Once upon a time, in a land far, far away…

No. It wasn't a fairytale. It wasn't a myth, or a legend, or the romancing of an origin; not a garish Punch and Judy, or a lurid Commedia dell'Arte (though Beatrice would have made an excellent Signora). There weren't woods, or wolves, or castles, or dragons – even if she was a witch –, no mothers or maidens or crones. Just us.

It was a story, though, because everything is. And it began where it ended; it fell where it stood. A thousand skies ago, in a place called London.

Once upon a time, at Coal Hill…

Monday November 15th, 2027

… a wicked wind tore through the trees, splaying my long hair out across my eyes like black weeds waving in the water. I didn't attempt to tame it. Instead, I stood up taller, pushing out my chest and lengthening my strides, conjuring the air beside me into a gnarled wooden broomstick like the illustrations in my copy of Macbeth. I'd be a witch today, I decided. That would be the safest. Even the heroes in my books got scared sometimes, but the witches never were.

I wished I was a witch. My chest clenched painfully as the school loomed closer and closer, dull grey like a Gothic castle, fading like dust on the wind into the heavy-hanging clouds. It was awful weather, dark and bitter and silent, with driving, freezing rain that I had to shake from my hair like a dog when I edged through the gates; a storm waiting to happen. I tried not to think about the pathetic fallacy.

Despite this, though, I wasn't cold. My heart hammered and hot blood ran through my veins, scalding my cheeks, the sweat on my back prickling in the heavy black witch coat I wore for courage. It didn't seem to be working.

Brave, Amy, I tried to think. Brave. Be a witch, and be brave brave brave.

But I was scared scared scared – and when I looked down, though my hand was still clenched in a hard white fist, the knuckles ivory from a painstaking grip, the broom they'd been holding had disappeared without a trace.

The world, for me, had always been consistent in one aspect at least: it was never anything like how I imagined it. The former seemed mostly content with keeping my life simple, and harmless, and benign; whereas my mind wanted to jump right to the very worst things possible. It whispered to me, bargaining, blackmailing, stoking the flames; teasing out the terror and then taunting my cowardice. Every bitterly black night, the moon looking malevolently on and the sun wondering whether it would ever be time enough for it to rise, no matter what I told myself, I'd never quite be able to believe I would wake again in the morning. The scenes playing themselves out in my mind's eye, the blackness and the doom, the death I was so scared of, they were too clear, too plausible.

It was the same with the classroom. I'd imagined it even worse than my old one, a great Roman arena of a room filled with children who stared and catcalled and who somehow knew all about me. The form teacher was sadistic and sarcastic and screamed at my stupidity, plucking out the word which still rang like a gunshot in my head and mocking me endlessly while I trembled into a terrified heap on the floor, unable to speak a word.

It was nothing like that. For a start, there was hardly anyone in there, just a few stragglers scribbling notes and flicking through their phones while the form teacher glanced over his PowerPoints – a form teacher who was, I have to say, probably more or less the antithesis of my imaginings. He was round and Scouse and nodded at me kindly as he indicated a seat. I drew in my breath as I took in the girl next to it, pulling my witch coat tight around me like an armour – but she didn't look malicious. She had wide brown eyes and very red hair that curled like the perms in my grandmother's photo album, and big white teeth that glinted when she grinned. She was grinning at me.

"Hi!" she said – and I grinned too as I heard the Scottish lilt in her voice leap out at me, just like Macbeth. I liked her already, I decided. "You're Amy, yeah? Now, you don't probably realise this seeing as you only got here, what, five minutes ago, but this is the second-best form in the whole school. Well, third-best if you count the fact that 9D have theirs in the library right now because the Science wing's being rebuilt, but second-best really."

I opened my mouth to reply, but shut it quickly as a sudden terrible thought floated through my mind. She wouldn't know about my Macbeth thing. What if she thought I'd been laughing at her accent? What if she thought I was the malicious one? I didn't want to make an enemy before I'd even spoken a word.

