Miss Cast and the Headhamster

Lindsey Mountford

 

CHAPTER ONE

Gone with the Wand

 

You might have suspected your teacher is a witch, but has she ever actually turned your class into a room full of frogs?

Mine did.

That's because she's High Sorceress Cassandra Cast, Wickedest Witch, Wizard-Killer and Merciless Minion-Slayer. Except I call her Miss Cast, and that's because as well as being the queen of all evil witches, she's also my Primary Three teacher.

This is how it happened.

It all started one Tuesday morning. Our usual teacher Mrs. Dodson hadn't turned up, and I was feeding celery to the class hamster when the headmaster strode in (without knocking, very rude). Behind him was a lady we hadn't seen before.

"Class, sit up straight and pay attention,” Mr. Humphrey barked, his eyes like two cold pearls wobbling in an oyster shell. “This is your new teacher, Miss Cast. I expect you all on your best behavior for her first day. Silence. Listening. Full marks on tests. One hundred percent effort at all times."

Miss Cast nodded eagerly, her hands clasped together as she listened intently. I quite liked the look of her, but then anything had to be better than old Mrs. Dodson, who was probably about nine hundred and seemed to be able to suck the life and soul out of every kid she ever taught. Here’s why:

1) She was so boring, she fell asleep during her own lessons (we suspected).

2) She had glasses so thick that you could never tell where she was looking, or even if her eyes were open (see point 1).

3) Whenever she fell asleep, at first we would all get a bit scared she had died and nobody wanted to touch her shoulder to see if she was alive, so we all sat frozen in fear until she started snoring and we could all breathe a sigh of relief.

 

"What happened to Mrs. Dodson?" I said, suddenly worried.

"Trust you to be the first to shame Bishop Bumford Elementary, Gareth Michaels, raise your hand if you want to ask a question. As I was about to explain, Mrs. Dodson rather suddenly decided to fulfil her lifelong dream of climbing Mount Everest, and her letter of resignation was on my desk this morning. I wasn't aware she had this ambition, and she really should have given us more notice, but there you are. Luckily, Miss Cast arrived just ten minutes ago, looking for a teaching position. Now no more of your impertinent questions - and congratulations, you've just earned yourself a detention."

 I grunted and sank lower in my chair. Mr. Humphrey and I hadn't got on since last year's end-of-term egg and spoon race, when he gave the golden spoon to Brian Baxter, even though I WAS TOTALLY DEFINITELY THE RIGHTFUL WINNER and Brian had his thumb on the egg PRACTICALLY THE WHOLE RACE AND EVERYONE KNEW IT. Since that fateful day, both Brian and Mr. Humphrey’s were my sworn enemies, and I was biding my time waiting for the day when the sweet taste of revenge would be mine.

"Miss Cast, I'm afraid that this is your class," Mr. Humphrey continued, waving his hand over our heads. "I apologize in advance. They’re a sorry-looking bunch, I know. Eight year-olds are the worst," he said with a shudder. "And there are a lot of rotten apples in this crop. That one is trouble," he said, nodding towards scowling Brian. "That one is a crybaby," he said, pointing to Betty, who promptly burst into tears. "And that one is an insufferable little know-it-all," he said pointing at Alicia, who turned pink at the ears.

"And as for that one with the scruffy black hair sticking up all over the place… the one with the impudent look in his eye," Mr. Humphrey said, turning to me. "He's the worst one of all. Watch him like a hawk. Nasty temper. Very sore loser. No respect for authority. You might as well have a ticking time bomb in the back row letting him sit at the back like that. Gareth, come here and swap with Alicia."

“Thanks, Mr. Humphrey!” I said, sitting in front of him while a sulky Alicia took over my back corner chair. What he didn’t know was that Kevin had been sent to the front as punishment for talking to me the day before, so now we were sitting beside each other again.

“Impudence, I’m sure of it,” Mr. Humphrey muttered, but he didn’t know why I looked so happy and I wasn’t about to explain. "Miss Cast – don’t say I didn’t warn you. And I hardly need tell you that in this school, I expect discipline at all times."

