[Roux]

Near the woods, holding my little sister, I am pushing my feet to run as fast as I can. Even though my legs started to give out and my heart was pumping so hard that my lungs threatened to explode.

Sharp pebbles poked painfully on my bare feet, yet my mind was focusing on something else as I dragged my little sister’s body close to me.

We had to get to safety, or that I had to get my sister to safety.

“Roux, I can’t. My legs hurt, I can’t…”

“No, Lotte, we can't stop now. Or else the townsfolk will get to us.” I barely paid attention to the panting voice next to me and tightened my hold on my sister’s wrist, not caring if it would leave a bruise or that I might snap her frail bones in half.

At least that would not kill her.

It was already nearing sundown when the townsfolk saw me without the scarf and discovered my cursed crimson colored hair.

My body was still exhausted from fighting the raging current, with my scarf swept by the water and unbounding my tangled mass of crimson locks had sent the townsfolk in raging madness and fear.

It was almost half a century ago when the last time that creature appeared in our small town and spread fear into the land. My parents weren’t even married at the time.

A beast, they said. A woman wearing a red dress during the night when the moon was bleeding red. Everyone was outside their homes just to observe the spectacle as it had never happened before. However, a horrifying scream followed, and that woman in red dress had been taken away from our town and was never to be seen again.

The townsfolk claimed that they have seen this monstrous beast who did it, though it was just a tell-tale that has been passed down over decades ago. Ever since that incident, the color red was declared forbidden, and everything associated with it. They thought that red was the one that beckons the beast from its lair.

After I was born with flaming crimson locks crowning my head. They feared that I would cause panic in the town, so my parents did everything to hide it from everyone.

And now, my sister gets caught in the middle.

“I’m sorry, it was all my fault. If only I just listened to you,” Lotte sobbed, wiping her thin arm on her eyes to clear the tears that were blocking her view. Her little feet struggled to keep up with mine. I know her arms are searing just like mine, and I could feel like they are dislocating from her shoulders from being dragged on.

Yet, I ignored her wailings. No, not even with the guilt that was gnawing inside me.

“Stop crying now, I will hear none of it. It wasn’t your fault, okay? It was mine. I was being careless.” It hurts me to see the fear dominating on my little sister’s face, but I must strengthen myself for the safety of the both of us. Or at least for Lotte.

Even though fear was crippling me, I tried to be brave, wounding through the town’s narrow alleyway, hoping we could find a spot to hide from the mob that was chasing us.

“There they are!”

However, a nearby shout jammed my heart to my throat, prompting me to take a sharp turn. But even then, we come across one of the townsfolk that out of nowhere suddenly emerges from the corner, blocking our way. Panic sets havoc inside my chest and my hands start to get clammy while holding tight to Lotte’s wrist.

Instinctively, my steps retreated, turning around and tugging my sister’s body haphazardly. “Adite’s mercy! Faster Lotte!”

“I am trying—ah!”

However, I tugged her a little too hard. The sudden motion made Lotte lose her balance, slipping through my grip and twisted on her ankles. Sending her little body to go careening down the mudded alleyway.

My heart stops beating for a moment.

“Rings of hell!” Coming into a skidding halt, I pirouetted on my heels to grab and help Lotte on her feet. “Get up! Take my hand, I will carry you.”

I crouch in front of her, struggling to hoist her body on my back.

“Go Roux! You cannot waste time hoisting me up. Just run and save yourself!”

“Don’t be daft you foolish little girl! I am not leaving without you!” I groaned, balancing on my aching legs as I struggled to keep myself upright, chanting inside my head not to collapse. Somehow unaware of my surroundings, I hadn’t noticed one of the townsfolk sneak up on me and grab my arms. Twisting and manhandling me, forcing me to drop Lotte.

“No!” I screamed, but it fell deaf into the air.

“I got her!”

“No! Let go of me!” I struggled and fought, clawing and kicking. But my attempts were futile against the man that has now pinned me down to the ground.

I could only hear Lotte crying out in terror as someone yanked her away from me.

“No! Please! Roux!”

“Let her go, she had nothing to do with this!” I cried out, struggling to free my captor. “Look, she had a black hair! Nothing like mine. Please, just spare her.”

I tried to reason while the fat tears I was holding back from a while ago came rushing down my face as all the emotions I was trying to withhold crumbles. The townsfolk circled around me and started dragging me through the alley.

“I am sorry Roux, but we can’t put the village at stake. We need to dispose of you before you attract the beast.” The man whispered in my ears, half-willing about the thing that is going to do with her.

I just cried, not caring to know who’s voice it belonged to.

