Human Again

by E. L. Tenenbaum

Kellan would also help Jaxel restrain me when the beast so overpowered me I was brought to my knees, made to thrash about my room as I fought its monstrous takeover of the last vestiges of my humanity. Both suffered mightily for it, constant bruising and broken bones that didn’t always have enough time to heal properly. As such, Kellan was charged with rounding out every sharp corner in my room until there was hardly any furniture, and certainly nothing I could break apart or use as a weapon. I slept on a stack of mattresses. My writing desk, my favorite chair, my bedside table were moved to another room and bolted to the floor.

  The rest of the small handful of servants keeping the castle together were adept at disappearing whenever I was near. The few and far between guests who happened to stumble upon the castle were let inside, fed, offered a bed in a remote room, and otherwise not engaged. My hospitality was bare, but it was there, though no guest was allowed to know of my presence. “The master is away,” they were told, but they were still welcome to stay the night.

  I cannot claim that kindness influenced the gesture, as it was a calculated one. In the very least, I figured that were the faery to ever check on the man she’d cursed, she’d believe I’d learned my lesson well enough. At most, I prayed this one act would grab hold of some remnant, some enduring thread of humanity, deny it from the ever-encroaching fingers of darkness squeezing my soul. I never once thought that this selfish decision would actually be the source of my cure.

  Still, even with this gesture, day by day I lost more and more ground to the beast. I could hear it in my roars, could hear it in my desperate, unspoken pleas for help, could feel it in the expanding desolation of my soul. After a year and a half of wrestling with such worsening madness, I doubted I’d last much longer before I was forever lost to that interminable abyss. Despite my determination to survive it, despite swearing I’d prove them—especially my father—wrong, my ambition wilted swiftly in the face of my reality.

  Worse, when I looked into the haunted, icy windows that should have shown my soul, I rarely glimpsed more than a hint of the man slowly yielding to the beast within.

  As autumn leaves began to fall, a merchant stumbled into my castle late one stormy night. Any local—really anyone within a two days’ journey of the castle—knew not to get too close. The man must have been incredibly daft, incredibly desperate, or a fair mix of both to have thought he’d find any sanctuary in the home of a terrifying beast. Though it’s possible that his regular route had been waylaid because of the war, or even the storm, diverting him through Monsephe and the forbidding castle it held. Prior to his arrival, very few travelers had slipped past the villagers and come to my front door before they could be warned about the perils awaiting them in my domain. As for the villagers themselves, none came near the castle after the incident with the villager’s dog.

  It rained that fateful night, the third full day of an unrelenting rainstorm reminiscent of the one that upturned my eighteenth birthday and changed my life forever. Weather like that usually had one of two effects on my mood: it immediately flung me into the void and stole any resistance I managed against the raging animal within, or I embraced the misery it brought onto the world and used it to justify my own. Unable to feel the cold, I would stand outside for hours, in rain or snow, looking upward and marveling at the relentless fall from above, seeking an answer to my life in the clouded Heavens. Except I found no solace in prayer, found no refuge in thought, so I remained shrouded in despair as the rain continued to soak me.

  However, when the door creaked open that night and a stranger foolishly let himself into my castle, curiosity overtook my apathy and anger. From the eaves above, I watched through the balusters of the stairs as he stepped into my gloomy domain, the way meagerly lit by candles intermittently spaced along the wall. Sticking to the shadows, I studied the guest, tempted to reach out to him and converse with someone new, but held myself back, the memory of a barking dog and the reek of burning red-stained clothes still accusingly vivid. Perhaps there was nothing in my face to suggest danger, as I bore no external scars of my savage struggles, but one look into my eyes and he would know. Innocence offered no protection around me. Even I’d been avoiding my own gaze in the mirror because of it.

