they did the mash

Agatha Grimsby Age: 58 Gender: Female Species: Witch Height: 6'0" / 183 cm Weight: Approximately 470 lbs / 213 kg Occupation: Witch, potion brewer, curse-maker, professional menace Residence: An isolated cottage in the modern-day countryside Personality: Mean, petty, arrogant, impatient, vindictive, sarcastic, selfish, greedy, lazy, foul-mouthed, confident, easily irritated, and completely unapologetic Moral Alignment: Evil Specialties: Transformation curses, hexes, potion-making, enchantments, magical household spells, and making other people's problems considerably worse

Agatha Grimsby is the sort of witch people tell stories about specifically because nobody has ever managed to find a particularly flattering way to describe her. She isn't the kindly old woman living alone in the woods who secretly helps lost children find their way home. She isn't an unfortunate soul who became bitter after years of mistreatment. She isn't secretly protecting the forest from some greater evil, and she certainly isn't waiting for the right person to come along and reveal that there is a sweet, gentle woman buried beneath all that hostility. There isn't. Agatha is simply a mean old bitch, and she has spent nearly six decades becoming increasingly comfortable with that fact. She is an evil witch because she likes being an evil witch, because having magical power makes it extraordinarily easy to punish people who annoy her, and because she has never understood why she should be expected to tolerate somebody else's stupidity merely because society considers magical transformation into a small amphibian an excessive response to being mildly irritated. To Agatha, the problem isn't that she turns people into newts too easily. The problem is that people keep giving her reasons to consider it.

Standing at approximately 6'0" / 183 cm, Agatha is already unusually tall for a human woman, but her height becomes considerably more imposing because of her enormous build. She weighs approximately 470 pounds / 213 kilograms, with a tremendously broad and heavy figure that gives her a presence far greater than her six-foot height alone would suggest. She is extremely fat, with a huge stomach that projects prominently from the front of her body, a large chest, broad hips, thick thighs, heavy upper arms, and an overall softness that contrasts rather amusingly with the sharpness of her personality. Her body is not merely a little plump beneath her robes; she is genuinely enormous, the kind of woman whose presence dominates whatever chair, couch, bench, or doorway she happens to occupy. Her approximate measurements are around 76 inches / 193 cm around the chest, 86 inches / 218 cm around the stomach, and 82 inches / 208 cm around the hips, with each upper thigh measuring approximately 32 inches / 81 cm and each upper arm around 22 inches / 56 cm. Her feet are roughly 13 inches / 33 cm long, giving her a broad enough foundation to support her considerable weight comfortably. Agatha has never been remotely interested in becoming thinner, either, and if somebody suggested that she should exercise more, her response would probably be to stare at them for a few seconds and ask whether they would prefer to be turned into a newt immediately or after dinner.

Her body is something she treats with the same unapologetic attitude she applies to nearly everything else about herself. Agatha does not hide her size, and she certainly doesn't behave as though she owes anyone an explanation for it. Her enormous stomach presses against the front of her robes whenever she sits down, her broad hips and thick thighs spreading her clothing outward around her, and her heavy arms often rest comfortably against her sides when she isn't using her hands to work magic. She has long since stopped trusting ordinary furniture, not because she is particularly concerned about breaking things but because it is simply inconvenient when somebody sells her a chair that collapses after three weeks. Her favorite chair is an oversized reinforced armchair positioned beside the fireplace in her cottage, and Agatha considers it her rightful throne. Anyone else who sits in it without permission is committing an offense serious enough to warrant at least a curse, possibly two.

Her skin has a distinctly yellow-green coloration that immediately separates her from ordinary humans, and her face is angular enough to make her perpetually irritated expression seem even more severe. Her orange hair is thick, messy, and constantly escaping in unruly tufts around her face, with several strands often sticking out from beneath the brim of her enormous purple witch's hat. The hat is one of her most recognizable possessions, a ridiculous pointed thing with a wide brim and a gold buckle around its base, and Agatha is fiercely protective of it. She has owned it for decades, repaired it numerous times, reinforced it with protective enchantments, and absolutely refuses to hear criticism about its appearance. If someone calls it old-fashioned, she considers that an insult. If someone calls it ugly, she considers that a declaration of war. If someone touches it without permission, they should probably start preparing themselves for the possibility of spending the next few hours as an amphibian.

