by Dave Leys
made of glass, and the other she had taken from a dead snake. She coughed as she stood up, but again that was nothing unusual, because she always coughed when she stood up. It was her bony old ribcage, it rattled like a bag of tin cans.
What was a surprise, however, was that she somehow felt different. Not herself.
She shuffled over to the cauldron and peered inside. Hmmm, breakfast, she thought. Lizard’s tongue, silver sharks’ teeth, boiled grass. The usual. Only, for the first time that she could remember it didn’t seem very appealing.
‘Strange,’ she said. ‘Maybe it needs some extra flavour.’ She pulled down a bottle marked Deep Sea Dungeon Salt, sprinkled some in the cauldron, and stirred it three times counter-clockwise with the wizened leg of a vulture. Then she dipped her nose in and smelt it. Yuck! She reeled back from the edge of the large kettle and nearly retched. It made her stomach turn. Shuddering, she tipped the contents of the cauldron down the drain.
‘Deadly me,’ she said, and continuing to mutter to herself she walked over to her table and sat down. Perhaps she had witch flu. Her friend, Agara, had come down with a bad case of it last week and had not eaten anything but rats’ tails for three days.
She reached over and uncovered her crystal ball. Rubbing her hands to warm them up, she placed them both at the top of the globe and began to intone:
‘Rage, rage, sick ones, dead ones, crystal ball come hear my voice. All the things that should not be, make them oh so clear to me.’
She looked into the crystal ball, waiting for the red mist to swirl and form into a face. Nothing.
‘Oh my badness,’ she said. ‘Perhaps it’s broken.’ She checked its surface for any sign of a crack, but it was glassy and smooth.
She heard a miaow, and turned to see her familiar, the black cat called Nexus, pad its way into the cave.
‘Here, furry one,’ she said, holding out her gnarled hand. Nexus leapt up into her lap and curled itself around. She smiled her toothless smile, but then something started to tickle the inside of her nose. What was it?
‘Ahhh chooo!’ she cried. Nexus looked up at her with her yellow eyes. She sneezed again, and again.
‘Shoo!’ she said, throwing the cat onto the floor. Nexus wagged her tail in an angry motion and padded away. She stopped at the mouth of the cave, gave the witch one more baleful look, and then disappeared.
What next? Helva thought. Sighing, she waddled over to the cupboard and picked up her broomstick. Without even thinking she started to sweep up around the place, moving the layers of grime and cobwebs into a pile.
Hang on, what was she doing? Broomsticks were for flying on, not for cleaning with. She dropped the broomstick and sat down in a hurry. All of a sudden she was finding it difficult to breathe.
Something was very wrong. She was Helva, the ancient witch of the Brass Mountain, the most eerie of the Hideous Hags, the sinister sorceress! Yet she was behaving like a normal old woman. The most pathetic thing of all – a mortal!
She began to pace back and forth. She opened up her Book of Magick and looked at the first spell, one of her old favourites, Curse Thy Neighbour.
‘If your neighbour should annoy you,’ she read, ‘this spell puts white warts on his nose. Only follow this ritual ...’ and then she stopped. What was that next word? Scrolling down the page she tried to read the text, but the language was strange, as if written in a monkey’s hand.
‘Oh dearie me!’ she said. ‘What?’ She thought in a panic. That was not what a witch said! Witches cursed, they used evil expressions.
She dropped to the floor and began to cry, her salty tears running down her whiskered cheeks. A mortal, she had turned into a weak little human! What would she do without her magic? And what would the other witches say when they found out?
Suddenly she remembered – tonight was the Woeful Wizardry celebration – and she was hosting it! Sinister Sylvia and Mocking Mary would be flying in under cover of the clouds. She began to tremble. She was supposed to conduct the Black Magick ritual. If those two found out they would turn her into a shaggy goat or a small bag of pebbles.
‘Foulness, Hideous Helva,’ came a voice from the entrance to the cave, and before she could gather herself, in walked Sinister Sylvia, holding her black cane in front of her.
‘Hi,’ she said, at a loss for words.
Sinister Sylvia leaned on the cane and scratched at her left eye. She was ugly to look at – a thin old woman in a red and grey felt cloak, with sores all over her face and one withered arm. ‘So, Helva,’ she croaked, ‘I’ve been looking forward to this - the animals we kill, the tasty blood sodas, the macabre atmosphere.’ Sylvia looked around the cave. ‘So where are the snacks?’
