Halloween Havoc

by Lou Kuenzler

  “Of course!” She was so happy, I decided not to mention my conversation with Piers. “What are you waiting for?” I said, pointing to the bag. “Try the hat on.”

  “OK.” Esme plunged her hand inside. “Yikes!” she cried, leaping backwards like a startled frog.

  The hat tumbled to the floor and scuttled past our feet.

  “It’s alive!” squealed Esme.

  “Spitting scorpions! Stand back!” I said, stepping in front of Esme and holding my wand out like a sword. “I think it’s enchanted.”

  “As long as that’s not a giant spider under there!” said Esme, leaping on to the bed. The hat spun round and round in circles.

  “Juddering jellyfish!” Had Piers managed to play some sort of horrible spider trick already? No … this was far too clever for Piers. He couldn’t use magic. It must be some sort of witch’s curse. All my worries about the hat came flooding back. “Aunt Hemlock probably put a hex on it!” I shuddered. To my horror, I could see a hairy grey leg poking out. If it really was a spider under there, it must be about as big as a cat. And it wasn’t just one leg I could see… There were two, three, four hairy legs! And a bushy grey tail too! Hang on—

  “A tail?” I gasped out loud. “That’s not a giant spider!”

  I grabbed the pointy tip of the hat.

  “Careful!” cried Esme.

  “Don’t worry!” I smiled as I whisked the hat into the air. “It’s only Rascal!” Sure enough, my little grey kitten looked up at us with his big green eyes. He must have sneaked into the bag of costumes before I left home.

  “Naughty boy! You frightened us silly!” I hissed at him in Cat Chat.

  “I was only dressing up,” he purred. “If you can have a cat costume, I don’t see why I can’t wear a witch’s hat.”

  “Honestly!” Esme and I collapsed in laughter as I translated what he had said. It was always impossible to stay cross with Rascal for long.

  “I have promised the witch’s hat to Esme,” I said firmly, passing it to her so that she could finally try it on.

  “Hocus-pocus!” she cackled, doing a spooky witch’s voice as she pulled the hat down over her ears.

  No real witch would ever say hocus-pocus – it doesn’t mean anything at all! – but I had to admit Esme did look pretty good.

  As Rascal rubbed himself against my ankles, I looked at Esme cackling and pulling witchy faces in front of the mirror. I instantly forgot how frightened of the hat I had been. It didn’t look spooky on Esme at all – or only in a fun way. She was like the pictures of girls I had seen dressed up as witches in the Sellwell Department Store Catalogue (pages 72–73). They’d had plastic caldrons and shiny capes as well.

  “All I need is a big black coat,” said Esme.

  “There is one of Grandpa’s old ones in the cupboard under the stairs. Wait there.” She dashed out of the door as I bent down and tickled Rascal between the ears.

  “I’m sorry you can’t dress up,” I said. “You’ll just have to stay here and be a good boy until I can take you home later.”

  Esme swept back into the room wearing an enormous buttoned-up coat which brushed against the floor. The sleeves were so long they made her look like a giant black squid. You couldn’t see her hands at all. The coat covered every inch of flesh.

  “My black school shoes will be perfect too,” she said, slipping into them as I struggled out of my own clothes and pulled the cat costume on.

  “SPOOKTACULAR!” cheered Esme as we stood side by side in front of the mirror.

  “If you’re a witch, I can be your cat,” I said, looking at my costume and thinking how well it had all worked out. Esme was thrilled to be a witch and I was delighted to be a cat. But Rascal stalked away and sat with his face to the wall.

  “What’s the matter?” asked Esme.

  “He wants a costume too.” I sighed.

  “Hold on, I’ve got an idea,” said Esme. She dashed out of the door and I heard her clattering down the stairs again.

  A moment later she was back.

  “Hocus-pocus, here we go!” she said, cackling like a witch as she pulled one of Jack the Bean’s mini Babygros from behind her back.

  “Bless my whiskers! Is that for me?” gasped Rascal. It was a tiny stripy tiger suit.

  “That’s perfect!” I grinned as Rascal leapt up on to the bed and I helped him tuck his legs through the sleeves. I pulled the hood up so that the fluffy tiger ears covered his own.