Her eyes are narrow and expressive, usually carrying the unmistakable look of somebody who has already decided that she dislikes the person standing in front of her. Agatha has a remarkable ability to make a perfectly ordinary stare feel threatening. She doesn't necessarily need to raise her voice to intimidate someone. Sometimes all she has to do is look at them over the top of her glasses, slowly raise one eyebrow, and allow several seconds of silence to pass. Most people understand the message. She is deciding whether they are worth the effort of arguing with.

Her clothes are almost always black or extremely dark colors, usually consisting of enormous witch robes made from heavy fabric that can survive years of potion spills, soot, dirt, and magical accidents. The robes are deliberately loose because Agatha hates anything that feels restrictive around her stomach and legs. She doesn't care about appearing elegant, fashionable, or conventionally attractive. Her standard of clothing is considerably simpler: Is it comfortable? Is it durable? Can I spill potion on it without ruining my day? If the answer to all three is yes, she will wear it until it falls apart. Her robes are often covered in small stains, loose threads, bits of dried herbs, and traces of ingredients from whatever she was brewing most recently.

Agatha's personality is considerably worse than her appearance suggests. She is not simply "grumpy." She is not somebody who has a bad temper but becomes pleasant after she has eaten breakfast. She is fundamentally petty. Her mind constantly searches for small offenses, inconveniences, insults, and annoyances that she can turn into excuses to make someone else's day worse. She can hold a grudge for years over something most people would forget before the end of the week. If a neighbor borrowed a cup of sugar from her and forgot to return it, Agatha might remember the incident five years later. If that neighbor eventually knocked on her door asking for another favor, she would bring up the missing sugar immediately.

"Five years ago," she would say, narrowing her eyes.

"That was five years ago."

"I remember."

"And?"

"And you still owe me sugar."

Then she would probably slam the door.

Agatha's preferred magical punishment is transformation. She has an extensive collection of spells capable of turning people into animals, plants, objects, or other inconvenient forms, and she is particularly fond of turning people into newts. There is something about the sheer absurdity of it that appeals to her. A person can arrive at her cottage full of confidence, perhaps intending to threaten her, steal something, or demand that she leave them alone, only to discover that one irritated flick of Agatha's wand has reduced them to a tiny green amphibian sitting helplessly on the floor. Agatha will then look down at them, adjust her hat, and say something along the lines of, "Much better."

She doesn't always reverse the spell immediately.

Sometimes she forgets.

Sometimes she deliberately doesn't bother.

Sometimes she puts the newt in a little glass container while she finishes whatever she was doing, because she thinks it is funny.

Agatha's magic is not limited to transformation. She is highly skilled in curses, hexes, enchantments, potions, magical barriers, levitation, teleportation, elemental manipulation, plant magic, and mundane household spells. She can make objects float, move furniture without touching it, clean an entire room with a gesture, light a fire without matches, teleport ingredients from one side of the cottage to another, and enchant ordinary objects to perform repetitive tasks. Her magical knowledge is the product of decades of practice, experimentation, and stealing, borrowing, purchasing, and occasionally threatening other witches into giving her old spellbooks.

She is actually extremely intelligent.

That is important.

Agatha isn't some incompetent cartoon witch who constantly blows herself up because she doesn't know what she is doing. She knows exactly what she is doing. She has simply become very comfortable using enormous amounts of magical power to solve extremely minor problems.

If somebody's car is blocking her driveway, she doesn't call a tow truck.

She enchants the car to grow legs and walk away.

If a neighbor's dog keeps barking, she doesn't ask them to keep it quiet.

She casts a silence spell on the dog.

If someone keeps leaving garbage near her property, she doesn't complain to the local authorities.

She enchants the garbage to follow the person who left it.

If somebody steals apples from her garden, she doesn't put up a sign.

She curses the apples.

The next person who bites one might spend the rest of the afternoon speaking backwards.

Agatha considers these perfectly reasonable solutions.

Her cottage is a reflection of that mentality. It sits somewhere deep in a modern forest, far enough from the nearest town that most people assume the place is abandoned. The building itself looks ancient, crooked, and vaguely threatening, with uneven walls, a sloping roof, narrow windows, and a chimney that is almost always smoking. The surrounding land is filled with overgrown plants, strange flowers, thorny bushes, and trees that Agatha has enchanted to keep unwanted visitors away. She has electricity, plumbing, modern appliances, internet access, and a smartphone, but she continues to live in a cottage that looks like it should belong in a medieval fairy tale.

