Red, The Wolf, & The Huntsman

Table of Contents-2

“I hope I haven’t offended you,” Hunter said catching up to Red as she continued down the path.

“I think you have made your point clear. I wouldn’t want to subject you to my wonderful disposition for too long. You might end up dead with joy.”

“I’ll risk that.”

“It is your right to walk where ever you want, but I am done talking to you today,” she said sternly.

“Then it was a pleasure to talk to you. I look forward to the next opportunity,” he said with a smile and a bow before continuing to walk by her side.

The two walked in silence for another hour. Initially Red was upset, but quickly Hunter’s gesture grew on her. She wasn’t really mad at him and shouldn’t have taken it out on him. She was mad at herself for losing her riding hood. Her mother was going to be very upset when she found out.

At the same time, though, Red was a little happy to see it gone. Hunter was right. She never went anywhere without it on. She never wanted to wear it as much as she did, but her mother made her. It was all part of her mother’s plan to marry her off to a nobleman.

Red always hated that plan. But for all of Red’s other faults, the one thing that was true was that she was an obedient daughter… mostly. Or, at least as far as her mother knew.

With her grandmother’s house a short walk up the path, Hunter stopped. The change surprised Red. She had been wondering how far he was planning on taking it. Clearly even he had his limits. But although he didn’t progress further, he also didn’t remove himself from view.

Still not saying a word, he watched as Red approached her grandmother’s door, knocked and was greeted.

“Red, what are you doing here?” Her grandmother asked not as excited as Red thought a woman living alone in the middle of nowhere should be to see her only grandchild. But then again, her grandmother rarely did what Red expected.

“Mother wanted me to deliver you some food.”

“Who is your handsome escort?”

Red looked back at Hunter. Her Grandmother was right. In a certain light, he was handsome. “Just someone I know from the village. I ran into him on the path here, and I guess he wanted to make sure I made it here safely.”

Her Grandmother stared at Hunter as he stared back. “I think he’s sweet on you. I bet he would make a wonderful lover.”

“Grandma!” Red said shocked.

“He looks like a strong man. The last thing you want is a weak man. You want a man who will let you know that he’s in control in the bedroom.

“Grandma!” Red said turning bright pink.

“Perhaps we should invite him inside.”

“Absolutely not. Absolutely not!” Red said pushing her grandmother inside and closing the door behind her.

Before she did, she took a finally look at Hunter. As she did, he bowed. Red closed the door before she saw him stand up. Hunter certainly was a strong man. Was that what was required to be good in the bedroom?

Red wasn’t really sure about the details of all of that. Like every other child in her village, she had seen the animals during mating season. But it didn’t give her any hint to what it would be like when she and her husband fell into s****l embrace.

“So, your mother sent me bread, huh?” Her grandmother said suspiciously. “Did she send me anything else?”

“Just a note,” Red said handing over the basket of bread.

Taking out one of the loaves, she tapped it on the table. The bread was rock hard. She looked at Red. Red shrugged.

Returning to the basket, her grandmother retrieved the note. Unfolding it, she read it.

“Did you read this?” Her grandmother asked.

“No, Grandma. It was for you.”

Her grandmother looked at Red suspiciously and then pushed the basket of bread to the side.

“Considering how late you arrived, I imagine you’ll want to stay the night?”

“Is that a problem?” Red asked unable to imagine what else an old woman, who lived alone, would have to do with her time.

“No, that’s fine. But you must be out in the morning.”

“Sure, Grandma. I’ll leave in the morning.”

At this point, Red was more than confused, she was bewildered. She had been to her grandmother’s house many times and she had never seen her act like this. Had Red done something wrong? Red cared for her grandmother very much. The last thing she would ever want to do would be to upset her.

“Okay. I can see I upset you,” her grandmother said.

“No, Grandma. I’m fine.”

“You’re clearly not fine.”

Her Grandma stared at her with a pierce that made Red’s eyes water. She really hadn’t meant to upset her grandmother. Maybe it was possible that she could leave right away.

“Okay. I’ve upset you. Here. Sit down. You can stay the night. Is just that…” Red’s grandmother looked away staring at the ground. She looked frozen for a moment and then looked back at Red intensely.

“How old are you now, Redina?”

“I’m 18.”

“Then you’re a woman.”

“I am,” Red said brushing the tears from her eyes.

“It’s time for me to share a little secret with you.”

“A secret? A secret about what?”

“A secret about who you are.”

“A secret about who I am? Who am I?”

“More than you think,” her grandmother said before leaving her sitting in suspense.

Chapter 2

Red maneuvered around the one room cabin eventually sitting on one of the two chairs at the dinner table. She watched her grandmother make the tea pot off the stove and admired the way she moved. She had hardly ever seen her grandmother with her hair down, and seeing it now Red realized how beautiful she was.

