by Walleye
The Beast put his face up so close that his breath almost overwhelmed the poor man. “It’s that or stay foreverrrr in my dungeons. Choose now rrr.”
“I will do it only if my daughter consents.” The coward blubbered.
The Beast found that this man was so despicable that he wondered how could the daughter of such a person be as good and gracious as this imbecile described her to be? She had to be a shrew even if she was as pretty as this old fool claimed.
He decided this idiot needed some more incentive.
“If she does not come here after one month then you will be the one I that hunt down and drag back here to cutup to fertilize my roses.” Let the fool think that he was going to kill him as he had no intention of doing so as such an action would truly turn him into a beast.
He ripped the man down from the wall and hurled him onto the ground. “Get out of my sight. Now.” The Beast turned and strode away angrily without looking back at the human trash who had dared to desecrate his beloved roses.
“Oh dear. Oh dear.” Thomas rung his hands together and fled the castle. “I’ve done it again, haven’t I? The first time I bragged so about my daughters that the king wanted them to spin gold for him and now I’ve promised the Beast that Belle is a princess which seems so important to him.” He shook his head sadly. “My daughters are going to kill me.”
Inside the castle as the Beast strode angrily down the hall he saw Marshal Falk step out of a side hall and hold up his hand to get his attention. Since the Beast side of him was so much in control he wanted to shove by him but he still had to act as the Duke. “What is it rrr?” He growled in irritation.
“Pardon me, Master.” The Marshal gave him a quick bow. “We have a young noble-born lady who seeks sanctuary here.”
“She has to be crazy rrr.” He growled. Her first sight of him would surely send her packing. “Let’s have a look at herrrr.” He commanded.
The Marshal bowed, stepped back, and waved the young woman forward out of the crossing hallway for him to look at.
Johnathan’s first impression was of a handsome young woman with blond hair who stepped by the Marshall. She bowed without looking at him and he waited for her to raise her head which would be followed by the shriek which always came when the women saw him clearly for the first time.
She lifted her head and she looked him right in the eyes, taking him in with all his savageness. The anticipated shriek never came.
He waited for the look of revulsion and shock that had come across every other young woman’s face who had ever seen him up close. It never came. Instead she smiled at him like he was her dearest friend.
He staggered back. She had smiled at him like he was normal and not a beast. No woman had ever done that before. “Who arrrrr you?” He managed to get out.
She started to bring up her slate and chalk but the Marshal interposed. “She’s a mute, Milord. Her name is Lady Maryellen.”
Maryellen was writing something and when she finished she held up the slate. It read. Your friend. She looked for any sign of recognition in his eyes but sadly she saw nothing but confusion and shock there.
No woman had reacted with delight or ever told him that she was his friend since he’d become the Beast.
“Don’t you find my appearance repulsive?” He asked her. Was she insane? She had to be crazy. That was the only explanation he could come up with.
She shook her head indicating ‘no’ and then wrote again on her slate and showed it to him. Inside you are a good man.
“Do you really mean that?” This was beyond belief.
She wrote again on her slate. Yes. I do.
She stepped forward entering his personal space and he held up his paw in reflex to stop her. She halted but then she put the slate down, took his paw in her two hands and gently kissed it. She raised her head, put her cheek up against his paw, held it there for a long moment of time and finally she smiled up at him.
He was shaken to his core. When he had been a man, he’d had seen women smile at him like this but only after an enjoyable period of nighttime loving and in the cold light of morning lately such smiles had become so very rare.
In that moment, seeing such a smile on the face of a woman he’d never seen before touched him deeply. Was she in love with him? He had been in love once before. He had no other experience to guide him and it was telling him that this unknown woman loved him.
He knew that he had to see more of her. He removed his hand gently from her possessive grasp and he bowed to her feeling calm and almost human for the first time in days. “Lady Maryellen.” He said fervently. “I grant you sanctuary for as long as you desire.” He smiled at her. “It would give me great pleasure if you would join me and my cousin for dinner this afternoon.”
The slate was picked up, erased and written on. She turned it back to him and he saw that it now read. Gladly.
She looked at him and smiled that so familiar smile again. Somewhere back deep in his mind he almost could remember seeing a smile like hers before. For a brief moment he felt himself holding in his arms a blond-haired woman who had squeezed him back while they embraced in water.
Just as quickly as it had come, the image vanished, leaving him feeling bereft.
He shook his head and to hide his confusion he turned to Falk. “Marshal, see that the lady has suitable clothing to wear and a maid servant to tend to her needs.”
“Yes, Milord.” The Marshal bowed to him before turning to Maryellen. “If you’ll come with me, Milady, I’ll take you to the Wardrobe Mistress.”
The Marshal offered her his arm and led her away. She turned her head once to look back at him and Johnathan saw only longing in her eyes.
Johnathan could only stare after her. Had that really happened? Had a young woman just treated him like a normal person? He had to see her again and see more of her.
Maryellen was presented by the Marshal into the care of Marjorie, Phillip’s wife, who was also the Wardrobe Mistress. After eyeballing her size the good woman found three dresses and a gown originally intended to be worn by Cousin Elliot to a ball. She declared that the gown and dresses would almost fit her new charge after they were let out and sewed up again.
