A.N.D. - Wolf Woods

Too proud and aware of Cinderella’s keen gaze on her, Red couldn’t bury her face in her hands. Still, she squeezed her eyes shut just as her pet scrambled and leaped, unable to bear seeing, knowing that the mere sounds would replay in her dreams for the rest of her life. She briefly wished she hadn’t ordered Lucy to stay behind, but her secretary had always been squeamish. Today she would be too busy with her own pain to deal with Lucy’s nerves as well.

The crowd before them snarled in one bloodthirsty voice. There was a thump-he landed safely!-a scramble, and then...

His sole scream was cut off quickly.

The noises of the crowd grew uglier as they snarled and snapped, and Red was glad she had eaten no breakfast as her empty stomach clenched at the mental image of a pack arguing over a kill. Beside her, Cinderella gasped. “Meat! You’ve fed wild wolves fresh meat! They’ll go on a killing spree now! Wendell, you’ve let her murder us all!”

He was the only one who sounded calm, and Red hated him for it. “No, Madame, I have provided justice. You must learn to trust our newest citizens. See, they’re disbanding already.”

A triumphant howl was instantly stifled and Red forced her burning eyes open. Had they gone mad with bloodlust and turned on themselves? No, it was the hero Wolf, his hand clamped over his sister’s mouth, his eyes flaring yellow at the crowd. “No howling,” he ordered viciously. “Take no pleasure in this.”

The deed done, they rapidly disbursed. Red forced herself to look at where Benjamin had last been and saw only blood, a few shreds of fabric, and a severed tail on the ground.

“Oh, Grandmother! Oh, Grandmother!” Red slapped both hands over her mouth.

“An appropriate one to call to at the death of a wolf,” Cinderella said, one supercilious eyebrow rising.

Out of the corner of her eye she could see Wendell shake his head, frowning. “This is not an entertainment,” he reminded his own grandmother. He turned to Red, resting a glove on her shoulder. “Are you all right?”

Red shook her head, the tears she couldn’t keep anymore starting to fall. “I raised him from a pup!” she sniffed, hating herself even as she broke. “He was my baby, I raised him from a pup!”

Cinderella started to say something that sounded catty, but was shushed by a new voice.

“Your majesty,” Lady Virginia said softly. “You must not blame yourself so much. You are not the first woman to be led astray by a man.”

How patronizing! Red snapped her head up to point out that Wendell’s precious heroine had never had the problems of a kingdom on her shoulders, but her rebuttal was swallowed as she realized that the dignitaries gathered around her were shielding her shameful breakdown from the crowd. Habit more than emotional stability dried her tears. A Riding Hood was always brave and resourceful and calm in public. Her grandmother...

Your grandmother was fooled by a wolf in a nightgown she suddenly thought in a voice that sounded suspiciously like her father’s. He could have been furry or he could have been in human shape, but he was still a ‘he’ and must have looked awfully silly in that gown.

That wasn’t the point of the story, she thought back, repeating a conversation they’d held in life when she couldn’t have been more than eight, suddenly remembering the line that had come next.

No, the point is that after she was fooled so terribly, she went on to become a great woman.

Well. She’d been fooled, just like grandmother. Which meant that it must now be time to be great. Red bit her lip then took a few deep, steadying breaths.

“Are you okay?” Wendell repeated. Red nodded, a little uncertainly at first, but with growing confidence. Oh, she was frightened! Her life had changed so drastically in the last few days, and it would change drastically yet again. But deep in her heart, she knew what she was about to do was right. Not just proper, not just expected, not just regal, but right. And she had always wanted to do the right thing. Suddenly she understood the leap of faith Wendell had made when he put the fate of his realm into the hands of a “scared girl.” She felt very young and very scared… and very sure.

Lady Virginia was a very perceptive woman. As their eyes met, the heroine smiled at her, nodding in understanding. With a respectful dip that wasn’t quite a curtsey, she stepped out of the way as Red stood up.

Head held high, half feeling that it was her turn to jump into a pack of homicidal killers, Red walked to the front of the viewing platform. “People of the Fourth Kingdom, former citizens of the Second Kingdom, and representatives of all the kingdoms, hear me! Before this trial, I made a promise to the wolves of my kingdom. I call you now to witness the outcome of this promise.”

She had expected her voice to crack or tremble as she made the historical announcement. To her surprise, it came easily, almost as if a weight had been lifted off of her. “This morning, I sent a messenger to my palace. He carried with him a scroll repealing the Wolf Code of the Second Kingdom. From this day forward, wolves are equal under the law with humans. They will have the same rights.” As the crowd’s cheers became overly enthusiastic, Red put a bit of snap to her voice. “They face the same penalties.” The cheering threatened to drown her out, so she hastened to add the most important part. “I would welcome back those of my wolves… those of my people... who wish to return.”

And then there was no chance to say anything, as everyone in the square went almost moon-mad, cheering, howling, dancing, and hugging one another. Dizzied with the movement all around her, Red looked up, into the mirror.

