by Brea Viragh
His hulking shadow crawled toward me in the gloom of the library. Please don’t let me feel his memories again…
I would not be able to handle another episode. Though I hoped it heralded some kind of return of my powers, a tender part of me knew my heart would break to feel his anguish again. To know he’d hidden himself away watching the years crawl by without a shred of hope to lighten the shadows.
“You’ve come for the potion?” I asked.
“You have it ready? And you’re confident it will work?”
I lifted my chin higher to meet his eyes, feeling utterly exposed. “This isn’t easy for me, you know. No matter who I used to be, the magic isn’t mine to wield anymore. Not really, not completely. I’m doing the best I can with the meager resources available to me. Just so you understand that. I have no idea whether the potion will work or not.”
He nodded. “Understood. I’m still surprised you found anything.”
I knew he meant the potion book. Expelling a breath, I flashed him a smile then said, “It was a stroke of good luck. Your mother had a vast collection. This particular potion looked promising because it is called ‘Resurrection’. Maybe if we can return you back to human form, it doesn’t matter that I don’t have my memories. I’m fine the way I am.”
Wasn’t I? Or had I said it more for my benefit than for his?
I handed the vial to Merek. “Here. This is for you. To show you what a dazzlingly good cook I really am. I mean, who knows! You might want to hire me on to work in your kitchens after this. Your head chef may have a need for my skills.”
Merek jerked back. “I didn’t realize you expected me to drink this…garbage.” His nostrils flared at the smell, eyes closing on a wince.
“It’s not going to kill you.”
“Is that a guarantee?”
“Well…no. No guarantees, sorry. Look, I’m not sure what you expected. Did you want to bathe in it, instead?” I teased.
“Perhaps that would be better than drinking it, but I don’t believe there is a bathtub in the castle large enough for me.”
Merek held my gaze for a moment longer. Another joke! And here I thought I’d seen it all.
“But if it does work…what will you do then?” I asked as I waited for him to make up his mind whether to drink the vial of hideous liquid or not. “Once the spell lifts, I mean. I’m sure you have some kind of…plan.”
It took him a long moment to answer. “I hadn’t given it a thought.” He cocked his head to the side and his mouth tightened. “I’d given up.”
“Given up hope?”
“Given up everything. Your curse ripped through me and changed the course of my life in seconds. Turned me into this creature that could not trust himself to be around others without harming them. I did my best to figure out how to break it, but could find no answers. How could I? How could I get others to trust me when I could not trust myself? No, there would be no way to break the curse, and knowing that, hope fled. After everything that happened, I knew I would be nothing but a monster to any and all. For the rest of my days.” He held the vial up in a mock toast. “Salud!”
Merek downed the entirety of the potion in one swallow and grimaced, his sharp teeth on full display. “This is awful.” Gagging, he managed to keep it down.
“I promise I’m a much better cook than this,” I told him with a straight face.
Merek set the glass vial down, still grimacing with distaste. “Now what? I don’t feel any different.”
I sighed and closed the spell book. “Now we wait to see what happens.”
I slept fitfully that night, anxious to see what the outcome would be, to see if the ancient recipe I’d found in the dusty old book would turn the Beast back into the Crown Prince. Back into a man. Nightmares kept me tossing and turning, and when I finally cracked my eyes open, still groggy, the sheets were soaked with sweat. I took a moment to look inward, but found that nothing inside of me stirred in response to the magic I’d supposedly cast.
Why not, I wondered, staring up at the coffered ceiling. Why, in all these months of being here, wouldn’t my magic return to me in full? Especially now that I knew more about it.
My mind went quiet in a cold anxious agony over what I might find when I stepped out of this room. Whether I would find things the same or entirely changed.
The only thing I knew for certain was that I had changed. I was no longer the cruel witch who had condemned a man to torture, imprisoned in his own castle.
My mother and father had raised me to be responsible. To care for the people around me, to make sure to protect my brother. Apparently, there were yet many things they hadn’t gotten around to teaching me. Or perhaps those were banished from my memory as well.
Worrying my lip, I snuggled deeper beneath the covers, dragging them close to my chin. I was stalling, not ready yet to face the aftermath. My parents certainly never taught me how to navigate my personal feelings in a healthy manner. Such as the fact that I was coming to care for Merek despite everything that had transpired between us. He loathed me. I knew that. He saw me as a cruel monster, as hideous as the one he saw when he looked in the mirror, yet I couldn’t stop myself from caring about him.
I looked forward to our daily arguments because I knew then at least he dropped the mask. Over dinner we allowed each other to see who we really were and the conversations grew in depth and complexity.
I rolled onto my side and heaved out a long groan. I must have been ridiculously naive when I decided to come here, thinking I’d have this issue solved in a few days. A week at most. I’d been a guest in the castle for over four months now and Merek’s birthday fast approached. Like a giant guillotine poised over my neck—over his neck—and as the days passed the rope frayed a little more, a little more. Soon it would come slicing down and all would be lost.
