I watched as Micco slowly wore down the lone wolf. It would have been a quicker fight if Micco was going for the kill, but instead, he seemed to be just trying to subdue the wolf. I only knew which wolves were my friends, so I had no idea who the rogue wolf was, but it seemed Micco did. I kept the child tucked in my arms as Micco worked away at the rogue wolf. After what felt like forever but could have only been moments, Micco had the wolf trapped and hurt bad enough it couldn’t get away. I saw it was now time for me to get the child back to the tree villagers who were waiting at the wolf village.
Easier than going up, I jumped down to the ground in one motion. Micco growled at the rogue wolf, who dared to lift his head and look at the child. Wolf Micco couldn’t talk to me, but I knew it was better to get the tree people away from the village as fast as I could. I knew he’d understand why I was leaving him.
“I’ll send backup to help you,” I told Micco, but he shook his head. He didn’t want help, but he didn’t have much of an option. The wolf couldn’t get away; who knew what it would do next? “You plan to stay here all night like that?”
Micco nodded. I wasn’t about to fight with him. I would get the child back to his people and then come to help Micco.
My return was quicker than anyone expected as all the wolves seemed to be still following trails or fanning out in the woods to search. Sera still held the man on the ground, and many of the tree villagers were on the ground now by their horses. I could see more than one was holding their weapons even if Sera hadn’t authorized anything like that.
“I found the child,” I told the crowd as I approached. Wolves and tree villagers alike started to chatter in happiness at what I was holding.
Sera looked up at me and nodded. She let the man at her foot go and took the young child from me. After a quick check over, she turned to her people.
“Go home,” she ordered them with only the authority the next Red could have.
The tree villagers lingered for only a moment before turning around to head back to the tree village.
“Charles,” Sera called to the man she had been keeping on the ground. “I’ll be borrowing your horse, and you can ride back with another one of your friends that aren’t supposed to be here.”
Charles scowled but handed the reigns over to Sera. She handed me the child as she climbed up on the horse. I handed him back to her once she was seated.
“I’ll personally return him to his mother,” she told me. I nodded as she turned and faded back into the dark trees of the forest on top of the horse she borrowed. The child calmed in her arms and was quiet before they were out of view.
I didn’t wait for anyone to ask as I made my way back into the woods too. I followed the path back to where Micco was still with the rogue wolf. I paused as I neared and smelled blood. That wasn’t a good sign. I took off running to help Micco, who might have been overpowered by the weird powers of the rogue wolf, only to skid to a halt where I left him.
Human Micco was standing over the body of another human. He was bending down to pick the other man up.
“Micco…” I didn’t know what to say.
I knew who the man was. It was only days before that Micco showed me his friend Nathan, who was one of the first wolves to get sick. He was doing everything in his power to keep his friend alive. No matter how it went down, the sickness had taken its first wolf.
2
5th March
The sun was high in the sky by the time I woke the next morning. I really didn’t want to get out of bed after the disaster of the day before. What started out as a fun day with a festival that made me forget all the problems of Elder ended with a reminder that Elder needed help. I was kind of wishing it was all a dream even if I knew I couldn’t be that lucky.
I never knew the real details; I don’t think Red shared them with anyone, but I knew that Elder was a better place because the curse was gone. The place I was raised had problems, just like any kingdom, but it was working towards a new era where the people of Elder were one people and not divided tribes. At least, that was what Red was going for the night before. It didn’t exactly turn out that way.
Eighteen winters ago, Red had faced and beat the curse. While that didn’t mean the wolves would be free from turning into animals, it meant the wolves regained control of their animal. They could change or not change at will and remembered every moment they were in their wolf form. As my best friend, Nikkan, had explained to me more than once, being a wolf meant having a second person in his head, he was still in control of that person. The curse was when they lost that control. Anyone with the wolf side could be called by the moon to turn into a vicious wolf that would attack humans at will.
The curse divided Elder. The non-cursed people fought and feared the cursed. Neighbors turned on neighbors. No one was safe. Nighttime became dreaded as people feared the wolves in the woods. The human-only people retreated to the safety of the trees. Elder was a different place then, and no one wanted to go back to that.
The divide was something Red had worked so hard to stop. Even after the curse was broken, people stayed in the trees, and the wolves stayed in their villages. Red could see that they needed to be one kingdom and tried her best to encourage everyone to get along. That was ruined now. All her work had gone out of the window.
What we saw last night was just like everything that had ever been described to me before. I wasn’t alive when the curse happened, but I knew all about it. Most of my childhood had been spent sitting in meetings of people seeking retribution from Red for what had happened to them winters before. The curse touched everyone and devastated many families.
I groggily made it out of bed and was disappointed to find Nikkan was still gone. Three nights without him felt like the longest we had ever been apart in the past three winters. It was strange. Yes, he was a wolf, and no, he wasn’t related to me, but he felt more like my family than anyone. He was my brother in every sense of the word but blood. I hated to fight with him, but I knew he just needed to cool down. I could wait for him, but it was still weird to be in my house alone.