Unlike all of the other grandmothers in the village, Red’s grandmother’s hair was jet black with only a thin sliver of grey. She was also a more voluptuous woman than the other grandmothers. But she was not voluptuous everywhere, just in the parts that made her more womanly. Red envied her aged beauty and felt proud that she might one day look like her.

“What has your mother told you about her father?” Her grandmother asked placing a cup of tea and buttered bread in front of Red.

Red thought back to the often told story about her family’s fall from wealth.

“She said her father was a wealthy landowner who died. But, because he didn’t have any sons, the land he owned was stolen by the king. She says that’s why she wants me to marry a nobleman. So that we can reclaim our place in royal society.”

Red’s grandmother looked at Red harshly before turning her attention to her tea. “Your mother’s story would make me be the worst type of human if it were true. And it would turn her into an abomination.”

Red was shocked by her grandma’s response. “Why, Grandma? I don’t understand.”

Grandma leaned back on her chair and turned briefly towards the roaring fire. She considered her words carefully and then relaxed as if relieving herself of thirty years of secrets.

“That is the story that your mother would like to be true, but it certainly isn’t. It wasn’t your mother’s father who was a wealthy land owner, it was her grandfather. My father. When I was a little girl we lived in the most wonderful home overlooking the acres of land that my father owned. He had inherited it from his father who had inherited it from his father before him.”

“So what happened to it?” Red asked considering her own humble upbringing.

“I happened to it… along with your grandfather,” her grandmother said unapologetically.

“What do you mean?”

“The women in our family aren’t like the other scared, prudish women around you. We were born with fire. We are born with lust.”

“Grandma!”

“Lust, Redina. Don’t be afraid to say it. It is only the backwards hypocrites who hope to control you and steal from you that say otherwise. Never believe them when they tell you that your womanly power is wrong. Don’t mind them for a second,” she said furiously. “Say it, Redina! Say that you won’t let their backwards thinking control your power.”

“I won’t let them control my power,” Red said reluctantly compling.

“That’s good. Because once they have your mind, they have your body. And, what is a person who doesn’t control their body? A slave. The women in this family, Redina, are slaves to no one.”

In all of her years visiting her grandmother, she had never heard her talk like this. Certainly, she had never been a wilting flower, but who was this fiery woman who was more alive than anyone Red had ever met?

“I don’t understand, Grandma. What does any of this have to do with your husband, my grandfather?”

“First of all, he wasn’t my husband. You mother would like people to believe that because it means that she could still be an acceptable lady of society. But that’s not who he was. Your grandfather was a stable boy no older than me. When I first saw him, I can’t tell you the way he made my body feel. It was like I was opening my eyes for the first time and it was all because of him.

“I fell in love with him. At least I thought I did. And we made love again and again. My father wanted to believe that it was him who was to blame for our passion, but it wasn’t. In truth, he was quite shy. It was me who had seduced him. It was I who, for the first time, took his hand and moved it to my breast. And it was me who undressed him and explored his body with my own.

“I wasn’t sure how long I had been pregnant with your mother by the time I realized it. My mother had died ten years earlier and the women who cared for our house probably knew but dared not tell my father. No, my father didn’t know until the day I gave birth to your mother. He was shocked, then angry, but eventually he came to accept it.

“He sent away my lover, of course. My father blamed him for everything. My fear was that my father had him beaten to an inch of his life. I prayed that wasn’t true. He didn’t deserve that. He was kind and gentle. The only thing that he was guilty of was falling prey to my affections.”

“Grandma, that’s so sad.”

“It is what it is, my dear,” Grandma said feeling the sadness that she felt back then.

“But, when my lover was sent away, I quickly came to accept that the past was the past. I now had your mother to take care of. It wasn’t that hard because, back then, your mother was as sweet and pretty as a doll. My father had once suggested that I give your mother up. I would never do it, though. I loved her too much.

“There were consequences for that decision, however. And I learned those consequences as soon as my father got sick. He and I both recognized his cough. It was the same one that had killed my mother.

“We prayed for him to get better but we both knew where it would eventually lead. That was when my father tried to marry me off. But no nobleman’s son wanted a sixteen year old wife with a child.

“When it became clear that he couldn’t find me a husband, he started to sell the land. As your mother said, women can’t inherit property. So the only thing he could give me was gold.

“He was able to sell the first bits of land for a fair price. But, very quickly, land buyers caught on. My father was desperate to sell. He ended up selling what he could for a tenth of what it was worth. He died quickly after that. And, days after that, the king’s men came and threw me and your mother out of the only home that either of us had ever known.”