Banjo sagged on to his knees, tears of misery rolling down his face.

“Sorry Mum sorry sorry Mum noooohhh Mum sorry Mum sorry sorry—”

Then the figure turned to Medium Dave again.

The sword dropped out of his hand. His face seemed to melt.

Medium Dave started to cry.

“No Mum no Mum no Mum nooooh Mum—”

He gave a gurgle and collapsed, clutching his chest. And vanished.

Teatime started to laugh.

Susan tapped him on the shoulder and, as he looked round, hit him as hard as she could across the face.

That was the plan, at least. His hand moved faster and caught her wrist. It was like striking an iron bar.

“Oh,
no
,” he said. “I don’t
think
so.”

Out of the corner of her eye Susan saw Banjo crawling across the floor to where his brother had been. Ma Lilywhite had vanished.

“This place gets into your head, doesn’t it?” Teatime said. “It pokes around to find out how to deal with you. Well,
I
’m in touch with my inner child.”

He reached out with his other hand and grabbed her hair, pulling her head down.

Susan screamed.

“And it’s much more fun,” he whispered.

Susan felt his grip lessen. There was a wet thump like a piece of steak hitting a slab and Teatime went past her, on his back.

“No pullin’ girls’ hair,” rumbled Banjo. “That’s
bad
.”

Teatime bounced up like an acrobat and steadied himself on the railing of the stairwell.

Then he drew the sword.

The blade was invisible in the bright light of the tower.

“It’s true what the stories say, then,” he said. “So thin you can’t see it. I’m going to have such
fun
with it.” He waved it at them. “So light.”

“You wouldn’t
dare
use it. My grandfather will come after you,” said Susan, walking toward him.

She saw one eye twitch.

“He comes after everyone. But I’ll be ready for him,” said Teatime.

“He’s very single-minded,” said Susan, closer now.

“Ah, a man after my own heart.”

“Could be, Mister
Tea
time.”

He brought the sword around. She didn’t even have time to duck.

And she didn’t even try to when he swung the sword back again.

“It doesn’t work here,” she said, as he stared at it in astonishment. “The blade doesn’t
exist
here. There’s no
Death
here!”

She slapped him across the face.

“Hi!” she said brightly. “I’m the inner baby-sitter!”

She didn’t punch. She just thrust out an arm, palm first, catching him under the chin and lifting him backward over the rail.

He somersaulted. She never knew how. He somehow managed to gain purchase on clear air.

His free arm grabbed at hers, her feet came off the ground, and she was over the rail. She caught it with her other hand—although later she wondered if the rail hadn’t managed to catch her instead.

Teatime swung from her arm, staring upward with a thoughtful expression. She saw him grip the sword hilt in his teeth and reach down to his belt—

The question “Is this person mad enough to try to kill someone holding him?” was asked and answered very, very fast…She kicked down and hit him on the ear.

The cloth of her sleeve began to tear. Teatime tried to get another grip. She kicked again and the dress ripped. For an instant he held onto nothing and then, still wearing the expression of someone trying to solve a complex problem, he fell away, spinning, getting smaller…

He hit the pile of teeth, sending them splashing across the marble. He jerked for a moment…

And vanished.

A hand like a bunch of bananas pulled Susan back over the rail.

“You can get into trouble, hittin’ girls,” said Banjo. “No playin’ with girls.”

There was a click behind them.

The doors had swung open. Cold white mist rolled out across the floor.

“Our mam—” said Banjo, trying to work things out. “Our mam was here—”

“Yes,” said Susan.

“But it
weren’t
our mam, ’cos they
buried
our mam—”

“Yes.”

“We watched ’em fill in the grave and everything.”

“Yes,” said Susan, and added to herself,
I bet you did
.

“And where’s our Davey gone?”

“Er…somewhere else, Banjo.”

“Somewhere nice?” said the huge man hesitantly.

Susan grasped with relief the opportunity to tell the truth, or at least not definitely lie.

“It could be,” she said.

“Better’n here?”

“You never know. Some people would say the odds are in favor.”

Banjo turned his pink piggy eyes on her. For a moment a thirty-five-year-old man looked out through the pink clouds of a five-year-old face.

“That’s good,” he said. “He’ll be able to see our mam again.”

This much conversation seemed to exhaust him. He sagged.

“I wanna go home,” he said.

She stared at his big, stained face, shrugged hopelessly, pulled a handkerchief out of her pocket and held it up to his mouth.

“Spit,” she commanded. He obeyed.

She dabbed the handkerchief over the worst parts and then tucked it into his hand.

“Have a good blow,” she suggested, and then carefully leaned out of range until the echoes of the blast had died away.

“You can keep the hanky. Please,” she added, meaning it wholeheartedly. “Now tuck your shirt in.”

“Yes, miss.”

“Now, go downstairs and sweep all the teeth out of the circle. Can you do that?”

