by Radclyffe
“You are,” I say, standing on my tiptoes and kissing Cedric’s cheek, “the most fascinating creature.” I grab his phone and quickly enter my contact information. “Let’s walk around some more. I think I want to spend more time getting to know my own personal hero.”
It’s nearly dawn by the time I return home. I have learned three things over the last several hours, though. First, I can spend weeks in Cedric’s company and will never fully understand him. Second, Paul and Todd are the worst, weakest kind of bullies. I channeled a bit of Carabas and they practically fell over themselves to drive me home, all the while promising to leave me, and anyone else they might have wanted to mess with, alone. And third: I have standards. I have self-respect. And now I can add self-confidence to the mix.
It may have taken a catlike hottie in tiger-striped spandex and pink and gold platform boots to bring him out, but I really do have a little bit of Marcus Carabas in me. I’m not going to hide him behind baseless insecurities anymore. And if I tried—I stroke a hickey on my collarbone and grin—Cedric will just haul him out again. Which is exactly how it’s supposed to be.
Andi Marquette (andimarquette.com) is an award-winning author of mysteries, speculative fiction, and romance. Her latest works include the novels Day of the Dead and The Edge of Rebellion and the novella From the Boots Up.
This story is based on “Little Red Riding Hood.”
Red
Andi Marquette
Flesh and fur were slow to burn, and Rebeca knew the odor too well. From her vantage point on the steps of the church she could see the pyre in the town square and hear the pop and hiss of wood and wolf. She descended the steps two at a time and pushed through the crowd until the stench of death and heat stung her face.
“How many?” she asked a boy who stood to her right. She dreaded his answer.
“Two, miss.”
She stared hard at the forms in the flames, but the blackened remains told her nothing of their past. She smelled no enchantment in the air, and she knew these were mere wolves, targeted because they might be something else, something much stronger, something tied to earth, blood, and magic. She’d once hunted them, too, roamed the forests in her scarlet cape, arrows tipped with silver, seeking to stop the beasts from spreading the bite and ravaging the landscape with fear.
She was an excellent shot and had brought several of the beasts in without killing a single true wolf. But, she thought as greasy black smoke rose from the pyre, she’d let old stories blind her, as they did so many. She realized it when she met Isadora.
“They’ll be going out again,” the boy said. “Another hunting party.”
Rebeca looked down at him.
“Will you go with them?” he asked. He motioned at her cloak, recognizing it and taking her for the huntress she used to be.
“Not today. Sick friend.”
“Tomorrow?”
“Perhaps,” she lied.
“Lost the taste for it?” said a man who had appeared next to her. A large man whose dull brown hair hung to his shoulders and whose cheeks always appeared as if he’d been out in the wind too long. He stared down his long nose at her and grinned.
“Perhaps I’m just busy.”
“Aye. With a sick friend.” He gave “friend” a sarcastic emphasis, then looked at the bonfire. “Shot one of those myself. One bolt.” He looked back at her, as if expecting her to challenge him.
She did. “I hope your friends were there to put the poor beast out of its misery after you’d missed all the vital organs with your one shot.”
The boy cleared his throat, like he was trying to cover a laugh, and the man glared at him, then back at her.
“Stay out of the forests, miss. Do what women should, and find a man.”
“And are you making yourself available, Robert?”
He scowled and spat on the stones underfoot. “Watch yourself.” He turned and strode away.
She stared after him, wondering whether his last statement was a warning or a threat. The boy scampered after another group of boys and Rebeca gathered her cloak around her and slipped out of the crowd. The smell followed her, and she tasted bile in her throat as she hurried down a series of alleys until she arrived at a particular door. She hesitated to knock, afraid that this time, there would be no response from within.
She stood long enough outside the door that a woman across the way lingered in her own doorway, watching. So Rebeca knocked, dreading what she might hear. Or worse, what she wouldn’t.
The door opened a crack and an eye, blue like a gemstone, appeared. Rebeca exhaled in relief. A whispered greeting sounded within and the door opened enough to let her in.
