Curse of the Dream Witch

by Allan Stratton

  Once in the turret room, the servants tucked him into bed under fresh linen sheets, but he was too excited to stay there. As soon as they left, he raced to the window to breathe in the view of the countryside. To his delight, he saw his home beyond the hills.

  But something was strange. He could still see the witch’s forest; it looked unchanged. Hadn’t Olivia’s mother said it had suffered a great fire?

  Milo wondered where the coach was, too, that was supposed to be going to pick up his parents. There was no sign of it below in the courtyard or on the cobblestoned road leading from the castle.

  His thoughts were interrupted by a tickle of laughter, high and otherworldly. He turned around. There was no one there.

  Little voices whispered his name in sing-song from inside the armoire: Milo . . . Milo . . . Milo . . .

  Milo smiled. It must be the servant children hiding from him. Now that he’d be living in the castle they’d be new friends. He went to the armoire and threw open the doors. It was just as it was when he’d been transported here through the bats’ wing parchment: a cupboard with dolls and toys hanging from its walls and sitting on its shelves. But where were the children?

  Milo . . . Milo . . .

  Was there a secret compartment somewhere at the back? There must be, Milo thought. He went inside and stepped forward. The door slammed shut behind him. Milo jumped with fright, then laughed at himself. His nerves were on edge after everything he’d been through, but, truly, what was there to be afraid of now? Surely a little breeze from the window had blown the door shut. He groped around for an inside handle. There wasn’t one.

  He knocked on the door. ‘Hello? Can anyone hear me? Can someone let me out?’

  There were titters all around him in the dark.

  Milo didn’t know whether to be scared or angry. ‘What’s so funny?’

  ‘You.’ The voice was that of a little girl, maybe five or six.

  Milo relaxed. ‘All right. Now that you and your friends have had your fun, please open the door?’

  ‘We can’t,’ the little girl laughed.

  Milo was annoyed. Still, he didn’t want the servant children to think he was a cry-baby. ‘I don’t want to spoil your joke,’ he said, ‘but I’ve just gone through the worst time of my life. So, really, unlock the door. I’d like us to be friends. I’m going to be living here, after all.’

  ‘Oh you’re going to be living here all right,’ a strange voice clacked. ‘You’ll be here forever and ever.’

  Milo froze. This wasn’t the voice of a child. It was the voice of an old man. And what was that clacking sound when he spoke? ‘Who are you? What do you want?’

  ‘Guess,’ said a woman, slyly.

  More titters.

  ‘At least let me see you.’

  ‘As you wish.’ A light went on. It came from a tiny lamp held by a tiny lady standing on the shelf by his head. Milo gasped; he’d seen her before. She was one of Olivia’s dolls.

  Milo looked around in panic. There were stuffed dolls circled all around him, with heads of brightly painted papier maché, birchwood, and china. Only the faces weren’t as friendly as he’d remembered. Instead, they had a surly look, with sneaky smiles and shifty eyes.

  ‘He looks surprised,’ said a milkmaid with a cracked chin.

  ‘Very surprised,’ echoed an acrobat.

  A commanding figure stepped out of the shadows. He was made of solid oak, with a military uniform decorated with gold leaf, and a chiselled face with pink cheeks, red lips, and black eyes. His jaw had been carved separately; it had a white beard and was hinged to a sturdy lever that ran out of his back.

  Milo’s eyes went wider yet. He suddenly understood the clacking sound he’d heard. It was Olivia’s nutcracker. ‘Count Ostroff!’

  ‘Salute, peasant,’ the nutcracker said. ‘I rule this armoire.’

  ‘But this is impossible,’ Milo gasped, saluting. ‘Toys can’t talk.’

  ‘In dreams we can,’ the milkmaid said.

  ‘But I’m awake.’

  ‘Are you?’

  ‘Yes. I went through the witch’s dream world and woke up in the castle courtyard.’

  Howls of nasty laughter.

  ‘Correction,’ Count Ostroff said darkly. ‘You didn’t wake up. You only imagined you woke up. You’re still in the witch’s world.’

  Milo was filled with a sickening horror. Of course, that would explain everything: Why he couldn’t remember rescuing the village children. Why the witch’s forest looked unharmed. But if he was still in the witch’s world, then, even worse – the queen who greeted them in the courtyard wasn’t Olivia’s mother. She was a creature of the Dream Witch. He and the princess were in danger of their lives.

