A.N.D. - Wolf Woods

“It’s my turn to sit on the throne!” Bluebell complained.

“You couldn’t sit on a toilet!” Blabberwort shot back.

“BEEEEEEE QUIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEET!” Burly’s screech had them all grabbing at their ears. When they were cowering before them, he growled, “That’s better.”

“No, it’s not!” his sister snarled. “This ruling thing is hard! We don’t have riches, the witch who killed Dad is still alive, and we don’t even have any slaves anymore!”

“We should kill Wendell and take over his kingdom!”

“Yeah!”

“Yeah! Kill Wendell!”

They stared hopefully at one another for a minute.

“You attack first.”

“No, you!”

“You want to be king, you go!”

“That’s it!” Burly slammed his tankard down. “Let’s all attack the Fourth Kingdom! We’ll each raise an army of our own, from whoever wants to see that one of us on the throne. Whoever catches and keeps the most slaves gets to be king.”

Blabberwort snorted her nasal laugh. “And then there will be shoe parties again! And feasts!”

Burly nodded. “And torture! Every night!”

Bluebell sniffed. “I’m afraid of the wolves.”

“Aw, smoke some dwarf moss first. It’ll make you brave.”

“And if it doesn’t,” Blabberwort chipped in helpfully, “the wolves look so much prettier when they’re pink with green spots anyway.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“I rolled a giant this morning. Let’s smoke it now! It’ll help us plan!”

Blabberwort always scored the good stuff. After the first three go-arounds, they picked their targets. Burly would take the Troll Gate garrison, to prove his bravery. Blabberwort would take the wolf village of Broken Collar to prove her cleverness. Bluebell, because he was the littlest, took Beantown. (To prove he was a coward, snickered the other two.)

After another few rounds of puffing, they picked their time. They would each attack at dawn after the next full moon, when the wolves were still sleeping it off.

And then, after a few more tokes, they were too busy looking at the colors to even think about the wolves.

Queen Red strode at top speed down the corridors of her castle, her military advisors hustling to keep up with her. “B-b-but, the Council of the Nine Kingdoms won’t allow a war!” one of them protested. “The whole point of the council is to keep peace between the kingdoms! Nine kingdoms, one unity!

“I didn’t notice them doing much about it when the trolls attacked Wendell,” she snarled back. “The trolls weren’t provoked. I am. He has tried by stealth to topple my government, which means anything I do to remove the threat to my throne-anything at all-is only self-defense.”

“You have no proof!”

“Only because he was not fool enough to leave proof behind to be found here. The last thing he wanted was for anyone to know, now, wasn’t it? Doubtless I will find something incriminating when I reach his palace.”

“You’re not planning on taking the Fourth Kingdom over?”

“Nooooooo...” She wished she could, but controlling that amount of land would be too difficult over time. “Merely to replace its king with someone a little less moon-mad. Someone who was never touched by the Evil Queen and therefore could not be her puppet. I’m not the only one who thinks Wendell has been behaving very strangely since that whole business ended! Look at the newspapers from his own kingdom! Half his own people will support my call for his abdication!”

“But we can’t afford it!”

“We can’t. He can. I intend to use his own network and assets against him. All we need to do is seize one garrison to use its resources to fund our next foray, and continue like that. We have enough men-at-arms and weapons to seize a single garrison, and our wolves can send false signals to their network.”

“Men-at-arms, yes, my queen, but how do you plan on dealing with the wolves in the garrison?”

“That’s the simplest part of all-and proof that Wendell has not thought through the problems of his so-wonderful system. All we need do is attack at dawn the morning after the full moon. They’ll be too dazed and tired to do any more than surrender. And that is why wolves will never be as good as human soldiers.”

Edwina returned from the woods looking smug and confident. “It’s all set in place, you’ll see,” she whispered as she passed Betty in the hall. “Soon everything will be set to rights again.”

Betty nodded and bent further over the vegetables she was chopping for dinner. She wished she felt so confident. Instead, the deeper she got into this mess, the more worried she got.

