Scarlet

In a village very much like yours, with smiling faces and muddy roads and a baker and blacksmith and apothecary, lived a girl named Scarlet. Scarlet's mother helped the apothecary and earned enough to keep them both fed, and for Scarlet's birthday had saved up enough money to get a brilliant red cloak and hood for her little girl. Scarlet loved it so much that she wore it everywhere, and some began to wonder if she hadn't acquired her name from the cloak instead of getting the cloak to match her name.
One fine sunny day, Scarlet's mother prepared a basket of food and handed Scarlet a bouquet of beautiful purple flowers and told her to deliver the food to her grandmother. Scarlet's grandmother lived in a charming cottage a couple of miles outside of town, and mother worried about her so. Scarlet readily agreed, for the alternative meant sitting in the apothecary's shop watching her mother work, and Scarlet didn't imagine mother or the apothecary had much fun and she knew she certainly didn't. "Mind that monkshood, Scarlet, and don't let it near the basket!" her mother called, and Scarlet was off, running out into the sun and wind and sweet smells of early summer. When she tired of running, she skipped, and when she tired of this too, she slowed to a walk and realized that her enthusiasm for this errand had been spent and she'd barely left the village. Dutifully she plodded along, until she noticed a man chained to a thick tree. Puzzled, Scarlet stepped toward him to take a closer look, for he was off the road a ways, and the man yelled at her!
"There's no need for that, sir! I saw you from the road and thought I would help if I may. No one deserves to be bound up as you are, and there are wolves in these woods!"
"Little girl" the man said through clenched teeth, "if you know what it good for you then you'll leave me be. I-" and the man didn't finish, for something seemed to wrench his throat though Scarlet couldn't see anyone else, and didn't think the man had been eating food all chained up like that.
"You speak nonsense, sir." As she spoke, Scarlet noticed a key lying on the ground near the tree, as though whomever had chained the man carelessly left it there to taunt him. Scarlet picked up the key and fitted it into the lock she found around back of the tree. Turning it so that the chains would fall away from the man, Scarlet felt shocked as he wailed in protest, but undaunted by her good deed she picked up her bouquet and basket and went around front to see the man. "You are very welcome, sir. I do hope you avoid this trouble in the future." The man gave Scarlet a feral look, and just as the little girl began to suspect something was not quite right, the man looked at her beautiful bouquet of blossoms and ran howling into the woods. Feeling thoroughly bemused, Scarlet returned to the road and continued on her journey.
The next thing of interest she saw (and Scarlet had been walking for what felt like an eternity between interesting moments on this trip) was a man, perched on a grey horse and staring off into the woods. The man wore leathers and carried a bizarre assortment of tools on him, some of which looked wickedly sharp with points gleaming in the sun. Though he didn't turn his head to look at her, Scarlet felt like he watched her all the same. "What brings you to these woods, child?" he asked, his voice deep and level.
"I'm delivering food to my grandmother" Scarlet replied sweetly, for she had always been a sweet person and honestly didn't know how else to be.
"Does your grandmother need those flowers?" the man asked, turning now to look her up and down. Scarlet shook her head.
"No sir, mother always has me walk with these flowers when I leave town. Aren't they beautiful?"
The man nodded, and turned his head to face the woods once more. "Be on your way then child, and stray not from the road. Wolves are in these woods, you know."
"Are you a hunter, sir? Have you come to hunt wolves?" The man said nothing, and Scarlet shrugged before skipping along, unperturbed by the man's brusque manner. In far too long a time (perhaps half an hour for the average adult) Scarlet finally arrived at the quaint cottage where her grandmother lived. She couldn't help but notice that the gate was open, and her grandmother's chickens (a lesser number than Scarlet remembered) had wandered out looking for food as no feed lay in the grass, but grandmother might be sick. Scarlet knocked on the door before letting herself in, and saw her grandmother lying in her bed under a bright patchwork quilt.
"Grandmother, it's Scarlet! I brought you some food from mother. Would you like me to butter some bread for you, or bring you some fruit?" Scarlet's grandmother sat up, and Scarlet noticed the sweat pouring down grandmother's face. No wonder, thought Scarlet, she's sleeping under a big quilt on a summer's day!
"No, no thank you dearie." Grandmother didn't sound well at all.
"Some tea, then? I can start a fire all by myself! I'll boil some water for you." Scarlet started to fill the teapot from the ewer in the kitchen, but grandmother shook her head. "Maybe you'd like to smell my flowers? It's so stuffy in here!" As Scarlet approached, grandmother started coughing violently, and shooed Scarlet away.
"Why don't you put those flowers in the ewer, dear? They mustn't dry out, the pretty things."
"Oh, that's alright grandma, I can do that when I get home. Mother told me to keep these flowers for myself, and I don't want to forget them." as Scarlet spoke, grandmother's coughing started and stopped again, and her eyes looked like they might bulge out of her head. "Grandmother, what big eyes you have!"
For a second, grandmother looked calm, and stared at Scarlet as though she saw her for the first time that day. "The better to see you with, my dear" she said softly, a tear running down her cheek. Scarlet couldn't help but notice that grandmother's ears had grown, which she thought couldn't ever happen to adults who stopped growing, but here they were with points and hair and everything.
"Grandma, what big ears you have!" Scarlet exclaimed, not meaning offense of course but struck with innocent wonder.
Grandmother smiled as the voice of her beautiful granddaughter reached her. "The better to hear you with, my dear." she said with a smile, though the smile slowly changed, warping into something hungry, something alarming.
Scarlet's eyes went wide. "Grandma, what big teeth you have!"
Grandmother stood up her in her bed as Scarlet watched hair grow on her arms, and she could see the bite mark on grandmother's neck as it closed up. "The better to eat you with, my dear!" came a feral voice that was definitely not grandmother's. Scarlet screamed and clutched her flowers, and the great grey beast still wearing grandmother's clothing stopped short and growled angrily, pacing around the small cottage. Just as Scarlet began wondering what she could possibly do, the door flew open and the horseman from the road strode in. With one fluid motion he raised a crossbow and launched a bolt directly into grandmother, or the beast that had taken grandmother's place, piercing its heart with sharp silver. Grandmother wobbled for a second and then fell with a tremendous crash, leaving Scarlet and the man alone in the cottage that now smelled of blood and fur.
"Thank you sir" Scarlet whimpered, for she'd been terribly frightened by the whole ordeal. "How did you know I would need your help?"
"This is what I hunt, young lady. I am sorry about your grandmother, but there is nothing to be done once a beast like that bites you. Most of the time they're so hungry they'll just gobble you up, but if they don't, you become one."
"I... I suppose I should go home then." said Scarlet, still in shock over losing her grandmother.
"I'll take you home. You'll be safe with me, don't worry. You can even leave your flowers here." The man reached out his hand, and Scarlet saw a fresh bite mark on his arm. "You've nothing to fear at all."