  ‘What do you want with me?’

  Two clown dolls leapt out of a knitting basket with a pair of long, sharp scissors. ‘Fun,’ they giggled. ‘We want fun.’ They each took a handle of the scissors: ‘Snip, snip snip.’

  Ladies-in-waiting dolls hoisted pins and needles. ‘Sew, sew, sew.’

  Milo recoiled. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘We mean we’re going to turn you into a doll for Olivia,’ Count Ostroff explained.

  ‘No!’

  ‘Yes,’ Count Ostroff said. ‘First, we’ll cut you open and take out your meat. Then we’ll stuff you with straw and paint you bright as buttons.’

  ‘Pretty dolly, pretty dolly,’ the dolls sang happily.

  Milo screamed and heaved himself at the four walls. They wouldn’t budge.

  ‘There’s no escape,’ the count clacked gleefully.

  Two dolls began to crawl up Milo’s legs. He tried to shake them off, but toppled to the ground. The acrobats had tied his feet with ribbons.

  Dolls swarmed Milo’s limbs, pinning him to the floor. A baby doll sat on his chest with a knitting needle in its chubby hands. ‘Can I poke out his eyes?’ it gurgled. ‘Then he won’t have to see what’s happening.’

  ‘Leave me alone!’ Milo howled.

  ‘And spoil the party?’ the count clacked.

  A voice rang out from the top of the armoire: ‘If it’s a party you want, it’s a party I’ll give you!’

  The tiny lady raised her lamp. There was a mouse perched in a popped-out knothole at the top of the armoire.

  ‘Ephemia?’ Milo exclaimed. ‘But you’re dead!’

  ‘Apparently not,’ Ephemia squeaked. She threw back her head and let loose a cry of the wild. It soared up from the underworld into the burrows and tunnels beneath the forest floor, its pitch beyond human hearing. The glass on the tiny lady’s lamp cracked.

  Suddenly, there was a scurry in the walls around the armoire. Squirrels and chipmunks spilled in from every conceivable nook and cranny.

  ‘To the rescue!’ Ephemia cried in the language of the woods.

  Ephemia’s troops pounced on the demon dolls. With a grand chatter, china heads cracked on the ground, and claws tore papier maché. Meanwhile, little teeth chewed through knit body socks and snipped the stitching of cotton limbs.

  ‘Eek!’ the acrobats shrieked, as their legs fell off.

  ‘Ack!’ the clowns cried, as chipmunks stuffed their cheeks with stuffing and ran off with their insides.

  In no time, the dolls had vanished, taken to line the nests of the forest. Only Count Ostroff remained.

  ‘What shall become of me?’ he wailed as squirrels dragged him to a rat hole.

  ‘For all your sins, you must spend the rest of your days cracking nuts for my friends,’ Ephemia said. ‘If not, you’ll make a wonderful toy for them to gnaw on.’

  The squirrels chittered their goodbyes.

  ‘Thank you for saving my life!’ Milo called after them, and then to Ephemia: ‘And, above all, thanks to you. But how did you survive the owl? We saw you in its talons.’

  ‘That was another wee mouse, alas. When I saw the owl, I ran for my life and hid for what seemed like forever.’

  ‘Then how did you find me?’

  Ephemia
wriggled her nose. ‘We beasties have a powerful sense of smell. In your case, a mixed blessing.’

  ‘Uh, thanks,’ Milo said. ‘Did you find Olivia, too?’

  Ephemia shook her head. ‘I tried, but her scent’s been masked.’

  Milo frowned. ‘The Dream Witch conjured a vision of Olivia’s mother. It told her she didn’t need her pysanka anymore. Then it led her to a dream of the royal bedroom.’

  ‘Oh dear, we haven’t got much time,’ Ephemia fretted. ‘But where to look? In dreamland, palace walls can shift as fast as thought.’

  ‘I’ve got it,’ Milo said. ‘We don’t look, we smell. Imagine the odours in a royal suite that might block Olivia’s scent, Ephemia. Then follow your nose.’

  The Smell of Witchcraft

  Olivia was in her parents’ bedroom, as conjured by the Dream Witch. She’d seen her spell-father propped up in his bed and hugged him close. He’d tapped his blessing on her cheek with his left thumb, then she’d gone with her spell-mother into the adjacent bathing room to soak away the grime of dreamland.