“Isadora,” Rebeca said as she pulled the woman to her. She kicked the door shut with her foot. “They’re burning two more wolves in the square.”
“Pity.” Isadora clung to her.
“You can’t stay here.”
“Shh.” She stroked Rebeca’s cheek with her fingertips.
“I mean it. It’s too dangerous.”
“And too dangerous to be in the forests while they hunt.” Isadora smiled, but her expression was haunted and pained. “I am too weak, love. I wouldn’t last a night.”
Rebeca reluctantly released her and glanced around the cramped, darkened room. It smelled of fatigue and weakness, a heavy, cloying odor. Underneath it she caught an acrid scent of scorched metal, not Isadora’s usual. Dark enchantment. A bottle stood on the nearby table. She picked it up and held it near a weak slash of light that snuck in past the shutter. “How much have you had?” She jerked her gaze back to her, worry rippling through her chest.
Isadora looked away.
“Tell me.”
“Enough.”
She held the bottle up again. Over halfway gone. “It’s too much.” She set it down. “It’ll kill you.” She tried to keep the fear out of her voice, but from Isadora’s expression she had failed. “Does it no longer work at the smaller dosage?”
“No.” Isadora wrapped her arms around herself, and Rebeca saw, in the dim light, how frail she was, how the elixir had done what the old woman had said, but how it had indeed exacted a price.
“You must stop taking it.” She returned to Isadora’s side and gathered her into her arms. How thin she seemed.
“If I do, I’ll die anyway. You know that.”
“Then we’ll leave. We’ll go somewhere safe, where you won’t have to hide from the moon. Or take poisons to ward it off.”
Isadora laughed, but it lacked humor. “The hunts are not merely confined to this village. Or to these forests. Where, dear one, will we go?”
“There is a place—” She stopped at Isadora’s expression.
“No.”
“You’d be safe. We both would. Morgayne would ensure that.”
“There’s always a price for magic.”
“You’re paying a price now.” Rebeca gripped her arms and stared into her eyes, fierce. “Every moon, you have to take larger amounts of that—that poison.” She jerked her head toward the table. “I don’t want to lose you to that.”
Isadora lowered her head.
“Please. It’s the one part of the forest the huntsmen won’t go.”
She sighed in resignation. “Of course they won’t. She’s a witch.”
Rebeca stroked her face. “She’s also my grandmother. And she owes me.”
Isadora stepped again into Rebeca’s embrace, and Rebeca knew that she’d won this argument. “We can leave before dawn. Can you be ready?”
“Yes.” She pressed her lips against Rebeca’s, a fleeting, teasing warmth. “You’d best go. Not all mind their business.”
Rebeca kissed her forehead. “Keep the door latched.” She slipped out and saw that the neighbor woman watched.
“She taken sick?”
“A touch of fever,” Rebeca said.
The woman grunted, suspicion underneath the sound.
“Good evening to you.” Rebeca nodded once and made he
r way out of the alley, out of the chill and darkness that collected between the buildings this time of day.
“Still about?”
She bristled at Robert’s voice.
“So why is it you’ve not been on a hunt in at least a year?” he asked, catching up to her.
“Busy.”
“There’re rumors about you.”
“There always are.” She sped up and left him behind.
“And about your sick friend.”
She slowed.
“Best hope they’re not true,” he said, a gloat in his voice.
She clenched her teeth and passed the square, where the flames had collapsed into embers around two blackened skeletons. Rebeca averted her eyes and quickened her pace.
*
A day’s journey felt more like a week’s, and Rebeca saw each hour’s pain in Isadora’s eyes, in the grimace that seemed frozen on her mouth. She’d saved more than enough in the hunts for the horse Isadora rode, one the stablemaster had laughed off as not worth half what Rebeca offered. She didn’t know much about horses beyond basic care, but she’d spent some time around the stables, and she saw in this one patience and endurance, and maybe even a bit of gratitude.
