The Little Witch

by Otfried Preussler

  “Your brother Krax need not worry,” said the little Witch. “Fly back and give him my kind regards. Tell him to hurry here and let me know if the boys climb the elm to get at his nest. I’ll get rid of these scamps for him!”

  “Will you really?” cried Abraxas. “You are a good witch, anyone can see that! The Head Witch will be pleased with you! I’ll fly and tell Krax and his wife at once.”

  Several days passed and nothing happened. The little Witch forgot all about the two nest robbers. But one afternoon towards the end of the week brother Krax came flying breathlessly up.

  “They’ve come, they’ve come!” he began croaking even before he arrived. “Come quickly, little Witch, before it’s too late!”

  The little Witch had just been grinding coffee, but she put the coffee mill down on the kitchen table at once, ran for her broomstick and flew like the wind to the duckpond. The brothers Krax and Abraxas could hardly keep up with her, she flew over the wood so fast.

  By this time the two boys were high up on the old elm tree. They could almost reach the raven’s nest.

  Mrs Krax was crouching over her eggs, trembling.

  “Hey there, you two!” cried the little Witch. “What are you doing there? Come down!”

  The two boys were frightened. But when they saw it was only a little old woman calling up to them, one of them put his tongue out at the little Witch and the other made a face at her.

  “Come down, I tell you!” the little Witch warned them. “Or you’ll be in trouble!”

  But the two boys just laughed at her. “Come and get us, if you can!” one of them answered rudely. “We’ll stay sitting up here as long as we like. Yah!”

  “Very well!” said the little Witch. “You’re welcome to stay up there!”

  And she cast a spell to make the two nest robbers stick fast. They could climb neither up nor down. They stayed clinging just where they were, as if rooted to the spot.

  Now Abraxas and Krax and Mrs Krax attacked the boys with their beaks and claws. They nipped and pecked and scratched them until they were sore all over. The egg robbers began to cry out in despair. Their cries for help were so loud and miserable that half the village heard the noise and came to the duckpond.

  “What’s going on, for heaven’s sake?” asked the people in alarm. “Why, just look, it’s Fritz the tailor’s son and Sepp the cobbler’s son! Were they going to rob the raven’s nest, I wonder? Well, it serves them right. They’ve got what they deserve. What do they have to go climbing trees and stealing eggs for?”

  No one felt sorry for them. The only odd thing, so people thought, was that Fritz and Sepp didn’t make their escape. Even when the ravens at last left them alone they stayed perched up on the tree.

  “Come down, you two heroes!” called the villagers.

  “We can’t!” wailed Fritz the tailor’s son, and Sepp the cobbler’s son sobbed, “Boo-hoo, we’re stuck! We can’t get down.”

  In the end the fire brigade had to turn out. The firemen put tall ladders up and brought down the two wretched boys. And in fact the fire brigade was successful only because the little Witch had released Fritz and Sepp from the spell just in time.

  The Witches’ Council

  The witches’ year was coming slowly to an end. Walpurgis Night drew nearer and nearer. Things were getting serious for the little Witch now. She was giving everything she had learnt a thorough revision these days. Once again she went through the Book of Witchcraft, page by page. She had her witchcraft at her fingertips.

  Three days before Walpurgis Night Aunt Rumpumpel came riding along. She climbed down out of her black cloud to say, “The Head Witch has told me to come and summon you before the Witches’ Council. The test is at midnight the day after tomorrow. You’re to be at the crossroads behind the red stone on the heath. However, if you’ve thought better of it, you don’t have to come …”

  “But I’ve got nothing to worry about!” said the little Witch.

  “Who knows?” replied the witch shrugging her shoulders. “It might be wiser to stay at home, all the same. I’d willingly make your excuses to the Head Witch.”

  “Yes, I’m sure you would!” said the little Witch. “But I’m not so stupid as you think. You can’t frighten me.”

  “There’s no helping those who won’t take advice!” said Aunt Rumpumpel. “Well, till the day after tomorrow, then.”

  Abraxas the raven would very much have liked to go with the little Witch this time. But he had no business at the Witches’ Council. He had to stay at home. When the little Witch set off he wished her the best of luck.

  “Don’t be nervous!” he called as they parted. “You’ve been a good witch, that’s the main thing.”

  The little Witch reached the crossroads behind the red stone on the heath at the stroke of twelve. The Witches’ Council was already assembled. Besides the Head Witch, there was a wind-witch, a wood-witch, a mist-witch, and one each of all the other kinds of witches. The storm-witches had sent Aunt Rumpumpel.