  Her nose filled with a wondrous blend of aromas. Her mother’s large porcelain tub, with its golden feet and faucets, had been filled with a bubble bath infused with orange blossoms and rose petals. Essential oils of jasmine, juniper, and eucalyptus hung in silver pans over lavender-scented candles.

  The spell-queen sat on a stool at the head of the tub, combing Olivia’s newly-washed hair with a brush dipped in freshly squeezed lemons.

  ‘Your bedroom doesn’t look like I remember it at all,’ Olivia said.

  ‘Doesn’t it?’ her spell-mother said. ‘I suppose that’s not surprising. You were locked up in your turret for so many years, you missed out on all the changes. I hope they don’t disappoint you.’

  ‘Oh, not at all,’ Olivia reassured her. ‘It’s good to be home.’ She looked down at the pysanka, dangling from the chain around her neck. It seemed to glow in an unfamiliar way.

  The spell-queen eyed the talisman. ‘I’ll know you’re truly well, my love, when you get rid of that thing.’

  ‘Why? It’s beautiful.’

  The spell-queen shook her head. ‘It’s nasty. Such bad memories.’

  Olivia frowned. ‘All the same, I’m so used to having it near me, I’d feel odd if it were gone.’

  ‘You mustn’t be afraid of change,’ the spell-queen soothed.

  ‘I’m not, it’s just – this was my christening gift from Ephemia. It wouldn’t feel right to part with it.’

  ‘But—’

  Before her mother could say another word, Olivia decided to change the subject. ‘How long have I been soaking? I feel like a prune.’

  She rose from the tub and let her mother wrap her in a thick towel warmed over a bed of smouldering pine needles. Then she stepped behind the changing screen where ladies-in-waiting began to dress her in fresh petticoats and a sunny yellow gown with a cream bodice, pearl buttons, and lace trim.

  ‘Ephemia was a good and faithful servant,’ the spell-queen called over the screen. ‘The pysanka was a token of her love, and I’m pleased you’re loyal to her memory. But do you think she’d want you tethered to your past?’

  ‘I can’t hear you,’ Olivia lied. ‘Wait till I come out.’

  ‘Surely Ephemia would want you to have a future as fresh as tomorrow,’ the spell-queen continued a little more loudly. ‘Come, let’s get your father’s advice.’

  Olivia was cross that her mother kept pestering her. Still, she didn’t want to be cranky – not on her second day home, and when her mother meant so well. ‘Fine. As soon as I’m dressed.’

  ‘But you are dressed,’ the spell-queen said.

  Olivia blinked. It was true: She was dressed. How did that happen so quickly? she wondered. And when did I slip into these beaded shoes?

  Olivia looked up in confusion. To her further surprise, the ladies-in-waiting were gone and she was sitting between her mother and father on her parents’ bed. The shock made her woozy.

  ‘I’m not well,’ she gasped. ‘Time is playing the strangest tricks on me.’

  The spell-queen eased her down onto the pillow. ‘Rest. A little sleep will do you good.’

  Olivia pressed her father’s hand against her cheek and drifted off. She dreamed she was in the witch’s world, lying on a rock bed between two demon serpents made of hair and fingernails stuck together with bits of blood and skin.

  Now, do it now, one said.

  The other removed its hand from beneath her cheek and began to remove the pysanka hanging from her neck.

  Olivia woke with a start. She found herself staring into her father’s eyes. There was something strange in the blacks of his pupils: little shavings swimming in their gaze.

  ‘Father?’ She clutched for her pysanka and felt his hand around it. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘N-nothing,’ her spell-father stammered.

  Olivia filled with terror. ‘You’re talking. You’re moving. You’re not my father! You’re—’

  ‘Give us the pysanka!’ her spell-mother shrieked. ‘Give it now or we’ll rip out your throat.’ Her hair shot out in all directions. Her teeth turned to fangs.

  Olivia screamed.

  ‘Not so fast, demon!’ Milo cried. He shot out of the chimney beyond the bed, Ephemia on his shoulder.

  ‘It takes more than jasmine and lemon to mask the scent of Hell!’ Ephemia cried.

  The spell creatures turned from Olivia. The skin fell from their forms. Their limbs disappeared into trunks of swelling sinew. They reared up from the ground like mighty snakes and undulated across the ceiling.

