Hilda - Snow White revisited (17 page)

He stared at the ceiling.

Several minutes later he still stared at the
ceiling. His blissful smile had faded. "Don't tell me...", he
moaned. But no one had to tell him. Hilda had taken his sleep
away.

The wicked witch was by then nearing the open
space where the dwarfs were sipping beer and chatting away a mile a
minute. Her wand beat any satnav system, although she had no idea
about that. She had heard the voices already and progressed as fast
as she could, wanting to see what was happening and perform damage
control were needed.

The view she was treated to made her stop before
she was completely out of the woodwork, in this case the bushes
that were between her and the others.

The dwarfs were sitting around near the coffin.
There was a horse in the open area, and that was definitely not
something the dwarfs owned.

But the biggest shock was that a MAN was
kneeling next to the coffin, and he was taking the lid off! As he
was holding the glass cover, Hilda burts into the space. "Don't!!
Get away from there!"

At that point things went very fast, despite
that here they are described in slow-motion.

Some of the dwarfs jumped to their feet and
stared at the witch that came from the bushes, waving her broom and
wand.

The man dropped the lid. That shattered in the
proverbial million pieces. He too got up and turned to see what was
causing all the racket behind his back.

Hilda cried out as she saw the top of the coffin
break into shards and lashed out to the idiot man with her broom.
He was getting in the way of her plan, and that was
unpalatable.

One of the dwarfs (it was Bashful, although this
information is rather irrelevant) yelled out: "No!"

This caused Hilda to look where the sound came
from. Because of that she did not see the large twig in front of
her feet that caught her shoe. Hilda fell forward.

The idiot man, standing close to the glass and
now also open coffin, saw the woman in the burgundy dress lose her
balance, waving her arms. Galantly he held out his arms to catch
her whilst at the same time trying to avoid being whacked by the
broom that was now in free flight as Hilda had let go of it.

Hilda shrieked as she saw the man come closer,
even while he did not move. She did not want to touch him, but
gravity and her falling made her wishes subordinate to reality.

Several dwarfs closed or covered their eyes or
ears, as they saw impending doom come up. It was unavoidable.

Hilda bumped into the man.

Hilda and the strange man who caught her fell.
Their downfall was accompanied by the sound of even more glass
crashing and it ended with an 'oompf', coming from the man who
landed under Hilda and a "that must have hurt", from one of the
dwarfs.

The next sounds were of someone gagging and
coughing and then the polite question: "Can you please get off
me?"

Hilda groaned. She sat up on the man's chest and
slapped him in the face. "Now see what you did, stupid ignorant son
of a bitch!"

"King," the man said as he warded off another
slap.

"Hey, did someone hear me?" Snow-White started
pounding at anything in her reach as there were several legs
prodding in her belly.

Hilda looked back at the source of the voice.
"Damn it." That was her mistake.

The man on the ground, the stupid ignorant son
of a king, saw his chance and whacked Hilda against the chin,
making her world spin around and then go black. Granted, it was one
of her favourite colours, but not this way.

Throbbing head. Hilda kept her eyes closed.
Throbbing head. She was certain she had not touched any mead, as
that always had such an effect on her. Sore jaw. No, that was
certainly not a known side-effect of mead. Slowly she reached for
her face. It hurt, but it was still there.

"It looks like she is waking up," a young girl's
voice said. "Hello, mrs Witch, are you okay?"

Eyes still closed, Hilda groaned again. "Stop -
shaking - me..."

"Oops..."

The shaking went away.

"Grimhilda? Are you okay?" The voice of Doc,
soft and caring, still was loud.

"My head hurts. My brain buzzes. I am lying on
my back in the dirt. What gives you the idea that this has any
resemblance to okay?" Hilda opened her eyes carefully and saw a big
nose, small glasses on it and a dwarf's hat. "Are you leaning over
me?"

"Yes," Doc nodded.

"Don't. Don't ever do that again. The sight of
your nose is heartwrenching."

