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Wyrd Sisters

An alderman of Lancre shuffled past her and pointed politely to the seat on her left.

‘Is anyone sitting here?’ he said.^{67}

‘Yes,’ said Nanny.

The alderman looked distractedly at the rest of the benches, which were filling up fast, and then down at the clearly empty space in front of him. He hitched up his robes with a determined expression.

‘I think that since the play is commencing to start, your friends must find a seat elsewhere, when they arrive,’ he said, and sat down.

Within seconds his face went white. His teeth began to chatter. He clutched at his stomach and groaned.[20]

‘I told you,’ said Nanny, as he lurched away. ‘What’s the good of asking if you’re not going to listen?’ She leaned towards the empty seat. ‘Walnut?’

‘No, thank you,’ said King Verence, waving a spectral hand. ‘They go right through me, you know.’

‘Pray, gentles all, list to our tale …’

‘What’s this?’ hissed Granny. ‘Who’s the fellow in the tights?’

‘He’s the Prologue,’ said Nanny. ‘You have to have him at the beginning so everyone knows what the play’s about.’

‘Can’t understand a word of it,’ muttered Granny. ‘What’s a gentle, anyway?’

‘Type of maggot,’ said Nanny.

‘That’s nice, isn’t it? “Hallo maggots, welcome to the show.” Puts people in a nice frame of mind, doesn’t it?’

There was a chorus of ‘sshs’.

‘These walnuts are damn tough,’ said Nanny, spitting one out into her hand. ‘I’m going to have to take my shoe off to this one.’

Granny subsided into unaccustomed, troubled silence, and tried to listen to the prologue. The theatre worried her. It had a magic of its own, one that didn’t belong to her, one that wasn’t in her control. It changed the world, and said things were otherwise than they were. And it was worse than that. It was magic that didn’t belong to magical people. It was commanded by ordinary people, who didn’t know the rules. They altered the world because it sounded better.

The duke and duchess were sitting on their thrones right in front of the stage. As Granny glared at them the duke half turned, and she saw his smile.

I want the world the way it is, she thought. I want the past the way it was. The past used to be a lot better than it is now.

And the band struck up.

Hwel peered around a pillar and signalled to Wimsloe and Brattsley, who hobbled out into the glare of the torches.

OLD MAN (an Elder): ‘What hath befell the land?’

OLD WOMAN (a Crone): ‘’Tis a terror—’

The dwarf watched them for a few seconds from the wings, his lips moving soundlessly. Then he scuttled back to the guardroom where the rest of the cast were still in the last hasty stages of dressing. He uttered the stage manager’s traditional scream of rage.

‘C’mon,’ he ordered. ‘Soldiers of the king, at the double! And the witches—where are the blasted witches?’

Three junior apprentices presented themselves.

‘I’ve lost my wart!’

‘The cauldon’s all full of yuk!’

‘There’s something living in this wig!’

‘Calm down, calm down,’ screamed Hwel. ‘It’ll all be all right on the night!’

‘This is the night, Hwel!’

Hwel snatched a handful of putty from the make-up table and slammed on a wart like an orange. The offending straw wig was rammed on its owner’s head, livestock and all, and the cauldron was very briefly inspected and pronounced full of just the right sort of yuk, nothing wrong with yuk like that.

On stage a guard dropped his shield, bent down to pick it up, and dropped his spear. Hwel rolled his eyes and offered up a silent prayer to any gods that might be watching.

It was already going wrong. The earlier rehearsals had their little teething troubles, it was true, but Hwel had known one or two monumental horrors in his time and this one was shaping up to be the worst. The company was more jittery than a potful of lobsters. Out of the corner of his ear he heard the on-stage dialogue falter, and scurried to the wings.

‘—avenge the terror of thy father’s death—’ he hissed, and hurried back to the trembling witches. He groaned. Divers alarums. This lot were supposed to be terrorizing a kingdom. He had about a minute before the cue.

‘Right!’ he said, pulling himself together. ‘Now, what are you? You’re evil hags, right?’

‘Yes, Hwel,’ they said meekly.

‘Tell me what you are,’ he commanded.

‘We’re evil hags, Hwel.’

‘Louder!’

‘We’ve Evil Hags!’

Hwel stalked the length of the quaking line, then turned abruptly on his heel, ‘And what are you going to do?’

The 2nd Witche scratched his crawling wig.

‘We’re going to curse people?’ he ventured. ‘It says in the script—’

‘I-can’t-HEAR-you!’

‘We’re going to curse people!’ they chorused, springing to attention and staring straight ahead to avoid his gaze.

Hwel stumped back along the line.