Beauty Within

by Emily L Goodman

  Something like a small bell tinkled as though a question was being asked.

  “Oh. No, I don’t need anything,” Callista said quickly. “Honestly, I’m just…”She shrugged expansively.

  That small bell sound again.

  “Lonely.” She smiled quickly. “But there are good things about lonely. I bet I’ll learn a lot more about the castle than either of my sisters did—and I’ll learn more than if I had been here with them, because they wouldn’t have wanted to go exploring.” She was sure her sisters would have chosen a place to call their own—perhaps one of the sitting rooms arrayed near the guest wing—and not left it much. They would have embroidered, or practiced their personal talents.

  She didn’t have a personal talent, so she was going to explore.

  Filled with a new sense of purpose, Callista pushed herself out of the chair. That bell-like sound—was she actually hearing it with her ears, or was it just in her head?—came again.

  “I’m going exploring,” she said grandly. “I’m going to learn things about this castle that I bet even Prince Griffin doesn’t know, and I’m going to enjoy doing it.”

  There was no answer, but the sense of a waiting, watching presence faded. Callista grinned. She was learning how to handle the servants—and she didn’t think that they were creepy, not really. She could sense that they were magical, tied in some way to the curse—a support to the prince throughout his trial, perhaps. After all, it would be impossible for the few servants who had stayed with him to run the castle on their own.

  She set to exploring the castle—to seeing everything that there was to see. It was a very busy morning. She examined incredible artwork hung casually on the walls, feeling as though she was making her way through a museum. She visited the conservatory, which she was sure would be fascinating at night, with its amazing view of the stars. She found bedrooms aplenty—most of them shut up, with an air of disuse that suggested to her that they hadn’t been used in a very long time.

  In one such room, Callista lingered longer than the others, feeling deeply sad in a way that she couldn’t entirely explain. The room was decorated with more care than most of the guest rooms. It looked like someone had been a resident there once—as though they had planned to make a life there.

  But not anymore. Now, it was empty. The invisible servants did their part to keep it clean, and she was sure that Mrs. Picard visited on a regular basis to be sure that it was getting done, but the room still felt oddly empty, as though it was in waiting for its occupant to return.

  An entire castle full of people had their lives changed forever by the curse, Callista thought, really seeing it for the first time. There were people who had lives here. People who were planning out their futures to live here, or work here, or to contribute in some way by being here. No—more than that. It hit her, then, that it wasn’t even just the inhabitants of the castle, though of course that was certainly terrible enough. Griffin was a prince.

  The curse was impacting his entire kingdom.

  She didn’t even know how far his kingdom stretched; but when she voiced that question aloud, not really expecting anyone to answer—she was aware that it was an annoying quirk of hers, talking out loud as she worked through things, especially when she was actually in a room with someone else—invisible hands tugged gently at her dress, pulling her back toward the library. Luckily, she was close to it, having taken a circular route through all the rooms on that floor of the castle and come back to the point where she had started. It was at least, she thought, laid out reasonably for a castle; everything made sense, as long as one was possessed of at least a reasonable sense of direction, and so she had no trouble figuring out how to get back to where she had started, if nothing else.

  There was a huge map on the wall—a map that proclaimed that it was of the Kingdom of Lukash.

  The Kingdom of Lukash? Callista considered those words for a long moment, wondering if she was supposed to recognize them. Surely she should have, particularly given the extensive nature of her education. She should have known of such a large, sprawling kingdom.

  And yet she didn’t remember anything about it. Not anything at all.

  “Most of the population thinks that they are living in the Regency of Dane,” a voice said behind her.

  Callista jumped, spinning around so fast that she nearly toppled over.

  “My apologies.” Mrs. Picard came further into the library, offering a small smile. “It’s all too easy to sneak up on people here, since you have no idea where people are most of the time.”

  “It’s all right.” Callista pressed a hand to her chest, trying to still her pounding heart without being too obvious about it. “I was just—” She gestured to the picture. “I feel like I should know the kingdom, somehow, but I don’t. I don’t know anything about it.”

  “Well, you wouldn’t, would you?” She sighed, running a trembling hand over the map as though she was afraid it would disappear if she looked at it too hard. “Griffin should have been ruling the kingdom in truth by now.”

  “Ruling in truth?” Callista frowned.

  “His father—King Leopold—died when Griffin was eighteen,” Mrs. Picard explained. “I suppose, given the nature of the curse, you won’t remember that at all now; but he died, and the kingdom passed into the hands of the regency until Griffin’s twenty-fifth birthday.”

  Callista nodded. That made sense. Most nobles weren’t able to actually command their positions until they were at least twenty-five—old enough to be responsible for their people.

  “King Leopold had set a strong board of regents in place. They should have been centered here, at the castle. The idea was to give Griffin some experience with ruling before he actually had to take over the reins, you see; and he was so young that it wouldn’t have hurt him to acquire a bit of polish before he had to actually come out and take over. No one expected Leopold to die when he did; it had been assumed that he had many good years yet, but as he had only the one son and there was no question who would inherit the crown, Griffin started training from a very young age anyway. The board of regents all trusted him—listened to him, they did, even though he was young enough that he didn’t have a true voice on their council.”

