E-Written: Red and the Wolfe

Why was I so stupid? Why did I think he wouldn't just come in and get me once I was home?

How HAD he gotten through the sigil my mother had just activated?

I turned and he was scowling at me angrily. I looked ahead, dropping my eyes sadly. This was a mess and it was my own fault.

They pulled me into his home and his mother was there when we went in. She looked cold and angry as she looked me over with her pale complexion and white hair. "You will never tame her," she said, shaking her head. "She is a Wilde through and through."

"She just doesn't know," Ancel said, taking hold of my arm and gesturing the men away. "I have the day to convince her."

"A single day, this is the last night they will come!"

"I will. I said I would. Come on, Red," he said the last more gently, pulling me away from the front room.

The house was quiet as he led me to the bedroom I had been tied in the day before. I shied back, pulling away, but he swung me into the room before letting me go and shutting the door. He leaned on it and watched me as I circled wide of him and put the bed between us.

"Red... you don't understand anything. I wasn't going to keep you that way, spelled like that. Just till it was all over and the village was free of Wilde control. How did you slip it? The spell?"

How did you get past the sigils on my family's door?"

"Because I didn't mean you harm I am assuming. I have never meant you harm. Red... I adore you. I always have. It's been hell waiting for you to become a young woman, watching you with your friends, doing things with them it was inappropriate for me to join you in."

"You are only five years older."

"Too old to go fishing with a girl so much younger. Too old to trek into the woods or sneak mead with. Now tell me. How did you slip the spell?"

"Didn't your shadow people tell you why they wanted me?"

"No. Just that they needed your help."

"My help?!? As if I would help them."

"Red... can't you understand we want free of your mother's control? All of us? The whole village? And her making it so much harder on us, especially us, since my mother asked her to release her hold a few years back. The council won't even let me buy a plot so I can build and move!"

"What are you talking about? None of that is true!"

"Of course it is? Don't you wonder why everyone caters to your mother so? And all the boys fawn after your sisters? They aren't such great prizes as they think, or as you think. Red... your mother is evil. Your grandmother was evil and we finally got her control over the village severed. Now we can at least leave if we want, but we want our village back! The Shadow clan needs you for some reason to break her control over us."

"None of this is true! None of it!"

"It is. Even your oldest sister joined us when she found out. Helped us end your grandmother's spell."

"She helped me get away!"

"I knew it! I knew it was her, I told him! She messed up the spell, didn't she? Said it wrong? She'd already said twice she didn't think it was needed if we just explained, but there wasn't time!"

"I don't know."

"How can you not know?"

"Because I have no arcana, not at all, so I was never taught about it. I am a Null. I nullify all magic I touch."

Understanding dawned on his face. "So she did it right, but it was never going to work on you anyway?"

"Probably."

"And you... you let the Wolfe clan go. You know they are working with your family, right? They are minions of your grandmother? Of the Wildes? You wiped the sigil on the back door and we didn't know it! No wonder they need you! You can undo everything!"

"I am not doing anything! You are lying to me! I know you are! My mom isn't very nice to me sometimes, but she is a nice person! The village loves her!"

"The village is terrified of her!"

"I don't believe you! You are lying to me, trying to get me to help willingly! I won't!"

"Why do you think we all meet in secret so she doesn't know? Ask Lewis. Or anyone! Most of your friends are among us! Even Malcolm came to some of the meetings! He swore you weren't like them, your mom and sisters."

"Why did they kill Malcolm? Your friends?"

"They didn't, ask your Wolfe clan about that. They are the ones who kill that way."

"What is your tattoo then?"

"It is supposed to hide us from the Wolfe clan at night. Mine didn't work last night, now I know why."

"I don't believe any of this!" I said weakly, turning and laying on the bed, facing away from him so he wouldn't see me cry.

"You have not slept, have you?" he asked softly, moving across the bed and putting a hand on my shoulder as he looked down at me.

"Leave me alone."

"My love, I will not. Do you know why I took you for a wife as this was all coming to a head?"

"Because you are selfish and you don't care how I feel."

"Because I knew there would be a battle and people might die. I couldn't bear the thought of you dying. I knew you would fight, you don't have it in you not to. It's who you are. Not with magic, like them, but with your wits and your fire and your fists if it came to it."

