Ebonie Woodhead is NOT a Witch! – opening
Chapter 1.
It was that strange time on Sunday when Monday’s shadow was starting to blacken the edges of everything. Sassie Selander was standing by the edge of Dappleden Pond, throwing little stones with all her might so that they splashed into the dark water. It was a bit tricky to throw them too far, as she had on her new, thick winter coat that she’d got for Christmas, just a few weeks before. It wasn’t the one that she’d wanted, with the fake fur at the collars and cuffs, and the fancy logo on the arm, but at least it was the right shade of blue, the one she specially liked, at least her parents had got that bit right.
She bent down to the frosty ground, silvered slightly with a fine dusting of snow, and chose another two small, rough stones. Standing up straight, she threw one of them with all her pent-up frustration and aggression into the water. School tomorrow. Another day of being invisible, another day of slow-motion clocks and giggles behind her. The stone made a satisfying splosh and little white ribbons of water sprayed up around it as it sank. She started to pull her arm back to send the other cold, damp stone flying.
“You don’t want to be doing that dear.”
Startled, Sassie dropped her arm, clutching the small stone tight in her fist, and spun round.
“Wh-what?” she said.
“Throwing stones. Not here, not now. Not a good idea.” The voice belonged to a wild-haired old lady, her woolly hat doing a not-very-good job of keeping her yellowy-white hair under control. Her eyes were the brightest, bluest and most unsettling that Sassie had ever looked into – and it did feel that she was looking into them rather than at them, like looking down into a kaleidoscope, into endless sparkled tunnels.
Sassie forced herself to look away from those eyes. Recovering a little from the shock of the unexpected voice, she stood as straight as she could and put on the toughest voice she could muster: “Are you going to tell me there is some sort of old and dusty law about throwing stones into Dappleden Pond on a Sunday? In January?”
The old lady shook her head and gave a very thin smile. “No law dear, but still, you don’t want to be doing that.” Sassie thought she recognised her. Ebonie Woodhead. Wasn’t that her name? She lived in what was little more than a shed, out by Wallowfere Lake somewhere, hidden in the trees. People said she knew things. People also said she ate frogs, and not just the legs.
“Why then?” asked Sassie.
“Cold today, isn’t it?” asked Ebonie Woodhead back to her, seeming to ignore her question, looking from side to side, taking in the ice-grey winter landscape.
“Bit,” nodded Sassie, following the old lady’s gaze.
“So cold, in fact, that there’s snow, the ground is hard-frost and there’s ice about – even the edges of Wallowfere have frozen over.” The old lady stopped talking, as if that might explain things, and looked back to Sassie briefly before gazing out over the pond, she seemed to be looking for something.
Annoyed, Sassie thrust her hands into her pockets, releasing the small stone as she did so. It really was a very cold day. “And?” she snapped.
“And have you considered why, when even Wallowfere is starting to ice over, that this little spit-of-water pond is still all water with no sign of freezing?”
“I…” began Sassie, but stopped as she thought about it, and had to admit, it was rather strange that Dappleden Pond wasn’t frozen.
“So,” Ebonie Woodhead carried on, “if I were a young girl like you, and I was out here all on my own, I wouldn’t be throwing stones into that water, on a day like today. Lord knows what you might hit with one of those little stones. Lord knows what you might disturb.”
“What, some big old fish?” said Sassie, more bravely than she felt, as the situation and the old lady were starting to unnerve her slightly.
“No, not a fish,” said the blue-eyed lady, “not a fish by a long stretch.”
“What then?”
The old lady really stared at her then with those kaleidoscope eyes glittering in the pale winter sun. She seemed to be contemplating something, but then she turned around and started to walk away, and as she did so, she looked back over her shoulder at Sassie, and just said,
“Go home. Before you find out.”
Chapter 2.
Up on the Beacon, the wind was starting to blow. It wasn’t snowing now, but the wind was making the snow on the ground dance and twirl a little. There was a biting chill in the air, but the cold ache in his bones was still several degrees cooler. The strikingly tall man pulled his old patchwork-jacket close around him and narrowed his eyes. They weren’t what they were, but he could make out the two figures far below him by Dappleden Pond. One was Ebonie Woodhead, who ought to know better, and the other…the other was a girl, a girl he hadn’t ever seen before, but he knew. He knew by the way she held herself, the way she straightened up and spoke back to Ebonie Woodhead. He knew by the feeling he got at the back of his neck. Yes, she was the one. The one they had come to take. Now would be a good time, now that Ebonie Woodhead was walking away, leaving the girl on her own, there by the pond. And yet… he hesitated.
