Chapter Text
You can’t control the shaking of your hands, but it doesn’t stop you from pulling Elisa closer. She gasps softly as you let one of your hands trail up her back to her neck while you bury your face in her straw-colored hair and trail kisses along her jawline. She smells like home, like grass and dirt and a hint of garlic from the stew she had cooked for you both. As she pushes herself further into you, the cold air seeping into the groundskeeper’s shed seems hardly noticeable. Elisa has kept you warm through most of these recent chilly evenings. Though your meetings have been secretive, they feel like the closest thing to safety you have ever known.
Elisa moans your name softly and rallies you out of your reverie. You bring her lips to yours, their softness and the sweat from her work in the fields intoxicating to you in every way. She is gentle and satiating in ways you have never known before you met her, in ways your male suitors can not compete with. As your lips trail down to her exposed chest, you imagine the two of you are in a different place away from the village, isolated, safe, and free from secrets.
You look up into her chestnut eyes, admiring the way her brows furrow in pleasure as you continue to kiss your way down to her stomach, pulling the front of her olive green dress down as you move lower. A smile plays upon your face as you kneel.
Leaning in to nip her waist, you feel her grow tense suddenly.
“Elisa,” you ask. “Was that not okay?”
You glance upwards quickly and your heart nearly stops at the look of horror on your lover’s face as she stares straight forward at the door to the shed.
Deep down, you know what you will see if you look behind you, but you have no other choice. Pushing yourself off of your bent knee, you turn around and come face to face with the cemetery groundskeeper, a hunched and scraggly old man. His eyes are blown wide at the scandalous sight in front of him. Your heart sinks to the pit of your stomach.
“I-I came to fetch my shovel,” he stammers. “You ought to head home now.”
“Otto, I-” you start.
“You should go,” he states much more firmly.
You stand up and look at Elisa, who covers herself up quickly and with tears in her eyes hurries away from you, past the groundskeeper, and out the door.
* * *
The image of Elisa running out of the groundskeeper’s shed quickly became an image that was burned into your memory from that night forward. Like a line of dominoes, it triggered a series of events that pulled her further and further away from you despite your best efforts to keep her close.
You didn’t see much of her for days on end after you were caught. Aside from evening services in the church, in fact, you didn’t see her at all. Try as you might to catch her eye during those few moments, Elisa did not glance your way once. Her parents and sister, however, glared at you every moment they could. The news had spread across the small village quickly. You were beginning to be regarded as a bit of a pariah in the only place you’d ever known.
The luthier you worked for, the man who had taken you in as a child, gave you more work than you had previously been used to. Less deliveries, more cleaning the workshop, minor repairs, and tedious tasks that kept you inside. You can tell by the way the burly man watched you over his spectacles that he was displeased with your actions, but he chose not to speak about it. Instead, he kept your hands busy and the rest of you out of sight from the leering eyes of the villagers who remained both disgusted and curious by the newfound discovery of your deepest, darkest secret.
Perhaps you should have thanked your adopted father figure, though fatherly he was not. It was safer for you to be inside than amongst a small community full of hateful people you had once regarded as neighbors. Still, you missed Elisa terribly and longed to speak to her, and you couldn’t stand being locked up within the same four walls day in and day out for the unforeseeable future. It felt like a prison to you.
By now, the second week of your isolation, you’ve had as much as you can stand. Waiting for nightfall, you listen for the luthier to retire to his quarters before donning your tattered trousers and a heavy sweater, and sneaking softly out of the wooden cabin. Tip-toeing lightly across the village, careful to stick to the shadows, you make your way through the center of town and towards the fields beyond which Elisa’s family lives.
Stealthily sliding up the worn wooden paneling to where her bedroom window is, you rap a familiar coded knock on the pane, a pattern that has always alerted her that it was you. You hold your breath and wait for a response that you are not sure you will even get when suddenly Elisa’s face appears. She is less happy to see you than she usually is during your evening trysts, but your heart swells to see her regardless.