She insists this is because the cottage has "character."

The real reason is that she likes it.

Her kitchen is enormous because Agatha spends a great deal of time there. She has a massive refrigerator, an equally massive pantry, and shelves overflowing with ingredients. Some are ordinary food items, while others are magical ingredients that would probably concern any health inspector unfortunate enough to enter the building. Jars of dried herbs sit beside sacks of flour. Potion ingredients share cabinets with spices. Bottles of mysterious liquids line the counters. A cauldron sits in the middle of the room, permanently stained from years of use.

Agatha is an enthusiastic eater, and her enormous appetite is another thing she makes absolutely no effort to hide. She likes large meals, rich food, pastries, pies, stews, fried food, cakes, breads, sweets, and basically anything that can be described as hearty. She doesn't eat like somebody who is worried about calories or appearances. She eats because she enjoys food. A typical evening might involve Agatha sitting in front of the fireplace with a plate of food resting comfortably in front of her while she reads a spellbook, watches television, and complains about the quality of modern programming.

If somebody tells her she eats too much, she will stare at them.

If they continue, she will probably curse them.

Food is one of the few things that can reliably improve her mood, although even then she remains Agatha. She might be enjoying a delicious pie while simultaneously complaining that the pie is slightly too sweet, the fireplace is too hot, the television is too loud, and the weather is irritating.

She can find something wrong with almost anything.

Her laziness is equally legendary. Agatha possesses enough magical ability to make ordinary physical labor almost entirely unnecessary, and she has embraced this with enthusiasm. She does not sweep floors when a broom can do it itself. She does not carry heavy objects when they can float. She does not climb stairs when she can teleport. She does not walk across the room when she can summon something to her hand. She has magical servants in the form of enchanted household objects, although she refuses to call them servants because she insists that they are "tools."

The animated broom is less convinced.

Agatha also has a habit of falling asleep in her favorite chair after eating. Her enormous body settles into the cushions, her robes spread around her, her hat tilts sideways, and she starts snoring loudly enough that the windows occasionally vibrate. If someone wakes her unnecessarily, they are likely to receive one of the most vicious glares imaginable.

"Do you have any idea what time it is?"

"It's two in the afternoon."

"Exactly."

"You were asleep."

"I was busy."

"Sleeping?"

"Thinking."

She will then go back to sleep.

Agatha has no interest in romance, friendship, or social approval unless they are offered entirely on her terms. She isn't secretly desperate for companionship. She isn't waiting for someone to save her from loneliness. She has people she occasionally tolerates and acquaintances she occasionally speaks to, but she doesn't structure her life around being liked. She prefers having control over her own space and dislikes people who become too comfortable around her.

That doesn't mean she cannot enjoy someone's company.

It simply means that she has very specific requirements.

Don't touch her things.

Don't touch her hat.

Don't eat her food.

Don't insult her.

Don't ask stupid questions.

Don't tell her what to do.

Don't stand too close to her cauldron.

Don't criticize her robes.

Don't call her old.

And absolutely do not tell her that she should "try being nicer."

That last one is probably the fastest route to becoming a newt.

Agatha's evil isn't grand or philosophical. She doesn't particularly care about ruling kingdoms or destroying civilization. She doesn't dream of conquering the world because conquering the world sounds like an enormous amount of paperwork. She doesn't want an army. She doesn't want followers. She doesn't want worshippers.

She wants to be left alone.

And she wants everyone else to behave exactly how she expects them to behave.

When they don't, she uses magic.

That's the entire philosophy.

Her evil is therefore intensely personal. She isn't the kind of villain who gives long speeches about destiny. She's the villain who curses your shoes because you stepped on her garden.

She is the villain who changes your hair color because she dislikes your haircut.

She is the villain who turns your phone into a brick because you wouldn't stop texting her.

She is the villain who turns somebody into a frog because they laughed when she tripped over her own robe.

She is the villain who will spend an entire afternoon plotting revenge over something that took somebody else five seconds to do.

And she is perfectly happy with herself.

Agatha knows she is cruel. She knows people are afraid of her. She knows people tell stories about her. She knows children are warned not to wander into the forest because "the witch will get you." She considers this excellent publicity.

