by Barbara Becc
The creature standing before Belle does so in a human way, though that is the only human thing about it, save for the expensive-looking clothes it wears, which it has quite clearly outgrown, if one can outgrow a body shape rather than size. Its hands have all the digits of a human’s, but they end in long, clawed nails, and are covered in the same thick brown fur as the rest of it - its lack of shoes makes it clear that its feet are the same, long and padded like the hind paws of a lion. Its head, a hideous combination of animals, is covered in the same fur, but not so much that Belle can’t see the large, protruding teeth, or the eyes staring back at her. There is no better word for it, she must admit, than ‘Beast’. Her father was right.
The Beast opens its mouth, and that alone is enough to make Belle flinch back from it, though she’s surprised she can even move at all. Fear has her rooted to the stone steps, and though she can hardly bear to look at it, she can’t quite look away.
“Are you the daughter?” It has the voice of a man, but distorted, and every word comes out as a growl - Belle is too focused on this to register what it’s asking her, and she continues to stare at it in silence. “Are you the daughter?” it repeats, its tone more irritated now, and the new edge makes her jump, snapping her attention back to the question at hand, but leaving her thoughts no less frantic.
“I-I,” she stammers, but her voice catches in her throat. Too slow.
“Well?”
Tears start to well in her eyes, but as her vision starts to blur, she catches sight of a dart of movement from behind the Beast - it turns to face the source of the oncoming footsteps, and Belle takes the opportunity to quickly wipe her tears away.
Standing on the grand staircase behind the Beast is a young woman, lovely and livid with a pink gown and dark hair and a wrath Belle can feel from outside. Even elevated by several steps, Belle can tell that this woman is taller than she is, and given the sturdiness of her build, stronger, too, though her open hostility towards the Beast already proves that. Her pale face is contorted into a glare, but her beauty is still painfully obvious, her sharp features aimed like a dagger at the creature standing in front of Belle.
“What is wrong with you?” The woman descends the rest of the stairs, keeping her look of revulsion fixed on the Beast as she approaches, but when she turns to look at Belle for the first time, her temper seems to ease - at least, until she turns back to it, and her anger returns at full force. “You made her cry?”
Belle is amazed to see fear on the Beast’s face, fear at the sight of this seething young woman who only reaches his chin at her full height. “Of course n-”
The woman ignores him completely, turning instead to face Belle, her expression far gentler again, and she offers out her hand. “I’m so sorry - please, come with me, I’ll find you a room.”
Belle’s chest still feels tight, leaving her unable to take anything but tiny breaths, but she gives a shaky nod, and takes the other woman’s hand. She lets herself be pulled away up the grand staircase, but she’s still too dazed to take in her surroundings - the castle blurs past her, and it occurs to her that she should be more concerned with the situation at hand than the fact that she’s already crying, but she doesn’t care. Thoughts of laughter and taunting try to cloud her mind, but she does her best to ignore them, grounding herself with the feeling of the woman’s cold hand in hers.
By the time they reach a spacious bedroom, Belle has her breathing back under control, and has the presence of mind to recognise her surroundings, as well as the look of concern on the woman’s face.
“I’m fine,” Belle insists, before she can say anything, but she doesn’t look convinced, which doesn’t really come as a surprise. “Thank you, by the way,” she adds. “For saving me downstairs.”
The other girl lets out a long, slow breath, trying to calm herself down, but her hands are still clenched tightly into fists when she sits down on the edge of the bed, and motions for Belle to join her. “Honestly, you weren’t in any danger, but I didn’t want him being... him at you.”
Belle sits down next to her, sinking into the sheets. “Did he make you come here, too?”
The girl laughs, flashing Belle a grin as sharp as the rest of her. “No, I’m his daughter. Rose, by the way. I suppose you’re Belle?”
