Jack Trott was once believed to merely be a thief on the run from the law. He has since been outed as a witch with the power to grow any plant to any size at will, and has shouldered the blame for the death of a Giant due to an unstable beanstalk thirteen years ago and, far more recently, a young huntsman accidentally killed in exactly the same way. Much to his relief, he’s been exonerated of the death of the Giant, who it turns out was actually secretly murdered by huntsmen. He is still, however, very definitely a witch, and did definitely kill that young huntsman, albeit unintentionally. He has apologised to the dead huntsman in question several times now.
Gretel Mudd is not actually a witch at all, it’s just that so many people now think that she is one that in the current climate it’s safer for everybody concerned if she lives out in the Darkwood rather than returning home to her family’s farm in Nearby Village. This is not even remotely an ideal situation for her, as much as she enjoys the company and camaraderie of the witches of the wood. She really wishes she could just go home, and the fact that bits of wet biscuit keep falling on her head only cements that miserable homesickness further.
The cake cottage has two further residents, neither of whom is helping with the buckets, on account of it being physically impossible for them to do so. One is Trevor, a largeish house spider who would be perfectly ordinary, were it not for the fact that he can talk, and enjoys wearing a range of tiny little hats, glasses and false moustaches. The other is the Ghost of Patience Fieldmouse, the aforementioned huntsman accidentally killed by Jack Trott in a beanstalk-related incident, as they were all trying to flee the monstrous Bin Men who prowl the forest every Monday night, taking offerings left outside homes and slaughtering anybody caught wandering after dark. Her death does remain a little bit of a sticking point, but she has at least accepted that it wasn’t deliberate and that Jack was actually trying to help her at the time. To her credit, as underlying causes of housemate grudges go, your own unintentional killing is rather more pertinent than whose turn it is to clean the dishes.
After a lot of running about with buckets, Gretel stands back and assesses the leakage situation.
‘I think this is the best we’re going to manage, for now,’ she says. ‘Buttercup, how did you manage to accidentally cakeify the roof?’
Buttercup sighs. ‘I was trying to fix the Battenberg chimney.’
‘See now, all that answer does is lead to further questions.’
‘I can start growing thatching straw as soon as this rain’s stopped,’ Jack says. ‘Don’t worry, Buttercup, we’ll get it sorted.’
‘I’m pretty good at thatching,’ adds Gretel, with a touch of pride. ‘Did you guys see the pig shed’s roof on Liberation Day? I did that myself.’
There is a muted chorus of slightly bored ‘yes’s. The Liberation Day she refers to is the day that the witches and beasties of the Darkwood teamed up with the residents of Nearby to turn a large occupying battalion of huntsmen out of the village. There had been a party afterwards, and Gretel had shown the witches around her home village during their brief visit to her much-missed old stomping ground. That was just over two weeks ago now, and she’s still going on about it.
There is a bang, and the door is kicked open.
Buttercup sighs indulgently. ‘Are you ever going to knock, Snow?’
Snow smiles fondly at Buttercup as she clanks wetly in. The rivulets of rain dripping off her armour and the liberal spray of water from seven hairy Dwarves shaking themselves dry quickly coat the cottage’s interior and leave its residents with a damp sheen and a sinking sensation that they really needn’t have bothered with all those buckets after all.
‘Rainy out,’ announces Snow.
‘Yes, we noticed.’
Snow eyes up the buckets. ‘Surprised that Trott hasn’t just grown a big waterproof canopy of ferns or something over the whole house, to be honest.’
Jack tuts, annoyed. ‘Trousers. I didn’t think of that.’
Gretel steps towards Snow, with an air of impatience. ‘You brought your dad?’
Snow lets Gretel help set the Mirror down on the kitchen table. ‘Yes, if only to shut you up about it. What’s for lunch?’
Oh yes – the Mirror is magic, can show anything within the land of Myrsina as long as the request is made in rhyme, and contains the soul of Snow’s dead father.
Buttercup looks at all of her pots and pans currently littering the soggy kitchen floor. ‘I’ll try to magic us up a nice pie.’
‘And Snow and her dad can tell us the whole “what’s going on” of it all,’ says Gretel, wiping the Mirror dry.
‘The rest of the forest in general’s doing pretty well,’ Snow tells them, taking a seat and propping her feet up on the table. ‘The few beasties that were injured fighting for the village are all healing up nicely. No huntsmen scout parties to report, either. Looks like what we did in Nearby put a stop to that.’
‘For now,’ adds Patience. ‘I know what they’re like. They’re persistent. They’ll be back.’
‘Yes, well, that’s the sort of thing we can check with the Mirror, isn’t it?’ says Gretel. She levels a meaningful gaze at Snow. ‘Let’s see how things are in the Citadel and whether it isn’t about time for… the other thing…?’
‘There’s another thing?’ Trevor asks excitedly, abseiling down on a line of web from rafter to table. ‘What other thing… Ooh! Is it a princess thing?’
‘Trevor…’ warns Snow.
‘Are you going to reclaim your rightful place of the throne? With a big ceremony where the whole country bows down to you while you stand on a big rock or something?’
‘Trevor.’
‘And then there’ll be a masked ball and I’ll go in disguise and all the ladies will be like “who is that dashing man?” And I’ll be all “ha ha! It’s me! Trevor the spider and not a man at all!”’
‘Trevor. Calm down. There’ll be no throne-reclaiming…’ Snow pauses, watching the expressions of the others. ‘Well, not for now at least, we’ve still got a lot to do before we can even contemplate that.’
‘But we can at least get the wheels in motion?’ Gretel prompts.
‘The “other thing” has wheels?’ Trevor asks. ‘This sounds exciting! Tell me what it is! Tellmetellmetellme…’
Snow rolls her eyes. ‘Go on then, New Girl, since you’re so keen.’
‘Snow was talking about an excursion north, to the mountains,’ Gretel tells them. ‘Try to get the wolf and bear witches on board before any kind of push against the Citadel.’
The mood in the room suddenly becomes much more uneasy.
‘Ah,’ says Trevor, ‘so… sorry, where do the wheels come in with this incredibly dangerous idea?’
‘Getaway cart, I hope,’ replies Jack.
‘Have none of you ever been north, at all?’ Gretel asks. ‘Jack? Snow? Buttercup?’
‘What’s that, dear?’ asks Buttercup, coming back into the kitchen, holding a rather sad-looking quiche. ‘Sorry, I was trying to do a pie, it just went a bit wrong.’
‘You’ve been out here the longest,’ says Gretel to Buttercup. ‘You ever met any of the witches in the northern territory?’