The big nose removed itself from view, and was
replaced by the face of Snow-White, who kept a rather respectable
distance. "Mrs Witch? Can we help you sit up?"

"Do I look like I need help?", Hilda asked. She
hated this. She hated this very very much.

"Yes, you do."

"Urgh..." Hilda let several hands get her in an
upright position. The world started swimming before her eyes for
several nauseating moments in which it proved impossible for her to
conjure up her wand. As soon as the world had decided on a state it
wanted to stay in, her wand popped in her hand.

"Great gods," a male voice said as the wand
appeared. "She is a real one!"

Hilda pointed the silver stick at herself,
muttered something, and felt normal again.

She got up and stared at the man who sat just
too close to Snow-White. "And who might you be? Yes, I am a real
one. And you may find that I am the worst one you could have pissed
off."

"My name is Jordan, honourable witch." He got up
and made a professional bow. "I am the son of king Louie. He owns
the property next to this kingdom. You may have heard of him, he's
somewhat of an expert on jungles. Wrote a book about them too."

Snow-White had gotten up also and wrapped her
arm around the prince. "Isn't he cute?"

The prince's natural reaction was to put an arm
around the girl's shoulders, kiss her hair and whisper something in
her ear that made her giggle.

"Hey, do you have any idea how long she hasn't
washed that hair?", Hilda inquired. "You should be careful."

Jordan blushed. "I am sure that it is all fine,
honourable witch."

At least, she thought, he knew how to address
her. Hilda repressed her revulsion as she saw how Snow-White almost
crawled into Jordan, displaying an amount of affection that was
revolting.

"We have to talk." Hilda whipped up a set of
chairs, large and small. Also a table with cups of tea. "Sit.
Powwow now."

They all sat.

"Right. First thing: you messed up my plan big
time, buster." Hilda's wand pointed at Jordan. "I had fabulous
plans with that girl, and here you come and screw that all up."

Jordan wanted to say something, but the wand
prevented that.

"Not yet. Second thing: I do not like it when
people sock me in the jaw without proper introduction. Come to
think of it, I don't like that when I know someone either."

Jordan tried to make his point clear by waving
his hands, which was a waste of his energy, as Hilda ignored
him.

"Third thing: we have to come up with something
good and fast. The kid's Dad is in on the plan also, and now I have
to get to him to let him know about the change in events. Thanks to
you." The glare at Jordan was far from friendly, while Snow-White
looked offended by being called a kid. "So. What do you have to say
for yourself?"

Prince Jordan boggled as he pointed at his lips
that did not want to part.

"Oh, right. Sorry."

A flip of the wand later, Jordan gasped for
air.

"Good grief, don't exaggerate. Speak, boy."
Hilda was becoming a bit impatient. Just a bit. The tip of the wand
tapping on the table made that very clear.

"Well, honourable witch, I have fallen in love
with Snow-White and I am taking her to my father's castle so we can
get married."

"Really..."

"Yes," the prince said happily, "really."

"And does she have a say in this?" Hilda pointed
her wand at Snow-White.

"Oh, yes, she does! I told her that I love her
and that I want to marry her and she said okay."

"That simple, eh?" The happy couple showed Hilda
that it was indeed that simple, by becoming one heart with two
bodies, joined at the lips. For a long time. "Hey, alright, you
made your point, back to business now."

A disappointed sigh rose up from the mouths of
the dwarfs who would have loved to see where that kiss would
lead.

"Looks like you two made up your minds." Hilda
shook her head.

"Mrs Witch, can you tell us what you were
planning?", Snow-White asked.

"Wow. She makes sense," Hilda acted surprised.
"I want to get rid of your step-mother. She's no good, screws half
the kingdom but not your Dad, and she has something that belongs to
me."

"Oh. I never liked her much either," Snow-White
admitted. "What can I do to help you?"

Talk about getting to the point, Hilda thought.
"Well, I am thinking... maybe you can invite her to your
wedding..."

Faces became question marks, and Hilda started
talking to them, bent on making them exclamation points. That took
a while, but in the end there was a general consensus that Hilda's
quickly revised and changed plan was a good one.

