A Hat Full Of Sky

she mumbled.
    A hand slapped her sharply across the face. She stared through inner mists at the tall dark figure in front of her. A bucket handle was pressed firmly into her hand.
    “Milk the goats now, Tiffany! Now, Tiffany, d’you hear! The trusting creatures look to you! They wait for you! Tiffany milks the goats. Do it, Tiffany! The hands know how, the mind will remember and grow stronger, Tiffany!”
    She was thrust down into the milking stall and, through the mist in her head, made out the cowering shape of…of…Black Meg.
    The hands remembered. They placed the pail, grasped a teat, and then, as Meg raised a leg to play the foot-in-the-bucket game, grabbed it and forced it safely back down onto the milking platform.
    She worked slowly, her head full of hot fog, letting her hands have their way. Buckets were filled and emptied, milked goats got a bucket of feed from the bin….
    Sensibility Bustle was rather puzzled that his hands were milking a goat. He stopped.
    “What is your name?” said a voice behind him.
    “Bustle. Sensibil—”
    “No! That was the wizard, Tiffany! He was the strongest echo, but you’re not him! Get into the dairy, Tiffany!”
    She stumbled into the cool room under the command of that voice, and the world focused. There was a foul cheese on the slab, sweating and stinking.
    “Who put this here?” she asked.
    “The hiver did, Tiffany. Tried to make a cheese by magic, Tiffany. Hah! And you are not it, Tiffany! You know how to make cheese the right way, don’t you, Tiffany? Indeed you do! What is your name?”
    …all was confusion and strange smells. In panic, she roared —
    Her face was slapped again.
    “No, that was the saber-toothed tiger, Tiffany! They’re all just old memories the hiver left behind, Tiffany! It’s worn a lot of creatures, but they are not you! Come forward, Tiffany!”
    She heard the words without really understanding them. They were just out there somewhere, between people who were just shadows. But it was unthinkable to disobey them.
    “Drat!” said the hazy tall figure, “where’s that little blue feller? Mr. Anyone?”
    “Here, mistress. It’s Rob Anybody, mistress. I beg o’ ye not tae turn me intae somethin’ unnatural, mistress!”
    “You said she had a box of keepsakes. Fetch it down here this minute. I feared this might happen. I hates doin’ it this way!”
    Tiffany was turned around and once again looked into the blurry face while strong hands gripped her arms. Two blue eyes stared into hers. They shone in the mist like sapphires.
    “What’s your name, Tiffany?” said the voice.
    “Tiffany!”
    The eyes bored into her. “Is it? Really? Sing me the first song you ever learned, Tiffany! Now! ”
    “Hzan, hzana, m’taza—”
    “Stop! That was never learned on a chalk hill! You ain’t Tiffany! I reckon you’re that desert queen who killed twelve of her husbands with scorpion sandwiches! Tiffany is the one I’m after! Back into the dark with you!”
    Things went blurry again. She could hear whispered discussions through the fog, and the voice said: “Well, that might work. What’s your name, pictsie?”
    “Awf’ly Wee Billy Bigchin Mac Feegle, mistress.”
    “You’re very small, aren’t you?”
    “Only for my height, mistress.”
    The grip tightened on Tiffany’s arms again. The blue eyes glinted.
    “What does your name mean in the Old Speech of the Nac Mac Feegle, Tiffany? Think…”
    It rose from the depths of her mind, trailing the fog behind it. It came up through the clamoring voices and lifted her beyond the reach of ghostly hands. Ahead, the clouds parted.
    “My name is Land Under Wave,” said Tiffany, and slumped forward.
    “No, no, none of that, we can’t have that,” said the figure holding her. “You’ve slept enough. Good, you know who you are! Now you must be up and doing! You must be Tiffany as hard as you may, and the other voices will leave you alone, depend on it. Although it might be a good idea if you don’t make sandwiches for a while.”
    She did feel better. She’d said her name. The clamoring in her head had calmed down, although it was still a chatter that made it hard to think straight. But now at least she could see clearly. The black-dressed figure holding her wasn’t tall, but she was so good at acting as if she was that it tended to fool most people.
    “Oh…you’re… Mistress Weatherwax ?”
    Mistress Weatherwax pushed her down gently into a chair. From every flat