But, as ever, the world and my mind insisted on differing. She wasn't even looking at me, her eyes on our form teacher as he shook his head and tutted in faux irritation.

"Second-best? Second, Carlotta? I can't think of a single other form with a teacher as humorous and benevolent and easy on the eyes as yours truly!" He pretended to look startled as the few present members of the class began to laugh. "What are you all sniggering away for? Look, see what you've started! You're going to have to enlighten us now. Unload a little of that Invernessian wisdom, go on!"

Carlotta just went off in a fit of giggles, her shoulders shaking. I would have did (no, don't say that, Amy, don't even say that) but she didn't seem at all embarrassed. Neither did the pretty Latina girl perched on the desk in front, swinging her long legs and scuffing the toes of her black trainers absent-mindedly as she called out,

"How's she supposed to do that, sir, without risking the staffroom equivalent of a cock-fight after school? I mean, I wouldn't want you to get hurt or anything, sir."

He flapped at her with his big red hands. "Beatrice, while I'm grateful for your concern, I'd also like to remind you that the last time I checked, you were not a host on the Coal Hill equivalent of Question Time. The last time I checked, you were also not in this form. Miss Satterly's your tutor, isn't she?"

"Who wants to know, sir?"

"Well, all I'm saying is if I were you, I'd hot-foot it to that classroom before it ticks over to half past. I've heard she's not exactly lenient with latecomers." He paused, pulling a comically agonised face. "A fact I think you probably know better than anyone."

Beatrice rolled her eyes as the increasing population of the classroom began to 'oooh' at her, but leapt off the desk obediently, landing perfectly balanced on the tips of her trainers, before strutting out with a grace and confidence that reminded me of the queens in my book of fairytales. My gaze must have lingered, because she caught my eye through the glass of the classroom door, laughing. I tensed, hoping I hadn't already ruined my chances of liaision with this girl who looked so much like one of my stories come to life - but then she cocked her head silently towards Carlotta and mouthed, It's amazing, isn't it? Her accent. I didn't quite dare (no, don't use that word, don't, don't, don't) nod, but I smiled back at her in what I hoped read as agreement. She flashed me one more quick grin, then ducked out of sight once more, dashing down the corridor. I swung back to Carlotta, brimming with questions and for once too interested to worry about how I sounded.

"Does she come in here a lot? Beatrice, I mean?"

If she thought it was an odd question, she did well not to show it. "She's in here most mornings, yeah. Sir pretends he hates it, but honestly I think he quite enjoys her dropping in. The rest of us do, anyway."

"Doesn't she get into trouble?" I couldn't help wondering, thinking how scared I'd be - but then I remembered the way she'd strutted out so coolly. Maybe she didn't get scared – although that seemed a ludicrous notion.

Carlotta shrugged. "I don't know. I probably should, seeing as she's my best friend, but it isn't really something she talks about. She's in trouble most of the time anyway." Her face clouded as if she was suddenly anxious, and I had to pull my witch coat tighter than ever around me, but then she looked up at me, and the moment broke. "Anyway, whatever. It doesn't matter. Don't you want to know what the best form is?"

I sucked in my cheeks and swallowed, wondering how on Earth she was managing to avoid the thoughts stinging me like poison. "Yeah. Erm, you mean he won't…" I gestured helplessly towards the teacher. Carlotta burst out laughing, and I cursed myself. Stupid, stupid, stupid! You should know this!

"No, of course not! Beatrice was just annoying him, and he was just pretending to be annoyed. We all know what the best form is, anyway."

"Oh, I bet I can guess!" a boy from the next table jumped in.

"Well, yeah, well done, Miles, it's not exactly difficult," put in the blonde girl beside to him, rolling her eyes. "It's obvious, right, Carlotta? It's Miss Oswald's. It's always Miss Oswald's."

Miles shoved her in the ribs. "Yeah, Scar, I know that. I meant I could get the name of the form, right."

"'Course you did, Miles," Scar said, groaning. Then her eyes glinted. "What form does she have this year…?"

