|
|
|
Hello Journal, it's been a while, and I have a story running rampant in my head that I will share. Little Red Riding Hood is the inspiration for this. So, It's pretty much the same story, same theme, just a little tweaked out.
Here goes, fingers crossed!
Lilly looked outside her bakery window. It was another overcast and boring day in the village and she didn't want to be stuck indoors all day again. After all things had been dismally slow for the past three weeks and she was getting cabin fever in here. Her mother was busy preparing sweets for the Easter holiday, the Pope was insistent that the goodies be made a week before the event and promptly brought to the cathedral a day before the celebration. He also insisted that Lilly be the one to deliver the goods. The guy was very creepy in Lilly’s eyes. Something about that hat really, Lilly had a phobia of hats and no one really understood why. "Mother, may I please do something today? Anything to get out of this bakery, please!" She pleaded as her mother rolled out dough for pie crusts. Mrs. Avarice gave her daughter a stern look, and then smiled, "Alright," she replied, and just as Lilly grabbed for her long red cape she added, "you can deliver the extra spring cakes to your grandmother." What a dirty trick! Lilly had a disappointed look on her face and she gave her mom a sarcastic grin as if to say 'Fine' then she was out the kitchen door, to the pantry where the basket of extra cakes was at, and then on her way to the back of the house where her little donkey and cart was at. Lilly loaded up the cakes and a blanket in the cart and then got up on the donkey. Soon she was out of the village and into the woods as she headed to her grandmothers cabin. The woods seemed to get darker and darker as she went along. Lilly knew that the sun was probably getting lower in the sky, closer to the horizon meant that she may have to stop at the midway cave instead of traveling straight through to her grandmothers’ cabin. Not that she didn’t mind the cave, just that she hoped to be in a warmer, softer area before sun set. No chance that would happen though, thus the reason Lilly brought a blanket along. Not that the midway cave didn’t have its own stock of blankets, just that she felt better bringing one along, just in case.
The wolf had been watching the girl called Lilly for a very long time. Ever since the girl was but a babe he had been watching her, following her, and waiting until the time was just right. Was it time now? No, not yet, but very soon. He knew the hour was drawing near; he would make his move for the girl and hope that he would succeed. The wolf jumped down from his perch high above the entry of the woods. These particular woods where very dense, but the wolf knew them well. He followed the scent of the girl and the donkey and projected that she was heading to the old woman’s house. It was much too late for the girl to make it all the way there, so she would be stopping at midway cave. There, at the cave, the wolf would wait for the girl to fall asleep before he made his approach. The donkey may be a little trouble, but only if the woodsman was within ear shot.
Lilly drove the donkey into the cave, just as the winds started to pick up. “Oh bother. The winds are imitating the wolves. Hopefully there are none out. I didn’t see any game that they would be hunting. Oh course it is near winter, the animals have probably gone lower down the mountain to escape the eminent snow.” She said to the donkey as she found an old blanket to put on him. The donkey only whinnied and laid down, making things a little more difficult for Lilly to remove, namely the cart, saddle and harness. Once the task of getting the donkey ready for bed was completed, Lilly went to the back of the cave where her mother stashed the grains and dried meats. This was the first time Lilly was here alone. Normally her mother went with her, but it had been a while since her mother could leave the village. After her last episode the doctor forbade her from leaving. That meant Lilly hadn’t seen her grandmother in months, not that she minded. Lilly had asked her mother once if she could go to make a delivery to her grandmother on her own, but she was too young then. Now she was approaching womanhood, and she had no other siblings. Her father had died long ago, before she was born, and her mother never remarried. Lilly paused on her way to the hidden store room in the cave. She wished she could have met her father. From what her mother said about him the man was a great man. He built the house they lived in with his bare hands, carving out the trunk of a tree just to make a strong house, part tree part stone. She was proud to be the daughter of such a great man, he was also said to have been one of the ten men who built the village. Times though had become rough, and the bakery was barely making ends meet. Had it not been for the Pope the bakery would have closed and Mrs. Avarice along with Lilly would have to move to the city and work for some warehouse. Lilly shook that awful thought and retrieved the grain along with some dried meat and bread for herself. She then went to the little pool in the cave and used the pitcher her mother left behind to gather water for herself and to bring to the trough for the donkey. She put another log on the small fire and then Lilly pulled her blanket up over herself. She was too tired by now to eat the meat she got herself. By this time the donkey was happily munching on his oats and nearly ready to fall asleep.
The sound of wheels over rocks had awakened the woodsman. “Who the devil would be coming through the woods at this hour?” he asked himself. Always one to be prepared for anything, the woodsman grabbed his axe and sword then headed out to the not so public road that ran through the woods. From the tracks in the dirt he could tell it was a small cart pulled by a donkey that went through. The cart was familiar, like that of the baker, Mrs. Avarice. This time though the tracks where not as deep, so perhaps the young miss Avarice was alone on a delivery to her grandmother. This may indeed prove interesting, for he knew that the wolf had long been trailing the girl. Why the wolf was after the girl, the woodsman didn’t know, what he did know was that whatever the wolf had planned was probably something nefarious. Besides, the woodsman was told to protect the Avarice’s should they go through the woods.
To be continued.
Jez Robin · Mon Mar 29, 2010 @ 08:48am · 0 Comments |
|
|
|
|
|