Breakfast was going to have to be tea, and I needed to go hunting. There was close to nothing left in my cupboards, and even more so, I needed to be up and going. I didn’t have time to hunt, though I needed to. Azren had supplies I could get, but I preferred to hunt for my food, and that way, owe nothing to anyone. But hunting would have to wait; the wolves needed their fence now more than ever.
I heard someone outside the door to my house and hurried over to open it. I was going to be glad to have Nikkan back to talk to. There was too much that happened, and I needed his opinion on it all. He was a wolf, but he never really acted like one. He was pretty impartial most of the time and was good to bounce ideas off. Together we could come up with some great, and sometimes not so great, plans.
I opened the door and tried not to be disappointed. Sera stood there looking at me, waiting for me to invite her in. It wasn’t Nikkan, after all.
“What do you want?” I asked, a little harsher than I intended. It wasn’t her fault she wasn’t Nikkan, but she wasn’t the face I wanted to see right after waking up.
It wasn’t that Sera wasn’t a pretty face to see. She was beautiful when she wasn’t scowling. But we never got along the best. Somehow, she always pushed my buttons, and I did my best to do the same to her. We had nothing to be competitive about, but we still were. I couldn’t help it. Something about Sera made me want to try harder and do better. I couldn’t let myself be bested by her no matter how much I really didn’t care about something.
“Tsk, tsk,” Sera said as she pushed her way into my house just like she always did.
Sera had grown up with me for the most part. My mother insisted on keeping track of her over the winters. Therefore, we visited her and her parents often. They were one of the few human people of Elder left living in the woods on the ground. They refused to move to the trees, and Red made sure they had a cottage protected by enchantments to ke
ep the wolves out.
Needless to say, that made them into really tough people, and Sera inherited all of that toughness from her parents. She tended to say what she thought when she thought it, and that meant we didn’t always see eye to eye. Sure, I had opinions about everything, too, but I knew when to keep my mouth shut. Sera didn’t.
“I came all the way here to collect you and find you sleeping until the sun’s at the highpoint of the day. You’ve probably missed two meals already. Bet you were planning to sleep until supper time, lazy,” she said as she walked around my house, scrutinizing it as she went. She looked in my sink as she passed it and raised one eyebrow at me.
Yes, there were dirty dishes in the sink, but who cared? This was my house. I didn’t have to live like Red, the perfect leader of the kingdom of Elder. My house didn’t need to have everything in complete order like Red’s house. I never recalled seeing even one thing out of place growing up. Red was perfect; I was not. This was my house, and if I wanted to leave a dish in the sink, I could do that. I didn’t need Sera’s opinion or approval.
Sera made her way back to me after inspecting my house. I just stood with my arms crossed and waited. I really didn’t have time to argue with Sera. I had things to get done, and obviously, I’d overslept.
“Red asked me to fetch you,” Sera finally told me, looking me over like she was checking to see if I was even dressed for the day. I was basically dressed since I had slept in my clothing the night before when I got home so late.
“Like as in, she wants me there today?” I asked.
Really? Red had great timing. I had better things to do than spend another day at the tree village. It wasn’t like she needed my account of the night before. She already had Sera, who was there the whole time. I was ready to argue with Sera when she continued talking.
“I wasn’t to return without you,” Sera added, touching the cupboard like she was checking for dust.
Yep, Red wanted me there today.
“Fine,” I said, unable to avoid the inevitable.
If Red demanded I be somewhere, I had to go. At least, for now. When I had my place completely self-sufficient, I wouldn’t have to be at her beck and call. And really, I’d do anything to get Sera out of my house.
I motioned for Sera with a grand wave to leave out the door I held open for her and shut it behind us as we left.
“Race you?” I dared her once we were both outside in the clearing before my house.
Just because I had to go to the tree village didn’t mean I had to waste my whole day. The sooner I got there, the sooner I could be done and back to the wolves to help them.
Sera wasn’t one for backing down from a challenge, and she took off full speed into the woods. I laughed at her head start and ran after her.
It didn’t take me very long to catch up with her. Yes, Sera had the power of the Red and could see better in the daylight than the dark night before, but what she didn’t realize last night was that I could go faster than we had run when tracking the rogue wolf. I only kept pace with Sera and Grace, but alone I could have been to the wolf village quicker.
Sera pumped her arms quicker as I caught up beside her, but she was unable to break away from me. She expertly jumped and ducked branches in her pathway as I did the same. Gritting her teeth, she tried to get ahead of me, but I just smiled. I wasn’t going at my full pace yet; I was just keeping up with her. Knowing that we would be there soon at this pace, I decided to pull in front just a little to drive her nuts. Sera huffed and tried to keep up with me.
Racing was actually a great idea. My blood was pumping, and my brain was thinking faster about everything. The wolves needed help. Micco shouldn’t have to bear the weight of their problems alone. Red needed to see that, but she didn’t go the night before to the wolves. I didn’t have time to ask Sera, but something was up. What did Red need from me?
Breaking through the tree line, we made it to Red’s cottage on the ground in record time. She stood outside the doorway, holding a steaming cup of tea, staring into the woods. Red wasn’t staring in our direction as I pulled to a stop two saplings away from her. Red continued to stare into the trees.
