The Wee Free Men

“An’ stop snivelin’ and come awa’ wi’ us and stop bein’ a burden to your wee sister!”
    Tiffany opened her mouth to protest—and shut it again when Wentworth, after a moment of shock, chuckled.
    “Funny!” he said. “Wee man! Weewee man!”
    “Oh dear,” said Tiffany. “You’ve got him started now.”
    But she was very surprised, nonetheless. Wentworth never showed this much interest in anyone who wasn’t a jelly baby.
    “Rob, we’ve got a real one here,” a pictsie called out. To her horror, Tiffany saw that several of the Nac Mac Feegle were holding up Roland’s unconscious head. He was full length on the ground.
    “Ah, that was the laddie who wuz rude to ye,” said Rob. “An’ he tried to hit Big Yan wi’ a hammer, too. That wasna a clever thing to try. What shall we do with him?”
    The grasses trembled. The light was fading from the sky. The air was growing colder, too.
    “We can’t leave him here!” said Tiffany.
    “Okay, we’ll drag him along,” said Rob Anybody. “Let’s move right noo! ”
    “Wee wee man! Wee wee man!” shouted Wentworth gleefully.
    “He’ll be like this all day, I’m afraid,” said Tiffany. “Sorry.”
    “Run for the door,” said Rob Anybody. “Can ye no’ see the door?”
    Tiffany looked around desperately. The wind was bitter now.
    “See the door!” Rob Anybody commanded. She blinked and spun around.
    “Er…er…” she said. The sense of a world beneath that had come to her when she was frightened of the Queen did not turn up so easily now. She tried to concentrate. The smell of snow…
    It was ridiculous to talk about the smell of snow. It was just pure frozen water. But Tiffany always knew, when she woke up, if it had snowed in the night. Snow had a smell like the taste of tin. Tin did have a taste, although admittedly it tasted like the smell of snow.
    She thought she heard her brain creak with the effort of thinking. If she was in a dream, she had to wake up. But it was no use running. Dreams were full of running. But there was one direction that looked…thin, and white.
    She shut her eyes and thought about snow, crisp and white as fresh bed sheets. She concentrated on the feel of it under her feet. All she had to do was wake up….
    She was standing in snow.
    “Right,” said Rob Anybody.
    “I got out!” said Tiffany.
    “Ach, sometimes the door’s in yer ain heid,” said Rob Anybody. “Noo let’s move!”
    Tiffany felt herself lifted into the air. Nearby, a snoring Roland rose up on dozens of small blue legs as the Feegles got underneath him.
    “Nae stoppin’ until we get right oout o’ here!” said Rob Anybody. “Feegles wha hae!”
    They skimmed over the snow, with parties of Feegles running on ahead. After a minute or two Tiffany looked behind them and saw the blue shadows spreading. They were getting darker, too.
    “Rob—” she said.
    “Aye, I ken,” said Rob. “Run, lads!”
    “They’re moving fast , Rob!”
    “I ken that, too!”
    Snow stung Tiffany’s face. Trees blurred with the speed. The forest sped past. But the shadows were spreading across the path ahead, and every time the party ran through them, they seemed to have a certain solidity, like fog.
    Now the shadows behind were night black in the middle.
    But the pictsies has passed the last tree, and the snowfields stretched ahead.
    They stopped, so quickly that Tiffany almost toppled into the snow.
    “What’s happened?”
    “Where’s all oour old footprints gone?” said Daft Wullie. “They wuz there a moment ago! Which way noo ?”
    The trampled track, which had led them on like a line, had vanished.
    Rob Anybody spun around and looked back at the forest. Darkness curled above it like smoke, spreading along the horizon.
    “She’s sendin’ nightmares after us,” he growled. “This is gonna be a toughie, lads.”
    Tiffany saw shapes in the spreading night. She hugged Wentworth tightly.
    “Nightmares,” repeated Rob Anybody, turning to her. “Ye wouldna want to know about them . We’ll hold ’em off. Ye must mak’ a run for it. Get awa’ wi’ ye, noo!”
    “I’ve got nowhere to run to!” said Tiffany.
    She heard a high-pitched noise, a sort of chittering, insect noise, coming from the forest. The pictsies had drawn together. Usually they grinned like anything if they thought a fight was coming up, but this time they looked deadly serious.
    “Ach, she’s a bad loser, the Quin,” said Rob.
    Tiffany turned to look at the