"I don't care, I want to go home!"

"She won't let you. Your mom. She was already trying to get you out of the village, she sent word to the Wolfe Clan to take you back with them however they could."

My stomach fell and I was crushed. "No! No, he likes me!"

"The hunter? He might, some, but I promise you he was told to catch your interest."

I deflated, squeezing my eyes shut. I didn't want to believe him, but the image of Jeremiah scowling at my house as if he had a distasteful job to do sprang to mind. "Please leave me alone," I said, my voice wavering.

Instead, he laid next to me and pulled me back against him, his arms around me. I was too numb to pull away or fight.

Ancel... the Alcott's. They weren't the bad guys. My family was. I was. Jeremiah was. Did people hate me the way I was trained to hate the Alcott's? Was it all lies? Deep down, I knew it was the truth. It rang of the truth. Even Jeremiah. I thought of the way he had kissed me, how... hard and rough he had been. How blunt and insistent and... uncaring he was.

I broke down into sobs and Ancel squeezed me tighter, hugging me to him. I didn't want his comfort! But all I could do was lay there in confusion and hurt and hold on to the arms around me.

I jerked awake seconds later, confused and his arms tightened again. "Hey," he said softly, leaning up to look over my shoulder at me. "Feel better after a nap?"

"No!... How long did I sleep?"

"Few hours."

"Do you think... I could please have a drink?"

"Yeah, of course. Come on," he said, pulling me up and leading me out to the kitchen. His mother and his sister were in there and he released my hand as he poured me some water.

They both looked me over and his mother looked nervous as she eyed me. Clarrissa looked like she would like to scratch my eyes out. I took the cup and looked away as I drank the water.

"Sit down my love, let me get you something to eat too."

"Dinner will be ready soon," his mother said quickly.

"She's too good to eat with us," Clarrissa sneered.

"Lyssa!" his mother hissed.

I blushed and looked down. "I'm sorry, I don't know your name," I said to her. "Should I just call you Mrs Alcott?"

"If you want, or my name is Helena. Or, since it applies, you can call me mother."

I gave her a small nod. "Thank you, Helena."

"I can't imagine your real name is Red?"

"Kinley. My parents discovered too late it is hard to have two daughters with two similar names. Linley got her name, I got Red."

"Kinley, I will set a plate for you at the table next to Ancel," she said with another deferential nod.

"Why are you being nice to her! She is the enemy, she is one of the ones doing this to us!" Clarrissa screeched.

"She isn't!" Ancel said quickly. "She never was and she didn't know. She doesn't even have magic, none at all. She is a... what are you Red?"

"A Null."

"A Null!" Helena breathed, wide eyed. "No wonder they need you to stop her!"

"She is why the hunters got a shot off at me last night too," he said, tapping his chest where his tattoo was.

"I didn't know!" I said quickly, guilt lurching up in my stomach.

"I wasn't blaming you, not like that. We couldn't figure it out was all. Or how they escaped. Now we know."

"If you have magic, why can't you just counter hers?" I asked.

"Because unbeknownst to us, they have been siphoning and countering our magic for generations. Every single thing your father and his family builds, she invests with magic that takes from us and gives to her and her daughters. We cannot destroy them and we sent away for help when we got hold of Anette. Our houses, our furniture, every single thing made of wood. We weren't allowed to leave the village, we couldn't do anything about it at all. Once we got Anette... once we got help... we began to have hope. Especially when your grandmother died and we could leave the village again. If we cannot wrest the power from your mother's grasp, at least we can get away from her iron rule."

"I didn't know," I whispered.

"Of course you did! How could you not see it?" Clarrissa demanded. "How everyone fawns over her, your sisters, all of you."

"She isn't like them!" Ancel said angrily. "Shut up Lissa, you have no idea what you are talking about!"

"I know that haughty Clara knows! Clara TOLD me her sister would win the auction, that I would never have a chance no matter how well I cooked! I just thought she meant the other one. The older one that was trying for you for so long, the homely one."

"Melany is not homely!" I yelled.

"They are all homely with their stupid, insipid faces! They walk around like dead dolls under their mothers' complete control. Not you and now we know why. How that must have galled her to not be able to parade you around like a puppet!"