  Idly, I watched the merchant from my lightless perch, my nose picking up the faint scent of food being laid out on a small table in the parlor just off the entrance to keep him contained in as small an area as possible. I allowed visitors to enter, but only so much. The fire was also built up, which served to lure the stranger to the room, enticing him to take a seat in any of several comfortable chairs and dry his weary bones.

  “Anyone here?” the visitor timidly asked into the silence.

  “Good evening, sir,” Jaxel’s deep bass responded.

  “G-Good evening, s-sir,” the merchant stammered, and I could imagine why. Jaxel was a forbidding man and he usually kept from fully stepping into the light, an old habit from his early years of elite service, so it seemed his voice mysteriously emanated from the surrounding shadows. To punctuate this hospitable yet dark scene, thunder rumbled loudly in the courtyard.

  “You are welcome to eat and stay the night,” Jaxel intoned. “When the rain stops, we wish you safe travels.”

  “T-T-Thank you, good s-sir,” the merchant said, but there was no response. Jaxel had already left.

  A few long minutes passed, a few minutes during which the merchant surely studied the food and wondered if it was poisoned. I finally heard his fork and knife scrape against the plate, hesitantly at first and then more quickly as he eagerly consumed the hot meal. By then, my curiosity had dissolved into a familiar surge of anger. How dare he enjoy my food when I no longer could? How dare he find pleasure in the simplicity of a warm fire after hours slogging through rain? Who was he to feel contentment when his own crown prince suffered just above?

  Somehow, I managed to hold back from acting out against the man, though not out of any sense of chivalry, and surely not because I knew what was to come. Rather, forever and always before me was a too clear image of the old woman in the rain, followed by the slamming of a door and a faery’s blazing purple eyes. It was enough to give me pause in encountering a stranger seeking shelter from a storm.

  I slept little that night. Instead, I restlessly paced the floor of my chambers, the halls, as I fought the urge to throw the man out. The beast insisted on accosting this affront to my circumstances and I fought it with every inch of humanity I had left, physically straining to keep the monster at bay until the man left. Only then would I run to the tallest turret and howl at the unresponsive sky, only then would I blunt my nails against the wooden floors of my room, gnash my teeth in frustration before collapsing in a heap of frayed nerves that would later make me wonder about just what had overcome me.

  At some ungodly hour, I even tiptoed downstairs and studied the man, a predator slowly taking measure of his prey. He’d been so run down, he’d fallen asleep slumped over in what used to be my favorite reading chair, his chin drooping against his chest in a way sure to leave him a sore neck. He was a rather regular person, with an honest but forgettable face and streaks of gray hair that spoke of his age. Even asleep, his brow was half furrowed, a sure sign of personal worry.

  Fortunate for me, and the merchant as well, the sun shone bright and warm the next day, so he was able to leave the castle before I completely lost control. Still, I shadowed him, watching as he heartily ate the breakfast prepared for him. For good measure, and only because I had come so close to attacking him, I had left a few gold coins beside his plate as a gift. A balm for the remnants of my conscience, an act of defiance to prove I still possessed that streak of kindness, a prayer that the faery would notice the sparkle of my gesture and take pity on me, consider the past six seasons punishment enough.

  When he was done, the merchant gathered up his traveling bag and tucked the coins into his pocket. “Thank you,” he called, leaving his voice to echo in the emptiness of a forgotten castle.

  I
stalked him as he left, an obsessive need to see this man from the real world as he went on his way, needing to make sure he made it out before I could no longer guarantee his safety.

  Just before the man mounted his horse, just before I turned back inside to unleash the beast in the relative safety of my rooms, the man turned his head and then his body followed. The next moment he was standing in the small side garden visible from the front parlor, his hand reaching toward one of my carefully cultivated, highly prized, deep red roses. The color of blood and the ultimate shade of the beast’s fury, their preservation a singularly sustained act of defiance against the beast.

  So when the snapping of a stem told of theft in repayment of hospitality, of an assault against the only thing to survive countless storms of rage, my tenuous hold on my patience snapped as well. Enraged, the beast came roaring free.