Rose. Now her father’s ramblings about stealing a rose made more sense - the price wasn’t a daughter for a flower. It was a daughter for a daughter. Even so, it’s hard to guess from looking at her that she could be related to something as inhuman as the Beast - at least, unless he hasn’t always been this way.
“How do you know my name?”
“I met your father, when he came here - he talked about you an awful lot. He tried to make me leave with him, and when my father found out, he was furious. It’s not like I would have gone in the first place, but it didn’t matter to him.” Rose sighs. “Although, I would have liked to have the option.”
Belle squashes down a spark of pride that her father would’ve mentioned her over her sisters. “Why wouldn’t you, though? Leave, I mean?”
“Well, he’s my family,” Rose replies, as if it proves a point. Belle just looks at her. Assuming Belle’s disbelief comes from her father’s appearance, she adds, “He wasn’t always like that. He was cursed by my mother, when she left - she was... a witch, I suppose. Honestly, you can spend five minutes with him and see why she did it. It was supposed to teach him a lesson, but I can’t see it working. He’s so impossible.”
Before today, Belle did not believe in curses. After today, Belle thinks she’ll believe anything. “Can anything change him back?”
“Yes. True love.” Rose keeps a completely straight face when she says it, but the second her eyes meet with Belle’s, both women burst into laughter. “No, really.”
“God, the poor man.”
“He’ll save a fortune on fur coats, though.”
“That’s a horrible thing to say,” Belle says, but she giggles all the same. It feels like an age since she last laughed, and it occurs to her that the same could be true for Rose - they share matching smiles, weightless and silly and everything they haven’t been able to be, and for the first time in God only knows how long, Belle feels like everything could be okay.
“You know, if you want, I can give you a tour of the castle,” Rose offers. “You’ll need to know your way around. And on the way back, I can pick up some of my dresses for you.”
Belle smiles at her. “Yeah. I’d like that.”
The words are barely out of her mouth, and yet Rose has already leapt to her feet, her expression even brighter than before. “Right, then, let’s go. We’ve got a lot of castle to see.”
With understandable enthusiasm for a woman living alone with a monster, Rose pulls Belle through the winding stone corridors by the arm with an energy Belle can barely match, and yet there is nobody else Belle would rather have showing her around. Despite the circumstances she lives in, her love for the place shows clearly in the way she describes everything, proud and protective. The details only someone who’s lived here their whole life would know come out so casually in her descriptions, revealing the secrets of the castle to such a degree that, to someone so new to the place, it feels indecent to listen to, but Belle couldn’t tear her attention away from Rose even if she wanted to. She is vaguely aware of the fact that she isn’t taking in nearly enough of what Rose is saying, but she can’t bring herself to care.
Eventually, the tour extends to the garden, and, looking at it with a new sense of reassurance, Belle can now fully appreciate the beauty of it - even the garden walls, with the tops of the pines peeking over them, are just another elegant feature of the castle’s design, no more intimidating than the arches and pillars of the castle itself, no longer reminiscent of a prison.
She lets her fingers brush lightly over the heads of flowers as she walks. “Lots of roses, I see.”
Rose smiles, picking one from a bush, twirling the stem in her hand. “My father planted them f
or my mother, before they got married.”
“And they named you after them?”
“Very perceptive.”
“Very symbolic.”
She snorts. “Oh, coming from Beauty over there.” Rose slides her a sideways glance. “Not that it’s entirely inaccurate.”
Belle laughs. Rose does not.
“Rose!” The cry comes from the castle; the Beast, standing in an archway, looks out to them. Belle thinks for a moment that, since he’d shouted so loud, he might be frustrated, but then she looks at him a little harder - perhaps it’s the distance confusing her vision, but the Beast looks nervous, as if he’d rather shout to them than come any closer. She doesn't understand why someone like him would fear anything, least of all them. He points over to Belle, beckoning her over, and she shoots Rose a worried look.
“It’ll be fine,” Rose says, under her breath. Belle raises her eyebrows. “It will. He probably just wants to talk to you.”
