The Dance of the Witches by Elizabeth Chettlebrugh (each kindness read aloud TXT) 📕

Ann Rede was a shy girl, she never spoke a word nor lifted her head to look at anyone, the other kids at Miss Hartwell’s boarding school for girls ran and stared in astonishment as Ann strode past in her grey hoody with her head drooped so low that the shadow from her hood covered half her face! When she was only 12 years old, she ran away from the school and made herself a home at the very end of Blossemhill gardens. Ann’s parents died when she was the tender age of 1 year old, when Miss Hartwell found her laying helplessly on the street, she felt sorry for Ann and took her back to the school.
Of course Ann always knew that Miss was not her true mother and she really didn’t need a birth certificate to tell the difference… When she was 10 she made her point in an irritating and of task speech in the middle of her science lesson when Miss Hartwell called Ann Darling! “Only if I was fat with a warty nose and a ridiculous hair style, not to mention the smelly smell and no sense in style would we be even close to relatives!” She was sick of Miss Hartwell treating her like a daughter, if she couldn’t be with her real parents then why on earth would she want to be with a fat idiot that bought her cookies and milk every night and didn’t even bother to try and teach her!
Ann ran across the bright green grass of the garden of Blossemhill towards the fence, her dog Cathy closely running behind her, sniffing the ground as she went behind her owner. Ann carefully stepped through the gap in the wooden fence and appeared graciously on the other side in the Blossemhill forest; she skipped over to a pile of leaves and brushed them away to show a pink rucksack, with a rose-petal pattern and a small white sticker reading “property of Ann Rede”. She put the rucksack on her back, picked up Cathy from the other side of the garden fence and sealed up the gap in the fence with twigs and leaves.
She, with Cathy on her lead, slowly walked over to a large tree with a small hole in it, she unzipped her bag and drew out a small torch and two thick blankets. She flicked on the torch and hung it from a sturdy branch above the small hole so that it was shining into the tree, she gently laid the blankets on the floor of the hollow tree and got in bringing her rucksack and Cathy in after her, she pulled a cushion out of her bag and placed it on the blankets, then she pulled out a small bowl from a corner of the tree and went out of her hole towards the lake at the far end of the forest, cutting a line between Blossemhill village and Horsefield city.
She sat by the lake, took her shoes off and put them next to her, then she dipped her feet into the calm and cool water and washed her face and her hands, she got up and dried her feet on the grass at the lake side, put her shoes back on and moved up the lake side and kneeled down at the lake to fill up her bowl with fresh water, then walked back to the tree slowly so she didn’t spill the water.
When she got back to her tree hole, she poured a small amount of the water on the ground next to Cathy to drink from; she put on her rucksack, picked up Cathy then walked to Blossemhill library.
In the library, Ann was surrounded by billions of books, new and old, fact and fiction, belief and religion. She strode up the isles until she reached the “myths and legends” section of the library, the shelf were packed with old books about dragons, fairies and witches.
She picked up a book on the bottom shelf titled “dragons of the wild, by Chloe Jane-Ark”, one from the top shelf, (which Ann had to use a step ladder to reach) titled “The magical world of Pixies and fairies, by Roxan Serphant” and then an old, dusty book, in the darkest place of the shelf appeared in the corner of Ann’s eyes.
The book was black with a golden five-pointed star on the front and gold writing down the spine reading “dark and light magic, the story of witches” no author was stated on the cover or inside the book, Ann picked it up and blew the dust away into the shadows, she opened the book, the writing was small and the pages were turned at the edges, the paper was a yellowish brown type colour and they were decorated with a silver leave pattern.
She closed the book and walked out of the dark corner of the huge shelf and went with the three books to the librarian and asked politely to take them out or if she was allowed, to buy them .The librarian said that she could have them for free, no one ever read the books from the myths and legends section.
Ann took the books back to her tree in the forest along with Cathy and her rucksack, then she took Cathy out in the forest, she bought two plastic bags, one for Cathy’s business and the other for dead animals and un-poisonous leaves. They walked over to the lake and washed out the leaves and animals, then went to the other end of the forest and put Cathy’s business in a heap of compost.
