Windows in the West
Mildred Hubble. Saved the school. Again.
Constance Hardbroom sighed. Well, she supposed it was a good thing that all the faculty members hadn't been turned to frogs while they slept. Again. Escaped a lifetime living in the lake.
Miss Hardbroom would never admit it, but she was actually not fond of water. Well, more accurately, not fond of swimming. More accurately still, scared of drowning.
Of course, if they were all frogs, she imagined there would be more pressing issues to worry about. Such as being stepped on by Agatha Cackle. After this third attempt at mass frogification, Constance concluded that the headmistress's sister's imagination was even less prone to flights of fancy than her own.
Turn to frogs. Impersonate twin. Whatever next, try to burn us at the stake?
Rather fire than water.
Constance suppressed a small shiver.
She could hear the celebrations coming from the Great Hall. Cheers, singing, dancing that sounded like a hundred elephants crashing into things repeatedly. Constance herself had loosened her long, dark hair out of its usual severe style, but refused to relax any further than that on a Tuesday evening.
She sighed when she thought about how difficult lights out would be in a few hours time, when the girls were in such high spirits.
Cackle's Academy was a castle – a small castle, but a castle nonetheless. She should have demanded an office in some isolated corridor rather than ten feet away from the mayhem.
The third floor of the west wing would have been perfect. If it hadn't been occupied by a certain Physical Education teacher. Constance treated the curriculum area of P.E with the same sort of disdain that one might treat a class based around making balloon animals.
She remembered her protests when Miss Cackle informed the staff, at this point just herself and Davina Bat, that they would be gaining a faculty member. A non-witch.
Preposterous. Outrageous. Pointless. Were just some of the words that had flitted through Constance's mind. She merely said 'Will this... Imogen be staying long?'
Three years later she had her answer.
Yes.
Not that gym class got in the way of her own teaching, she wouldn't allow that. She did however believe that there was something undignified in vaulting over high objects, and that outbursts of energy should not be encouraged.
She made a mental note to observe the next third year P.E class, they were always particularly lively at lunch immediately afterwards. She then made an actual note in her diary which she kept meticulously up-to-date. Opening another large, musty textbook she carried on working.
Meanwhile, Imogen Drill had been enjoying the celebrations. Now she stood outside, trying to clear her head. Try as she might, she couldn't shake away her bitter thoughts regarding Miss Hardbroom.
For someone with a naturally sunny disposition any negativity, even her own, was irksome.
She kept thinking back to the previous day, before mayhem ensued and Mildred saved the day.
In their weekly staff meeting, Constance had been infuriating, as usual. Of course, as she was a senior member of staff Imogen could do very little about it, except agree to the observation Constance wanted to place on one of her classes.
Imogen knew she was a good teacher. She could appreciate that an academic like Constance held little regard for the subject, but she would like to be recognised for her abilities with the girls at very least.
She may not have been a potions mistress, or even a witch but she doubted that Miss Hardbroom realised she was even remotely intelligent.
A bat or two fluttered overhead, interrupting her train of thought.
Miss Drill looked over at castle, at the windows in the west.
She could see one of her bedroom shutters. The window of the floor below was Constance's chambers, where the potion mistress's black cat was lying on the ledge, lazily swishing her tail backwards and forwards.
A glance downwards took Imogen's eyes to where the witch herself was working at a desk.
So like her to avoid the celebrations. Miss Drill thought to herself.
In the distance, Constance pushed a strand of hair out of her face and briefly rested her head in her hands.
For a second, as though bewitched by the dark flowing hair which teamed up with candlelight to soften the witch's features, Imogen couldn't help but stare. She then forced herself to tear her gaze away.
There was another niggling thought in Imogen's mind. Although she didn't dislike the deputy headmistress, and she knew her annoyance would fade – if she was indeed, so annoyed, why when the castle was under attack, full of her friends and pupils under her charge, was her first panicked sentence 'Is Constance alright?'.