Rosie & The Forest King (7 of 9)
Grandmother's House
IN THE MORNING, Rosie did as Luke had suggested. She took her time, despite Dan scampering about, urging her on.
“Grandmother’s cottage is just up here,” he said. “Just a short way.”
But Rosie wandered slowly, studying the gnarled trees. Rather than marching in a straight line, she meandered, drifting toward the shadows on one side of the path, then to the other.
“We’re awfully close to the trees,” Dan muttered. “I’d feel more comfortable if you sang Over the River and Through the Woods. It’s always helpful when you do.”
She stared at Dan, perturbed that he was brining it up again. Defiantly, she sang something else. But this time, it was her own song:
No more rivers, no more snow, No more roads that I must go. I’ve sung the songs and tales of yore, I shall not sing them anymore. No careful, curated song to sing, Just joyful truth that ever rings. I’ll hum a tune that’s only mine— No path, no call, no borrowed line. I need no map, no star to guide. For I shall travel far and wide. The song I sing is made of will— And I am singing, singing still.
Dan watched her as she sang and, under his breath, said, “Oh, bother.”
As Rosie approached the edge of the trees, she grabbed a stick from the forest floor and tapped it along the edge, searching for traps that Karl might have set.
She stopped singing and listened.
“What are you listening to?” Dan asked, rubbing his paws together in apparent worry.
“I can’t listen to anything if you’re talking, Dan. Quiet—and listen to the trees. There are whispers.”
“Whispers?” Dan asked. “They must be ghosts.”
“I don’t know,” Rosie said. “But they’re asking how long. How long until they are free. I wonder who wants to be free—and what they want to be free from.”
“Probably nothing,” Dan said quickly. “Let’s go onward. It’s just around this bend.”
Rosie stepped back to the center of the path, then turned to look at him.
Dan stopped too, glancing up at her. If he’d had a hat, he’d be holding it in his paws.
“You’re more than just familiar with Grandmother, aren’t you?” Rosie asked. “You know the way. You’ve been here before.”
Dan hesitated. “Err… yes. Well, all hares know Grandmother. She’s very famous in these parts.”
“Famous for what?” Rosie asked, resuming her pace.
“She’s very good with poetry,” Dan said nervously. “Much the same way you are. And as you know, all hares are fans of poetry. So we’re naturally inclined to enjoy spending time with her… from time to time.”
“So, you visit her often?”
“I do,” Dan said quickly. “It just so happens I was heading here myself, which is why I’m traveling with you.”
Rosie stopped again.
“I’m not sure I should go on,” she said. “Maybe I’ll turn around and go home. Or somewhere else entirely. Why bother staying on the road at all? I could walk straight through this forest.”
“There are wolves!” Dan cried, hiding behind her leg.
“There is one wolf,” Rosie said. “And he will not harm me.”
“You don’t know that,” Dan replied. “The werewolf even said he can’t control the beast that comes out at night.”
“He will not harm me,” Rosie said again, with quiet certainty. “I know it.”
“How do you know?”
She turned, eyes steady. “Because he loves me.”
Dan scampered on ahead, saying, "No. No. Silly girl. He's only seen you like twice. That's not love. Not what Shakespeare talked about at all."
"What do you know of these things?" she asked as she caught up to him. "You said you only have girlfriends in the spring and didn't have a wife and didn't care for one."
"I said I do get lonely sometimes," Dan said. "But you get used to it."
"Some of us don't get used to it," Rosie said.
"Well, I know it's not love," Dan said. "You don't just love someone after you see them twice."
"I'll admit," Rosie said, walking along the path, "That it would be highly unusual, and it might not be very deep; but I believe that you must start somewhere."
"Maybe," Dan said, looking as forlorn as a hare can look. "There might have been a time…"
"What does that mean?" she asked.
"Oh, look!" Dan said, changing subjects, "Grandmother's house!"
Rosie looked. It was nothing at all like she had expected. Not a quaint little cottage. Not a gingerbread house like in fairy tales, more like a run-down old castle. Cold stone choked with vines. It didn't look very pleasant in its current state, although it might have been magnificent in the past.