  A loud, angry snarl ripped from my throat and I bounded toward the merchant, who first stared in terrified shock, then cowered in fear. Once near, I raised up to my full height, grabbed him by the collar and leaned threateningly over him, my face contorted in a menacing mask of fury.

  “This is how you thank my hospitality?” I whispered, my chilling voice at disconcerting odds with the behavior that had brought me close to him.

  The man must have seen the bestial ferociousness in my eyes. He shook before me, his lips quivering so hard he could barely form words to muster a reply. I raised my hand, ready to strike what would surely be a deathblow to a man so much older and weaker than I.

  “Pray stop, good sir!” he finally called out. “Excuse my trespass, please! I only thought to take one for my daughter.”

  I paused, as, unwarranted, unwanted, an image of Amellia flashed before my eyes. There was a time when I would have faced down anything for her. Just as Adlard had stood up to my father for me.

  I narrowed my gaze and focused on the trembling man. “You take this rose for your daughter?” I questioned.

  “We had roses once, sire, but not anymore,” he stammered. “Before my journey, my older daughters asked me to return with silks and jewels, but all my youngest girl wanted was a single rose to remind her of happier times long past.” Tears pooled in his eyes, but they were not enough to melt the heart of a beast. “Please,” he begged, “at least let me bring it to her. Then I can return and you may do with me as you wish.”

  “You will return.”

  “I will, of course, I will,” the man quickly agreed, eager to spill whatever words would spare his life, even for a few more days. “Whatever you ask of me I will do, but please, let me bring this to her.”

  “Very well,” I relented. I waved a hand over him as if casting a spell. “I warn you now that I have magic to track your every move. If you do not return within one week, I will hunt you down. Then I will make fine work of the rest of your family.”

  The merchant nodded vigorously, utterly convinced of my power, and my cruelty. Granted, I had no magic to find him, and the faery’s mirror certainly wouldn’t show him to me, but I needed some way to guarantee his return. Still trembling, he scuttled back to his horse and rode away, fear spurning him to ride the wind like a man half his age.

  I howled after him, finding malicious pleasure in the way his body ducked even lower, as if he could avoid the evil surrounding the madman he’d left behind.

  When I turned back to the castle, Jaxel was standing guard at the entrance.

  “What will His Highness do with him when he returns?” he asked mildly.

  “Whatever it is, it’ll be amusing,” I growled back, thinking that though I may not have been to war, I might have a captive after all.

  Jaxel simply pursed his lips and nodded. That alone told me that whenever the merchant returned, Jaxel would do his best to never leave me alone with him.

  A week passed, during which I found particular glee in imagining the man returning home and saying farewell to his family. I didn’t yet know what I intended to do with him, but the thought of a man who cowered so much in terror of me humored me to no end. I relished the pervasive fear that came from the beast’s power over others, the feeling of dominance that came with knowing its will would be done. This delight was nothing akin to real happiness, though. I may as well have thrown a meatless bone to a starving dog, which would quickly figure out just how worthless the supposed treat was.

  At the end of the week, midafternoon of a sunny, innocent, late-autumn day, the castle’s front doors swung open, allowing in more light than had ever been permitted entry since I took up residence. I was upstairs when I heard them and the sound pulled me stealthily toward the main stairway. My senses were heightened enough to know that the light patter of footsteps that followed did not come from an old man.

  Were we to have another visitor already? Two so close together, so the second would be here when the merchant arrived, trembling from dread of the beast he’d been forced to return to against his will? Perhaps the war would really do me some good after all.

  I ducked between the shadows. I leaned over the railing and paused. A young woman about my age stood in the foyer surveying her surroundings with the brave, defiant naiveté of sheltered youth. The sight of her there stopped me completely. Where had this girl come from? How had such a divine being stumbled upon my palatial hell?

  “Hello?” she called in a melodic voice.