  But the little Witch was not afraid. She was sure of herself. She’ll burst with rage when I pass the test and join the dance on the Brocken mountain tomorrow, she thought.

  “Let’s begin,” said the Head Witch. “Let’s see what the little Witch has learned.”

  So each in turn the witches set her exercises – calling up winds, and thunder, making the red stone on the heath disappear, conjuring up hail and rain. They were not particularly difficult tasks. The little Witch was never once at a loss. Even when Aunt Rumpumpel told her, “Cast the spell on page three hundred and twenty-four in the Book of Witchcraft!” she was not stuck for a moment. She knew the Book of Witchcraft inside out.

  “By all means!” she said calmly, and she cast the spell on page three hundred and twenty-four in the Book of Witchcraft – it was a thunderstorm with flashes of lightning.

  “That will do!” said the Head Witch. “You’ve shown us that you can cast spells. So in future I will let you join the dance on Walpurgis Night, although you’re still rather young. Do any of the witches disagree?”

  The other witches agreed with her. But Aunt Rumpumpel replied, “I do.”

  “What’s your objection?” asked the Head Witch. “Aren’t you satisfied with her knowledge of witchcraft then?”

  “No, it’s not that,” said Aunt Rumpumpel. “But she’s a bad witch all the same. I can prove it!” She took a notebook out of her apron pocket. “I’ve been watching her secretly all the year. I’ve written down the things she did. I’ll read them out.”

  “You’re welcome to read them out!” cried the little Witch. “I’ve nothing to fear if it’s not all a pack of lies!”

  “That remains to be seen!” said Aunt Rumpumpel. Then she read aloud to the Witches’ Council what the little Witch had done during the year. She told them how she had helped the women picking up firewood, and how she had taught the mean forester a lesson. And she told the stories of the flower girl, the driver of the cart with the beer barrels, and the chestnut man too. She told them about Corbinian the ox, whose life the little Witch had saved, and about the snowman and the boys who stole birds’ eggs.

  “Don’t forget the tile-maker!” said the little Witch. “I taught him a lesson too!”

  She had expected Aunt Rumpumpel to take great pains to run her down. Instead, she was reading only her good deeds out of the notebook.

  “Is this true?” asked the Head Witch after each story.

  “Yes, it’s quite true!” said the little Witch – and she felt proud of it.

  In her pleasure, she never noticed that the Head Witch was putting her question in a sterner voice each time. Nor did she see the other witches shaking their heads more and more seriously. So she was terribly startled when the Head Witch suddenly cried in horror, “And to think I very nearly let her dance on the Brocken mountain tomorrow night! Ugh! Ratsbane! What a bad witch!”

  “But why?” asked the little Witch in surprise. “I never did anything but good magic
.”

  “Exactly!” spat the Head Witch. “The only good witches are those who do bad magic all the time! But you kept on doing good things. You’re a bad witch.”

  “And what’s more,” Aunt Rumpumpel told them, “what’s more, she once cast spells on a Friday! She did it behind closed shutters, to be sure, but I was watching down the chimney.”

  “What!” cried the Head Witch. “This is the last straw!”

  She seized the little Witch in her bony fingers and pulled her hair. At that all the other witches fell on the poor thing with wild shrieks and beat her with their broomsticks. They would have beaten the little Witch till she was crooked and lame, if the Head Witch hadn’t called, after a while, “That’s enough now! I know a better punishment for her. You shall collect the wood for the witches’ bonfire on the Brocken mountain,” she told the little Witch spitefully. “All by yourself. By midnight tomorrow you must have the bonfire built. Then we shall tie you to a tree nearby, and you shall stand and watch the rest of us dancing all night long!”

  “And when we’ve had a dance or two,” suggested Aunt Rumpumpel, “we’ll go and tear the hairs from her head. One by one! That will be fun – we shall enjoy that! She won’t forget this Walpurgis Night for a long time.”

  She Who Laughs Last …

  “Miserable raven that I am!” groaned good old Abraxas when the little Witch had told him what had happened at the crossroads behind the red stone on the heath. “It’s my fault, all my fault! I was the one who told you to keep doing good magic. Oh, if only I could at least help you!”

  “I must do it by myself,” said the little Witch. “I’m not sure how just yet … But I shan’t let myself be tied to a tree, I know that much!”

  She ran indoors and took the Book of Witchcraft out of the table drawer. She began turning the pages fast.

  “Will you take me with you?” asked Abraxas.

  “Where?”

  “To the Brocken mountain! I don’t want to leave you alone tonight.”

  “All right,” said the little Witch. “I’ll take you with me. But only on one condition; you must keep your beak shut now and not disturb me.”

  Abraxas kept quiet.