Carlotta turned away from the suddenly forged anarchy beside us and smiled at me. "Have you got your timetable yet? Can I see who you have for English?"

I laid it on the table wordlessly, not wanting to embarrass myself a second time by admitting the numbers and initials it displayed were meaningless to me. Carlotta ran her finger along and then down the newly printed paper, muttering under her breath in concentration.

"Erm, let's see… EN… Monday, period three… room… one one seven! Yeah, you've got her!"

I stared, completely bewildered.

"Miss Oswald! You've got her for English, we both have!" she said, taking out another incomprehensible timetable and placing it next to mine. "Oh, wow, Amy. I don't s'pose you'll really know how lucky we are this year, so, let me 'unload a little of my Invernessian wisdom' onto you. OK, most of the English teachers here are shit. Then there are a few good ones. Then, there are a couple of really good ones – Mr MacLean is one, actually, he's our form teacher. And then, there's Miss Oswald. She's… OK, don't judge me for saying this, it's Beatrice's words not mine, but basically, she's a legend. Half the school would fight like Miles and Scar to get put in her class."

And I think, if I had to narrow it down, that that was the moment things began to change. Because you know how, in stories, premonition is always a thing? How, always, always, no matter what clever device the author tries to use to make it realistic, the main character just knows when something is about to change their life? Well, up until that point, I'd always believed in it, always at least wondered; because I'd always believed in stories, too – far more than I'd ever believed in myself.

But afterwards, I knew that it didn't exist – it couldn't. Because if it had, I am absolutely certain that I would have been more aware of the fact when I asked what was probably the most important question of my life.

"Who's Miss Oswald?"

"She's a witch," said Beatrice at breaktime, flinging herself down on the hall floor and baring her teeth like a cat. "And we're all her little familiars," she added in explanation.

"Beatrice!" Carlotta looked a little uncomfortable and more than a little indignant. "Of course she's not a witch, don't be stupid. You can't fill Amy up with all this before she's even met her, it's not fair!"

"I didn't say Miss Oswald was a bad witch," argued Beatrice. "On the contrary, I think she's a marvellously good one. Glamorous, too. Have you seen that eyeliner! No one non-magical could manage it that smoothly. Although," she added, "I have to say mine isn't terrible."

She lunged away, laughing, as Carlotta made to dig her in the chest. "Get off, Lotta! What's that for, anyway?"

"You've got to stop doing this! Not only is it, firstly, bullshit, and secondly really rude, you'll scare Amy away!"

Oh, you don't know the half of it.

I almost laughed out loud, catching myself just in time. Scare me away? I'd spent my whole life plucking crab apples and peering after black cats, distracting myself every endless night watching through my window for skirted silhouettes moving across the shell of an egg-white moon. I hugged my witch coat around me now, amazed and amused. Witches didn't scare me. Witches kept me brave. Even if they were about all that could.

And I'd always wanted to meet a real one.

"Why is she a witch?" I asked them, hoping I sounded just casually interested.

Carlotta groaned. "See, Beatrice! See what you've done! She's not a witch."

Beatrice ignored her, squinting thoughtfully out of the rain-soaked window behind us. Utterly, hungrily fascinated, I followed her line of sight, up through the muddy, grassless field and the grey concrete playground, past the gym and the canteen and the art huts, to a classroom on the first floor. It was lit brightly against the dark day, leaving the silhouette of a woman clearly visible at the window. She stood very straight, her chin jutted and her chest raised, dark hair hanging sharply to her shoulders and silky skirts hanging softly to her knees. I thought I knew now where my broomstick had gone. She may not have been gliding it across the silvery midnight moon of my stories – but other than that, she was utterly, impossibly, exactly like the witch I'd always watched for.

I guessed right away who she was.

"Because…" Beatrice's voice snapped through my dream, answering the question I'd almost forgotten asking. "Because her lessons are amazing. Because she shouldn't be allowed to teach them. Because the whole school just adores her and yet no one can quite tell you why. Because of the eyeliner. God, how many reasons do you want?"

