Snow White and Rose Red- The Curse of the Huntsman Read online

  “Mother still thinks us children. She needs our help. With Alice missing and Lavender and Hazel accusing me, what if the villagers begin to suspect the truth about our family?”

  “We can’t let that happen. They’d burn us as witches. Well, I guess they’d have to come up with something else for you,” Snow pointed out.

  “I’m not eager for them to try. We’ve got to find the beast and end these attacks,” I concluded. “Besides, this is our chance to show Mother that we’re capable of helping. Do you really want her out there alone facing whatever it is that’s after us?”

  “No,” Snow admitted. “I would feel much better if she let us help.”

  “This is our chance to show her what we’re capable of, before she returns. She told us to protect each other. Right now we need to protect each other from Hazel and Lavender’s accusations by taking matters into our own hands.”

  “And how are we going to do that?”

  I smiled. “With a trap.”

  Chapter 9: The Kiss – Snow White

  Rose’s plan was a good one, and after a few minutes of talking it through and making adjustments, neither of us could find any problems with it. The plan did not require us to take action until the night fell—in any case, the beast never appeared before then, anyway—so we returned to the briars for the rest of the afternoon to pick our roses.

  “I guess we don’t really need to be scrambling to pick these anymore,” I told Rose, holding up a flower.

  “Because you’re planning to sell yourself to Latham.”

  I swatted at her with the flower. “Don’t be dramatic.”

  “You’re the one so intent on sacrificing herself,” Rose said with an indignant sniff as she reached through the briars to lift up a branch. “In any case, until I think it’s a good idea, I’m going to keep picking roses. So I’m off to the rabbit trails.”

  “Until nightfall, then,” I told her as she disappeared from my sight.

  I went about picking roses with a renewed energy, as though if I picked enough roses this one day I’d free myself from Latham’s offer.

  Part of me knew that it was useless—with my mother gone, it would be impossible to even make up for the roses she would have picked, much less increase our family fortune. But still I kept on. It was better than the alternative of simply accepting it.

  I had already gone up and down the hill a dozen times when I ran into the Huntsman. I had a full basket and had just made my way around a twist in the road when he crashed into me on his way down.

  I spilled to the ground, roses going everywhere.

  The Huntsman kept his footing but staggered back, wincing while his hand went to his bandaged side.

  “I’m sorry,” I said instantly. “I’ve hurt you.”

  The Huntsman shook his head, looking almost amused. “I knock you to the ground and you’re sorry.”

  He reached down a hand to help me up and I took it. When our fingers touched, my heart leaped. I looked up into his eyes and saw him staring at where our skin met.

  “Thank you,” I whispered, reluctantly pulling my hand away from him and bending to pick up the roses that had fallen.

  Without a word, he knelt to help, his fingers fumbling over the roses as he tried to treat them with care. There was so much that separated us. I hardly knew him, but I could not help feeling that I should. But soon my life wouldn’t be my own and it would be too late.

  “Latham Rosewood intends to make me his bride,” I said suddenly.

  The Huntsman froze, a rose bud clutched in his hand as he turned to me. “Then you are spoken for,” he said angrily.

  “He isn’t who I would choose,” I said quickly, my hand going to his arm.

  He shook me off. “Why tell me this?”

  “There is something in you that calls to me,” I said, knowing the words didn’t fully make sense. “I want to be near you. I want to hear your voice. I can’t explain it.”

  I was frustrated now, feeling even more hopeless as he pulled away from me.

  “You mock me,” he said.

  “You can’t feel it?” I demanded, beyond caring about propriety.

  “What are you talking about?” he asked stiffly, turning away from me.

  I darted around him so that he still had to face me. “Do you feel nothing for me?” I asked, tears now threatening in my eyes. I touched my fingers to his hand, feeling a shiver shoot up my arm. “When we touch, you don’t feel—”

  Suddenly, he pushed me away, and in his eyes for the first time I saw something strong and burning.

  I did not think. I threw my arms around him and pressed my lips to his. I could feel his shock run through him, frozen disbelief melting and giving way, finally, to passion. He lifted me in his arms, kissing me back and holding me tight enough to make me gasp.

  Just as suddenly, he pushed me away.

  “You should stay away from me,” he said. “You should go far from this place.”

  “What are you saying?” I searched his face, trying to understand.

  “Go, Snow White,” he said, turning away. “Before it’s too late.”

  And then he left me standing there surrounded by roses, out of breath, and lost about what he could possibly mean.

  Chapter 10: The Trap – Rose Red

  The trap was a good idea. As the darkness settled in around us, I told myself that Mother would be proud and not furious when she returned.

  “This seemed like a better idea before the sun went down,” Snow muttered.

  “Quiet!” I hissed, glancing up above me where Snow was hidden in the boughs of a tree. “If this beast wants to hunt magic, we’ll give it magic.”

  We were near where we’d found Alice’s cloak. I knelt by the stream while Snow perched above me. There were dry, dead weeds around me, and I picked at one of them idly, pulling the pieces apart and thinking of what Hazel and Lavender had said.