“Should we stop?” Rebeca asked after another long stretch of silence between them, broken by the horse’s solid, slow hoofbeats on the hard-packed earth of the road and the chattering of birds in surrounding trees.
“No.”
“You should eat. Have a bit of water.”
Isadora managed a tight smile. “I’d prefer to keep going. Nightfall is not long off.”
Rebeca stopped the horse. “Let me at least give you something to eat while you ride, then.”
Isadora didn’t reply, so Rebeca took her pack off, mindful of the crossbow she’d fastened across its front, and rummaged through it. She handed a hunk of dark bread up to Isadora along with a chunk of dry cheese. Next she passed a waterskin up.
“Put that around your shoulder, so it doesn’t fall. You need to drink more, to flush out the poison.”
Isadora laughed, but it sounded forced. “The poison is all that keeps me from hurting you.”
“I don’t believe that. Not anymore.” Rebeca took the reins and gently tugged the horse forward.
“I wish I felt the same.”
Rebeca didn’t answer, instead clucked her tongue softly. The horse snorted in response and she automatically reached over and touched the horse’s jaw, offering comfort to them both.
By the time evening announced itself in the angled rays through the forest canopy, the miles no longer seemed to pass beneath Rebeca’s boots, but rather weighed them down. She checked on Isadora again—almost obsessive at this point—and studied her features for any change. Isadora dozed, fortunately, still upright on the horse’s back, but slumped forward a bit, her dark cloak wrapped around her.
Rebeca scanned the surrounding forest and sniffed. Moss and damp, decaying leaves. Wild onions. And the thick, pungent scents of plants her grandmother might use in her medicinals.
She sniffed again. There. Barely discernible. Like what a wind chime might smell like, light and crisp, clean metal. Magic. The breeze shifted and the smell with it, stronger. They were close. She patted the horse’s neck and urged her on with an encouraging click of her tongue. She needn’t have worried. The horse hadn’t wavered on this journey.
And finally, the sounds of birds and breeze stopped. She slowed, and to her right, the thick growth parted just enough to reveal a narrow path, wide enough to accommodate both her and the horse, if she walked in front. She again checked on Isadora, who still slept, and led the horse off the wider road.
Here, the deep shadows pooled beneath huge ancient trees, limbs gnarled with age, decorated with thick layers of moss. Rebeca knew they weren’t alone. The prickle of a hundred eyes raised the hair on the back of her neck. She looked up, into the latticework of branches. Ravens watched them from their perches, silent and unmoving. And then one leapt from its branch and took flight, skimming gracefully ahead through the tangle of trees until its dark form was swallowed by darker shadows.
A sentry. Rebeca gripped the reins a little tighter, catching a hint of magic on the breeze left in its wake. She recognized the signature, faint as it was, and relaxed. Not quite dark, not quite light. Her grandmother had always walked the border between worlds. She checked on Isadora, still asleep, moving with the horse’s slow, steady rhythm, hooves making muted thumps on the path, layered as it was with fallen leaves. That was good, Rebeca thought. Easy on both horse and rider.
She pressed on, thinking about the last time she’d come this way. Not so long ago. A year, maybe. She’d still been hunting then. And good thing, because even witches could be ambushed, as she’d discovered when she emerged into the clearing that sheltered her grandmother’s home that day a year ago.
“Red?” Isadora’s voice, soft and rusty with sleep.
She smiled at the pet name. “Here, love.”
“Where are we?”
“Nearly there. Have some water.” She looked back over her shoulder, pleased to see that the pain lines around Isadora’s mouth had relaxed.
“I want to walk.”
Rebeca stopped and the horse stopped, too, as if she had become attuned to her human guide. “Are you sure? It’s not that far.”
“I’d like to move a bit. And I’m sure the horse could use a rest.” She smiled, and Rebeca saw more of the old Isadora in it, more of her familiar warmth and humor. She looped the reins around her left arm and stood on the horse’s left side so she could offer support to Isadora as she slid to the ground.
