Snowred Series Book 1: Snowred
Author
C. Swallow
Reads
628K
Chapters
32
Wish
ELLIE
The clouds over the Ice Valley are thick with menace, swollen and low like they might drop from the sky and swallow the world whole.
But thereās no freak storm outside to rival the one building in my chest, created by this dark twist of fate.
The Law Tellerās words still ring in my ears, though he left ten minutes agoāor was it longer? I canāt tell. Time has lost all meaning. Only the weight of the letter in my hand feels real.
My adopted family is deadāthe lot of them.
Gone in an avalanche while traveling to their holiday cabin in the luxurious part of the Kingdom of Almaāthe Queenās territory. Their sleigh was found broken and halfburied along the cliffās edge.
Gone are the slaps for being too slow. The cold dinners while everyone else ate their fill. The silence when I cried. The bruises. The names. The years spent learning how to disappear into corners.
The letter suggests that it was an unfortunate accidentāa tragedy.
But I can read between the lines. And signatures.
Itās the blood-smeared writing at the bottom that sticks with me. Scribbled in a shaky hand, the ink blurred by what I know was panic.
I often saw that kind of fearāin the mirror, at their dinner table, behind closed doors.
The Law Teller didnāt offer sympathy. Just handed over the notice and a key.
āWhen the grieving ends,ā he said flatly, āyou might want to dress for your station. Youāre the Lady of this homestead now, Ellie.ā
Then he left, pulling his coat tight and shutting the door behind him like he couldnāt get away fast enough.
I collapse into the rocking chair by the fire, where Iād been knitting socks out of necessityāno one ever gave me anything.
The wood cabin holds the basics. Enough to live, not to live well.
The fire crackles softly. Outside, snow whispers against the windows. But I canāt seem to move.
Whenever I feel this kind of panic or the pressing weight of despair that can only come from death, I retreat into the recesses of my mind.
My safe place is a centuries-old story that became my oasis when I was consumed with this particular dread.
As a child, my favorite folktale was Snowred.
Everyone in the Valley knows it. It was about Queen Myrageās most prized Knight, a man called Snow.
He could shift into a ferocious white wolf, massive and silent, his coat blending into the drifts like camouflage, so no one ever saw him coming.
He was the Queenās weaponāsent after her enemies, always returning with a heart.
The jealous Queen next door.
The bakerās wife.
The maid.
Anyone who dared outshine her beauty or threaten her ruleā
Snow would do her bidding, then return with their hearts.
The part of the story I loved the most was the ending.
Snow had a secret family who had been exiled from the Queenās territory for reasons no one knew.
But heād been fighting for them all along, providing for his child and ailing wife.
When the Queen discovered his secret mission, she tested his loyalty by ordering him to kill his family.
After all, heād still have the Queenās affection in the end.
Instead, Snow betrayed the Queen and tried to kill her.
She was too strong, and Snow was left scarred from her feline claws.
Ashamed of his disfigured face, he vanished into the woods, hidden away in the coldest parts of the Ice Valley.
What became of his wife and childāno one knows.
This story was hundreds of years old.
I hated the Queen, still alive today, reigning over us allā¦
But I loved the tale of the warrior who fought for his family.
I grew up in the Ice Valley. I saw Snow when I was a child.
He saved my life.
At leastā¦I like to imagine he did.
Ten years have passed.
Iām twenty now.
But Iāll never forget the middle of winter, when I was ten and sold to be a house slave to an aristocratic family.
My loving family had died while out of the Valley on business.
After that, everything turned to mistānot from grief, but something stranger, thicker than sorrow.
My earliest memories float just out of reach, locked in a fog Iāve never been able to lift.
All I knew was that I had no one. Nothing.
And so, I was made into the neighborās workhorse.
I had a roof over my head, but it was hell being their burden.
One night, after a broken dish earned me a bruise across the face, I slipped out barefoot into the snow. I didnāt care what happened. I just wanted it to end.
I walked until my feet went numb and my legs gave out.
Thatās when I saw itāhim.
A white wolf, three times the size of any Iād ever seen or heard of.
Silent. Still. Watching me.
I closed my eyes, certain I was about to die from a vicious bite.
And you know what happened?
I woke up the next morning in my bed. Warm. Safe. No explanation.
To this day, Iām still unsure whether it was real or just a dream.
But I needed it to be.
I started to believe in him. Not just the wolf, but the man. The protector. The one who stepped in when no one else would.
Because I clung to the belief that Snow had saved me.
I anxiously waited for the day life would bring me another small miracle to ease my suffering. The day that he might return.
In the years that followed, I survived on the kindness of village folk.
A baker who gave me free treats. A seamstress who taught me to stitch. Children who played with me in secret, so that they could sneak me extra food when my new family wasnāt looking.
Tiny signs that the world wasnāt all cruel.
I felt like a secret princess of the town.
But I never stopped dreaming about Snow. Not the fairytale version, but my version.
In my dreams, he looked the same, scarred but strong. Heād come back for me, knock on the door with frost still clinging to his shoulders, and tell me he wanted to keep me safe and make me his new wife.
There are rumors. Whispers. Stories in hushed tones about a white shadow in the woods.
The kind of stories you only believe in if youāve already seen him. And I canāt help but wonder if he is the reason they are all dead.
Is it possible that he saved me twice?
So I pack a bag.
Because if Snow is realāand if he did thisāI need to look him in the eye.
I donāt know if I want to thank him. Or scream at him. Or beg him to stay.
But I have to find him. And if I walk out here into the snow, I may attract his attention.
Iād rather search for him than sit in that rocking chair, chasing endless circles of what-ifs and maybes.
Heās saved me out in the wild once beforeāmaybe heāll do it again.
So here I go. I leave my home behind, a thin curl of smoke rising from the chimney as I cross into the trees. The cold bites harder here. The light doesnāt reach the forest floor.
Everything smells like frozen bark and pine and something faintlyā¦ feral.
The deeper I walk, the more signs I seeā
Broken branches snapped high, as if by something taller than a bear, footprints dissolving into claw prints.
Heās out here. I just know it.
I walk until my legs ache, until the moon is pale above the trees. Then I stop.
I build a fire, hands shaking more from anticipation than cold. I eat a strip of dried meat and force myself to sip water, but I canāt sleep.
My heart is too loud, my thoughts too sharp.
What if heās changed?
What if Iāve made it all up?
At some point, exhaustion wins. I curl beneath my cloak, the fire crackling low, and drift into a fitful sleep filled with white wolves and sharp claws.
And then I wake.
Not to sound. Not to movement.
But to the overwhelming sense that I am not alone.
I blink against the firelight, the hairs on my arms lifting before I fully understand why.
Someoneās here.
The wind howls behind him, but he doesnāt flinch.
A man.
His shadow looms just beyond the edge of the fireātall, still, silent.
And then I see it.
A thick lock of white-blond hair.
Snow.
He doesnāt speak.
Neither do I.
Because every story Iāve ever told myself is standing right in front of me, watching.
Like he never left.