“Elisa,” you start as she cracks open the window.
“Shh! Y/N, what are you doing here? You can’t be here!”
“I needed to see you,” you reply, your brows knitting together. You can already feel your lip trembling. “Why are you avoiding me?”
Elisa’s shoulders slump.
“What did you think would happen? My parents would beat me if they knew I was talking to you right now.”
“They don’t have to know. They never have to find out again. Elisa, let’s leave this place. We can’t live like this.”
Elisa sighs and tears well up in her eyes.
“Why are you crying?” You laugh softly, though it is filled with worry more than joy. “Just say yes, Elisa. Just come with me.”
“You’re right,” she replies. “We can’t do this anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
Elisa takes a deep breath and steadies herself.
“I’m engaged, Y/N,” she responds. “Josep proposed again shortly after we were found out. I wasn’t going to get another chance here if I didn’t take his offer. What other man would take me to be his wife after the word got around about us, especially if I said no to Josep so soon in the wake of it all? I accepted. We are to be wed next Sunday after services.”
You fall to your knees in the dirt below her window. The tears you have fought back for so long begin to flow, glistening in the light of the moon so that you can not hide them from Elisa.
“I’m so sorry,” she says, her voice catching in her throat. “I did what I had to. I need to be here with my parents and family. It’s all I’ve ever known and I must stay.”
When you do not respond, she bids you goodnight and closes her window with an air of finality that sucks your better senses out of you. Elisa would never be yours again.
* * *
Come Sunday morning, you find yourself trudging through the snow in the dark forest on the village outskirts. A heavy snowfall had blanketed the mountains and the surrounding areas beneath them, the first major snowstorm of the season. You shiver as your boots crunch through the drifts, the cold biting at your extremities. You pull your worn cloak tighter around your shoulders and look up to the sky.
The sun is rising, and in a few hours the townsfolk would gather to say morning prayers to Mother Miranda. After prayer, Elisa, the woman you love, would be marrying Josep. Josep, the blacksmith’s son, is considerably handsome and from a decent enough family. You chastise yourself for not feeling relieved that in such a bind Elisa had found a dashing and capable husband, but your broken heart will not let you see the meager silver lining. After all, you have left behind everything and retreated into the cold, snowy woods. Where is your silver lining?
You already told the luthier you were planning to say prayers in private and would not be attending the public service or the wedding ceremony afterwards. He had agreed, thinking it best to avoid dampening the spirits of the merrymakers so soon after the scandal. Before he awoke to prepare himself, you had left your home with nothing but the clothes on your back, leaving no note or indication of where you had gone and if you would be returning. It wasn’t necessary. You wouldn’t be back.
In fact, you were delighted when the snow had fallen and the frost settled in, you reason, continuing your aimless trek through the dead trees. The exposure would surely put an end to things long before the starvation hits. Hungry wolves would be desperate for food too. As grim as it sounds, you can’t help but see only the practicality in a quick dispatch from a hungry creature. Anything that hurries you out of your misery sooner was a gift, you think.
The sound of a snapping twig startles you out of your twisted calculations, and you spin around to look behind you. You see nothing, but you’re shocked at how quickly your heart begins to race when confronted with the possibility of danger. You assume the adrenaline is merely your self-preservation instinct kicking in. Such things must be hard to shake. Still, you remind yourself that there is no need for that anymore.
You continue your walk, quickening your pace a little. The sun is rising higher into the sky, but the dense forest doesn’t feel much brighter than it had felt at dawn even with its branches being mostly barren of leaves. You think about morning services and how you never made good on your promise to the luthier to say them in private. What is the point, you wonder. Who is Mother Miranda? If she is so powerful and bestows so many blessings, why hasn’t she helped you? Why is she allowing you to wander the wintry forest until your untimely demise? You have often doubted the presence of deities, but in your current situation you seem more and more certain that none exist. If they do, they certainly don’t care all that much about a young woman from a small village in the mountains.
