Without warning, both of his gloved paws shot out to grip the underside of my wrists. I flinched at the sudden movement, but only because I hadn’t expected it, not that I was afraid of what he might do.
“Now,” he began, his chest moving against my back as he breathed deeply, and I found myself taking the breath with him, “do as I do.”
I was so distracted by the way his body warmed mine in the cold that it took me a moment to notice the thing that had taken shape before me. At first, there was only this strange purple smoke, curling through the winter air. As it floated apart, there appeared a faceless, featureless figure that looked just as real as Bastian or I, dipped in black from head to toe.
“The figure will try to attack us, when I give the command,” Bastian murmured into my ear. “Let me lead you first, and then you’ll be on your own.”
The figure then let out an inhuman shriek and flew at us, a similar pole suddenly in its grasp. I recoiled into Bastian’s chest, unsure of what was happening, but his hold on me never wavered, and we met the black phantom head-on.
Together, we blocked its first advance, and then its second, and for a few moments, it felt like Bastian and I were the same person. At first, we only dodged the strikes, but he began to move against the figure until we had the upper hand. I’d never felt this before—this rush of the fight. Of getting the best of a skilled opponent. It made me feel strong, powerful.
It was then that he let me go.
At first, I felt unbalanced, and though it seemed like the figure was giving me a chance to get my bearings, its tightening grip on the pole told me it was growing impatient. Then, it rushed me. Instinctively, I turned the end of the pole towards it just in time to block down the thrust. No longer having Bastian’s strength behind me caused a quick pain to shoot up my arms from the impact.
“Trust your instincts,” Bastian called out to me, and I shook my head to clear it—I can do this.
Taking a forward stance, I didn’t wait for the figure to come at me again. I lunged forward and swung down with my left arm, watching as it sidestepped my move easily. It came at me again, with greater force than before, and our poles met jarringly. Taking a step back, I stumbled over something hard and jagged beneath the snow, and without Bastian behind me, I felt myself tumbling backward.
The figure disappeared as quickly as it had come and Bastian’s arms caught me before I could hit the ground. I looked up at him through tangled wisps of my hair that had come loose and saw that he was trying to hide a smile.
“Sorry about that,” he said, lifting me so that I could stand on my own again. “The magic is a bit tricky with them. They can sometimes form a mind of their own.”
I snorted out a laugh, still a bit shaken. “Sure they can.”
Bastian looked offended. “You can’t think that was on purpose.”
I shrugged, trying not to grin in return. “I mean, it’s your magic, after all.”
He shook his head, then looked back up at me with a hooded gaze. “You did very well, Belle.”
I bowed theatrically, a wide smile seeming to be plastered permanently on my face now. Catching my bow and arrow out of the corner of my eye, though, suspicion grew in my mind.
“How did you know that I like to hunt?” I asked, folding my arms across my chest.
Bastian shrugged. “I found you with a bow and arrow and callouses on your fingers, so I assumed you at least used the thing once or twice.”
“So it was you that saved me that night,” I said, though I’d guessed the answer a while ago. I just wanted to hear him admit it.
He smiled, and I was sure he could tell that I’d already figured it out. “Don’t let it go to your head. I would’ve done it for anyone.”
“I doubt that,” I said—that got his attention. “You were obviously so entranced by my unmistakable beauty that you couldn’t bear to see me ripped apart by the forest wolves.”
Bastian laughed fully, a rumbling sound that I liked instantly. “Yes, that must’ve been it. Though your beauty, while certainly entrancing, wasn’t what helped me find you.”
I froze. He’d called me beautiful, though I wasn’t sure he’d realized it. No one had said that to me since my scars.
“And what was that?” I managed.
“You were practically trampling through the forest. A deaf squirrel could’ve found you.”
I scoffed and shook my head at him in disbelief, stepping towards him to push at his chest lightly. He pretended to stumble back, clutching at his heart, and I laughed.