“We goin’ a-hunting?” came a rasping voice by his side. He looked down at his unwelcome companion with distaste.
“Why so eager?” the tall, patchwork-jacketed man asked
“Gots me a hunger on,” the shorter figure sniffed, pig-like and ugly, “and fresh-whetted slicers. Keen to blood ‘em. Don’t mean to tarry.” He spoke in sharp, dicing little breaths. “Is we then? Goin’ a-hunting? Goin’ a-reaping”
The tall man sighed, very gently, and shook his head, watching Sassie walk away.
“Not today. Today is, I regret to have to tell you, not a day ripe for reaping. You must be patient my eager little fellow.”
The small one spat on the ground in disgust.
“Soons though. Thirsting I am. Needs it. Needs it bad.”
“What you really need,” replied the taller one, sniffing, “if you don’t mind me mentioning it, is a bath.”
“HEE!” There was a surprisingly high-pitched whine of a laugh and the small one looked up. “Hads me a bath last year. I rubbed and I scrubbed and I blew the soap down. Don’t never do no good. It’s all part of me special charms. Aintcha used to it yet?”
“I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it, Peppersalt. Not ever.” The tall man’s eyes were drawn back to Ebonie Woodhead. It had been a long time since they had met, and her reputation had grown over the years. He watched as she walked away from the pond. How he wished he could walk so easily away from the odious little character by his side. Regrettably, however, Nailpot Peppersalt was an unfortunate burden that he needed to carry for the foreseeable future. A curse was a curse.
Chapter 3.
Ebonie Woodhead felt it as she walked home, along the path back towards Wallowfere and her tiny house. She felt a tingle in her fingertips, and a whispering in her heart. There was something about that girl, something special, something powerful. What if this was the one she’d been waiting for, all these years? But then, right before she turned into the woods, she felt an uncomfortable prickling at the back of her neck, under the chain of the silver necklace that she never took off. She turned around and looked up, at the Beacon, high above. She saw two figures there, it was difficult to make them out in the dull greyness and the bits of snow blowing around, but although she couldn’t see who they were, she knew what they were. And what they were was not good news for either herself or the young girl she had just met.
Chapter 4.
Sassie hadn’t run home. Not really. She’d just walked very, very quickly, her new coat zipped up tight against the wind, her hood close around her face. By the time she’d arrived home she was quite hot and sweaty, her cheeks flushed and warm.
“Is that you Sass?” her mother called from the kitchen.
Sassie sighed. Why did her parents always ask that whenever she got in through the door. Who on earth else was it going to be? It was only her and them. Oh, and the dog, but Morris didn’t have a key.
“No.” she answered, kicking off her boots and slipping out of her jacket. Morris came running to greet her. “Hey Mo-Mo,” she smiled, kneeling down to let him lick her hand as she ruffled the back of his neck.
“You haven’t just left your boots higgledy-piggledy in the hallway have you?” called out her mother.
“No,” she called back, tidying the higgledy-piggledy boots away. “What’s for dinner?” she asked.
“Dad’s doing it tonight, so don’t get your hopes up.”
“Hey!” came her father’s voice, and she could hear her mother chuckle slightly.
When she went into the kitchen she could see her mum sitting at the kitchen table, reading, and her dad standing at the stove, looking a little stressed, the counter by the side of the stove was covered in bits of strange vegetable odds and ends and peelings and gratings. They may annoy her at times, and they may get her Christmas present wrong, and they may embarrass her by holding hands at the supermarket and kissing in public way more than she thought appropriate, but there was no doubt that this was home. This was where she felt safe, and warm and happy. The only place she ever really felt that, these days.
“It’s actually going to be fried courgette, tomato omelette and a nice side salad” he said, blowing a kiss towards her. “Did you have a good walk?”
Sassie wandered over next to her dad and peeked at what was in the pan. It looked sort of okay.
“Yeah,” she nodded. “You know, that almost looks edible.”
He bumped her with his hip, “Rude,” he said, with a smile in his eyes.
“You’ve got me to thank for that,” said her mum, looking up from her book, “He was going to try that awful goat stew he made before.”
Sassie pulled a face. “Ugh. Not that thing from the cooking show?”
“It was okay last time,” her dad said, sounding slightly hurt.
“Sam, it was the most disgusting thing I have ever tasted in my life,” her mother said, shutting her book and winking at Sassie.
“Okay, maybe it didn’t look quite as good as on the TV, and perhaps I went a bit overboard with the chilis, but it wasn’t that bad.”