  Callista nodded.

  “Well, there was a string of calamity—what isn’t really important anymore, but the regents didn’t feel themselves equal to handling the responsibilities of governance, given the issues within their personal lives.” Mrs. Picard snorted. “You’ll have to excuse me, Miss, but what they had to be getting along with wasn’t anything that should have prevented them taking care of the needful responsibilities, if you take my meaning. Still, the king had prepared for that possibility, too, as the advisers chosen for the board of regents were getting on in age and there was a possibility that, if he died, they wouldn’t be far behind him.”

  “Were they?” Callista asked curiously.

  “ I have no idea whether or not any of them are still among the living,” Mrs. Picard admitted. “It’s devilishly hard to have any communication with the outside world, to be honest. Most people quite forget about us unless we’re actively standing in front of them.” She sighed, easing down into a seat across from Callista. Callista, who had grown up treating her servants like practically family, would have thought nothing of it, had Erin not drilled her in appropriate protocol from the time she was very young. As it was, she assumed that Mrs. Picard had, over the months and years here alone with the prince, been elevated to essentially a member of his family.

  At least, she sincerely hoped so, as she rather liked the woman and felt that her loyalty to him was quite admirable.

  “At any rate, since the board felt themselves unable, control passed to the Regency of Dane, which has control of…hm…I believe it’s a combined three kingdoms starting at our borders. It was, King Leopold deemed, the logical choice.” She sighed. “But now those regents are so firmly entrenched that I’m not sure Griffin will be able to take control
of his kingdom back when he’s finally released from the curse.”

  “Does he even want it?” Callista asked curiously. “I mean, he’s already lost so many years of his life—”

  “He doesn’t,” Mrs. Picard said slowly, looking surprised that it had occurred to her. “But he wants to protect his people, too, and in many ways, decisions that are best for the entire Regency of Dane are not necessarily those that are the best for his people, either. There have been some increased taxes—we aren’t taxing the people much at all right now, of course, and only the village below the castle is sending us any supplies at all.”

  “Can he afford to continue living that way?” Callista wondered.

  “Oh, yes.” Mrs. Picard smiled. “Remember, the castle is currently supporting only five people at a time. It would be possible to exist like this for many lifetimes, if it were necessary.”

  “But surely it won’t!” Callista protested.

  “No. No, I don’t think it will.” She pushed herself back out of her chair. “I didn’t mean to go on,” she told Callista firmly. “It’s just Maude—Mrs. Martel—and I have chased the question around so many times that we have nothing new to say about it: what’s to become of Griffin, of Lukash, when the curse is finally ended.”

  “How long has the curse lasted?” Callista asked curiously.

  “More than five years now.” Mrs. Picard smiled sadly. “We haven’t aged a day in five years. Maude and I have the same number of grey hairs; Griffin’s face hasn’t changed so much as a wrinkle.”

  “But that’s barbaric!” Callista protested.

  “Is it?” Mrs. Picard looked down at her work-worn hands. “I think it’s intended as a kindness. We aren’t really losing these years, now are we? We’ll have the chance to live out our lives as they were designed, if Griffin manages to break the curse.”

  “But?”

  “But…life is going on outside without us. Maude has a daughter outside these walls, living her life—and she keeps getting older.” Her eyes were haunted for a bare moment before Mrs. Picard plastered a smile on her face again. “He’ll find a way to end it,” she said firmly.

  “What is the end to the curse?” Callista barely breathed the words, half afraid that she was stepping into the middle of something that was personal and private.

  Mrs. Picard looked surprised. “Don’t you know?” she demanded.

  Callista could only shake her head mutely, staring at her. “Not—I mean, Erin and Millicent said—” She shook her head. “But it’s not us being here, is it?”

  “He has to fall in love. There’s something twined about it about how he has to find ‘beauty within’ or some such nonsense, but I’ve no idea about that part—just that he has to fall in love.”

  “That’s why the girls,” Callista said slowly. “That’s why he needs to fall in love? To break the curse?”

  Mrs. Picard nodded. “Someday,” she said staunchly, “one of you girls is going to see past the curse and see him for the man that he is—and he is a good boy, you mark my words. He has the best heart you could ask for in a king.”

  “Are you trying to sell me on him?” Callista felt her face growing hot. She was starting to see just how much relied on her ability to become what the prince needed.

  How could she possibly live with herself if she condemned them all simply because she couldn’t look past a furry face?

  “Callista.” Mrs. Picard caught her attention. She wondered if the woman had been calling her name for a long time. “Don’t put the pressure on yourself,” she urged. “If you fall in love with him of his own merit, it will be wonderful. If you don’t, then there’s no harm in it—it just means you’re not the one for him.” She patted her shoulder. “He’s consulted with many a wise man over the terms of the curse, trying to understand it more fully, and one of them told him something that’s stuck with him all these years.”

  “What’s that?” She wasn’t going to hyperventilate. That was no way to look in front of the housekeeper,who was surely going to be reporting this conversation back to Griffin before it was all said and done.

