The Beauty's Beast

by E. D. Walker

  The king looked at once to the wolf, all concern. Llewellyn quickly, but without seeming haste, inspected the wolf. The beast’s eyes looked cloudy to Kathryn, and he panted, staring at Llewellyn as though from a great distance. The magician clucked his tongue.

  “Use my chambers.” A crease had formed on the king’s brow.

  “The herb garden is closer, my king.”

  “Of course.” King Thomas slapped Llewellyn’s shoulder affectionately, though the concerned look still haunted his eyes. “Sir Edric.” The king turned to another of his men. “Carry the wolf to Llewellyn’s workshop, if you will?”

  As the knight picked the panting animal up, the king helped to adjust the weight of the wolf in Sir Edric’s arms. Llewellyn trailed behind, his black robes billowing. He cast one look at the high table and locked gazes with Kathryn for the barest of moments before turning away.

  His was not a look of reassurance or grief but plainly a call to arms. His meaning seemed clear enough to Kathryn: come to the workshop.

  She jumped as the queen addressed her in a whisper. “I have a black cloak. Heavy wool. Very discreet. I realize I have forgotten the cloak in your clothing chest. Tomorrow you will return it to me, please.” The queen leaned forward, her brow knit anxiously. “Tell me what you can tomorrow? About the wolf?” Aliénor called her tirewoman over and whispered a judicious word in her ear. The woman slipped away, swift but unobtrusive.

  Kathryn found resolve enough to meet the queen’s gaze. “Thank you.” She clasped the queen’s bejeweled hand in her own and squeezed gently. “And I will.”

  After that, Kathryn could hardly contain her impatience. When the king rose from the table to retire, she was barely a beat behind him out of the chamber. She took leave of the queen, who would stay below to listen to the court musicians, and Kathryn hurried back to the women’s apartments.

  As she entered the bedroom she shared with the other ladies, the barest click betrayed that the door connecting to the ladies’ solar had just been closed.

  Kathryn dashed to her clothing chest and flipped up the lid. The black cloak lay folded neatly in amongst her other clothing. She snatched the garment up and hastily drew the dark fabric around herself.

  While halfway out the door, a rising hesitation stilled her hand. The hour was by no means late enough for the castle’s halls to be empty. Any lady caught trying to sneak into the gardens at night in a concealing cloak would be in very great trouble if caught. The harm an indiscretion could do not only to her reputation but also to the reputation of the queen was very great. Another worry was that any men who caught a woman out in the dark would believe her of low virtue and therefore fair game for any and all liberties they should decide to take with her.

  Of course, these concerns never seemed to trouble Beatrice—she snuck out most nights—but Kathryn didn’t have Beatrice’s experience or connections. She suspected she and Beatrice were also sneaking out for very different purposes.

  What should I do?

  The moon shone, pouring silver light over the landscape to illuminate the castle grounds and buildings almost as brightly as day. Kathryn stared down, her gaze arrested at once by a trellis attached to the wall beneath the window. Prickly vines crept up the wall’s sides, and the trellis did not seem overly sturdy. Still, if Kathryn managed the first few feet, then she could make her way to the stable roof and climb down from there, following the walls and the shadows to the workshop. I had far more daring escapades at home, climbing the apple trees to steal the fruit.

  With that encouraging, if somewhat unrealistic, thought, she stepped onto the window ledge. I hope the queen will not mind a little wear and tear on my borrowed cloak. Kathryn pushed that and all other thoughts aside and squeezed through her narrow window. Heart racing, she began negotiating the barbed trellis down to her destination. In her haste to get to the workshop, she hardly regarded the various scrapes and scratches the prickly vines inflicted on her.

  ***

  Llewellyn had taken the wolf to his workshop and deftly tied the beast to his worktable before the animal aspect took over completely. The garwaf had been conscious for this and wearily submitted to the indignity. Still, Llewellyn would hardly have blamed the beast if, in his present mental and spiritual fugue, he had forgotten all that.