"Crivens! There's an awful lot to remember," said Miss Cast. "And I haven't even started learning all their names. Are there always this many in one class? Can’t we send a few home to make the numbers a bit more manageable?" 

"If only, Miss Cast, if only. Don't trouble yourself with names, all you need to remember is that rules must be obeyed and regulations enforced. My word is law, and I always have final say. That's the way we do things at Bishop Bumford Primary. All clear?"

"Oh, absolutely," Miss Cast said, her face shining. "I love rules and discipline."

"Good. We don't allow weakness to interfere with a productive working atmosphere. No games. No laughter. No nonsense."

"Certainly not," said Miss Cast, shaking her head enthusiastically. So enthusiastically, that a long, thin stick of wood fell from her sleeve and onto the ground with a clatter.

"What's this, Miss Cast?" the headmaster asked, bending down.

"Oh, it's nothing, it's just, my erm..."

She twitched as he picked it up. "Aaaah, it's been a long time since I saw one of these," he said, stroking the smooth wood lovingly. "Bit of a funny shape though, isn't it? I prefer my canes a bit thicker, and not so pointy at the end. More bite that way. Back in my day, we had one in every classroom. I like your thinking, Miss Cast. I can tell already we'll get along. It was a very sad day for the state of education when the cane was banned in schools. Doesn't mean we can't have a little fun though, eh?"

"No, don't!" Miss Cast yelled, grabbing it as Mr. Humphrey brandished the stick.

"You can't tell me what to do, Miss Cast!" he shouted, just as the stick came slamming down, pointing straight at where I was sitting in the front row.

It was the strangest thing, but I could have sworn I saw the stick light up just as it was swooshing through the air. Like a birthday candle, it shone at the end. Like a sparkler, it left a glowing path where the end sliced a semicircle.

But finally, like a gun, the stick shot out something bright and hot that hit me smack bang in the middle of the forehead.

Everything suddenly went purple… and then all was black.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER TWO

Miss Cast Nearly Snaps

 

It's always a bit of a worry to have a new teacher, but especially so when you open your eyes after being hit in the head by a purple lightning bolt and you see:

1. a) Warts on her nose and chin where there were none before.
2. b) The nose and chin now covered in warts are also green, as is the rest of her face.
3. c) Instead of the pink cardigan and skirt from before, she's now wearing a black dress and a cape.
4. d) The hair piled on top of her head is wriggling as if it's 
5. e) On top of the wriggling hair is a pointy black hat.

 

Thoughts jumbled in my head like socks in a washing machine as I tried to work out what just happened.

I looked around – nobody else was in costume. It was January, nowhere near Halloween. And I distinctly remembered that only moments ago, she had looked about as interesting and exciting as a bathroom sponge.

"Do you notice anything weird about Miss Cast?" I whispered to Kevin.

"She seems pretty boring to me," he replied with a yawn. “It’s not like she’s got two heads. She’s not taking us on a school trip to Mars. What’s so special about her?”

Really? Didn't he see the cauldron in the corner and the broomstick propped up against the stationery cupboard? The wriggling hair, the warts, the pointy black hat?

But before I could whisper back, Mr. Humphrey was in our faces.

“Gareth! What did I just say about rules and discipline? It’s not even been two minutes and there you are openly flouting my authority, whispering and snickering like Bishop Bumford Primary is your personal playground and that we’re here for your entertainment.”

“What does ‘flouting’ mean?” I asked calmly.

“And that’s another detention, right there. You can kiss goodbye to after-school football this whole week, young man.”

Normally, I would have bounced something else right back at him to put off lessons for as long as possible, but Miss Cast’s wriggling hair was distracting me.

Why could nobody else see what I saw?

Fair enough if Kevin didn’t notice anything, he was always daydreaming and could never concentrate on anything that didn’t involve space travel, but nobody else, not even brainiac Alicia had said a word. And trust me, she would have been the first to stick her hand up in the air and voice her opinion.

“My apologies, Miss Cast, I told you he was particularly rotten apple. I'll come back later to check how things are going," said Mr. Humphrey and he left us alone with the new teacher.

