The Wolf's Den

Path 2: Ryland, Chapter 1

        The hallway was wide when they stepped into the building, the building seemingly a brothel of interesting characters. There was Red, the child with the red hood, and seven brothers, young in age and all shaking in terror. Passing them, there were multiple doors, locked without handles, such as a door covered in hedges of thorns, the name covered in vines. There was a barren door made of stone, trails of long, long hairs between the stone blocks. Another, much farther down the hall, was a door made of the mirror's glass, and, just before the room their host stopped at, was a door with a pond sitting quietly to the left of the door. Finally, their host opened the last door on the left and turned to his three companions.

        "This," he said. "This will be your room," Bowing with mock respect to the older two, he stepped aside to allow them in.

        Inside the room, they discovered, were three, simple beds, barren walls, an open closet with hooks crudely placed, a threadbare rug, a dingy window high above their heads, a battered hat stand, and a rusty door handle from the inside of the door. As their host bowed once more, he studied the three women curiously.

        "Well, aren't you going to ask my name?" After no reply, he chuckled, shook his head slightly, and bowed once more. "You will learn to ask questions soon, I promise you, but for now, I will give you this: my name, children, is Berdinham Wolfe. You, however, may call me Mr. Wolf."

        With that, he was gone, and they stood facing each other with various different expressions. Finally, the youngest, Tilli, spoke. "Oughtn't we rest for the night?"

        "No," said the eldest, Adrieve, said, shaking her head and stamping her foot violently. "We need to leave."

        "Well I think we need a plan," argued the redheaded Ryland, staring directly at Adrieve coldly. "Not everyone can just pack up and leave at their own right. That's what got us here in the first place!"

        "Please, don't fight, not now, I don't think-" Tilli tried, only to be cut of by Adrieve saying:

        "Stay out of this, infant, this has nothing to do with you. It has everything to do with her, our fearless leader."

       Sulkily, Adrieve murmured that she would like to go to bed, to which the younger two followed that action. However, awoken from her deep slumber, Ryland carefully rose from bed, placing her cloak over her shoulders. Studying the room, the moonlight helped to show the relative destruction within the room. After a moment, she studied the dark of the room through the moonlight falling from the window. The door was slightly ajar, and the hinges were torn away from the rotting wood of the doorway at the top , causing the door to swing open with a creak.

        Toeing on her shoes, she carefully stepped into the hallway, closing the door delicately behind her. In the darkness, she knocked on the first door she could find.