Gothel found herself lying in the wildflowers, littered with the remains of her minions. She was covered in bruises and had deep gashes on her arms from going through the odd sisters’ kitchen window. She thought her face might be bleeding as well. She wasn’t sure. She just lay there, staring at the odd sisters’ house as it rose into the sky. She sat
up, clutching the flowerpot in one hand and flinging her other hand at the odd sisters, trying to direct lightning at them, but nothing came forth. There was no lightning. There was no magic. She watched them, with their bug-eyed expressions of astonishment, disappearing into the clouds. And from her life.
“Gothel! Gothel! What in heavens happened?” It was Mrs. Tiddlebottom. She was tottering into the field, kicking broken bones and thick white ash as she rushed over to Gothel.
“I don’t know, Mrs. Tiddlebottom.”
“Here, take my arm, lady, let me see to those cuts.” She examined Gothel’s face. “I think I should call the doctor to come around the house. But I don’t know if the message boy will be by this afternoon. Maybe I’d better go into town myself.”
Gothel was heartened by Mrs. Tiddlebottom’s concern. “I’m sure I will be fine under your expert care, Mrs. T. Let’s not bother the doctor.” Gothel could see Mrs. Tiddlebottom eyeing her; she couldn’t tell if Mrs. Tiddlebottom was looking at the cuts or noticing that her face was younger now. She wasn’t even sure herself how young she looked. She clutched the flowerpot as they went into the kitchen, where she was instructed to sit down. “Put that plant down, Gothel, and let me look at you!” Mrs. Tiddlebottom went to a pantry to find her tinctures and cotton strips. She soaked one of the cotton strips in a deep reddish-brown liquid and held it in her fingers, hesitating. “I’m sorry, lady, but this is going to hurt.”
Mrs. Tiddlebottom was by no means a gossip, but her sister was. It wasn’t long before the entire town heard about the strange happenings at Lady Gothel’s. After the odd sisters left, Gothel had sequestered herself in her library, and Mrs. Tiddlebottom was at her wit’s end trying to get Gothel to come out for her meals, or for any reason at all. Mrs. Tiddlebottom confided her concerns to her sister, who in turn told the most notorious gossip in town. And before she knew it, Mrs. Tiddlebottom had a full-blown situation on her hands.
“Lady Gothel! Please come out. We have a situation.” Gothel opened the door to her library. “What is it?” she asked. Her hair was wild, and her face was smudged with red and purple powder.
“Oh! Look at you, Lady Gothel, sorry to disturb you!”
“And look at you, Mrs. T. You’re wearing spectacles!”
Mrs. Tiddlebottom blushed. “Yes, my sister got them for me. Speaking of my sister, lady, well, you see, she came by today.” Mrs. Tiddlebottom was clearly distressed, and she was having trouble arriving at the point.
“Yes, you said there was a situation?” asked Gothel as patiently as she could. She wondered how she must look. Her hands were stained with magical powders, and she hadn’t changed her clothes in more days than she could count.
“My lady, would you please come into the kitchen with me? Conversations like this are always better over a cup of tea.”
“So I have been told.” Gothel laughed. She remembered the odd sisters saying something very much along those lines. “Of course, Mrs. T. Let’s go into the kitchen.”
In the kitchen Mrs. Tiddlebottom held out a chair for Gothel. “Here you go, my lady, sit.” Gothel wished the old woman would just get on with it, but she reminded herself to be patient with her. She realized her cook was rather distressed.
“Here, Mrs. T. It looks as if you should sit down. You look peaked. I’ll go get the tea.” Gothel went to the cupboard and pulled out two teacups and the teapot that matched. It was a set from her home in the dead woods. “Hmmm…there’s only five cups. What happened to the sixth?” she asked absentmindedly.
Mrs. Tiddlebottom looked up. “What’s that, lady?”
Gothel realized she hadn’t meant to say that aloud. “I’m sorry, I just noticed there were only five cups to this set. There used to be six. Never mind. I’m sorry, you had something important to tell me?”
Mrs. Tiddlebottom got up to see what set Gothel was talking about. “Oh yes, the Samhain set. The silver ones with the black skulls painted on them. Your sister Ruby said she broke one when she was having her tea in the garden.”
Gothel wondered if that was true. She was, in fact, almost sure Ruby or one of Ruby’s sisters had actually stolen the cup. Come to think if it, there were quite a few little things from around the house that are missing. “Never mind, Mrs. T. Sit down and tell me what the matter is.”
“There’s no other way than to say it straight out, lady,” she said, clearly trying to be brave.
“Well, you know that is what I prefer. Please continue.”
“Yes. Well, it seems the kingdom has sent soldiers here to find some flower they think once belonged to the queen of the dead.”
“What? What will become of my sisters?” Gothel was panicked. How am I going to get my sisters’ bodies out of here?
“Your sisters, lady?”
“Never mind. We have to leave!” said Gothel, running into her library and grabbing her mother’s most important books.
“Lady Gothel, stop! What is it?” called Mrs. Tiddlebottom, tottering after her. “What’s the matter?”
“What is it? What is it? Mrs. T! Soldiers are coming here to destroy my home! They think I am the queen of the dead! They’re going to burn this place down! I suggest you pack anything you have of value this moment!”
“Lady, calm down, please! Listen to me. I have an idea. Now, I don’t want to know anything about what you have down in that cellar, or your library, or what you get up to with those sisters of yours, but I do know you’re a good girl. You’ve always been very kind to me, and you don’t deserve to lose your home. It seems to me all they want is that flower. If we give them the flower without a fuss, I think they will take it without much kerfuffle. We can plant it outside, pretend we never even knew it was there,” said Mrs. Tiddlebottom with a resolve that surprised Gothel. “Better yet, why don’t you steal yourself away down in that cellar when they come? I will pretend to be the lady of the house and let them find the flower without a fuss.”
“No, Mrs. Tiddlebottom! I can’t give them the flower!” Gothel snatched the flowerpot in her hands and squeezed it tightly. “I can’t give it up! I can’t!”