The path of pins was a lie. Swiftness, Redalhia had boasted, but the sun was already bleeding through the canopy, and she was late. A dull ache throbbed low in her belly, a new and unwelcome rhythm that left her feeling unsettled in her own skin. She clutched the basket, the warmth of her mother’s galette a small comfort.

At the fork in the road, he waited. Not a wolf, but a man with a woodsman’s shoulders and eyes like chips of ice. A predator’s stillness was in him.

“In a hurry, little bird?” he rumbled, his voice a gravelly purr. He sniffed the air, a gesture too animal for his human face. “Something sweet on the wind.”

Redalhia’s chin lifted. “I’m for my Grandmother’s cottage. And I’m not afraid of you.”

A slow smile spread across his lips, showing teeth that were a shade too long. “Fear is not the only path. There is the path of pins, for the quick and the clever. And the path of needles, for those who linger.” He gestured with a thumb. “Which will it be?”

“Pins,” she said, her youthful pride a sharp, foolish thing. “And I’ll be there long before you.”

He watched her go, hips swaying with a defiant rhythm. Only when she was gone did he allow the man-skin to peel away, and with a guttural sigh, Bzou loped down the path of needles on four silent paws.

When Redalhia arrived, the cottage was unnervingly quiet. “Grandmother?” she called, pushing the door open.

The old woman was in bed, blankets pulled to her chin. Her voice was a dry rasp. “Ah, my child. I am weak. But I’ve left a little something for you on the table. Meat to build your strength, and wine to warm your blood.”

On the table sat a small platter of dark, cooked meat and a goblet of what looked like watered wine. A barn cat on the windowsill let out a low, guttural yowl. “Kin eats kin,” it seemed to cry.

“That wretched cat,” rasped the figure in the bed. “Throw your shoe at it.”

Redalhia hesitated, but the wine’s aroma was strangely compelling, thick and metallic. She took a sip. It was dizzying, erasing the ache in her belly and clouding her thoughts. She ate the meat. It was rich and strangely familiar.

Sated and light-headed from the “wine,” she undressed as bidden and slipped under the covers. The bed was too warm, and her grandmother smelled of damp earth and musk.

“What fine, strong arms you have, Grandmother,” Redalhia murmured, her head spinning. She felt coarse hair brush her skin.

“All the better to hold you with,” came the rumbling reply.

“And what large, dark eyes you have.”

“All the better to see your fear with.”

A claw, sharp as a shard of glass, pricked her side. The fog in her mind tore away, replaced by icy terror. That was not Grandmother’s voice. That was not Grandmother’s touch.

“And what great teeth you have!” she shrieked, scrambling out of the bed as Bzou lunged, his true form exploding from the bedclothes.

He roared, “All the better to—”

But she was already gone, snatching her crimson cloak as she bolted out the door into the twilight. The wolf gave chase, slavering jaws snapping. Redalhia flung herself from the path, deep into a thicket of thorns, leaving her cloak behind as a blood-red sacrifice.

Bzou lunged for the flash of crimson, his howl of triumph turning into a yelp of pain as the thorns ensnared him. He thrashed, tearing himself free in ribbons of flesh and fur.

Redalhia didn’t stop. She fled to the river, where washer-women were gathering their linens. “Help me!” she cried, her voice raw.

Seeing the bloody wolf gaining on her, they stretched a heavy linen sheet taut across the churning water. Redalhia scrambled across, the sheet sagging and swaying. Just as she reached the far bank, she looked back. The wolf was halfway across. With a final, desperate sob, she yanked the sheet from the women’s grasp.

Bzou plunged into the current. The sheet, his winding-shroud, tangled around his limbs. As the river dragged him under, he fixed his icy eyes on her.

“Foolish girl!” he howled, water filling his throat. “The meat you ate was your grandmother’s flesh! The wine you drank… was my blood! The curse is in you now!”

The river swallowed his final words.

And so it was. Redalhia’s monthly flowering now brought a different kind of blossoming. When the full moon coincided with her blood, Mother would bolt the door to Grandmother’s old cottage, leaving her ravenous daughter chained within. And there, in the darkness, she would listen to the howls and pray for the dawn to deliver them both.