  Much of the night was waiting, but after about an hour, I heard the same low, terrifying growl that I’d heard the night before.

  Fear shot through me, but I tried to push it away. I looked up slowly, seeing the glowing red eyes and glistening teeth of the beast in the darkness a few feet away.

  Wait, I thought to myself. Don’t panic. I stayed where I was as the beast took slow, steady steps towards me. It snarled and snapped its teeth. I winced back but refused to budge.

  Even angrier now, the beast lunged forward at me, landing just in front of me.

  There was no more time for waiting. I called up all the anger I had been saving and thrust my hands into the dry weeds we’d spread all around the clearing.

  In an instant, the ground ignited and the flames swept the clearing.

  The beast gave a yelp and dove for the only place not on fire—the stream.

  The instant the beast’s paws were in the water, there was a crackling sound as frost shot through the stream. Strings of ice crept up its legs, locking it in place.

  The beast howled and thrashed, but the ice held. Up close, it was even more frightening than I’d first believed. Its eyes rolled to me, its teeth still snapping.

  Snow slipped down from the branches of the tree. “Well. We’ve caught your beast.”

  “And now to slay it,” I said, picking up the dagger that I’d brought with me.

  The beast’s eyes went wide, as though it had understood. It shook its head, trying even harder to free itself.

  “Do you think… it understood me?” I asked, turning to Snow.

  “Red, I can’t hold this ice forever,” Snow said, her hands clenched.

  “Right.” I took another step forward, the knife outstretched.

  Suddenly, the beast’s skin seemed to ripple. I froze. The fur heaved and suddenly was pulled inward. There was a snapping sound as bones and flesh shifted, and then suddenly there was no longer a beast in front of me, but a man. And not just any man, but William.

  And… I averted my eyes. Not just William, but William without his clothes.
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  “Well,” he said. “This is embarrassing.”

  His hands and feet were as trapped in the ice as the beast’s paws had been.

  “You’re the beast,” Snow said levelly. “You’re the one that hunted down Alice.”

  “No!” William said forcefully. “That wasn’t me.”

  “Then why were you in the dark forest last night where she disappeared?” Snow demanded.

  “I was there to protect you. Both of you.”

  I recalled what the Huntsman had said, about how the beast had been about to attack him. I quickly explained what I had overheard.

  “Rose, I told you to stay away from the strangers,” William said, sounding frustrated and furious and as serious as he could while being completely naked and frozen in the ice in front of us.

  “Sometimes telling Rose not to do something is as good as giving her an order to do it,” Snow said with a laugh.

  “Could you please let me go, Snow? I don’t know how you’re doing this, but it’s damned uncomfortable.”

  “I’m sorry, Will. But you’re a Were. How do we know we can trust you? You looked ready to pounce on us last night.”

  “Not on you! On the Huntsman. I would never hurt either of you, ever. Rose, you should know that. Like I said, I was only attacking to protect you from the Huntsman.”

  “What makes you think we needed protecting from him?”

  “There’s something not right about him. I can smell it on him.”

  “The Huntsman has been nothing but kind and you want us to let you go because you’re sure there’s something wrong with the Huntsman because you can smell it?” Snow put her hands on her hips. “Sure.”

  I could tell that Snow was not about to listen to anyone speaking against the Huntsman. I recalled what I’d seen in the mirror. “There is something strange about that group of travelers,” I said. “But it may not be the Huntsman who is at fault. It could be Shell who has a more sinister purpose, or someone else entirely who is traveling with them.”

  “What do you mean?” Snow asked.

  “I saw someone else with them… Another person. She was older and terrible. She looked like a witch. I’ve never seen her with them other than when I spied on them at the Rosewood manor.”

  “Maybe this witch cast a spell on the three of them,” William suggested.

  “The Huntsman has done nothing for us to suspect him,” Snow said stubbornly.

  I wasn’t sure I trusted the Huntsman as much as Snow did, but it was clear there was nothing to be done about that. On the other hand, I also couldn’t fully believe that William would be responsible for taking Alice’s life. “What are we going to do with him, Snow?”

  “This was your brilliant plan,” Snow reminded me.

  “I thought we were hunting a beast! We’d just… Dispatch it… And take home the carcass.”

  “So you’re going to kill me?” he asked.

  “No,” I said immediately. “Of course not. Not now that we know who you really are. Snow, we couldn’t do that. Not unless we’re sure.”

  “Ask your mother,” William suddenly said. “She knows the truth.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She’s known about me since I was born.” William shook his head. “I mean, think about it. I’ve been changing into this beast my whole life. Why would I attack someone now?”

  “I think he’s telling the truth,” I said. “Besides, he’s got a point. It’s not like we can just kill him without proof.”

  “The second we let him go, he can shift again. And then what are we going to do?”

  I frowned. That was a problem. Some part of me wanted to trust William, but he had kept a terrible secret from us. He was the beast that I’d spent so many nights fearing. How could he possibly be the same boy that brought us firewood to keep away the cold? One was an act, the other his true face—but there was no way to know which was which.

  Still, that did not mean we could let him freeze to death. I had an idea. “What if we wait until we’re a safe distance away to let him go? We can be back to the village before he’d be able to come after us.”

