Thank you, lovely reviewers. I know I still owe several people replies, and I will do that… but my internet connection threw one of its occasional wobblies last night, so I couldn't do it then. So now, I present Chapter Four…. Keep those reviews coming, they really do keep me motivated and focused! Oh, and plug alert: there's a vague reference to my WW fic Sounding a Chord, which can be found on my profile. You don't need it, it's just my version of Constance's background.

Thanks to CirqueduGleek yet again!

CHAPTER FOUR

The Third years were in their form room, awaiting Miss Hardbroom for registration. At the front sat – or rather, lolled – Mildred Hubble, who was improving the shining hour with a quick snooze. Her head was cradled on her arms in the time-honoured fashion of pupils wishing to declare exhaustion or ill health, and her long plaits dangled over the other side of the desk, the ends only inches away from the floor.

She was in that cosy place halfway between waking and sleep; more than half-convinced that her dream of holidays was real. Therefore, when she was addressed in a gentle voice (a fully alert Mildred would have recognised that tone as ominously gentle) she reacted accordingly.

'Catching up on a little sleep, are we?' the voice asked.

'Hmm-mm,' said Mildred, trying to snuggle more deeply into non-existent pillows.

'Perhaps we should provide you with a pillow and blankets, just so that you are comfortable,' the voice continued, acquiring a slight edge that should have served as a warning.

'Hmmmm….,' Mildred agreed happily, blissfully anticipating several more hours of shut-eye.

'Oh, for goodness' sake … OPEN YOUR EYES THIS INSTANT, MILDRED HUBBLE!'

Mildred's eyes snapped open and her body jerked back to the perpendicular with a speed that was certainly comical enough to justify the suppressed titters that arose from the back of the classroom.

'Miss Hardbroom!' she gasped, trying to gather her scattered wits.

Her form mistress pushed herself straight, using the desk as a lever. 'Congratulations on stating the blindingly obvious yet again, Mildred. Yes, it is I. There's no need to sound so surprised; this is a school day, although it would seem that fact has escaped your memory.' Her glare was at full strength, whatever her body might be, and Mildred visibly wilted.

'I'm sorry, Miss,' she offered, wondering what awful punishment would be imposed upon her this time. Mildred knew she'd been responsible for a number of 'firsts' during her years at Cackle's, and she was certain this would be another for the list. Whoever heard of someone falling asleep with Miss Hardbroom in charge?

At least she can't do anything magical, Mildred told herself as she awaited her form-mistress's verdict with considerable trepidation. Only stupid lines, detention, or scrubbing floors…

Her eyes widened and an involuntary grin crossed her face as she was visited by a sudden flash of insight.

HB's never used magic against us, she realised, only half listening to Miss Hardbroom's lecture on the iniquity of falling asleep during lesson hours. Bless, she's just an old softie at heart-

'MILDRED HUBBLE!' Miss Hardbroom hissed in a stentorian whisper. Such was its force that even the distracted Mildred jerked to attention.

She straightened her face immediately, and tried to play the innocent. 'Yes, Miss?'

Miss Hardbroom narrowed her eyes until they were dark slits. 'Five hundred lines of I must not fall asleep during lessons, followed by another five hundred of I must not grin like a defective ape when my form-mistress is talking – and I want them tonight.'

'Yes, Miss Hardbroom,' Mildred acquiesced, sliding down in her seat as the prospect of any kind of free time that afternoon vanished.

Her form mistress looked as if she was going to say something more, but thought the better of it. For a split second, her upright posture faltered, and she moved several steps away from Mildred, towards the desk, where she could get a better view of the class as a whole.

'Where is Maud Moonshine?' she asked in a resigned tone.

Personally, Mildred was surprised it had taken her so long to notice, but any attempt to answer was forestalled by the arrival of Maud herself.

'I'm awfully sorry, Miss,' she panted as she slipped into her place beside Mildred. 'Miss Bat wanted to see all the chanting group, and I – uh, I don't think she heard the bell.'

Miss Hardbroom's lips pursed. 'Chanting –' she began in derisory tones before momentarily closing her eyes. She took a deep breath, exhaling slowly. 'Never mind, Maud, never mind. There are more important things to worry about, and we've wasted nearly half our time as it is,' she went on, sending another narrow-eyed glance towards Mildred.

