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ThoughtBubble
14 Nov 2026 – 15 Nov 2026
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Manchester Megacon
31 Jul 2027 – 1 Aug 2027
Manchester Central
I mean..she doesn't NEED the witch, a certain german we know went from one anchor to another over land. I'm sure it's a long time but it's doable.
Getting back on her own from Chomolungma is certainly doable, although it will take time. Since none of the expeditions that have gone looking for the island anchor have ever returned she might have a hard time if that is where she ends up.
I thought the Island Anchor was known, it was the quasi-legendary Fourth Anchor that no one had ever found? (Said Anchor being represented by the the outline doorway.
Domain of the Deep Sea Anglerfish Witch!
[https://genius.com/Hank-gre...](https://genius.com/Hank-green-a-song-about-an-anglerfish-lyrics "https://genius.com/Hank-green-a-song-about-an-anglerfish-lyrics")
you're both correct- the island one is known, but unexplored by anyone from the west.
As I recall the reason it hasn’t been visited is because anything approaching it explodes. “Fails catastrophically” I think you said.
Not explodes, no.
According to Ms Barber's notes, "All boats sent there vanish. All magical means fail, often explosively". I didn't quite remember it right. But Ms Barber may have a long wait for a lift.
Replodes?
Deplodes?
As I recall - and I'm working off memory here - they know that there IS a third anchor, but all expeditions to it have failed. There is no knowledge of a fourth anchor, but there are some fringe rumors one might exist, which we as readers have reason to believe may have some truth to them due to that mysterious shadowy door. My guess would be that the third anchor is on some island whose locals are elusive, located within a dangerous area of the ocean, or are hostile to outside forces. Seems like the witches get along, though, and Mountain Witch presumably has no interest in spilling the beans on Island Witch.
Hmm.
London - Earth
Himalayas - Air
Island - Water
I'm going to wildly speculate that the fourth's one in Cotopaxi. Biggest active volcano in South America, just south of the Equator. I'm also going to concede that you could define London as Water, or the Himalayas as Earth, and that there's no reason to think that Kate's going for an elemental theme in the first place, but: 'South American volcano' would be cool.
Yorkshire, not London! :) Small but significant difference!
Granted it WAS raining heavily in Hebden t'other day but generally I fnd Yorkshire too stiff to classify as water.
Yeah, sorry about that. :)
It's a huge difference linguistically, as I had cause to discover XD
My wild speculation is that the anchors lie on a great circle, equally spaced around it. The other side of the world from Widdershins (Halifax) is off the south coast of New Zealand = island. Mount Everest is about half way between the two, according to a piece of string stretched around my globe. The other side of the world from Everest is off the West Coast of Chile. AU - perhaps we can move South America a bit to the West (like Lundy).
=== My wild speculation is that the anchors lie on a great circle, equally spaced around it ===
And I thought somehow they were located on the vertexes of the tetrahedron inscribed in the globe :)
You can do the maths to predict where the other two anchors are.
I can't do the maths, I'm not clever enough :)
...or you could move Easter Island a bit East and that could be your island witch, leaving the fourth closed door as the unknown anchor off New Zealand that likes blowing things up...
we stan one anxious boyo
Wow... "I found you, didn't I?"
This sequence gave me a frisson of emotion.
"Jack" did it for me.
Panel 4 has 'I won't say I'm in love' from Hercules stuck in my head. Be good if that's what the music box is actually playing
Hff.
Those two talk really, really fast.
Later...
Mal: ...'Arry said to tell ye she'd be back soon, so, well... an' Sid - y'r s'posed to look after Gren f'r her, she said...
Vee: ! facepalm (to Sid) She does fancy you! I knew it!
Sid: What?! trademark flustered grin Really-?
Florrie: :-D Of course she does! Or she'd have left Gren with me! I'm so happy for you! Both of you! clasps hands together X-D
Mal: sees huge pink spirit heart swell from her to great size with alarming speed with his witch vision flinches
>:=)>
And now I just have this vision of Mal giving Sid the If You Hurt Her Talk, only for Sid to let it be known that he would NEVER. And then mention that Harry's response would be scary enough on it's own but she also has Captian Barber and Gren as backup. Mal would declare this answer satisfactory.
Are you kidding? Nicola, Edward, and what's-her-name-with-the-luscious-hair-shoot will each give him a talk. You don't just get into a family like the Barbers.
Admittedly, Edward's talk probably involves a fake nose and a unicycle...