I turned away and Ancel caught me. "Lyssa, that's enough! She was never like them and she never knew. Stop being cruel! She doesn't deserve it."

"They all deserve it!"

"Lyssa, if you cannot be civil, you will go to bed without dinner," Helena said primly.

"Fine," the younger girl sulked.

"Go set the table and then help me serve. Ancel, will you announce, please?"

Ancel pulled me along with him to announce in the other rooms that dinner was ready. I was surprised at the number of people in the house. It was a large house, but not big enough for all of these people.

"Is everyone here family?" I asked Ancel in a whisper.

"Yes, when my mother confronted yours, every house our family owned but this one was burned and we weren't allowed to rebuild or buy more land. She has us all crammed in here together. She has threatened to burn it with us locked inside. She did the same with other families too, anyone who speaks against her."

I remembered a couple years back with all of the fires. Papa has said it was because it had been so dry and people weren't being careful enough.

Ancel sat me down and there were so many eyes on me. I looked around and my eyes fell on Anette. "Are... are you here because you want to be here?" I asked her.

She blushed and looked down. "I would not leave if the door wasn't barred to me," she answered, turning to Ancel's older brother, Harris, and putting a hand on his arm.

Ancel patted my hand. "She was a little like you," he said softly enough no one could hear a seat away. "She was taken, but after while she began to understand. She knew more than you did, but not all of it, or why. Especially not why she kept getting more and more powerful."

I felt out of place sitting there with so many eyes on me. Some looked hostile, most looked like they had all their hope in me. Their future was in my hands. I couldn't eat. I got up and left the table, heading to the small room we had been in and he followed me. "Red?"

"I'm not hungry. I will sleep longer."

"Red, you should eat. You're shaking like that because you haven't eaten. Please?"

"I can't, Ancel."

"Red," he whispered pleadingly, hugging me close to him. "I don't want you to get sick. Please try and eat something? For me?"

I let him pull me back to the dining room but I didn't look around this time. I picked at my plate and held on to the hand Ancel had on my thigh under the table.

An older woman leaned forward and she looked enough like Helena that I was sure they were sisters. "How long before you think you might have kids?" she asked me.

"What?" I asked, stunned.

"Hildy! Hildy, not now," Helena said quickly. "Yes, they are newlyweds, but it's complicated. I told you that. Remember?"

"But you didn't say how? And does that mean she can't have children?"

"I can," I answered, realizing the woman was a little dim. "Perhaps soon, we will see. Do you like children, Hildy?"

"Love them! Little ones anyway. Once they get older they get meaner, but the babies! So sweet and just want to be held and loved."

I gave her a smile. "If the time ever comes, I will come to you first when I need someone to care for her."

"Her! You know it's a girl already do you?" she asked gleefully.

"Girls run in my family, we never have boys. That's why when we marry the men take our names."

Ancel jerked and turned to me. "I am a Wilde now?" he demanded.

"You are."

He scowled, sitting up straighter.

"So is he," I said nodding at Harris.

"I haven't married her," he said with a smirk, petting Anette. "May now though, if it means getting a place outside of this house."

"So that is why the sigil didn't keep me out," Ansel said quietly, thoughtfully.

Anette was scowling at her plate and I felt a sting of guilt. She hadn't wanted him to know that. I wish I could talk to her alone.

Why?

Why did I care what they thought?

"Anette? Is what they are saying true? Is our mother truly evil?"

Anette cut her eyes at the oldest woman at the table and I finally noticed her. I didn't know why I hadn't before, she was sitting and staring at me with a keen eye.

"It is true... she holds a great deal of power now. But it wasn't always so. There has been a struggle for centuries between the four great houses until there were three, and then two. Our great grandmother began this, laying the groundwork to take over, make the village ours... theirs to control. Mother has been very... domineering and not very nice, but it was the same when the other side was in power. Whichever way the balance of power lays, there will be strife for the other side."

"But we aren't trying to gain power, just strip her power over us and get our own back!" Ancel said, turning me to look at him.

"From the plans I have heard, they are not currently planning on retaliating once they are done with this," Anette said. "If you do this for them, it will just even the playing field. That's all."

I nodded. "If... If I do this," I said, turning to Ancel. "I want you to release me. Annul this marriage and start over."

"No!" he pleaded as his father said, "Done."