  The magician was currently trying to make sure the wolf’s bonds would hold through the night and ensuring the wolf did himself no injury in his madness and glancing every few seconds at the door waiting for Lady Kathryn and, meanwhile, trying to make sure he himself was not scratched, kicked, beaten, or otherwise mauled by the werewolf.

  Llewellyn had tried talking to the wolf at first to soothe him, but his voice had only redoubled the paroxysms of rage gripping the beast. The magician had abandoned that remedy. He wiped sweat from his brow before the moisture dripped into his eyes and sighed. “I should have listened to my mother and become a hermit.”

  The door of his workshop creaked ever so slightly ajar, and a shadow insinuated itself into the room, only to be brought up sharp with a gasp on beholding the wild creature upon the table.

  Llewellyn, after nearly an hour and a half of dealing with a crazed, dangerous werewolf, had reached the limit of his usually benevolent patience. “Idiot girl,” he snapped out. “Take the damn cloak off so he can see you.”

  The raging wolf lay between Kathryn and himself. Llewellyn wasn’t sure sheer fury wouldn’t win the wolf his freedom at last if the magician made a move toward wolf or girl now. Llewellyn’s bones ached, his head throbbed, and he had to admit he was terrified as he stared at the big animal growling murderous desires to the room at large.

  ***

  Blood-red curtains of rage clouded his gaze as he growled and thrashed about, not understanding what bound him in this inferno of pain. Images kept flashing through his head. A woman’s face. The red chasm of the hunting dog’s neck he had ripped out. He salivated, snapping in futility at whatever creature manhandled him. The words the creature spoke were an irritating buzz to his ears. He longed to spring up and create a similar slash of gore on this infuriating creature’s neck, if only so it would shut up.

  As whatever restraints on the wolf’s extremities held, the beast tilted his head back and howled his fury to the moon, the stars, and the chill night air—the only sovereigns he recognized now. The craving to hunt, to kill, swelled strong in him, and only one vision of the myriad display swimming in his head came close to being in focus: the treacherous female with the pale blond hair and the frowning brown eyes. The fragmented pieces of his understanding could not supply a reason for his hatred. He needed the hot rush of her blood spilling down his throat, and soon, or he would wither and die from longing.

  A new bouquet mingled with the smell of the herbs and the sweating stench of his oppressor. Judging by her scent, this new one was female. And frightened. She wore a concealing cloak. An image swirled through his afflicted mind of the one he loathed, the one he longed to mangle, wearing just such a cloak.

  The female moved only close enough for him to smell her fear and the sweetness of her. Her fragrance alone sent bloodlust pounding in his veins. He reared up, baring his fangs. Let her come near him, let her lay one of those traitorous hands on him, and she would not live the night through with her creamy white hide intact.

  ***

  Kathryn wavered. She thought of running back into the night, back to a world with nothing more dangerous or mysterious than a tricky piece of embroidery. More than ever, she longed for the dull routine of the queen’s chambers. Even the oppression of Beatrice was better than this snarling beast.

  The wolf jerked toward her, and corded muscles of iron strained against ropes that suddenly seemed a trifle too flimsy to Kathryn.

  She swallowed and, drawing herself up, she stepped away from the door and into the workshop, throwing back the hood of the cloak as she did so. Her disordered coil of hair fell around the shoulders of her blue gown. Stinging scratches from the trellis vines cov
ered her hands and her face.

  More than a little ruffled, she caught her reflection in Llewellyn’s small looking glass. Her eyes seemed dull, with heavy blue shadows beneath them. The skin around her lips had turned a pasty white, and her battered hands clutched convulsively at the folds of her skirt.

  The wolf growled again, feral eyes rolling in a body almost boneless now as he thrashed to free himself.

  “He’s not—” Kathryn’s breath caught on a sob.

  “Rabid?” Llewellyn’s voice sounded ragged, a throaty gasp of fatigue. “No. This is an affliction of the spirit and the mind, no mere physical malady. I marked him well at dinner. The king’s announcement of the Feast of St. Aaron at dinner did this, although the full moon tonight probably isn’t helping much.” Llewellyn rubbed his forehead.