She hadn’t known about the stolen magic well back in her home village. That was a secret only given to Peeps when they turned eighteen, and she’d been fifteen last year when Sally'd had her birthday and everything had gone so terribly wrong, literally overnight. Betty honestly thought that the Peeps always won because they were naturally good.

It was a terrible shock to realize that they were naturally good at being bad.

It wasn’t her fault, none of it! She hadn’t stolen the water, she hadn’t hurt Sally! But she was teased and picked on and spit on like the rest. Not one of her friends had stood by her. Peeps had no friends anymore.

Mum had asked her if she’d like to get away from it all, get a chance to start over with a distant relative. She’d said “yes,” thinking that she might be able to go back to the life she’d known before. But then she’d been bundled off in the coach and her mum hadn’t even looked up to say goodbye; she’d been that busy sanding up suspicious stains from the floor...

Betty didn’t so much chop the onions as stab them to death, using them as excuse to get her tears and fears out. Now she was here under the name Betty Wheelright, right in the house of the Wolf who had uncovered it all. Betty knew mum hated that wolf, but he wasn’t to blame for Uncle Wilf stealing the water or killing poor Sally. Betty wanted to like him, but she was too afraid he’d remember her.

Oh, Great-aunt Edwina had been so sly! The night she’d arrived, she’d batted big eyes and gotten Wolf and Virginia to tell their “grand, wonderful” story. They’d talked for hours and never known that all Edwina was interested in was the part where he said he’d been too moon-mad, crowded, and confused in Little Lamb Village to remember any of it before the trial. Betty relaxed a little then-she’d been too far from him during the trial for him to remember her scent. But she still felt bad lying to him.

She felt worse about the baby. It was a nice enough little child, gigglesome and prone to playing with the shadows as if they were secret, special friends. Edwina was planning something bad about that child, but she wouldn’t tell what-only that soon the wolves would all “be sorry.”

A knock on the door almost startled her into cutting a finger. Who would be coming to the back, away from the street? Hesitantly, fearfully, Betty went to look.

It was a little old lady, dressed in worn, torn clothing as if she had been walking a long way. “Alms, little lady? Can you spare a bit of food?”

Betty bit a lip. She didn’t want company. Wolf was quite clear about not having strangers around the baby, and he was nuts about anything that cut into the food supply. On the other hand, Virginia was equally strict about helping anyone who asked, in memory of how she and her father had needed help on their journey.

And then again, anyone who knew a story knew that little old ladies asking for alms were very so often extremely powerful people indeed! Crossing her fingers behind her back, Betty swung the door cautiously wider. “Come in, please. But I must be about my duties, and the master of this house is cautious.”

“Is he?” the woman asked without curiosity as she settled into a chair at the worktable. “Well, I suppose he must be, with a child to think about.”

“Oh! How do you know?” This was a fairy godmother! Quick, what did they like to eat?

The old woman pointed with her walking stick to something lying in a corner. “Are you the one who plays with pull-toys, then?” she asked wryly.

Betty blushed, picking up the waddle-sheep and dusting it off with her apron. “No! No, I’m not.”

“No,” the old woman echoed, putting down her cane and leaning on the table for a good look, “you’re not.” Her eyes suddenly turned shrewd. “But you are like that baby, aren’t you? Innocent, while all the others plot and plan around you.”

Betty couldn’t manage to say anything other than a terror stricken, “Ghaaaa...”

The intent gaze never wavered. “Many others have tried to decide your fate. The time is coming fast when you must decide it for yourself.”

“But how will I know what to do?”

“No one ever knows that, child. Do what you think is right.” With a sharp nod, the woman gathered herself and started to rise.

“Wait! Can I give you something? Your food?”

The old woman chuckled. “Dearie me, your generosity is enough. I know better than to take food from a wolf with a cub to feed!”

“Please... why...” Why me? I’m no heroine... am I?

The old woman knew without her voicing the full question. “The story is in motion, child,” she said, pausing at the door. Again that hard, clear gaze pinned Betty. “Only your fate is not yet sealed for good or ill. That part will be up to you. Choose quickly. Choose well.”

The slammed door cut off any other questions. Betty rushed to the window.

There was no one in the back yard.