Nathan Reed - Spelling Trouble

Cover

Title Page

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

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About the Publisher

Jessica Diamond found out that she was a witch on her tenth birthday. She started broom-flying lessons at once with the legendary witch trainer, Miss Strega, and soon afterwards passed her Flying Test (despite a nearly catastrophic encounter with a tearaway goblin). Now she was about to begin her Spelling Lessons.

Miss Strega’s shop was founded in 991. It was an old-fashioned hardware shop, tucked in between the estate agent’s and the toy shop. If anyone peered in through the window they could see what a heap of junk it sold: There were hurricane lamps and mousetraps and flypapers dangling from hooks high above a stack of iron cooking pots; and untidy balls of string which unwound themselves and got caught up in broomsticks and bird scarers. But hardly anyone ever went inside and if they did Miss Strega shooed them away, saying she was closing up early.

When Jessica arrived after school that afternoon, she discovered the place was even messier than usual. It looked as if a tornado had just rushed through it. There were cauldrons, cobwebby crates and three-legged stools lying all over the floor. Dozens of dusty books were scattered on the counter beneath a pile of flying helmets. And Miss Strega herself seemed to have been blown into the cupboard under the stairs, for she suddenly emerged draped from head to toe in witches’ cloaks.

“What on earth has happened?” Jessica asked, dismounting from her broom and rushing to disentangle Miss Strega. “Have you been burgled?”

“Not at all, my little lamb’s lettuce!” exclaimed Miss Strega. “Perish the thought. I’m just having a good sort-out. We can revise your renaming skills at the same time.”

“My renaming skills?” Jessica frowned.

Miss Strega pushed Felicity, her fat ginger cat, off a stool and set down armfuls of cloaks. “As you now know, Jessica,” she said, tapping the side of her long nose, “I am the Official Storekeeper of the Members of Witches World Wide, the W3. My shop has to be a highly undercover secret operation so I make the shop look as uninviting as possible to ordinary people. Even so, once in a blue moon, some chump blunders in looking for garden shears or a packet of parsley seeds, so …”

“I know,” said Jessica, “you rename things so that they think they really are in a hardware shop before you chase them out. Like you put the Teenage Slugs in a drawer marked Ten-Amp plugs.”

“Exactly,” agreed Miss Strega. “There are two Spelling Programmes involved – Noquan and Sablit.”

Jessica’s eyes opened wide.

“NOQUAN stands for Not-Quite-an-Anagram. SABLIT – Sounds-a-Bit-Like-It. You’ll soon get the hang of them. Pop up on your broom and follow me.”

The back wall of the shop was covered from top to bottom in wooden drawers with brass handles and spidery handwritten labels.

“Look at that, for example,” she said, pointing at a label that read Parsley Seeds. “What do you think I really keep in that drawer?”

Jessica knitted her brow. “Is it Sablit? Pa’s Sleigh Beads. No, that doesn’t make any sense.”

Miss Strega stroked her long chin. “Try Noquan.”

Jessica allowed the letters to swim around in her mind. “Could it be a Sleepy Dress? A magic dress that makes whoever wears it fall asleep?”