Prologue
Veiled in a cloak of blood… a mist of crimson in the echoes of the woods spreads fear like venom in the veins. Poison in living form, sweeps the edges of light, but only reaches the moon. The moon is its only brilliance. Its world, its love… its damnation.
Chapter 1
Darkness fell as I stumbled through the woods, stalked by the foes of night.
It was running…
I could feel the footsteps pounding the ground… no sounds. No snapping twigs or the crush of dead leaves strewn on the forest floor. There were only the vibrations in the earth, bellowing at me that my silent follower was gaining on me with every second.
Fear clutched at my heart as my fragile shoes slammed against the ground. So fast, my chest ached beneath my red cloak, but never fast enough. I could still feel it gaining. Unparalleled speed. I was nothing against this matchless killer.
Running, begging to scream, but too short of breath. Air burst from my lungs and threw itself down my throat as tears splashed my cheeks. My fear was a panicked frenzied, my heart a caged animal, beating on the bars of its confinement.
Legs pounding, running, running, and then… I trip. My foot snags on a root and my heart stops, and I hit the ground. It had already dawned on me that I am doomed. From the very start.
I twisted around to face my death and saw it glaring at me. The wolf snarled and saliva dripped from its fangs like fluid webs. Ears bent back, and neck spiked with fur. Hot breath on my skin, putrid. But was caught me was the eyes… as red as blood.
He lunged.
Chapter 2
I burst awake, breathing deeply, clasping at my throat, which I had been sure had been torn from my body. Cold sweat dripped from my skin and my eyes were wide in fear.
I rushed out of bed and into my bathroom, clutching the mirror. I stared at my face. I looked scared. My bronze hair was matted to my head with sweat. My black eyes had dark circles under them. I looked how I felt, or maybe worse.
My hands moved to push my shirt down to view the scar between my shoulder and neck. It was where the strange wolf had bitten me just a month ago. It was barely visible.
I washed my face, breathed deeply, and slipped down onto the tiled floor, facing away from the sink.
My eyes moved the open window and to the bright sphere glowing in the sky. I shivered.
Tomorrow night… that moon would be full.
…
All day I was distracted. Visions of fanged mouth and blood irises were filling my mind with shocking throbs.
And then the light faded. All, except the moon. Big, bright… and full.
Chapter 3
I stared at the ink sky.
A cloud shrouded the moon. But for not much longer.
I saw it drift away. And then I felt it… the change.
A stifled scream vibrated in my body as my bones altered. Elongating and shifting. Claws retching from my fingers and fur erupting from my skin.
“NO!” I screeched in agony. “ARGH! NO!”
My teeth grew longer and sharpened in my lengthening jaw.
I clawed at my flesh, and I felt it ripping off, and liquid seeping into my fur.
I could feel my eyes pulsing and swelling with red ooze. The irises were enlarging and changing colour, my eyesight was different. My mind was different.
I gurgled out a cough that sounded as though my throat had been dragged out wet gravel, and I spat out red spit. And then a bellow surged from my lips. I was howling to the moon with such cursed emotions. Love, need, pain… tortuous doom.
My reflection was caught out of the corner of my eye, and I wanted to die. But then… nothing mattered. I had no control. I was lost in the oblivion, but I wasn’t blind… I saw everything. And that was much worse.
I tore out of the house and into the street, murder in my eyes and death in my heart.
Chapter 4
She stared at the stars. Twinkling like angels’ eyes.
“What are you thinking about?”
The girl looked at her boyfriend and smiled. “Just the stars. Aren’t they beautiful?”
He gazed at her, his mouth curling. “Magical. Just like you.”
“And you.”
“Like us…”
A howl broke the ambience of adoration, stopping the heart of both of the young lovers.
“What was that?” she asked.
Her boyfriend waved it off. “A stupid dog, don’t worry about it.”
They held each other closer in the dewy grass, staring at the sky.
Little did they know that a pair of scarlet eyes was peeking through darkness of the bushes, eyeing them off.
She heard a rustle of movement.
“Hon…”
“It was nothing.”
Abruptly, a wolf tore out of the vegetation and growled.
The girl screamed, trying to get up. Her boyfriend was yelling out, and scrambling on the ground, pulling out grass. But they just slipped on each other and fell over, vulnerable.
The wolf snarled and leapt onto the boy slashing into his abdomen, desperate for the meat inside, clawing and slitting skin, letting it ripple with crimson.
Screams filled the night.
Blood sprayed and guts hung from sharp teeth that tore continuously into soft flesh.
The boy gurgled on his own red fluid, choking. His girlfriend was in fits of fear, unable to do a thing.
The creature’s mouth engulfed his head and in one effortless move, crushed his skull. Teeth sunk into the slimy organ inside, and ripped it from the shards of bone it was once held in.
Eyes wide, the terrified adolescent backed up, shrieks muted in horror. Vomit splashed onto her front as she saw her lover’s brain in the grips of a monster. She tripped on a stone in an attempt to run, and crumpled, falling on her back.
Done with the boy, the wolf sprung onto the fallen girl and stared into her eyes.
She breathed fear, and it was nectar for the hungry animal. It sniffed at her, smelling the aroma of her blood, pumping from her heart and through her veins.
And then it plunged and the girls’ world was over.
Chapter 5
I could see it all. See me ripping into intestines and shattering skulls. I could see the fear in the eyes of the girl I was going to murder. That I was going to consume.
And I transformed… I had become something else, and I was no longer distant from the murder. I was no longer a little girl in a red hood, prancing in the woods…
I was a killer.
…
When I woke up, I was covered on blood. None of it was my own.
I remembered last night, with a rush. All the terror and screams, all the hunger and death.
I shivered with satisfaction. I adored the sound of murder reverberating in my ears. My eyes fluttered, and I stood up to stare out my window.
The sky was blue and cloudy, but I knew, behind it all was my lover. My moon.
I held my red cloak closer, and smiled to myself.
I would wait each month for my world, my love. To engulf me in its full light. To transform me into a beautiful killer.
My hand reached my mouth, and I smelt the blood on my fingers… I licked the tips of them, and shuddered with the delicious taste.
I would wait each month for my damnation…