The Wee Free Men

Wullie’s mouth.

Tiffany opened her mouth, but stopped when her ears tickled strangely.

In the roof of the cave, several bats woke up and hastily flew out of the smoke hole.

Some of the Feegles were busy on the far side of the chamber. What Tiffany had thought was a strange round stone was being rolled aside, revealing a large hole.

Now her ears squelched and felt as though all the wax was running out. The Feegles were forming up in two rows, leading to the hole.

Tiffany prodded the toad. ‘Do I want to know what a pismire is?’ she whispered.

‘It’s an ant,’ said the toad.

‘Oh? I’m… slightly surprised. And this sort of high-pitched noise?’

‘I’m a toad. We’re not good at ears. But it’s probably him over there.’

There was a Feegle walking out of the hole from which came, now that Tiffany’s eyes had become accustomed to the gloom, a faint golden light.

The newcomer’s hair was white instead of red and, while he was tall for a pictsie, he was as skinny as a twig. He was holding some sort of fat skin bag, bristling with pipes.

‘Now there’s a sight I don’t reckon many humans have seen and lived,’ said the toad. ‘He’s playing the mousepipes!’

They make my ears tingle!’ Tiffany tried to ignore the two little ears still on the bag of pipes.

‘High-pitched, see?’ said the toad. ‘Of course, the pictsies hear sounds differently than humans do. He’s probably their battle poet, too.’

‘You mean he makes up heroic songs about famous battles?’

‘No, no. He recites poems that frighten the enemy. Remember how important words are to the Nac Mac Feegle? Well, when a well-trained gonnagle starts to recite, the enemy’s ears explode. Ah, it looks as though they’re ready for you…’

In fact Rob Anybody was tapping politely on Tiffany’s toecap. ‘The kelda will see you now, mistress,’ he said.

The piper had stopped playing and was standing respectfully beside the hole. Tiffany felt hundreds of bright little eyes watching her.

‘Special Sheep Liniment,’ whispered the toad.

‘Pardon?’

‘Take it in with us,’ the toad said insistently. ‘It’d be a good gift!’

The pictsies watched her carefully as she lay down again and crawled through the hole behind the stone, the toad hanging on tightly. As she got closer she realized that what she’d thought was a stone was an old round shield, green-blue and corroded with age. The hole it had covered was indeed wide enough for her to go through, but she had to leave her legs outside because it was impossible to get all of her into the room beyond. One reason was the bed, small though it was, which held the kelda. The other reason was that what the room was mostly full of, piled up around the walls and spilling across the floor, was gold.

Chapter 7 First Sight And Second Thoughts

Glint, glisten, glitter, gleam…

Tiffany thought a lot about words, in the long hours of churning butter. ‘Onomatopoeic’, she’d discovered in the dictionary, meant words that sounded like the noise of the thing they were describing, like ‘cuckoo’. But she thought there should be a word meaning ‘a word that sounds like the noise a thing would make if that thing made a noise even though, actually, it doesn’t, but would if it did’.

Glint, for example. If light made a noise as it reflected off a distant window, it’d go ‘glint!’ And the light of tinsel, all those little glints chiming together, would make a noise like ‘glitterglitter’. ‘Gleam’ was a clean, smooth noise from a surface that intended to shine all day. And ‘glisten’ was the soft, almost greasy sound of something rich and oily.

The little cave contained all of these at once. There was only one candle, which smelled of sheep fat, but gold plates and cups gleamed, glistened, glinted and glittered the light back and forth until the one little flame filled the air with a light that even smelled expensive.

The gold surrounded the bed of the kelda, who was sitting up against a pile of pillows. She was much, much fatter than the male pictsies; she looked as if she’d been made of round balls of slightly squashy dough, and was the colour of chestnuts.

Her eyes were closed as Tiffany slid in, but they flicked open the moment she’d stopped pulling herself forward. They were the sharpest eyes she’d ever seen, much sharper even than Miss Tick’s.

‘So-o… you’ll be Sarah Aching’s wee girl?’ said the kelda.

‘Yes. I mean, aye,’ said Tiffany. It wasn’t very comfortable lying on her stomach. ‘And you’re the kelda?’

‘Aye. I mean, yes,’ said the kelda, and the round face became a mass of lines as the kelda smiled. ‘What was your name, now?’

‘Tiffany, er, Kelda.’ Fion had turned up from some other part of the cave and was sitting down on a stool by the bed, watching Tiffany intently with a disapproving expression.

‘A good name. In our tongue you’d be Tir-far-thoinn, Land Under Wave,’ said the kelda. It sounded like ‘Tiffan’.

‘I don’t think anyone meant to name—’

‘Ach, what people mean to do and what is done are two different things,’ said the kelda. Her little eyes shone. ‘Your wee brother is… safe, child. Ye could say he’s safer where he is noo than he has ever been. No mortal ills can touch him. The Quin would-nae harm a hair o’ his heid. And there’s the evil o’ it. Help me up here, girl.’

Fion leaped up immediately and helped the kelda struggle up higher amongst her cushions.

‘Where wuz I?’ the kelda continued. ‘Ah, the wee laddie. Aye, ye could say he bides well where he is, in the Quin’s own country. But I daresay there’s a mother grievin’?’

‘And his father, too,’ said Tiffany.

‘An’ his wee sister?’ said the kelda.

Tiffany felt the words ‘Yes, of course’ trot automatically onto her tongue. She also knew that it would be very stupid to let them go any further. The little old woman’s dark eyes were seeing right into her head.

‘Aye, you’re a born hag, right enough,’ said the kelda, holding her gaze. ‘Ye’ve got that little bitty bit inside o’ you that holds on, right? The bitty bit that watches the rest o’ ye. ‘Tis the First Sight and Second Thoughts ye have, and ‘tis a wee gift an’ a big curse to ye. You see and hear what others canna’, the world opens up its secrets to ye, but ye ‘re always like the person at the party with the wee drink in the corner who cannae join in. There’s a little bitty bit inside ye that willnae melt and flow. Ye ‘re Sarah Aching’s line, right enough. The lads fetched the right one.’

Tiffany didn’t know what to say to that, so she didn’t say anything. The kelda watched her, eyes twinkling, until Tiffany felt awkward.

‘Why would the Queen take my brother?’ she asked eventually. ‘And why is she after me?’

‘Ye think she is?’

‘Well, yes, actually! I mean, Jenny might have been a coincidence, but the horseman? And the grimhounds? And taking Went worth?’

‘She’s bending her mind to ye,’ said the kelda. ‘When she does, something of her world passes into this one. Mebbe she just wants to test you.’

‘Test me?’

To see how good you are. Ye’re the hag noo, the witch that guards the edges and the gateways. So wuz yer granny, although she wouldnae ever call hersel’ one. And so wuz I until noo, and I’ll pass the duty to ye. She’ll ha’ to get past ye, if she wants this land. Ye have the First Sight and the Second Thoughts, just like yer granny.