Chapter Four
Like a Queen ascending to her throne,
The moon rises in the night sky.
All her subjects bow at her might,
As she sways the man to a beast.
The last rays of light are dragged down to the horizon as the sun sets rather rapidly, as if it was running away from something. Villagers retreat to their prison-like houses with fright instilled on their faces, as darkness blankets the sky and the moon ascends to her throne. The night brings her music, as the crickets chirp, the owls hoot, and the bats scream. Predators linger in the shadow of the town's giant, fortified wall, waiting for unsuspecting prey to senselessly stroll past. But the most dangerous and terrifying of all predators, lingers within the fortified walls.
Scarlet's grandmother finishes packing up from dinner while her mother tries to get Scarlet's little brother Jackson to change into his night clothes.
"Hurry up Jackson! Don't make me come back up there." Scarlet's mother yells from the bottom of the stairs. Scarlet and her mother have been avoiding each other since this morning. Her grandmother convinced Scarlet's mother that yelling at her would only make that matter worse.
"I'm coming, I'm coming." Jackson says drearily as he stomps down the stairs. His mother wraps an arm around him and ushers him into the living room.
"Red hurry up." Her mother yells as she unlocks the hidey-hole that lays hidden underneath the heavy oak table that sits in the middle of the room. A small two man, iron enforced trap, that Scarlet has been forced into every wolfstime since birth.
"Red, help me with the door." Her grandmother tugs at her elbow. They both walk to the front door, each lifting a heavy beam which are much like Scarlet's in her room, except these ones are twice as heavy and are steel enforced. They place the beams across the door, locking it. Once locked they both move to the windows and shut the wooden shutters over the top of the iron bars, and slide another steal enforced bar across the shutters. "Are all the windows locked upstairs?" Her grandmother turns to her.
"Yes I closed them before dinner." Scarlet replies as she shuffles into the living room.
"Quickly now, in with your brother." Her mother helps Jackson into the trap as she gestures for Scarlet to join him. Scarlet hates the trap, always has. The first night that she had been left alone was when she was two, her mother had stayed with her until then.
"Why can't I stay up her with two? I'm good with a bow, you know that." She glances back and forth between her mother and grandmother. "No one has seen the wolf in years. Is this even necessary anymore?" She gestures to the hole in the floor, where her brother sticks his head out from. Scarlet's mother looked horrified.
"Of course this is necessary!" Her mother starts going red. "Now come here." Her mother holds her hand out for Scarlet.
"No, I want to stay with two." Scarlet crosses her arms over her chest and looks at her grandmother for support, but she receives none.
"Darling there are many things in this world that we agree on, but this is not one of them. Now go with your brother." Her grandmother picks up the two crossbows that were leaning against the wall and passes one to Scarlet's mother. Scarlet prepares herself to argue further but her thought process is interrupted by a howl. A loud, piecing howl makes the three women spin on their heels and face the front window. All the hairs on Scarlet's body stand up in shock. The howl is so haunting that it makes the blood drain away from the three women's faces, leaving them all white. It echoes so loudly throughout the house that it almost sounds like its being emitted from the room that they're all standing in. Jackson whimpers in fear.
"Mama…" He weeps slightly but quickly wipes the tears away, trying to be as brave as he thinks his sister is.
"Scarlet go with your brother! Now!" Her mother pulls her by the arm but she doesn't resist. Scarlet jumps down next to her brother. "Here, take this." Her mother passes her a hunting knife. "Don't come out till morning." Scarlet nods her head and closes the hatch and locks it from the inside. The small space becomes pitch black, so the pair aren't able to see anything.
"Red…"Her brother trials off.
"It's okay. We're going to be okay." She manages to cross her legs while Jackson sits on her lap. "It'll be fine." Scarlet tries to reassure her frightened brother but the fear in her own voice seeps through. She's only heard the howl once before, she was six and she's never forgotten it. The way it instilled terror into the hearts of men, made children cry and women scream. Scarlet was thankful that Jackson had never had the unpleasant pleasure of hearing it, until now. The howling gets louder and louder. The mumbled voices of their mother and grandmother soon get drowned out by the scratchy howling that grows closer and closer.
