A/N: I do not own the Worst Witch or the characters.

Chapter Two

Strange Behaviour

It did not take very long for Ethel's bruises to be noticed. She went to help Esmerelda with her jobs and luckily none of the first years reacted to much, they didn't know Ethel so to them it could be just an ordinary thing she had bruises, for all they knew she got into a fight which resulted in the bruises, no she didn't get comments until other year groups started to notice her face.

"Ethel what happened to you?" Miss Drill asked her as she spotted the young blonde in the corridor and noticed her bruised and battered face.

"Nothing serious, just had a fight..." Ethel lied not wanting to talk about it. Luckily for her Miss Drill seemed to sense this as she did not ask anything more. However, her classmates were another matter, they all asked her what had happened and even after she told them she didn't want to talk about it they kept it up but everyone knew something was extremely wrong with Ethel by the way she reacted to this.

Ethel normally would have screamed at them all to leave her alone and stop bugging her but all she was doing now was falling silent, in fact the girl was barely speaking in classes. She sat in her classes playing with her hands not volunteering to answer as normal, she hadn't so much as glanced at Mildred, and seemed not to be able to concentrate on her work.

Mildred couldn't help watching Ethel in chanting that day, the girl was not even making any attempt to sing she was just flickering through the pages in her book as if she was in another world and acting nothing like herself.

Esmerelda and Sybil were not having an easy time either, despite it not being them who were walking around with a face full of bruises, students would still come up to them and ask them what happened, especially to Esmerelda. She had first years all the time asking her what had happened to her sisters face as they had by then heard from the older years the girl was not known to come to school bruised, the problem is neither girl really knew how to answer, it wasn't for them to say and so they didn't answer but the questions kept coming despite all this.

Esmerelda sighed and sat next to Ethel at lunch playing with her lumpy soup with her spoon before she spoke.

"The amount of people who have asked me about your face and it is only the first day" Esmerelda said clearly fed up of people asking her the same thing all the time. Ethel wasn't eating herself and burrowed into her sister's arm like a child.

"Are you okay?" Esmerelda asked still worried about her sister being so so clingy. Ethel nodded before she replied.

"I am just not hungry" she replied feeling even less hungry when she saw her sister spoon the runny soap into her mouth.

"Alright I will let you of this time" Esmerelda told Ethel not wanting to force her to eat. Esmerelda glanced up and saw most of the hall were staring at her and Ethel and she was just about to moan in annoyance when Sybil came and sat with her sisters.

"Sybie, where are Clarice and Beatrice?" Esmerelda asked wondering where the girls friends were. Sybil ate some of her soup before replying.

"They are sat at another table, I needed to talk to you alone" Sybil replied seeming upset about something.

"Oh, what is wrong?" Esmerelda asked instantly concerned about that.

"Well people have been asking me questions about Ethel but I said I cannot talk about it and then I heard some people talking and ...well there is a rumour going around" Sybil said with a sigh clearly upset about what she had heard.

"What rumour? I haven't heard anything" Esmerelda replied. People clearly had been careful to avoid saying it in front of Esmerelda as they knew she would probably say something unlike Sybil and she was head girl...she could punish them for it.

"They said that Ethel got the bruises from mum and dad, that they have been hitting her" Sybil said eating sadly as she told her sisters.

Esmerelda was annoyed at that. She knew where that was coming from. Their parents did not like Ethel and were pretty cold and it made sense that people would think Ethel had drove them to far and they had lost it with her but even though she knew why people were saying it she couldn't believe people would speak so casually about it. Did they not realise it could have bad consequences if someone heard? Esmerelda and her parents were not exactly best friends but comments like that could be enough to get them put into care.

"How can they say that?" Esmerelda asked annoyed. Sybil sighed in response.

"I know, they said it is why we are being secretive about it, I thought I better tell you" Sybil told her sisters as she had not wanted them to overhear for themselves, she wanted them to be aware of what everyone in the school was saying. Ethel pulled away from Esmie slightly but still held on to her arm.

"I am going to have to tell everyone the truth aren't I?" the blonde asked her sisters, knowing before long Cackle would have her parents in if they weren't careful.

"I think so Ethie, you don't have to go into details just tell them about the attack" Esmerelda replied with a smile and Ethel burrowed in again before talking.

"Can you tell everyone?" "I really don't want to talk about it" Ethel replied dreading the thought of it and the questions she would get asked.

"Alright, If it will make it easier I will tell people" Esmerelda told her sister and Ethel nodded at her. Sybil looked at her sister concerned by the way she was acting, Sybil had noticed her extra clinginess as well.

So Sybil and Esmerelda agreed to talk about the truth if anyone asked them but Sybil decided to tell her friends first and sat them down in their bedroom nervously.

"Ethel said I can tell you what happened" Sybil told her friends. Both girls had asked Sybil but after a few times they had stopped realising she didn't want to talk about it so they were touched she trusted them enough to tell them now.

"It wasn't my parents like everyone is saying, Ethel was coming home after being out at the library and well someone jumped her and attacked her" Sybil told her two friends who gasped in shock, they hadn't expected that.

"Why would they randomly decide to beat someone up?" Clarice asked not understanding the logic behind it.

"Well they did it to mug her" Sybil replied before she pulled a face as if she doubted that part.

"What is wrong?" Beatrice asked her seeing the expression she pulled and seeing the doubt on her face.

"Well…..Ethel lied about that part" Sybil replied with a sigh.

"How do you know?" Clarice asked curiously.

"The attacker didn't steal anything, she said he wanted a phone and was angry she didn't have one so he beat her up but….she was wearing this really expensive gold necklace our grandmother had brought her for her birthday….and he didn't take it even though he would get much more for that than a phone" Sybil replied feeling bad for doubting Ethel but she had been going over it in her head and something didn't make sense.

"Maybe he didn't know it was real?" Beatrice suggested. Ethel was after all a child, the attacker probably didn't expect for her to own anything gold, they weren't to know she was rich, unless they could tell by her clothes, which clearly they hadn't or they would have taken the necklace.

"Yes but...wouldn't you take the chance …?" Sybil asked and Beatrice and Clarice looked at each other both knowing Sybil was right. For some reason Ethel had lied about the mugging.

Ethel seemed to be struggling to maintain her composure a lot these days. Another odd thing was she kept crying for no reason such as that morning in spell science she burst into tears when Mr Rowan Webb asked her a question and she grew worse the closer the man got to her. As Mr Rowan- Webb was the only male in the school it was not hard to notice her strange behaviour around him.

At home Ethel had being the same with their father. She was never exactly close to the man and to be honest all three girls had always being more scared of their mother but now as soon as he entered the room she would make an excuse and leave.

As Esmerelda walked down the corridor with Ethel and she grabbed onto her for dear life when Mr Rowan-Webb walked down the corridor Esmerelda knew something was wrong and she came to the conclusion the attacker had been male and he had mentally scarred her from the attack as after all he had beaten her up really bad so she was of course scared. Esmerelda tried to hide the worry in the back of her mind though, something telling her something else was going on, she knew when Ethel was hiding something and this time she could tell it was something big.