Lords and Ladies

stones, and then a shadowy hand moved across them and upturned a ladle, hiding them in steam.
    This can’t be inside the Long Man, he told himself. That’s an earthworks, this is a long tent of skins.
    They can’t both be the same thing.
    He realized he was dripping with sweat.
    Two torches became visible as the steam swirled, their light hardly more than a red tint to the darkness. But they were enough to show a huge sprawled figure lying by another bowl of hot stones.
    It looked up. Antlers moved in the damp, clinging heat.
    “Ah. Mrs. Ogg.”
    The voice was like chocolate.
    “Y’lordship,” said Nanny.
    “I suppose it is too much to expect you to kneel?”
    “Yes indeed, y’honor,” said Nanny, grinning.
    “You know, Mrs. Ogg, you have a way of showing respect to your god that would make the average atheist green with envy,” said the dark figure. It yawned.
    “Thank you, y’grace.”
    “No one even dances for me now. Is that too much to ask?”
    “Just as you say, y’lordship.”
    “You witches don’t believe in me anymore.”
    “Right again, your hornishness.”
    “Ah, little Mrs. Ogg—and how, having got in here, do you possibly think you are going to get out?” said the slumped one.
    “Because I have iron,” said Nanny, her voice suddenly sharp.
    “Of course you have not, little Mrs. Ogg. No iron can enter this realm.”
    “I have the iron that goes everywhere,” said Nanny.
    She took her hand out of her apron pocket, and held up a horseshoe.
    Casanunda heard scuffles around him, as the hidden elves fought to get out of the way. More steam hissed up as a brazier of hot stones was overturned.
    “Take it away!”
    “I’ll take it away when I go,” said Nanny. “Now you listen to me. She’s making trouble again. You’ve got to put a stop to it. Fair’s fair. We’re not having all the Old Trouble again.”
    “Why should I do that?”
    “You want her to be powerful, then?”
    There was a snort.
    “You can’t ever rule again, back in the world,” said Nanny. “There’s too much music. There’s too much iron.”
    “Iron rusts.”
    “Not the iron in the head.”
    The King snorted.
    “Nevertheless…even that…one day…”
    “One day.” Nanny nodded. “Yes. I’ll drink to that. One day. Who knows? One day. Everyone needs ‘one day.’ But it ain’t today. D’you see? So you come on out and balance things up. Otherwise, this is what I’ll do. I’ll get ’em to dig into the Long Man with iron shovels, y’see, and they’ll say, why, it’s just an old earthworks, and pensioned-off wizards and priests with nothin’ better to do will pick over the heaps and write dull old books about burial traditions and suchlike, and that’ll be another iron nail in your coffin. And I’d be a little bit sorry about that, ’cos you know I’ve always had a soft spot for you. But I’ve got kiddies, y’see, and they don’t hide under the stairs because they’re frit of the thunder, and they don’t put milk out for the elves, and they don’t hurry home because of the night, and before we go back to them dark old ways I’ll see you nailed. ”
    The words sliced through the air.
    The horned man stood up. And further up. His antlers touched the roof.
    Casanunda’s mouth dropped open.
    “So you see,” said Nanny, subsiding, “not today. One day, maybe. You just stay down here and sweat it out ’til One Day. But not today.”
    “I…will decide.”
    “Very good. You decide. And I’ll be getting along.”
    The horned man looked down at Casanunda.
    “What are you staring at, dwarf?”
    Nanny Ogg nudged Casanunda.
    “Go on, answer the nice gentleman.”
    Casanunda swallowed.
    “Blimey,” he said, “you don’t half look like your picture.”

    In a narrow little valley a few miles away a party of elves had found a nest of young rabbits which, in conjunction with a nearby antheap, kept them amused for a while.
    Even the meek and blind and voiceless have gods.
    Herne the Hunted, god of the chased, crept through the bushes and wished fervently that gods had gods.
    The elves had their backs to him as they hunkered down to watch closely.
    Herne the Hunted crawled under a clump of bramble, tensed, and sprang.
    He sank his teeth in an elf’s calf until they met, and was flung away as it screamed and turned.
    He dropped and ran.
    That was the problem. He wasn’t built to fight, there was not an ounce of predator in him. Attack and run, that was the only option.
    And