Before Beauty

by Brittany Fichter

  Isa nodded again. She had known this, as he had written about it in one of his first letters.

  “We saw many other administrators while we were gone. Eight, actually. Some lived like lords, and others had little more than their people. But they all had had one thing in common.” Raoul dropped his eyes the ground. He didn’t go on.

  It took Isa a moment to realize that he was talking about her. “Their wives,” she whispered. Raoul nodded. Isa had to swallow hard before she could speak again. “So, you are saying that I’m unfit to be a chancellor’s wife.”

  “Now wait–” he began to correct her, but she held her hand up angrily.

  “I can read and write, which is more than you can say for many men in this wretched city. I can figure the sums of the treasury better than you can! How is that an unsuitable match for a chancellor? What more could you possibly want?”

  “I need a woman who could rule in my stead if something happened!”

  “No! No, what you mean is you want a mindless ninny who can stand by your side without having to lean on you for support! A flawless flirt who can charm visiting politicians with her grace and allure! You want a woman without a crooked hand or a lame foot!”

  “Belle–”

  “Don’t call me that!” She was shouting now. “Just tell me one thing. Was this your idea or your father’s?”

  He stared at her for a long moment before softly answering. “It was my father’s wish for me to see how others lived, but it was my choice to live like them. I want what’s best for this city.”

  “Then take what you want and go.” Isa’s father was suddenly beside him. “But before you do, I want you to know that neither you nor your father are ever welcome in my mercantile or my house ever again.” Ansel wore a look of deep hatred Isa had never seen before. “Men without honor have no place in my home.”

  With a weak nod, Raoul looked silently down at her hand. Isa realized what he wanted, and angry tears spilled down her face as she yanked the ring off her hand and shoved it at him. No words seemed to come to the young man as he stared down at the silver band, so after a long moment, he simply turned and walked out the back gate. Isa and her father sat in silence for an immeasurable amount of time before she was finally brave enough to speak.

  “Is everyone still inside?”

  “No, your mother cleared them out after I asked Chancellor Dupont what his son was up to.”

  Isa nodded, and before she knew it, her father had drawn her close and held her tightly. She could hold back no more, and before long, she realized she was wailing. She’d felt pain before, like the day the prince had shoved her into the way of the rearing horse. She’d felt grief when she’d realized that she could no longer dance. She had felt sorrow when the other children left her alone to find more suitable play spots, places she could not walk to or climb.

  But Raoul had always been the one to tell her things would be well, to stay with her when the others had run off. He had been the one to ask her to dance at all the town festivals when no other young men dared to. Raoul had been the one to nickname her Belle. He had believed she was worth marrying, despite her handicaps. But he had lied. And none of the pain she had ever known compared to this.

  Isa cried into her father’s shirt until she could no longer sit up straight. It wasn’t until she was tucked into her own bed that she realized she must have dozed off. She was still in her white dress, but she didn’t bother getting up to change. Instead, she lay in bed and listened to her parents through her little attic floor.

  “Did he say why?” her mother asked.

  “Some nonsense about how it was acceptable for his son to befriend a crippled girl, and even ask her to go dancing sometimes.” Ansel’s voice was low, but Isa could hear the dishes they were collecting clatter and bang much louder than necessary. “But as Raoul’s father, it was his responsibility to direct him towards important matters, now that he’s a man. He didn’t say as much, but I can tell you right now that Isa’s the reason he took him on the trip, to show him what a chancellor’s wife ought to be.” At that moment, a dish shattered and Ansel cursed. Isa’s parents were silent for a long time before Deline spoke again.

  “I’m worried about her, Ansel. I’ve never seen her like that.”

  Isa’s father gave a loud sigh, and Isa could imagine him running his hand through his graying hair. “Me, too. But she’s a strong girl. She’ll get through it. She has to.”

  Dawn was slow to come the next morning. Isa had drifted in and out of a tearful slumber, and the light brought little relief. Finally, Megane got out of her bed and crawled in with Isa. Isa held her little sister tightly, which released another set of tears. Megane watched her anxiously, but was silent until it was time to get dressed.

  “You should fold that nicely,” she said as Isa crumpled the wedding dress and threw it in the drawer. “Then it won’t be wrinkled for the next time.”

  “There won’t be a next time, Megs.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because men don’t want crippled women for their wives.” Isa spat out the words before she remembered whom she was talking to. Megane’s eyes grew wide and she hurried out of the room. Isa felt badly for speaking to her sister in such a way, but she couldn’t cleanse the bitter words from her mouth.

  As she collapsed back onto the bed, she felt her anger grow. Not just for Raoul, but for all the girls who had told her cripples don’t get husbands, and for those people who stared at her sympathetically every time she walked the city streets. The women who had nudged and winked at her as the wedding day had approached. For her small bed that should have laid empty last night. But most of all, for the prince.

  If it hadn’t been for him, she never would have been a cripple. She would have continued to dance, to run, and to grow and laugh with the other children. She would have been called beautiful by more than Raoul as she became a woman. The touch of a loving husband would have been hers by now, and maybe even children, as some of her friends had. It didn’t matter that no one had seen the prince since the Fortress had gone dark. Isa suddenly hated the man with a vengeance she hadn’t known herself capable of until that instant.