She turned and walked around the desk, and sank – thankfully, Mildred thought – into the chair behind it, her sticks leaned carefully against the blackboard. Then she glared around them all, more or less impartially.

'It is vital that you pull yourselves together, girls, and that you do so forthwith.' She clasped her hands on the desk, her fingers moving automatically into spell-casting position. 'We are expecting another visit from Mistress Broomhead. She will arrive at lunch –'

'Lunch?' exclaimed half the class in disgusted tones, while the other half cowered and pretended they weren't there.

'Lunch,' repeated Miss Hardbroom inflexibly. 'Miss Cackle and I believe that she has learned of our epidemic and its resultant effect on our collective magic-'

'No prizes for guessing how,' Mildred hissed in Maud's ear.

'-and she is coming here as a formality, Mildred Hubble. She will almost certainly remove our GAS this time.'

'But can't we use what we learnt about her last time?' Maud protested in response to a dig from Mildred. 'About her really being Wilhelmina Wormy or whatever it was.'

'Wormwood, Maud. It worked once; if she's brave enough to try again, chances are that it will not work again. Hecketty Broomhead is not a stupid woman,' Miss Hardbroom added, with an intensity that thoroughly unnerved her pupils. 'She will have taken what we know about her into consideration even before she sent notice of the inspection.'

'What are we going to do, Miss?' Ruby piped up.

'She's a horrible, horrible woman,' Maud declared. 'We have to do something.'

Miss Hardbroom looked sad, an emotion that only Mildred had seen in her before.

'We have no magic. I don't think there is anything we can do; all we can do is attempt to mitigate the effects. Accordingly, girls, as soon as we finish here you are all to go to your dormitories and clear them completely of any and all items that do not belong in the most perfectly regulated of witch schools. And that includes those – those popstar posters of yours, Jadu Wali, and that collection of mechanical contrivances I know you've got hidden somewhere, Ruby Cherrytree. Is that perfectly clear?'

'Yes, Miss,' the form responded meekly. Even after more than two years they continued to be stunned by Miss Hardbroom's general omniscience.

Mildred ventured to raise her hand, remembering how her beloved bats had had to go into hiding the previous year in an effort to placate Mistress Broomhead, who was known to detest them. 'Please, Miss, what about Winky, Blinky and Nod?'

'And Barney,' Maud added, looking worried.

Miss Hardbroom pressed her index fingers together and raised them to her lips, her dark eyes studying the pair before her for a long moment. She gave a queer half-smile. 'I think we'll leave them where they are. After all,' she continued with a smirk, 'no-one can say that bats do not belong in a school for witches!'

When she dismissed them to go to their rooms, the smirk had spread across the entire form, heartened as they were by the thought of that one miniscule token of defiance.

xxx

'Make sure you check the dormitories thoroughly, Miss Drill,' Constance reiterated for the fourth time as the mistresses went through their last-minute preparations for the upcoming inspection over tea in the staffroom.

Imogen tutted. 'Yes, Miss Hardbroom. I know. I'm to check for: tidiness, neatly-made beds, Fenella's room for forbidden books, Griselda's for that potion making set you seem to think she has, Ruby's for electronics, Jadu's for posters, Sybil's for –'

'Well done, Imogen,' Miss Cackle interjected before the Games mistress could list the forbidden dormitory contents of the entire school. 'You do seem to know what you're doing, and there isn't much time. Do you want to go now?'

'I think that would be best,' Imogen agreed gravely, and whipped out of the room before Constance could add anything more.

That lady glared as the door shut behind her. 'She never takes anything seriously,' she complained, furiously stirring her tea. 'If Hecketty has her way we'll all be out of a job before so very long.'

'Constance,' Miss Cackle started, and something in her tone prompted the younger woman to look at her. 'We won't be. Don't forget what happened last year with Amanda Honeydew: this castle is mine. Even if our GAS is withdrawn – and I agree it probably will be – we can continue, somehow.'

'Without official backing,' Constance pointed out grimly. 'Fat lot of good that'll do the girls when they come to leave school, if they haven't got their WJC or WHC.'

Amelia patted her arm. 'Don't worry. I have a plan.' She tapped her nose and tried to look knowing. She glanced at the clock and handed Constance her sticks. 'Come along, my dear. We'd better go and greet our visitor, and you did say that Mistress Broomhead is a little obsessed with punctuality.'

