The Nac Mac Feegle of the Chalk hated writing for all kinds of reasons, but the biggest one was this: Writing stays. It fastens words down. A man can speak his mind and some nasty wee scuggan will write it down and who knows what he’ll do with those words? Ye might as weel nail a man’s shadow tae the wall!

But now they had a new kelda, and a new kelda brings new ideas. That’s how it’s supposed to work. It stopped a clan getting too set in its ways. Kelda Jeannie was from the Long Lake clan, up in the mountains—and they did write things down.

She didn’t see why her husband shouldn’t, either. And Rob Anybody was finding out that Jeannie was definitely a kelda.

Sweat was dripping off his forehead. He’d once fought a wolf all by himself, and he’d cheerfully do it again with his eyes shut and one hand tied behind him rather than do what he was doing now.

He had mastered the first two rules of writing, as he understood them.

1. Steal some paper.

2. Steal a pencil.

Unfortunately there was more to it than that.

Now he held the stump of pencil in front of him in both hands and leaned backwards as two of his brothers pushed him toward the piece of paper pinned up on the chamber wall (it was an old bill for sheep bells, stolen from the farm). The rest of the clan watched, in fascinated horror, from the galleries around the walls.

‘Mebbe I could kind o’ ease my way inta it gently,’ he protested as his heels left little grooves in the packed-earth floor of the mound. ‘Mebbe I could just do one o’ they commeras or full stoppies—’

‘You’re the Big Man, Rob Anybody, so it’s fittin’ ye should be the first tae do the writin’,’ said Jeannie. ‘I canna hae a husband who canna even write his ain name. I showed you the letters, did I not?’

‘Aye, wumman, the nasty, loopy, bendy things!’ growled Rob. ‘I dinnae trust that Q, that’s a letter that has it in for a man. That’s a letter with a sting, that one!’

‘You just hold the pencil on the paper and I’ll tell ye what marks to make,’ said Jeannie, folding her arms.

‘Aye, but ‘tis a bushel of trouble, writin’,’ said Rob. ‘A word writ doon can hang a man!’

‘Wheest, now, stop that! ‘Tis easy!’ snapped Jeannie. ‘Bigjob babbies can do it, and you’re a full-growed Feegle!’

‘An’ writin’ even goes on sayin’ a man’s wurds after he’s deid!’ said Rob Anybody, waving the pencil as if trying to ward off evil spirits. ‘Ye cannae tell me that’s right!’

‘Oh, so you’re afeared o’ the letters, is that it?’ said Jeannie, artfully. ‘Ach, that’s fine. All big men fear something. Take the pencil off’f him, Wullie. Ye cannae ask a man to face his fears.’

There was silence in the mound as Daft Wullie nervously took the pencil stub from his brother. Every beady eye was turned to Rob Anybody. His hands opened and shut. He started to breathe heavily, still glaring at the blank paper. He stuck out his chin.

‘Ach, ye’re a harrrrd wumman, Jeannie Mac Feegle!’ he said at last. He spat on his hands and snatched back the pencil stub from Daft Wullie. ‘Gimme that tool o’ perdition! Them letters won’t know whut’s hit them!’

‘There’s my brave lad!’ said Jeannie as Rob squared up to the paper. ‘Right, then. The first letter is an R. That’s the one that looks like a fat man walking, remember?’

The assembled pictsies watched as Rob Anybody, grunting fiercely and with his tongue sticking out of the corner of his mouth, dragged the pencil through the curves and lines of the letters. He looked at the kelda expectantly after each one.

‘That’s it,’ she said, at last. ‘A bonny effort!’

Rob Anybody stood back and looked critically at the paper.

‘That’s it?’ he said.

‘Aye,’ said Jeannie. ‘Ye’ve writ your ain name, Rob Anybody!’

Rob stared at the letters again. ‘I’m gonna go to pris’n noo?’ he said.

There was a polite cough from beside Jeannie. It had belonged to the Toad. He had no other name, because toads don’t go in for names. Despite sinister forces that would have people think differently, no toad has ever been called Tommy the Toad, for example. It’s just not something that happens.

This toad had once been a lawyer (a human lawyer; toads manage without them) who’d been turned into a toad by a fairy godmother who’d intended to turn him into a frog but had been a bit hazy on the difference. Now he lived in the Feegle mound, where he ate worms and helped them out with the difficult thinking.

‘I’ve told you, Mr Anybody, that just having your name written down is no problem at all,’ he said. ‘There’s nothing illegal about the words “Rob Anybody”. Unless, of course,’ and the toad gave a little legal laugh, ‘it’s meant as an instruction!’

None of the Feegles laughed. They liked their humour to be a bit, well, funnier.

Rob Anybody stared at his very shaky writing. ‘That’s my name, aye?’

‘It certainly is, Mr Anybody.’

‘An’ nothin’ bad’s happenin’ at a’,’ Rob noted. He looked closer. ‘How can you tell it’s my name?’

‘Ah, that’ll be the readin’ side o’ things,’ said Jeannie.

‘That’s where the lettery things make a sound in yer heid?’ said Rob.

‘That’s the bunny,’ said the toad. ‘But we thought you’d like to start with the more physical aspect of the procedure.’

‘Could I no’ mebbe just learn the writin’ and leave the readin’ to someone else?’ Rob asked, without much hope.

‘No, my man’s got to do both,’ said Jeannie, folding her arms. When a female Feegle does that, there’s no hope left.

‘Ach, it’s a terrible thing for a man when his wumman gangs up on him wi’ a toad,’ said Rob, shaking his head. But, when he turned to look at the grubby paper, there was just a hint of pride in his face.

‘Still, that’s my name, right?’ he said, grinning.

Jeannie nodded.

‘Just there, all by itself and no’ on a Wanted poster or anything. My name, drawn by me.’

‘Yes, Rob,’ said the kelda.

‘My name, under my thumb. No scunner can do anythin’ aboot it? I’ve got my name, nice and safe?’

Jeannie looked at the toad, who shrugged. It was generally held by those who knew them that most of the brains in the Nac Mac Feegle clans ended up in the women.

‘A man’s a man o’ some standin’ when he’s got his own name where no one can touch it,’ said Rob Anybody. ‘That’s serious magic, that is—’

‘The R is the wrong way roond and you left the A and a Y out of “Anybody”,’ said Jeannie, because it is a wife’s job to stop her husband actually exploding with pride.

‘Ach, wumman, I didna’ ken which way the fat man wuz walking’,’ said Rob, airily waving a hand. ‘Ye canna trust the fat man. That’s the kind of thing us nat’ral writin’ folk knows about. One day he might walk this way, next day he might walk that way.’

He beamed at his name:

ЯOB NybOD

‘And I reckon you got it wrong wi’ them Y’s,’ he went on. ‘I reckon it should be N E Bo D. That’s Enn… eee… bor… dee, see? That’s sense!’

He stuck the pencil into his hair, and gave her a defiant look.

Jeannie sighed. She’d grown up with seven hundred brothers and knew how they thought, which was often quite fast while being totally in the wrong direction. And if they couldn’t bend their thinking around the world, they bent the world around their thinking. Usually, her mother had told her, it was best not to argue.

Actually, only half a dozen Feegles in the Long Lake clan could read and write very well. They were considered odd, strange hobbies. After all, what—when you got out of bed in the morning—were they good for? You didn’t need to know them to wrestle a trout or mug a rabbit or get drunk. The wind couldn’t be read and you couldn’t write on water.