How many times must I repeat that I was no longer the vile person I’d been then? So many things I might have done differently if only I’d known better.
I waited for the sun to rise, glad for the windows granting me a view of the golden mountains, the air bright and cold though I ached to return to sleep.
I started to slide out of bed when the door to my room exploded inward.
“Reila!”
The raw force in Merek’s voice had me acting on instinct, ducking down with my hair obscuring my face and my arms over my head for protection. Only when he remained silent did I lift my gaze to him.
And my heart sank.
He stood in the doorway, wearing the tattered remnants of his usual hunter-green tunic, claw marks having shredded the fabric from elbow to shoulder. Those claws were out and the fur covering his arms seemed to have grown longer. His face remained unchanged.
“It didn’t work,” he growled. “Your potion. Look at me. I’m still…well, you can see for yourself.”
“It didn’t work?” I repeated stupidly.
And why would it work? A part of me voiced the question while the rest of me shied away from the answer. After so many years of not knowing what I could do, not knowing who I was, how could I expect any magic to do what I asked of it?
“I should have known better than to allow myself to hope,” Merek said dejectedly. “I am ridiculously foolish.”
I rose from the bed and crossed to stand within swiping distance without fear of reprisal. “I don’t want to hear you say such things about yourself. You are not foolish. We are simply exhausting all avenues which present themselves. It is not foolish to hope for the best outcome.”
He sighed with resignation. “There is only one avenue left.”
“What is that?” I asked.
“True love.”
The words hit me with two resounding clunks. I ached to hold him, to reach out and assure him that I would be there for him whatever would happen, and that even if we lost, I was here.
But I kept it to myself, detaching from him and everything else around me, including my own terrible desires. I would scour books, clean the cas
tle, sit in the winter-frozen garden, and think of any way I could to make this life better for the both of us.
He was…a conundrum, I decided, at times confident and cocky and at other times withdrawn. Angry through it all but not without his moments of joy. I’d seen as much with our snowball fight. I’d gotten used to his formidable energy and these days I felt him before I saw his physical self.
He cracked a smile that somehow didn’t seem nearly as ferocious as the first time I’d seen it. It was an attempt at humor that fell short of the mark, because I could detect the ocean of sadness behind it. “I was merely joking again. We all know true love isn’t possible.”
He looked and sounded beaten, and I pitied him even more. Something should have happened with the potion. It made no sense for Merek to remain unaffected. Yet here he stood, still in beast form, revealing his fears to me.
I might have been an ambitious bitch when I cursed him—I was still having a hard time with that, though—but I knew myself better than anyone. I would have left a loophole in the spell, if possible. A way out. It only made sense, right? I couldn’t have been so heartless, so evil. There had to be a way around the wording of the curse, if only I could remember.
“Don’t give up hope. I’m going to find a way.”
I watched his face grow cold, so cold and so calm that it unnerved me.
“We will never break this curse—”
I held up a hand to stop him, inches away from his lips. Slowly I withdrew my hand. “I’m not going to stop looking until I find it. Maybe it isn’t clear to you by now, although it should be, that I am here for the long haul. Keeping you entertained has become my new favorite hobby.”
“And here I thought it was reading.”
“I read for pleasure and for business,” I said somberly.
His gaze dropped to the open, untied front of my nightgown and my face warmed. “Pretty soon, Reila, you will want to return home to your family. You will decide that being here with me does nothing to help you or your plans for future happiness.” He looked me up and down. Assessing me. Weighing what to say. “You will want to leave and I will remain behind, making the best of this situation the way I have done for the past five years.”
“I told you I would stay until I’ve freed you,” I insisted, at once annoyed at his pessimism. “You don’t get to decide how I feel or how I will act.”
He frowned at me. “Say what you will. I know your type. You’re content to help me as long as it serves your goals. If you can’t find a way to break me free, to assuage your own sense of guilt, then you’ll run away and you will try to forget.”
“You think so little of me even now.”
I halted on my way past him, looking down at the elbow Merek had grabbed to keep me in place. I didn’t know how to process this. How to process my own rage and the sadness inside of him.
He stood that way for a long moment and I wondered if we’d been in this position before, once, when the world had been at his feet and he’d been unafraid to look in the mirror. Once when there was an endless string of possibilities for his life, for my life, for our life.
“Prove me wrong,” he said softly. “Prove me wrong and then we will see.”
He tried hard to appear unaffected, tried hard to keep the hurt from his voice though I knew it to be genuine. I noticed the frown tugging at the corner of his mouth and knew he felt I’d let him down on purpose.
“It will be my pleasure.”
I pulled my arm out of his grasp and reached for a robe I’d found in the wardrobe. No time to dress properly. My research must continue. I owed it to him. “Maybe I got the recipe wrong. Or the wrong ingredients. I don’t know, but I won’t give up trying,” I told him as I headed for the door. “Have a little faith. Please.”
If I wanted an apology out of him for his lack of faith, then I’d be waiting a long time. He still thought I played him for a fool.
I’m the fool.
