Forbidden

By Elle Anor

Two young women from the village of Billedar, Konitah and Marilla, discover love for the first time. This love was forbidden and punishable by death. They escape death but are brutally separate from each other. Marilla is forced into marriage with a man, and a spell turns Konitah into a creature. She turns into a beast and becomes a forest dweller.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: May 30, 2017
• ISBN: 9781387005581

Elle Anor

Elsie Meyer is an Afrikaans speaking writer from Pretoria, South Africa. Writing many Afrikaans novellas, she has decided to try her hand at writing English. Using the pen name 'Elle Anor', she has written her first novel, 'Darkness of Her Soul' (rewritten August 2014), followed by a novella, 'Rain McKenzie M.D.'. As a participant and first time winner of NaNoWriMo 2013, she penned her second novel, 'Ylva the She Wolf'. Thereafter a short story 'Konitah' followed and its prequel the novella 'ForbiddeN'. She published her third novella, TASS while taking part in NaNoWriMo 2014. Elsie and her partner, of more than eleven years, share their home with lots of furry and feathery children.    

Book preview

Forbidden

Forbidden

Before she became the hunter of men

First edition. March 5, 2014.

Second edition. May 25 2017

Copyright © 2014 Elle Anor

Published by Elle Anor 2017 at Lulu.com

ISBN 978-1-387-00558-1

This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

Lulu.com Edition, License Notes

This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.

This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people.

Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

1. Only nine years old

Konitah froze when two wolves appeared out of the bushes, snarling.

Her father pushed her behind him when they jumped to attack. Coltar stabbed one of them in the chest. He kicked wildly at the other one, while he grabbed his daughter and pushed her into the nearest tree. Stay here until they’re gone! He kicked at the wolf again before he continued. Then you run as fast as you can back to the village. He fell down to the ground when the wolf got hold of his leg.

Another wolf appeared. Coltar stabbed it in the throat when the wolf jumped on top of him.

He reached out to his little girl, but more wolves came and dragged him down.

Konitah!

There were too many now. The pack was on top of him.

I love you – The last words he uttered before the wolves ripped his throat apart and tore his body to pieces.

Konitah swallowed a scream and buried her face in her arm when the blood gushed from her father’s throat. Tears flowed freely – impossible to swallow them up as well.

The knuckles of her little hands turned white as she clenched the tree’s branch. With her knees bent and her feet pulled up high enough, she sat quietly in the tree. She listened to the wolves growling and fighting over their prey.

When the growling faded, she lifted her head from her arm. Tears flowed again as the wolves dragged what was left of her father’s lifeless body into the woods.

She stared at his brown boot on the ground beneath the tree – all that was left of him.

She shut her eyes again, her hands still clenching the branch. She couldn’t let go now. If the wolves returned, they would catch up with her and tore her apart as well.

Her whole body shivered.

She looked around her. The forest was getting darker. What was she going to do without her father?

Her heart pounded rapidly. She was never scared of anything as long as he was by her side. Now she was all alone in this big forest.

***

Konitah always went hunting with her father. As soon as they were out of sight, he gave her a pair of boy trousers and shirt to put on. After she changed into the boy clothes, she hid her dress, petticoat, stockings, and frilly white cap underneath the bushes. This was their little secret.

She was at her happiest when she wore pants.

They would go into the woods to hunt. Sometimes they returned home with a few rabbits or squirrels, sometimes empty-handed. One day they came home with a small antelope – enough meat for a week.

When it was time for them to head back home, she would take off the boy clothes and – under protest, of course – put the dress and everything else with it back on.

It was always a mystery to her mother how clean her dress still was after a whole day out in the woods. When she asked them about it, Konitah and her father would glance at each other and shrugged.

***

She lifted her head up from her arms again and looked down from the tree. She knew she had to jump. Knew she had to make a run for it; she had to get out of the woods. Back to Billedar – her village.

She held her breath for a moment to listen.

The leaves rustled in the breeze.

A squirrel squeaked and hurried down the tree. It sniffed on the ground and scurried back up the tree again.

There was no growling wolves close by.

She drew a deep breath and jumped out of the tree. A shrill cry echoed through the woods when she hit the ground. She grabbed hold of her ankle with one hand and covered her mouth with the other hand. Wide eyed, she scanned the area around her.

She noticed her father’s hunting-knife a meter away and dragged herself over there to get hold of it. She sat quietly again, clenching the knife.

The dreadful pain in her ankle caused her to drop the knife. She grabbed her ankle with both hands and applied pressure to the painful area. She didn’t know what else to do. It seemed to help though, the sharp pain in her ankle subsided after a while.

She stood up from the ground and gave a tiny step, her eyes still on the look out for those nasty wolves. It hurt a bit. She put her full weight on the foot. It still hurt, but she would be able to run home.

Konitah glanced at her father’s brown boot and grabbed it.

She started running, slow at first and then increasing her pace. Her ankle hurt, but she had to keep on running. She had to get out of the woods.

Her father’s words, run as fast as you can, repeated in her mind with every step she took. She increased her pace even more with his very last words – I love you. Tears flowed freely again. She wiped them out of her eyes with the palm of her hand.

The house seemed so far away; it felt like she ran forever.

She huffed and puffed. She was getting tired.

Was the house always this far?

She sped past the rock where she