  “GRRRR!” roared Rascal, arching his back. “I’ve always wanted to be a big, fierce tiger!”

  The only trouble was, of course, that he didn’t look fierce at all. He looked adorable! Like a cute, cuddly cub!

  “Yikes!” Esme pretended to shiver. She is really good at acting. “That’s the scariest Halloween costume ever!” She giggled.

  “Tumbling Tigers, I’m terrified!” I yelped, translating into Cat Chat for Rascal too.

  He purred with pride as the three of us all stood in front of the mirror.

  We had perfect costumes at last. I couldn’t help beaming. I had always dreaded scary Halloween night in the past, when the witches and wizards tried out their most horrible spells – but this year it looked like it really might be fun!

  Chapter Seven

  Mrs Lee served steaming bowls of pumpkin soup for lunch and we discussed the plans for trick-or-treating that evening. We were all going to start at my house and go from there.

  “Are you girls all right if I meet you at Bella’s?” she asked. “I need to get to the post office first. My publishers are waiting for this.” She patted a large package on the kitchen table. “It’s the final finished pages of The Rabbits of Windmill Meadow!”

  “Congratulations!” I said.

  “We’ll be fine to stay here and get to the village by ourselves later on,” promised Esme. “We have both taken the bus lots of times. And we’ll stick together.”

  “All right. Have fun,” said Mrs Lee, picking up her parcel under one arm and Baby Bean under the other as she bustled Gretel towards the door. “I’ve got my mobile phone, so you can always call if there are any problems. We’ll see you at Bella’s house in time for the trick-or-treating to start.”

  “See you later!” Esme and I waved from the door. Rascal yawned and jumped out of the laundry basket where he had fallen asleep. I don’t think Mrs Lee had even noticed him, all tucked up in his tiger suit.

  The minute Mrs Lee was out of the door, Esme spun round and grinned at me. There was a cheeky look in her eyes that I knew only too well.

  “What do you want?” I asked suspiciously.

  “Please, Bella,” she begged, “can we go for a broomstick ride? Just one more time.”

  “But…” I could think of about a hundred reasons why we shouldn’t.

  “No one will see us,” she said quickly. “It’ll be just like yesterday. Only better because I am wearing my witch costume … and you can pretend to be my magic cat and ride beside me.”

  “Well…” I had to admit it did sound fun.

  “Pleeeeease…” she begged.

  “Oh, Whizzing Wasps! Why not?” I cheered.

  We dashed out to the garden with Rascal bounding along behind us in his tiger costume as I retrieved the broom from the garden shed.

  “I want to come too – I won’t be scared!” he roared with a growl as deep as tiger cub.

  “What do you think, Esme?” I asked. “Are you the sort of witch who has a cat and a tiger riding on her broomstick?”

  “I’d be delighted!” She giggled.

  “All right, everybody? Just once around the windmill,” I said firmly. Then I raised my wand and chanted the familiar spell.

  Sweep like wings into the sky,

  Brush the clouds and fly, fly, fly!

  The broomstick rose gently into the air.

  “Glittering Goblins!” I was beginning to feel like an expert. Any young witch in the Magic Realm would have been proud of the way the broom hovered in front of us withou
t so much as a wobble. “Climb aboard, everyone!”

  Esme sat at the back with her enormous coat hanging down over her feet. I couldn’t even see her hands as she gripped the handle. I jumped on the front and tucked my cat’s tail over my arm. Rascal leapt on to my shoulder and ROARED.

  “We’re off!” cried Esme.

  The broomstick shot into the clouds like an arrow. Not this again! “Behave, broom!” I gave it a firm tap. Nothing happened.

  “Slow down a bit, Bella. I’m nearly being blown off the back,” gulped Esme, clinging to my waist.

  “I – I can’t slow down,” I cried, trying my best to push the broom handle towards the ground. That usually slows the broom down straight away. But it just kept shooting upwards, flying higher and faster still.

  “I can’t control it!” I cried. “It’s like the broom’s got a mind of its own.”

  This wasn’t like yesterday, when the broom just seemed to be having fun. It wasn’t wobbling or swooping or playing; it was flying straight upwards through the air!

