by Susan Kohler
Beauty was exhausted but unwilling to leave her mother’s side until the Beast reminded her that the servants, Seth and Gwyneth, would be glad to keep watch through the night and tend to the woman. They promised to call Beauty if she was needed.
Seth took Beauty aside, out of Gwyneth’s hearing. “I’ll take good care of your mother, Beauty, and you well know it. I feel very sorry that she ever got into such poor condition. It is as if I’ve let your father down.”
“Nay, Seth, my old friend,” Beauty told him, “tis my fault.”
“Does it matter?” Seth asked her gently. “We just have to make her well and strong again. I’ll help any way I can.”
“I know you will Seth,” Beauty told him gently.
“I care for her, Milady,” Seth admitted softly. “Even though I have no right to.”
“I’m glad you do,” Beauty said, kissing the man’s cheek. “And as far as I’m concerned, you have as much right as any man to care for whom you will. Things have changed greatly around here in the last few years. Watch her tonight and I will see you in the morning.”
Beauty got into bed beside the Beast and looked over, almost shyly at him. “Thank you, M’lord, for helping us today.”
“’Twas nothing, lass.” Gently, he drew her into his arms, showing her a tenderness that was rare but very real before gently teasing her. “You’ll thank me properly when you’re not so exhausted though.”
“Nay, sir,” Beauty whispered in his ear, smiling slyly, “I’ll thank you most improperly. But later, much later.” She dozed off instantly.
For several days, Beauty used all her skills and energy fighting for her mother’s life, and ever so slowly the older woman’s health began to get better. Finally the older woman regained her senses enough to have a joyous and tearful reunion with Beauty.
“Mother, I love you so much. I’ve missed you awfully.” Beauty hugged her mother gently. “I’m so glad you’re here and that you’re healing.”
“I’ve missed you too, Beauty. I’ve been so worried for you,” her mother sobbed in her arms. “How goes it for you? How do you fare with that dreadful man? How did I get here? Am I now a prisoner too?”
“Of course you’re not a prisoner here. The Beast heard you were ill and brought you here so that I could take care of you. And to please me. He’s a hard man, fast-tempered, stern and strong-willed, nay, stubborn really, but he has a good soul in spite of his reputation. He can be warm and good natured. He has never hurt me,” Beauty grinned wryly, “Well, not too much.”
“You sound like you’re in love with him,” her mother pointed out sharply. “Do you forget who he is? Who you are?”
“Nay, Mother,” Beauty replied, “I forget nothing, but I have come to care a great deal for this man. Tis not unlike a maid being given in marriage to a man she fears and loathes at first and slowly comes to care for him.”
“But this is no marriage, Beauty,” her mother said softly.
“To me, it is,” Beauty told her mother. “I think of him as my husband. Tis the only way I can keep my self respect. The Beast is the only man I will ever give myself to, whether he keeps me or not. I will never know another man’s touch.”
Beauty’s mother listened and pondered what she heard but kept her thoughts to herself. As her faint energy drained, she slept again. Her progress was slow, and by the time there was any real improvement in her condition, Beauty, Gwyneth and Seth were all exhausted but relieved and very happy. They hadn’t been at all sure the older woman would ever recuperate from her illness.
It was a mixed blessing however, for as soon as Beauty’s mother felt the least bit better, she started to make known to the Beast exactly what she thought of him. She began to tell the Beast constantly and in painfully explicit detail what she thought of his looks, his life, his treatment of Tom, Nate and Beauty. It was not a flattering assessment for the Beast or pleasant for him to hear, to put it mildly.
She harangued him for keeping Beauty as a hostage and sleeping with her without a thought about her chances for a good marriage, the future, her good name or the possibility of bastard children. She insisted that he used Beauty only for sex without any tenderness or care about her feelings, and insinuated that he was a selfish and inadequate lover. She also berated him for his care of the castle and the village. She insulted him and defamed his character in front of Claire. She complained of the food and the servants, and then loudly assailed his character when he attempted to discipline them.