Many village elders have claimed to see Miranda. Others have said she watches over the village in the form of the ravens that circle overhead. You have never seen a woman like the one in the portraits that adorn the church walls. Additionally, you had lobbed many a stone at the ravens for sport as a young kid and faced no retribution. Surely no god would tolerate that, right?
You muse to yourself that maybe this was your long-awaited punishment after all.
* * *
Night has fallen, and you curse the tears that are stinging your face in the cold.
Elisa is a married woman now. As you shiver under your cloak, you imagine her dancing in a beautiful white dress with flowers in her hair. You imagine the wedding you dreamed up for the two of you so many times over in your wildest fantasies. Now, however, it brings you pain instead of comfort. She is Josep’s bride. If it wasn’t this damn frigid you think your bitterness alone could keep you warmer than fire ever could. You pick up a rock and throw it into the pitch black nothingness in front of you to work out your frustration. It helps, but only for a moment.
You lean back against a tree in the snowy clearing where you chose to wait out the night. The moonlight illuminates it just enough to see your immediate surroundings. It isn’t safe but it feels better than continuing to walk blindly into the forest. You didn’t bother building a fire to try to warm yourself up. If you are lucky, you think, the frost would get you in your sleep.
Does it happen that fast?
The numbing pain of the cold makes it difficult to get comfortable. You feel a twinge of regret as you think about the cozy bed you used to sleep in. It wasn’t much, but it was almost regal in comparison to where you now find yourself. You steel yourself as best as you can as homesickness sinks in. There is nothing left for you back there, you remind yourself. Elisa was the only thing that had given you roots since you were orphaned, and now she is lost to you for good.
You close your eyes and feel pathetic. Slowly your body adjusts to the numbness, and you manage to fade into a light sleep.
* * *
Your eyes begin to flutter as you feel something tickle your hand. As you open them you are surprised to find that early rays of light are beginning to brighten the sky. You shake the snow off of your cloak and slowly stand up in your stiff, frozen clothes. You shiver and wonder how much more you can take of this.
Feeling the tickling sensation on your hand once again, you look down and notice a large fly wandering around on you. Disgusted, you swat your hand to shake it off. The insect takes flight in a hurry before turning back to bite your palm.
“Ack!”
You yelp, swearing under your breath as the fly takes off once more. A thin trickle of blood oozes slowly from the bite. You have never seen anything like it before, not from a fly.
You glance up at the direction where it flew before encountering something far more curious. Now that the sky is starting to lighten, you can see a towering structure in the distance, looming high up over the forest. It is a castle, one you had only seen from much farther away or in pictures as a kid. You have heard stories of the castle and have been told about the noble family that lives there, but you could never decipher what was fact and what was fiction as so many of the tales seemed so far-fetched to you. If merchants didn’t frequently head up the winding roads towards the castle’s gates, you might have wondered if anyone even lived there at all.
Even though your view is still obscured by the tree line of the forest, you can tell the castle is far larger and far more decadent than you had previously considered. Not that you ever paid a whole lot of attention to the lives of the Lords in the area. The Lords didn’t seem to pay you or the village any mind either.
You have no set path to walk in mind anyway so you decide to resume your march in the direction of the castle, leaving the clearing and pushing once more into the denser parts of the forest. The deeper you walk and the closer you get to the castle, the more you can’t shake the feeling that you are being watched. Scattered flies like the one that had bitten you earlier buzz past your face more and more frequently as you walk. You consider that despite the cold, the strenuous physical activity may still have lured them towards you; you could definitely stand to wash up. Even so, it seems rather unusual that so many flies would have survived the bitter drop in temperature.
By the time you reach a carriage path heading towards the castle grounds, your feet are pruned and blistered. It somehow hurts to walk even more than it previously had, both to your amazement and chagrin. You had hoped this ordeal would be much quicker. Staring ahead down the path you wonder if - provided you are polite about it - you could ask the residents to let you warm up and perhaps have a bite to eat.
