Little Red's Riding

Blood Magic and Lies

"My human husband, Bruce, was not in fact my first lover after my mate was killed. I did not immediately come here to settle in this cabin after his death, although it had been given to me if I wanted it."

"For a while I thought I'd lose my mind. I guess you could say that I was a rogue. In my wolf form I ran and ran as far as I could. And I lived that way, as a wolf, hunting and eating and sleeping, as days turned into weeks and weeks turning into months."

"Some days I toyed with the idea of going near enough to a town to bother the human population so that they would send out their hunters and put me out of my misery. But I never went through with it. By that point I was already far beyond the borders of this kingdom, in another land, to the west of this place."

"And so I wandered on and on, seeing more of the world than I had ever wished to see, for I was not born with the twin gift and curse of wanderlust, but now I knew that I would never again truly feel that I was whole. Which wouldn't have been so bad if I had never known what it was like to have a mate. But once you've had it how can you live without it? At least that's what I thought when I was much younger than I am now."

"One day I was so tired I could hardly lift up my head, but I kept pressing on, through a thick and tangled forest, and I think I heard the snap of the trap before I felt it dig into the bone of my leg. The pain was intense and I honestly thought that I was done for before the world turned to black."

"I am not sure that I had ever been more surprised in my life than I was when I woke, wearing a soft cotton nightgown in the softest bed that to this day I have ever slept in. When I was unconscious I must somehow shifted back to my human form, and one of his guards who patrolled the property had come across me, naked as the day I was born, my leg mangled in a bear trap, and the poor man had nearly passed out at the sight."

"Finally I'd been brought back to the manor house and a doctor was called, and my leg was cleaned and sewn up properly which, along with my wolf, saved my life, because if I'd been a human I'd have been long dead by the time I was found. The maids I'd learned had had quite the task of cleaning me up since I'd been running through the forest out of my mind for months on end, my hair matted and filled with sticks and mud."

"After a few more days the master of the house came to see me. He was a Lord in the kingdom, but more than that, he was a mage, for in that land they do not burn witches at the stake. No, beyond the mountains, those with magic talent are revered. But as with any power there are those who are good and those who allow their power to corrupt them. And when I met Remy all I saw was his dazzling beauty."

"He had the face of an angel and the body of a God and to see him looking at me with the same expression I hadn't seen since my mate had been buried six feet under, well it gave me hope that maybe there was a reason to keep living. I knew I wouldn't have a mate bond with him, but he sat with me while I healed and told me stories of his adventures as the king's right hand man and he brought me trinkets and plied me with flowery compliments."

"I was too old and had seen too much to be as easily won over as I was. But my heart longed for happiness and he offered me a fairy tale. And maybe he bewitched me too."

"I know in reality he didn't, because he didn't need too, but sometimes, at night when I think back to those days, I tell myself that he did, to ease my conscience about the choices that I made that set all of this in motion."

"We weren't married when my moon days failed to show month after month. And then my waist began to thicken, more quickly than it had with my son. At first I was happy. Overjoyed really. Until all at once he changed. It was as he knew that with his child in my womb I would be trapped in his manor and in his life forever."