"Red!" he cried, turning my face up to his. "Please?"

"I want it done now. Before nightfall. And I want free as soon as I finish. No one grabs me and holds me against my will."

"Steffan, go get Elder Hathaway, quickly," his father said, standing. "No one will impede you, no one at all," he said to me.

I looked at Anette. "And I want Anette released! She was to be the Witch of the Cottage, it is what she wanted!"

"No," Harris spat.

"I won't do it otherwise, you have to let both of us go!"

"Red," Anette said, sitting up. "I don't want to go. Truly. I am... I have learned to care for him."

"And she will marry me," he said. "I will go out to the cottage with her."

"The witch of the cottage has to live alone," Anette said, shaking her head. "One of my sisters will have to do it. I will have to teach her."

"Then it is settled," his father said.

Ancel stood and grabbed my face. "Red! I will be good to you! A good husband and a good father to all of our girls!"

"I don't doubt it," I said softly. "But I don't love you, Ancel Alcott. Court me, woo me, give me time and if I learn to care for you, ask my papa."

"Your mother won't have you back if you do this," Helena said softly. "As his wife, you'd have a place here."

"I will stay out at Malcolm's place. Finish building the house he was starting," I answered sadly. "If she won't allow me home."

Helena said nothing, but she gave her son a sorrowful look.

I stood through the annulment, avoiding Ancel's pleading eyes, then went and cleaned up and changed into my own dress to get ready to meet this Shadow Clan.

Ancel led me into the darkness behind their house, his hand gripping mine as if the annulment could be taken back if he held on tight enough. I let him.

I met the shadow clan in darkness. I could not see, but I could hear them, and feel them as three of them took my hands to bless me.

"I will lead the girl," the oldest woman said, taking my hand.

After that, it was simple, if very slow and tedious. She dragged me around to every single house in the village, held my hand to any wall on the house, drew a sigil as she whispered, then left. I felt nothing.

They left my house for last and as soon as her whisper stopped, I heard shouting from inside. As if they had felt the magic in the whole house cease to exist.

The old woman turned and they began heading back, then there was a grunt from her and a yell from somewhere else. Her hand was yanked from mine violently and I dropped down to the ground, staring wide eyed in the dark to try and see anything.

A hand on my face made me jerk back, though I knew it, and I took a swing. The hand caught my wrist and spun me, pinning me down to the ground. I screamed at the top of my lungs as I struggled, until he gagged me with a soft cloth. He held something over my nose, something sweet and sharp and my head fuzzed as my body went limp.

"Take her out of here," a voice whispered softly.

Hands lifted me and I knew his hands as he rolled me to hang over his shoulder. I couldn't move, not at all, but I could hear and I could think. He took off at a trot, running away from the village and he did not stop. I was starting to think he was never going to stop, it had been an hour at least and he was still running. How could he run that long? Carrying me?

He finally slowed and walked me into what seemed like a tiny village with cloth houses, lit up by bonfires. The snow was deeper, I saw, but I didn't feel cold. I didn't feel anything, just numb.

"Jeremiah!" a woman's voice called. "Is this her? The girl you were to bring here?"

"It is."

"What happened?"

"Nothing went as planned, this girl destroyed everything."

"Yet you brought her?"

"I want her."

"You said you did not? You said she was sour and angry?"

"I decided differently. The others are not far behind, they were rescuing the witch of the cottage to put her in place."

"Will you take her as a wife?"

"Go on, Nomi. Prepare the fires for those returning."

"Yes, Miah," the woman said, running off.

He took me across the little village and ducked into one of the cloth houses and set me down, laying me on a bedroll. He stepped out and came back with a burning stick, shoving it into the wood already stacked in a pit. It caught quickly and I watched it blaze up.

Jeremiah squatted on his heels, blocking my view and looking down at me. "You are different than I imagined, and also not. I will have you, you were promised to me. Your mother promised you to me, even if I did not want you at first. Soon, the Ghrodeera will wear off and you will be able to move again. Then, I will claim you as my wife."

I stared at him unable to speak, but fear spiked up in my belly. Had he killed Ancel? He must have if he thought to marry me! He didn't know the marriage was annulled. I remembered then that he had killed Malcolm as well and I wondered if it was because of the teasing and he and I being so close. He didn't like being teased or laughed at.