The dwarfs got ready to go home. Before they
left, Hilda warned them to take care of Sleepy. She did not reveal
more, even though they asked her several times why she had said
that.

"So you two lovebirds are off to the next
kingdom, right?"

Prince Jordan nodded. "We're going to prepare
the wedding as we agreed, and get the invitations out also. We'll
have a blast."

Snow-White hugged Hilda. "Thank you for
everything you did."

"Sure. Just leave out the soppy stuff next time,
okay? I don't go for the huggy kissy stuff. Oh, wait... before you
leave..." Hilda looked at prince Jordan. "One last thing... Manus
saxeaus."

The wicked witch took a swing at the prince, her
hand, changed to rock, hitting him square on the jaw. He went down
like a brick. "Payback. He'll be around again soon, kid, and then
you can go. He might experience some dizziness, but that will go
away also. Just later."

Hilda changed her hand back, took her broom and
winked at Snow-White. Then she took to the skies again.

The wicked witch landed on the dot. There was a
nice green dot in front of the door, and she often tried to land on
it, to see if she could still handle precision landing. This time
it worked. "Cool," she said to herself and pulled the door... not
open. "Now what?"

"Hilda, we need to talk."

"Not now, I have things to do." She stepped back
and looked at her house. "Don't give me this. Not now. Well, not
ever actually."

The house was not impressed. "You have been
neglecting me. In the housing codex for witches it states clearly
that the inhabitant of the house should take proper care of the
building and its surroundings, including the area underground for
at least six feet."

"Yeah, so? Have I burnt you down?"

"Not recently," the house had to admit.

"Did I bang nails in your walls to put up all
kind of junk that nobody is interested in?"

"No, but-"

"Do you see any dirt here? Debris? Some sort of
mess? Well? Well?" Hilda put her hands on her hips and looked
challenging at her house.

"Uhm, no, the area is clean, I have to admit
that."

"And look here..." Hilda drew her wand and
lifted fifty square feet, five feet deep, out of the yard and had
it hover several feet above the surface. "See? Nothing. All clean
and sandy and worms, like new." She put the lump of ground back.
"So, what are you whining about?"

"I need to be painted."

Hilda magicked up a chair and sat down on it.
"You really are not giving up, are you? You go on and on about the
paintjob, as if it is the best thing since magical wands and
brooms."

"Yes. Because it is."

Hilda sighed. First this thing with the coffin.
Then the idiot prince who punched her lights out. And now this.
Would this day please end now?

The day did not.

"Okay... you win..." Hilda shook her head. This
happened every so many hundred years and she still wasn't used to
it.

She got up and drew her wand. "Right. What do we
need..."

"Paint," said the house.

"Don't push it. I know that. Paint. Brushes.
That sounds about right, right?"

"It does. Lots of paint."

"Quiet you, you sound like an addict. Any
favourite colours?" She might as well do it right while she was
going to do this.

"White. And red. And black."

"No purple? You always want white, red and
black."

"I like white, red and black," the house
commented, "and I hate purple. You always bring up purple. Have you
ever heard of a purple witch-house?"

"No, sadly not, it would look ultimately cool
though. Why don't you try? Just to be the first?", Hilda tried one
more time.

"I am a conservative house. I do not do
purple."

Hilda understood that this was not going
anywhere. "Okay...", she sighed. Large buckets of paint, white, red
and black appeared in front of the house. Also a small army of
paintbrushes in all sizes materialised, resting peacefully and
waiting for the real work.

"Paint." Hilda muttered. She shook her head and
sat down again.

As always, it took a while for the English spell
to take effect. Then the myriad of brushes flew up, plunged into
the paint and went to work on the house at an astonishing speed.
The roof was even painted, bright red, and it looked as new. The
walls were really white again, the woodwork along the windows was
shiny and red, the doors became seriously black. Gone were the
smudges, the scratches and the bits of peeled paint. Magically,
everything was repaired as the witchy paint covered spots and
filled cracks, leaving the house as new within five minutes.