This was my entry for the RDNA February contest "Fairytales Gone Horribly Wrong". Since RDNA seems to be no more, I'm not sure if they'll get around to judging the entries...but that's okay because that just means I get to share it here! It was also a short story challenge, so here's the short story I wrote to go along with it: Lara burst into her grandmother's cottage with a desperate shout. The heavy door slammed into the wall and the old hinges screamed into the night. "Grandmama!" Lara gripped her arm tighter, even though it worsened the pain. The hood of her cloak remained fastened to her hair but she'd wrapped the rest of it around her mangled bicep. "Grandmama, help!" The wolf had bitten her. She had tried to run but of course he was faster, stronger, and more cunning than she. Oh, it hurt. Everything hurt. The tang of her draining life stung her eyes and nose with an iron redness Lara feared she would never escape. What had he said to her? Lara reeled and staggered through the darkness and into her grandmother's modest parlor. What was it he had said? She fell against a little wooden side table and shouted again in pain. Her grandmother's porcelain knickknacks fell to the ground and shattered. 'Mine now,' he had hissed. 'Mine now.' Blood poured down Lara's arm in thick, velvet waterfalls, pulsing with the terrified tempo of her heartbeat. She thought to collapse onto the little sofa before her but had the wild, fleeting thought that her grandmother would be horrified to find it stained. 'Mine now. See you soon.' Her equilibrium betrayed her. The room tilted this way and then that way, until soon it was spinning and twisting like her brain had been caught in the coils of an angry serpent. Lara lost herself for a moment. What was she here for? She was hungry. She was thirsty. No, no, that wasn't right. Her arm was hurting. Someone had bitten...? Or had they not? Some drowning part of her suggested that a loved one might know. "Grandmama?" Lara forced herself through the madness though the effort brought her to her knees. Without the use of her wounded arm, she hobbled like a broken animal into her grandmother's bedroom. Her knees scraped across the knotted, wooden floor and bruised her from kneecap to ankle. She dragged herself as far as she dared and hung her head, too weary now to do more, too tired now to even stay awake. She yawned. Her little pink gums itched. "Grand...ma, where...?" Strong, male hands caressed her jaw and brought her eye to eye with a man whose eyes were the color of stardust and rain, silver and blue and black. "You look lost, Little Red," he purred. Lara nodded at him, her aching eyes saucers. That name. Little Red. Someone had called her that before. Someone had shouted it at her sometime today, or was it long ago? Sometime when she was running. When her arm hurt. "Do you know where you are?" Lara shook her head. Her every breath threatened to choke her. He smelled like fire and full moons. She liked that smell. He was a loved one. She licked her lips. "Here," the wonderful man whispered, voice low and conspiratorial, like a lover's. "This way, Little Red." He helped her to her feet and brought her to the bed. The sheets were wet with some delicious, red dessert, and a mangled body lay upon them. Lara needed no further instruction. She dove into her meal until her stomach went warm with a buzzing, drunken contentment she'd never known she'd needed. Lara went to wipe the blood from her mouth but stopped short when the back of her hand brushed against the emerging fur on her cheek. She fingered it briefly, wondering, and used her tongue to fish out bits of flesh from between her teeth. She was changing and she found she could see far better now. She glanced at her friend. He was changing too. "Mine now." He grinned. -- Outside Credits - Kybele Hair by 3Dream and Mairy on DAZ Ron's Milk by deviney on DAZ Follow me on Facebook for artwork, before and afters, tutorials, livestreaming and more! https://www.facebook.com/RehnaysArtwork/