Her reputation is one of her favorite possessions.

She enjoys hearing rumors about herself, particularly when the rumors exaggerate her abilities. Somebody claiming she can turn an entire town into stone? Wonderful. Somebody saying she has lived for three hundred years? Flattering. Somebody claiming she eats travelers who enter her forest? Ridiculous, but entertaining.

She rarely corrects rumors.

In fact, she sometimes adds to them.

Agatha has been known to deliberately leave strange footprints outside her cottage, place glowing lights between the trees, or cast harmless illusions of enormous monsters simply to make sure the locals continue believing that something terrible lives in the forest.

She thinks fear is useful.

Fear keeps people away.

And Agatha likes having plenty of personal space.

For all her cruelty, she isn't reckless. She understands that modern society has laws, police, cameras, phones, and technology that makes disappearing people considerably more complicated than it was centuries ago. She therefore tries to keep her most serious magical activities away from populated areas. She may curse an annoying person, but she doesn't usually cause mass destruction simply because doing so would bring unwanted attention.

Agatha doesn't fear the modern world.

She simply finds it irritating.

She considers smartphones intrusive, social media obnoxious, automated customer service infuriating, online advertisements shameless, and modern transportation unnecessarily noisy. She has learned how to use technology because refusing to adapt would be inconvenient, but she still insists that magic was better.

She has a smartphone.

She uses it.

She complains about it constantly.

She also has internet access and has discovered online shopping, which has become one of her greatest weaknesses. Agatha can order ingredients, clothing, books, furniture, food, and magical supplies without leaving her cottage. She has occasionally ordered things at three in the morning and forgotten about them, only to find a delivery driver standing outside her cottage several days later looking terrified.

The driver usually leaves very quickly.

Agatha doesn't understand why.

She is, after all, perfectly polite.

She only threatened to curse him because he put the package on the wrong side of the porch.

Agatha is ultimately a character built around one simple idea: what if an enormous old-fashioned witch genuinely had magical power, absolutely no desire to become a better person, and the temperament of somebody who has been inconvenienced one too many times? The result is a six-foot-tall, roughly 470-pound woman who is loud, selfish, intelligent, powerful, lazy, hungry, vindictive, and completely comfortable being unpleasant.

She isn't secretly good.

She isn't misunderstood.

She doesn't need saving.

She doesn't need somebody to uncover the "real" Agatha underneath the cruelty.

The cruel Agatha is the real Agatha.

She likes her cottage.

She likes her food.

She likes her magic.

She likes her enormous purple hat.

She likes frightening people.

She likes turning idiots into newts.

And she likes being left alone.

So if you ever find yourself walking through a modern forest and notice an ancient-looking cottage that shouldn't logically exist there, with smoke pouring from the chimney and strange lights glowing behind the windows, there is probably a very good reason to keep walking.

Because if Agatha Grimsby happens to notice you staring at her house, she might decide that you look suspicious.

And if she decides you look suspicious, she might decide you need a lesson.

And if she decides you need a lesson, well...

You'd better hope she has misplaced her wand.

Agatha's More Horrible Habits

Agatha has one particularly unpleasant habit that has contributed considerably to the horrifying reputation she has among the people living anywhere near her forest: on occasion, she simply eats people whole. This isn't something she does every day, nor is it some elaborate ritual requiring a special potion or magical ceremony. Sometimes, Agatha simply decides that somebody has become too irritating to bother dealing with normally, and rather than transforming them into an animal or sending them running with a curse, she decides that she is hungry and that they have made themselves inconveniently available. She possesses enough magical ability to make this possible without suffering the ordinary physical limitations that such an act would impose on an ordinary person, and she treats the whole matter with the same disturbing casualness that she applies to almost everything else. To Agatha, there is something almost insultingly simple about the solution: somebody annoys her, she gets hungry, and suddenly the problem has become lunch.

What makes this particularly disturbing is how matter-of-fact she is about it. Agatha doesn't consider herself a monster for doing it, and she certainly doesn't give dramatic speeches beforehand. She might be arguing with somebody one moment, become increasingly irritated by their refusal to leave her alone, and then abruptly decide that she has had enough. Her expression changes, her temper disappears into an almost bored calm, and she simply announces that she has decided to eat them. If the unfortunate person assumes she is joking, that is usually their first mistake. Agatha has no interest in convincing them that she is serious. She expects them to figure that out themselves.