You're noticing that your willpower is starting to shake. There has to be another way than waiting out your expiration date.
It might have been a subconscious excuse to delay yourself, but you find yourself suddenly wondering what the castle and its residents are like up close. Are they just like the stories you heard? Those tales had been colorful and wildly hard to believe - both the good and the bad. As a child you were told about the decadence, illustriousness, and power of the lady of the castle, and about how she aided the village - though in what ways, no one seemed to have an answer for. As a teenager, you heard whispers about the runways who ran towards the castle and never came back. Some folks even went so far as to say the residents were witches that feasted on the flesh and blood of young men and women. All you really know for certain and can bring yourself to actually believe is that the lady of the castle makes popular wine, is incredibly wealthy, and probably wouldn’t waste her time entertaining a half-dead woman from a no-name village.
But it couldn’t hurt to look around, you think.
Leaning into your newfound spirit of adventure in an effort to take your mind off of the past few weeks, you tramp up the pathway that starts to incline towards the mysterious castle in the mountains. The longer you walk the more intense your curiosity grows - so intense even that you don’t realize that you are in fact being followed, just as you had suspected earlier. Flies swarm in circles around your head more and more as you get closer to the castle gates. As you start swatting more wildly, careful not to incur more nasty bites, you begin to feel like you are in a buggy swamp rather than climbing a snowy mountainside.
Finally, a gateway opens up to the overwhelming sight of a vineyard more spacious than you could imagine. You gasp at the rows of grapes struggling to grow against the chill. Forgetting the pain that stings your extremities, you run towards the rows of plants, gliding your hands gleefully along the vines and shamelessly picking and eating the cold grapes without a second thought. You are so hungry you think all the grapes in the vineyard would never be enough to satisfy you. The only thing that stops you in your tracks is when you run face first into a nearby scarecrow.
You murmur an apology to the air around you awkwardly as you look up at the scarecrow. You find yourself marveling at the craftsmanship. It appears strangely human, from the clothing it’s wearing right down to the decaying face, and the frost that dots its...eyelashes…
How many people put eyelashes on their scarecrows?
A chill runs down your spine as you step back to truly look upon the handiwork before you. Attached to a pole in the ground, a man’s body is bound, bloodied and torn, his arms tied outward on an attached crossbeam. The man’s eyes are open, his face twisted up in stiff horror. A bluish hue colors his sickly skin. Crows caw overhead, frightened to approach the ghastly figure erected before you. You back up quickly and trip onto the ground as you attempt to process the terrifying sight you have encountered.
“He’s cute, isn’t he?” a saccharine sweet voice sounds from behind you.
Your head spins around just in time to see the swarm of the flies that pestered you up the mountain drifting toward you, coming together in a buzzing cloud that takes on shape until a tall, young redheaded woman in a flowing black gown, gloves, and a heavy fur cloak appears before you. She swings a sickle in her hand playfully, a brilliant smile parting her lips that are stained dark with blood. Her teeth are unusually pointed, and a strange tattooed symbol brands her forehead.
She continues to speak, ignoring the fear that leaves you dumbstruck.
“My sisters and I made him. We make all the scarecrows for the vineyard after we finish our dinner. Mother loves them. She says they are so much more effective in keeping...unwanted things out.”
You swallow hard as she twirls her sickle in her hands again.
“They’re not flawless in function, however,” the redhead mused. “I guess that’s why Mother has us.”
Before you can register the movement, the redheaded woman quickly swings the sickle deep into your shoulder, sending you spiraling into unconsciousness.
* * *
It’s not the yelling that wakes you, but the searing pain radiating through your body. You can’t bring yourself to sit up. Instead, you writhe on the hard, damp floor you have woken up on. You whine as the slice in your shoulder throbs angrily. Next to you, you can hear commotion but you don’t register words as you try to take in your new surroundings. Looking up, you can see a weathered stone ceiling, and around you are matching stone walls - all of which lack the comforts of home. Cold droplets of dirty water fall from above onto your face and body, but you can barely acknowledge the feeling as the heat of the angry wound you’ve received pulsates through you.