There was a moment of silence while Miss Cast stared at us. Then she cackled. She patted her wriggly hair until it settled down a bit. She sat down at her desk then stood up again. She walked over to the chalkboard then walked back to her desk. Our eyes tracked her every movement as we waited to see what she would do.

But no-one else apart from me was sitting bolt-upright and rigid with tension.

"You have no idea how good this feels!" she said at last and stretched her arms to the ceiling, her face a picture of warty green bliss. "You just don't know what's ahead, but I can feel it. All you sweet innocent children, ripe and ready to take in the pearls of wisdom about to drop from my lips in our first ever lesson together. How noble! How beautiful! What a privilege to stand in front of you today, and what an honor for you children to sit before me, your devoted teacher. This is my dream come true," she said, pausing to wipe away a black tear about to spill from her eye.

It wasn’t what I had expected.

“Aargh – this is too much! It’s my dream come true and I can’t take it!” she said brokenly, burying her face in her hands.

We sat, stunned into silence as the tears sloshed down her face and dripped off the end of her pointy chin. From my seat in the front row, I heard them hiss as they burned holes into the floor. Tendrils of purple smoke curled up from the pockmarks and formed smoke circles of sad faces over Miss Cast’s head.

"All I ever wanted to do was teach," she gushed on in between her sobs of acid rain. "I just wanted to help children to learn, inspire their fresh young minds. I want them to wake up every day happy and excited, and run to school because they can't wait for their lessons. Soaking up all the knowledge from my chalkboard, and never ever forgetting me as long as they lived - Miss Cast, the teacher who taught them the true value of education."

After the speech was over, Miss Cast just kept smiling and staring at us in that weird way, bursting into tears every time she tried to say something, until eventually Alicia raised her hand.

“Yes, pointy-nosed girl?”

"Are you actually going to teach us anything, Miss?"

Miss Cast seemed to pull herself together. "But of course, that's what I'm here for." Then she looked round at us all. She picked up a piece of chalk, touched it to the chalkboard, then put it down again.

"So much ground to cover. So many subjects. SO much to say. But where to start?”

Then she just didn’t say anything for a while, just hmm-ed and hawed and fiddled with her chalk, until eventually she turned to us.

“Erm. What is it exactly that you don’t know yet?"

Of course Alicia was the first to butt in, before I could make a sensible suggestion like how to pass level twenty-six of Zombie Dinosaurs from Outer Space.

"Maths!" Alicia cried out in excitement. "We got up to the six times table yesterday."

 "Maths, ah yes, my favourite,” said Miss Cast, firing up again. “CRIVENS, children, just think of it - with the power of my skillful teaching of math and your devoted learning, you will rise to be whatever you want to be: astrologists, weavers of splendid tapestries, candlemakers, warriors, minstrels to the highest court in the land, alchemists exploring the deepest secrets of the universe….why, some of you may be so inspired by me, you may even wish to become schoolteachers,” she added with a light green blush at the top of her cheeks. “I will set you on the path to make all these dreams come true." She paused for dramatic effect. "It all starts HERE, and it all starts NOW… with the glorious, perfect, shining example of logic and form, one of the foundations of mental arithmetic, the wonderful, my favourite… the thirteen times table."

Everyone except Alicia groaned.

"Times tables are BORING," said Brian Baxter. "And so is school. Ow!"

What looked like a bat had flitted across the room to clip Brian’s ear with its wing. The bat then flew to a corner of the classroom, where I saw it crawl over the top of a cupboard and disappear amongst the shadows and cobwebs.

"Oh, goodness me, where did that creature come from?" Miss Cast said, patting her hair, which had suddenly lost a lot of its height and all of its wriggle. "As I was saying, it's a great privilege to be allowed to go to school and you should be very grateful." Her face darkened. "I was never allowed."

"You weren't?" Alicia said in surprise. "So how did you become a teacher?"

Miss Cast looked shifty, then cleared her throat loudly.

"But perhaps that squashed-face young man is correct, times tables aren't the most stimulating for young minds. Let's try a fun puzzle instead."

Miss Cast thought for a long time, then scraped out in very craggy, spiky handwriting on the board:

 

The potion the witch needs to turn her sworn enemy into a maggot requires SEVEN eyes. In her eye cabinet, she has the eyes of cyclopes (one eye), tuatara lizards (three eyes), bats (two) and two-headed snakes (four).

