'Shall I see you again tomorrow?' said Vlad, proving to Agnes that males of every species could possess a stupidity gene.
'You won't be able to turn her into a vampire!' she said, ignoring him.
'She won't be able to help it,' said the Count. 'It's in the blood, if we choose to put it there.'
'She'll resist.'
'That would be worth seeing.'
The Count dropped Oats on to the floor again.
'Now go away, Miss Nitt. Take your soggy priest. Tomorrow, well, you can have your old witch back. But she'll be ours. There's a hierarchy. Everyone knows that... who knows anything about vampires.'
Behind him Oats was being sick.
Agnes thought of the hollow-eyed people now working in the castle. No one deserved that.
She grabbed the priest by the back of his jacket and held him like a bag.
'Goodbye, Miss Nitt,' said the Count.
She hauled the limp Oats to the main doors. Now it was raining hard outside, great heavy unmerciful rain slanting out of the sky like steel rods. She kept close to the wall for the slight shelter that this gave and propped him up under the gush from a gargoyle.
He shuddered. 'Oh, that poor old woman,' he moaned, slumping forward so that a flattened star of rain poured off his head.
'Yes,' said Agnes. The other two had run off. They'd shared a thought - and Perdita had too. They'd all felt the shock as Granny set her mind free and... well, the baby was even called Esme, wasn't she? But... she couldn't have imagined Granny's voice in her head. She had to be somewhere close...
'I really made a terrible mess of it, didn't I?' said Oats.
'Yes,' said Agnes vaguely. No, lending her self to the baby did have a sort of rightness to it, a folklore touch, a romantic ring, and that's why Nanny and Magrat would probably believe it and that was why Granny wouldn't do it. Granny had no romance in her soul, Agnes thought. But she did have a very good idea of how to manipulate the romance in other people.
So... where else was she? Something had happened. She'd put the essence of herself somewhere for safety, and no matter what she'd told the Count she couldn't have put it very far away. It had to be in something alive, but if it was in a human the owner wouldn't even know it-
'If only I'd used the right exorcism,' Oats mumbled.
'Wouldn't have worked,' said Agnes sharply. 'I don't think they're very religious vampires.'
'It's probably only once in his life that a priest gets a chance like this...'
'You were just the wrong person,' said Agnes. 'If a pamphlet had been the right thing to scare them away, then you'd have been the very best man for the job.'
She stared down at Oats. So did Perdita.
'Brother Melchio is going to get very abrupt about this,' he said, pulling himself to his feet. 'Oh, look at me, all covered in mud. Er... why are you looking at me like that?'
'Oh... just an odd thought. The vampires still don't affect your head?'
'What do you mean?'
'They don't affect your mind? They don't know what you're thinking?'
'Hah! Most of the time even I don't know what I'm thinking,' said Oats miserably.
'Really?' said Agnes. Really? said Perdita.
'He was right,' mumbled Oats, not listening. 'I've let everyone down, haven't I? I should have stayed in the college and taken that translating post.'
There wasn't even any thunder and lightning with the rain. It was just hard and steady and grim.