business with incantations and implements whiffed of wizardry. It was pandering to the things, making them feel important. Demons ought to come when they were called.
But protocol dictated that the host witch had the choice, and Nanny quite liked demons, who were male, or apparently so.
At this point Granny was alternately cajoling and threatening the nether world with two feet of bleached wood. She was impressed at her own daring.
The waters seethed a little, became very still and then, with a sudden movement and a little popping noise, mounded up into a head. Magrat dropped her soap.
It was a good-looking head, maybe a little cruel around the eyes and beaky about the nose-, but nevertheless handsome in a hard kind of way. There was nothing surprising about this; since the demon was only extending an image of itself into this reality, it might as well make a good job of it. It turned slowly, a gleaming black statue in the fitful moonlight.
'Well?'
it said.
'Who're you?' said Granny, bluntly.
The head revolved to face her.
'My name is unpronounceable in your tongue, woman,'
it said.
'I'll be the judge of that,' warned Granny, and added, 'Don't you call me woman.'
'Very well. My name is WxrtHltl-jwlpklz,'
said the demon smugly.
'Where were you when the vowels were handed out? Behind the door?' said Nanny Ogg.
'Well, Mr— Granny hesitated only fractionally – 'WxrtHltl-jwlpklz, I expect you're wondering why we called you here tonight.'
'You're not supposed to say that,' said the demon. ' You're supposed to say—'
'Shut up. We have the sword of Art and the octogram of Protection, I warn you.'
'Please yourself. They look like a washboard and a copper stick to me,'
sneered the demon.
Granny glanced sideways. The corner of the washroom was stacked with kindling wood, with a big heavy sawhorse in front of it. She stared fixedly at the demon and, without looking, brought the stick down hard across the, thick timber.
The dead silence that followed was broken only by the two perfectly-sliced halves of the sawhorse teetering backwards and forwards and folding slowly into the heap of kindling.
The demon's face remained impassive.
'You are allowed three questions,'
it said.
'Is there something strange at large in the kingdom?' said Granny.
It appeared to think about it.
'And no lying,' said Magrat earnestly. 'Otherwise it'll be the scrubbing brush for you.'
'You mean stranger than usual?'
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