  The little Witch buried herself in the Book of Witchcraft. From time to time she muttered something. The raven didn’t understand, but he took care not to ask questions.

  This went on until evening. Then the little Witch stood up and said, “I’ve got it now! Let’s ride to the Brocken mountain!”

  As yet there was no sign of the other witches on the Brocken mountain. They had to wait for the hour of midnight before they could mount their broomsticks and ride there. That was the custom for witches on Walpurgis Night.

  The little Witch sat down on top of the mountain and stretched her legs out in front of her.

  “Aren’t you going to start?” asked Abraxas.

  “Start?” said the little Witch. “Start what?”

  “Collecting wood! Aren’t you supposed to be building a bonfire?”

  “Plenty of time!” said the little Witch, smiling.

  “But there’s only an hour left before midnight,” replied Abraxas. “It’s just struck eleven down in the valley.”

  “It can strike half past too,” said the little Witch. “Don’t worry, the bonfire will be ready on time.”

  “Let’s hope so!” croaked Abraxas.

  The little Witch’s calm was beginning to make him feel uneasy. If only everything turned out all right!

  Down in the valley it struck half-past eleven.

  “Hurry up!” Abraxas urged her. “Only half an hour left.”

  “Quarter of an hour is long enough for me,” she answered obstinately.

  When it struck quarter to twelve, she sprang to her feet. “Now to collect the wood!” she cried, and she repeated a magic spell.

  They came flying up from all directions, cracking and snapping and clattering. They fell helter-skelter, piling up on top of each other into a heap.

  “Aha!” cried Abraxas. “What do I see? Aren’t those broomsticks?”

  “Yes, they’re broomsticks – they’re the big witches’ broomsticks! I’m casting a spell to bring them all to the Brocken. And that one, the long one there, is the Head Witch’s broomstick.”

  “What – what does it mean?” asked Abraxas the raven in alarm.

  “I’m going to set fire to them,” said the little Witch. “They’ll burn well, don’t you think? But I still need paper for the fire.”

  She repeated a second spell.

  Now a rushing and blustering noise rose in the air. They came flying over the woods to the mountain top, like troops of giant bats, beating their wings.

  “Come along!” cried the little Witch. “Quick! Up on the pile of broomsticks.”

  They were the big witches’ Books of Witchcraft. The little Witch had ordered them to fly to the Brocken.

  “What are you doing!” croaked Abraxas. “The big witches will kill you!”

  “I don’t think so,” said the little Witch, and she recited a third spell.

  This was the most powerful spell of all. It took away all the big witches’ witchcraft. Not one of them could work magic any more. And as they had lost their Books of Witchcraft too, they would never be able to learn it again.

  Down in the valley midnight struck.

  “There!” cried the little Witch happily. “Now we’ll begin! Hurrah for Walpurgis Night!”

  She set fire to the broomsticks and the Books of Witchcraft with the firework she had bought from Jacob Cheapjack.

  It was the most beautiful bonfire you can imagine. The flames shot up towards the sky, hissing and crackling.

  And the little Witch, alone with Abraxas the raven, danced round the blazing bonfire till morning. Now she was the only witch in the world who could work magic. Yesterday the other witches had laughed at her. It was her turn now.

  “Walpurgis Night!” the little Witch cried happily on top of the Brocken. “Hurrah for Walpurgis Night!”

  OTFRIED PREUSSLER (1923–2013) was born into a family of teachers in Reichenberg, Czechoslovakia, and as a boy loved listening to the folktales of the region. Drafted into the army during World War II, Preussler was captured in 1944 and spent the next five years as a prisoner of war in the Tatar Republic. After his release, he moved to Bavaria and became a primary-­school teacher and principal, supplementing his income by working as a reporter for a local newspaper and by writing scripts for children’s radio. One of the most popular authors for children in Germany, Preussler was twice awarded the German Children’s Book Prize. His many books have been translated into fifty-five languages and have sold over fifty million copies. New York Review Books also publishes Preussler’s Krabat & the Sorcerer’s Mill and The Little Water Sprite and will publish The Robber Hotzenplotz in 2016.

  ANTHEA BELL is a translator from the German, French, and Danish, and the winner of the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, the Helen and Kurt Wolff Prize, and, three times over, the Marsh Award for Children’s Literature in Translation. She has translated Asterix, Hans Christian Andersen, Cornelia Funke, Kerstin Gier, W. G. Sebald, Sigmund Freud, and several novels by Otfried Preussler.

  WINNIE GEBHARDT-GAYLER (1929–2014) was a German illustrator who was a frequent collaborator with Otfried Preussler.