Heat, you think to yourself. You finally let yourself process that you are out of the snow now. You don’t know exactly where you are but you can tell you’re in someplace slightly warmer than you’ve been for the past day and half. As you focus on the light flickering on the walls from torches somewhere behind you, you finally tune into the argument.
“--didn’t realize I swung that hard, Bela! You’re missing the point that I subdued an intruder tonight! I think we have much more to worry about than whether an already half-dead girl lives or dies right now.”
You turn your head to your right and squint. You are...behind bars? Just outside what appears to be your cell, you can see your redheaded assailant arguing with two other women in matching dresses and with matching tattoos who are wearing lighter black cloaks than the fur the redhead had been sporting out in the vineyard. They must have stayed inside, something you find yourself wishing you had done more and more as the hours since your departure from the village add up.
“Mother is going to be furious, Daniela,” one of the cloaked girls responds, running a gloved hand through her blond hair.
“I fail to see the issue, Bela,” the last, a brunette, replies from her seat on the ledge of a table below a rack of glistening instruments you couldn’t name. In her hand, she fiddles with one that looks halfway between medical and medieval. “We gag the girl, we have our fill, and should we need to we throw the rest to the lycans. Disposed of. Mother doesn’t even have to know.”
Bela pinches the bridge of her nose.
“Cassandra, this is why she is on your case all of the time. We don’t know if this is connected to anything larger than one wandering person. We need information so we know what we’re dealing with.”
“We’re dealing with humans ,” Cassandra hisses. “They can send as many intruders, spies, or assassins as they please and we’ll be more than able to take them out.”
“You’re foolish to think we should invite a skirmish into our home no matter how equipped we are to quash it! Think of how livid Mother would be if she found out we were involved?” Bela snaps.
“Found out you were involved in what , darling?”
The voice that chimes in is one you haven’t heard before. It is low, sultry, and almost dreamlike in timbre. Still, the authoritative and regal undertone you can hear in it sends a chill up your spine. The sight of the three young women jumping to attention does little to quell your nerves. You muster your strength to crawl to the far corner of your cell where you can get a good vantage point from the safety of the shadows.
The gasp you emit threatens to blow your cover.
You have a clearer view of where you are from your new spot. Your prison looks like the dungeon of an old castle - you assume the castle you found yourself roaming around prior to your encounter with Daniela. Torches line the walls but don’t provide too much light. Devices that you can only assume are used to torment are strewn about, covered in dried red stains. The sight is ghastly, but it’s not the one that knocked the wind out of you.
At the end of the dungeon, a figure of incredible stature looms in the doorway. You recognize her face, made up with dark eyeliner and deep red lipstick. You recognize her black hair, neatly curled and set underneath her large, wide brimmed black hat. You recognize the pearls that hold a floral crest of gold around her neck. You’ve seen this woman’s portrait in the village church alongside Mother Miranda’s. This is the lady of the castle.
What you never realized from looking at that portrait is that the Lady stands taller than any human you have ever laid eyes on. She towers over the cloaked women that captured you, making them look like children even though they themselves stand at least a foot taller than you. The top of her head barely clears the roof of the dungeon as she slowly walks forward, her huge white gown swishing gently from her wide hips as enormous heels clack against the stone floor. To say you are now more frightened than you have ever been would be an understatement - even after overhearing your bloodthirsty captors bickering over what to do with you. You can feel the danger you are in escalating at the mere presence of this woman.
“Girls,” the Lady says. “What have we here?” She gestures towards you with a wave of a hand gloved in black leather. You curse quietly to yourself as you realize that the darkness you attempted to use for cover did not prevent glowing yellow eyes from fixating on you.
“Mother,” Daniela says hesitantly. “I found her in the vineyard. She was eating from the crops.”
