Thirteen: A Gothic Tale Inspired by Red Riding Hood

It is the worst time in all the year for wolves, but this strong-minded child insists she will go off through the wood.... Angela Carter

***

Thirteen girls were ready at winter's end. All in our thirteenth year, we waited to find out which one of us was to be awarded the red cloak. Time stood still while we stood in a ring around the moon dial.  The grandmothers sang and changed our positions at every thirteenth measure until the moon rose and cast the shadow of the dial, like a long pointing finger upon the chosen one.

Madame Silvanus had offered our threadbare village a great deal of money for one of us. The chosen girl was to live in splendor at her great mansion in the forest, wear gowns of colored silks and sparkling jewels, and attend Madame's magnificent midnight feasts. Madame did not reveal why she wanted one of us, only that she did not care about our common origins. Rather, she was looking for a girl with mysterious qualities that only the moon would know.

So there we were on that thirteenth day, at the mercy of the moon.

We thirteen watched the lengthening shadow of the moon dial's pointer with mounting fear, for everyone had heard the wild chants and howlings that blew through the forest in the night, had seen Madame shun the church as if it burned her, had watched her grow old and then, eerily, young again.

Thirteen girls of thirteen years stood in edgy silence around the moon dial, watching the shadows creep closer. Telepathic voices whispered our fears beneath the constant singing of the grandmothers. Shadows rippled through the budding trees, rustled the green shrubberies, padded across the clearings to glance at us, and move on. The moon looked over the wind-swept evergreens at the central stone of the dial, and cast its long bone of darkness.

A long red cloak was draped around my shoulders, the red hood pulled up and over my head.

*

Madame Silvanus sent payment to the village. It was my role to wear the red cloak and distribute the gifts of gold, silver, clothing, and sweetmeats to every house. I was to be petted and spoiled until flowers filled the trees. Then, I was to walk alone into the forest to the other side of a stream, there to await my patroness.

Friends came to warn me with stories of dark huntsmen, virgin sacrifices, and barbaric rituals. Some said Madame's mansion was guarded by wolves. I shivered in my bed every night after that, dreaming that wolves chased me over the stream, drawn by my smell and the redness of my cloak, fluid as blood spilling among the trees.

The moon beamed down, washing my windows with white brilliance. I heard them in the distance, howling down the night.

*

When the trees smelled of honey, I was sent alone into the forest. The long train of my cloak swept over last winter's leaves with a susurrus sound along a thin and winding path trodden centuries ago by hunters. On my arm was a basket, a gift from my mother to Madame of red roses, blood pudding, and blackberry wine.

Soon the trees grew unfriendly. Dark, tapering spires and long, tangled limbs crowded the boundaries of the path. Twilight brought owls and lowering gloom. Gurgling water alerted me to the nearness of the stream before I saw it rippling like a silver ribbon through the screen of trees. On the other side, an opulent carriage, pulled by three white horses, waited.

The driver wore a hat that obscured his face. A gust of wind opened the door, and I was suddenly inside, sitting against a blanket of grey-white fur. As we rattled off, darkness fell until all I could see were stars and the glittering night eyes of wolves racing along the ground. The path went steeply upward between banks of violet lupins before we drove into the forecourt of the mansion, a looming turreted darkness against billowing moonlit clouds.