Violet Riding Hood

Chapter 16

There must be Light in the Heavens

Carrow Silvermoon walked into the clearing with a slow and quiet pace, wearing the same black cloak that Vallery recalled from the night before and without speaking a word to his daughter.

Vallery almost screamed to her father to get out of that place, that it was too dangerous, that the Wolf was nearby and could attack any moment... but she realized something a split second before crying out any warning, and it was a vision so terrible that her heart skipped a few beats and she became frozen on the spot.

Carrow's right hand had been replaced by an awful black paw with claws covered in blood, and the old Woodcutter looked more sinister than ever as he stared at Vallery and displayed a sick and wicked smile...

"I had no choice" Carrow whispered with a wolfish voice, looking down at Julie for a moment- "She finally realized... What I am."

Vallery fought hard to come back to herself, to stop shaking with fear and force her heart to work normally again... however her grasp on the silvery sword remained as strong as ever, and she reacted fast enough to keep a safe distance as her father began to walk in circles all around her.

Carrow released a soft wolfish laughter, amused to see the reaction that he imagined Vallery would have.

"Lucy, and mom... All of those people, the soldiers, and now your own mother!" Vallery cried out, pointing her sword at the Wolf- "How could you do this...?!"

Carrow tried to slowly draw closer to his daughter, but Vallery kept her distance with great courage and would never lower her blade. She began to move around as she tried to find a way to escape, but there was nobody nearby to rescue her and she knew that she would be no match for the speed and the agility of a Wolf.

The image of Julie dead on the bloody snow kept distracting her eyes, they were circling each other and Carrow would sometimes get almost close enough to touch her...

"Stay away from me!"

"You need to know many things, my daughter" Carrow replied, still speaking with that harsh and unnatural voice- "I loved Lucy, your mother and my own, and never wanted to hurt them! I have been waiting all your life to reveal my true colors to you, Vallery... The Purple Moon came and I was ready, but I wanted Lucy to receive my gift first."

"You killed your own daughter!"

Carrow let out a high laughter, and this time he sounded even more eerie than before. Vallery witnessed in terrified silence as her father's sharp fangs were growing before her eyes, and also his other hand transformed into a wolf paw as he laughed. Then he stared at Vallery for a long time, and she thought that those wolfish eyes were getting larger with every minute that passed...

"Really? Well, that's what you would believe, after all" Carrow said, coming to a halt in the middle of the clearing- "That night I forged a letter, Vallery, I made Lucy think that Harry wanted to see her at the Rye Field. Poor thing, she had such a crush on him... Lucy arrived there in the darkest of the night, and you know what happened next: She found the Wolf instead of her love..."

Vallery was heartbroken as she tried to grasp Lucy's terror that night, all alone in the Rye Field, facing the terrible monster when she had been hoping to date Harry in secret. She could barely endure to imagine the last moments that her little sister had lived, and to know that her own father had murdered her sister was almost beyond all comprehension.

"You see, there is a way to identify any offspring of mine" Carrow explained with great pride- "When I confronted Lucy her eyes did not glow in answer to my own eyes, and then everything that I had been fearing for years finally made sense... Lucy did not have my Wolf blood, she could not be my daughter! Your mother lied to me!"