I strode down the staircase toward the library, and whatever servants thought to stop and speak to me moved swiftly out of the way. I tried to concentrate on what I could do to find a new spell, a new potion, a new piece of magic to work. My tumultuous emotions hissed at me and all demanded to be noticed.
Not likely. I was on a mission.
I returned to the library to pore over more books, more literature on magic and arcane subjects. Maybe there was something I might have missed. I’d take whatever sliver of knowledge I could get, whatever I might have overlooked that would give me an edge.
It took several more days of Merek avoiding me, several more days of hunting through the vast volumes for anything I might have overlooked before, and finally I stumbled upon a book on “black magic.” While it went against every grain of my soul to peruse the contents, I could not dismiss it out of hand just because it related to harmful curses.
The very first page held a caveat. A warning.
Curses cannot be undone once they are cast. They must be broken.
I sat for the longest time staring out the window at the snow, the harsh, bitter laugh dying in my throat. They must be broken…but how? I didn’t remember what I’d done, and Merek didn’t seem to want to speak to me about it. No one did.
True love’s kiss? That didn’t exist. And even if it did, he would never…
With me…
I locked eyes with my reflection in the window glass, noticing the tense set of my lips, the look in my eyes like I’d been slapped. The last bit of my composure unraveled.
Instead of telling Merek, knowing it would not do a bit of good, I kept the information to myself.
Chapter 16
Strains of a piano echoed distantly in my mind. Groaning, I rolled over in bed, positive the sounds came from a dream. The melody seduced me, the song achingly familiar. Something just out of reach but one I’d heard before, long ago.
The enchanting chords sank deep beneath my skin and caressed me with a sensual wave of heat. From the lowest notes to the high tinkling melodies, whoever played showed a range and depth of emotion I’d never heard, and one I would never be privy to again.
I shook sleep from me and pushed up onto my elbows. Darkness danced outside the window as a distant snow storm grew closer, smothering the bright light of dawn.
I stretched, determined to follow the song, slipping on a robe and slippers before exiting the room.
My heart grew heavy the longer I listened.
“Hello?” I called out into the hall.
No answer, although I didn’t expect one. I walked downstairs following the sound, following the passion I heard in it.
My breath caught when I crossed into the front parlor and saw Merek hunched over the keys. He was playing a delicate melody I recognized but could not fully recall.
Something drew me forward. Drew me toward him and the small bit of empty space on the bench next to him. I marveled at how, despite the fur-covered paws and retracted claws, the prince mastered the keys as though he’d been playing the piano most of his life. His eyes were closed and I knew he had lost himself in the melody.
I narrowly resisted brushing the fur away from his collar though I ached to run my fingers there, to feel the silky heft of those strands. He wore one of the only pieces of clothing large enough to fit his muscular frame, a tan linen shirt with strings at the neck.
Merek didn’t bother grumbling out a good morning as I sat and watched him play. I closed my own eyes, relishing the melody. And without thinking, I added my own fingers to the keys. The song coursed through me, my body knowing the notes, knowing exactly what to do.
When had I learned to play the piano?
With the snow outside and the fireplace roaring, the two of us made music together, toiling over the keys in tandem. I wondered how I knew this song, and if Merek had been the one to teach it to me. The gap in my recollections did not stop me from keeping time with him. Nor from pouring out my soul onto those keys.
At once my failures over the last few months didn
’t matter anymore. Nor did the lack of sleep or the fact that I’d taken to eating in the library while I worked. The music swept me away until we reached the crescendo together, the last notes trailing off into silence.
My heart nearly cracked open.
The two of us sat for a moment longer before I spoke. “How do I know that song?” I asked finally.
A spark of compassion entered his green eyes and Merek’s voice softened when he said, “There was a time…the two of us used to play it. Whenever we were upset with each other, instead of getting into a fight—although there were plenty of those anyway—we both decided to pour ourselves into the music. Hoping it would soothe out the tangles in our emotions which words simply could not do.”
His statement shook me. His green eyes held me captive, breathless. I stood on the edge of a cliff ready to throw myself over with delight.
Vulnerable and exposed and raw.
“What do you mean we used to play it together?”
Merek exhaled and shut the cover over the keys, shaking his head. “You and I know each other a bit better than I’ve led you to believe, Reila There are some things that have been too painful for me to address. About you, about us. About myself.”
“I don’t understand.” I sat still, my shoulders squared and my heart beginning to beat a quick tempo. “You never told me. You made it seem as though…as though meeting me had been a mistake, as though my coming here and cursing you was unexpected. How deeply did we know each other?”
Merek stood quickly and pushed away from the piano, the legs of the bench screeching against the floor in protest. “This was our song. Okay? One we made up together in our darkest hours, an outpouring of our feelings. So why would I talk to you about it now? It’s not something I care to remember. Sometimes a pain that deep is better left in the past.”
And yet he’d been playing it when I woke. Not so much in the past, then, but something still impacting the present. “Our song,” I repeated, hugging my arms around my midsection on a shiver. Wishing I could remember…
