Little Red's Riding

Your Own Mother...

"Is it true, Captain?" The King was standing at the window, staring out over the courtyard with his back to the door when Deckard walked into the room.

"Your Majesty?" Deckard bowed and straightened, his eyebrows raised, waiting for the King to explain what exactly, he was asking.

"Do I really have to spell it out for you?" Etan turned away from the window, and fixed Deckard with a hard stare that the soldier had seen many times since he'd become a member of the Guard. It had been his good fortune in the past that he'd never seen that look turned in his direction.

"Your Majesty, I don't know what I've done that could have incurred your displeasure. I live to serve you, as I've done since the first day I arrived in the Capital." His mind was whirling, trying to think of what could have possibly set the King off. Everyone with any connection to the Capital, and many with less than that, knew that Etan was temperamental on the best day. But while he couldn't say that he was the King's friend, no one really could, except perhaps Lady Calla, and even that was probably a stretch, he thought that the King rather liked him. Hell, the man had come to him for advice several times. And no one could know-

Deckard's entire body went cold as the thought occurred to him. He was the Captain of the regiment that killed werewolves. If somehow, someone had brought word to the King that his sister, who Deckard had brought here, who he'd personally carried inside the walls of this palace, was actually that thing that the King despised above all else, then not just his military career, but his life would be over. He'd be lucky if he wasn't drawn and quartered, likely after being tortured for several days.

He wasn't quite ready to admit to anything though. Fuck, he wasn't ready to admit what she was to himself, much less his Kijng. The King might very well just be in one of his pissy moods. He wasn't going to lose his life just because he had lost his cool.

The King stared at him for a long moment and then shook his head.

"You disappoint me Captain. Or perhaps I shouldn't even be addressing you by that title since it hasn't been formally bestowed upon you yet and now, well, now I'm not sure it should." Etan had turned back to the window and Deckard stood frozen in place, his heart pounding in his chest. It was tempting to tell the King everything that he knew, but that moment had already passed and he still wasn't quite certain that that was what the King was talking about.

"Your Majesty." Drawing his sword, he took a slow, deep breath as he weighed his options. Dropping to his knees and holding out his sword before him, he bent his head low as he waited for whatever it was that would come next. "Please. Tell me what I have done to fall so far from your favor. I have always done my best to serve the crown with honor and integrity."

"You have brought a wolf here, within these walls. Is that honor, Captain?" The sword clattered from Deckard's hands as the shock of the King's words hit him as hard as any physical blow might have done.

"Your Majesty- I don't-"

"Don't make it worse by continuing to lie to me now, Captain. I've heard it from the lips of your own mother. How you brought her here and were going to pass her off as a fine Lady. Can you imagine that astonishment of the poor hapless chap she married? When she started popping out pups instead of children? It would have the worst scandal in a century, Captain? Did you think of that? Aside from the danger of having a wolf here in the Capital? Hell, inside the walls of my own Palace, Captain?"

"I don't believe she is one, Your Majesty. She's my baby sister and I've known her all her life. I've never seen a thing that suggests-"

"Your own mother swears it." The second mention of his mother finally managed to penetrate the thick fog of panic that was clouding Deckard's mind.