Phenomena Willow, a young witch in training, grumbled to herself as she made her way across the vast and thick Pembroke Forest. Wrapped in a dark sweater robe that was slightly big for her which was clumsily emblazoned with the face of a cat, her round dark eyes scanned the ground. Finding nothing but brambles and tall grass, she gave a snort from her round, button nose and her metal teeth correcting retainer caused her to lisp angrily. Her messy black hair was tied in a braid, and it bobbed along as she lugged around a large hand-woven basket. A single, tiny mushroom bounced around inside it—the sole spoil of a gathering session. The cap was scarlet with white polka dots.

The mighty pine trees of the Pembroke Forest stretched out of the ground like giant’s legs, and they were tall enough to form a natural roof over the sky. They kept everything a breezy cool, but also made a warming glint of sunlight as rare as the mushrooms themselves. A silvery mist hung like a veil over everything, making scouring the ground for the elusive mushrooms even more difficult.

“I’ve been out here for hours, and all I’ve found is one measly magicap,” she muttered. “If I don’t find any more in the next few minutes, she’s going to have to make do with this one…whoa!”

Her foot locked with something on the ground, and she tripped forward, tumbling face first into a pile of mud. Splattering into the pile with a loud scream, the young witch cursed her bad luck. “Miserable magicaps, this day keeps getting worse and worse! It must be a spellcaster itself because it really put a hex on me. What did I trip over anyway?”

Mena turned her head and saw a pile of brown mushrooms growing in the mud. “Of course,” she said, her voice dramatically rising. “I find some more mushrooms, but of course, they’re the wrong kind…Wait!”

A sparkle of illumination flickered in her eyes and her mouth spread into a glossy grin, making her mud-covered face shine. As she held her hand to her head, she cast a spell over the single magicap in her basket. “Copycat copycat, make these mushrooms just like that!”

A purple cloud swirled around the brown shrooms and when it had cleared, they magnificently resembled the magicaps—right down to the white spots. “My my,” the Phenomena gloated as she gathered her newly disguised mushrooms. “I amaze myself sometimes…”

Suddenly, her expression changed to one of disbelief. “Wait a minute…Why didn’t I think of that the first hundred times?”

The young witch stunned herself into silence and the only sound came from a bird flying overhead. Her rare moment of quietness was interrupted by a loud, high-pitched cackle cutting through the air. “I’ve found you dearie!”

The young witch looked behind her and gasped.

Three women hovered over her on broomsticks. The first was a big fat woman with a wide jaw and a huge forehead. It was a miracle, it seemed, that she could balance on a thin broomstick. The woman beside her, in contrast, was thin with stringy brown hair and an inordinate number of teeth arranged in a sinister grin. She emitted creepy giggles through her teeth that sounded like ‘heh heh heh.’ The third woman actually resembled a regular person with a sweet, round face and an average physique. Each was dressed in classic witch attire with dark robes and pointy hats. The fact that these women were witches, hardly scared the young spellcaster, but there was something that struck her as rather odd about these three.

“Why are you guys so green?!” she asked pointing at them at their peculiar pigment.

The fat witch put her hands on her hips, and her large chin stuck out in a scowl. “Hey, we don’t talk about your skin color, dearie!”

Phenomena had never seen green witches before. They seemed to be the wicked kind you’d only find in storybooks. That depiction generally gave humanity in Autolycus the wrong impression of magical sorceresses.

“Ok…” the young witch said raising an eyebrow. “Then who are you?!”

The fat witch looked excitedly at the other two. “Are you ready girls?” she asked.

The other two nodded. “Bubbel!” the fat witch exclaimed raising her hands. “Bubbel, Bubbel.”

The thin witch raised her hands too. “Toila! Toila and…”

“Karen!” the third, average looking witch exclaimed with even more exuberance.

“Bubbel, Toila and… Karen?” the young teen exclaimed, her eyebrows raising even higher towards her hair.

The fat witch crossed her arms and frowned. “Unfortunately, our third sister, Trubba couldn’t make it. Karen’s filling in for her.”

”And doing an outright ruddy job of it,” Toila growled.

Karen looked downwards, disappointed in how she ruined their witch chant. “What do you want with me?” the young witch cried out.

“Well little witchy-woo,” Bubbel said, narrowing her eyes and rubbing her hands together. “We’re wondering if you could tell us the whereabouts of a certain witch named Grizabella.”

Mena squeaked nervously as they said her aunt’s name. These weirdos knew about her aunt even though they lived out in the middle of a dense forest. What could they possibly want? Mena put on her brave face, and spoke in her bold dramatic fashion, “I don’t know any Grizabella,” she lied. “But if I did. I wouldn’t tell you!”

Bubbel laughed. “Oh, you do know, don’t you? We have ways of making you tell, child. If you don’t, we’re going to string you up over our favorite cauldron like a little rat.”

Toila nudged her sister. “I think,” she said, in between her creepy ‘heh hehs,’ “An oven would be more suitable. We can cook her to a crispy brown and devour her flesh if she doesn’t tell us.”

“I think,” Karen said in her sweet and non-threatening voice. “We should have her for tea.”

“Brilliant idea, Karen,” Toila said, her eyes bulging. “We can turn her to liquid and drink her in one of my porcelain tea-cups.”

“Oh,” Karen said, looking disappointed. “I just wanted to invite her over for some tea. I picked up some chamomile recently and…”

”Karen…” Bubbel responded, glaring at her. “You haven’t gotten the hang of this wicked thing yet. We should….”

But Phenomena had already risen to her feet and dashed away as fast as ,she could. “Great. While you were distracting us, Karen,” Bubbel said off in the distance. “She’s getting away! After her!”

“Fire blast! From my wand you’ll cast!” An orange blast expelled from the tip of Bubbel’s wand with a powerful swing and flew towards Phenomena’s head. She ducked it just in time and quickly dodged the shrubbery in front of her that had caught fire.

“Yikes,” the teen panted. “She’s not joking here.

As Mena made a mad dash for her home, the witches all took turns firing all kinds of blasts of energy. Chants filled the air as plants caught flame, dissolved into sulfuric acid or exploded. The girl knew she would soon be at her aunt’s house if she made her way west, but the hags were quickly gaining on her. She saw three ominous shadows looming in front of her. Come on, Phenomena, her brain thought encouraging her. What’s a good counterspell…or…?”

The hags’ wands glowed brightly at the tips ready to unleash a blast of death. Bubbel howled in laughter. “Looks like we’re in the clear. Now you’ll have something to fear!”

“Oh yeah?” said Mena, a clever brace-faced grin on her face as she turned around. “There ain’t mush’room between us. But after this, there will be!”

Bubbel unleashed her most powerful blast just as Phenomena chucked a mushroom and the two collided in a purple and red cloud. The cloud hovered in the forest for half a minute before Mena emerged running like her legs were possessed. She reached the top of a woodland hill and tumbled down into a clearing where Grizabella’s hut was. Falling into brambles, Mena breathed hard in relief.

“Safe at last,” she lisped, spit congealing in her mouth from her retainer. But what was that?!”

Mena swallowed hard, her face turning pale. “And why did they want with my aunt?”