‘Umm,’ said Helva. She had nothing to offer her, none of the usual treats that were ordinarily prepared – Jellied Bad Eels, Baked Mistakes, Foul Sheep Brains. ‘You’ve caught me a little short today. Give me a moment.’ She edged towards the back of the cave.
Sinister Sylvia sniffed meanly. ‘I had better get to eat something before Mocking Mary arrives. She always hogs it all, the greedy guts.’
As if she had been summoned by Sylvia’s words, Mocking Mary arrived that moment, flying right into the cave, her broomstick aquiver. She hovered there a moment, sneering. ‘I see the place is still a dump,’ she purred, ‘just like you, Hopeless Helva.’ Throwing her head back in a laugh she inched off her stick and onto the ground. ‘Ahh - Sorry Sylvia!’ she uttered, staring just above Sylvia’s head.
‘It’s Sinister Sylvia,’ hissed the other witch, walking unevenly towards her, ‘You know my name.’
Mary pursed her lips and backed off a step. She lifted up the gold brocade edge of her dress and spun around. ‘I cast a pretty-me spell this morning,’ she said, peeking over her shoulder at them.
Helva stared at her. She certainly was beautiful – a lithe figure, with a long neck like a swan and dark eyelashes framing her silvery blue eyes.
Sylvia snorted and found a rock to sit on. ‘Let’s get on with it,’ she said. ‘I’m due to curse a whole village later on.’ She grinned a jagged smile. ‘The mortals there kept me up with their singing and working. I’m going to turn them all into snails.’
Mocking Mary put her hands on her hips. ‘Snails,’ she said, ‘are soft, slimy things. They leave goo wherever they are. You should feel right at home with them.’
‘Right, that’s it,’ said Sinister Sylvia, grabbing at her cane, ‘I’m going to roast your insides.’
For a moment their eyes flashed dangerously, the young beautiful witch pouting while the wizened old witch showed her teeth, and Helva thought they might come to blows. Mary lowered her face and leaned against a wall. ‘Sylvia’s right,’ said Mary. ‘Let’s get on with it. I’m going to cast one of my favourite curses on the way home, Nil Esteemius. It’ll make all the young men living near me feel terrible about themselves. Ha!’
‘So, girls,’ said Helva brightly. ‘Thank goodness you’ve calmed down. I always find it’s best to take a deep breath when I get angry, and sometimes I even count to ten. Then the whole world seems like a better place, and we can all be friends again.’
The two witches looked at Helva strangely.
‘I guess,’ mumbled Sinister Sylvia. She looked away.
‘Umm,’ said Mocking Mary. She looked confused.
Helva herself was confused. What was she saying? The world a better place?
‘Who’s up for a drink?’ she asked. Both witches put up their hands. Then she remembered she had tipped the cauldron out.
‘I’ll have a small rat’s blood soda,’ said Sylvia. ‘And Mary will have what she always has, liquefied lizard guts.’ Mary nodded and licked her lips.
Helva paused. Without magic she couldn’t summon the creatures to make them. ‘How about something different?’ she said hopefully. There was silence. ‘A nice cup of tea?’ More silence followed.
Mo
cking Mary looked down her nose at her. ‘Helva, you are such a failed wench. Come on, then, let’s start.’ She began to draw a circle in the sand with the point of her boot around Sylvia and herself.
Sinister Sylvia cackled. ‘My favourite part!’ she said. ‘The Black Magick Ritual. Curse the mortals. Their birds will fly backwards. Their crops will fail. Their water will taste like vinegar. Curse the mortals.’ She began to place dead flies around the circle.
‘Curse the mortals,’ intoned Mary dreamily. ‘Their children will run away from them. Their roofs will spring leaks. Their courage will fail them. Curse the mortals!’ She pulled at her silver necklace and stood in the centre of the circle.
Helva hesitated. If she stepped into the circle they’d discover straightaway she had no magic.
‘Girls, girls, show some pride in your work,’ she said quickly. ‘Let’s do this ritual properly. That circle doesn’t look quite round enough to me.’ She walked over and scrubbed it out with her shoe. ‘And these flies – I’m sure we can do better than that.’ She picked them up and dropped them in a box behind her. ‘I must have some dragonflies in my cupboard somewhere. Both of you rest a minute.’
The two witches stopped what they were doing.
‘Pride in our work?’ said Sylvia. ‘Ha.’ But she sat down.
‘The circle not round enough?’ said Mary, ‘I think it’s just that lousy eye of yours.’ But she leaned against a wall.