  “Why did you—”

  The wolf lunged for her again, and the bonds held him back by only the barest of inches. She stumbled away until her spine banged against the workshop door. She shivered and, swallowing the fear that choked her, looked to Llewellyn. “What can I do?”

  He laughed shakily and quite without mirth. “The beast hasn’t let me touch him since he slipped into this state with the rise of the moon. He won’t let me near him except to rip my limbs from my body.” The magician’s tone was dry, but Kathryn sensed the sobbing, shaking panic that lay behind his cool façade. The same panic she herself kept in check only with a supreme effort of will.

  Llewellyn continued, “If he does not quiet for you…” The magician glanced meaningfully at the hatchet hanging on the wall by his head.

  Kathryn’s stomach dropped. But I know who he is now. He had a name, a human identity. Whatever madness gripped him now as a wolf, he was human.

  The knot of fear in her belly hardened into adamant resolve. “Then he will know me,” she declared with more confidence in her voice than she actually possessed. Then she murmured on a sigh, more prayer than pledge, “He has to.”

  She went to the wolf, as near as she dared, and knelt to put her gaze on a level with his.

  Human eyes no longer stared back at her, but the feral and furious eyes of a wolf who, even as she looked at him, was deciding how best to break his bonds and savage her. Yet even as his human soul suffocated, even in this animal rage, there was more than just a wolf there. There was hate.

  Hate is human invention. Animals kill because they are afraid. They kill to defend or to eat. The creature looking at her would also kill for his hate. That hatred gleamed in his eyes now, and anything human enough to hate might be human enough to bring back.

  She hoped.

  She prayed.

  ***

  She moved closer, within an inch of the sharp snap of his jaws. She looked at him, brazenly looked at him, daring him to bite the overinquisitive nose off her too-lovely face. Oh, and how he wanted to. And he would. A few moments more and he would be free, free to have his way and butcher her as he longed to do. Her and then her mate in the corner.

  But then…then the female said his name.

  He recognized the voice, but it was not the one he had expected to hear, not even one who was supposed to know that name.

  Quickly but hesitantly, she stepped toward him. She stood close enough for him to strike. Or close enough for her to get her arms around him.

  She did not embrace him. Only the sweetness of her scent stretched out to engulf him, to muddle and drug him with her heady essence, dulling the tearing madness in his heart. She smelled of fertile earth, with a sharp tang of crushed leaves about her, and a caressing feminine fragrance, something that made him think of springtime and sunshine. Like a sweet, fresh fruit ready to be picked. His growling subsided, and he blinked, befuddled senses trying desperately to refocus. She reached out a hand to him. He wanted to snap at her fingers, to scare her back from him, but he could not.

  “I will not hurt you,” she said quietly and then, almost with wonder in her voice, “and you will not hurt me.”

  This was not the mate who had betrayed him. This was not Alisoun. He came to himself again, or as near to his human self as he could manage these days. Oh, I’m exhausted.

  “Go to him, Kathryn,” said a disembodied voice over the wolf’s shoulder that the beast did not concern himself with. His whole existence was wrapped in the white face shining above him, a safe haven in the dark. Like salvation and redemption and hope.

  Kathryn is her name, he thought somewhat coherently as his head lolled back. His wounded shoulder ached and ached, a steady throb timed to his heartbeat. I’m so tired.

  ***

  The wolf whined softly. Kathryn all but fell across his body, tangling her fingers in the soft fur of his neck, her hot tears falling on his face. Llewellyn carefully lifted the silver hatchet from the wall. He waited and watched for a long moment. Then he smiled to himself and, unseen by the others, placed the hatchet back over his hearth. Quietly, he sidled out his back door to give the young people a moment alone.

  ***

  The wolf licked Kathryn’s cheek. She looked into his face and sighed. “So you’re back, my lord.” She laughed, the sound bordering on hysteria, and wiped her eyes. She traced the line of his scar, then seized the sides of his face to give him a tiny shake. “Dear Sir Wolf,” she crooned to him, “don’t do that again.”

