Hilda - Snow White revisited (3 page)

She held out her left hand and snipped the
fingers of the right, as there was only silence in response to her
question. The arrangement of flowers in front of her feet jumped up
from the grass and landed in her hand. Hilda looked at the faces of
the five young women who were there. One of them had to be the
witch, she knew. Obviously that woman had a lot of self-control, as
nobody flinched.

Hilda took one flower. It turned black. She
tossed it in the lap of the first young woman she saw. "So..." She
tossed the second one, also turning black, in the lap of the next
one. "Who is..." Another black flower. "The creative one... among
you... liars?!" During each pause she tossed a black, stinking
flower which landed in a lap.

There was no reaction. Quietly she admired the
stamina of the witch that tried to hide. Tried, because Hilda had
located her already. It was the only one who did not hold her nose
because of the stinking flower; the witch had simply removed the
stench from the black thing, and the experienced wicked witch had
picked up the short, badly shielded flare of magic.

"No one, eh? So all this grew by itself." Hilda
slowly walked up to a man who sat leaning against a wide birch. She
looked at the tree.

"Abomination," she muttered.

"Hey, I resent that," the man said as he got up.
He was almost a foot taller than Hilda and looked down at her. "I
am not an abomination."

"So people say, so don't get your knickers in a
knot, Anton. You're just the leader of the liars." Hilda looked
around, entirely unimpressed by Anton. "So nobody has a fucking
clue what to tell me? Nobody has the guts to say something?" Her
voice was calm and chilled. Not yet cold. "Come on, guys, you are
here for your rhymes and prose and stuff, you're good with words.
Invent something to make the evil witch happy so she goes
away!"

Hilda turned and looked the unfortunate young
witch in the eye. "You. Get up."

The young woman slowly rose to her feet,
avoiding Hilda's eyes.

"Now fix that tree." The wicked one pointed at
the birch with its unnatural shape.

"Why should I?", the young woman asked. "What
makes you think I did that anyway?"

Hilda snipped her fingers, making the scentless
flower jump in her hand. She smelled it and then said: "Wrong
reply." She stepped up to the young witch, took one of her hands
and slapped the flower in its palm. "Hold on to this. It might
help."

"Help? With what?" The young witch was
puzzled.

Hilda spread out her arms (so she would not get
caught in the folds of her dress), made her wand pop up in one of
her hands and pointed it at the girl.

"Hey, Hilda, you can't put a spell on another
witch!", the young woman exclaimed, as she understood what was
about to happen.

Hilda smiled. "Grimhilda for you, kid. And who
says I can't? Perhaps I shouldn't, but since when I am bothered by
that?"

"Coloris flavens ab aqua." The Latin, combined
by an adequate portion of magic, worked immediately. With a
satisfied smile Hilda turned to Anton again.

The young witch let out a scream as she
discovered that she was now completely covered in yellow
watercolours. Her hair, her dress and her skin, everything. A
whining sound crawled up from her throat as she rubbed the back of
her hand and the colour did not come off.

"Now, what were we talking about," Hilda said
with an amiable smile that gave Anton the creeps.

Anton stared at the young witch who had by now
watercoloured tears streaming down her yellow cheeks. The man was
afraid to speak. Who knew how a wrong answer would make him end
up.

"I think," Hilda said, pressing the tip of her
wand against his cheek to make Anton look at her instead of the
yellow girl, "we were talking about liars."

"Were we?", Anton dared.

"Ayup, we were. At least I was, and you should
have picked that up. It looked to me as if you were paying
attention, Anton!" She whacked him on the head with the wand, then
held it to his cheek again.

"Oh yes, I was!" Anton blushed.

"You really like it here, don't you?" Hilda
waved at the surroundings, "with the grass and the trees and the
water and the girls and such."

Anton nodded carefully, to prevent the wand from
taking out one of his eyes.

"I thought so," Hilda smiled. "I can see you're
one of the big boys, a born leader, and probably quite a poet
also."

