Thanks to Jess Deaton and her inspiring art, and Jessibelle881 and her inspiring stories. Crush you both, you sucked me back in and now I have plot bunnies multiplying like mad!

Chapter 3

The morning before the first full moon after my sixteenth birthday, my best friend Clover died peacefully in my arms. He held on so long for me, and I regret any pain that he suffered in order to help me through what had been a tough year.

I had been given more and more responsibilities as a princess, more class work in statecraft, tactics and etiquette.

As a Story Keeper, the tales I finished had grown deeper, more complex, more full of war and pain - the need for love and hope stronger and stronger in every one. But there were those I could not finish, that I would have to leave for the right Keeper - and I had to learn to accept that fact. My magic work was strange and unpredictable, slithering between unexpected power - enough to cause a minor tornado in the throne room, and complete fizzle - I had no luck at all glamouring my skin blemishes away, much to Amber and James' amusement.

Clover had been there for it all, a wise but forgetful ball of funny fur. But he was fading, and I grew to value each day, knowing it could be the last. Until it was.

The Hunger was relentless when it came to me, but I found my strength to deny it's power from Clover, and from Ced...Mr. Cedric. But my sadness, oh I remember the pain of it still. Burying Clover under his favorite tree, Mr. Cedric watching quietly from a distance as I let my tears flow. I had been keeping everything bottled up and contained, and I was terrified that night I would be unable to control myself.

Mother gave me a long hug that night before bed, her eyes dark and worried. I didn't understand then that she knew more than she had ever admitted, I didn't think her capable of deceit, naive that I was.

By midnight I was outside, running barefoot along the edges of the forest, near to Clover's tree and his grave beneath, exhilarated and sad and terrified. Something was thumping within me, clawing to get out. I felt as though I could disappear into the depths of the dark woods and never ever come out again - and I wanted exactly that. I saw brilliant yellow eyes staring at me hungrily from within the forest, and I was strangely unafraid. I took a few steps forward, only to have my amulet shimmer and pulse with light, and a princess appear to me.

It had been some time since I had been visited by a princess guide. I thought perhaps I had outgrown the privilege, or that once I proved worthy, perhaps I would visit someone else someday. Perhaps I might yet do so, for my story is far from finished, I hope.

The light cleared and within was Snow White. She was lovely as I remembered, dark hair and pale skin, but she was not in the typical princess dress. She was dressed in a cream colored tunic and trousers, a bow over her shoulder and a quiver across her back like she knew how to use them. I think my eyes just about bugged out of my head.

"Hello, Sofia. It is good to see you again." The high pitched trill of her voice was sweet but somehow tired. I remember wanting to offer her a chair, when there was nothing about but cold grass and tree stumps.

She found her own tree stump soon enough, her posture not that of the proper princess, but of a woman who had seen more than her body could handle, and would likely face more soon enough. Somehow, I realized that the happily ever after that we all hear about from the story books might not have been quite the ending to her story I had always believed it to be.

"Princess…" I asked, but was interrupted immediately.

"Call me Snow. Please." Her eyes closed for a moment, and she rolled her shoulders. Something was definitely wrong for her.

"Can I help, Snow? Is there something…"

She closed her eyes, a smile on her lips. "Oh, child. You are so very good. I'm so happy I am able to come to you, to help you. Do not worry about my own troubles. It will be a relief not to think about them for a time." She opened those soft brown eyes, eyes so like a doe, and her smile softened further. "Have you discovered what you are yet, Sofia?"

I had tried to find out, search the Secret Library and peeping into Cedric's vast stores of books when I could. There was very little I could discover. But in my gut, I knew the answers so close but not yet clear. "No, Pr…Snow. I know that I am kind of guardian, according to my friend, Clover." I gestured at the grave at our feet. "But he couldn't tell me any more. He said there was another but…"

"He hasn't revealed himself to you? He has more restraint than I would have guessed." Her smile widened. "You are a Guardian of the Forest. You have an animal spirit that is entwined with your human soul. You are both of the Kingdom, and of the darkness of the deep forest And in both, you are a Princess true."

I soaked in the words, less shocked than I should have been. "What kind of animal?" Why would that have been my first question? Shouldn't I have asked about this other Guardian who wouldn't reveal himself? But a the time, I was almost frightened to find out for certain who he was. I wasn't ready yet.

"I don't not know for certain, but I suspect. You are still young yet to transform and know yourself completely."

I stood taller, defensive in the way of the all too young. "I am sixteen, almost old enough for my debut!"

Snow smiled again. "Perhaps, but your body still has many changes to make before you are ready for all you need to know. It took me years until I was prepared." And then she began to glow with a soft golden white light. And then came the stretching and cracking and slow shifts that were awesome and terrifying and more than a bit unsettling to my stomach, allowing the Hunger to abate. And then there was no Princess Snow White. There was a white doe.

A shining white doe, reflecting the light of the moon to an unearthly extent, so full of magic I could barely breathe.

"Snow? Snow is that…"

The doe nodded, pawing the ground with one delicate hoof. And then she trotted a few feet away, toward the thick woods. She snapped her head at me, clearly wanting me to follow, and then she ran straight into the brush. Before I consciously made a choice - I was running. Faster and faster, dodging every root and branch as though I could feel every part of the forest in my very blood. I felt like I was flying. Better than flying. I felt like the earth itself pulsed within me, like every rock and stream and tiny thudding heart around me sang a symphony around me. Somehow, impossibly, I had kept up with the white doe's every leap. But I skidded to a clumsy stop when she halted ahead of me in a moon bright glen ahead. I stumbled, suddenly awkward and noisy again, suddenly a sixteen year old girl once more, very deep within an enchanted wood.

