The Beast

by Alianne Donnelly

  He does not. He makes me read until the very end. Every last sordid word. When I finish, I snap the book shut and throw it on the ground. I would never treat a proper book this way. This one is an abomination. An insult to the written word.

  “Well done, Lyssette,” he mocks.

  “You disgust me.”

  He chuckles. “Do I?”

  “How could you possibly enjoy this? How could a man write such things?”

  “So innocent.” He says it as an insult.

  I cannot even look at him. My humiliation runs too deep. If I meet his gaze now, I know I will not be able to control myself. I do not know which would be worse: to burst into tears before him, or attack him. I know his strength is far superior to mine, and I know he would merely enjoy the sight of my tears so much more.

  “Come back tomorrow night. I have something else for you to read.”

  “Are we finished?” I ask stiffly. He demanded I stay the night. It is not yet morning, though the sun will be coming up any moment.

  “For now,” he says. I can still feel his eyes on me. It makes me feel unclean. I push to my feet and walk out of the chamber without looking at him. “Good day, Lyssette,” he calls after me.

  I would slam the door behind me but the sight of Marguerite out in the hallway stops me cold. “What are you doing here?”

  Marguerite shakes her head with disgust. “You little whore,” she says.

  Her words make resentment coil inside me. “You were told not to come here.”

  “Yes, and now I can see why. So where is your lover? No need to hide him now. Or do you exhaust him so completely that he has no strength left to see his guests?”

  Before I can utter a cutting remark, a scream carries from inside the chamber. It saps what little strength I have left. My heart aches for the Beast. Because I know I am failing him. Every time he endures that transformation is pain he should not be feeling any longer. He should be free by now. Why can I not free him?

  Marguerite’s eyes widen. “My God, Lyssette, what have you done to him?” She shoves past me to the door.

  “Marguerite, don’t!”

  But I am too late to stop her. She bursts into the chamber, heading straight for the suffering Beast. I follow on her heels and we both stop when the screaming stops and the Beast drops to his hands and knees. He is breathing hard, low growls rumbling in his chest. I cannot see Marguerite’s face but I hear her gasp and I can tell she’s not breathing.

  My Beast raises his great head, his weary eyes lighting on the two of us. He growls, hackles rising. “Get out!” he roars so loud the walls shudder.

  Marguerite screams and runs. No doubt she will wake the entire castle with her hysterics. I should be more concerned, but I am tired. I help the shivering Beast up and to his bed we do not even look at each other and by the time he is settled I am so weary I can barely stand.

  Marguerite is gone, the servants must be up already, and my family will soon be asking them many questions. I curl up at the foot of the grand bed and allow sleep to claim me. Consequences be damned.

  Chapter Eleven

  Sounds invade my dreams. A familiar voice speaks my name. I hear it calling but my mind is too weary to rouse.

  “No,” I hear. “Let her sleep.”

  A warm blanket settles over me and I sigh. I didn’t realize I was so cold.

  Then strange dreams once more pull me away into an unknown land. I see statues weeping. They come to life before my very eyes, reaching out to me. Wolves howl in the distant forest, taunting and jeering. They are closing in and I know this time there is no iron gate to keep them out. They near swiftly and they are coming for me.

  I wake with a start. Candles are lit everywhere and the windows are wide open to let in the night air. This is not my chamber. How long have I been asleep?

  “Ah, the beauty wakes.”

  There is my answer: long enough that the sun already went down and it is no gentle beast sitting on the bed behind me.

  “I was beginning to think you’d sleep through the night.” Someone freed my hair while I slept. He eases it to the side now, exposing my shoulder. His lips brush over my skin. “I would not have minded.”

  I shove away from him, desperate to escape his hold and his bed. He catches my arm and pulls me back. We struggle but it is no more than a game to him. He laughs at my feeble attempts to get away from him. His much stronger body pins me beneath him. His hands capture mine so easily. I am trapped, left to his mercy – and I already know he has none.

  We stare at each other, his heavy lidded eyes reflecting the candle light all around. His weight on me makes it difficult to breathe. Still, I suck in air to scream. Surely someone is near by. Surely they will be brave enough to oppose their master and rescue me.

  He silences me swiftly. “Ah-ah now, little bird. None of that. You’ll only worry our guests.”

  “Let me go,” I say, unable to disguise the fear in my voice.

  “We have a bargain.”

  “For me to read to you. Not… do this.”

  “Yes, well, that was before you availed yourself of my bed for an afternoon nap. I’ve decided to amend the terms slightly.”

  “No.”

  He merely smiles. “Don’t you want to know what I’ve come up with?” He leans his face into my neck and inhales deeply. “Mm, I thought it was quite generous, given our… unusual circumstances.”

  “I’m sure you did. The answer is still no.”

  “Well then,” he says, levering himself up, “it’s high time you got out of bed. We’ve guests to attend to. They’ve already been asking about you.” He releases me and I fight and tug on the tangle of skirts and sheets to escape to freedom.

  “I won’t stay here another minute. I’m leaving and taking my family with me.” The moment I am standing I run for the door. I just manage to open it when he slams it shut again with one hand. His speed amazes me. His strength is frightening.

  “You needn’t bother,” he murmurs in my ear. “I’ve already instructed the guards to bar the gate. They will not dare disobey me. No one leaves the castle until I say so.”

  “You’re keeping us prisoner?”

  He pries my hand away from the handle and turns me to face him. “That’s one way to think of it.”

  “Damn you!”

  He throws his head back and laughs. “Oh, my sweet Lyssette. I’m already damned.”

