Red Riding Hood
In every shadow there is light,
In every tear a smile,
In death I know that there is still life,
That lingers for a while.
- Anonyms
The girl dragged her body through the shin deep snow; each step bringing another painful pull through cold yet beautiful white blanket.
She raced out of the pitiful village (most likely she was a young daughter, escaping from the town and everything she ever knew), towards the forest. It was the village’s protection and its controller. They lived off each other, without the forest the village was nothing.
At closer inspection of the girl you could see her un-controllable shakes. At first I assumed that the shakes were the caused by the cold winter digging itself under her skin.
But at later inspection I saw her body move like she wanted to be invisible; or so small that you could not notice her running across the snow. Her eyes also showed an almost guilty urgency, her eyes darting wildly from side to side like an animal on its first hunt.
I realised then that it was guilt that shook the girl and not the freezing cold night. Her body was fully covered by her long, red, hooded robe that was tattered on the bottom, excluding her face. It was fully visible when she turned around franticly to make sure that she was not being pursued.
Her long hair hung over her shoulders, escaped from inside the hood when she had been running. Her hair was quite dazzling at first glance. In the dark it could be perceived by a simple man as black, but in my eyes I could see the lingering brown. It reached almost down to the snow; if not for the small ringlets at the bottom it would have touched it.
I could see it was hard for her to feel inconspicuous and get into the right state of mind to stay invisible. She was a small red defect placed upon the imperfect and monotonous canvas of hills that was the newly burnt forest covered with pure snow.
She had nearly hauled herself all the way to the dark forest, when the sound of a fleeing (or possibly pursuing) wolf that had been residing there since she began her expedition out of the village stunned her out of her thoughts.
She turned towards me, but saw right though me, and looked into the blackened forest behind. The movement was graceful and beautiful; too skilled to be that of a human. Her pale and rune covered arms slowly emerged from out of the red robe, tightly held in powerful and angry fists.
The turn also revealed her breath-taking face. Like what angels are said to be like; not a simple village girl. Her large strangely coloured eyes darted through the trees, looking for the ragged furry body of a wolf.
The girl’s arms slowly sunk back into her robe. They lingered there for a few silent moments; her eyes still not shifting from where the wolf had last been standing silently behind me. After a look that might have been hesitation, she pulled out two swirling daggers from her leather working boots.
The daggers were both held tightly, as if she needed the familiarity to go through with the hunt that was to come. She held the daggers to her chest for a few seconds, the full moon reflecting the light into the forest as she muttered foreign words under her breath, in a tongue I did not recognise.
She stared at me, and I felt my heart skip a beat. Of course she could not see me; there was nothing to be worried about. I was transparent, invisible, only seen to those who paid attention as the evanescence of vapour and not a solid entity.
But as she stared at me I was sure that she could see me and that she was going to attack me like a horrid animal. She placed her foot behind the other and flung back her arms, before releasing her daggers mid-decent and throwing them through the air.
They sliced straight through me and there was no pain, just the sound of a whimper. She had hit a wolf somewhere in the dark forest. The whimper echoed, like am eerie reminder that it wasn’t me she had hit, but a living and solid entity.
She quickly ran into the dark forest, dodging trees as she went. The wolf was at least 20 metres inside, and as I followed, amazed that she could throw a deadly dagger that far, she kneeled into the side of the wolf.
As I reached the wolf’s dead body, hanging over the eviscerated body of a deer, I noticed the daggers were embedded into the wolf’s skull and held in with two solid pieces of ice. She swore quietly, her breath creating a small puff of mist that carried itself around the wolf’s body.
She reached quickly for the daggers and watched as the ice melted in her hands, a lot faster than it should of. The ice melted and her hands suddenly burst into an inferno of beautiful blue flames.
The sound of her clapping her hands together was almost in-audible. I was bewildered to see that when she slowly separated her palms there was no fire or burns that showed that the fire had ever existed.
She pulled out her daggers and stood up with her back to me.
“Stupid ghost, why did you have to make me do that?”
She turned, a single bloody tear descending down her pale cheek. All she could think was how much she loved me. That, I could not understand.
Her wrists were tied and her immature body ached from lack of nourishment. She had not fed for days, she had been deprived of the only thing that she needed for survival and all she had to do was ‘show them her power’.
She had been in the cottage for days; lost in her thoughts, devastating as they were. She wondered what they meant when they said power. There obsession with her made her feel slightly mirthful in the dire situation.
“Are you gonna’ do it or not?” An old man waddled over, his walking cane the only thing stopping him from toppling over. As he came closer his stench riddled her insides with disgust.
The disgust was only the first thought of blood, but as he came closer the coppery smell of decay frenzied her. It smelled good, the blood hunger awoke, the dry spot at the back of her throat releasing a fire.
As the man hobbled closer she snapped, her fangs barred like an animal.
“My, you’re a nasty one aint’ ya?” He took a step back, but not from repulsion. He was too smart to risk his life for this.
“The young ins are always malicious. Dark little beasts. Children should never hold the power of a monster; it rots there mind.”