And there was a wolf in the glen with us. A very big wolf.

The doe pranced, just a bit nervous, and my heart skipped a beat in fear with her. Then she bowed, a noble nod of her head, and miraculously, the wolf returned her nod with equal grace. She turned to look in my wide eyes, and then she shimmered into sparkled, leaving the pink glow of the Amulet as my only company. That and the wolf of course.

I hate never seen such a terrifyingly beautiful animal in this forest. He was black, deep black, and would have been able to disappear into any shadow except for the light grey shock of fur that ran along his muzzle from a black nose to a long tuft between midnight-black ears. Amber gold eyes looked at me with something akin to shock, and I blurted out the first thought in my head.

"Cedric?"

The wolf flinched, before nodding slowly and staring at me with inscrutable yet so familiar eyes. Cedric the Sensational, my friend, my teacher, the man who had helped me through some of the scariest, most challenging things in my life, could change into a wolf. Snow White, proper idyllic princess and renown queen, could change into a doe. What did that make...

"Are you the other Guardian?"

He huffed softly, a sound of cynical amusement if a wolf could be said to make such a noise. Then he yipped an affirmative.

"Can I...will I able able to…can you show me…"

He turned away, then turned half way back, flicking his ears just so and then leaping into the woods. I was filled with terror for a minute, thinking he was about to leave me alone and lost in the middle of the woods, but he barked sharply again from the dark woods, and my feet took off at the sound, following him as easily as I had followed Snow as a doe.

We ran for most of the night, the Hunger soothed with the vigorous activity. I had never felt so alive. This was the feeling I had always been chasing for during Flying Derby training. Cedric was beside me, then leading me, then practically nipping at my heels and enjoying my squeaks of pseudo-terror. He was having fun. And I adored watching him have fun. It made some warm secret place in my heart throb with happiness. I hadn't yet realized what that meant, or what other warm secret places would throb at the merest thought of him. But it wasn't that much longer.

We burst through the forest and out into the edges of my secret garden, and I gasped at the cold shock of the reality of my day to day life. I was a princess. I had just lost one of my oldest and best friends. My nightdress was torn and dirty, and my hair wild and full of sticks and leaves. I had a hundred duties and obligations to attend to tomorrow, not to mention a test on the political history of Tangu and Agrabah the day following. I bent over, suddenly feeling completely exhausted and sucked in air greedily, my hands on my knees and my eyes closed.

"Well, I see that your athletic skill translates well into this particular aspect of your developing nature." Cedric's wry voice made me jump, and i turned to stare at him.

There had been no unsettling noises when he changed. Nothing but a wolf one minute and a man the next. My eyes took him in, his green shirt open at the neck, his black breeches conforming tight to legs that were nowhere near as scrawny as they seemed in my childhood, with firms calves and large, strong feet that were bare in the dew-laden grass. His hair was a bit longer than it had been when I first met him, and he normally had it back in a queue, but now it was loose and just a bit wild, and I was breathless for a completely different reason.

I loved him, of course I loved him. He was a dear friend when I needed one most. He understood me at a level no one else seemed able to. He was interesting and powerful and knowledgable about so many things. But I had never really seen him as a man before that night. An attractive man. One who made my knees go a bit shaky and my heartbeat unsteady and who I wanted to…well, I didn't exactly know in that moment what I wanted to have him do, much less what I wanted to do to him, but my imagination over the next months began to become consumed with ideas.

He pulled out his wand - I had not a clue where he had stored it as a wolf, and with a deft flick and a few words his hair was tamed, his yellow tie and shoes had appeared, and he wore a set of familiar dark purple robes. He was once again Mister Cedric, Royal Sorcerer and my magic master, not a slightly disheveled and remarkably sexy man who had just been a wolf. Another tight movement of his wand, and I had a thick warm robe, slippers on my feet, and my hair was in a braid down my back and free of any sign I'd just been on a wild run.

"Shall we have breakfast, my dear? I'm always quite famished after a wolf night."

I nodded, still not quite believing what had happened. I was filled with so many questions, yet I couldn't yet find the voice to ask.

That night was followed by many more where I ran with him in the forest. Not just on nights where the moon filled my heart with Hunger, but on other nights he wasn't always the wolf. He once fluttered to my window as a raven, who I mistook for Wormwood until I saw the shock of white feathers over the bird's right eye. Another time he was a black otter, and I had to restrain myself from pulling him into my arms and smothering him with kisses, he was so adorable.

I began to know the forest like I knew the castle, every glade and stream and rocky outcropping. One summer night I saw Cedric defend the forest from the threat of fire. In the fall, from an attack by some kind of monstrous black boar that was thoroughly unnatural, dripping some kind of acid with every shake of it's enormous head. Then there was a long winter's night where he sat in the freshly fallen snow and settled disputes between creatures from sleepy bears preparing to hibernate and competing for caves to snow white owls fighting over hunting territory. He was remarkable, but not perfect. Where he tore into the boar with flashing teeth and wandless magic, he was useless at healing the injured animals and trees - so I did my best to help. Where he used cold logic to render decisions between those animals and people who used the forest, he let me speak up with insights into the hearts of the involved, and sometimes he allowed it to sway him. I felt useful and needed. It was thrilling.

He was thrilling. He was every bit the prince or king he claimed he always wanted to be, but he didn't seem to realize it. He was certainly more of a prince than any of the foolish boys who tried to charm me at Royal Prep, or attempted to steal kisses when I was more than uninterested. I lived for the nights I ran with him, and nothing any of those royals could do could possibly compare. I only wished I had told him earlier how completely I was his.