“Don't say 'probably’!”
“Just go!”
Reluctantly, Belle makes her way along the garden paths towards the Beast; as she draws closer, all doubt recedes - he definitely looks apprehensive of her, but why? All she’s done so far is cry in front of him.
Belle comes awkwardly to stand in front of the Beast, and for a moment, he just looks at her, unsure of what to say.
“Are you alright?” Belle asks.
He looks surprised. “What?”
“You look like something’s troubling you. Are you alright?” If I’m bothering you that much, I’m only here because you made me, she thinks, but doesn’t dare say. Besides, it would be cruel.
For a moment, the Beast just looks at her, confused, perhaps as to why a creature like him would be asked such a question, perhaps as to why she would be brave enough to speak out. But then he forces out, “I came to apologize.”
Belle can’t help but raise an eyebrow. “For keeping me here?”
“For startling you earlier.” He stalls for a moment, fighting expression from his face. He looks out over the garden, which Belle might interpret as disinterest if she hadn’t seen him so nervous a moment ago. The fact that he refuses to look at her is very telling. “What is your name?”
“It’s Belle.”
He gives a brisk nod. “Well, I’m- I’m sorry, Belle.” He lingers for a moment, uncertain, before turning back through the archway, stalking away back towards the castle.
The footsteps scraping their way up the path announce Rose’s presence before she speaks; she comes to stand beside her, nudging Belle’s shoulder with hers. “Are you alright?”
“Yes. That was just... strange, is all.”
“I told you he wouldn’t be any trouble,” Rose says, and smiles, in an ominous sort of way. Belle has a feeling she knows who the Beast was really afraid of upsetting. Rose links their arms together again, starting back towards the castle. “Come on - let’s go get those dresses. You don’t need to worry about him.”
As the days pass, Belle quickly finds that Rose was right - the Beast keeps to himself to the extent that Belle barely sees him. But while the Beast remains a stranger to her, she and Rose grow ever closer - Belle had been terrified that she would be miserable in the castle, but she finds herself becoming closer than she’d ever thought possible with the lonely, lovely girl. Belle barely notices the days spreading into weeks as she spends every possible moment of them with Rose, sharing the stories and secrets they’d never been able to tell, and the castle sees more laughter than it has done in years. Belle wonders, most days, how she could have gotten so lucky in a situation that had once seemed so grim.
The gardens, from the first day, have remained Belle’s favourite part of the castle - she wanders through them every morning, before Rose wakes up to join her. Usually, her walks are peaceful, uneventful, but, on a morning in her fourth week at the castle, she sees something odd on her way: the Beast, standing at the gate, with a young woman on the other side.
Curious, Belle draws closer to them, but a few paces further and the cold weight of dread drops itself upon her as she recognises the girl at the gate to be her sister, Livia. Belle’s first instinct is to go back inside, and ask the Beast what she had wanted at a later, safer time, but Livia has already seen her, and Belle realises that she has no choice but to talk to her.
“Belle!” Her sister’s face breaks into a teary smile as she sees her approaching. The concern in her face, to Belle’s surprise, seems genuine enough. “Oh, we’ve been so worried-”
“Livia, what are you doing here?” Belle can only hope she doesn’t sound as nervous as she feels. She casts an uneasy look towards the seemingly indifferent Beast. “What’s going on?”
“It’s our sister. Portia,” she adds for Belle’s benefit, though she doesn’t see why it matters - they’ve gelled into one entity into her head, a four-headed beast of their own right. “She’s fallen terribly ill - we don’t know if she’ll...” Livia pauses for a moment to compose herself. “We want Belle to come home. Just so P can see her again.”
The Beast doesn’t so much as look at Belle when he asks, “And she would only be staying for a few days?”
“Of course. It might be all the time we have.”
The Beast considers this, then turns to Belle for the first time since she arrived. “And would you go?”