“God’s blood!” the Beast raged when he had a moment alone with Beauty. “Tis well we’re not in our chamber, else I’d beat you half to death this time!”
“M’lord! Calm yourself.” Beauty tried to soothe him. “How have I wronged you this time?”
“Why didn’t you warn me that your mother was such a shrew!” he angrily complained after a long day of being harangued for his sins. “I need a drink, a lot of drinks.”
The Beast drank deeply from a tankard of ale. “Did you have to feed her all that muck? About how I’m so cruel and thoughtless. Did you have to tell her I was so inadequate as a lover? She tells me you find me much too fast, too clumsy and even too short to please any woman. Too short! Hah! What comparison have you had, woman?”
“M’lord! Please believe that I never said those things to her! I would not tell her the private things that happen between us.” Beauty was shocked but she protested, “Why would I tell my mother that you were inadequate or too short? You’re on me every spare moment we can find, riding me as well and as often as you ride your charger. As for short, I don’t know how to compare your endowments with other men for I’ve never seen any other man naked, but you fill me almost to the point of pain. I simply cannot imagine how you could be any larger, how any more of you could possibly fit inside me. And as for telling her you fail to pleasure me, how could I? You know exactly when you pleasure me; indeed, the whole castle hears my screams at the moment I reach the peak of my pleasure.”
“So I do give you pleasure when I mount you?” the Beast asked, slightly drunk.
“M’lord fool.” Beauty didn’t answer; she merely shook her head and smiled. “Men!”
Beauty was truly shocked and puzzled by her mother’s uncharacteristic behaviour but she tried to defend her mother to the Beast. If she could smooth this over, she thought to herself ruefully, she could become a diplomat and help bring peace to warring counties.
“Remember, M’lord,” Beauty soothed him, “she doesn’t really know about your recent kindness. All she remembers is that you took me from her. She’ll soon see you as I do and come to lo... ”
“Come to what?” the Beast demanded. Could he have heard what he thought he’d heard?
“I’m sorry, M’lord, I’ve lost all sense and order to my thoughts.” Fearing her loose tongue would betray her, Beauty quickly fled the room leaving the Beast standing there with a silly grin on his face.
Chapter Eight
As the summer slowly passed into autumn, there was a great deal of uneasiness amongst the small group living in the castle. Although the Beast had learned how to show some of his tender feelings and he had slowly begun to extend small courtesies both to Beauty and her family, all was still far from well.
The lass, Claire, still clung to Beauty, following her everywhere as Beauty worked to keep the castle and its grounds running smoothly. Part of this dependency on Beauty was based on her fear of the Beast and Beauty well knew it, but part of it was based on sheer loneliness. It also was the natural fear and despair of a young girl suddenly and brutally cut off from the only family she had ever known, and the suffering of the victim of an extraordinarily vicious attack and rape.
Beauty used the time she spent with Claire as an opportunity to try to teach the girl some of the tasks she did and the principles behind the management of such a large estate. She tried to show her the various methods of maintaining the castle and its grounds, along with teaching her the basics of reading, writing and math. She also
worked, gently, on the girl’s comportment, grammar and manners.
The girl wanted very much to be like Beauty. She admired Beauty’s style and manners and she tried very hard to learn, but deep inside she was still a very disturbed girl, barely recovering from the ordeal of her grandmother’s murder and her own rape. Her concentration seemed apt to wander and she was prone to breaking into tears for no apparent reason.
The presence of Margaret, Beauty’s mother, also proved to be an irritation for the people living in the castle. She freely ordered the staff and servants about as if it were her castle, frequently countermanding the Beast’s orders. The servants were getting nervous and edgy just from having too many conflicting voices to listen to.