  “And then?”

  “We ask Mother. She’ll return tomorrow morning. If he’s telling the truth, she’ll know.”

  Chapter 11: The Book – Snow White

  We waited a day, and then another and another. We didn’t know where our mother had intended to go, but she had promised to be back the following morning, so something was clearly wrong.

  Each day the roses around the village withered more and more. The festivities were thrown into chaos as everyone raced to collect the remaining blooms before they died. Rose and I should have been working harder than ever, but it was impossible to do so when our Mother was missing.

  “Mother should be back by now,” I said finally on the morning of the fourth day, giving voice to what we were both worrying over.

  Rose’s voice was barely a whisper when she asked, “You don’t think… That she’s in trouble?”

  “It’s possible,” I admitted reluctantly. “I can’t imagine that anything else would keep her from us. Have you noticed the roses changing?”

  “Of course,” Rose said. “They’re dying faster than usual.”

  “Rose, Mother’s magic is what gives the flowers life. She is why they grow around the village. Without her, they’re withering. She would never let that happen. She’s guarded the secret too carefully for people to realize that she is the cause of the roses. Something must be very wrong.”

  Rose smacked her hand down. “Then it’s time we do something.”

  “We need to be cautious.”

  “We’ve been cautious, Snow! Now we need to do something. Mother could be out there, hurt or in trouble, and we’re just sitting here doing nothing!”

  “We don’t know enough to help.”

  “Didn’t Mother ever tell you anything that might lead us to where she is?”

  “No, she never spoke of anything to me,” I said, frustration filling my voice. It had always stung that my mother didn’t trust me to be a part of the magical world that she lived in.

  “Think. Any detail would help.”

  I collapsed by the hearth, gazing at the embers and searching my memory. “There’s a place, somewhere, where people like us are gathered. People who can use magic. Mother said that when we were old enough, once we’d proven that we weren’t a danger to those around us, we’d all go to live there. Where it would be safe. And until then, we had to hide from the monsters.”

  “Is that where Mother went?”

  I shrugged helplessly. “There’s no way to know for sure… But maybe there’s a way to at least get more information. Mother’s tomes.”

  “Yes!” Rose leapt up at the idea.

  “Wait. Maybe we shouldn’t. Mother forbid us from looking at them until we’re old enough to control our magic.”

  “Our magic is what’s gotten Mother in trouble. If we don’t learn all we can right now, we won’t be able to help her.”

  I started to argue that we didn’t even know for certain that Mother was in trouble, but some part of me knew that she would never leave us for this long in such danger if she weren’t in peril.

  “All right, Rose,” I said instead. “But we must be careful.”

  There were three tomes that we pulled out from beneath Mother’s bed. One bound in scarlet, one in a deep blue, and a third in black.

  Rose opened the scarlet tome first. She squinted at the pages with such concentration that I leaned over her shoulder to see.

  “What is this?” she asked me.

  I looked over the drawings and the tiny, hand-written explanations beside them. I flipped through the pages. Each contained an illustration of a scene with some notes accompanying it.

  One had a knife with an intricate handle in the shape of a dragon. Beside it, there was a tableau of a man wielding it and a lash of flame coming out from his other hand. Written beside it was the scrawled words: The Dra
gon Blade, imbues the wielder with fire magic in short bursts.

  The next page showed an ornate amulet set in a cage of twisting metal snakes. Beside it there was a illustration of a woman wearing the amulet as two men attacked her. Behind her, one man brought a sword down on it, snapping the sword in half. In front of her, the woman was sinking her teeth into the shoulder of another man as he flailed at her with a dagger. The Amulet of Vipers makes the wearer invincible and venomous.

  “I think this is a listing of magical items,” I said.

  Rose tilted her head. “That seems useful. I mean, it would be more useful if we actually had any of these items… But this could help, I suppose.” She flipped quickly through the book.

  “What are you looking for?” I asked.

  “This!” Rose stopped on a page in the middle, her finger on the item.

  The page showed a cracked mirror in a rich frame. A handsome man stood before the mirror, but in the reflection there was a snarling wolf. The Mirror of Truth shows true forms and reveals spells.

  “Why that one?” I asked, thinking that the Amulet of Vipers would be more helpful to us at this point.

  “Because I’ve seen it,” Rose whispered. “It was in the Rosewood’s manor, Shell and her family had brought it. I looked into it, Snow. I saw someone cross in front of it.” Rose swallowed. I’d never seen her look so worried. “It wasn’t another person, Snow. It must have been Shell’s reflection that I saw. To think that she’s been hiding that…”

  “What did you see in it that terrified you so?”

  “Evil.”

  Rose and I stayed up late into the night reading through the first tome. When we finally went to bed, I’d fallen asleep as soon as my head came to rest on my pillow. The next thing I knew, I heard my name being called from outside the cottage.

  “Snow White!”

  When I first heard the sound of him call my name, I hesitated, tempted to make him call it out again just so I could savor the sound of it coming off of his lips. But then, I was too eager to see him, too eager to find out what brought him to me when I was always the one running to him.