Reaper Man

Miss Flitworth pushed her way through the crowd at the top of the stairs.

‘There’s one in Chambly,’ she said. ‘But there’s a witch over Lancre way.’

NO WITCHES. NO MAGIC. SEND FOR HIM. AND EVERYONE ELSE, GO AWAY.

It wasn’t a suggestion. It wasn’t even a command. It was simply an irrefutable statement.

Miss Flitworth waved her skinny arms at the people.

‘Come on, it’s all over! Shoo! You’re all in my bedroom! Go on, get out!’

‘How’d he do it?’ said someone at the back of the crowd. ‘No-one could have got out of there alive! We saw it all blow up!’

Bill Door turned around slowly.

WE HID, he said, IN THE CELLAR.

‘There! See?’ said Miss Flitworth. ‘In the cellar. Makes sense.’

‘But the inn hasn’t got—’ the doubter began, and stopped. Bill Door was glaring at him.

‘In the cellar,’ he corrected himself. ‘Yeah. Right. Clever.’

‘Very clever,’ said Miss Flitworth. ‘Now get along with the lot of you.’

He heard her shoo them down the stairs and back into the night. The door slammed. He didn’t hear her come back up the stairs with a bowl of cold water and a flannel. Miss Flitworth could walk lightly, too, when she had a mind to.

She came in and shut the door behind her.

‘Her parents’ll want to see her,’ she said. ‘Her mum’s in a faint and Big Henry from the mill knocked her dad out when he tried to run into the flames, but they’ll be here directly.’

She bent down and ran the flannel over the girl’s forehead.

‘Where was she?’

SHE WAS HIDING IN A CUPBOARD.

‘From a fire?’

Bill Door shrugged.

‘I’m amazed you could find anyone in all that heat and smoke,’ she said.

I SUPPOSE YOU WOULD CALL IT A KNACK.

‘And not a mark on her.’

Bill Door ignored the question in her voice.

DID YOU SEND SOMEONE FOR THE APOTHECARY?

‘Yes.’

HE MUST NOT TAKE ANYTHING AWAY.

‘What do you mean?’

STAY HERE WHEN HE COMES. YOU MUST NOT TAKE ANYTHING OUT OF THIS ROOM.

‘That’s silly. Why should he take anything? What would he want to take?’

IT IS VERY IMPORTANT. AND NOW I MUST LEAVE YOU.

‘Where are you going?’

TO THE BARN. THERE ARE THINGS I MUST DO. THERE MAY NOT BE MUCH TIME NOW.

Miss Flitworth stared at the small figure on the bed. She felt far out of her depth, and all she could do was tread water.

‘She just looks as if she’s sleeping,’ she said helplessly. ‘What’s wrong with her?’

Bill Door paused at the top of the stairs.

SHE IS LIVING ON BORROWED TIME, he said.

There was an old forge behind the barn. It hadn’t been used for years. But now red and yellow light spilled out into the yard, pulsing like a heart.

And like a heart, there was a regular thumping. With every crash the light flared blue.

Miss Flitworth sidled through the open doorway. If she was the kind of person who would swear, she would have sworn that she made no noise that could possibly be heard above the crackle of the fire and the hammering, but Bill Door spun around in a half-crouch, holding a curved blade in front of him.

‘It’s me!’

He relaxed, or at least moved into a different level of tension.

‘What the hell are you doing?’

He looked at the blade in his hands as if he was seeing it for the first time.

I THOUGHT I WOULD SHARPEN THIS SCYTHE, MISS FLITWORTH.

‘At one o’clock in the morning?’

He looked at it blankly.

IT’S JUST AS BLUNT AT NIGHT, MISS FLITWORTH.

Then he slammed it down on the anvil.

AND I CAN’T SHARPEN IT ENOUGH!

‘I think perhaps the heat has got to you,’ she said, and reached out and took his arm.

‘Besides, it looks sharp enough to—’ she began, and paused. Her fingers moved on the bone of his arm. They pulled away for a moment, and then closed again.

Bill Door shivered.

Miss Flitworth didn’t hesitate for long. In seventy-five years she had dealt with wars, famine, innumerable sick animals, a couple of epidemics and thousands of tiny, everyday tragedies. A depressed skeleton wasn’t even in the top ten Worst Things she had seen.

‘So it is you,’ she said.

MISS FLITWORTH, I—

‘I always knew you would come one day.’

I THINK PERHAPS THAT—

‘You know, I spent most of my life waiting for a knight on a white charger.’ Miss Flitworth grinned. ‘The joke’s on me, eh?’

Bill Door sat down on the anvil.

‘The apothecary came,’ she said. ‘He said he couldn’t do anything. He said she was fine. We just couldn’t wake her up. And, you know, it took us ages to get her hand open. She had it closed so tightly.’

I SAID NOTHING WAS TO BE TAKEN!

‘It’s all right. It’s all right. We left her holding it.’

GOOD.

‘What was it?’

MY TIME.

‘Sorry?’

MY TIME. THE TIME OF MY LIFE.

‘It looks like an eggtimer for very expensive eggs.’

Bill Door looked surprised. YES. IN A WAY. I HAVE GIVEN HER SOME OF MY TIME.

‘How come you need time?’

EVERY LIVING THING NEEDS TIME. AND WHEN IT RUNS OUT, THEY DIE. WHEN IT RUNS OUT, SHE WILL DIE. AND I WILL DIE, TOO. IN A FEW HOURS.

‘But you can’t—’

I CAN. IT’S HARD TO EXPLAIN.

‘Move up.’

WHAT?

‘I said move up. I want to sit down.’

Bill Door made space on the anvil. Miss Flitworth sat down.

‘So you’re going to die,’ she said.

YES.

‘And you don’t want to.’

NO.

‘Why not?’

He looked at her as if she was mad.