I Shall Wear Midnight

the lads that when I go back I will take them along to see the ballet for themselves.’
    The stick seemed to fly itself for a while as Tiffany stared at nothing, or rather at a mental picture of Feegles in a theatre. She had never been inside one herself, but she had seen pictures and the thought of Feegles among ballerinas was so unthinkable that it was better to just let her mind boggle and then forget about it. She remembered in time that she had a broomstick to land, and brought it down very neatly near the mound.
    To her shock there were guards outside it. Human guards.
    She stared in disbelief. The Baron’s guards never came up onto the downland. Never! It was unheard of! And … she felt the anger rising – one of them was holding a shovel .
    She jumped off the stick so fast that it was left to skim over the turf, scattering Feegles until it fetched up against an obstruction, shaking off the last few Feegles that had managed to hang on.
    ‘You hold onto that shovel, Brian Roberts!’ she screamed at the sergeant of the guard. ‘If you let it cut the turf there will be a reckoning! How dare you! Why are you here? And nobody is to cut anybody into pieces, do you all understand?’
    This last order was to the Feegles, who had surrounded the men with a ring of small, but ever so sharp, swords. A Feegle claymore was so sharp that a human might not know his legs had been cut off until he tried to walk. The guards themselves suddenly had the look of men who knew they were supposed to be big and strong but were now faced with the realization that ‘big’ or ‘strong’ wouldn’t be nearly enough. They’d heard the stories, of course – oh yes, everyone on the Chalk had heard the stories about Tiffany Aching and her little … helpers. But they had only been stories, hadn’t they? Until now. And they were threatening to run up their trousers.
    In a shocked silence, Tiffany looked around, panting for breath. Everyone was watching her now, which was better than everyone fighting, wasn’t it?
    ‘Very well,’ she said like a schoolteacher who is only just satisfied with the naughty class. She added a sniff, which would usually be translated to mean: I’m only just satisfied, mark you. She sniffed again. ‘Very well, then. Is anybody going to tell me what’s going on here?’
    The sergeant actually raised his hand. ‘Can I have a word in private, miss?’ Tiffany was impressed that he had even been able to speak, given that his mind was trying to suddenly make sense of what his eyes were telling him.
    ‘Very well, follow me.’ She spun round suddenly, causing both guards and Feegles to jump. ‘And nobody, and I mean nobody , is to dig up anybody’s home or cut off anybody’s legs while we are gone, is that understood? I said , is that understood?’ There was a mumbled chorus of yeses and oh ayes, but it didn’t include one from the face she was looking down at. Rob Anybody was trembling with rage and crouching ready to spring. ‘Did you hear me, Rob Anybody?’
    He glared at her, eyes ablaze. ‘I will give ye nae promise on that score, miss, hag though you may be! Where is my Jeannie? Where are the others? These scunners hae swords! What were they going to do with them? I will have an answer!’
    ‘Listen to me, Rob,’ Tiffany began, but stopped. Rob Anybody’s face was dripping tears, and he was pulling desperately at his beard as he fought the horrors of his own imagination. They were an inch from a war, Tiffany reckoned.
    ‘Rob Anybody! I am the hag o’ these hills and I put an oath on you not to kill these men until I tell you to! Understand?’
    There was a crash as one of the guards fell over backwards in a faint. Now the girl was talking to the creatures! And about killing them! They weren’t used to this sort of thing. Usually the most exciting thing that happened was that the pigs got into the vegetable garden.
    The Big Man of the Feegles hesitated as his spinning brain digested Tiffany’s order. True, it wasn’t an order to kill anybody right now, but at least it held out the possibility that he might be able to do so very soon, so he could free his head from the terrible pictures in his mind. It was like holding a hungry dog on a leash of cobweb, but at least it bought her time.
    ‘You will see that the mound has not been touched,’ said Tiffany, ‘so whatever may have been intended has not yet been achieved.’ She turned back to the sergeant, who had gone white, and said,