"Yeah, well, uh...", Anton enthusiastically
confirmed her words.

"A poet who likes trees too," Hilda said, the
smile still on her face.

"Yeah, trees are great," Anton took a dare.

"And you love this place so much that you get a
witch to turn it into this farce. This mockery of nature." Hilda's
tone became less sweet and understanding. "And you remove all the
shrubbery and herbs. Which, of course, is not a big deal for you,
Anton, for you and your friends here..."

Her eyes slowly went past each person on the
grass.

"But it is quite a big deal for the gnomes, you
know... They usually have their houses under the bushes. But these
are no longer here. They have no place to live now the bushes are
no longer here. Just so you and your miscreants can sit here once
or twice a week with your fucking poems and what not?"

The wand was by now leaving a serious imprint on
Anton's cheek.

The large man attached to the cheek, said:
"Hilda- Ehm, Grimhilda. The forest is large enough. There are
plenty of shrubs and hedges where the gnomes can live. And when
you're talking about Quirrin... I mean, please, he's not the kind
that lives under a hedge. We need our space, to let the fine art
and poetry live. Only this tiny piece of land..." Sweat was forming
small streams that ran down his face.

"Oh, Anton, you're sweating," Hilda said in a
caring voice. "So this is all for the arts and for poetry?"

"Yes," Anton nodded, not sure about what pile of
dung he was getting himself into. It sounded like Hilda was
beginning to see his version of the light.

Sadly for Anton, she didn't. Hilda took her wand
away from the sweating face and wiped it off on Anton's nice white
shirt. "So the poet by the tree is in love with poetry..."

"Yes, very much!", Anton confirmed, "very
much!"

"I see. I think we can come to some kind of
arrangement, Anton." Hilda stepped back, not taking her eyes off
the man. The other people, including the yellow witch, continued
their silent presence.

Hilda calmly pointed to Anton with the wand,
calmly mumbling words under her breath.

"What are you doing?", Anton asked, not feeling
sure about the situation.

"I am making...", said Hilda, "poetree..." A big
grin showed on her face.

Nothing happened for a few seconds. Anton
carefully filled his lungs with air.

As usual, it took a while before the English
spell took hold. Then the spell and the magic slammed Anton in the
chest, threw him against the tree and next there was a flash of
green light.

When the light had vanished, which did not take
long, so was Anton. His silhouette was clearly outlined in the
birch. The outline was, as everyone saw, all that remained of the
poet.

Hilda turned to the shocked people. "Anyone care
to belong to that poet's society?", she asked. "If so, do stick
around. If not, get your asses off this field and never come back
again. Except you, young lady," she added for the yellow witch.

"Me? Why can't I go?" The yellow face turned a
bit more pale.

"Because you are going to fix this field, as
soon as these losers have packed up their junk and left. I want
every bush, every shrub, every herb and every heap of birds hit
back where it was. And every tree too. Except that one." Hilda
pointed with her thumb over her shoulder, to the poetree. "That one
stays. Have I made myself clear?" Her voice was of such a tone that
it would easily cut through iron.

The yellow witch stared at Hilda's thumb,
dumbstruck, and nodded, as her former friends scrambled to their
feet and disappeared in the surrounding forest as if... well...
Hilda was after them.

After several hours, the young yellow woman was
exhausted. She had drained herself while she was converting the
field back to its original state. She was whining, complaining that
it was too hard and too much, but finally it was all done.

"How do I get home now?", the girl asked,
sitting on the rough floor. "My friends all took the carts and
horses."

"Friends," Hilda smirked. "But I'll drop you
off," Hilda said, summoning her broom. "Come. Get up."

With the girl in front of her, she flew her
broom to the part of the village where she hardly ever came. Too
decent people for her taste.

"What will my family say when they see me like
this?", the young witch asked, rubbing her yellow arms.

"Don't know, kid, I am not your family."

"But when will I look normal again?", another
thought made the young woman's heart jump.

"We'll see..."

