Page 36 of Blood Coven

Azalea raised her head, her decision made. To have everything, I will first have to lose everything.

“Mama?” Juniper pressed, seeking an answer to her question.

“No, Juniper, we must keep looking,” she lied.

24

SILVANIA

THE YEAR OF THE MOON

RED

Red looked into the black eyes of the Wolf-man, awaiting his reaction. Having asked him to slaughter more than half of her family, she expected more from him than a blank stare, but that was all she received. Releasing the breath she held, Red allowed her frustration to seep out. “It is rude to ignore a person who is standing before you and speaking to you.”

“No,” he said, lifting his head and looking at the ceiling.

“No?” Red felt her heart sink. Her only chance at getting revenge on the people who harmed her throughout her whole life was quickly slipping through her fingers. She held tight to it, refusing to let go of the power just within her grasp. Wolf or not, she was going to do this.

“Revenge…” he gasped at the air as if trying to breathe in the words. “It does…terrible things to people.”

Red did something she had never done before; she hiked up her skirt in front of a man. She had never exposed herself to anyone before. She showed him the dark bruises on her knees, large and purple, with green around the edges. Her knobby knees were warped from years of torture, and she was bone thin from all the meals she had been denied over the years. She allowed him enough time to see the damage to her body in the firelight. She watched his face as he studied her, then released the fabric and let it flow back down around her legs. She rolled up her sleeve and showed the faint marks from where she was grabbed by her father and thrown into her room. The scars on her cheeks were faded but still visible.

“I have never not been marked by abuse. I have never not ached when I woke in the mornings,” she stated. Her voice quivered, both in rage and in her desire to never again be harmed by her abusers. “I have never not been afraid.”

His expression became pained, and he dropped his head. His black eyes seemed sympathetic to her plight but nothing more. “No.”

He stepped out of the house, saying nothing else. Should I leave and return home? she wondered. No, I can’t go across the town line, and I certainly will not return home. There is nothing left for me there.

Either she had to kill her father and grandmother on her own, or she had to start walking. She wondered how far she could get before collapsing from cold and exhaustion. As the minutes crawled by, Red realized she was on her own. Her shoulders sagged in defeat. As much as she wanted the power to hurt those who hurt her, she did not have it on her own. Dejected and defeated, Red looked around the modest cabin. There was one room attached to the main area, and she gravitated towards it with only a single glance back to see if the man would return. Perhaps he had stepped out for a bundle of firewood or a breath of fresh air. Red suspected he didn’t want to be around her after she begged him to murder for her.

In the darkness of the second room, Red fumbled for a lantern. She found it and lit it quickly, the glow of the flames spreading along the walls of the room to set the shadows dancing like witches. An unmade bed was pressed against the wall, and beside it, tucked under the window, was a beautiful desk made from rich wood. As she moved closer, she discovered a stack of parchment filled with crude charcoal sketches.

She gingerly lifted the first few pages, scratched so heavily with the charcoal that it had ripped in the center. She soon found herself entranced. Underneath each sheet, there was another with something more visible past the frantic sketching. The further she went, inspecting each sheet, she began to unveil the secrets. Beneath each crossed out and scribbled on parchment was a face; it soon became clear that it was the face of a woman. Red assumed the final sheet would be an undamaged portrait, but she did not go straight to it, continuing to unbury her page by page.

She carefully placed each piece of paper to the side. An eye appeared, wide and full of love. Next, she made out the round nose, button-like. The shape of the face took hold, beautifully round, with a soft chin to match her petite nose. As the pile grew thinner, she suddenly grew weary. The face staring back at her was unsettlingly familiar. Her stomach twisted as she reached the bottom, and she pulled forth the ancient, tea-colored parchment.

It was her.

Red’s hand shook as she gripped the undamaged piece of parchment; it was like staring into a mirror.

How long has the Wolf been watching me?

Before she turned to confront the man and demand an explanation, she spotted something scrawled at the bottom. Hardly legible from the aged charcoal, the brief script, written by an untrained hand, formed a name.

Ana.

Red didn’t recognize the name, the parchment still trembling in her fingers. With an unevenness to her walk, Red emerged from the bedroom and walked into the living room, where the man stood, facing the fire.

“Who is she?” Red asked.

“The woman I loved,” he replied. His voice was much smoother than before, as though he found it in his brief disappearance.

“Why does she…”

“Look just like you?” He turned to face her. The defeated and sympathetic look on his face fit him so well, it was as though he always looked that way. As though for four hundred years, he had been in mourning. “I have been asking myself the same question since I first saw you.”

“When did you first see me?” she asked, afraid to hear the answer. Was this man stalking her? Maybe he was not the Wolf after all, but someone who cowered in the woods and remained hidden from sight, watching the young girls who dared wander into the forest without protection.

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