Thief of Time

shoulders.
    “Mrs. Ogg? You are married now?”
    “Yep. Twice,” said Mrs. Ogg, cheerfully. “What can I do for y—”
    “You must come at once. It’s very urgent.”
    “I didn’t know anyone was—”
    “I have come a long way,” said the figure.
    Mrs. Ogg paused. There was something in the way he had pronounced long . And now she could see that the whiteness on the cloak was snow, melting fast. Faint memory stirred.
    “Well, now,” she said, because she’d learned a lot in the last twenty years or so, “that’s as may be, and I’ll always do the best I can, ask anyone. But I wouldn’t say I’m the best. Always learnin’ something new, that’s me.”
    “Oh. In that case, I will call at a more convenient…moment.”
    “Why’ve you got snow on—?”
    But, without ever quite vanishing, the stranger was no longer present…
    Tick
    There was a hammering on the door. Nanny Ogg carefully put down her brandy nightcap, and stared at the wall for a moment. Now a lifetime of edge witchery * had honed senses that most people never really knew they had, and something in her head went “click.”
    On the hob, the kettle for her hot-water bottle was just coming to the boil.
    She laid down her pipe, got up, and opened the door on this springtime midnight.
    “You’ve come a long way, I’m thinking,” she said, showing no surprise at the dark figure.
    “That is true, Mrs. Ogg.”
    “Everyone who knows me calls me Nanny.”
    She looked down at the melting snow dripping off the cloak. It hadn’t snowed up here for a month.
    “And it’s urgent, I expect?” she said, as memory unrolled.
    “Indeed.”
    “And now you got to say ‘you must come at once.’”
    “You must come at once.”
    “Well, now,” she said. “I’d say, yes , I’m a pretty good midwife, though I do say it myself. I’ve seen hundreds into the world. Even trolls, which is no errand for the inexperienced. I know birthing backward and forward and damn near sideways at times. Always been ready to learn something new, though.” She looked down modestly. “I wouldn’t say I’m the best,” she said, “but I can’t think of anyone better, I have to say.”
    “You must leave with me now.”
    “Oh, I must, must I?” said Nanny Ogg.
    “Yes!”
    An edge witch thinks fast, because edges can shift so quickly. And she learns to tell when a mythology is unfolding, and when the best you can do is put yourself in its path and run to keep up.
    “Right-o. I’ll just go and get—”
    “There is no time .”
    “But I can’t just walk right out and—”
    “ Now. ”
    Nanny reached behind the door for her birthing bag, always kept there for just such occasions as this, full of the things she knew she’d want and a few of the things she always prayed she’d never need.
    “Right,” she said.
    She left.
    Tick
    The kettle was just boiling when Nanny walked back into her kitchen. She stared at it for a moment, and then moved it off the fire.
    There was still a drop of brandy left in the glass by her chair. She drained that, then refilled the glass to the brim from the bottle.
    She picked up her pipe. The bowl was still warm. She pulled on it, and the coals crackled.
    Then she took something out of her bag, which was now a good deal emptier and, brandy glass in her hand, sat down to look at it.
    “Well,” she said at last, “that was…very unusual…”
    Tick
    Death watched the image fade. A few flakes of snow that had blown out of the mirror had already melted on the floor, but there was still a whiff of pipe smoke in the air.
    A H YES, I SEE, he said. A BIRTHING, IN STRANGE CIRCUMSTANCES. B UT IS THAT WHAT THE PROBLEM WAS OR WAS THAT WHAT THE SOLUTION WILL BE?
    S QUEAK, said the Death of Rats.
    Q UITE SO, said Death. Y OU MAY VERY WELL BE RIGHT. I DO KNOW THAT THE MIDWIFE WILL NEVER TELL ME.
    The Death of Rats looked surprised.
    S QUEAK?
    Death smiled. D EATH ? A SKING AFTER THE LIFE OF A CHILD? NO. SHE WOULD NOT.
    “’Scuse me,” said the raven, “but how come Miss Ogg became Mrs. Ogg? Sounds a bit of a rural arrangement, if you catch my meaning.”
    W ITCHES ARE MATRILINEAL, said Death. T HEY FIND IT MUCH EASIER TO CHANGE MEN THAN TO CHANGE NAMES.
    He went back to his desk and opened a drawer.
    There was a thick book there, bound in night. On the cover, where a book like this might otherwise say “Our Wedding” or “Acme Photo Album” it said MEMORIES .
    Death turned the heavy pages carefully. Some of the memories