They ran back to the tree hole with the food, picking up wood and leaves on the way, when they were back at the tree at last, Ann made a small pile of wood and dunked the leaves on top, then she took a box of matches out of her rucksack and made a fire, she hung a bowl over the fire and put the half the dead animals in the bowl, she gave the other half to Cathy who ate the meat quickly, she helped herself to the leaves and gave some to Cathy who nudged them away in an unpleasant way.
When the meat was cooked, Ann took the bowl from above the fire and started eating it. When night time fell, Ann got into her bed and put a small blanket around Cathy to keep her warm, they both went to sleep quickly and the night was silent apart from the distant howling of the wolfs night cry’s.
The next morning, Ann and Cathy woke up early, they had herd a bang, followed by what sounded a lot like some sort of medieval music, and it was coming from the distance, somewhere near the lake. Ann took Cathy on her lead and ran across to the lake with her rucksack (which was now even heavier because of the three books she got the night before).
The music was getting louder as she got nearer to the lake, she waked slowly up the lake side where the music was getting louder still, she moved further up the lake and then knew that it couldn’t be coming from Blossemhill, it was from the other side of the lake, in Horsefield city forest.
Ann found a small boat and got in with Cathy and her rucksack, she slowly sailed over to the other side of the lake, trying not to be caught, when she, Cathy and the rucksack were safely over the lake, they quietly moved to where the sound was strongest, Ann had Cathy in her arms and not on the ground because she thought that Cathy would step on a twig and make a big noise.
They reached the outside of a circle in the middle of the forest and looked through a small gap in-betweens two trees and saw three people dressed in long black capes, walking around a small tree, singing in a deep voice, she saw another person standing outside the tree circle singing in high pitch and nothing else was surrounding them but trees.
Ann took her three books out of her bag, the first book she took out was the one about fairies, she flicked through the pages, scanning through the images, they couldn’t be fairies, even dark fairies were not as evil looking as the people singing deeply before her. She took out the second book about dragons, they couldn’t be dragon tamers, there were no dragons or dragon eggs anywhere and the book said that dragons were shy around more than two people.
Ann took out the third book, the one about witches, and she opened it and looked at the images, all the pictures of witches were hooded figures, with white eyes and wore black capes with a golden five-pointed star on them. Ann looked up at the people; they were all hooded with a black cape that had a golden star on it. The people were witches.
Ann quietly pulled a camera out of her bag and took a picture of the four witches, the camera made a flash and a click and all the attention drew to Ann, she picked up her books and her camera and ran to the small boat.
She went back across the calm lake as fast as she could, the witches were running to the lake but when they reached it they stopped, the y didn’t move there wands or get on there broomsticks to fly across the lake, they just stood there with white eyes staring directly at Ann.
Ann ran back to her tree hole and got in the tree, panting heavily and not realising that the witches had stopped chasing her. She put the books and the camera back into her bag and then took the book about witches back out, she lit a large candle and started to read the book.
She read until half past three in the afternoon, then realised that she was starving, she took a plastic bag from here rucksack and opened it, she took out a raw carrot, cold pasta, cold meat and a smaller bag of dog food and started eating, giving the dog food to Cathy.
After she ate, she took Cathy out for a walk in the forest, she walked around for five minuets then sot bored, she went to turn back to her tree hole but Cathy wouldn’t let her move, Ann looked at Cathy and she was sniffing the ground, pulling her owner further up the lake.
Ann couldn’t keep control of Cathy and was being dragged up the lake side until they reached the point where they saw the four witches, Ann looked over the lake and saw nothing, she looked back at Cathy but she was staring at a place in Blossemhill forest.
They quietly ran to another circle, in the circle were five women dressed in white capes, that dragged behind them on the grassy floor as they danced and skipped around a smaller circle made up by three little girls dressed in short white dresses, they were holding hands and happily skipping and singing around a white candle, the candle flame was glowing bleu.
Ann reached into her rucksack and pulled out the book about witches, she turned to the light magic section, all the witches were dressed in white and standing near bleu fire, she took out her camera and got ready to run.
She took a picture and the camera made a snap, the three older witches turned and looked her with blue sparkling eyes, then turned back and joined