To make matters worse, whenever the Beast tried to be alone with Beauty, at least during the day, either Claire was underfoot or Beauty’s mother was in the way. The older woman and the girl proved to be very effective barriers to the frequent, rowdy and spontaneous sex the Beast and Beauty had come to enjoy sharing. It was very frustrating for both of them.
For months, the couple had made love, had sex or just plain fucked in every room of the castle at any and all hours of the day or night. They had copulated in every position imaginable, from standing and slamming into the castle walls, to stretching out on the great dining table, or lying on soft furs piled high in front of the great stone fireplace. They made love slowly, playfully, tenderly, furiously and always passionately.
Arguments turned to love play, tender moments to passion, dinner was apt to become a feast of a different kind entirely, and even tickling, wrestling matches and the playful spankings would soon turn amorous.
The servants had long since learned to knock before entering a room as they went about their daily duties, but those same servants were also more relaxed than they had ever been since the Beast’s arrival. They had even begun to smile indulgently at the loving couple. Suddenly because of the presence of Margaret and Claire, that all seemed to have ended forever.
To make matters even worse, Claire was still completely terrified of the Beast. While he fully sympathized with the girl’s plight, the Beast was quickly growing weary of the girl’s practice of giving a small scream and bursting into tears whenever he happened to come near her. Beauty quizzed the girl about her excessive fear of the Beast but she never received an intelligible answer.
Then, one day, Beauty’s brother Tom was injured by the Beast during training. While practicing with broadswords, the Beast accidentally caught him with the edge of his blade. Tom was brought into the castle and once again Beauty and Gwyneth were pressed into work as healers, this time along with Margaret, Beauty’s mother.
It was not a deep or very serious wound but it gave Margaret yet another sin to lay at the Beast’s feet, one more thing to complain about incessantly. It also strained the tenuous truce between the Beast and Tom; not because Tom blamed the Beast for his injury, but because Tom was simply a restless and demanding patient, ill used to lying about idle.
Margaret continued to harbour ill feelings towards the young lord and she wasted no chance to make him aware of it. The injury to Tom gave her fodder for complaining even longer and louder. She had found confederates, it seemed, both in Claire and to the Beast’s surprise, Gwyneth, not to mention his own manservant, Seth.
The Beast often found the four of them huddled together, seemingly conspiring against him. Was he going crazy he wondered?
He could understand Seth joining the group. The man hadn’t been with him long. In fact, he was the only servant of any status to have come with the castle. He had once been the personal manservant to the old lord. His service to the Beast was impeccable, but his loyalty to the Beast was recent and still tenuous.
The Beast was very surprised however that even his long time servant, Gwyneth, was seen whispering with the small group. Gwyneth had been the only source of support in his life long before he’d met Beauty. She’d been with him since he was fostered as a boy, first as his governess, then as his personal maid.
Thus, things in general, as well as the lack of freedom or privacy, in particular the privacy to indulge in frequent sex, seemed to cause tension between everyone in the castle, especially between Beauty and the Beast. Beauty was grateful for his care of her family and of the girl, but was also strained and hindered by the very presence of the group. Every time she held the Beast in her arms, a picture formed in her brain of her mother’s disapproving glare and the wide, frightened eyes of the young girl, Claire.
With her family present, Beauty also began to realize that she’d been fooling herself by treating this arrangement between herself and the Beast almost as a marriage and acting as the lady of the castle. In truth, she was simply ruined and living in disgrace, and because of that, doomed never to marry any man and never to know the joys of having children. It was no longer possible to think of her promises to the Beast as her own form of wedding vows. She had to admit, finally, that she had simply and completely sold herself like a common whore. It mattered naught that her price had been high indeed, for the price of her decency had been the life of her brother. She had still willingly sold herself into a life of depravity and sin. Needless to say, Beauty heard all of this from her mother, repeatedly. This realization contributed to the tension between the pair because Beauty suddenly felt too ashamed and inhibited to fully express her passions. Of late, the very presence of these passions, which she still felt strongly and very frequently, caused her to feel a conflict deep within herself.