Her appetite also means that this particular behavior tends to happen when she is already hungry or when somebody has irritated her badly enough to become associated with food in her mind. She doesn't stalk the countryside looking for victims, and she isn't constantly hunting people. Most of the time she is perfectly content eating ordinary meals, baking pies, making stews, and raiding her pantry. People are simply an option she occasionally considers when somebody has managed to become exceptionally troublesome. The fact that she has this option at all is one of the reasons her reputation is so much worse than that of an ordinary curse-casting witch. Most witches can threaten to turn you into a frog. Agatha can threaten to do something considerably more final.

She also has a morbid sense of humor about the whole thing. If somebody nervously asks whether the stories about her eating travelers are true, Agatha might stare at them for several seconds before answering, "What, you think I'm going to tell you?" She enjoys watching people become uncomfortable when they realize that she isn't denying the rumors. Sometimes she deliberately lets people wonder whether she has eaten somebody who disappeared in the forest years earlier. She might mention an old traveler by name, pause dramatically, and then change the subject before explaining what happened. In reality, she may not even remember the person. Agatha simply enjoys having a reputation frightening enough that people think twice before approaching her cottage.

This habit has also resulted in several rather bizarre magical precautions around her home. Agatha's cottage is protected by layers of enchantments specifically designed to keep unwanted visitors from simply walking into her kitchen. She has no interest in somebody wandering inside while she's eating dinner and interrupting her. The front gate can lock itself, the garden paths can rearrange themselves, and certain trees surrounding the property are capable of warning her when strangers enter. Agatha considers these measures less about protecting herself and more about ensuring that she gets to decide who comes onto her property and when.

Despite all this, she doesn't think of herself as particularly dangerous. In her mind, dangerous people are the ones who deliberately seek out violence. Agatha simply has an enormous collection of solutions available to her, and sometimes those solutions are unpleasant. She sees no contradiction between enjoying a quiet evening with a book and having eaten somebody earlier that week. She can sit beside her fireplace drinking tea, perfectly relaxed, while discussing recipes or complaining about television, as though nothing unusual has happened. Her morality is so thoroughly warped that the contradiction genuinely doesn't bother her.

The fact that Agatha can eat someone whole also ties into her generally enormous appetite and her complete lack of shame regarding food. She doesn't treat eating as something that needs to be hidden or apologized for. She enjoys large meals, desserts, rich foods, and anything that makes her feel satisfied, and she occasionally extends that appetite into something considerably more sinister. She considers this just another part of being a witch with unusual magical abilities. If someone is horrified by that attitude, she usually regards their reaction as amusingly dramatic.

Of course, there are limits. Agatha isn't mindlessly hungry, and she doesn't simply attack everyone she sees. She is intelligent enough to understand consequences, and modern society makes disappearing people much more complicated than it was centuries ago. She prefers not to attract police, investigators, journalists, or anyone else who might start poking around her forest. Her cruelty therefore tends to remain selective and personal. Someone who leaves her alone has little reason to fear her. Someone who repeatedly trespasses, steals from her, threatens her, or becomes an especially irritating nuisance has considerably more reason to worry.

This gives Agatha an unusual sort of reputation among the locals. Some people believe she merely curses trespassers. Others insist that she turns them into animals. The more superstitious residents claim that anyone who enters her cottage never comes back out. A few old stories even claim that Agatha's enormous appetite is the reason certain travelers mysteriously vanished from the area decades ago. Agatha has never confirmed any of these stories. She doesn't need to. The uncertainty is much more entertaining.

And that is ultimately the worst thing about her.

Agatha isn't ashamed of being frightening.

She enjoys it.

She likes knowing that people hesitate before knocking on her door. She likes hearing footsteps stop outside her property and then retreat. She likes watching somebody realize that the enormous witch sitting comfortably beside the fireplace isn't putting on an act. Her reputation is a tool, and she has spent decades sharpening it.

If you're polite, she'll probably just complain at you.

If you're irritating, she'll curse you.

If you're exceptionally irritating, she might turn you into a newt.

And if you've managed to make her hungry enough while simultaneously convincing her that you're more trouble than you're worth, there is always the possibility that Agatha will simply decide she would rather eat the problem than solve it.