Find all the possible combinations the witch can use to turn her enemy into a maggot.

 

Betty started crying.

"Oh dear, maybe we shouldn't start with maths at all," Miss Cast said, wringing her hands. "Shall we try a different subject?"

Now was my chance to test her. Level twenty-six of Zombie Dinosaurs from Outer Space would just have to wait.

"Well actually Miss, at this time Mrs. Dodson usually reads us stories,” I said cunningly, and I handed her a book I knew could ruffle some feathers if my suspicions were correct. “She says they’re very educational.”

"Fairy tales," Miss Cast read, stroking the green cover. "Are you sure this is the one you want? I've never found fairies to have much to say for themselves."

"Read us Hansel and Gretel," I said.

"Those two little rascals, eh?" she said, brightening. "Well, this should be interesting."

So she started reading. Alicia sat up with her legs crossed and back straight, while the rest of us slouched across the cushions in the story corner. Brian lay down on the carpet, which is just what you would expect from someone who didn't mind cheating in an egg-and-spoon race, but Miss Cast didn't seem to notice or care.

“Once upon a time, by a great forest dwelt a poor wood-cutter…” she began, but she hadn't got further than the first page when she slammed the book shut.

"No, no, this is all wrong. Who wrote this rubbish?" She looked at the front cover again. "The Brothers Grimm? The brothers ‘dim,’ more like. They haven’t got a clue - it didn't happen like that at all."

Miss Cast sat forward in her chair, looking at us earnestly. "Children, I want you to put yourself in that poor witch's shoes. Just for a moment, let's all imagine that she wasn't a little old hunchbacked lady as that ridiculous book suggests, but a tall and striking sorceress of great beauty. Just picture it - you've spent fifty years getting your cottage just how you want it, all your knick-knacks in the right nooks and crannies, potion cabinet nicely organized with the different kinds of eyes in pretty jars so you can grab the right ones when you need them. Imagine you lovingly baked every gingerbread brick with your own fair hands, telling yourself that as soon as everything was perfect you could finally renounce witchcraft once and for all, and live out your years peacefully in your dream home. And then one day just when the end is in sight, along come these two impertinent guttersnipes who take whopping great bites of your beautiful home, ruining everything, just because they're a bit peckish and fancied a snack. It would be enough to make the most patient witch snap!"

"But Miss, weren't they starving?" I asked.

"Can’t have been that hungry if they were lobbing great hunks of bread in their path behind them, can they?!" she said. “Pair of brats! They had it coming.”

Betty started crying again but this time Miss Cast’s rant was in full swing.

"And as for putting ME in the ov... I mean, as for Hansel and Gretel putting the beautiful sorceress in the oven, ha! I'm sure these dim Grimm brothers would like to think so, but I'm afraid it didn't quite work out that way. Let's just say that someone had a lovely new pair of koi carp for her ornamental pond at the end of that day."

"Please can you read Snow White and the Seven Dwarves instead?" Betty said in a weak voice. "That's a nice story."

"That hussy," Miss Cast said, curling her lip. "Well, I don't need the book for that one either.” She snapped the book shut again. “Once upon a time, there was a beautiful, noble sorceress who lived a lonely existence high in a castle. She was doomed to be hated and alone, purely because of the witchcraft that had been forced upon her AGAINST HER WILL as a mere child. Her only consolation was her beauty. Her only friend was a magic mirror, and daily she would look into its depths and find comfort.

Then came a day when the mirror told of another girl, who not only was beautiful, but young, popular, surrounded by friends - even if the admirers were a bit on the vertically challenged side. Nobody had forced her into a profession she didn’t want. Oh, she thought she was better than everyone! Oh, it was all so easy for her to be nice, to be loved, to be wanted and admired swanning around being a milkmaid dishing out free milk to all the children. Crivens! It was enough to make anyone snap.”

At that moment, a loud crack nearly made me fall off my storytime corner cushion. I looked at Miss Cast in fear – the noise had come from her hand. Her face was dark green and purple smoke was billowing out of her nose.

