Dante's Heart
Donna Burgess
The Wolf at the Door
He was scratching.
The old woman could hear his nails tearing at the wood--claws creating thin,
ragged grooves in the rain-swollen floor. It was a grating sound. Made her
flesh crawl, imagining nails bent back and torn.
“Let me in, you,” he screamed in a voice thick with saliva. “I’ll gobble you up
like so much rabbit meat. You will be a tastier morsel than that little thing in
the red cloak.”
Enraged, the old woman threw back her door—and the man fell into the
cabin, naked, drooling, hands bloody at the tips of the fingers, feet bloody
at the heels from the wild run through the forest.
“Old flesh is tougher than you know,” she hissed.
In an instant she had lopped away his shaggy head, sent it across the fire-lit
cabin, leaving a wide ribbon of scarlet on her floor. She then removed her
skirts, even her leather-dry old woman skin and left it all in a neat heap on
the hearth.
The ancient grey wolf feasted well on the night of the full moon.
The Wolf at the Door
He was scratching.
The old woman could hear his nails tearing at the wood--claws creating thin,
ragged grooves in the rain-swollen floor. It was a grating sound. Made her
flesh crawl, imagining nails bent back and torn.
“Let me in, you,” he screamed in a voice thick with saliva. “I’ll gobble you up
like so much rabbit meat. You will be a tastier morsel than that little thing in
the red cloak.”
Enraged, the old woman threw back her door—and the man fell into the
cabin, naked, drooling, hands bloody at the tips of the fingers, feet bloody
at the heels from the wild run through the forest.
“Old flesh is tougher than you know,” she hissed.
In an instant she had lopped away his shaggy head, sent it across the fire-lit
cabin, leaving a wide ribbon of scarlet on her floor. She then removed her
skirts, even her leather-dry old woman skin and left it all in a neat heap on
the hearth.
The ancient grey wolf feasted well on the night of the full moon.
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