Ditched Cheating Alpha, I Led My Daughter to Life's Peak novel Chapter 27

She found her grandmother was so sick she had taken to her bed and fallen into a fretful sleep, moaning and shaking so that the child guessed she had a fever. She felt the forehead, it burned. She shook out the cloth from her basket, to use it to make the old woman a cold compress, and the wolf's paw fell to the floor.

But it was no longer a wolf's paw. It was a hand, chopped off at the wrist, a hand toughened with work and freckled with old age... she knew it for her grandmother's hand.

She pulled back the sheet...

There was a bloody stump where her grandmother's right hand should have been, festering already.

The child crossed herself and cried out so loud the neighbours heard her and come rushing in...

They drove the old woman, in her shift as she was, out into the snow with sticks, beating her old carcass as far as the edge of the forest, and pelted her with stones until she fell dead.

Now the child lived in her grandmother's house; she prospered."

That's what we talk about in English, our teacher teary eyed at the story, but it doesn't stop there.

After we talk about calculating district boundaries in Math, and the start of the Swiss werewolf witch trials in History, I decide to consult my sources. Alvin and the Chipmunks is basically a primary source, so I start there.

Alvin knew what he was talking about when he cried wolf. His brothers and family members held him back, but if they had just believed him when he said it, little Theodore wouldn't have been infected in the first place.

My heart stops when I think of Charlie and the way those brothers were looking at Megan. They probably want to force them into their pack!

"Are you alright?" Carson asks at my side in Art, the final class of the day. It's more like the art of political strategy.

Carson looks worried. I bet he is. I've caught you red handed.

"Is something wrong?" he asks.

I shake my head, eyebrows drawn. I narrow my eyes. "I'm fine." I look up at him, even though we're both sitting. I stare.

He looks taken aback, but I don't stop. I have to see this for myself. I wouldn't say they're an unnatural color, his eyes. They're just really golden as far as amber go. Him and his brothers are tall, but not so tall that it couldn't naturally occur in society. And this town is in the middle of some pretty historical lands, so a bit of folklore every now and then isn't so outlandish.

Not as outlandish as jumping to the conclusion that an entire town is full of werewolves with a primary source being an animated children's movie. I shake my head, still watching him. This guy is not a werewolf.

"Why are you staring at me?" he asks, crossing his arms. I think I see the slightest hint of red across his cheeks.

I shake my head. "No reason."