“A grave misstep indeed.” The Lady folds one arm across her chest and rests her other elbow atop of it, cradling her chin in her hand as she gazes at you. You shrink under her intense scrutiny.
“Did she threaten you, Daniela?”
“No, Mother,” Daniela answers without stopping to think. “She couldn’t even if she wanted to. She was nearly dead in the snow-”
“Unbelievable,” Cassandra mutters in frustration.
The giant woman lets a smile spread across her face but you sense that it isn’t as amicable as it appears.
“So you buried your sickle into the shoulder of a half-starved woman - one that could not escape you even if she tried to - instead of bringing her directly to me as I have requested you girls to do with any and all intruders you find on the grounds. Is that correct?”
You can see Daniela’s face fall as she registers her mistake.
“Y-yes, Mother. That’s correct.”
Bela mouths something that you’re pretty sure is “I told you so”.
The Lady turns gracefully away from you and steps towards her redheaded daughter. Her gloved hand caresses Daniela’s pale cheek, and the redhead closes her eyes, leaning into the touch. Suddenly, the sound of leather striking skin echoes in the dungeon. You jump at the sight, causing a new wave of pain to burn through your body as you watch Daniela buckle backward clasping her cheek with both of her hands. Her sisters look on but no surprise registers on their faces. You, however, are shaken up enough for everyone.
“I want you all to remember that I personally deal with any intrusion,” the matriarch states. “You have free rein to hunt when it is time to hunt, my daughters. However, I determine what is to be done with those unfortunate enough to cross us. Understood?”
“Yes, Mother,” the women respond in solemn unison.
“Very well. Now leave me to speak to our new... visitor here in private.”
The three daughters begin to hurry towards the exit to the dungeon at their mother’s command.
“Oh, Cassandra?” the Lady calls over her shoulder.
Cassandra stops in her tracks.
“M-mother?”
“Don’t ever let me overhear you hiding things from me again or you will face far worse for your secrecy than your sister did for her honesty.”
“S-sorry, Mother,” Cassandra says. You watch her pouting figure disappear into a swarm of flies that scatters from the dungeon.
The titan of a woman that stands before your cell scowls as she watches the last of the flies leave.
“I was never bothered by the idea of disciplining those who did not obey me,” she says to you. “Not until I had daughters. It’s entirely different when it comes to one’s own children.”
You don’t know what to say, so you don’t respond. Instead you look up meekly at this woman you are now certain would be your judge, jury, and executioner. She looks back down at you, her glowing yellow eyes shining, a smile on her face again.
“Forgive Daniela, she is young. She is sometimes a little too eager for my approval. Combined with her inexperience, it often leads to mistakes despite her best intentions. She’s learning.”
You grimace as you force yourself to sit slightly more upright.
“Oh?” you gather the courage to respond. “What are your excuses for the other two?”
With the sound of blades unsheathing and a gleam of metal in the torchlight, you find yourself face to face with claws that have sprung out of the giantess’ gloves at lightning speed, weaving through the bars of your cell. She uses the one on her index finger to force your face upwards so you can see her eyes burning with anger, her pointed teeth bared. The blade nicks your skin ever so slightly.
Who IS this woman?!
“Oh, little girl,” she growls. “You are in no position to remark on the hospitality of this castle, and especially not on my daughters. You’ve overstepped your bounds as it is simply by coming here, so tread carefully now. My patience is not to be tested.”
She retracts her blades back into her gloves with incredible swiftness, but not before she takes a moment to lick the blood off of the blade that cut your face. She sighs contentedly causing you to shiver.
“I wish to ascertain what possessed you to come here and steal my property, but I would like to enjoy my dinner first. I will be back afterwards to discuss the matter with you. I’ll have a maid bring up a plate from the kitchen. I request that you eat and drink so that you remain alert enough to think carefully about the answers you give me.”
With that, you watch as she straightens her hat, turns, and leaves you alone in the dungeon to attempt to process everything you have just witnessed.