From TBM guest blogger, Martin Howard…

The Wickedest Witches?

An interview with Esmelia Sniff and her apprentice Sam by Media Hysterick, Books Editor of The Cackler.

Following a trail of stale bread crumbs though the thorns of Pigsnout Wood to Esmelia Sniff’s ramshackle cottage, the first thing you notice as you arrive is the smell. Esmelia’s apprentice, Sam, opens the door and tells me with a shrug, “You don’t ever really get used to it, but it stops making you actually sick after a few weeks.” I can’t say I believe her and stop for a moment to throw up in my handbag. Thankfully, for the rest of the interview having a bag of cold sick close by works just like an air freshener.

The stench is coming from a bony ratbag sitting by the fire with a scowl on her face like she’s chewing a wasp. As it turns out, Esmelia Sniff is chewing a wasp, but spits it into the fire before getting up with a creak of old bones to shake a finger at me. “I ain’t telling you nuthin’,” she shrieks. “I know what you newspaper reporters is like. Making stuff up about whom I’ve snogged and takin’ pictures of me knees as I’m getting off me broom.”

I try to tell Esmelia that The Cackler is not that kind of newspaper, but of course it is that kind of newspaper. She stalks off muttering and grumbling to herself.

While Esmelia sulks in a corner, I take a look around the cottage. It’s a proper old-fashioned witch’s hovel with spider webs, sagging beams and an ancient Hansel & Gretel Industries HaG 3000 oven—big enough to fit even the most gangly teenager and with traditional wonky styling for the choosy witch. “I love what you’ve done with the place Esmelia,” I sneer. (Being a reporter for The Cackler is all about sneering. That and funny-shaped vegetables.) “It’s soo 200 years ago.”

“It’s oldey worldey,” snaps the crone

I’m just about to tell her that it looks more like “mouldy worldey” when Sam brings me a cracked mug of something that might be tea, if tea was lumpy. I push it away and we sit to begin the interview at a kitchen table that is covered with books, potions, and Esmelia’s sleeping cat, Tiddles.

For a witch who’s already made such a name for herself Sam looks very young. It’s easy to forget that this saucy young lady who has caused such a stir in the witching world only got her license a few weeks ago. She has green eyes and running across her nose are either freckles or beetle footprints. It’s difficult to tell which and there’s a large beetle perched on her pointed hat. Sam introduces Ringo, her famous familiar. He waves a foot at me and begins jogging around the brim (Ringo is a fitness fanatic).

I’m supposed to be here to talk about a new book—The Wickedest Witch. It’s all about Sam and Esmelia’s recent adventures and their attempts to become Most Superior High and Wicked Witch. I don’t really give a thrupenny trump about that though, so I ask Sam if she’s old enough to go out on dates and if she’s been seen on the arms of any celebrities at swinging nightspots.

“Umm no,” Sam blushes. “Definitely no. I’m not old enough and, anyway, Esmelia has views about that sort of thing.”

There is a snort from the corner of the room. “Disgustin’,” Esmelia mutters.

“So how did you come to be the apprentice of old Stinky Sniff?” I ask instead.

“Well,” says Sam. “Ever since I was very little I knew I wanted to get involved with magic. I read tons of stories about it and spent ages waiting to be whisked away from the orphanage to a magical land, which is what usually happens in books. I once spent the best part of three weeks in different wardrobes trying to force my way out the back.” Sam stops for a moment and looks wistful. “But there never were any fauns or talking lions and it made people jump, finding me in there when they went to get some clothes, so they made me stop. Anyway, after I got my head stuck in a rabbit hole I got sick of waiting and everyone said that there was a wicked old witch living in Pigsnout Wood so I came to find her. It was lucky… well sort of lucky… for me that Esmelia needed an apprentice.”

“Worst mistake I ever made,” grumbles Esmelia in the corner. “Put a pointy hat on a sock puppet and it’d make a better apprentice.”

Sam hunches over the table. “Esmelia’s not all that bad once you get to know her,” she whispers. “She does whiff a bit and she’s a crusty, miserable old baggage who likes to poke people in the eye, plus she used to eat children, but she does have her good points and she’s a vegetarian now.

“That’s what you thinks you cheeky little maggot” I hear Esmelia cackle under her breath.