"What do you mean, she shouldn't be allowed to teach them? Her lessons are way better than anyone else's!" Carlotta leapt in indignantly.

"That's what I mean! Half the time she doesn't do exam stuff at all! It's like she just teaches whatever she fancies and no one bothers to reprimand her – and yet Mr Jones went absolutely bonkers that one time when Miss Shinney tried to teach us statistics instead of sequences. I'm telling you, Amy, it's highly suspect," she said, turning to me. "All she needs is a pointed black hat, and then I'll be certain."

I listened to her, mesmerised. She didn't need anything, not for me. I was already certain. "What are her lessons about?"

"Everything!" said Carlotta firmly. "Really, they are. Remember at Christmas, Beatrice, when we spent a whole week debating about feminism, and the rest of the year were doing reading comprehensions on The Giver? Grace was so jealous!"

"That was incredible," said Beatrice. "And when some twat was stupid enough to ask what on Earth it had to do with the book, she lectured us for half an hour oh how debates were basically verbal essays, then finished it up by saying that actually she thought Lois Lowry was a bit of a shitty author! I never said she wasn't awesome. She rides a motorbike, too, can you believe! That's a hell of an upgrade from a broomstick!"

Carlotta sighed, very heavily and very Scottishly. "Bea, for the last time, Miss Oswald is not a witch! Can you stop telling people that? Even if you do listen to Mr Michaels – which, by the way, I know for a fact that you don't - witches haven't existed since 1727. We aren't living in a fairy tale here!"

Maybe she wasn't. But it was the only way I could cope. Houses crafted themselves into stone castles and thatched cottages, soft green woods hurtling up into great dark forests teeming with wolves and candy houses and little girls in red cloaks. Stories rose for me at each and every turn – and when I thought of the way Beatrice had looked as she'd peered up at the woman in the window, all wide black eyes and reverent face, I wondered whether I might not be alone.

If it was so, I burned at Carlotta's choice of words. But Beatrice just grinned, her expression shunted into submission and the lilt of laughter back in her voice.

"Says the girl who used to spend her days in a gingerbread cottage half a mile from Loch Ness," Beatrice grinned, apparently letting the subject silde. "Anyway, Amy, we've got her in about two minutes! You'll soon see who you agree with!"

She got up to leave, hitching her bag over her shoulder and untangling her long hair from the straps in one admirably fluid motion. Carlotta shook her head.

"What?" said Beatrice. "The bell's going to go in a second! I'm not going to risk being late for her English, she might turn me into a frog or a snake or a monkey or something," she called over her shoulder as she strode out of the hall.

"Maybe she doesn't need to," Carlotta murmured drily, rolling her eyes. But Beatrice had already turned the corner.

She took hold of my hand. "Ignore her, Amy," she said. "Beatrice is all right, but she loves winding people up. It isn't even that she doesn't like Miss Oswald – like she said, everyone does. But isn't because she's a witch, and Beatrice knows that as well as I do."

I wasn't so sure. For all the joking and jesting, there had been a real note of conviction in Beatrice's voice - as well as that one mad, magnetic moment when I knew we could both have gone off in raptures about the magic of the woman in the window. But from the way she talked, Carlotta had obviously heard it all a thousand times or more, and was exhausted of the subject; so I said instead, "Why is she? So liked, I mean? Is she nice?"

Carlotta paused carefully. "She's amazing."

Outwardly, I frowned, realising that would be the appropriate response – but inside, I beamed. All the stories I loved so much, and needed so much more, seemed to have bled right out of my mind and down into the pages of my life. I couldn't help thinking it was a good job I'd read enough to know all the right questions. Fizzing with excitement, feeling like an actress reading from a script, I asked Carlotta, "Yes, but is she nice?"