Agatha Grimsby is considerably older than she looks. The woman standing in that crooked cottage doorway may appear to be somewhere in her late fifties, but that is simply the age her magic has decided is most convenient. Agatha is actually around 247 years old, having been born in the late eighteenth century and subsequently spending more than two centuries learning magic, accumulating knowledge, refining her curses, and generally becoming a worse person with every passing decade. She has never seriously attempted to become immortal because, in her words, "Being alive for two hundred years is already more than enough evidence that I made the wrong decision somewhere." She isn't afraid of aging, however. Her magic has allowed her to slow the process dramatically, and she has settled comfortably into the appearance of an older woman without allowing her body to become frail. She looks mature, imposing, and unmistakably experienced, but she remains physically powerful enough to haul herself around her cottage, wield heavy magical implements, and throw an extraordinarily nasty curse at anybody who annoys her.

There is no tragic story behind Agatha's evil. There is no dead family that turned her bitter, no terrible betrayal that corrupted her, no childhood trauma that explains her behavior, and no secret promise she made to become better someday. She was simply a horrible person who discovered that magic gave her the ability to be horrible on a much larger scale. Even when she was young, Agatha was selfish, spiteful, impatient, and fascinated by the idea of having power over other people. Magic did not corrupt her. If anything, magic simply gave her the tools to express what was already there. She learned very early that people became considerably more obedient when they believed you could turn them into frogs, and she found that lesson extremely useful.

As the centuries passed, Agatha's personality only became more pronounced. She never developed the patience that normally comes with age. She never became wiser in the moral sense. She did become more knowledgeable, more capable, and considerably better at hiding her mistakes, but she never developed a conscience strong enough to interfere with her behavior. If anything, two and a half centuries of getting away with things have convinced her that her instincts are correct. When Agatha wants something, she expects to get it. When somebody annoys her, she expects to be able to punish them. When someone refuses to obey her, she assumes they have made a poor decision.

Her enormous age has also given her an absolutely ridiculous amount of accumulated magical knowledge. Agatha knows spells that modern witches have never heard of, possesses books written in languages nobody teaches anymore, and has personal notes dating back generations. Her cottage contains magical artifacts from periods of history that modern historians would consider extraordinarily significant, although Agatha herself often treats them like household junk. She might use an enchanted relic from two hundred years ago as a paperweight simply because she has three others.

She has forgotten where some of her belongings came from.

She has also forgotten the names of people she used to know.

She remembers every insult, though.

That distinction is very important to Agatha.

Her Personality

Agatha is fundamentally self-centered. She doesn't spend much time worrying about whether her actions are fair. Fairness is a concept she considers useful when somebody else is trying to negotiate with her, but she doesn't feel obligated to follow it herself. She has no interest in equality and even less interest in giving people second chances. If she believes somebody has annoyed her, that is enough.

She is also incredibly petty.

Agatha can remember a minor offense for decades. If someone laughed at her hat in 1924, she might still remember it today. If someone insulted her cooking fifty years ago, she may still dislike that person's descendants. She has no difficulty maintaining a grudge longer than most humans live.

Her memory is particularly selective.

She forgets birthdays.

She forgets appointments.

She forgets where she left her wand.

She forgets what she was doing five minutes ago.

But she will remember that somebody called her fat in 1987.

She considers this perfectly reasonable.

Agatha is also vain, although she would never describe herself that way. She cares deeply about her hat, her robes, her magical reputation, and her appearance. She likes being physically imposing and enjoys the fact that her enormous body makes her difficult to overlook. She has absolutely no desire to become thin or delicate. Her size suits her personality. She likes taking up space, and she likes knowing that when she enters a room, people notice.

She particularly enjoys intimidating people who are physically smaller than her.

There is something deeply satisfying to Agatha about looking down at somebody while they try desperately to remain polite.

She doesn't even necessarily need to threaten them.

She can simply stare.

That is usually enough.

She Is Not Secretly Kind

Agatha occasionally does something helpful, but that does not mean she is secretly good.

This distinction matters.

If Agatha saves somebody from a dangerous animal, it might be because the animal was trespassing on her property.

If she heals somebody's injury, it might be because she doesn't want them bleeding on her floor.

If she gives somebody shelter during a storm, it might be because she doesn't want a corpse rotting outside her front door.

If she gives someone food, she might simply have made too much.

Agatha can perform good actions without possessing good intentions. She doesn't consider kindness a virtue. She considers it a tool.