After a beat, he said, “I come out here to hunt the wolves that my magic has created. Sometimes, the younger ones are feeling bold and they come find me. But the older ones are smarter.”
“Why do you hunt them?” I asked, searching the forest for any sign of the creatures.
“Because I created the monsters, and the least I can do is kill as many as I can.” Bastian shrugged. “Besides, they’re easy for me to take down, even without a weapon.”
I lifted an eyebrow at him. “Bit cocky, aren’t we?”
“Fine, don’t believe me?” He gestured up. “Climb that tree and wait. You’ll see.”
I stared at him a moment, but did as he said. The branches on the tree were perfectly placed for me to climb, and even though my body was still stiff from my injuries, I was able to do it.
As soon as I’d climbed up high enough in the tree, I sat on a solid-looking branch and waited. Bastian looked up at me and grinned toothily. Then he closed his eyes, opened his mouth, and howled so loud that I had to cover my ears. It was deep and piercing—my whole body vibrated from it.
He cut off a few seconds later, and the forest answered with silence.
Alert now, my sharpened gaze roved over the trees and the ground below, and I opened all of my senses to the woods. Not long after, I heard the soft crunch of paws on snow. I pulled out an arrow silently and placed it in my bow. Glancing down at Bastian, I saw that he was crouched in an attack position, facing where I’d heard the wolf, teeth bared. He looked dangerous and a lot like the night he’d caught me in his room. But at least his anger wasn’t directed at me this time.
The young wolf entered the small clearing, ears back, tail low, its black coat thick and wet from the snow. It growled at Bastian and I tensed, training my arrow on the pup. I was sure Bastian could handle himself, but I wanted to be sure nothing would go wrong. The young wolves may not have had the experience, but they had stamina on their side. Sometimes youth won out over skill—I’d make sure that didn’t happen.
Just as I thought this, the young wolf leapt at Bastian, teeth bared. He moved at the last moment in a blur, the creature barreling past him, and I let out the breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding. Without hesitating, the wolf turned back and charged him again. This time, Bastian stood his ground. I wanted to yell at him to move, but I had to remind myself that he knew what he was doing. He held his paws out and let the wolf fall on top of him. I straightened up and pulled my arrow back, closing one eye. A few more seconds and I would—
Suddenly, Bastian was on top of the wolf instead. He pinned its paws to its chest, and though the wolf had its sharp teeth bared at him, Bastian simply head-butted the creature, effectively knocking it out. Then he took the wolf’s head in his ungloved hands and twisted its neck with a resounding crack.
I swallowed hard. Despite the callousness of the kill, I knew that the hybrid wolves were dangerous, and Bastian hated himself for creating them. At least he was doing something about it.
I dropped down from the tree into the snow. Bastian still had his back to me, looking down at the wolf. “Impressive,” I commented.
“See, I told you,” he said breathlessly. When he turned around to look at me, I saw the blood and gasped. He had a long gash across his forehead and three claw marks down his left side shown only by the torn fabric.
“Are you okay?” I demanded loudly, and he looked down at himself, as if just realizing that he was hurt.
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“This?” he gestured to himself. “Don’t worry, it’s just a flesh wound. Now get back up in that—” But his words were cut off by a large flash of black fur flying into him and knocking him to the ground.
“Bastian!” I called out as the new wolf growled on top of him.
This wolf was much bigger that the first, his claws shredding through Bastian’s clothes and fur like butter, burying into his skin. He cried out; the sound felt wrong and my stomach dropped.
Bastian was dying.
It opened its jaw to bite into Bastian’s neck, and, on instinct, I brought up my bow which had been loose at my side, pulled back the arrow dangling between my fingers and released it. Swiftly, it imbedded itself into the roof of the wolf’s mouth, and the impact forced it backwards into the snow. It twitched a couple of times before becoming still.
