Carpe Jugulum

Agnes's hair snagged in the twigs. She managed to get one boot on a branch while holding on for dear life to the branch above, but that left her other foot standing on the broomstick, which was beginning to drift sideways and causing her to do what even ballerinas can't do without some training.

'Can you see it yet?' Nanny cried, from far too far below.

'I think this is an old nest as well- Oh, no...'

'What's happened?'

'I think my drawers have split...'

'I always go for roomy, myself,' said Nanny.

Agnes got the other leg on to the branch, which creaked.

Lump, said Perdita. I could have climbed this like a gazelle!

'Gazelles don't climb!' said Agnes.

'What's that?' said the voice from below.

'Oh, nothing...'

Agnes inched her way along, and suddenly her vision was full of black and white wings. A magpie landed on a twig a foot from her face and screamed at her. Five others swooped in from the other trees and joined in the chorus.

She didn't like birds, in any case. They were fine when they were flying, and their songs were nice, but close to they were mad little balls of needles with the intelligence of a housefly.

She tried to swat the nearest one, and it fluttered on to a higher branch while she struggled to get her balance back. When the branch stopped rocking she moved further along, gingerly, trying to ignore the enraged birds, and looked at the nest.

It was hard to tell if it was the remains of an old one or the start of a new one, but it did contain a piece of tinsel, a shard of broken glass and, gleaming even under this sullen sky, something white... with a gleaming edge.

'"Five for silver... six for gold..."' she said, half to herself.

'It's "five for heaven, six for hell",' Nanny called up.

'I can just reach it, anyway...'

The bough broke. There were plenty of others below it, but they merely served as points of interest on the way down. The last one flipped Agnes into a holly bush.

Nanny took the invitation from her outflung hand. Rain had made the ink run, but the word 'Weatherwax' was still very readable. She scratched at the gold edging with her thumb.

'Too much gold,' she said. 'Well, that explains the invite. I told you them birds will steal anything that glitters.'

'I'm not hurt at all,' said Agnes pointedly. 'The holly quite cushioned my fall.'

'I'll wring their necks,' said Nanny. The magpies in the trees around the cottage screamed at her.

'I think I may have dislocated my hat, however,' said Agnes, pulling herself to her feet. But it was useless angling for sympathy in a puddle, so she gave up. 'All right, we've found the invitation. It was all a terrible mistake. No one's fault. Now let's find Granny.'

'Not if she don't want to be found,' said Nanny, rubbing the edge of the card thoughtfully.

'You can do Borrowing. Even if she left early, some creatures will have seen. her-'

'I don't Borrow, as a rule,' said Nanny firmly. 'I ain't got Esme's self-discipline. I gets... involved. I was a rabbit for three whole days until our Jason went and fetched Esme and she brought me back. Much longer and there wouldn't have been a me to come back.'

'Rabbits sound dull.'

'They have their ups and downs.'

'All right, then, have a look in the buoy's glass ball,' said Agnes. 'You're good at that, Magrat told me.' Across the clearing a crumbling brick fell out of the cottage's chimney.

'Not here, then,' said Nanny, with some reluctance. 'It's giving me the willies- Oh no, as if we didn't have enough... What's he doing here?'

Mightily Oats was advancing through the wood. He walked awkwardly, as city people do when traversing real, rutted, leaf-mouldy, twig-strewn soft, and had the concerned look of someone who was expecting to be attacked at any moment by owls or beetles.

In his strange black and white clothing he looked like a human magpie himself.

The magpies screamed from the trees.

' "Seven for a secret never to be told,"' said Agnes.

' "Seven's a devil, his own sel',"' said Nanny darkly. 'You've got your rhyme, I've got mine.'

When Oats saw the witches he brightened up very slightly and blew his nose at them.

'What a waste of skin,' muttered Nanny.

'Ah, Mrs Ogg... and Miss Nitt,' said Oats, inching around some mud. 'Er... I trust I find you well?'

'Up till now,' said Nanny.

'I had, er, hoped to see Mrs Weatherwax.'

For a moment the only sound was the chattering of the ravens.

'Hoped?' said Agnes.

'Mrs Weatherwax?' said Nanny.

'Er, yes. It is part of my... I'm supposed to... one of the things we... Well, I heard she might be ill, and visiting the elderly and infirm is part, er, of our pastoral duties... Of course I realize that technically I have no pastoral duties, but still, while I'm here...'

Nanny's face was a picture, possibly one painted by an artist with a very strange sense of humour.

'I'm really sorry she ain't here,' she said, and Agnes knew she was being altogether honest and absolutely nasty.

'Oh dear. I was, er, going to give her some... I was going... er... Is she well, then?'