  The notes plucked at something long dormant in my heartstrings, coaxing from it a tune I had long ceased to hear. I pressed closer for a better look and the corners of my mouth pulled up into what could almost be considered a genuine smile. I had never seen a girl like this before. A girl who shined brighter than the light she’d left outside, who brought with her more warmth than a steaming bowl of soup on a wintery night.

  That first glimpse may have really been nothing more than a contrived moment of fantasy, a brief nod to the human imagination that was still left somewhere inside of me. It wasn’t something dwelled on for any length of time. I only know what thoughts hit me that first moment I saw her, and nothing that happened after would cause me to rethink any of them.

  All I knew then, even from my perch above her, was there was something about the girl that was indescribably enchanting, something I wasn’t keen on letting go now that I had seen it.

  That, and I wanted her to be mine.

  Kiara

  The woman stepped away from the door and the light behind her dimmed. Even so, light still seemed to emanate from within her, an iridescent girl who sparkled like a smattering of stardust against the eternally darkened night of my life.

  I finally forced myself to step forward, taking the stairs slowly so as to study her that much longer. When I was finally close enough that I could no longer avoid it, I stepped into her light.

  “Welcome,” I said, my voice reverberating through the cold castle walls.

  The girl jumped slightly at my unexpected appearance, her expression darkened, but she quickly regained her bright smile.

  “Oh, I didn’t see you there, sir,” she said, falling into a curtsy and stifling a relieved chuckle.

  Her manner, her voice, her every action hummed with the music of the world I so longed to delight in once more. Even the abbreviation of her laugh was uplifting, the joyful tinkling of silver bells lining a sleigh smoothly gliding over pristine white snow. Would that I could bottle up the sound and keep it close, a surefire antidote to calm my icy fury.

  The woman stiffened her spine and dared to step closer to me, which only exaggerated the differences between us. She was dainty and beautiful, a deceptively human-looking angel charged with bringing light unto others. And I, hulking beast and brute of a man, was easily double her width and far above her height, so she barely reached my chest. Yet, even from there, I could feel the warmth radiating out from her. No matter that she was so much smaller than me, I never felt I was looking down at her.

  I could take her in one bite, I realized, and when the satisfied growl such a thought began to awaken in the beast, I recoiled
in horror, unwilling to think of the possibility that I could willfully smother the wonderful creature before me.

  “What brings you here, miss?” I inquired.

  The woman looked up at me, and despite the words that followed, she still seemed too out of place. “I am here in my father’s stead, sir. I hope I’m not too late. I hurried to be here within the appointed week.”

  “You father’s stead?” I repeated dumbly.

  She nodded. “I asked him for the rose,” she explained. “I didn’t mean to cause insult to anyone for it.”

  “Yet your father was the one to take the rose,” I countered, “from another’s garden, no less.”

  “Still, it was at my request,” she immediately rejoined, “so it’s only right I bear the consequence.” She stepped closer to me and lightly placed a grateful hand on my arm. “It really was so kind of you to let him come home to us.”

  I stared down at her hand, unable to remove my gaze. How was it, even with the cracked, icy landscape of my soul, where the vaporous breath of a merciless beast cooled the fire of life within a body that hadn’t worn a coat all last winter, that her hand felt warm to me? What fire burned inside her, strong enough to tease the potential of a power resilient enough to thaw a frozen soul, to bring empathy to a heart imprisoned in ice?

  Was this girl only my prisoner? Or could she actually be my chance?

  I shook away the idea before it could fully manifest. It was ludicrous to assume this model of perfection could open her heart to—could open the heart of—someone like me. It would never happen. The beast would destroy her the moment she got too close.

  Following my gaze, the woman realized she had been too forward and snatched her hand back. An awkward silence descended and I rushed to break it.

  “How old are you?” I asked in a way I hoped was courteous.

  She raised her head and jutted out her chin. “Twenty.”

  Older than I thought.