Ever After High: Secret's Out

Secret's Out

It was just a typical day after school in General Villainy for the Big Bad Wolf. While his students were off galivanting and enjoying their after-school activities, as all students should, he himself was busy grading papers in the cold, unfeeling, window-less, dungeon classroom.

Badwolf rubbed at the bridge of his nose as he continued working by the dying overhead lamp. I've got to get this place remodeled, he made a mental note regarding the next school board meeting, or at least get some decent light fixtures up. But despite his complaint he continued working diligently.

The clock in the room continued to tick. With the lack of outside lighting, it was nearly impossible to know whether it was day or night, but Big Bad Wolf persevered as he didn't want to take work home as he had a very important video call on the crystal ball that night – a call shared with the two most important people in his life.

An hour – or maybe three, who could tell – And the Badwolf was finding himself etching closer and closer to the finish line. Stiff, Badwolf stretched out his arms and legs as he remained seated. He leaned back in his seat, using his arms to brace the back of his head, and stared up at the stone ceiling. One more final push, he tried motivating himself to continue his work, but his mind started to wonder.

Pushing his seat back more, Badwolf leaned down towards the bottom right draw of his desk. It was locked of course and there was no key, but that was okay as the draw was specially enchanted only to work for him. Changing just his right hand into his lupin claws he used his claw and unlocked the draw with no resistance. Opening the draw there was only one item in it. The most important item in Badwolf's classroom. It was a picture in a small red frame shaped like a heart.

Badwolf leaned back again into his seat as he brought the picture to his chest. Staring at it for but a moment he started to run his finger over the protective casing as if he was trying to burn every single detail to his memory.

The picture itself was of three figures, one of them being himself in human form. The two next to him were the most important people in his life – His wife and his daughter. Seeing them both next to one another in their matching name-saked red hoods, one could have easily mistaken them for sisters. The more his daughter grew up, the more he seemed to the outlier in their family. Badwolf's facial expression grimaced.

What was The Big Bad Wolf? At first, he thought he was doing the right thing by him and his family, but as the days go by it just seemed like he was being selfish. The relationship of the hood-wolf family was secret to all but only a selected trusted few, this was meant to protect his wife and daughter as if word would ever get out no doubt people in their community would outcast them for circumstances that they couldn't control – Red Riding Hood for falling in love with the wolf, and his daughter being born from that love. So long as his loved ones were safe, Badwolf didn't mind staying out of the picture.

That was the truth, wasn't it? Or was it a lie?

Badwolf wasn't blind. He had hurt his wife and daughter in the process of trying to "protect" them. His ears were large so he could hear everything. He heard the stories in Red's village where apparently The Hunter was rumored to have fathered Cerise during a one night stand, he'd even heard the stories that Red didn't even know who the father was. Back in her Spellmentary days, he had heard of murmurs from the faculty of that time about how they were worried about early signs of Cerise's possible mental state.

Badwolf rested his head in the palm of his hand, he rubbed the side of his temple as he thought about it. What was it that he was supposed to do? Everything he could think of he could only imagine that it could have been worse. The idea of the stories that would spread had the family been upfront since the beginning started to flood his mind. He could just imagine the stares that he would receive from everyone around them; the stories of how a predator like him took advantage of a young girl; the rumors of how he would be abusive to his own daughter. He could just picture how everyone would look at him. He didn't have the right.