Almost as still as Bastian…
I just stared at him a moment, not believing what had happened, looking for a sign that he was alive. Then, his chest moved up and down as he fought to breathe, and a sob caught in my throat.
He was alive—for now.
I ran to him, sinking into the snow beside his broken body. His chest and stomach were bleeding profusely—blood seeped into the snow, staining it red. “Bastian? Bastian!”
He opened his eyes and I exhaled in relief. “See,” he said hoarsely. “Just a flesh wound.” Then he coughed, and blood spattered his lips, speckling the snow with flecks of crimson.
I shook my head at him, touching his face gently. “I have to get you to Sophie.”
He tried to pull himself to his knees, groaning. I worried that he might attract more wolves, but there was nothing I could do about that. I grabbed onto the arm with less blood on it and used any strength I had to haul him up. He began falling to one side and I braced myself against a tree to keep him upright.
“Can you walk?” I asked. He answered me by hobbling one painful step at a time out of the woods and through the gate towards the castle.
We nearly fell to the ground a couple of times, but finally reached the open doors. Sophie was waiting there, looking suspiciously unsurprised at what she was seeing.
“He was attacked,” I told her breathlessly.
Without answering, she took hold of his other side and together we brought him inside the doors. I heard them close resolutely as we left them behind, cutting off the early-morning sunlight that had bled into the castle.
“We’ll take him to the infirmary,” she said finally.
Not sure where that was exactly, I let Sophie lead and helped steer Bastian down the right corridor, past the room where I slept. He was putting more and more weight on us, and by the time we got him to a cot, he fell into it. There was a path of red blood trailing into the room and now pooling beneath the cot. He was losing too much…
“Sophie,” I warned.
“Don’t worry, Belle. This happens at least half a dozen times in a year.” But she looked too worried for that to be true.
“How bad is it?” I asked.
She took her eyes off him and found mine for a moment. “I don’t know,” she answered honestly, then hurried off into another room.
She came back a moment later with a container of what looked like milky water that had been frozen over, but the smell told me it was the stuff she’d put on my hands. Skipping the cloth she’d used before, she took off the top and tipped it over his chest and stomach; I cringed as the whole of it hit his skin in globs. He roared, and then fell back into the cot in silence. He must’ve passed out.
I couldn’t take being so far away from him when he was in such pain. I rushed over and knelt close enough that I could hold his hand, not caring about the blood and burning liquid that touched me. His skin was horribly cold and my throat tightened. This couldn’t be it. There had to be more time.
I bowed my head, hot tears slicing down my winter-bitten cheeks. Then I gripped his hand tighter and willed him to live.
Chapter 20
She Would Be Alone
BASTIAN
M y head swam like I’d had too much wine when I woke—and then the pain slammed into me.
It consumed me completely, and my entire body was on fire before the flames settled into my chest and stomach. I went to clench my fists to keep the pain at bay, but there was something in one of them. I opened my eyes, and though my vision was blurry, I could see a small figure laid out next to me on the bed.
Belle.
She was alright; she was alive. I thought I’d killed us both when I’d forgotten to check if there were more wolves nearby. I’d let the kill go to my head and had almost died because of it—had almost gotten Belle killed too.
As I’d laid there helplessly, waiting for the wolf to kill me, I’d heard something cutting swiftly through the air and then the wolf falling to snowy ground, an arrow in its mouth. She’d saved me.
And she was in a bed, with me…
With my other hand, I felt the sheets beneath me and knew that I was in my own bed in my chambers, and not in one of the cots in the infirmary. I remembered being there briefly, but I had no recollection of being moved here. Sophie and Belle must’ve worked together to carry me here. Moving my legs to reposition myself, I looked down and noticed that my entire torso was wrapped in bandages; I was also in different pants than the ones I’d had on.
Even though it was probably Sophie who’d dressed me, a different kind of heat rose to my cheeks.
