The Woods

Chapter 1 - The Ever Beckoning Woods.

She was young. She was ready for the world, but still so innocent. She knew about wolves, ogres and sex. Yes, sex is a sin, a monster, it belongs with the wolves and ogres.

She lived in a small cottage where the summers were hot and dry, many would starve in the intense heatwaves. They would leave those who couldn't get through the hot, humid summer days at the edge of the village. After a while the corpses would begin to fester and rot away. Every time she went to school she would see the bodies lying there, it repulsed her - the rotting flesh, ever a reminder not to succumb to death. To be strong, to stay alive. Some morning's she would wake up and the bodies would be gone. Eaten. Wolves like to eat humans, however they preferred fresh bodies, they preferred to kill for food, but they were content with those left at the edge of the village. But, lets remember those corpses were that of those who had starved to death, they weren't plump and juicy. Quite the opposite - they were scrawny, skinny; not a good meal for a wolf.

She was called Scarlet; the young girl was. She was pleasant, but she was growing, older, maturer each day. On this particular day she became a woman. She sat on her rocking chair, in her brand new white cloak that her mother had made for her. It was beautiful, with golden stitching around the edge and a lovely pointed hood; in case of rain or snow in those months where the nights were dark and bitter.

The winter nights suited the people; they were grim, dark, unforgiving cold people. Odd and strange. They we're savage just like wolves and ogres. In fact, they were so savage that it is hard to see why they separated themselves from the wolves who live in the woods. They both walked, they both talked. The only thing different was the way they looked, wolves have long matted, grey and brown hair, which when wet becomes smooth. Wolves are just as clever as peasants, wolves know that working in a pack is better, just like the peasants do. But wolves are cunning, wolves are smart and wolves have power. In fact, the wolves rule the peasants. Peasants are scared of the wolves.

Scarlet, picked up her wolf-skin satual and walked along the cobbled path to a grey stone building. Scarlet enjoyed school, there she could be herself, she had many friends but she wasn't popular, she was with a group of outcasts. The popular one's were Beatrice and Florence they were twins. Their mother used sex to get into important places, she was a harlot a nefarious termagant of a woman. She fornicated with the doctor and forced him into marriage. The doctor had already been married he'd lost his wife long ago, he loved his wife but he couldn't hide her from the village. In their eyes she was a witch; they stoned witches. It happened nine year's ago this very night, after the doctor and his wife had, had sex, he was feeling her breasts, and found a lump. It was round, and stuck out a little, firm to the touch. Everybody knew 'odd lumps' meant witch craft. She begged him not to tell the vicar, she knew she'd be stoned if he told him, and so the doctor promised her he wouldn't speak of the odd lump. But they both knew they could only keep the lump a secret for so long.

One day, the doctors wife, Saskia, decided to bathe with her friends in the lake at the edge of the forest. She enjoyed swimming in the lake the water was warm and refreshing, it caressed her skin as she swam towards the forest, which circled the kings castle. After a long afternoon of floating between the reeds, Saskia decided to leave. She knew her daughter Clarissa would be home from her first day of school and hoped to cook a luxurious meal to celebrate how old Clarissa was. She swam to the edge and stood up and walked to her sheep skin coat. The water hung in drops to her cold, naked body, it dripped down from her hair over the lump, and hung on her breast. The lump had grown since the night her husband had found it, it was clearly recognisable from the skin, so obvious, that her friend saw it and shouted that she was in the presence of a witch. Saskia ran into the woods away from the cries of the friend whom had stabbed her in back. Being accused of witchcraft, would destroy friendships, destroy families and destroy lives. After hearing his wife's cries the man rounded up a mob to locate and kill the witch. The men soon found her, they circled her as she begged them not to kill her. The children followed with as many stones as they could carry, some rocks fell, and tumbled through the tree's, and plopped into the calm lake.