“You broke the chalk, Miss,” said Alicia.

Miss Cast looked down at her hand, and opened it to reveal a palm full of white powder.

“Whoopsie – the sort of thing that happens all the time, I imagine. Flimsy stuff, this chalk. Not really robust enough for the pressures of teaching.”

I leaned back in relief, not seeing her wand anywhere.

“As I was saying, the noble sorceress disguised herself as an aged crone, and went to Snow White's door with a basket of shiny red apples. Greedy pig that she was underneath all that pretty hair, of course Snow White couldn't wait to stuff the biggest juiciest one down her gob, right in front of me... I mean, the sorceress. Ha! Within seconds she was conked out on the floor. It was for her own good, she would have come out of it a better person. However, it was just that noble sorceress’s typical luck to find that the minute her back was turned, the nearest prince had come running to give Snow White a big smoocher, and dash all her plans into smithereens. Curses! Oooh, that girl really got on my - I mean, the sorceress's - nerves."

Everyone in the class shifted uncomfortably on their bums.

"Okay, was that normal?" I whispered to Kevin.

"It's her first day. She's probably feeling all muddled," he said, his forehead creased.

"Teachers aren't supposed to get muddled. They're supposed to be in charge and know what they're doing. Miss Cast doesn't know anything. I bed she’d go along with anything we say."

"Now, who's ready for the little mermaid?" said Miss Cast. "That's a good one, the noble sorceress really showed that fishy little..."

"Please, no more!" Betty said with a whimper.

I put my hand up. "Miss, on Tuesdays after storytime we usually do circus studies."

Miss Cast brightened. "Now that sounds like fun, just the kind of thing to inspire young minds. Alicia, hand me the rope."

"What rope?"

Miss Cast flicked her wrist. "Over in that corner, see the big pile?"

"Hadn't we better put on some safety equipment?" Alicia said doubtfully as we stood on chairs to rig the ropes across the room. "And I don't think we should do this without a net."

"Trust me, I know what I'm doing," said Miss Cast. And with another flick of her wrist, we were off.

Well, you should have seen it. Kids were flying through the air. Everywhere you looked, there were arms and legs tumbling and spinning. Even Betty, who normally fell over if she tried to walk and speak at the same time, was doing somersaults and backflips and throwing Kevin halfway across the classroom over to Logan. Kevin was having the time of his life.

“This is totally like being an astronaut! Wheeeeeeee!” he shouted, soaring across the room, one arm outstretched like he was Buzz Lightyear.

It looked like flying. It looked a lot like flying.

It probably felt like flying too, only I didn't know because whatever she was doing didn't work on me, no matter how many times Miss Cast tapped me with her finger. Eventually she had me sit in the corner drawing clowns. I gave them all sad faces.

By now I would have thought it was obvious to anyone that Miss Cast couldn't be a normal teacher, but nobody had said a word about it. Fair enough, they were all breathless from their trapeze antics... but even when they rushed out of the classroom after the breaktime bell ding-donged (giving Miss Cast quite a fright), they were still talking about which level of Squirrel Attack! they were on. They didn't seem bothered that they'd just spent half the morning being tossed around like pancakes.

I didn’t need a crystal ball to know that having a witch as a teacher could spell trouble for my innocent classmates. If nobody else could see her for what she was, then it was up for me to find out the truth.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER THREE

The Promise

 

I didn't go to playground with the other kids at breaktime. Instead, I went up to where Miss Cast was smiling to herself as she rearranged the pencils on her desk.

"Miss Cast?" I said, my heart hammering. I would have to do this ninja-style. "I'm a reporter for the school newsletter, and I'm writing a question and answer page about new teachers."

"Oh, what fun," said Miss Cast, sitting back. "And very educational, too. Ask me anything you like!"

I did my best to look innocent, pencil poised over my notebook like a real journalist. "What job did you do before teaching?"

Miss Cast blinked at me.

"Errrr. Hmmmm. I dabbled in a bit of... this and that."

I looked up and stared at her until she started squirming.