A solemn young queen dressed in scarlet looked back. Behind her was a hearty man, smiling at her. Daddy! Oh, Daddy, did I do the right thing?

The image nodded and faded, to be replaced by a wizened woman in a tattered, thick woolen cloak that had been washed until the once-vibrant color faded to a cherry pink.

Red Riding Hood the first looked into her granddaughter’s eyes for a moment. Then, with regal grace, she bent her head in the courtesy of an equal to an equal.

For once, the tears in her eyes were not ones of sorrow. Red scrubbed her eyes clean and went back to her compatriots, for the first time feeling as if she truly belonged.

My people won’t like this. But they can’t deny that the loss of the wolves almost ruined us. The fate of the wolves is the fate of the Second Kingdom, whether either they or us likes it.

Besides, I have finally turned our economy around! The silver from the collars will go straight to the treasury. So will the output from the mine. As for the charm idea... hmmm, the Fourth Kingdom doesn’t have any mines. I wonder if Wendell would be willing to buy the spare scraps for melting for his tourist trade. At a reasonable rate, of course. I can afford to be very reasonable now that he will, as my friendly ally, of course be buying my wood again. And while I’m thinking of tourists, I could build a replica of this stage out near my grandmother’s cottage. Make it a sort of history of the wolves-first their fall, at Granny’s, then maybe some placards telling the story of Wolf Lewis-he was my citizen first, after all, I have as much a claim to his story as anyone-and then it ends at the replica, with wax effigies all around it, so people can feel like they’re part of the crowd. It just... might... work...

She was so buried in her thoughts and deafened by the noise of the crowd that she never heard the little, childish voices. “Please, release us too!” “Let us go!” “Mercy, great queen!”

Virginia bent over Dell, her mind a whirl. Something was still wrong, she could just feel it. Something evil hovered over the crowd still, something cold and twisted was blowing in the winds out of the woods...

“I thank you all,” Wendell was saying to the crowd. “Now that we are done-”

“We’re not.” Virginia handed Dell over to Wolf, who followed her with a confused whine as she walked up to platform.

“I beg your pardon?” Wendell asked, looking torn between confusion and indignation at the interruption.

“We’re not done. It’s not over.” It was getting easier to go with her gut feelings; a year ago, she would have been second-guessing herself, only going forward if she had no way of going back. Now she felt a little excited, but very, very sure of herself. “Can’t you feel it all around us? All the evil and hate is still here! Humans and wolves will be at war here as long as the ghosts walk. It’s never going to be over until the curse is taken off the woods themselves.”

“How am I supposed to know how to lay them to rest?” Wendell protested.

“Perhaps Elizabeth? The ghosts come to her,” Red suggested. “Surely she knows the most about them?”

“I wish I did, Liege Lady. All I know is that there is more than one curse, but they cannot tell me how to break them.”

Wendell tapped his chin, thinking. “Do you want me to leave one of my wizards here to try to find the way?”

“I wonder…” Virginia said, scrambling up on the viewing platform and facing the mirror. “If we point the mirror into the woods and ask it to show the truth of the first uprising, won’t it show the curses as they were cast?” Except that the mirror didn’t always give sound, and she was afraid to touch it. The big magic mirrors reminded her of what her mother had become, and she distinctly remembered the bad luck that had almost killed her father.

Wendell was nodding. “That might work-if the key to breaking the curse is in the cursing. It isn’t always.”

“Don’t move the mirror,” Wolf suggested. He handed Dell over to Tony and turned to his sister. “Go to the woods and break off a branch. The woods and you have both been touched by the curses. That might be enough for the mirror.”

Oh, I hope this works! Littlebit ran as fast as she could down the nearest street to the woods. For a brief moment she had thought, hoped, that her own unwitting sacrifice would have chased the ghosts away, but apparently she was the only one freed. How had Virginia seen the mutilated children? Queen Red seemed to be oblivious at what was clustering in the shadows around her.

The road was unfinished, petering out to dirt and finally ending next to an oak tree. Its branches were fairly high off the ground, but if she jumped, maybe she could catch the end of...

“What are you doing?” The shout spoiled her jump, and Littlebit turned to snarl in frustration. Who was out here anyway? Everyone in town was stuffed into the square to see what was happening.

She turned to look and amended her statement.

Everyone alive in town was in the square.

The big butcher-like ghost who had threatened her before was glowering at her, shoving to come between her and the tree. Beside him was a new woman with claw marks down the side of her face, her skull showing through. And a man who looked dimly familiar under all the blood. And... Snow White protect her! These were the humans she had killed for threatening Dell!

“No happily ever after for you,” one of the ghosts hissed. “Murderess! You killed us and put our families in jail!”

“Their own actions put them in jail,” Littlebit pointed out, trying to dodge around them, but the human ghosts were clustered thickly around, keeping her from the tree and cutting off her escape back into town.

“We’re trapped here,” one of them said. “The curse covered us as well. We can’t rest.”

“So we don’t see why you should get to live happily ever after,” another chimed in.

The big butcher-like man cracked his knuckles. “We really don’t see why you should get to live at all.”