  He whimpered and nuzzled her cheek.

  She wrapped her arms around him and squeezed. “Do not go where I may not follow you.”

  Never, never, never, never again. The thought was fierce, vehement. When he contemplated what he had almost done…if the ropes had snapped…a shudder passed through him.

  “Silly wolf. Whatever you’re worrying over, stop.” She planted a kiss on his pointed ear. “Don’t be a fool. You are a knight of this land, fur or no fur. You are too honorable to break your oaths. Your vows of fealty hold you still and always will, no matter what form you take. No less does the vow you swore to me in the forest hold you.

  “You are my champion, Sir Garwaf, and whether you will or no, harm will not befall me while you live. You will not let it.” She stroked his face again, grinning. “Now let Llewellyn back in and behave yourself while he dresses your shoulder. I’ll wait, and then I am for my bed and sleep. As should you be.” She turned to seek where the magician had gone. Smiling, Llewellyn approached with fresh ointment and dressings.

  ***

  Kathryn went to her accustomed bench against the wall. She fully meant to watch the proceedings, but her head kept bowing to her chest over and over again.

  By the third time, Llewellyn laughed and said, “Dear girl, I don’t require your supervision for this activity. Stretch out and doze if you like until I’m done. Your part in the evening’s affair is at an end.”

  She rubbed her eyes and watched the wolf. He stared solemnly back at her—with the same look he had given the king on first beholding his lord in the forest. She smiled into his eyes and looked reluctantly back to Llewellyn. “What happened? You said something about the king’s announcement.”

  “Since we cannot learn his thoughts, the best I can do is to draw my own conclusions—”

  “Yes, yes.” Kathryn waved that away. “You’re brilliant, Llewellyn, and your suppositions are probably correct. So?” She prompted him with her open palm and an expectant look.

  Llewellyn gave her a lopsided grin. “Unless I do the man a grave injustice, I very much believe the new husband of Gabriel’s wife to be the one who has betrayed him. Reynard of Troumper. The man courted and married Lady Alisoun immediately, when her other suitors waited out of deference to Gabriel’s memory and in fear he might come back to nullify their marriage. The Earl of Troumper had no such compunction.”

  “Well, why bother when you already know?” Kathryn asked, calling the betraying beast Reynard all sorts of vile names in her head.

  “Precisely. I believe our friend”—he patted the wolf’s side, and the wolf butted his head against Llewellyn’s hand and gave him a look of apology—“was entertaining t
houghts that his wife’s new husband must be attending the festivities and will be here in the castle, within his grasp. Those less-than-charitable thoughts, when coupled with the new moon tonight, served to bring out the worst of his wolfish nature. His animal impulses robbed the human half of control. The part of him that is still human drowned in these bitter emotions, and reasonable thought could not check the violence inherent to a beast.”

  “You’re saying the wolf triumphed?”

  “For a time.”

  Kathryn rose, awake all at once, and went to her beast. She stroked his head as Llewellyn finished applying the fresh dressing to the shoulder. She continued to card her fingers through the soft fur of the wolf. His eyes fluttered until at last Kathryn had lulled him into a peaceful slumber. She kissed his ears, then looked at Llewellyn. “How do we keep the human half in control?”

  Llewellyn scratched the side of his nose and frowned. “The best medication I can recommend is more time spent with his king and with you. The two of you bring out his humanity the best. He is most clearly in control of himself when with you. He knows himself then, who he’s supposed to be.” Llewellyn smiled gently. “Might say you make him want to be a better man.”

  Kathryn nodded. “The queen might excuse me for the mornings if I ask. She seldom rises early. The beast dearly loved the training session today, I think. You should have heard him barking for joy. I would hate to take that time from him. I would keep him in my chamber, but he does not think that’s proper.” She finally glanced at Llewellyn. “Will mornings with me and afternoons and evenings spent in the company of the king and his fellow knights be enough to keep him with us?” She chewed her lower lip, her brows pinched together with concern.

  He patted her cheek. “Dear girl, time spent with you is bound to have an improving effect upon anyone.”