I Shall Wear Midnight

and talk to your mum before she goes upstairs. I think she’d like to talk to you now.’ She bent down and whispered in her ear, ‘But don’t tell her too much about what Nanny Ogg said.’
    Letitia looked about to object, saw Tiffany’s expression, thought better of it and intercepted her mother.
    And now, suddenly, Granny Weatherwax was at Tiffany’s side. After a while, as if addressing the air, Granny said, ‘You have a good steading here. Nice people. And I’ll tell you one thing. He is near.’
    Tiffany noticed that the other witches – even Long Tall Short Fat Sally – were now lining up just behind Granny Weatherwax. She was the focus of their stares, and when a lot of witches are staring at you, you can feel it like the sun. ‘Is there something you want to say?’ said Tiffany. ‘There is, isn’t there?’
    It wasn’t often, and in fact now Tiffany came to think of it, it wasn’t ever that she had seen Granny Weatherwax look worried.
    ‘You are certain that you can best the Cunning Man, are you not? I see you don’t wear midnight yet.’
    ‘When I am old , I shall wear midnight,’ said Tiffany. ‘It’s a matter of choice. And Granny, I know why you are here. It is to kill me if I fail, isn’t it?’
    ‘Blast it,’ Granny Weatherwax said. ‘You are a witch, a good witch. But some of us think that it might be best if we insisted on helping you.’
    ‘No,’ said Tiffany. ‘My steading. My mess. My problem.’
    ‘No matter what?’ said Granny.
    ‘Definitely!’
    ‘Well, I commend you for your adherence to your position and wish you … no, not luck, but certainty!’ There was a susurration among the witches and Granny snapped sharply, ‘She has made her decision and that, ladies, is it .’
    ‘No contest,’ said Nanny Ogg with a grin. ‘I very nearly pity him. Kick him in the— Kick him anywhere you can, Tiff!’
    ‘It’s your ground,’ said Mrs Proust. ‘How can a witch do anything but succeed on her own home ground?’
    Granny Weatherwax nodded. ‘If you have let pride get the better of you, then you have already lost, but if you grab pride by the scruff of the neck and ride it like a stallion, then you may have already won. And now I think it’s time for you to prepare, Miss Tiffany Aching. Do you have a plan for the morning?’
    Tiffany looked into the piercing blue eyes. ‘Yes. Not to lose.’
    ‘That’s a good plan.’
    Mrs Proust shook Tiffany with a hand that was prickly with warts and said, ‘By happy accident, my girl, I think I should go and slay a monster myself …’
    29 You had been a sad little white kitten when Tiffany had given her to the old witch. Now she was a queen, far more snobbish than the Duchess. She must have recognized Tiffany because she graciously condescended to blink at her and then look away as if bored. There were never any mice in Granny’s cottage these days; You just stared at them until they realized how worthless they were and slunk away.



Chapter 14
    BURNING THE KING
    T IFFANY KNEW SHE wouldn’t go to sleep that night, and didn’t try. People sat together in little groups, talking, and there was still food and drink on the tables. Possibly because of the drink, the people didn’t actually notice how fast the food and drink were disappearing, but Tiffany was certain she could hear faint noises in the beams high above. Of course, witches were proverbially good at stuffing food into their pockets for later, but probably the Feegles outdid them by sheer numbers.
    Tiffany moved aimlessly from group to group, and when the Duchess finally left to go upstairs, she didn’t follow her. She was quite emphatic to herself that she wasn’t following. She just happened to be going in the same direction. And, when she darted across the stone floor to reach the door of the Duchess’s room, just after it closed behind the woman, she wasn’t doing this in order to eavesdrop. Certainly not.
    She was just in time to hear the beginning of an angry scream, and then Mrs Proust’s voice: ‘Why, Deirdre Parsley! Long time, no
    sequins! Can you still high-kick a man’s top hat off his head?’ And then there was silence. And Tiffany left hurriedly, because the door was very thick and someone would be bound to notice if she stood there any longer with her ear pressed to it.
    So she went back down in time to talk to Long Tall Short Fat Sally and Mrs Happenstance, who she now realized was blind, which was unfortunate but not – for a witch