But after all the bonding Mal and Harry have done while sharing this adventure, I can't help but feel he'll insist on doing it regardless. Just as I can imagine he''ll insist on doing when Wolfe finds that Special Someone.
I've sometimes wondered what will happen if Wolfe ever decides to settle down instead of flirting with every pretty redhead he meets. Whoever he marries will have to understand that Mal will always be a major part of his life.
Now there's a woman that was born to the shamble and the pointy hat. It's a tragedy that magic works so differently in her home dimension.
Nah. That's not the way Harry leads her life.
And you need not be a Discworld witch to be stone cold awesome and a blessing on your world. ^_^
Whichever Anchor she goes to, I just hope there's tobacco to be found. Otherwise, woe betide the locals.
Tobacco apparently has the same growing conditions as a Tomato plant. So Island witch should be able to afford it, and Mountain Witch we know already is in a Trading Hub, so there's no fear there either.
Great strip. Now go through a door, Harry; the music isn't playing in those last 2 panels.
You can do it, Mal. You are smart; you will figure something out. Depend on your friends; they are all depending on you.
That dog is going to be spoiled rotten.
And it'll be trained to hold still while it's "sawed in half." Imagine how much money Sid could bring in with a cute doggy assistant!
Although Sid may have gone off sawing-in-half tricks after the experience with Envy...
Oh! Your comment made me grin, because my mind skittered sideways and I suddenly wondered if, in Harriet's coming Island adventure, there will be a call-back to the magic bullet trick she has encountered!
Though he might master Slight-of-Hand if he trains the Magpie Spirit right
Although knowing him, he might think that's cheating.
Isn't all stage magic technically cheating, though?
But I feel like he'd be the type to feel like using wizardry in any form would mean he hasn't actually mastered the technique.
I suppose Gren might be more willing to serve as a magician's assistant than Harry would.
She wouldn't have trouble with being called...small. ([https://www.widdershinscomi...](https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/january-21st-2013/ "https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/january-21st-2013/") )
"Going to be" ... as if the doggo isn't already? :P
"Besides, if something does happen, you're looking after Gren for me." [https://www.widdershinscomi...](https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/september-14th-2016/ "https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/september-14th-2016/")
That's Harriet Barber's way of saying "I love you".
Ow my feels
Florrie will be thrilled because:
a) she knows Harry well enough to understand Harry would not entrust Gren to Sid if she did not love him and
b) this means Florrie will not have to take care of Gren ( [https://www.widdershinscomi...](https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/february-3rd-2012/ "https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/february-3rd-2012/") )
True love is Looking after your Bae's Furbabies. Didn't you know?
Also, that look. Somebody's trying not to cry...
"And that means you are someone I can count on to take care of everyone I care about."
It's a bit like Voss and the violin, hmm? ^_^
I see we're applying the "sink-or-swim" approach to hero-ing :D
Isn't that at the heart of hero-ing?
LOOK AT HOW COOL SHE LOOKS
It occurs to me that Harry is really brave to be doing this. Not just because she’s going somewhere unknown with no guarantee of when she’ll get back - she’s also leaving several of her loved ones in an uncertain state. She doesn’t know if Grandpa Henry will make it, or if Mal will be able to put Sid’s body and spirit back together, and she’ll have to go on not knowing until whenever she's able to return. That takes a special kind of strength.
Strength and balance. When the pressure is on like this, the "move aside and let me handle it" response is strong in people who would rather live with their own failures than depend on others and learn acceptance.
That's 100% me. If I could, I'd rather live by my own mess up than have someone do it for me. I don't know if i'd be able to do what Harry is doing because i don't think i'd be able to "just leave the situation to other people" and trust everything would work out.
Line from the film "My Name is Nobody", a spaghetti Western starring Henry Fonda and Terence Hill, not-directed by Sergio Leone, Fonda says to Hill something along the lines of "I'd rather die from my own mistake than live because of you."
It is, BTW, a FUN film.
To be fair though, just wanted to add at the beginning of the series i'm not sure Harry would have been able to make that call either, which I think is partly the point as well
I think the yellow door is the mountain witch. And really, that's the one that would be preferable to head to, since she can theoretically get home from there via conventional means, but I'm pretty sure the Europeans haven't found the island anchor yet. So, this could be a problem.
I think you might be right about that. Do we have anyone with familiarity on the designs or architectural elements of either of these doors?