Banjo nodded.

“What can you do?” Susan prompted.

Banjo concentrated. “Sweep all the teeth out of the circle, miss.”

“Good. Off you go.”

Susan watched him plod off, and then looked at the white doorway. She was
sure
the wizard had only got as far as the sixth lock.

The room beyond the door was entirely white, and the mist that swirled at knee level deadened even the sound of her footsteps.

All there was was a bed. It was a large four-poster, old and dusty.

She thought it was unoccupied and then she saw the figure, lying among the mounds of pillows. It looked very much like a frail old lady in a mobcap.

The old woman turned her head and smiled at Susan.

“Hello, my dear.”

Susan couldn’t remember a grandmother. Her father’s mother had died when she was young, and the other side of the family…well, she’d never had a grandmother. But this was the sort she’d have wanted.

The kind, the nasty realistic side of her mind said, that hardly ever existed.

Susan thought she heard a child laugh. And another one. Somewhere almost out of hearing, children were at play. It was always a pleasant, lulling sound.

Always provided, of course, you couldn’t hear the actual words.

“No,” said Susan.

“Sorry, dear?” said the old lady.

“You’re not the Tooth Fairy.” Oh, no…there was even a damn patchwork quilt…

“Oh, I
am
, dear.”

“Oh, Grandma, what big teeth you have…Good grief, you’ve even got a shawl, oh dear.”

“I don’t understand, lovey—”

“You forgot the rocking chair,” said Susan. “I always thought there’d be a rocking chair…”

There was a pop behind her, and then a dying creak-creak. She didn’t even turn round.

“If you’ve included a kitten playing with a ball of wool it’ll go very hard with you,” she said sternly, and picked up the candlestick by the bed. It seemed heavy enough.

“I don’t think you’re real,” she said levelly. “There’s not a little old woman in a shawl running this place. You’re out of my head. That’s how you defend yourself…You poke around in people’s heads and find the things that work—”

She swung the candlestick. It passed through the figure in the bed.

“See?” she said. “You’re not even
real
.”

“Oh,
I
am real, dear,” said the old woman, as her outline changed. “The candlestick wasn’t.”

Susan looked down at the new shape.

“Nope,” she said. “It’s horrible, but it doesn’t frighten me. No, nor does that.” It changed again, and again. “No, nor does my father. Good grief, you’re scraping the bottom of the barrel, aren’t you? I
like
spiders. Snakes don’t worry me. Dogs? No. Rats are fine, I like rats. Sorry, is
anyone
frightened of
that
?”

She grabbed at the thing and this time the shape stayed. It looked like a small, wizened monkey, but with big deep eyes under a brow overhanging like a balcony. Its hair was gray and lank. It struggled weakly in her grasp, and wheezed.

“I don’t frighten easily,” said Susan, “but you’d be amazed at how angry I can become.”

The creature hung limp.

“I…I…” it muttered.

She let it down again.

“You’re a bogeyman, aren’t you?” she said.

It collapsed in a heap when she took her hand way.

“…Not
a…The
…” it said.

“What do you mean,
the
?” said Susan.

“
The
bogeyman,” said the bogeyman. And she saw how rangy it was, how white and gray streaked its hair, how the skin was stretched over the bones…

“The
first
bogeyman?”

“I…there were…I do remember when the land was different. Ice. Many times of…ice. And the…what do you call them?” The creature wheezed. “…The lands, the big lands…all different…”

Susan sat down on the bed.

“You mean continents?”

“…all different.” The black sunken eyes glinted at her and suddenly the thing reared up, bony arms waving. “I was the dark in the cave! I was the shadow in the trees! You’ve heard about…the primal scream? That was…at
me
! I was…” It folded up and started coughing. “And when…that thing, you know, that thing…all light and bright…lightning you could carry, hot, little sunshine, and then there was no more dark, just shadows, and then you made axes, axes in the forest, and then…and then…”

Susan sat down on the bed. “There’s still plenty of bogeymen,” she said.

“Hiding under beds! Lurking in cupboards! But,” it fought for breath, “if you had seen me…in the old days…when they came down into the deep caves to draw their hunting pictures…I could roar in their heads…so that their stomachs dropped out of their bottoms…”

“All the old skills are dying out,” said Susan gravely.

“…Oh, others came later…They never knew that first fine terror. All they knew,” even whispering, the bogeyman managed to get a sneer in its voice, “was dark corners. I had
been
the dark! I was the…first! And now I was no better than them…frightening maids, curdling cream…hiding in shadows at the stub of the year…and then one night, I thought…why?”

Susan nodded. Bogeymen weren’t bright. The moment of existential uncertainty probably took a lot longer in heads where the brain cells bounced so very slowly from one side of the skull to the other. But…Granddad had thought like that. You hung around with humans long enough and you stopped being what they imagined you to be and wanted to become something of your own. Umbrellas and silver hairbrushes…