Born of Blood

Chapter 16

"If you are a strong pup, you will endure!"  She shouted.

Scarlets eyes couldn't see. The woods were so dark this time of night, all she could do was listen and feel. She was scared, her little feet sunk deep into the snow. Her tiny toes were so numb, so cold in the ice. She could hear them ahead of her, her Mama and Papa.

She was able to see them just minutes ago, though the sun had said goodnight, and went to sleep before she had the chance to say goodbye. They sounded so far away, so far ahead of the little girl trudging her way through the heavy wilderness, hundreds of miles taller than her small body. The snow was falling so fast around her, and she cried silently to herself, only to hiss when the frosty wind slapped into her skin and froze her tears to her cheeks.

"Scarlet, you must keep up! Walk faster, we are nearly home!" Her Mama sounded so excited, so relieved.

She pulled her little feet from the snow faster, jumping over the mounds as if they were hurdles in order to pick up her pace. Her Mama and Papa were so far ahead of her now, she almost couldn't hear their breathing, or the crunch of their feet over the snow. The wind was blowing harder, the whipping leaves of the Giant Sequoia beginning to become louder than even little Scarlets own breathing.

"Mama!" She shouted.

The wind howled in response, the trees towering like giants above her whispering the secret paths of those who traveled to each other. She wished they would tell her where her Mama and Papa went, she couldn't see them.

She couldn't hear them.

Her feet were so cold, her cheeks felt so much pain as her tears slowly started to freeze.

Scarlets heart began to pound in her chest.

"Mama, Papa, where are you?" She called.

No answer.

Scarlet stood still in the snow for a moment, her arms and chest trembling with the cold. The wind blew around her in a hug she wished she could ask to stop. It was too cold, it was hurting her skin.

Could she ask the wind to stop?

"Please, please stop." The child whispered on the cold winter night.

The trees slowly hushed their whispering to each other. There were no secret paths travelers were taking interesting enough to keep them from observing what would happen next to the child struggling in the winter. Their bodies tall, leering, over the scene about to unfold, the wind died down, stopping its hugs it attempted to give the poor child, in comfort for what was to occur.

She was too young to know that it only wished it could stop what would come next.

Scarlet could see red, far in the distance. Her eyes adjusting to the night could pick it up through the large tree trunks far away. It made their brown bark look orange in the dark night, Scarlet lifted her little feet and bounded over hurdles of snow again to reach that little flame so far away from her little body.

"Joan, David, what have you done?" The voice flowed between the trees, no wind there to cover its tremble.

"We saved her, our baby is okay." Mamas voice, Scarlet could hear. She headed as fast as her little legs would take her to the sound of it.