  “What’s happening?” Esme squealed. “It feels like the broom is trying to take us somewhere we don’t want to go.”

  “As if someone has put a hex on it,” I groaned.

  “Help!” squawked Rascal, digging his claws into me. He didn’t sound much like a brave tiger now.

  I grabbed my wand and tapped it firmly again on the broom.

  Take us back down to the ground.

  Land by the windmill safe and sound.

  Whoosh! The spell did no good at all.

  “Home! Home! Home!” came a strange, high-pitched wail behind me.

  “I’m sorry, Esme!” I yelled into the wind. “I’m doing my best. I really am!”

  “Bella … that wasn’t me speaking,” said Esme. Her voice was shaking as she whispered in my ear. “This is going to sound crazy, but I think it was … the hat!”

  “The hat?” I glanced round and saw that the burnt hole in the brim was opening and closing like a tiny mouth.

  “Home! Home! Home!” The whiny voice was stronger now. “HOME!” It was commanding the broom to do as it was told.

  So I had been right not to trust the hat. It must have been lying lost in the hills for weeks, waiting to go back to where it belonged in the Magic Realm. Now it had taken its chance – Halloween, the perfect night of the year for strange magic, when objects take on a life of their own.

  “Pull it off, Esme! Throw it away,” I cried.

  “I can’t!” The broom wobbled as Esme struggled. “It’s stuck to my head,” she groaned.

  “Home! Home! Home!” The hat was screeching like an eagle.

  The broomstick jolted sideways, spun in a corkscrew and shot out of the clouds.

  Bam! Something cold and wet hit me in the face.

  “What’s that?” cried Esme. “It’s like being hit with a fish!”

  But I knew the feeling only too well. My stomach dropped.

  “It’s the Curtain of Invisibility!” I said. “And we have just flown through it.”

  Rascal let out a squeal of horror. “You mean … we’ve crossed over?”

  “Yes!” I said. “We have flown into the Magic Realm!”

  Chapter Eight

  I had forgotten how dark it always was in the Magic Realm.

  It was already night-time on this side of the Curtain. The flat, empty marshes and crooked trees were lit by a strange green Halloween moon.

  “Creepy, isn’t it?” Esme shivered. “But it is sort of exciting too. I did so want to see the Magic Realm and now I have.”

  “Well, we’re not going any further than this,” I said. The hat was quiet now it was back on its own side of the Curtain, and the broom was bobbing calmly too. “We’re just going to leave the hat here and fly back to Merrymeet as fast as we can.”

  “I suppose you’re right,” said Esme, giving it a tug. “But – oh – no, it’s no use, Bella. I still can’t get it off my head. It just won’t budge.”

  “Let me try.” Now the broom was hovering gently, I felt safe to turn around.

  But Esme was right. No matter how hard I tugged, the hat wouldn’t shift.

  “I can barely even see out from underneath it!” said Esme. The brim was pulled down so low it was almost touching her chin.

  “Perhaps magic can get it off,” I said, reaching into the pocket of my fluffy cat suit and grabbing my wand. I was just about to mutter a spell when Rascal let out a startled yowl.

  “What’s that?” he hissed.

  I blinked at the dusky horizon as a black shadow flew towards us.

  “I can’t see,” said Esme, lifting her head and trying to peer out from underneath the hat.

  “It looks like a witch on a broomstick,” I whispered. And not just any witch. I blinked hard, hoping I was wrong. But I’d recognize that shadow anywhere. It had loomed over me often enough in the dark, damp cave where I used to live.

  “It’s Aunt Hemlock!” I breathed. “And she’s coming this way!”

  We had to get out of here.

  “Fly!” I tapped my wand against the broomstick:

  Fly back through the curtain and

  take us home,

  Please let Aunt Hemlock leave us alone!

  The broomstick shuddered and shot forwards.

  “Thank you!” I whispered. At last it was doing what it was told.

  But just then the green moon disappeared behind a cloud and we were plunged into darkness. Rascal jumped on to my head in panic, so that I couldn’t see anything at all.

  “Rascal, move!” I cried.

  BAM!

  Something much harder than the Curtain of Invisibility hit me in the face.

  Even in the dark, I could tell it was the sharp, scratchy branch of a tree.

