A Hat Full Of Sky

far. “Please! He’s not really a wizard! He just did evening classes there in fretwork! They hire out classrooms, that sort of thing. He thinks I don’t know! But he read a few of the magic books on the quiet and he pinched the robes and he can talk wizard lingo so’s you’d hardly know the difference! Please! I’d never get a real wizard for the money I pay him! Don’t hurt him, please !”
    Tiffany waved a hand. There was a moment even more unpleasant than the one that had ended up with the spare Brian bumping against the ceiling, and then the whole Brian stood there, blinking.
    “Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!” gasped Zakzak.
    Brian blinked. “What just happened?” he asked.
    Zakzak, beside himself with horror and relief, patted him frantically.
    “You’re all there?” he said. “You’re not a balloon?”
    “Here, get off!” said Brian, pushing him away.
    There was a groan from Annagramma. She opened her eyes, saw Tiffany, and tried to scramble to her feet and back away, which meant that she went backward like a spider.
    “Please don’t do that to me! Please don’t!” she shouted.
    Tiffany ran after her and pulled her to her feet.
    “I wouldn’t do anything to you , Annagramma,” she said happily. “You’re my friend! We’re all friends! Isn’t that nice please please stop me…”

    You had to remember that pictsies weren’t brownies. In theory brownies would do the housework for you if you left them a saucer of milk.
    The Nac Mac Feegle…wouldn’t.
    Oh, they’d try, if they liked you and you didn’t insult them with milk in the saucer. They were helpful. They just weren’t good at it. For example, you shouldn’t try to remove a stubborn stain from a plate by repeatedly hitting it with your head.
    And you didn’t want to see a sink full of them and your best china. Or a precious pot rolling backward and forward across the floor while the Feegles inside simultaneously fought the ground-in dirt and each other.
    But Miss Level, once she’d got the better china out of the way, found she rather liked the Feegles. There was something unsquashable about them. And they were entirely unamazed by a woman with two bodies too.
    “Ach, that’s nothin’,” Rob Anybody had said. “When we wuz raidin’ for the Quin, we once found a world where there wuz people wi’ five bodies each. All sizes, ye ken, for doin’ a’ kinds of jobs.”
    “Really?” said both of Miss Level.
    “Aye, and the biggest body had a huge left hand, just for openin’ pickle jars.”
    “Those lids can get very tight, it’s true,” Miss Level had agreed.
    “Oh, we saw some muckle eldritch places when we wuz raiding for the Quin,” said Rob Anybody. “But we gave that up, for she wuz a schemin’, greedy, ill-fared carlin, that she was!”
    “Aye, and it wuz no’ because she threw us oout o’ Fairyland for being completely pished at two in the afternoon, whatever any scunner might mphf mphf…” said Daft Wullie.
    “Pished?” said Miss Level.
    “Aye…oh, aye, it means…tired. Aye. Tired. That’s whut it means,” said Rob Anybody, holding his hands firmly over his brother’s mouth. “An’ ye dinna ken how to talk in front o’ a lady, yah shammerin’ wee scunner!”
    “Er…thank you for doing the dishes,” said Miss Level. “You really didn’t need to…”
    “Ach, it wasna any trouble,” said Rob Anybody cheerfully, letting Daft Wullie go. “An’ I’m sure all them plates an’ stuff will mend fine wi’ a bit o’ glue.”
    Miss Level looked up at the clock with no hands.
    “It’s getting late,” she said. “What exactly is it you propose to do, Mr. Anybody?”
    “Whut?”
    “Do you have a plan?”
    “Oh, aye!”
    Rob Anybody rummaged around in his spog, which is a leather bag most Feegles have hanging from their belt. The contents are usually a mystery but sometimes include interesting teeth.
    He flourished a much-folded piece of paper.
    Miss Level carefully unfolded it.
    “‘PLN’?” she said.
    “Aye,” said Rob proudly. “We came prepared! Look, it’s written doon . Pee El Ner. Plan.”
    “Er…how can I put this…” Miss Level mused. “Ah, yes. You came rushing all this way to save Tiffany from a creature that can’t be seen, touched, smelled, or killed. What did you intend to do when you found it?”
    Rob Anybody scratched his head, to a general shower of objects.
    “I think mebbe you’ve put yer finger on the one weak spot, mistress,” he