"This is where Grandmother lives?"
Dan opened his mouth to say something and then stopped as an old woman exited from a rickety door at the base of a tower.
"My dear, sweet child!" she said, Her voice was like honey. "Rosie Red," and she sang, like rippled water, about how her sweet Granddaughter had come Over the River and Through the Woods to find her. It made Rosie feel all warm inside.
"Forgive me child," Grandmother said, embracing her in surprisingly strong bony arms. "Because of certain bandits in these parts, I must disguise my home to look like this run-down castle."
Grandmother hummed more of the song, and Rosie felt safe.
"Let me dispel this illusion so you can see it as it really is!" Grandmother said, happily.
She sang:
Hey diddle diddle, The cat and the fiddle, The cow jumped over the moon. The little dog laughed to see such sport, And the dish ran away with the spoon.
Rosie, feeling warm and safe, was barely aware of what Grandmother was saying. She faintly remembered it was a rhyme of absurdity, used for making illusions. Grandmother must have sung it in a minor key to dispel the illusion.
But Rosie thought no more about it as the false edifice of a cold old castle faded. She blinked as the cold stone faded before her eyes. The vines slithered away like retreating snakes, the cracks in the tower smoothed, and the air warmed with the scent of wildflowers and cinnamon.
In place of the castle stood a quaint, picture-book cottage. Its roof was thatched in golden straw that gleamed in the sunlight like spun sugar. The windows glowed with amber light, each one framed by flower boxes spilling with bright red geraniums and bluebells that swayed in a breeze Rosie could not feel.
The door was painted a perfect cherry red, just slightly ajar, as if it had been waiting for her all along. A neat cobblestone path wound its way to the entrance, flanked by mushroom rings and perfectly trimmed hedges shaped like rabbits and foxes—though none of them quite matched the natural asymmetry of real creatures.
The air hummed faintly with birdsong, but it looped strangely, like a lullaby that couldn’t find its last note. Everything smelled too sweet—like rosewater and honey and the barest trace of nutmeg.
It was lovely. It was warm. It was exactly what a lost child might dream of.
Dan, for his part, ran around Grandmother's legs, almost like a cat. Then, he sat down in the corner of the room and began reading in Macbeth—the passage about "something wicked this way comes."
Grandmother took her hand.
“Come, child,” she said sweetly. “Welcome home.”
Rosie entered the cottage with Grandmother, and it was just as splendid inside, smelling of blueberries and gingerbread and the wafting scent of a turkey in the oven that would pair well with the pumpkin pie.
Grandmother showed her to her room. Her own room, with a canopy bed and stuffed animals, soft transluscent white curtains and a sky blue ceiling with a rainbow.
"You must be very tired, my child," Grandmother said. "Take a rest now in your comfy bed. Just rest."
She sang:
Rock-a-bye baby, on the treetop, When the wind blows, the cradle will rock.
Rosie did, feeling a little tired. More than she had expected.
"Thank you, Grandmother," she said. "It's so nice here."
"It is, isn't it?" Grandmother smiled.
Rosie looked at her through the dim fog of tiredness. Grandmother looked like she wasn't particularly well. She wondered if this was the way with Grandmothers. Her eyes bulged out a little bit, yellow and shining.
Rosie blinked. "Grandmother, why do your eyes shine like that? They're so..big and bright, like they see everything."
Grandmother, who was still humming Over the River, paused and said. "To watch over you, dear."
That made Rosie feel safe as Grandmother hummed a lovely tune.
"But Grandmother," she said. "Why does your nose move like that? It's… pointy, like it's sniffing something."
"To smell your pumpkin pie, child." Another hum, and Rosie's shoulders eased, though her fingers fidgeted.
Dan hopped up on Grandmother's shoulder. "I see you've met my familiar, dear child. And well done Daniel."
Grandmother’s mouth stretched, lipless, teeth jagged.
Rose said, “Your mouth looks… different. Why’s it so thin, like it’s hiding something?”
“To sing you songs.”
Over the River swelled, and Rosie swayed, but her brow furrowed.