“Yes,” Belle replies, too quickly - in the face of her sister’s possible demise, she can’t very well say no, but she regrets it the second the word leaves her mouth. Still, if Livia really has been worried about her, perhaps she has nothing to be afraid of, returning home. Considerably quieter nonetheless, Belle adds, “She’s my sister.”
Livia beams up at the Beast, reaching out to hold Belle’s hands through the bars with a grip that makes Belle’s fingers hurt. “Oh, thank you! Can we expect her tomorrow?”
The Beast nods, a dismissive gesture - there will be no more said on the matter, and Livia must go. Belle wasn’t sure whether or not she got what she expected: the Beast never raised his voice, but then again, she’s never seen him do so in all the time she’s spent here. On the other hand, hearing him make Belle’s plans for her as if she were a child has been a particularly irritating habit of his. Picking up on his meaning as well, Livia gives them both a last winning smile before turning her back on them, and heading off back into the forest.
Unwilling to watch her sister’s retreat for any longer than she has to, Belle starts to walk away, already thinking of how long she has left in the castle before she has to go. She didn’t realise how much she was going to miss it.
“Belle.” The Beast’s voice breaks her out of her thoughts, unexpected enough to startle her, but there’s no menace in his tone. “Would you walk with me?”
She isn’t quite sure why he would want to, but she nods, and he comes to walk beside her. They stay quiet for a little while, but just as Belle begins to wonder whether he’s doing it out of obligation, or simply prefers less involving company, the Beast speaks.
“Why was it that you came here?”
Belle wants to tell him that she had no choice, but, when she thinks about it, it’s not entirely true. She could have refused, she could have let her brothers go to the castle to fight for her, and yet, she’d chosen to go. “What do you mean?”
“You have sisters. Any one of them could have come here, so why you?” He pauses for a second, a hint of understanding crossing his face. “Was it your father’s choice?”
“No, it was mine,” she says, with rather more of an edge to her voice than she’d intended. It’s becoming increasingly hard to stay patient with the Beast’s idea that she can’t make decisions by herself. “I wanted to get away.”
“Even on someone else’s terms?”
“It worked.”
He considers this for a moment, and Belle is glad he didn’t pry any further. Finally, he asks, “Are you happy here?” The question catches Belle off-guard - she hadn’t been expecting any sort of emotional cons
ideration from the Beast, but though he seems oblivious to her capability of independent thought, he’s never been intentionally insensitive towards her. She nods, and he seems satisfied. “Since you came here, my daughter is happier than I’ve ever seen her. I’m grateful for that.”
Belle smiles. It’s the first time she’s heard him display any sort of affection for Rose, or any real emotion at all. She likes him better this way. “I’m glad I could help her. It’s awful, being alone.” Realising her mistake, she quickly backtracks. “Except for you, of course, I didn’t mean-”
The Beast shakes his head, holding up a hand in reassurance. “Rose and I don’t speak often, and I don’t blame her for that. I hardly count as pleasant company.”
“I don’t think that’s entirely true.” The Beast gives her a strange look. How long must have been since someone last spoke well of him? “You’re just... not so good with people.” She pauses. “You care about Rose, don’t you?”
“Of course I do,” he says, the hurt in his voice obvious.
“When was the last time you told her that?”
“Belle!”
Belle turns to see Rose standing a short way away by the main doors, looking expectantly out to her. The Beast, still silenced by Belle’s last comment, merely stares at Belle’s apologetic smile and her little wave of goodbye as she goes to join Rose in the doorway.
It suddenly hits her that she’s going to have to tell Rose that she’s leaving. It will only be for a few days, of course, but to a girl who’s been alone for so long, how long will three more lonely days feel? Looking at Rose’s smile, she feels her heart sink.
“What just happened?” Rose notices her expression, and frowns. “Are you feeling okay?”
“I’m fine.” She doesn’t look convinced. Belle sighs. “It was my sister at the gate.”