Carpe Jugulum - Terry Pratchett [111]
“They tried to turn people into things,” she said aloud.
“Sorry, miss?” said Piotr.
“Oh…just thinking aloud.”
And where had she got that other idea, Perdita wondered, the one where she’d told the villagers to send runners out to other towns to report on the night’s work. That was unusually nasty of her.
But she remembered the look of horror on the mayor’s face, and, later, the blank engrossed expression when he was trying to throttle the Count with his chain of office. The vampire had killed him with a blow that had almost broken him in half.
She fingered the wounds on her neck. She was pretty certain vampires didn’t miss, but Vlad must have done, because she clearly wasn’t a vampire. She didn’t even like the idea of rare steak. She’d tried to see if she could fly, when she thought people weren’t looking, but she was as attractive to gravity as ever. The blood-sucking…no, never that, even if it was the ultimate diet program, but she’d have liked the flying.
It’s changed you, said Perdita.
“How?”
“Sorry, miss?”
You’re sharper…edgier…nastier.
“Maybe it’s about time I was, then.”
“Sorry, miss?”
“Oh, nothing. Do you have a spare sickle?”
The vampires traveled fast but erratically, appearing not so much to fly as to be promising entries in the world long-jump championships.
“We’ll burn that ungrateful place to the ground,” moaned the Countess, landing heavily.
“Afterward we’ll burn that place to the ground,” said Lacrimosa. “This is what kindness leads to, Father, I do hope you’re paying attention?”
“After you paid for that bell tower, too,” said the Countess.
The Count rubbed his throat, where the links of the gold chain still showed as a red weal. He wouldn’t have believed that a human could be so strong.
“Yes, that might be a good course of action,” he said. “We would have to make sure the news got around, of course.”
“You think this news won’t get around?” said Lacrimosa, landing beside him.
“It will be dawn soon, Lacci,” said the Count, with heavy patience. “Because of my training, you will regard it as rather a nuisance, not a reason to crumble into a little pile of dust. Reflect on this.”
“That Weatherwax woman did this, didn’t she,” said Lacri-mosa, ignoring this call to count her blessings. “She put her self somewhere and she’s attacking us. She can’t be in the baby. I suppose she wasn’t in your fat girl, Vlad? Plenty of room in there. Are you listening, Brother?”
“What?” said Vlad, distantly, as they turned a corner in the road and saw the castle ahead of them.
“I saw you give in and bite her. So romantic. They still dragged her off, though. They’ll have to use quite a long stake to hit any useful organ.”
“She’d have put her self somewhere close,” said the Count. “It stands to reason. It must’ve been someone in the hall…”
“One of the other witches, surely,” said the Countess.
“I wonder…”
“That stupid priest,” said Lacrimosa.
“That would probably appeal to her,” said the Count. “But I suspect not.”
“Not…Igor?” said his daughter.
“I wouldn’t give that a moment’s thought,” said the Count.
“I still think it was Fat Agnes.”
“She wasn’t that fat,” said Vlad sulkily.
“You’d have got tired of her in the end and we’d have ended up with her always getting in the way, just the others,” said Lacrimosa. “Traditionally a keepsake is meant to be a lock of their hair, not their entire skull—”
“She’s different.”
“Just because you can’t read her mind? How interesting would that be?”
“At least I did bite someone,” said Vlad. “What was wrong with you?”
“Yes, you were acting very strangely, Lacci,” said the Count, as they reached the drawbridge.
“If she was hiding in me I’d know!” snarled Lacrimosa.
“I wonder if you would,” said the Count. “She just has to find a weak spot…”
“She’s just a witch, Father. Honestly, we’re acting as though she’s got some sort of terrible power—”
“Perhaps it was Vlad’s Agnes after all,” said the Count. He gave his son a slightly longer stare than was strictly necessary.
“We’re nearly at the castle,