“Oh, my. I’ve been sitting too long,” she said with a grimace.
Rebeca motioned at the waterskin Isadora had slung over her shoulder. “Drink.”
She complied with another smile, then unlooped the skin’s string and handed it to Rebeca. “You as well.”
Rebeca did, and waited as Isadora rummaged through a saddlebag and removed a small wooden bowl. She handed that to her, as well, and Rebeca filled it with water and held it for the horse, who drank until it was gone. She patted the horse’s neck while Isadora returned the bowl to its pack, then waited for Isadora to join her. The two of them could just fit side by side on the path.
Isadora took Rebeca’s hand as they walked, something she rarely did in the open. Rebeca looked at her and wondered if her color really was better or if the shadows masked her pallor. She sniffed and could only detect the barest trace of dark magic emanating from her. Instead, Isadora smelled more like herself, more like a mountain stream and cloves.
“When was the last time you took the potion?” Rebeca asked.
“Yesterday at midday.”
“How are you feeling?”
“Better, but still weak. Tired.”
“Am I walking too fast?”
“No.” She squeezed Rebeca’s hand.
They walked in silence until the path ended at a clearing occupied by a single house constructed of logs from the surrounding forest. Flowers grew in window boxes and the front door looked as if it had been recently varnished. Rebeca sniffed and caught the odor of magic and wild roses. Her grandmother was home, and probably knew she was coming.
Isadora sagged against her and Rebeca held her up with one arm while she clutched the horse’s reins in her other hand. The horse snorted in a way that sounded relieved, as if she knew they’d arrived at the end of their long walk. Rebeca looked up at the surrounding trees. The lone raven sentry stared back at her. She took a deep breath and started across the clearing, moving slowly because she was supporting Isadora.
They had almost reached the door when it opened and a woman who might have been Rebeca’s sister appeared. She wore heavy trousers, a loose rough shirt, and scuffed boots. Clothing like her own. Rebeca stopped and waited.
“To what do I owe the pleasure?”
“Gran. You’re looking well.” She always did. Magic ensured a timelessness. Her grandmother would
never age.
“I doubt you came to discuss my appearance.”
“You’re right. This is Isadora.” Rebeca motioned with her head, since both her hands were occupied.
Morgayne moved closer, took Isadora’s chin gently in her hand, and examined her face. Isadora barely protested.
She stepped back and looked at Rebeca, disapproving. “When was the last time she shifted?”
“Three moons ago.”
“Why has she gone so long?”
“The hunts have increased. It’s not safe for her near the village.”
Morgayne pursed her lips. “That ridiculous bastard magistrate again, letting his thick head get filled with lies.” She didn’t phrase it as a question. “Get her inside. And then I’ll need to see what she’s been taking.”
“Thank you.” Rebeca released the horse’s reins and supported Isadora with both arms.
“Don’t thank me yet.” Morgayne arched an eyebrow imperiously but a smile twitched at the corner of her mouth. She took the reins and motioned at Isadora. “Put her in the room behind the kitchen. Then come and unload your steed.”
Rebeca helped Isadora inside, where it was warm and smelled of fresh bread and some kind of stew. Her mouth watered. She hadn’t eaten all day.
“Rest here,” she said as she eased Isadora onto the bed in the room behind the stove.
“Red—”
“Shh.” She took her pack off and helped Isadora into a nightshirt before she settled her beneath the blankets. “Rest. I’ll be right back.” She went outside to retrieve the saddlebags.
“Have something to eat,” Morgayne said, and she took the horse behind the house and suddenly the house was much bigger, with another floor and a stable behind. Rebeca waited for the witchery to settle, then went inside.
*
Rebeca watched Morgayne examine the contents of the bottle from which Isadora had been drinking. She poured a drop of it into a small metal bowl and coaxed its elements apart with the motions of her fingers. “Griselda’s work.” She looked up at Rebeca for confirmation, and Rebeca nodded. “Poisonous, over time,” Morgayne added. “Typical of dark magic.”