  Milo pressed his back against the broad stone front of the fireplace. He tossed a coal scuttle on his head for a helmet and grabbed a poker and coal shovel from the hearth.

  The snakes dropped on Milo, one after the other. He pierced one with the poker and bashed the other with the shovel. Instantly, they fell apart. The outer bits turned to dust, while the insides shattered into strands of hair and slivers of nail.

  ‘Run!’ Milo yelled.

  Olivia didn’t need to be told twice.

  The pair ran into the corridor after Ephemia.

  ‘To the left,’ the good mouse cried.

  Milo and Olivia turned left and ran past suits of armour. As they passed each suit it sprang to life and gave chase. Soon they were fleeing an army of ghostly warriors.

  ‘Have a ride,’ Milo hollered as they reached the main staircase. He leapt on the marble banister and slid down in a flash.

  ‘Here goes nothing!’ Olivia gulped, speeding after him.

  The suits of armour weren’t so nimble. The first few fell off the rail and crashed below. The others tried the stairs. They tripped and tumbled, clattering down in a twisted ball of chainmail and steel. They lurched to untangle themselves, clunking and clanking in pointless frenzy.

  Meanwhile, Olivia and Milo raced through the palace gates with Ephemia. The dream castle disappeared in smoke, the gardens withered, and the friends found themselves running over rock. They were back in the witch’s underworld, in a cavern as large as nightmare.

  The rock floor sheered off in front of them, falling into a bottomless pit. They turned to run back, but the rock behind them had disappeared. They were on a ledge. It began to break into columns. Lava bubbled beneath. Sulphurous clouds billowed up from the cracks.

  As the columns crumbled, Milo pointed across the chasm. ‘Over there,’ he hollered above the roar. ‘It’s the entrance to the witch’s lair. It’s where she flew me.’

  ‘But how are we to reach it?’ Olivia hollered back.

  ‘We’ll fly!’ Ephemia cried. She opened her throat and roared to her woodland cousins roosting in the cavernous heights.

  A great wind blew down from above. Olivia and Milo looked up to see thousands of bats swarming towards them. A second cry from Ephemia and the winged rodents swooped into rows of a hundred, fifty abreast, five deep.

  ‘They look like flying carpets,’ Olivia marvelled.<
br />
  ‘Hop aboard,’ Ephemia said. ‘Lie flat to spread your weight.’

  Milo let himself fall forward. He rolled over thousands of furry backs.

  Olivia fell, too, Ephemia clinging to her ear. She missed her mark and plummeted towards the molten lava. Her carpet of bats dived after. They spread their wings and whooshed beneath her. Some rubbed their heads on Olivia’s chin in welcome. Then her carpet flew up to join Milo’s. They headed towards the witch’s lair.

  ‘Wait for me!’ called a voice from the mists.

  ‘Leo?’

  ‘I followed you. Spare me,’ he wailed.

  Olivia and Milo gritted their teeth.

  ‘There’s things you do because you have to,’ Ephemia said.

  ‘I know, I know,’ Olivia replied. She said a prayer, as the flying rodents circled back to rescue the puling brat. The bats at the edges of each formation peeled away to form a third flying carpet.

  ‘I’m so grateful,’ Leo wept, once safely aboard.

  ‘See that you stay that way,’ Ephemia sniffed. ‘These bats can fly upside down.’

  There was no more time to talk. They’d crossed the gulf and entered the Dream Witch’s lair.

  In the Dream Witch’s Lair

  The bats flew down a pitch-black corridor. They veered left and right, soared high and low.

  Olivia and Milo kept their eyes closed. It was far more comforting to pretend the passage was well lit, than to witness a flight into nothingness.

  Ephemia felt Olivia’s tension. ‘Never fear,’ she encouraged, ‘our friends see in the dark; the night is their home.’

  Nice words. But with the air whistling in her ears and her hair flying out behind her, Olivia was far from reassured. Her only comfort was that Leo was throwing up behind them; if he’d been in the lead . . .

  ‘Ah, the antechamber to the witch’s quarters,’ Ephemia announced.

  Olivia opened her eyes. She wished she hadn’t. The chamber was carved from the rock in the shape of a mouth. Its walls were lit by flaming skull-pots set into alcoves that glistened like oozing flesh. At the end of the chamber was an iron door crusted with rust and lichens. The latch was shaped like a devil’s head with an open jaw.