Violet Riding Hood

Chapter 15

Vallery's Dream

The growls and cries continued outside for several hours after Vallery broke into the clothing shop, or at least it seemed like hours for her, she had no way to be sure... the mysterious ravens soon disappeared from her view, and she became warm enough to drift into a relatively peaceful sleep that night.

Vallery was taken away by her dreams like a whisper in the wind, a soft, wonderful feeling that she had never experienced...

It was like leaving Swordhorn behind and crossing a gateway to a different world, but when the flying sensation ended and the images reformed around her she realized, surprised, that she had not abandoned her hometown after all.

She found herself hiking and climbing her way through the snowy trail that led out of the village and up the mountains, following the footprints of an old and frail woman that she knew very well...

"Grandmother Julie?" Vallery called inside her dream, recognizing the long, gray hair and the classic blue cloak- "Grandmother, it's me!"

Vallery called out her name several times, but it seemed that the Dream Julie was unable to detect the presence of her granddaughter behind her. They continued the advance up the trail on their way to the curious house where Julie lived alone, and Vallery, alarmed, realized that something really bad was taking place here.

Julie looked eerie and aghast, the fear visible in her soft purple eyes...

The Purple Moon was raising beyond the snowy mountains when they finally reached the house, it was a silent morning in the frozen forest and Julie looked around her with great fear before entering the house. She locked the door behind her, and Dream Vallery discovered that she could walk through the wooden door like she was a ghost.

It was very dark inside.

Vallery witnessed in silence as Julie lit a candle, and she followed her grandmother all the way upstairs to her personal bedroom at the highest part of the house... There, Julie closed all of the curtains and dragged, not without effort, an old and heavy-looking trunk from a concealed location under her gray and blue bed.

"Grandmother, what is that?"

Julie opened the trunk with a silvery key that she drew from a pocket in her dress, and her fragile hands extracted a heavy black coat from the depths of the container. Vallery thought that the coat looked really old, wondering whom it had belonged to and why her grandmother would have been keeping it hidden all those years.

The purple eyes stared at the old leather coat with a look of deep nostalgia, and then Julie, her hands shaking, drew it closer to her face and took a very deep breath...

Something changed in her face.

Vallery discovered an alarmed, tearful look in Julie's eyes when a terrible realization finally took form somewhere in the deepest of her mind, something that she had somehow known but also denied for the most part of her life... the frail woman grabbed a silver dagger and dashed downstairs with Vallery after her, soon reaching the snowy clearing just outside of the house.

There was a sound of branches breaking somewhere in the forest, Julie looked to the left with the dagger in her hand, a dark figure emerged from the trees and Vallery abandoned the Dream world...

44-

Awakening

The gray light of daybreak came in through the windows, the soft whispers of the wind could be heard somewhere outside, the air inside the shop was cold and quiet and Vallery awakened at last and opened her violet eyes.