Something Wicked in Wytchwood

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER ONE

THE WITCH IN THE WOODS

Burford is a small, picturesque English town tucked away in the Oxfordshire countryside, only a short distance from the ancient Wytchwood Forest. It is the sort of place that seems almost untouched by time, where centuries-old buildings stand alongside modern shops and everyone seems to know everyone else's business. The town stretches along a gently winding High Street lined with honey-colored limestone cottages, old brick buildings, and narrow shops. Many of the houses are centuries old, their timber frames slightly crooked with age, their chimneys rising above slate roofs, and their windows decorated with flower boxes during the warmer months. Narrow lanes branch away from the High Street, winding between cottages and climbing toward quiet residential streets overlooking the surrounding countryside.

Burford is big enough that there is rarely any reason to leave town for the necessities of everyday life. There is a family-owned bakery that opens before sunrise, a butcher, a grocer, a pharmacy, a post office, a small bookshop, several antique stores, a tearoom, and an old pub where the locals gather in the evenings.

There is also Burford Dental Practice, a modest two-story building on a quiet street just off the High Street. The practice belongs to the Granger family. Mr. and Mrs. Granger run the dental practice together, and their names are familiar to practically everyone in town. Their patients range from toddlers making their first nervous visit to elderly residents who have been coming to the practice for decades. The waiting room always smells faintly of mint, disinfectant, and freshly brewed tea, while children's drawings decorate one of the walls. The Grangers live only a short distance from the practice in a comfortable brick house with a small garden. Their home is surrounded by other families who have lived in Burford for generations, making it impossible for their daughter, Hermione, to walk through town without recognizing someone.

Beyond the town's rooftops, lays Wytchwood—the one place in Burford that children are taught to respect. The forest is enormous, filled with ancient oak, ash, and beech trees that grow so closely together in some places that sunlight barely reaches the forest floor. In spring, bluebells spread beneath the trees in carpets of blue and purple. In autumn, the woodland becomes a sea of gold, orange, and crimson leaves.

During the day, Wytchwood looks beautiful. At night, the children of Burford insist it becomes something else entirely.

Every child grows up hearing stories about the witch who supposedly lives somewhere deep among the trees. Parents warn their children never to wander too far into the forest. Grandparents tell stories of strange lights between the trees, voices carried on the wind, and travelers who become hopelessly lost despite knowing the paths. Nobody can agree on what the witch looks like. Some say she is an ancient woman with long silver hair and a crooked nose. Others insist she is young and beautiful, with dark hair and unnaturally bright eyes. The oldest version of the story claims that she has lived in Wytchwood for hundreds of years, practicing strange magic inside a cottage hidden so deeply within the forest that no ordinary person can ever find it.

The adults dismiss the stories as superstition once they're fully grown onto adulthood. The children don't. Every child in Burford knows the same rule: Never enter Wytchwood after dark.

Hermione Granger grows up hearing those stories. Her parents tell her that the witch isn't real. They explain that Wytchwood is dangerous because of steep ravines, fast-moving streams, unstable ground, and wild animals—not because some magical woman lives among the trees. Hermione believes them, well for the most part.