“Ready the pyre!” The town priest commanded. His voice billowed over the chaos but for me it sounded so distant.

I can only make out how the town folks gathered huge trunks of pine woods, made it into a heap and created a small platform with a wooden pole in the middle where they bound me using the fiber knitted rope that I helped to weave not a few weeks ago.

How ironic.

Tears streaming down my eyes in torrents, blurring the world around me. My head lifted into the sky as the clouds that had once obscured the moon started to fade.

“No, Roux! Let me go into the fire with my sister! She’s the only family I have! I can’t live my life alone.” My ten-year-old sister, Lotte, cried out in desperation, kneeling in front of the great pyre built for the prompt execution.

This is not what I had in mind to depart from this world, and certainly this is not what I have for my sister to ever witness.

Our mother died when Lotte was born and three days after our father followed in an accident through the woods.

Why? Why does it have to be me?

I close my eyes, not wanting to see the scared look on my sister’s face.

“Please, I’m begging you. Spare my little sister. She has a black hair. The beast won’t come for her.” The sound coming out of my mouth was barely a whisper, trying to block all the noise around me even though it was impossible.

“Come on, now Lotte.” Even without looking, I know that familiar voice. A middle-age woman stepped from the queue and took Lotte’s crying form into her spindly arms. I could feel her gaze on me, imagining the unshed tears glistening on her eyes, wanting to help but couldn’t do anything.

She looked for the two of us after both our parents died. Though I insisted on taking care of my sister, Esme continued to make sure that we had everything we needed. She helped us without question as to why I have my head always bound with a scarf.

Right now, Lotte needed her the most.

I finally found the courage to open my eyes and force myself to look at my sister for one last time, and somehow felt at ease when I saw her wailing in Esme’s arms.

She would take care of Lotte.

“Thank you, Esme. Blessed be your pure heart.”

“Please no! Don’t kill my sister. It wasn’t her fault! She can wear a scarf to cover her hair.” Lotte cried, trying to free from Esme’s grip. “Let’s kill the beast instead of her! How can all of you do this! She’s innocent!”

Lotte beseeched the town folks, but no one listened. Instead, most of them chanted in chorus, accusing me.

“Kill the red-headed girl! The moon is high and is about to come out. Burn her before she will lure the beast and kill us all!”

The chorus was agreed upon by everyone aside from Lotte and Esme.

“No! You fools! Stop this madness and free my sister!” Disputed Lotte. Yet, who would want to listen to a ten-year-old girl?

I wanted to rip myself free from my captors and hugged her tight. But all the fight in me was long gone.

“Hush now child,” the elderly Esme hugged my sister tightly. “You can’t do anything about it. We will pray for your sister’s soul to be with Adite.”

Adite is the merciful god that our town worships. We come to him for guidance, protection, and bounty. However, in this dark time, he seemed to be nowhere to be found.

Has he forsaken me too?

Lotte shakes her head in retaliation, unable to accept her sister’s fate.

My fate.

“This is cruel. Where is Adite’s mercy on this!? Roux did nothing to harm them!”

“Your sister will be the doom of us all if she’s not to be killed. You understand that child? You will die as well if you don’t keep your trap shut.” A bulky man growled at her, holding a torch that would soon set fire to the pyre they built and I want nothing more than to sink my nails into his face for shouting at my sister.

But no.

That will only make this matter worse.

“Then let me die with her! I want to be with my family! I don’t want to live in this village who murdered my sister just because she has red hair!”

Instead, I inhaled deeply. Ignoring all the pain stabbing at my chest.

“It’s okay, Lotte. I’m going to look over you from heaven with mama and papa. I will be with them.” Slowly accepting my fate, I said unexpectedly calmly. Then, I tried my best to smile at my sister, pouring all my love to her. “I love you.”

Just right after I uttered those words, a deafening roar shook the earth deep from the woods.

“The beast is here! Set the fire!” The town priest ordered, waving his arm towards me and the townsfolk threw their torches into the heap of woods, immediately setting it on fire.

Panic erupted.

“Roux! No!” Lotte’s screams drowned out the chaos and I can only see a glimpse of her as Esme dragged her away to safety.

“Oh, Adite my merciful god, refuge and salvation,” I could only close my eyes and despairingly started praying as the heat from the fire started to lick my toes and burned the edges of my dress.

“I need you in my troubled hour. I beg this of you on both my knees, grant me not of this pain. Touch my soul and let me be by your side—”

A loud thud suddenly crashed into the platform, breaking the woods into half and sending the half-burn logs ricocheting into the air.

My heart beating wildly against my chest in terror, threatening to jump out of my body as I refuse to see eye to eye with the creature growling right in front of me.

“Please…don’t!”