I always zone out at any action in films/books so found this hard to write!

Confidence and Control

Chapter 21

The Masikim

It took merely seconds for Hecate to realise that the girl standing in the centre of the room facing the masikim was not Mildred Hubble. The girl-in-question's brain felt more precise, more organised, with a gleam that hid an almost tightly wound feeling as if the girl had been trying for a long period of time to betray nothing of her real self. An ambitious perfectionist. Ethel Hallow.

Hecate stood open-mouthed in terror as the masikim appeared; a shadowy creature engulfed in a black cloak. He stood before the girl as slowly he lowered his hood..

Ethel screamed, a haunted sound that pierced the room. She stood trance-like as the creature approached, unable to move and paralysed with both fear and magic. Her eyes lost focus as the masikim's horrible face came into view, his lined face a grey-white and his eyes demonically red.

She found herself lost in a sequence of horror with a mixture of her own hideous memories and those that she could only dream up in nightmares that would usually have awoken her screaming:

She was a small girl, sitting alone and completely ignored as her parents made a fuss of the beautiful older sister, telling her she was useless, not worthy of her family legacy. Of nights without sleep, re-reading textbooks only to find that the test was not on anything that she had studied, of being bottom in the class and seeing the cold looks on her parents' faces. Of Esme and Sybil in turn, telling her how much they hated her... Of her classmates repeating their words... Even Felicity...

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"This isn't funny Ethel!" Mildred yelled, hitting the door with all of her might. She slumped up against it sobbing with tears of fury. If only she could remember the unlocking spell.. She should know it! She thought with real frustration, Miss Hardbroom would expect her to know it and would no doubt not allow her predicament to be an excuse. She would be fuming, and no doubt would appear any moment with crossed arms and a severe expression, with a strict punishment devised and dished out coldly with only her eyes betraying her disappointment.

Why do I always let her down?

"Mildred?" A voice appeared the other side of the door. Felicity Foxglove.

"Felicity?!" Mildred shouted, "Ethel..." She started, before realising with a pang that Felicity was likely in on the plan as Ethel's chosen sidekick. "I'm well and truly stuck in here, there's no need to keep guard.." She added bitterly.

"Wait - she's locked you in?" Felicity's voice shot through. The high pitched tone at the end showing authenticity that it was a genuine question.

"You didn't know?!" Mildred replied disbelievingly.

"I knew she was up to something..." Felicity muttered. "Bloody Ethel! I don't know what her plan is though Mildred. I don't want any part of it, but you will promise not to tell her that I've released you?"

"I promise Felicity. Quickly though please - I'm going to be in so much trouble.." Mildred added urgently.

"Okay - hold on!"

Mildred heard the door click and pushed it open with more force than necessary. She shot through the door, adding a rather breathless, "Thanks Flick," as she ran past her rather bemused classmate.

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Hecate wasted no more time. Faster than she ever knew she could move, she pushed the false Mildred to the floor, out of the deity's glare.

Ethel came to almost immediately, shivering and whimpering helplessly as she watched the creature now turn its attention and descend on her form-mistress...

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She made it, panting and with a bit of sweat on the back of her neck, at the classroom a few minutes later. Mildred pushed open the creaky door and stepped inside, breathing deeply to compose herself with Miss Hardbroom's disappointed face in mind.

"Please don't be too mad..." she started, but then abruptly as her horrified brain tried to make sense of what she was seeing. She was on the floor, herself, with her hair frizzing and uniform screwed. "What?" She squinted, before seeing a sight that stopped any thoughts in their tracks. Miss Hardbroom. Face blank and eyes rolling as ghostly black shape loomed over her. Miss Hardbroom!

Without really knowing what she was doing, she had grabbed at her teacher, perhaps intending to pull her to safety. Yet something strange happened when she touched her even colder-than-usual hands... Vibrations shot through her muscles and she suddenly found herself out cold, plummeting into a brain that was not her own. Thoughts that weren't her own swirled around her mind...

At first there was Pippa, her smile as breathtaking as it always was - but then suddenly gone as she caught her eye. "I could never love you Hecate... Look at you!" She laughed coldly, "You've been fooling yourself.. You're just a silly fool Hecate Hardbroom and it's all been a pretence." She felt the weight of the words hit her like blows to the stomach.

Then Miss Cackle, sitting at her desk, her face strangely stern as her glasses sat on top of her nose. "They all hate you. Every single pupil hates you. They call you HB behind your back - Hard Bitch - they mean it too..."

She was then confronted with another version of herself, her hair darker and glossy and her freckles absent, darker eyes matching her hair. "You actually think that I could want you? - I'd rather have anyone as my Godmother than you! Mum was clearly joking... Seeing if a lonely old woman would latch on to some weird fantasy of sharing her daughter.." The dark-eyed Mildred leered and shook her head. "I'm better off without you.. I cannot wait to graduate and never see you again."

"No," the real Mildred tried to scream, "Wake up Miss Hardbroom! You need to transfer away! Why are you not transferring?! Please Miss Hardbroom!"

"You think you saved me? It was you that made me like this in the first place - you that couldn't stop bullying me, that got some kind of sick thrill out of making me feel worthless..."

She felt her magic tug uncontrollably all over her body, mixed with her emotions. You need to discipline your magic Mildred! She felt Miss Hardbroom's voice telling her, real or memory she wasn't certain. Feel it through your body, concentrate on where you want to be. You're strong enough - I know you are.

Mildred felt the flecks vibrate through her as she gripped on even more tightly to Miss Hardbroom's hand. Concentrating harder than she had ever focused before, she felt the strange tingle that she had felt that afternoon in potion's class. A moment later she felt herself travelling through blackness, before she ended up on the other side of the room, her form-mistress's hand still attached to hers.

The last thing she remembered was Miss Hardbroom's slight quirk of a grin, a knowing-look as if she had been proven right and was rather smug, before the blackness took her for a second time...

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