“Not fair,” Sera said as she stopped beside me, panting from her exhaustion. I had barely broken a sweat.
Red turned to us and gave us a sad smile. She had seemed happy at the festival; I hated how she looked now. Her dream of wolves and tree humans as one burned down last night. I wasn’t sure if she were back to step one, but the look on her face said she knew it was like that.
“I’m cleaning up,” Sera said to the two of us as she went into the cottage and her bedroom that used to be mine.
Red watched her go and then turned back to me. Somehow, in just the few days since she had been to my house, she had aged again. It was like winters were passing each day she had. The lines on her forehead seemed more profound. Her hair might even have had a few more strands of gray in it. It was beyond strange. Red was eternally young. At least, that’s what I’d always thought.
Red wasn’t your typical mother. She didn’t give hugs or kisses freely. She didn’t make pies and cookies for you to have when you came home from lessons. She didn’t tuck you in at night or tell you there was nothing to be afraid of under your bed. That wasn’t Red. She was always real and honest with me. She was strong and fierce. And now, it seemed like some of that was fading along with her hair color.
“Come on in,” she motioned for me to follow her. I nodded and did as she asked. “Have a seat.”
I sat down at the kitchen table where I had eaten all my meals when I was a kid. Red sat in her regular chair at the head of the table. I tried not to feel like a little kid again.
“Sera told me about yesterday, but I need to hear it from you.” She took a sip of her tea.
“I’ve been trying to tell you, but you’ve refused to listen,” I started waiting for Red to reprimand me for my disrespect. She only stared at me, so I continued. “Micco told me the wolves were getting sick. I tried to get you to see that. What happened yesterday was because they are sick, and you didn’t care enough to listen to me.”
I wasn’t blaming her. It wasn’t her fault they were sick, but I felt like it was made worse because she didn’t believe me.
“I believe you now,” she told me like she could read my mind. “Tell me all the details. I need to figure this out.”
I stared hard at her. Was she just saying what she thought I wanted to hear, or did she honestly believe me? I didn’t know which it was.
“The wolves need help,” I started and waited a moment to see if she’d dismiss my words as she had already done only a few days before. “Some time this winter Micco found that a few wolves had gotten sick. He thought they were just making it up. Wolves can’t get sick, right?”
Red nodded her head but added nothing. She knew just like the rest of us that the wolf gene made it impossible for them to physically get sick. Wolves healed from almost everything and quickly. They never had to worry about catching a cold or if they ran across poison ivy. Nothing could get a wolf sick.
“Micco ignored it until he couldn’t anymore. He finally realized after you last visited him that the wolves weren’t pretending. They were really sick. That’s when he asked me to tell you. He showed me a sick wolf, and Mom, they’re really bad.”
We needed to help them, and I wanted to keep the wolves safe. The tree villagers already showed that they were ready to kill off the wolves if given a chance. I didn’t want to see my friends die, and I didn’t want to kill any crazy tree-dwellers either. We were all part of Elder, one people.
“What happens when they get sick?” Red asked as she watched me like I held some grand secret. It seemed that she was taking me seriously now.
“They are ravenously hungry, but no amount of feeding nourishes them; they lose weight, become weak, and are unable to work. The healthy wolves left in the villages are starving because the sick wolves eat everything at night. The available food is d
iminishing because it seems like the animals in the woods are avoiding the area as if they are aware of the increased risk to them. When a sick wolf transitions back to his human form, he is weak and starving. Hunting in their wolf form isn’t filling them up.”
Red pressed her fingers together and tapped them on her lips. She knew something she wasn’t sharing with me.
“Do they have control of their wolf?”
I bit my lip. If I told the truth, she might let the tree villagers hunt them. The wolves were a problem, and I knew that even though they lived in Elder, Red would protect the tree villagers first. Red didn’t need me to answer as she read my face.
“I need to talk with Micco further, but I have a feeling the curse is back.”
I stared at her. What was she talking about? She broke the curse. She saved everyone eighteen winters ago. It couldn’t just come back.
“Back? Not something new?”
I wanted badly for it to be something new. Something we could find an answer for. Something we could help the wolves defeat.
“No. It sounds just like how the curse began hundreds of winters ago.”
I shook my head. This couldn’t be happening. When the curse was active, not a single wolf was able to control themselves at the call of the moon. That would mean my friends, Nikkan and Grace, would turn into the monsters that lived to kill people. All the wolves would go crazy and hunt humans. No one would be safe.
“Micco brought out cages to keep the sick wolves in, and we started building a fence around the village to keep everyone in at night because he will soon run out of cages.” I wanted Red to see that the wolves were working hard to keep Elder safe. I didn’t want her organizing hunting parties, and I didn’t want her hurting the wolves.
I wasn’t sure if I convinced her or not as Red nodded, lost in her own thoughts. She had always been hard to read, but I think being away had made it harder for me. I knew she was never going to give a yes or no answer, that wasn’t her way, but it would have made me feel a lot better.
Castiel: Son of Red Riding Hood (Kingdom of Fairytales Boxset Book 3) Page 10