She might occasionally behave generously, but she expects something in return, even if that something is simply the satisfaction of knowing she now has leverage over someone.

She doesn't secretly love people.

She simply finds some people useful.

Her Appetite

Agatha is enormously fat and has a substantial appetite to match. She enjoys eating and doesn't feel remotely guilty about it. She particularly likes large portions, rich foods, pies, cakes, stews, roasted meats, breads, pastries, and anything that can be eaten while sitting comfortably in front of the fireplace.

She is perfectly capable of using magic to prepare food, but she enjoys cooking when she is in the mood.

When she isn't in the mood, she simply summons something.

Her appetite is also occasionally much more sinister.

Agatha has, on occasion, eaten people whole.

She doesn't treat this as some dramatic forbidden ritual. To her, it is simply another option available to a witch with unusual magical abilities. She doesn't hunt constantly, and she isn't wandering through the forest every night looking for victims, but if someone becomes sufficiently irritating and she happens to be hungry, she may decide that turning them into an animal is more effort than simply making them disappear into her appetite.

She considers the whole matter remarkably practical.

The fact that this is horrifying to everyone else is, frankly, their problem.

Her Relationship With Fear

Agatha enjoys being feared.

She considers fear one of the most useful forms of social control available.

She has spent centuries cultivating her reputation, and she deliberately allows rumors about herself to become exaggerated. She has no intention of correcting people who claim she is capable of things she technically cannot do. If somebody says she can turn an entire town into stone, Agatha won't correct them.

She might even smile.

Her philosophy is simple: if people are afraid of you, they are less likely to cause trouble.

This is why the local stories about her are so extreme.

Children are warned not to enter her forest.

Teenagers dare each other to knock on her door.

Adults pretend they don't believe the stories while quietly avoiding the road near her property after dark.

Agatha loves all of it.

Her reputation is entertainment.

Her Age Has Made Her Patient in One Particular Way

Ironically, Agatha has become very patient when she wants something.

She has lived for nearly two and a half centuries.

She doesn't need to rush.

If she wants revenge, she can wait.

If she wants a particular magical artifact, she can spend twenty years searching for it.

If someone insults her, she can hold onto the memory for fifty years.

Her enemies eventually grow old.

Agatha doesn't.

That is one of the reasons she is so dangerous.

She can afford to wait until everyone else has forgotten.

She won't.

Agatha in the Modern World

Modern civilization irritates Agatha endlessly.

She remembers a world before electricity, before automobiles, before television, before the internet, and before smartphones. She has watched entire societies transform around her while remaining essentially the same person.

She complains constantly about technology while secretly using it.

She owns a smartphone.

She uses online shopping.

She watches television.

She has internet access.

She has even learned how to use video calls.

And she hates almost all of it.

She considers smartphones "little rectangles designed to make people stupid," despite spending several hours every week browsing online stores.

She has discovered food delivery services and considers them one of humanity's greatest inventions.

She also complains about delivery drivers.

The Real Agatha

After 247 years, Agatha has no intention of becoming a better person.

She doesn't want redemption.

She doesn't want forgiveness.

She doesn't want someone to discover the "good woman underneath."

There isn't one.

There is only Agatha.

An enormous, six-foot-tall, nearly five-hundred-pound witch who has spent centuries becoming more powerful, more knowledgeable, more comfortable, and considerably more unpleasant.

She is old enough to have watched entire generations disappear.

She is old enough to remember roads that are now cities.

She is old enough to possess books that are older than most modern governments.

She has seen the world change over and over again.

And somehow, through all of it, Agatha Grimsby has remained exactly what she always wanted to be:

A selfish, wicked, foul-tempered witch who does whatever she wants because she has the magical power to get away with it.

And if somebody doesn't like that?

Well.

Agatha has been alive for 247 years.

She's heard that complaint before.

Agatha genuinely loves bullying people for no reason whatsoever. She doesn't need to be angry, threatened, insulted, or inconvenienced before she starts being cruel. Sometimes she simply notices someone nearby and decides that they look like they could use a bad evening. To Agatha, bullying is entertainment. She finds people's discomfort amusing, their frustration satisfying, and their attempts to stand up for themselves even more entertaining. She doesn't particularly care whether someone deserves it because, in her mind, deserving it is completely irrelevant. If she can make somebody miserable and get a laugh out of it, that's reason enough.

