Tiffany smiled. ‘If Nightshade is right, the elves will ride through this coming night – when the full moon shines in the skies. Ladies – and Geoffrey,’ she addressed the assembled witches. ‘Go and get some rest. I must fly back to my steading now, but goodnight and good luck.’
‘Let the runes of fortune guide and protect us all,’ Mrs Earwig added portentously, always determined to get the last word in.
Tiffany loved the little room she’d had since she was a child. Her parents hadn’t changed anything, and unless it was raining or blowing a gale, she slept with the window open.
Now, weary from the broomstick ride back, tense with the expectation of what the night might bring but hoping to get a few hours’ rest, she savoured the atmosphere of the little room, finding strength from its familiarity.
A strength that came from feeling that she was exactly where she should be. An Aching.
‘I get up Aching, and I go to bed Aching,’ she whispered to herself, smiling. One of her father’s jokes, and she had rolled her eyes when hearing it again and again as a child, but now its warmth curled over her body.
And there was the china shepherdess on the shelf.
Granny Aching.
And next to it she had placed the shepherd’s crown.
Aching to Aching, down the generations.
Land under wave, she mused. That was what the name Tiffany meant in the speech of the Feegles. Tir-far-thóinn, ‘Tiffan’, the kelda would call her. The sound of her name was magic, real magic from the beginning of time.
It was a soft night. She told herself that she really ought to get some sleep – she’d be no good without some rest – but she lay there, the cat You snuggled up against her warmth, listening to the owls. Hootings were coming from everywhere, as if they were warning her.
Outside her window, the moon was rising, a gloriously full silver orb to light the skies, to lead the elves in . . .
Tiffany’s eyes closed.
And a part of her, the soul of her, was in a chalk pit, the shepherd’s crown in her hand, its five ridges catching the light of the full moon, and it was glowing, like an aquarium out of time.
Now she could hear the roar of the ancient sea beneath her, its voice trapped in the millions of tiny shells that made up the Chalk.
And she was swimming . . .
Great strange fish were coming towards her, big and heavy-looking with teeth.
At that point, Dr Bustlefn2 floated into her mind and took his cue. ‘Dunkleosteus,’ he said as a creature the size of a house floated by. ‘Megalodon’ was huge and carnivorous – more teeth than Tiffany had ever seen in one go. Then there were sea scorpions – armour-plated, clawed horrors. But none of them paid any attention to her. It was as if she had a right to be there.
And then there was a smaller creature, an explosion of blue spines that did notice Tiffany.
‘Echinoid,’ whispered Sensibility Bustle.
‘That is correct,’ said the creature. ‘And I am the shepherd’s crown. Deep in my heart is the flint. And I have many uses. Some call me the sea urchin, others the thunderstone, but here, now, in this place, call me the shepherd’s crown. I seek a true shepherd. Where can a true shepherd be found?’
‘We shall see,’ Tiffany heard herself saying. ‘I am Tiffany Aching and my father is a king among shepherds.’
‘We know him. He is a good shepherd, but not the best. You must find the king of shepherds.’
‘Well,’ said Tiffany, ‘I’m just a witch, but I will help you if I can. I work hard, mostly for other people.’
‘Yes,’ said the echinoid. ‘We know.’
I’m talking to a creature from under the sea, thought Tiffany. Is that right? First Thoughts, not Second Thoughts, her mind reminded her.
‘It is strange,’ said the voice of Dr Bustle in her head. ‘But not so strange as falling down a rabbit hole with a pack of cards.’
Let me think about it, her Second and Third Thoughts said. If talking creatures from the sea turned up everywhere, we’d all know about it, so this must be something just for me.
The voice came from nowhere, as though it was part of that ocean from Time: ‘Tiffany Aching is the first among shepherds, for she puts others before herself . . .’
And the shepherd’s crown was warm in her hand, a golden light glowing from within its depths. An heirloom handed down from generation to generation of Achings – down to Granny Aching, on to Joe Aching, and now to Tiffany herself . . .
Then the sea had gone and she was back in the pit, but the magic was still there, for slowly, oh so slowly, she could see bones pulling themselves free of the chalk, rising to draw together . . . to make two figures . . .
Thunder and Lightning! Granny Aching’s sheepdogs. The best dogs any shepherd could ever have. Dogs for the first among shepherds.
Now they were at her feet, their ears pricked, and Tiffany felt as if she could almost reach out to touch them. Almost. But not quite. For if she should touch them, be part of them, would she too be drawn into the chalk, to be bones like them . . .?