"Scarlet!" He brother screams has he pulls himself into Scarlet's arms. The screeching of something being dragged across metal, claws at Scarlet's and Jackson's eardrums. With the breaking and splintering of wood everything goes quiet. "Scarlet…" Jackson whimpers as he slowly lifts his head up from Scarlet's shoulder. "Where is it?" He whispers in her ear. Scarlet's throat closes up like she's being choked, she doesn't want to answer, her heart is pounding so hard that she feels like her mother can hear it, or a beast. "Scarlet?" Jackson squeezes her shoulders when she doesn't answer. Scarlet wraps her arms around Jackson tighter and unsheathes the hunting knife.
"Where…okay…" Scarlet breathes as something crashes into their iron trap from the outside. Scarlet tries to restrain from screaming for her brother's sake but she soon loses all control over her throat, as something continues to hit the side of the trap, over and over again.
"It's there! It's going to get us!" Jackson screams and clenches Scarlet's shirt in his fists and continues to scream, as does Scarlet. Over the top of their screams Scarlet can hear the sound of metal being scraped away from the outer lining of the trap. Soon the wood starts to crack and splinter to the side of them. "Scarlet!" Jackson shrieks as splinters of wood burst inwards, revealing a small opening the size of someone's head. Scarlet turns slightly so she's facing the opening, with the knife out in front of her. In the centre of the blackness two yellow glowing dots appear. Eyes. The beast snarls and Jackson screams louder. "Go away! Go away!" Scarlet lets go of her brother so that she can reach up and unlock the hatch. She twists the lock around twice and the hatch flies open. With adrenaline and an extreme amount of fear coursing through her veins, Scarlet lifts her brother with one hand and basically throws him up and out of the trap. The light from the room above filters down and momentarily blinds Scarlet, she can still see the yellow orbs that stare intensely at her but she can't make anything else out over then blackness. She's too frightened to move, she just continues to sit there with her knees tucked up to her chin. She'd dropped the knife to her side when she lifted Jackson out. Her body remains paralysed with terror, her screaming ceases, and she just continues to stare back into the glowing yellow eyes that remain un-blinked since the time she had first laid her eyes on them. Two hands reach down and grab Scarlet by the shoulders and pull her up out of the trap. Scarlet falls into her rescuer's arms as her knees give way and the rest of body starts to shutdown in shock.
"Scarlet!" Her mother shrieks.
"Is she hurt?" Her grandmother kicks the trap door shut.
Scarlet is dragged over to the lounge where she is laid down. Grey stands over her. "You're okay…" He reassures has he examines her body for any wounds. "Red, can you hear me?" He asks as he grips the side of her cheek. Scarlet's eyes start to roll to the back of her head and her minds starts to go blank, every noise in the room turns into a dull hum and then into silence. "Red?" Grey shakes her shoulders. "Scarlet!" She still doesn't respond.
"Scarlet!" Jackson claws at Grey's arm, trying to get to his sister. His grandmother pulls him off and hands him to his mother.
"Move." She pushes Grey to the side and checks her granddaughter over. "She's unconscious. She'll be fine." She says and turns to Grey. "Kill it." Her voice is dripping with venom. Grey gives Scarlet one last quick glance to make sure that she is still breathing and then bolts out the door with his axe in hand. He joins the mob of hunters outside, he is given a torch and hunting party starts to move around the side of the house. Scarlet's mother shuts the door and locks it.
"Is she going to be alright?" Her mother's voice is on the edge of tears.
"She'll be fine. She's just in shock." Her grandmother lifts her legs and swings them onto the lounge, so that she's now laying down. "Get me a cloth and water." She tells her daughter who obliges immediately and runs to the kitchen, with Jackson in tow. Scarlet's grandmother places pillows behind her head and brushes strands of black and brown off Scarlet's pale white face. Jackson passes his grandmother a bowl of water while his mother hands her two cloths.
"Jackson come here." His mother takes him by the hand and leads him over to the other side of the room where an old reclining chair sits in the corner. She sits down first and Jackson sits her lap. He buries his face into her shoulder and starts to weep again, his mother strokes the back of his head affectionately and watches as her mother places a wet cloth on her unconscious daughter's head.
"I've never seen a beast as strong as that." Scarlet's grandmother mumbles. "It tore straight through all that metal, like it was nothing." Her grandmother says in disbelief.
"They'll find it." Scarlet's mother says. Her grandmother nods in agreement with her daughter.
"Yes." She says as she sits next to Scarlet. "It's laid quiet for so long." She buries her face in her hands. "I think it's sick of hiding." She moves the pillows out from under Scarlet's head and slides her head gently on to her lap. "The problem isn't finding it. It's killing it."
