The Wee Free Men

to look after them?
    She took a deep breath.
    “My mother’s in the house crying,” she said, “and…” I don’t know how to comfort her, she added to herself. I’m no good at this sort of thing, I never know what I should be saying. Out loud she said: “And she wants him back. Er. A lot.” She added, hating to say it, “He’s her favorite.”
    She pointed to the helmet twiddler, who backed away.
    “First of all,” she said, “I can’t keep thinking of you as the helmet twiddler, so what is your name?”
    A gasp went up from the Nac Mac Feegle, and Tiffany heard one of them murmur, “Aye, she’s the hag, sure enough. That’s a hag’s question!”
    The helmet twiddler looked around at them as if seeking help.
    “We dinna give oour names,” he muttered. But another Feegle, somewhere safe at the back said, “Wheest! You canna refuse a hag!”
    The little man looked up, very worried.
    “I’m the Big Man o’ the clan, mistress,” he said. “An’ my name it is…” He swallowed. “Rob Anybody Feegle, mistress. But I beg ye not to use it agin me!”
    The toad was ready for this.
    “They think names have magic in them,” he murmured. “They don’t tell them to people in case they are written down.”
    “Aye, an’ put upon comp-li-cated documents,” said a Feegle.
    “An’ summonses and such things,” said another.
    “Or ‘Wanted’ posters!” said another.
    “Aye, an’ bills an’ affidavits,” said another.
    “Writs of distrainment, even!” The Feegles looked around in panic at the very thought of written-down things.
    “They think written words are even more powerful,” whispered the toad. “They think all writing is magic. Words worry them. See their swords? They glow blue in the presence of lawyers.”
    “All right ,” said Tiffany. “We’re getting somewhere. I promise not to write his name down. Now tell me about this Queen who’s taken Wentworth. Queen of what?”
    “Canna say it aloud, mistress,” said Rob Anybody. “She hears her name wherever it’s said, and she comes callin’.”
    “Actually, that’s true,” said the toad. “You do not want to meet her, ever.”
    “She’s bad?”
    “Worse. Just call her the Queen.”
    “Aye, the Quin,” said Rob Anybody. He looked at Tiffany with bright, worried eyes. “Ye dinna ken o’ the Quin? An’ you the wean o’ Granny Aching, who had these hills in her bones? Ye dinna ken the ways? She did not show ye the ways? Ye’re no’ a hag? How can this be? Ye slammered Jenny Green-Teeth and stared the Heidless Horseman in the eyes he hasna got, and you dinna ken?”
    Tiffany gave him a brittle smile and then whispered to the toad, “Who’s Ken? And what about his dinner? And what’s a wean of Granny Aching?”
    “As far as I can make out,” said the toad, “they’re amazed that you don’t know about the Queen and…er, the magical ways, what with you being a child of Granny Aching and standing up to the monsters. Ken means ‘know.’”
    “And his dinner?”
    “Forget about his dinner for now,” said the toad. “They thought Granny Aching told you her magic. Hold me up to your ear, will you?” Tiffany did so, and the toad whispered, “Best not to disappoint them, eh?”
    She swallowed. “But she never told me about any magic—” she began. And stopped. It was true. Granny Aching hadn’t told her about any magic. But she showed people magic every day.

    There was the time when the Baron’s champion hound was caught killing sheep. It was a hunting dog, after all, but it had got out onto the downs and, because sheep run, it had chased….
    The Baron knew the penalty for sheep worrying. There were laws on the Chalk, so old that no one remembered who made them, and everyone knew this one: Sheep-killing dogs were killed.
    But this dog was worth five hundred gold dollars, and so—the story went—the Baron sent his servant up onto the downs to Granny’s hut on wheels. She was sitting on the step, smoking her pipe and watching the flocks.
    The man rode up on his horse and didn’t bother to dismount. That was not a good thing to do if you wanted Granny Aching to be your friend. Iron-shod hooves cut the turf. She didn’t like that.
    He said: “The Baron commands that you find a way to save his dog, Mistress Aching. In return, he will give you a hundred silver dollars.”
    Granny had smiled at the horizon, puffed at her pipe for a while, and replied: “A man who takes arms against his lord,