After summoning the seamstress who took measurements and promised she’d have one dress ready for wearing for dinner, Marjorie took her new charge to the ladies bathroom so she could get cleaned up.
The bathroom was a stunning revelation to the former mermaid of the differences between human women and mermaids. Mermaids didn’t do it like humans did. They did it like dolphins or some fish did it in the open water.
The mermaids under the sea in the castle went behind a screen when they had to go and sat on a bench with a hole in it which extended beyond the castle walls and by the time they came out what they done had dispersed into the water and had been carried away.
As Marjorie explained to her that unlike many houses those who lived in this castle didn’t have to go outside to perform their toiletries, the former mermaid learned more about her new body and its functions than she’d ever dreamed about.
Fortunately some of the knowledge had been put conveniently inside her head by the magic of her fairy friend and so she didn’t embarrass herself by being entirely ignorant. Her little missteps and confusions were put down to different customs.
Marjorie had no idea how right this assumption was. Mermaids definitely had very different customs from land folk.
Maryellen wondered how any of her sisters would’ve handled this problem if they had been given legs and internal organs with no explanation of how to use them by someone like the Sea Witch who was not known for her compassion and consideration. They could’ve ended up in a human crazy house.
She found also that humans used soaps and water to clean up. As a mermaid she had used sponges and plant tissues only as mermaids were always surrounded by water and soap couldn’t survive under the sea.
Then Marjorie and her newly assigned maid her daughter Tillie
insisted that Maryellen had to have her hair done up. She didn’t know what to say as mermaids usually just cut their hair when it got too long to be tolerated. There was no such thing for mermaids as permanent waves, hair curlers, shampoos, and other lotions meant for hair.
Fortunately they took her confusion for embarrassment at traveling without a servant and an experienced wife of one of the soldiers who ran a small business for ladies’ makeup and hair products was summoned to help do her hair.
The wife got things going and after she instructed and watched Maryellen’s maid she gave her approval and said if they needed her to call her but she thought they were doing fine and she left Tillie to finish the hair setting.
Tillie the maid was a slender, young, brown-haired woman with a slightly round face, a very pleasant smile and a charming attitude to match. Tillie it seemed was Marjorie’s and Phillip’s eighteen-year-old daughter and just as tall as Maryellen. She had been pressed into duty as since the Duke was unmarried and as the only other maid was attending Cousin Elliot there was no one else available to assist Maryellen except for Tillie and her mother.
Fortunately Tillie was a quick learner being a very intelligent young woman. After she helped Maryellen cleanup she set to work and began preparing Maryellen’s hair into something suitable for dinner with the Duke.
Tillie was also a very proficient gossip and Maryellen learned more than she had ever thought possible about everyone in the castle including Duke Johnathan.
Tillie told her that before Duke Johnathan had been cursed he’d been really stuck up and arrogant and had driven the staff crazy by being such a demanding perfectionist. Everything had to be just so and look a certain way and that had applied to all of the staff too. Two of the best servants had been dismissed just because they hadn’t looked perfect.
Maryellen began to get a feeling that she now knew what attitude of Johnathan’s had gotten him cursed. He had been too hung up on beauty for its own sake.
She found out that Tillie could not tell her anything about the curse as she was bound by the magic and so she could not tell her how it could be lifted but she could tell Maryellen how it had changed the master. He had become more tolerant and was now more accepting of how someone looked as long as they did their job.
Tillie said as she released Maryellen’s luxuriant blond hair from the rollers she had imprisoned it in. “I guess you could say he’s learned like my mother says to not judge a dress by the fanciness of the transport case it is in.”
“But it was not achieved overnight, Milady. For the first year he was in a terrible rage over what had been done to him. He almost sacked the castle wizard Garland because the magic of the Sidhe who cursed him was much too powerful for the poor man to break.”
“As the wizard said the Master was going to have to satisfy the curse’s words before he could be freed.”
Tillie stepped back and held up a hand mirror so that Maryellen could see her hair in the big mirror both front and back. “I think you look beautiful, Milady.”
Maryellen had never seen her hair piled up on her head in stacks like Tillie had done because you just couldn’t do that underwater. There certainly were advantages she realized to living on the land in the air over being underwater in the sea.
Thank you, Tillie. She wrote on the slate.
She reached up and gently touched the side curls marveling at how with just curlers, hot water and comb and brush the young woman had achieved such a miracle. She thought. ‘It is the prettiest thing I’ve ever had done to me and it had to be up here on the land for me to actually experience it.’
She was glad that the young woman could not hear what she was thinking or she would’ve had some explaining to do. There certainly were advantages to using the slate to communicate with as it made it harder for her to unthinkingly blurt out things.
“I’m glad you like it, Milady.” Tillie actually blushed as she said this. She knew she was not a great hairdresser and certainly the noble lady had had better done for her before than what she a poor peasant girl could do. This praise made her feel even closer to her new charge who was being so kind to her.
Finally the seamstress brought the modified dress and Tillie helped Maryellen put on the undergarments which she’d never seen before and then Tillie and the seamstress assisted her in getting into her blue dress by helping her get her arms through the proper holes.
