Wintersmith

looking for her, she thought as she fed a piece of ancient cheese to another mouse on her lap. But he won’t find her. She is safe here.
    Then the mouse looked up from the cheese. It had heard something.
    “I told yez! She’s here somewhere, fellas!”
    “I dinna see why we canna just talk tae the ol’ hag. We get along fine wi’ hags.”
    “Mebbe, but this one is a terrrrrible piece o’ work. They say she’s got a fearsome demon in her tattie cellar.”
    Miss Treason looked puzzled. “Them?” she whispered to herself. The voices were coming from beneath the floor. She sent the mouse scurrying across the boards and into a hole.
    “I dinna want to disappoint ye, but we’s in a cellar right here, and it’s full o’ tatties.”
    After a while a voice said: “So where izzit?”
    “Mebbe it’s got the day off?”
    “What’s a demon need a day off for?”
    “Tae gae an’ see its ol’ mam an’ dad, mebbe?”
    “Oh, aye? Demons have mams, do they?”
    “Crivens! Will ye lot stop arguin’! She might hear us!”
    “Nae, she’s blind as a bat and deaf as a post, they say.”
    Mice have very good hearing. Miss Treason smiled as the hurrying mouse came out in the rough old stone wall of the cellar, near the floor.
    She looked through its eyes. It could see quite well in the gloom, too.
    A small group of little men was creeping across the floor. Their skins were blue and covered with tattoos and dirt. They all wore very grubby kilts, and each one had a sword, as big as he was, strapped to his back. And they all had red hair, a real orange-red, with scruffy pigtails. One of them wore a rabbit skull as a helmet. It would have been more scary if it hadn’t kept sliding over his eyes.
    In the room above, Miss Treason smiled again. So they’d heard of Miss Treason? But they hadn’t heard enough.
    As the four little men squirmed through an old rat hole to get out of the cellar, they were watched by two more mice, three different beetles, and a moth. They tiptoed carefully across the floor, past an old witch who was clearly asleep—right up until she banged on the arms of her chair and bellowed:
    “ Jings! I see you there, ye wee schemies!”
    The Feegles reacted in instant panic, colliding with one another in shock and awe.
    “I dinna remember tellin’ ye tae move!” shouted Miss Treason, grinning horribly.
    “Oh, waily, waily, waily! She’s got the knowin’ o’ the speakin’!” someone sobbed.
    “Ye’re Nac Mac Feegles, right? But I dinna ken the clan markin’s. Calm doon, I ain’t gonna deep-fry ye. You! What’s your name?”
    “Ah’m Rob Anybody, Big Man o’ the Chalk Hill clan,” said the one with the rabbit-skull helmet. “And—”
    “Aye? Big Man, are ye? Then ye’ll do me the courtesy an’ tak’ off yon bony bonnet ere ye speak tae me!” said Miss Treason, enjoying herself no end. “An’ stannit up straight! I will have nae slouchin’ in this hoose!”
    Instantly all four Feegles stood to rigid attention.
    “Right!” said Miss Treason. “An’ who are the rest o’ yez?”
    “This is my brother Daft Wullie, miss,” said Rob Anybody, shaking the shoulder of the Feegle who was an instant wailer. He was staring in horror at Enochi and Athootita.
    “An’ the other two of you…I mean, twa’ o’ ye?” said Miss Treason. “You, there. I mean ye. Ye have the mousepipes. Are ye a gonnagle?”
    “Aye, mistress,” said a Feegle who looked neater and cleaner than the others, although it had to be said that there were things living under old logs that were cleaner and neater than Daft Wullie.
    “And your name is…?”
    “Awf’ly Wee Billy Bigchin, mistress.”
    “You’re staring hard at me, Awf’ly Wee Billy Bigchin,” said Miss Treason. “Are ye afraid?”
    “No, mistress. I wuz admirin’ ye. It does my heart good tae see a witch so…witchy.”
    “It does, does it?” said Miss Treason suspiciously. “Are ye sure ye’re no’ afraid o’ me, Mr. Billy Bigchin?”
    “No, mistress. But I will be if it makes ye happy,” said Billy carefully.
    “Hah!” said Miss Treason. “Well, I see we have—hae a clever one here. Who is your big friend, Mr. Billy?”
    Billy elbowed Big Yan in the ribs. Despite his size, which for a Feegle was huge, he was looking very nervous. Like a lot of people with big muscles, he got edgy about people who were strong in other ways.
    “He’s Big Yan, mistress,” Billy Bigchin supplied, while Big Yan stared at his