'And that is the understatement of the century,' Constance said sourly as she followed her employer out of the room, her sticks clacking on the hard stone floor.

When they reached the hall, it was to find Miss Drill (impeccably attired in a formal suit for once) waiting, along with a Davina Bat who looked marginally more aware of the world around her than she had done for some days.

Constance scowled at them. 'What are you doing here?'

Davina's lace-covered hands fluttered anxiously around her face. 'We're being sup-supportive.' She drew herself up to her full and limited height. 'I w-won't hide away, even if that woman doesn't like b-bats!'

'You're just right, Davina,' Imogen told her soothingly as she shot an answering frown at Constance.

Constance snorted. She shifted her weight slightly, and wished that she could abandon her sticks. Her heart thumped uneasily at the thought of exposing her frailty to a woman who would not scruple to exploit it, but her pride in her position as Cackle's Deputy Headmistress kept her where she was.

'I'm glad we're all here,' Amelia said, unwittingly uttering the thought that Constance's subconscious was grasping towards. 'I'd rather face this together.'

'Exactly,' Constance agreed with a heartiness that was only slightly false. 'Team work, that's how we do it, h'mm?' She glanced at her colleagues, and chose to ignore the variously startled and befuddled looks they were casting her in return.

She stomped the three steps it took to bring her abreast of Amelia. 'Mistress Broomhead has no concept of the value of working together. We can get to her that way.'

'And with bats,' she was sure she heard Imogen mutter in the background.

The clock chimed one, and, right on cue, a knock sounded on the great front door.

xxx

Unbeknownst to the staff, they had an audience as they awaited the arrival of their unwanted visitor. Maud and Mildred were crouched in their favoured hiding place, high above the hall in the shadows of the gallery that linked the stairs to the dormitories.

Maud eyed her friend with some disquiet when Mildred's face lit up at Miss Drill's mention of bats, but Mildred was too intent on watching the events below to say anything just then.

Mistress Broomhead's entry was typically brusque, and she shunned greetings in favour of proclaiming her intentions of scouring every square inch of Cackle's, from the highest attic down to the deepest dungeons.

'And that will be that,' she announced triumphantly in her unpleasantly metallic voice, her gimlet-like eyes switching from one staff member to the other. 'I've known for a long time that this school is failing; I have no doubt that when I finish here today I will be in a position to close Cackle's forever!' She began to move towards the Great Hall, but stopped throw a glare over her shoulder. 'What are you waiting for, Miss Cackle, Constance? Chop chop!'

'Poor HB,' Maud muttered as she watched their weakened form mistress struggle to keep up with Hecketty's brisk pace. 'I bet she's wishing she had her magic back right now.'

The look Mildred sent her was fiercely determined. 'We need to get that woman out of here! She's not just mean, she's dangerous.'

'What do you mean, Millie?'

'She scares HB,' Mildred told her, remembering how Miss Hardbroom had leaned against the doorframe when Hecketty materialised in front of them all that day in the store room. 'Really scares her. That can't be good. She hurts people somehow. Well,' and her mouth firmed, 'I'm not going to let her get away with it!'

Maud sighed. 'What are you thinking?'

That seraphic smile crossed Mildred's face once again. 'We're going to do what Miss Drill said. Get her with bats!'

And she unveiled her plans to an incredulous, but ultimately willing, Maud.

xxx

Amelia cast her deputy a concerned look as Hecketty dragged them around the dungeons, sticking her large hooked nose into literally every nook and cranny. Amelia tried not to smirk when this more often than not resulted in a spider's web dangling from the aforesaid hooked nose, but her amusement was tempered by her worry on Constance's behalf. The younger woman was ashen, and her lips were pressed together so firmly that they disappeared into her gaunt face.

We need to stop this marathon around the school, Amelia thought anxiously as she watched Constance narrowly avoid going headlong when one of her sticks caught at the edge of the uneven flagstones on the floor. Otherwise Constance will collapse despite herself, and I won't give That Woman the satisfaction…

She glanced at her watch, and hid a smile. Perhaps that could be the way out. It was almost quarter to two, and the bell for the end of lunch would go at two sharp. Constance was due with the First years for their afternoon lesson then, and Amelia herself should be doing the theory of advanced transfiguration and transfrogrification with the Fifth.

