Wild did not return until nightfall. She had waited near the edge of the forest until she was sure of the commotion coming from the bottom of the hill. When the noise died away, she crept into town once again to meet with the good mayor, to tell him what had happened at the Cleary house and find out the aftermath. When Wild had left, the Cleary man had not sent for a doctor. Instead, he had the priest try to exorcise her. But, of course, she had never woken. Believing still that she was indeed a changeling, the wretched husband took her body out and burned it. When the mayor found out about it all, he had the Cleary man arrested. He would be hanged in the morning.

“Good riddance to bad rubbish,” the mayor had said to her.

The moon was waning, but had a bright orange glow when Wild silently approached the beech tree by the hill. The Cleary house, thankfully, was empty of all inhabitants that night. When she approached the tree, she put her once-again gnarled hands on its trunk, feeling the life within it. Not only of the beech, but one of flame and passion.

My friend, I have returned to claim the Red Woman as my own. Please, my friend, return her to me.

Wild felt a great shift in the large tree, and stepped back. Then, suddenly, a shape began to form from the middle of the trunk, and stepped out. The woman was as gnarled as Wild was, but instead of the deep green foliage of the oak, her hair showed the deep red tresses of a copper beech. It was Red, returned to her. Red looked at her own treeish hands in wonder, before she looked up at Wild with the brightest gleam of a smile.

“You’ve saved me,” she said. “How can I ever repay you?”

Wild stepped forward and grasped Red’s gnarled hands in her own. “Be with me forever, my love, always. Stay in the wilds of the woods with me until the ends of days.”

Red stepped closer, and uttered a small, whispered yes. Wild drew her close and kissed her, and led her away.

In all the lands, humanity fears the wilds of the woods. Its borders surround the throngs of civilization, separating the familiar from the fantastic. Who knew what wonders, what terrors lurked in those dense groves over the hill.

In truth, the woman who was Bridget Cleary died, murdered by her husband on that fateful night. In truth, she did die, her soul gone over the hill, reborn into the forest.

Tales were told, of course, legends and myths surrounding the wild women of the woods. There are those, like you, who know, in truth, that over the hill, in the woods, running wild and free under the dense canopies and under the light of the moon, the Wild Woman of the Woods and her beloved Red lived together, forever in love.