Storytelling: Week 12 The Mistress and the Witches

There was a knock at the door.

When she opened it she was surprised to see a dark shadow with a tall pointed hat and a broom near the side of the figure.

When the lightning struck she saw a horrifying face to the figure, which led her to scream at the top of her lungs and run backwards. While running she felt her leg hit the back of the sofa forcing her to fall and hit her head. It was then that the mistress lost her vision.

Meanwhile, at the door the witch took it upon herself to come into the mistress’s home. She found a few pastries the mistress had baked. She carried them to the couch by where the unconscious mistress lay. The witch had a seat on the couch and began to eat. She sat there slowly rocking back and forth slowly counting to eleven.

She was counting to for her sisters. After about five minutes one by one they showed up at the door.

“Hello sisters! It is time that we came here to finish our business. Someone get the kettle boiling!” said witch number one.

Witch number three and four each grabbed a leg that belonged to the mistress and started dragging her towards the fire place. They laid her there while the others gathered supplies for the pot of boiling water. They put different spices, leaves, and hair all in the water. One of them ran around the pot chanting a curse.

Slowly the mistress started to regain consciousness. She realized what was happening. The man she had been seeing had warned her that they would come for her. He was married to a woman that would not let him go. He rebelled by sleeping with women, but every time his wife found out he had another lover she would cast a spell. The spell involved one witch at first, but since the first day the man cheated the numbers have grown.

The witches gathered the body of the mistress and put her in a chair.

“It is time!” said witch number one.

Then the twelfth witch brought over a bowl that the witches had been cooking.

The first witch looked down at the mistress and said “This won’t hurt a bit. It is time you became one of us.” She then splashed the concoction onto the mistress’s face. Her smooth clear skin then turned to wrinkles and she began to grow a horn on her head.

The curse was now complete. The witches’ numbers had grown to thirteen and the wife was completely happy that the woman had become one the thirteen ugliest people in the world.

The Horned Women

picture source

Bibliography 

The Horned Women by Joseph Jacobs from Celtic Fairy Tales (1892).

Author's Note: 

The original story made me think of how the witches would have appeared. I thought of how strange it would have been to be the mistress. It made me wonder why the mistress deserved this treatment. that inspired me to write of a cheating mistress and how the wife was able to seek revenge on every woman the helped her husband cheat. I thought the Celtic tales were very entertaining and could be interpreted in many different ways.