'Have you seen everything you needed to see, Mistress Broomhead?' she asked politely as the inspector circled around the centre of the floor and came to a stop, her eyes still roving here, there and everywhere. Amelia found herself wondering what kind of incriminating evidence Broomhead thought she'd find on the crevices of the ancient stone, and decided she didn't want to know. 'It's nearly the end of the lunch hour, and –'

A satisfied smirk hovered around Hecketty's mouth, and Amelia could have kicked herself. Her attempt at subtlety had obviously failed; Hecketty's smirk broaded into a cruel smile as she looked from Amelia to Constance and back.

'Surely this cannot be all, Miss Cackle?' Broomhead cooed. 'This is a large castle with a history that dates back a thousand years. Do you really expect me to believe that this one paltry room is the entire dungeon?'

Amelia's heart sank all the way down to her boots. Broomhead had clearly spent time learning the castle's layout, and now she was using it against them. 'There's more through this grille,' she admitted reluctantly, showing the inspector the narrow gate that led down a tiny dark passage to the next series of rooms.

'Well, unlock it, Miss Cackle,' Broomheard ordered impatiently. She tutted her irritation. 'And you, Constance. Hurry up,' she barked as the Deputy Headmistress walked towards them with agonising slowness. 'The tardier you are, the longer this will take.'

Amelia looked down at the key she held in her hand and seriously contemplated urging Broomhead in first. "Lock the door and throw away the key" had never seemed so tempting, but Broomhead anticipated her.

'Constance'll go first, and then you, Miss Cackle,' Mistress Broomhead instructed. 'I wouldn't want to get lost, would I?'

Amelia gave a hollow laugh. 'That would be a tragedy indeed, Mistress Broomhead.'

'Quite,' agreed Hecketty, oblivious to the irony, her hooked nose pointed into the air.

Amelia found herself counting the tiny spiders that still dangled there, the silken webs shimmering in the dim light. Idly, she wondered what would happen if one of the spiders crawled up Hecketty's nose…

'Finally,' the woman hissed as Constance reached them.

She stood leaning heavily on her sticks and trying desperately not to show how winded she was, but Amelia could see what the effort had cost her, and she had to fight down a surge of overpowering rage. Hecketty had them, as the saying goes, over a barrel, and they had no ready means of opposing her – and she knew it. Her pleasure in the entire situation was tangible.

'Now if we're all ready,' Broomhead began in a travesty of a teacher's classroom voice, 'let's get on with it and see what secrets you've been hiding.' Her eyes gleamed. 'Go on, Constance. Lead the way.'

Amelia gritted her teeth as Constance's dark eyes fleetingly met hers when she shuffled past in obedience to her former tutor. Never in the twenty years they had worked together had she seen such exhausted despair in her colleague's gaze. Impulsively, she reached out to help Constance over the uneven ground, and was shocked when Hecketty abruptly slapped her hand away, as if Amelia was a child illicitly raiding a cookie jar.

'I was only-' she began hotly.

'She can do it herself,' Hecketty threw back. 'She's learned self-sufficiency in a very hard school.' She sounded absurdly proud, and once again Amelia had to repress her fury.

If this is how Constance was taught it's no wonder she is how she is, she fumed inwardly as Hecketty mutely demanded the key to the grille, and Amelia was forced to hand it over. It's a miracle she wasn't entirely broken, between this – this harridan and that evil witch of a grandmother…

The passage was narrow and oppressive, and Amelia was relieved that neither she nor Constance – to the best of her knowledge – suffered from claustrophobia. The only sounds were the uneven clacks as Constance's sticks hit the floor ahead, and behind her, almost in time with the clack-clack-clack, Hecketty's rapid and excited breathing.

Amelia's skin crawled, and she was ready to cheer with relief when a change in the texture of the floor underfoot indicated they were moving out of the passage. She had only a fleeting moment to hope that Constance would remember the step when the inevitable happened. One of Constance's sticks caught on a rough patch on the timeworn floor, causing both crutches to go flying, and Constance herself to crash brutally into the unforgiving castle walls.

xxx

Heh. Yep, I seem to have succumbed to the 'let's all beat HB up' syndrome. Or have I? *disappears cackling*