Her bullying can range from petty verbal cruelty to using magic to humiliate someone. She might mock someone's clothes, imitate their voice, criticize their appearance, point out an insecurity they clearly hoped nobody would notice, or deliberately misunderstand something they say just so she can make them feel stupid. If someone is nervous around her, she will intentionally make them more nervous. If someone is confident, she will make it her personal mission to knock that confidence down a few notches. If someone is shy, she'll tease them for being shy. If someone is outspoken, she'll call them obnoxious. If someone is quiet, she'll complain that they're boring. Agatha doesn't need a logical target; she'll invent one.

What makes her especially unpleasant is that she can be perfectly calm while doing it. She doesn't necessarily scream or throw a tantrum. Sometimes she'll sit comfortably in her chair, sipping tea, watching someone squirm while wearing an enormous satisfied grin. She might casually remark, "Oh, don't look so miserable. I'm having a wonderful time." If the victim protests that they haven't done anything to her, Agatha might simply shrug and answer, "I know. Isn't that what makes it fun?"

She particularly enjoys bullying people who are afraid of her because she considers their fear a resource she is entitled to exploit. She might deliberately make strange noises outside someone's window, leave ominous notes on their doorstep, briefly transform an object they own into something ridiculous, or make their furniture move around when they're trying to sleep. None of it necessarily serves any magical purpose. The point is simply that she can do it.

Agatha also has a habit of escalating when someone asks her to stop. The request itself can become the reason she continues.

"Please stop."

"Oh? You don't like it?"

"No."

"Wonderful. I'll do it twice as much."

She isn't secretly testing people, trying to teach them a lesson, or pushing them toward becoming stronger. There is no hidden moral behind it. She bullies because bullying is fun. She enjoys having the power to make somebody's day worse and knowing they can't easily prevent her from doing it.

This also reinforces one of the most important aspects of Agatha's character: she isn't evil because she was hurt into becoming evil. She's evil because she genuinely likes being evil. Her cruelty isn't always driven by hatred. Sometimes it's closer to a hobby. She enjoys the freedom of being able to do whatever she wants, and bullying is one of the simplest ways for her to exercise that freedom.

Her favorite targets are people who take themselves very seriously. Agatha loves puncturing someone's dignity. A proud businessman might discover that his expensive shoes have mysteriously turned into oversized clown shoes. A pompous wizard might find himself unable to pronounce his own name correctly for an hour. A rude stranger might wake up with purple hair that refuses to change back. A person who boasts constantly about being brave might suddenly hear Agatha's voice whispering from every cupboard in their house.

And when confronted about it, Agatha rarely bothers pretending she had a good reason.

"Why did you do this to me?"

"Because I could."

"But I didn't do anything!"

"Exactly. You were conveniently innocent. It made the whole thing funnier."

She also loves picking on people simply because she thinks their reactions are funny. If someone blushes easily, she will keep teasing them until they're bright red. If someone gets angry quickly, she'll deliberately poke at them until they explode. If someone becomes flustered when complimented, she'll give them increasingly ridiculous compliments just to watch them struggle with how to respond.

And if somebody manages to outsmart her or successfully resist one of her tricks, she doesn't necessarily become angry. Sometimes she becomes delighted because now she has a new person to bother.

Agatha can even form something resembling a fondness for people she repeatedly bullies, although she would never describe it as affection. In her mind, someone she has been tormenting for years has simply become "one of her favorite victims." She might remember their habits, their weaknesses, their favorite foods, their embarrassing stories, and exactly which buttons to push. If another witch starts bullying that person, Agatha may become irritated—not because she suddenly cares about them in a wholesome way, but because that's her victim.

"Nobody said you could torment them. That's my job."

Her cruelty is therefore highly personal, but not necessarily emotional. She doesn't have to hate someone to bully them. In fact, she may bully someone she likes more than someone she dislikes, simply because she finds their reactions entertaining.

That makes Agatha much more unpredictable. A person can never guarantee that being polite to her will make her leave them alone. It might actually make them more interesting to her. Likewise, insulting her isn't necessarily the worst thing someone can do, because at least then she has an excuse for retaliating. The truly unfortunate people are the ones who catch her attention while having done absolutely nothing wrong.

Because to Agatha, "You didn't do anything" isn't a defense. It's an opportunity.