  The day didn’t bring much improvement for the family. After they spent all day cleaning up what should have been a wedding feast, Ansel came home from the city council meeting with grim news.

  “The chancellor wants someone to visit the other cities and towns to see if their tradesmen have suffered as we have since the Fortress went dark.”

  “And let me guess,” Deline sighed, “he chose you.”

  “He’s just angry that you stood up to him last night!” Isa’s younger brother, Launce, muttered over his stew.

  “I believe you’re right,” Ansel said to his son, “but whether he’s angry or not makes no difference. The other council members agreed to it. I leave tomorrow.”

  “How long will you be gone, Papa?” Megane asked.

  “Quite a while, Sweetheart.” Ansel lifted his youngest daughter out of her chair and into his lap.

  “You’re not going all the way to the western coast are you?” Deline frowned. “Surely they wouldn’t make you go that far!”

  “Unfortunately, yes. I’ll probably be gone until the leaves change color. But do not worry.” he kissed his wife. “I will do my best to be back before the first snow.”

  So Ansel left the next morning with all his provisions in saddle bags on one of the family horses. Goodbyes were tearful, all except for the one he exchanged with Isa. Isa felt as if there were no more tears left to shed in the whole world.

  The family watched as he made his way east towards the mountain pass, but Isa turned and went back inside. Looking at the pass meant seeing the Fortress as it rose up out of the mountain side. And looking at the Fortress meant looking towards Prince Everard.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Asylum

  Ansel wrapped his cloak around himself even tighter as he started down the mountain. His journey had taken eve
n longer than he’d thought, and the eve of his return looked like it might be have to be postponed. The black clouds above him were heavy with snow, and a long descent still stretched out ahead of him. Even in good weather, it would have taken him two hours to make it down the mountain to Soudain, but the biting wind whistled eerily, as if to guarantee him that his return would take him much longer than that.

  The trip had not been encouraging. The other cities and towns Ansel had visited were also suffering. Trade and travel had slowed to a crawl after the Fortress went dark. Without the protection of the Fortress and its kings, fear had driven many of the smaller towns to close their borders, and those that had remained open saw few tradesmen or merchants. Ansel would be forever grateful that the darkening of the Fortress had spared his daughter’s life, but he now hoped that he had enough in his own mercantile to feed his family, much less those who came to purchase food throughout the winter.

  Another large gust of wind interrupted Ansel’s thoughts, and when he looked up, he realized white flurries were already beginning to descend. Within moments, it was nearly impossible to see the road. He quickly considered what he should do. There were no cottages this high up the mountain that he could seek shelter in. In fact, the only thing that he could possibly reach before the blizzard fully struck would be the Fortress. And the Fortress was dark. More icy mountain air hit him as he considered this, making it hard to concentrate.

  After the Fortress had closed, the townspeople had whispered to one another of curses and all other sorts of dark magic. Ansel had paid little attention to it, at the time, simply thankful that whatever had happened had kept Isa alive. Besides, he was a practical man. He didn’t have the time to sit around fretting about gossip borne of idle minds. Now that he was suddenly faced with the choice of visiting the great Fortress, however, Ansel had to admit that he felt a bit of unease. Even if there was nothing to the rumors, his family’s last run-in with the prince had turned out to be more than disastrous.

  Still, he reasoned, he had no choice. No matter how he felt about the prince, he had friends there among the servants. Surely when they saw who was knocking upon their doors, they would be willing to open up and provide him simple respite in their quarters until the storm passed. The prince need not even know.

  It wasn’t long before Ansel was able to make out the post that marked the way to the servants’ entrance. He coaxed his tired horse onto the dirt path, which was now nearly invisible for the snow, and not a moment too soon, he was at the stables.

  Ansel should have felt relief at making it safely to a shelter, and yet a wave of anxiety hit him as he pushed open the heavy wooden door. There were a few dim torches lit, but no grooms came to greet him, and his sense of dread increased. Everyone knew that like his father, the prince was an avid horseman. He surely would have left at least two groomsmen to watch over his favorite warhorses in such a storm.

  “Hello?” Ansel called out. No one answered. His disquiet grew as he guided his horse into an empty stall. The other horses whinnied at him. They looked strangely thin for being the king’s animals. Peering closer, Ansel saw that they had feed in their troughs, but not much. The Fortress must be suffering from food shortages as well, he realized.

  In accordance, he took only enough to give his beast a few mouthfuls. He would pay the steward back when he found him. After brushing his animal and making sure he had clean hay, Ansel bundled back up to make the cold trek to the servants' entrance.

  The Fortress’s greeting was eerily similar to the one he had received in the stables. When no one responded to his knocks, Ansel let himself in. As soon as the door was shut, however, he found that unlike in the stables, not one candle was lit. And not only was it as dark as night, but it was just as quiet, too. No voices echoed down the stone halls. There were no whispers of children, or even footsteps to break the silence.

