Amelia Jenkins had always thought of herself as normal. She had normal brown hair which she wore in a normal pony tail like her normal friends at her normal school in her normal town in Wales. Not normal in a boring way, just normal in a not magical way. With no castles (moving or otherwise), no enchanters and their crazy families, no portals and no other worlds. Just Amelia and her mum and her dad and her older sister Julie. Until that day when it all changed.
That day was a Tuesday and it rained. Amelia, Julie and their parents were sitting around the kitchen table eating breakfast when the post came. Julie went to get it.
"There's a letter for you, Amelia. I wonder what it's about?" Amelia took the envelope from her sister. It was addressed in bright purple ink which looked like it might have been written with an old fashioned dipping pen. Here is what the letter inside said:
Dear Miss Amelia Jenkins,
It has come to my attention that your mother's maiden name was Chant, making you a relative of mine. Therefore, it is likely that you will have a talent for magic, but your world has no access to it. For this reason, I wish you to come and live with me for a few years. You would have a chance to become a witch as well as continuing your ordinary lessons. I will send someone to collect you on the Sunday following your receiving of this letter.
Chrestomanci
It took Amelia a few moments to get her head around the letter. Then her parents wanted to know what it said. What none of them could understand was why this Chrestomanci wanted Amelia but not Julie to come and live with him. For he was certainly being truthful. They all knew this, though nobody could say how. There was no question of whether Amelia would accept. Magic sounded both exiting and useful. And hadn't Amelia's cousin Howell had something to do with magic?
The next few days passed in a blur of packing, telling friends completely fabricated stories about aunts and far away islands, and generally preparing. Sunday came all too quickly for Amelia, who was not particularly keen to travel to some distant place to live with her second cousin once removed who would teach her to be a witch. She was sitting by the window in the living room when the taxi arrived. She saw a man get out of it. His coat billowed around him and the sleeves did not seem to be long enough for his arms, nor indeed his trousers for his legs. Amelia heard the doorbell ring and then her mum saying "Yes, she's just through here, Mister…?"
"Saunders, Michael Saunders." said the man, coming into the living room. "Ready to go, Amelia?"
"Yes." Amelia said shortly, getting to her feet and picking up her suitcase. She hugged her parents and sister goodbye and followed Mister Saunders to the taxi. He sat in the front with the driver and she sat in the back.
Amelia woke up the next morning scarcely remembering the previous day. It had passed in a confused blur, but she remembered getting out of the car and walking through a garden and then into a hedge and then feeling dizzy and then getting into an old fashioned car and driving along some long twisty roads through the countryside where the sign posts were in English. It was dark by the time they had got there, so all she had seen was a huge castle looking building before she had collapsed into bed.
She sat up, pushing her dark brown hair out of her face and gazed around her sun filled room. It had large, with red satin curtains embroidered with gold. The walls were pale yellow and the bedspread was the same scarlet as the curtains. There was a wooden wardrobe and dressing table on the other side of the room and a large oriental rug in the middle. Amelia got up and crossed the room to a door which looked as though it might lead to a bathroom. It did. It was red and gold like the bedroom with a claw footed bath on one side. Amelia was starting to like it here.
Amelia came out of the bathroom rapped in a towel and feeling much more awake. She couldn't find her own clothes anywhere, so she looked in the wardrobe. There she found old fashioned clothes like those of the woman who had shown her to her room last night. With nothing else to wear, Amelia dressed in a pale green dress, petticoats, garters and stockings. She felt an old fashioned fool. She tied her hair up in a ponytail just to be at least a bit normal.