  “Plummeting Polecats!” I had fallen off the broom and was spinning though the air – down down down—

  “Whoa!” Rascal’s voice whooshed past me as he fell too.

  “Ouch!” I landed with a soft thud on my bottom. Thank goodness for the boggy marshland all around the tree.

  “Ha! I landed on my feet,” purred Rascal. “Big scary tigers always do.”

  “Shh!” I hissed. “Don’t let Aunt Hemlock hear you. Where’s Esme?”

  Crack! A branch snapped above our heads.

  “Ow!” Esme squealed. She must have stayed on the broomstick and crashed right into the top of the tree. As the big Halloween moon came out from behind the clouds again, I saw her hanging high above us with the strap of her black school shoe caught in a branch.

  “I feel dizzy!” she gulped, spinning in her black coat like a giant spider on a web. Even though she was upside down, my pointy witch’s hat was still crammed firmly on the top of her head.

  “Don’t worry, we’ll get you down,” I whispered. “So long as Aunt Hemlock doesn’t—”

  But before I could move, there was a whooshing sound. The whole tree seemed to tremble as if it was caught in an icy wind.

  “Well I never! If it isn’t Belladonna Broomstick! So you’ve come back to the Magic Realm, have you?” Aunt Hemlock flew towards the tree, cackling in the pale green light of the moon. “Couldn’t stay away!”

  Rascal leapt into my lap as I crouched shivering by the trunk. There was nothing we could do to escape; poor Esme was still hanging from the tree by the strap of her shoe and I had no idea where our broomstick had gone.

  “Please, Aunt Hemlock!” I begged. “Please let us go.” But my throat was so dry the words came out as a croaky whisper. Aunt Hemlock didn’t even seem to hear me.

  “Hopeless!” she said, hovering on her broomstick. She leant over and grabbed Esme by her foot. “I don’t know what you think you are doing coming back here, Belladonna.”

  “Eeek!” Esme squealed as Aunt Hemlock unhooked her from the tree. Her shriek was muffled by the hat.

  “Do be quiet, Belladonna. You always did make such a fuss.”

  “Belladonna?” My mouth gaped open as I realized what was hap
pening. This was terrible. Aunt Hemlock thought Esme was me!

  “Wait!” I cleared my throat, terror making my voice nothing but a squeak. “You’ve made a mistake!”

  But it was too late.

  Aunt Hemlock whooshed up over the tree and away, with Esme dangling upside down from the back of her broomstick.

  “PLEASE! COME BACK!” my voice bellowed loudly at last. But the icy wind blew my words away.

  Esme and Aunt Hemlock were gone.

  Chapter Nine

  I couldn’t believe it.

  Aunt Hemlock had kidnapped Esme and vanished into the night sky.

  I brushed myself down and stood at the foot of the crooked tree, staring helplessly into the darkness. I knew there was nothing for miles but the wild, lonely moors of the Magic Realm. Here and there, jagged rocks were lit by shafts of eerie light from the emerald Halloween moon. I had absolutely no idea what to do next.

  I picked up Rascal and hugged him. “This is a disaster,” I sobbed. “Aunt Hemlock has snatched Esme thinking she’s me! All because she was wearing my stupid witch’s hat.” I buried my head in his soft tiger suit as a chill wind whistled round us.

  It was bad enough that Aunt Hemlock thought Esme was me. It would be even worse if she realized she had made a mistake. If the hat came off – and now that it had what it wanted and was back in the Magic Realm, it might – Aunt Hemlock would see that Esme wasn’t a witch at all. She was a Person. A Person in disguise who had no business snooping around the Magic Realm … especially not on Halloween, the most important and secret night of the witchy year.

  “Aunt Hemlock will think Esme is a spy!” I groaned, shivering as a wolf howled somewhere in the distance.

  “What will she do to her?” asked Rascal.

  “I don’t know!” I shuddered. “I don’t even want to think about it.”

  Aunt Hemlock had once caught an old warlock sneaking around her cave trying to steal spells – she had grabbed the ancient wizard by his long white beard, turned him into a dandelion clock and blew him away in the wind. The last that was ever seen of him was a hundred floating seeds disappearing into the sky.