"Well okay, I was a milkmaid once, long ago. And then a servant and an apprentice. And a sort of farmer and cheesemaker, and a castle cook, and philosopher and scribe. And then a... well, a pilot, and a bit of an astronaut, and prime minister. No, wait, not prime minister. Ahem. Haha, my little joke."

It was my turn to blink.

"That's a lot of jobs. Can I ask how old you are, Miss?"

"Three hundr...ahem. Three hun... That is to say, three."

"You're three?"

"And thirty years. Three and thirty years. I mean, thirty-three. Yes, that's what I meant."

"What's your date of birth?"

"16th of January."

"Which year?"

I saw her forehead wriggle. "Nineteen-erm... sixty… something... hang on, where’s my phone…"

"Never mind," I said, putting my pencil down. I'd heard enough. "Miss Cast - are you a witch?"

"Wh-what? Why, of course not! Whatever would give you a silly idea like that?"

"Miss, you have a bat in your hair."

"What, that little mouse? Oh, how did you get in there?"

"Miss, that 'little mouse' has wings. And he's black. And he's a bat."

"Oh, fine, have it your way, he's a bat. Anything else?"

"There's a cauldron bubbling in the corner of the classroom."

"What, my pumpkin and spider-sprinkle soup?" she said indignantly. "How else am I supposed to heat up lunch?"

"You also have a magic wand up your sleeve."

"It might not be a wand. It could be a… a… a special kind of cast, for a broken wrist I had as a child that ails me to this day when it’s foggy outside."

"It has purple sparks shooting from it. And you keep waving it and doing magic. I see you every time. Tell the truth, Miss. You're a witch, aren't you?"

"Crivens, what's the matter with this dratted thing?" Miss Cast muttered, rapping her wand on the table so it shot out angry red sparks. Then she stopped, and looked up at me. "The headmaster! He zapped you by accident when he dropped the wand, didn't he? Oh bedknobs and broomsticks! It must have been that Anti-Witch Wand Blast spell that Auntie Judy insisted I invent after that unfortunate incident with the melons and the gerbil. Now you have eternal protection from my power. Crivens!"

My heart was thumping wildly now.

"So you admit it?"

"Look – okay. I may have once been a little bit of a witch, but not anymore," she said earnestly, stopping her flapping to grab both my hands. Her green fingers were warm and didn’t feel scaly like I thought they would. "Those days are behind me, truly they are. All I want to do is teach. I don't want to do witchcraft ever again!"

"Then what's that doing here?" I said, nodding at the wand.

"Well... for emergencies."

"Like not letting us see what you really look like?" I said, pulling my hands away from her grasp. "And getting us to fly around the classroom so we stop asking awkward questions? And trying to wipe my memory?"

Miss Cast slumped. "It's all hopeless anyway," she wailed. "I'll never make it as a teacher now you've found me out. I really thought this was the answer. I was well and truly going to renounce evil and make my dream come true."

"Hang on a minute..."

"I never wanted to be a witch, you know," she sobbed on. "I only ever wanted to be a teacher, but Dame Griselda Grouch kidnapped me. Mother begged and pleaded when Griselda swooped down on that cursed broomstick and said I had special powers. Unfortunately, Mother was begging for me to be taken away because she was sick of the milk turning sour whenever I was in a bad mood and poisonous toadstools springing up behind me wherever I walked. But I didn't deserve what I got! From that day onwards, I was practically her slave. It was always 'chop this,' 'pluck the eyes from that,' 'clean my socks' - and witch's socks get pretty smelly, let me tell you... and 'trim my bunions,' 'feed the bat,' 'milk the snails,' - morning, noon and night until the day she hung up her pointy hat and cloak, and said it was my turn to be the most powerful wicked witch in the world. My turn, when I never asked for any of it. You have to believe me!"

Her purple eyes were wide and round with pleading.

 

Lindsey Mountford was born in Yorkshire, grew up in Edinburgh, and has since lived in Italy, London, San Francisco and New York. She has been a chambermaid, dinner lady, English teacher, mail sorter, usher, ice-cream peddler, cat foster mother, viral video advertising executive and now works in game advertising  When she’s not writing stories about witches (or goblins, haunted pumpkin patches and chocolate dinosaurs), she can generally be found watching cat videos on YouTube.