“I’m not a child!” She screamed, the blood hunger bringing a forth a new wave of courage. The man waddled back over to his prior position sitting on a rotting old table in the corner.
Then the silence returned.
The silence let her think. Her thoughts were encapsulated by the thought of digging her fangs into her captor’s necks, draining his life slowly, so very slowly. He deserved to suffer.
She wasn’t hungry. She was ravenous; and thirsty too. The blood hunger taunting her, the entire inside of her throat was on fire. Blood. Blood. Blood. Blood. Blood. Blood. Blood. Her breathing suspended in the heavy air around her, without the blood she could not survive, without it she was nothing again.
Her eyes looked around, hungry, as if she was eating him with her eyes. Her jolliness had all but disappeared; all she could think of was blood.
Blood.
Blood.
Blood.
Blood.
She could not escape, her mind formulating more and more ideas about how to torture him. She could slowly drain him, leave him just as he was about to die, keep him alive and then slowly tear him apart. Of course she would keep something to remember him by, as she did with every kill.
A finger, a spine, a head; her favourite was to pull out there eyes then watch them die slowly. She almost relished in their pain.
A small giggle escaped her dry throat, breaking the silence.
“I know what you want me to do.” A beautiful blue fire spread from her wrists, where the rope (doused in holy water) held her down like a doll sitting at a table for a tea party.
The rope disintegrated around her hands, slowly clenching and un-clenching at her sides. She stared at the man’s face; lines etched themselves into his forehead in fear. They showed his age well.
He was well over 100. He had been a pure-blooded vampire, but now he had changed. Magic had morphed his genes into that of a human and now he was helpless. About to be murdered by what he once was. I could only imagine how betrayed he felt, being killed by a turned vampire.
She plunged into him first. He seemed to be her favourite now; sparing him the fear and resentment for too long.
She pointed her hand, using her dagger like talons to pierce through his soft flesh. Blood instantly sprayed across the short distance to the opposing wall, the stench of decay and copper radiating from him, her, and the wall (which you couldn’t help but feel pity for, as it now stunk for concealing this vicious girl from the outside world. It was a saviour in fact. The girl was a ruthless killer).
The girl swiftly twirled, digging her nails in and changing her position so that she was at his side and could dig her fangs into his saggy neck. For a moment she stood their; inhaling his scent and placing it away in her mind so that she would never forget. It was a right she thought her victims deserved.
Without any more hesitation she dug her fangs into his neck, deeper and deeper until no more of his smoky blood could fill her. As she drank, moans of pleasure escaping her along with small dribbles down her chin, she spun her hand deeper into his chest.
His bones cracked his screaming beginning to kill him. Her dagger like nails sliced through the muscle and pulled out his withered, dying heart. Still pulsing in her gore filled hand she threw it against the pitiful wall.
Her hands began to fiddle with his flappy skin; pulling off clumps of rotting 100 year old flesh and stuffing it into her mouth glutinously. Blood poured from her mouth as she released herself from his neck and devoured the flesh in a few strong snaps. The snaps making her head spin for a small while; but it was almost un-noticeable because of the drug-like affect that the blood had on her also making her dizzy.
The man was devoured in minutes.
She was still hungry.
Would she ever feel satisfied again?
Or would the blood lust continue to starve her?
She didn’t know, as she was only young, but still not satisfied with the man’s disgusting blood and rotting skin she escaped into the night. The moon tainted her skin a vile yellow under the purple sky and the golden crescent.
A smile spread across her bloody crimson lips, as the wolves howled in the forest. The forest, where her love resided. He was a werewolf; most of the young men in the town where. The young females practiced witchcraft, and some, the powerful ones like her, where somewhat blessed with immortality.
She was a vampire because she was sanctified by the other young women in her secret group. As a recently turned vampire she had killed more than 7 of them, then captured by the werewolf males. They were scared of her.
They were scared that her power, now heightened with her senses.
Now she was to kill him. Their marriage could not happen now. The turn had destroyed all of her love; her heart was as hollow as her pupil less eyes.
When she reached the forest he was there. He always knew exactly where she was. He said it was her scent, and she believed him. The real reason was because he was always watching her, he knew what she had become.
‘I’m here to kill you.’ His canine body slowly rose, his bones slowly morphing back to that of a humans. His skin stretched, his face strained as his fur pulled itself back into his tan skin.
He knew this would happen. Feeling he betrayed their love, he spread out his arms and shut his gentle eyes.
‘Do it. But please, make it quick.’
Her talons sliced his neck, blood pouring out like it was a crimson waterfall.
‘Thankyou dear.’ She drank from him under the moons watchful eye, the purple heavens and the dark canopy of the forest that shielded everyone in this forsaken town from the outside world.
This was how I died, my love draining me from my neck. 20 years later, I saw her in a forest... She saw me as the apparition of the man she had loved, and ran away. It seemed she earned civilty in age, and she didn't snarl or attack me like the animal that she was.
She just left me alone, to travle these plains by myself. To remember how she kissed, her taste and smell. To feel her lingering touch, even without a solid body. As she fled a snigle tear dripped from my eye...
Why hadn't she stayed?
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