  Something, a suspicious feeling, kept him from calling out. So instead, he felt his way down the corridor to where he knew the servants’ kitchen would be. There was one lone candle lit on the long wooden table, and a weak fire in the large hearth. As long as Ansel had been visiting the Fortress to do business and speak with friends like the steward, there had always been people and food in this place. Women were always chasing giggling children away from the freshly baked bread, and hungry young men Launce’s age were always hanging about looking for leftovers.

  But now, aside from the small strange flames, there was no one. After a long, uneventful wait on the threshold, Ansel slowly walked into the large room. He found some old bread and aged cheese in one of the cabinets. The food was so dry it was nearly inedible, but Ansel was hungry enough to try and stomach it.

  A flicker of light against the wall caught his eye. There was something about the way the shadow danced that unnerved him. It was too much like a human shadow. Shaking his head, he went back to eating. The exhaustion and cold must be getting to him, he thought. When the shadow moved again, however, more boldly this time, Ansel froze with food still in his mouth. Fear made his limbs feel strange, and he began to shiver harder than he had outside.

  After a long moment of staring, he finally gained enough courage to swallow the rest of his bite. Unable to ignore his morbid curiosity, he stood up slowly to face the strange silhouette.

  It was really too large to be cast by the poor flames of the hearth or the candle, and that bothered Ansel. After he’d stared at it for a long moment, it moved again, jumping three feet down the wall towards the door. Another long minute later, it moved even farther. Ansel got the feeling he was supposed to follow.

  The game continued out of the kitchen and down the hall towards the servants’ chambers. Unable to see the shadow in the dark of the hall, Ansel lifted the lone candle and stood, for that seemed to be what the shadow wanted him to do. After coming this far, what other choice did he have?

  As he followed, he got the feeling that this shadow wasn’t the only one. The farther he walked, the more invisible eyes he felt on him. Even stranger than that, however, was the sensation that the eyes were familiar. And though the predicament should have sent him running back into the storm, he instinctively felt he could trust the strange apparitions. Either that, or the ancient food he’d just eaten was meddling with his ability to reason.

  Unlike the shadows, however, the Fortress itself was as unfriendly as he’d ever seen it. The darkness was nearly suffocating. Walking in it felt like walking deeper and deeper into a tomb. The air was musty and damp, and it smelled as if neither a door nor window had been opened in decades. What had happened to the kingdom’s beacon of shining light, the sacred place of protection? What kind of power could overcome it? This thought set him trembling more than anything else he’d encountered. Perhaps the gossip was not as farfetched as he’d first believed.

  The shadow kept him moving quickly down the corridors, but he paused before the throne room. There was one light, the brightest of any he’d seen yet that shone through the high windows above the throne. All of the other windows were covered, their tapestries drawn closed. It was moonlight, Ansel realized, that was coming through the highest of windows. The storm must have abated.

  As his eyes began to adjust to the new light, he realized the grand room had been decorated and left that way. He could only guess it had been set for the great coronation ceremony, as that was the night everything had gone dark. He had turned to go back into the hallway when a voice spoke from behind him.

  “And how is it that a commoner escaped the curse of the Fortress?”

  Ansel slowly turned to see that the throne, though hidden in shadow from the moon’s rays, was not empty. A dark figure sat hunched in it. Its voice was soft and terrible, and Ansel trembled so that he dropped the candle, and it sputtered out upon the floor.

  “I beg your pardon, my lord?” Ansel timidly called back.

  “All of my servants, my soldiers, and even my home itself were cursed into this blackness. No one has come or gone for months. And yet, you come in
as if you own the place.” So the prince had survived.

  “I beg your forgiveness, Sire,” Ansel quickly hurried forward and knelt, bowing his head. “I sought shelter from the storm. If I’d stayed outside I would have died. I did not mean to intrude.”

  Two thin rings of blue fire appeared through the darkness, fixing their depths upon him, and Ansel’s trembling nearly overwhelmed him.

  “What is your name?”

  “Ansel Marchand of Soudain, Your Highness.”

  “And what are you doing out in such a storm?”

  “I sit on Soudain’s city council, and I was sent to visit other parts of Destin to inquire about their matters of trade.”

  “So you thought it would be acceptable to trespass on sacred ground for this?”

  At this question, Ansel swallowed hard, praying his response would not be considered impertinent.

  “I beg your pardon, Sire, but was the Fortress not a place of asylum for the weary in the days of old?”

  The prince was silent for a moment. “It does seem that the Fortress has spared you, though I cannot understand why. But perhaps,” the prince spoke slowly, “you can be of use to me.”

  Ansel’s heart skipped a beat. What on earth could the prince need with him?

  “But first, I need to know why you were willing to enter a place that is cursed. What makes your life so worth living that you are willing to risk meeting with phantoms?”

  Ansel’s words became lodged in his throat. After narrowly escaping the royal edict meant for Isa, he could not tell the prince about his family. So he remained silent.

  “You would defy your prince?” For the first time, the terrible voice rose, which made it only more awful. Still, Ansel would not speak.