“Esmelia has good points?” I ask Sam. “Can you name one?”

Sam thinks about it for a few minutes, then says, “… so that’s how I became Esmelia’s apprentice anyway.

“We’d better talk about The Wickedest Witch,” I interrupt with a sigh. “I am The Cackler’s books editor after all. So, it’s the full and exclusive story of all the recent hoo-hah, capers, and goings-on at the tryouts for the Most Superior High and Wickedest Witch, isn’t it?”

Sam nods.

“And in the book Esmelia comes across as a total twonk, doesn’t she? A useless sack of doings, tied up round the middle. A wart-faced old cauldron-boiler with not enough brains to feed a wasp. In fact, Esmelia Sniff is as drooling, dung-faced dolt. A…”

At this point in the interview Esmelia stamps across the room and jabs a gnarly old finger at my eye. It seems I’ve accidentally upset her though I’m sure I don’t know how. Some people will get all worked up over the slightest little thing.

“It’s all lies,” she screeches as I duck out of the way of her pokey finger. “Them books people will print any old rubbish these days. It’s disgustin’. Well, I’ll show ‘em. I’ve put a curse on that Martin Howard what wrote it. We’ll see how he likes it when his bottom falls off and me and Tiddles is playing ping-pong with his eyeballs. That’ll learn the dirty, lying beggar.”

“Calm down Esmelia,” orders Sam. “She’s trying to make you mad…”

“I’ve got some book reviews here,” I tell them. “Tiffany Toadlick, Leader of the Grand Coven says, ‘The Wickedest Witch is a great book and it’s all true: Esmelia made a total nong of herself at the trials and I was one of the judges, so I should know’. And the Opera Lamprey book club writes, ‘This is a brilliant tale of wicked witching, and best of all is laughing at Esmelia, who—as we all know—is so batty she couldn’t find her own hands with both hands’.”

Esmelia makes a grab at my throat as Sam pulls her away by her raggedy skirts. Her face has gone a very deep shade of green.

“But as you’ve so kindly decided to join the interview Esmelia,” your intrepid reporter continues breezily. “Perhaps we can move on to something our readers might actually be interested in. Would you like to say something about the gossip that you’ve been bothering a certain wizard? Let’s see, what did Dr Sulfurus Cowl tell The Cackler this morning? Oh yes, I just happen to have it here. Dr Cowl said, ‘Since the Most Superior High and Wicked Witch trials Esmelia Sniff won’t leave me alone. On one occasion I went to put the rubbish out and found her ghastly face staring up at me from the bin, all covered in potato peelings and chicken giblets. Another time I caught her in the laundry basket, rubbing my old socks against her face…”

“I was polishin’ me warts!” Esmelia shrieks as she struggles with her apprentice. “There ain’t no law against it.”

“The Wickedest Witch is released on October 16^th. Just in time for Halloween,” Sam shouts, tugging on Esmelia’s dress. “It’s a really good story, and funny too…”

“Who cares about that?” I laugh, while scribbling away in my trusty notebook. “So Esmelia, you don’t deny you’ve been following Sulfurus Cowl around like a bad smell then?  An extremely bad smell.”

Esmelia tears her skirt out of Sam’s hands and throws herself at me with a screech. She really is quite the touchy touchy touch touch. I’m forced to swing a sick-filled handbag at the side of her head and before you know it we’re rolling around on the floor pulling out great handfuls of each other’s hair.

Out of the corner of my eye I see Sam flicking her wand with Ringo jumping up and down on her shoulder. She mutters, “Oh for goodness sake” then there’s a tiny pop and I’m back at my desk in The Cackler offices, which is very impressive magic for an apprentice. Sadly though, it looks like the fight… sorry, the interview… is over. Just as it was starting to be fun too. Still, I’m almost sure I bit off part of Esmelia’s ear. And I pinched three of her spoons while she wasn’t looking.

Media Hysterick

The Wickedest Witch by Martin Howard with illustrations by Colin Stimpson, is the first instalment of the Witches at War! trilogy. Published by Pavilion Children’s Books, it is available from all online booksellers and most bookshops.

Visit www.witchesatwar.co.uk for a sneak peek, or meet Esmelia Sniff on Facebook.

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