The old woman’s ears, pointed, shifted. “Why are your ears so sharp? They’re… pointy, like they hear things far away.”
“To listen to your voice.”
Rosie nodded, but paused, uneasy.
Grandmother tucked her into bed, tightly tucked, to keep her safe. The old woman used the soft curtains to wrap around Rosie's wrists, one on each side.
"To make you safe," Grandmother said, smiling.
"Ow!" Rosie said suddenly. "You scratched me. You really need to cut your fingernails?"
"I keep them long to better hold you, my dear," said Grandmother who continued humming.
Rose smiled and then, for the first time, noticed that Grandmother was wearing a beautiful tiara, dropping into the center of her forehead was a glowing orb.
"So pretty. But your humming sounds funny,” Rosie said, voice small. “Why’s it so… heavy, like it’s pulling me?”
“Just an old tune, sing with me!”
Grandmother’s orb pulsed, and Rosie joined, eyes glazing.
The cottage dimmed, walls creaking.
“Why’s your house so… dark? Your eyes and hands don’t match this place.”
“Just old bones, rest now,” Grandmother sang, Hush, Little Baby. Her tiara flared, orb bright. Rosie closed her eyes. Weariness overtaking here.
Runes glowed green. A throne—roots, iron, vines—bound her wrists.
An orb above hummed, linked to the tiara.
“Your soul’s my youth,” Grandmother whispered.
Rosie was almost asleep. She wanted to struggle, but she was exhasted.
“Fourteen granddaughters have nourished me. One every sixteen years.”
“My parents had more children?” she asked sleepily.
“Oh, dearie. They aren’t your parents. They are my sisters!”
“Sisters?” Rosie couldn’t understand what Grandmother meant.
A roar shook the chamber. Luke—fur black, eyes human, jaw wolf-stretched—tore in, claws slashing vines. “Hags!” he snarled, voice warping. “A coven of hags! You are a soul for her orb! Rosie! Wake up!”
The tiara dimmed; vines slackened.
Rosie blinked as the facade fell away.
The light shifted.
The golden thatch dulled to ash.
The windows dimmed, then vanished.
The cherry-red door splintered, swallowed by the stone.
And Grandmother—sweet-voiced, honey-eyed Grandmother—stood taller than before.
Too tall.
Her back hunched beneath the folds of a cloak that now hung like dead leaves. Her arms, once warm and smooth, were thin as broom handles, veined and bent. Her nails—no longer lacquered and neat—curled like claws, yellowed and cracked.
The skin of her face peeled back the illusion with it. What had passed for wrinkles were now gnarled creases, carved deep like bark. Her lips had vanished altogether, revealing jagged grey teeth that jutted in all directions like broken fenceposts. Her tongue flicked, forked at the tip, tasting the air as though testing Rosie’s fear.
Her eyes bulged wide, lidless and wet, glowing the color of rotting limes. They moved too fast. Darting. Searching. Listening.
The orb in her tiara pulsed green, but the tiara was no longer silver. It was bone. Human, perhaps. Its points rose like fingerbones crowned in rusted copper.
She opened her mouth to speak, and her voice was no longer honey—it was wet stone, grinding syllables that had once belonged to music.
Grandmother laughed. “Truth buries you, boy! Her soul’s mine, like others!”
Rosie began to sing, but the hag was quicker.
Hush little baby, Don't say a word, Gramma gonna buy you A mocking bird.
Rosie’s throat burned, the rhyme dying on her tongue at the first word of the hag’s rhyme. She was mute.
Luke roared, “She’s free!” claws longer, hands fading.
“The wolf wins!” the hag spat.
Thorns pierced Luke’s flank, blood matting fur. His eyes flickered—human, wolf, human.
"Rosie!" he said, gasping, growling. "Rosie!" again. "Roselyn—" and then his voice became just a growl.
Luke was gone. Only the black wolf remained.
And he lept at Rosie, baring his fangs.
Stephen B. Anthony is the author of Transmigrant, an epic science fiction thriller, available on both Amazon and Audible. The first seven chapters are available on this website for free.