“Sorry Dad, but it was that bad. I don’t know where you got the goat meat from, but it must’ve been from a very small and skinny goat, as it was mainly bones,” said Sassie, as her mother guffawed, “it was like sucking on little gristle lollipops.”
“Hmmph,” hmmphed her dad and went back to his pans.
“You were back quicker than I thought you would be,” said her mum, “was it too cold out?”
“Naaa…” said Sassie, picking out a bit of cucumber from the salad already prepared on the table. “But, I was wondering, I was down at Dappleden Pond, and I was wondering why it wasn’t frozen, when it’s so cold out. Even parts of Wallowfere are frozen, I hear.”
“Oh,” said her mother, “I suppose that is a bit odd. It’s not that big, is it?”
“No,” said Sassie sitting down at the table and picking up the book her mum had been reading, The Gatekeeper.
“Another romance Mum?” smiled Sassie, crunching on her cucumber.
Her mother winked at her again, “Bit saucy, this one. I think I might make your father read it.”
Sassie wrinkled her nose in distaste. “But the pond though…”
“Ah,” said her father, looking over his shoulder from the stove. “Hot thermal spring, deep down, water’s too hot to freeze.” He said this in his deeply authoritative voice, which always made Sassie suspicious.
“Did you just make that up?” she asked, reaching for a tomato from the salad bowl.
“Of course he did,” laughed her mother, slapping her thighs as she sat back in her chair. “He doesn’t know a blessed thing about ponds or thermal springs or geography. Do you darling?”
“Not a thing,” he agreed, “But it sounds reasonable, doesn’t it?”
It did sound reasonable, thought Sassie, but there was something in the way that Ebonie Woodhead had looked at her earlier, something about the tone of her voice, that made her think that there was nothing reasonable about why Dappleden Pond wasn’t frozen on the coldest day of the winter.
“Do you want to try a bit of this courgette, see if it’s done?” asked her father.
“No!” both Sassie and her mother said at the same time, and laughed.
“I’ll try it on Morris then,” he said, “He appreciated my goat stew, at least.”
“Sam, Morris is a dog, of course he liked something that was basically a big plate of bones,” his wife replied.
“And besides, Morris licks other dog’s bottoms,” put in Sassie, “he isn’t really a great judge of flavour.”
“Precisely,” said Becky, “Your daughter and I have slightly more refined palates than bones and bottoms.”
“He mainly just sniffs them,” said Sassie’s dad, sighing, “he’s a good boy though. Morris understands me.”
Becky Selander just raised her eyes heavenward as her husband spoke, and then looked over to Sassie.
“Actually, now that I think about it, I do remember some sort of story about Dappleden Pond, something my grandmother used to say. Oh, what was it now…?”
Sassie sat up straight in her chair and leaned towards her mother. “Go on, what?” she asked encouragingly. Her mother closed her eyes and frowned. She was quiet for a moment, and then:
“Something about…dark water, deep secrets. I think some children had gone missing there when she was young, something horrible like that, she always used to warn me about going there. My mother told me not to listen to her, that she was just being melodramatic.”
“Ha!” exclaimed Sassie’s dad. Sassie’s mum’s eyes narrowed slightly as she looked over at the back of her husband’s head.
“What?” she asked. Sam shook his head.
“Your mother accusing someone of being melodramatic. It just strikes me as being somewhat…amusing.” He looked over his shoulder from the stove to his wife and gave her a cheeky smile, “Don’t you think?”
“Oh, go and stick a courgette in it.”
“How long before dinner?” Sassie asked, “Have I got time to do a little homework?”
“Judging by the mess that your father is making over there, and that ominous smell of faint burning–”
“Oops!” interrupted Sassie’s father, turning down the heat on the pan.
“–I’d say we’d be lucky if we got this for breakfast tomorrow morning, but it might well taste better with age,” continued her mother, “give the omelette time to solidify.”
“If you’re not careful,” warned her husband, “You’ll be getting a double-helping. No, it’ll probably be another twenty minutes or so love, so you go and do what you need to.”
So Sassie did. And what she needed to do was not homework, but she was really curious about what her mother had said about “dark water, deep secrets”, so she went up to her room, lay on her bed, put on her headphones, started her current favourite playlist and searched on the Internet for something horrible that had happened at Dappleden Pond years ago.
The odd thing was, that when she typed in “Dappleden Pond” and “Missing Children”, the first search result that popped up was an image. A photo of Ebonie Woodhead.