The yellow (golden) door is sure Himalayan: gold is sacred material for buddist sacred statues. Besides, there is a flower of lotus (one of buddist symbols) on a panel of this door.
Alas, Harry heads to Polynesian door :(
Ed.: Well, I hope it's Polynesia and not Papua, where there lived cannibals at the time...
Also, Mountain Witch really likes yellow! [https://www.widdershinscomi...](https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/may-23rd-2014/ "https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/may-23rd-2014/")
I suspect Island Witch (whose Anchor is named "Tapu-something") will be the one who chooses when to be found. The other witches do seem to know a lot about what's going on. [https://www.widdershinscomi...](https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/september-28th-2016/ "https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/september-28th-2016/")
Here's the note, which doesn't say anything about when:
"To City Witch: Island Witch and I will come knocking soon. Until then please accept this welcome... two minutes' respite, to use when needed, and something to keep you warm. Good fortune to you, from Mountain Witch."
Mal is very new at this. Everyone he cares about is depending on him. No pressure or anything!
That does look like a lotus on the yellow door, doesn't it. But what do you mean, "alas"? We're going to see Harry Barber, world-famous discoverer of the Polynesian anchor! :D
Polynesian would be great :)
I'm afraid of Papua or New Zealand...
As far as we know, the "island" anchor is located on/near an island off the coast of New Zealand. : )
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polynesia#/media/File:Map_OC-Polynesia.PNG "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polynesia#/media/File:Map_OC-Polynesia.PNG")
haha 'off the coast of NZ' is a bit of an understatement-- the Polyesian Triangle is a really fuckin large place-- some of those islands are closer to the Americas than NZ :)
I'll admit, I had been kinda assuming the third anchor would be Uluru (Ayers Rock) in Australia. But, yeah, that would make them both Mountain Witches, because Australia is kind of a big island.
Oh haha good point! But no, I mean, I think we knew something more specific than that, a certain island which is part of New Zealand (nowadays), but I just can't remember what it was : P
Kate did say in the comments, years back, that it was near NZ. Which I believe led to us identifying Tapuenuku in the Chathams.
Well New Zealand is 100% Polynesia, in the ethno-linguistic sense. Geographically speaking Polynesia is a pretty meaningless term.
Andthose carvings look very much like something Maori. Papuan culture is very different.
i suspect (well at least hope) its New Zealand. The motifs look Maori, which are pretty similar to other Polynesian cultures, but have a lot of differences. On top of that, if the mountain really is called Tapu-something, as CountSessine says, that's pretty significant as Tapu in Te Reo (the Maori lang.) means something along the lines of holy or sacred. (Okay, Tapu is a concept in Polynesia as well but I really want it to be NZ!).
PS Tapu is the origin for the word Taboo fun fact
Can't envisage her in a grass skirt but it might be a loooong way to paddle.
Well, she knows it's on an island, so they may have some clue where it is.
I can only assume she ends up with the island witch, since that's the one we haven't seen yet and we need narrative completion :P
(Also why's everyone assuming she's gonna take the long way home, they JUST SAID she'll be stuck until she finds the witch, surely the witch can send her back the fast way.)
I was simply saying that I'd rather head to Nepal, since we know you can get to England from there, because, if things went poorly and the Witch couldn't send me back the fast way, it'd be nice to have a second option. Instead of having to hope that a group of the locals will be able to discover England (or at least China) for me.
I remember it being said that we are coming to the end of this particular story arc, but are we done with these specific characters? If not, Harry being stranded in an unfamiliar place and having to deal with magical shenanigans there could be the beginning of next arc...
Kate has said that this is the end of this story arc, but she has plans for at least a few more chapters. She has also said we will see some (but not all) of the current characters in the next story arc.
I have noticed that nothing that Harry has done so far in this story arc has been public enough to make her famous. Kate's reply to that seemed to imply the possibility that Harry might not become famous as a result of this arc and that it might be her actions in a future arc that are public enough to make her famous. That suggests the possibility that we will see more of Harry and Sid, although I would not consider it definite yet.
We know that Harry is posthumously famus among pastry-cooks almost two centuries later but we don't know for how long she had been posthumously famous. There is a class of heroes known principally for their pointless, heroic, deaths....
If she travels back from the anchor in the middle of the Pacific I think that might do it too.
Truly excellent faces on Harry here, especially in the third and final frames.
harry is saying you got this weather you are sure you can do it or not. I'm sure you can do it. so pull up your big boy pants and get this done. IE " tough love"