Even at night, the bedchamber had ceased to be a refuge and a place of pleasure for the pair. Now it was a place to finish the arguments begun earlier in the day. The pleasure had become hurried sex. Sex that did little to please either participant and certainly failed to bring the sense of peace and sharing that it once had. Now the sexual act was simply a release of tension and pent up frustrations.
Because of the tension in the castle, the Beast and Beauty now frequently quarrelled. They could be seen and heard throughout the castle exchanging harsh words, throwing and breaking things and slamming doors. There was one promising note, although no one seemed to realize it at the time. Through all the stress and turmoil the Beast never spanked Beauty in anger, not even in play. Indeed he raised his voice to her often but he never raised a hand to her or to any of the castle’s other inhabitants.
Beauty’s brother, young Nate, was yet another cause of the Beast’s irritation. The boy had settled into life at the castle well enough. He was a good hand in the stables and a hard worker, but he was also a very energetic young lad whose mischievous nature had been long denied in the sheer toil of trying to help support his family, to care for a weak and ailing mother, and to survive.
Nate began to feel safe and secure with life in the castle and soon began getting very bold and disrespectful around the Beast. He felt like his sister’s situation gave him some protection from the Beast’s wrath. He was also the only one to notice the new control the Beast held on his temper. The boy grew wild and became prone to pulling mischievous pranks on the Beast and some of his guards.
Unbeknownst to Nate, the Beast had not mastered his temper completely. It was all the Beast could do not to take a switch to the lad. He secretly wondered what Beauty would say about it if he did though. Knowing Beauty, he realized that she would not hesitate to make her feelings well known. Knowing that he feared the reaction of a woman increased his inner rage. The lad’s days were numbered, whether he realized it or not.
To add a final touch to his problems, one of the kitchen helpers was caught smuggling a bundle of food and some silver out of the castle.
The Beast was pondering what to do about the thief when Beauty, alone for once, found him likewise alone in the great hall.
“You seem uneasy. Is there aught that troubles you, M’lord?” she asked gently as she stood before him.
“Many things trouble me of late, Beauty.” The Beast looked at her, still awe-struck by her beauty.
“Mayh
ap I can help?” Beauty sat by him and looked at him softly. “Or at least listen. Tell me what bothers you. Please, M’lord.”
“First, let’s get some food together and have some horses saddled. We need to get away from the castle and have a few moments alone,” the Beast suggested.
As an answer, Beauty sent for a servant to fetch the cook and then to go to the stables and have the horses saddled. The Beast shouted after the servant, “Tell them to make sure Tom Two saddles both mounts and not the lad, Nate. Tis very important.”
Beauty looked at him quizzically but remained silent at the strange order. A bundle of food was brought to them and hand in hand they left the castle. Mounting their horses, they rode into the woods. They came to a small meadow near the stream and dismounted. They removed their boots and sat with their feet dangling in the cold water. They ate the cold chicken, bread and cheese packed by the cook, and of course they drank the wine.
“Why is there so much tension between us of late, my Beauty?” the Beast asked softly. “Why do you no longer enjoy being with me?”
“Things are unsettled at the castle now,” Beauty replied evasively. “That’s all.”
“No it’s not. What’s wrong, my love?” the Beast persisted.
The endearment softened her and Beauty replied honestly, “Tis that the presence of my family has made a truth clear to me. A truth that I have long denied even to myself.” She lowered her eyes. “I live with you without any marriage vows spoken between us. I am disgraced and shamed like a common slut.”
“Tis not so! You are no slut, my Beauty,” the Beast replied forcefully. “Answer me truthfully, did you not feel right and natural with me before your mother came to the castle? Was not your passion real?”
“Yea, M’lord,” Beauty blushed, “as you well know.”
“And did you ever feel that I thought of you as a slut or a whore?” the Beast actually blushed. “Well, after the first day or so.”