As the broom came over the square of the
village, Hilda kept her promise to the girl. As they hovered over a
large cart with hay, she gave the girl a good push, dropping her
into the hay. Before the young witch got there, though, she had
plenty of time to let out a heart wrenching scream.

"Drop off service, please scream again," the
wicked witch said.

As the good citizens of the village ran to the
young witch's rescue, Hilda turned the broom and headed back
home.

In the evening, the fireplace was burning with
green flames just because Hilda felt like that, the wicked witch
sat staring at the mirror. Despite the cracks and the lousy
imagery, it wasn't half bad, she thought. Every place she wanted to
see was accessible. Just a bummer that the sound was missing.

The problems that the yellow witch had had,
explaining her colourful appearance to her fellow villagers, had
amused Hilda for a while. Hilda had noticed some of the people who
had been on the field being near there, but none of them had
stepped up to help the girl. She memorised the faces of the
cowards. For crappy behaviour like that they deserved a small
reminder, and Hilda was just the person to supply that.

Quirrin had been overjoyed with the news that
the field was the domain of the gnomes again, and he had hobbled
off to 'inform all his brothers immediately'. Hilda still wondered
if the giant gnome had actually gotten to talk to anyone of them.
Knowing him, he probably had gotten sidetracked again.

And now Hilda was trying to locate the princess
who had run off into the woods. Not getting killed by the huntsman
had looked like a pretty good thing, but getting hunted down and
captured by one of the big wild creatures in the woods wasn't
exactly a prospect one would look forward to. At least, a stabbing
by the huntsman's knife would have been a quick and merciful end.
Wild creatures usually weren't that swift in their killings. Some
of them, Hilda knew, liked to play with their food for a while
before dinner.

The sun had set. Darkness was rapidly spreading
under the leafed roof of the forest, as a magical cloud of black
smoke, and the images in the mirror were getting impossible to
discern. Hilda waved at the shiny surface, which turned back into
its natural state of a reflecting patch of silver, cracks and
all.

"That much for trying to find her," Hilda told
her goblet of wine. "No use going there now. If she made it so far,
she should be asleep somewhere and that's fine. If she didn't make
it, then there's nothing to be done about it. Would just mean a
change in plans for the liver-eater." With a chuckle she got up
from her seat and stretched herself. It was time to have a look at
the potions and other mixtures she had prepared...

On the terrain that had been turned back to
gnome-proof habitats, far away from the castle, Quirrin was lying
on the ground, his massive body pushed underneath one of the larger
shrubs. With a satisfied grumble he closed his eyes, as the smell
of the forest drifted up his nostrils. He felt home again, and
tomorrow he would go to the other gnomes and tell them what Hilda
had done for them.

In the good part of the village, a young yellow
woman was determined to spend the entire night in a bathtub, hoping
that the hot water would make her skin turn back to its original
tone. She was still tired from the ordeal of rebuilding the terrain
on which Quirrin was now so happily snoring and cursed Hilda in
every way imaginable.

In a small house on the castle grounds, the
huntsman sat on his bed and looked at the really big knife that he
had gotten from the wicked witch. In his mind he saw himself
charging at bears and wolves and other large creatures. His eyes
glistened as he imagined the wild fights, the splatter of blood and
the victory that was bound to be his, with this magnificent
knife.

In the stables on the castle grounds, the horses
were doing what horses usually do when night approaches. They had
no clue there was a wicked witch around and wouldn't be impressed
had they known.

Inside the castle a loud scream, followed by a
prolonged crashing of glass and pottery emerged from the chambers
of the queen. All this noise was mixed with an amazing sequence of
profanities, one that nobody would expect a queen to know, even
less that she'd utter them. The reason for this was what the mirror
had said to the queen, in response to her question: "Looking-glass,
looking-glass on the wall, who in this land is the fairest of all?"
The mirror, made to be truthful, had replied: "Oh, queen, thou art
fairest of all I see, but over the hills, where the seven dwarfs
dwell, Snow-white is still alive and well, and none is so fair as
she." The reply did not go down well at all with the mean
stepmother.