I turned to peer over at Belle. Her hair had fallen out of her ponytail and it spilled out around her, a few strands caught in the light from the single flame that lit the room. Her face was slightly strained, her skin cinched even in sleep, but still unbearably beautiful. She was wearing the same clothes she’d worn out hunting, the fabric covered in dried blood. Had she stayed with me this entire time? How long had I been unconscious?
I went to move onto my side to get a better view of her, but my body screamed in pain. I let out an inhuman groan and Belle stirred. She opened her eyes lazily, saw me looking at her, and shot up.
“Are you alright?” she asked worriedly, her fingers barely grazing the bandages over my shredded skin.
I awkwardly caught one of her hands and she stilled. “I’m fine,” I assured her. Her eyes narrowed at me and I could tell she didn’t believe me. I tried to smile without grimacing, and that seemed to satisfy her. She laid back down next to me slowly, continuing to eye me with worry.
“Stop looking at me like that,” I told her, my voice barely over a whisper; I felt like I hadn’t used it in days. “You’re making me feel like I’m going to die any moment.”
She gave me a watery smile, until it melted into worry again. “You very nearly did,” she answered tightly.
I didn’t answer her. Watching the way her face changed as she looked at me, I suddenly felt like I was drowning in the possibility that she loved me. After nearly getting mauled to death by one of my own creations, I could tell that she cared whether I lived or died. Maybe even more than that.
And the thing was, I was falling for her again, this Belle that I knew now. I thought I’d loved the Belle that I’d seen out hunting in the forest, who muttered under her breath and sometimes hummed a sad tune on the way back to her cottage, who selflessly took care of her sisters. But this Belle that I’d come to know…I loved her more than I’d ever loved anyone.
I didn’t even care anymore if she broke the curse. I was so deeply enthralled with her that I’d do anything just to be near her. Anything.
At that thought, my eyes started to fall closed as unconsciousness pulled at me.
“Sleep,” she said, and I did.
Chapter 21
If She Could Not Be Happy
BELLE
A s soon as Bastian closed his eyes and I heard his breathing become more even, I moved to lay on my back, putting my fingers up to my lips in thought.
Seeing Bastian almost die had brought things into perspective: I needed to know if my sisters were alright.
I’d wait however long it took for Bastian to heal properly, and then I’d ask him to come with me back to town. I didn’t even need to speak with my sisters; I just needed to know that they hadn’t been carted off to the Brothel yet, or taken under Thomas’ control, or left at the market by father. So many things could’ve gone wrong in all this time, and here I was, completely fixated on myself. Not thinking for one moment that they were having a worse time from this deal than I was. It no longer surprised me that Bastian had been able to keep to himself in this place, ignoring the outside world.
I wondered what my sisters were doing right now. I couldn’t even remember what day of the week it was, but I was sure Em was on her way to her job at the dairy by now, with Lila in tow after picking her up from Mrs. Larue’s. I could see them walking there, swinging their arms back and forth, laughing at something Lila had said.
My chest ached from not being with them.
I peered back at Bastian. He was still turned towards me, his lips parted slightly, his face slack. He looked almost serene and I wondered if he dreamed…
“Belle,” a voice called, and I realized I’d fallen asleep again as my eyes flew open.
It had been Bastian that had called my name, but he seemed calm, not in pain. He still hadn’t moved, though he was wearing a loose tunic now. I managed a smile.
“Bastian.” But even I could hear the sadness in my voice, and I knew he’d notice.
Worry brought down his scarred brow. “What’s wrong?”
I waved it away. I couldn’t tell him about wanting to see my sisters just yet. He’d probably try to leave with me right this moment, and he needed to heal.
“Nothing,” I told him. “How are you feeling?”
He eyed me a moment longer, as if he knew I was keeping something from him, but when he tried to turn to me, he winced in pain.
I sat up. “Sophie!” I called out, as she told me she’d be nearby.
She came through the doors quickly and immediately went to Bastian.
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