The seamstress who was a big-boned and well filled out woman in her late forties stepped back and looked over the results. She sighed and shook her long blond hair side to side. “I see a couple more modifications I’d make if we had more time but we’ve run out of time as dinner is in ten more minutes. So this will have to do. I pray you not to be too upset with my poor efforts.”
Maryellen twirled in front of the mirror and marveled at how beautiful the dress made her look. She impulsively ran over and gave the surprised seamstress a grateful hug.
There was a sound behind her. The seamstress looked over her shoulder and saw Marshal Falk standing there in the doorway. “I’m glad you’re pleased with my efforts, Milady.” She separated herself gently, gathered up her measuring tape, pins and scissors.
“I will have the other dresses done by bedtime tonight. I hope you have a wonderful dinner.” With a smile she left.
As Melissa the seamstress left she passed Marshal Falk. “Good evening, Sir. You’re looking quite handsome tonight.” She said with a sweet smile.
Marshal Falk smiled back. “And you’re as pretty as ever, Melissa. Will you join me for dinner later tonight?”
“But of course.” She gave the Marshal a saucy grin and a slight curtsey before she left.
Marshal Falk watched her go with a twinkle in his eyes and Maryellen realized there must be something going on between these two that had to be an affair of long standing.
Marshal Falk bowed to her. “Milady, I’ve come to escort you to dinner.” He straightened up and held out his hand and Maryellen after she picked up her slate and chalk came over and took his hand. He then escorted her along the hall, down a coiling flight of stairs, and to the elegant dining room.
Johnathan’s Cousin Elliot was already there wearing an informal green dress. The Marshal bowed to her. “Lady Elliot, may I present Lady Maryellen who is your cousin’s guest?”
“You may, Marshal.” Elliot said with a smile and came over to greet Maryellen with her hand held out. “Welcome, Lady Maryellen.”
Maryellen took Elliot’s extended hand and bowed as she had been taught back in her Father’s castle. She looked up with a smile, wishing she could speak.
Lady Elliot asked. “I hear you sought sanctuary and are mute by magic. How did this happen?”
As Lady Elliot watched in puzzlement Maryellen took her slate and wrote on it. Mute by Curse.
“Oh my.” Lady Elliot exclaimed. “Can you tell me anything about it?”
Maryellen wrote simply. No. Curse forbids.
“Oh dear. Just like my cousin’s curse.” Elliot told her. “He can’t tell me anything about his curse either. Don’t worry as I’m sure we’ll become friends.”
She continued. “I will assume that you met my cousin when you arrived. What did you think of him?”
Maryellen hesitated and then wrote. He’s nice. The magic prevented her from saying that she had been a mermaid and that she loved him.
“You’re one of the few who thinks that.” Sir Rathbone growled as he entered from the door of the room facing Maryellen.
Who? Maryellen wrote on her slate.
Cousin Elliot just rolled her eyes. “Lady Maryellen, this sterling example of knighthood in flower is Sir Henry Rathbone.”
Sir Rathbone bowed only slightly. “And what are you a lady of, may I ask?”
Elliot gasped at this effrontery.
Maryellen glared at him before she wrote strongly and then showed him the slate. Oceanide kingdom.
This seemed to take him back and Elliot whispered fiercely in his ear. “She’s b
een confirmed as nobility by the wizard Garland. I’d be careful if I wanted to keep my head on my neck as my cousin is already angered by your poor attitude.”
Sir Henry Rathbone wasn’t a complete fool although he acted like one often as part of his cover. He bowed to her and said sincerely. “I apologize, My Lady.”
Maryellen’s slate said. Accepted. But her look was very frosty.
One of the servants announced at the entrance to the dining room. “His Highness Johnathan Harkins.”
Elliot was watching Maryellen and she saw her face light up. Elliot had seen women smile like that and become alert when they were in the presence of the person they really liked. She realized that there was a lot more to this young woman then there appeared on the surface. Could it be that she was attracted to Cousin Johnathan even if he was the Beast?
Elliot watched closely and saw that Maryellen’s eyes followed her cousin Johnathan as he strode into the room. He was wearing his formal red coat and a white shirt. Instead of pants he was wearing a black kilt as the tailor had given up trying to make pants fit his new legs.
All three bowed or curtsied to him. He nodded his head as he came to a stop behind his chair at the head of the table.
He stood there and stuck a claw inside his collar and pulled at it as he growled. “What’s everyone doing standing there? Let’s eat.”
Elliot sighed. She had already talked once to her cousin about his lack of manners. She saw Sir Rathbone grimace but when she looked at Lady Maryellen she saw the young lady was still smiling at her cousin.
Elliot immediately realized from the way that Maryellen was acting that she felt a lot more than just liking for him. It was very likely that she was in love with him. This was going to require some more investigation on her part.
She started to move to her seat at the table when she noticed that Maryellen was just standing there as if she didn’t know what she was supposed to do.
To Elliot this was a clue to Maryellen’s past that would need to be investigated. Why didn’t she know even the simplest cues for behavior in polite company?