"Honestly?" she said. "I'm never quite sure. No, maybe that's not fair. Most of the time, she is nice, she's ever so nice. But… sometimes there's just a moment, when she'll be talking to us, quoting from some poem or other, I don't know, and she'll suddenly look… I don't know, sort of desperate. Like she's…" Carlotta drifted off, her brow furrowing as she struggled to think of the right word. "Like she's terrified." Then she laughed a little shakily. "Listen to me, I'm turning into Beatrice, making all these assumptions! She's not a witch, though, I am sure about that."

I frowned for real. Terrified? This wasn't how it was supposed to work. Witches never got scared – never ever. It was the one thing every story agreed on – the one thing I'd carved all my bravery around, whatever little I had. I couldn't lose this, not to anything.

I spoke loudly and clearly, searing the words into the script.

"Of course Miss Oswald's not a witch, then. She can't be. Not if she's –"

"Ssh!" Carlotta hissed, pulling me hurriedly to the other side of the corridor – but not quite hurriedly enough. A small figure had ducked itself out of the classroom opposite while I'd been talking; and now the sharp dark eyes of the woman in the window were firmly fixed on me.

There was no way she couldn't have heard what I'd said – but Miss Oswald made no move whatsoever to indicate her awareness of the fact, just raised her eyebrows in a miniscule motion and said, "Are you coming in, then, or is there a Duke of Edinburgh expedition out here in the corridor I wasn't aware of?"

I could hardly imagine there being much she wasn't aware of; and Carlotta obviously felt the same way. Miss Oswald's tone was light, but she wasn't someone you messed with.

"This is Amy, Miss," she said quickly. "She's new. I was just showing her round. We're not late, are we? We took a bit of a detour."

"You'll do," she said. "I'd hurry up, though. If Mr Jones sees you he'll have a fit." She beckoned us into the classroom. I stumbled dumbly on the scrubby blue carpet, still trying to make sense of all that I'd just taken in. None of it fitted together. Everything contradicted everything else. She was a witch, and I knew she was a witch; because of the way she looked; because of the way her eyes flitted, so quickly, so sharply; because of the lessons, and the window, and the broomstick; because of Beatrice; because of everything. But she wasn't a witch, and I knew she wasn't, knew she couldn't be; because I knew she was terrified. Too quick, too sharp. I could read the signs, by now.

Even so, I couldn't quite bear to give up my fairytale.

It was just as well her classroom was so magical. An Aladdin's cave, the bejewelled tower room of an ancient stone castle – a Pandora's box, but for all the wonders. It was painted the same shabby green and cream as the other rooms I'd been in, with the same cheap wooden desks and chipped plastic chairs, but the walls were scarcely visible beneath all the posters and print-outs Blu-tacked to them. There were equipment lists and famous poems and passages from old books like the English classrooms at my old school, but there were also quotes from physicists and planetary diagrams and facts about the stars; pictures of high green mountains and ancient Eastern villages and secret springs like liquid sapphire; history and music and language and stars; a mad mixture of wonder and whimsy and – the word melting like honey over my tongue, just as it always had – witchcraft. She was a witch. She had to be.

But what were witches afraid of?

Outside, a raven screamed, flapping its wings and cawing at us as it flew off one of the bare black branches outside the window, up into the wide white sky, and I spotted the last picture; rather incongruously amidst all the others, a photograph of an old blue wooden box stuck just above her desk. It was blurred and grainy, obviously taken by an inexpert hand; and not quite centred on the page either, snapped at an odd angle with sprays of leaves visible here and there at the edge. It almost looked as though the photographer had been hiding.

I stared, interested, as I made my way towards the seat she had gestured to – and the face of a white-haired, frowning man, half-visible behind one of the painted doors, seemed to look just as hard back at me. If Miss Oswald was a witch, this man was undoubtably a magician. Where her eyes were black and sharp as a starless night, his were icy blue – but they were the same too, human beyond humanity, quick and ancient and missing nothing at all. I wondered whether he'd seen the photographer after all – and whether they'd ever realised.

Life and Time, was the title written in careful black capitals on the smudged whiteboard just above his head.