  “He said that when the right woman came along, it wouldn’t be a question of struggling to ‘look within’ to see his true self. That she would be the woman meant for him, and that was that. That’s the way curses of this nature work, you see: they’re designed that their ending is the moment when true love sweeps in to save the day.”

  “I like the sound of that,” Callista admitted. “Though the way you say it, it makes me sound like the knight in shining armor or something.”

  “In some ways, you are,” Mrs. Picard told her. “At least one of the knights come to battle the fell dragon—in this case, the curse.” She hesitated. “I heard that you encouraged Griffin to take his mask off last night.” There was purpose in those words, Callista realized immediately. That was a good indication that this was the reason Mrs. Picard had really sought her out.

  “I did,” she said slowly.

  There was a long moment of silence as the older woman looked her up and down. “Did it bother you?” she wanted to know.

  “I—what?” Callista frowned, not understanding.

  Mrs. Picard sighed, muttered something under her breath about princes who were too chicken to ask their own difficult questions. “Do you want him to wear it tonight?” she asked flatly.

  “What? No!” Callista stared at her. “I already told him there’s no sense in him wearing the silly thing to dinner with me. He’ll only half starve himself because he can’t get food through the opening in any real quantity, and it’s frustrating him besides.” She shook her head as though shaking off the foolishness of that idea. “If you’re reporting back to the prince, please tell him that I am not turning squeamish or having trouble directing myself due to his visage, and that if he comes to the table in that mask, I shall be deeply offended.”

  “Deeply offended.” Mrs. Picard snorted softly. “I like that,” she informed her.

  Callista blushed. “I didn’t mean—”

  “Oh, no, dear, it was nicely phrased, and you can’t take it back now.” The housekeeper looked positively delighted. Callista was glad that she had managed to give her a thrill, if nothing else. “I’ll pass on the message.” She smiled gleefully. “We’ve been after him to do away with the mask for years, but he keeps insisting that it’s to make the girls more comfortable, and he won’t give it up.”

  “To make us more comfortable, or to make him feel more human?” Callista demanded without thinking.

  “That’s an interesting question, my dear. You’ll have to pursue it with him,” Mrs. Picard informed her. “Well, I’m glad that you aren’t going to force him to wear it, at least. He’s much easier when he doesn’t have to walk about breathing stale air all the time.”

  “I would think that would make anyone easier.”

  “Hm.” The housekeeper excused herself—but her presence was still well felt. Callista had more to think about now than she had before—and her head had already been quite full of all the complexities of the castle.

  By the time she went down to dinner, she was fairly sure that she had cemented a map of the main floors, at least, in her head. There were other floors—well, it was a castle. The three main floors, however, covered most of the available living space and the space that she thought would make up the Court when there were actually people in residence.

  The empty halls were still somewhat disconcerting. There were times when she felt as though there had to be people somewhere, just waiting to jump out at her; and other times, the emptiness felt oppressive, as though anything could happen to her and no one would have any idea. In those moments, she made small requests—something that would stir the invisible servants to action. At least when they were moving about her, she had the assurance that she wouldn’t keel over dead without anyone noticing or doing anything about it for hours.

  It was a relief, however, to see even Griffin’s furry face when she came down to
dinner that evening.This time, he was the one waiting in the hallway, looking a bit nervous. Perhaps he had been nervous the night before, too, but the mask had concealed it so that she hadn’t been able to see? The thought was almost as reassuring as his solid presence in the entryway, a presence that somehow drove away much of the sense of isolation she had experienced all day.

  “Good evening.” Callista swept her skirts around her in what she hoped was a passable imitation of the appropriate court curtsy.

  “Good evening.” Griffin must have considered it acceptable, because he immediately sketched a bow in return. “May I?” He held the door open for her, gesturing her into the large dining room.

  Callista preceded him in, as he seemed to prefer. She would have been delighted to go in on his arm, just for the comfort of—well, she supposed it wasn’t actually human touch, but it was close enough.

  Getting him to offer it, however, was going to take a little more doing. She’d taken it the night before; doing it again, since he wasn’t offering, made her feel more presumptuous.

  “Did you have an interesting day?” Griffin asked courteously. He didn’t hold her chair out for her—another gesture that would have put him in too-close proximity. Had he been this standoffish with her sisters, when he was able to hide behind his mask and they hadn’t seen him for what he really was? It was an interesting question. She’d have to put it in her letter that evening.

  “I did,” Callista admitted. “I’ve been exploring the castle. You have lovely artwork—and the decor is exquisite.” She offered him a cautious smile.

  “I’m glad you like it.” Griffin made a face—at least, that was what she assumed he was doing. His expressions were a little strange—and yet there was something still very human within the alien face. “Personally, I think it’s becoming a bit dated, but I’m not much of a decorator, myself, so I’m afraid I’m stuck with it until we can bring someone in.”

  “Couldn’t you bring in a decorator?” Callista asked curiously. “The castle is big enough that you could surely stay out of sight, if you wanted to bring someone in.”