  His new terms are scandalous. As he’d said last night, he has a new book for me to read, and this one is far worse than the last. It is written by a woman. This time, he insists I sit on the bed with him. I refuse, of course, but in the end he gives me no choice. The one concession I am able to extract from him is that he will not touch me.

  To my surprise, he grants another, which I have not thought to ask. Moments after I agree to these new terms there is a knock on the door. He answers it himself and I prepare myself for another scene like the one last night. I will not be able to explain my presence here, or my absence all day long. And with Bastien in his human form, I will not be able to explain what Marguerite saw this morning.

  But when Bastien opens the door there is no one on the other side. There is only a trolley laden with covered dishes. He brings it inside. “Don’t get excited,” he tells me, “He did this, not me.”

  We dine together. As there are no chairs or tables, we are forced to sit close enough to bump elbows every time one of us reaches for something. He does not say a word but I can see by his expression how much he enjoys the feast. From what my beast told me, Bastien has not had a proper meal in a very long time.

  But dinner is over too soon and then I’ve no more excuses. Now sated, Bastien seems almost in good spirits. He does not rush me or make any more demands. I would be grateful, except I know why he is so calm and complacent. He set the terms and I agreed. He might have opened the door, but he will make certain I walk through it all on my own.

  I move all the way to the foot of the bed, as far from him
as I can possibly get. The book lies ready between us. I pick it up and steady my nerves. “Memoires of Madame Bordeaux,” the title reads. I open the volume to the first page. There is a dedication penned in an elegant hand: “To my Lord Bastien, with fond memories of the nights we spent together, and covetous wishes for more.” I look up at him. “This woman was your lover.”

  He smiles. “Yes.”

  “And she gave you a book of accounts of all her other lovers?”

  “I believe she gave one to all her acquaintances. She was quite proud of her writing and, as you’ll see, not shy about her profession.”

  “I cannot believe that—”

  “You will. Once you read it you’ll see how you’ve been deceived all your life.”

  “Deceived?”

  “You’ve been taught that sex is merely the means by which humans beget children.”

  “And is it not?”

  “It’s not all it is. It is quite enjoyable. A pastime I indulged in often when I was myself. Now that monstrous bastard has made a monk of me.” He takes a strawberry from the tray and bites into it. “A hungry monk.”

  I am coming to understand how Bastien’s mind works. He despises me for my prudence and what he called innocence. Any attempt to change him from his wicked ways would only invite scorn. My only recourse is to stoop to his level and be just as wicked.

  “I would not be surprised if the reason for your curse was your inability to keep your cock in your pants,” I say. Though my words are daring, my face burns with an embarrassed flush. I’ve never said such a thing before. Then again, I’ve never known about such things until last night.

  Bastien laughs. I’ve shocked him. Even amused him. He does not reply, merely shakes his head. I am heartened that he does not make jest of me and even smile as I turn the page. “Chapter one,” I read. “There is an art to making love, which many men, but few women understand. Whereas a man can avail himself of any means to his own pleasure, a woman is to make do with what she’s been allotted, something a man rarely appreciates. I find this reprehensible. Hmm, I like her already. Bringing his woman pleasure in bed is the very least a man ought to do for his wife or lover. I consider it my greatest life achievement that I was able to tutor so many fine men into attentive, expert lovers…”

  Chapter Twelve

  Change is a concept I have become very familiar with. I thought by now I would have embraced it, learned that it is a natural part of life. Yet to say that I have become used to it would be to belie the concept. If one becomes used to change, then nothing truly changes them.

  The truth is that I’ve not gotten used to it at all.

  The truth is that my Beast is not the only one changing.

  It is difficult to think of myself now as having once been that sure footed girl with a book always in hand, who never knew a moment’s hesitation. That girl, that innocent – and I can see now just how innocent she’d truly been – is disappearing little by little every day. I cannot say with certainty that it is wholly Bastien’s doing.

  Nothing is the same in this ever perfect, ever cursed castle. When servants whisper now, it is with scandalized excitement. For the first time in a very long time, they have something to gossip about. It seems that is enough to put smiles on their faces. Every duty they perform these days they do with joy. I even hear them singing sometimes.

  My family, too, is different. Marguerite is gone. Jacques tells me she ran away that night and has not returned. He’s sent a messenger to our village in disguise to seek her out. Thankfully, she’s made it home unharmed. Jacques assures me she is well, if a little unsettled. With the eldest away, Amalia is flourishing. She spends most of her time in the grand ballroom where Francois teaches her to dance. Perhaps in another time, another place, Amalia was meant to be a princess. Dancing becomes her.

  Father is not so easily distracted. Though he smiles at me and speaks with me the way he used to, there is a heaviness in his gaze. He strolls in the gardens and his shoulders seem weighted down. I ask him to confide in me but he waves my worries away, smiles, and tells me he loves me. He is not easy here, I know. It must unnerve him, sleeping in the lair of the beast, knowing that one of his daughters is bound to him. And now with Marguerite gone…

  Aimee let slip today that Father went to see my Beast. He’s never done that before, not willingly. Aimee will not tell me what they spoke about, even though I am certain she must have overheard. Father and the Beast will not tell me, either. Both deny having spoken at all.

  My monthly visits with Bastien are making me paranoid. Whenever I catch my thoughts straying more toward the ridiculous, I go to the library to read. But these days my hand reaches not for the works of Homer, Virgil, Socrates, and Dante, but the more obscure names, oft times scrawled across the book’s cover with a quill and chafed almost clean off.

  What I read in these volumes can hardly compare to the classics. It is crudely worded and poorly written but this lack of polish reveals stories far truer than any poem from Rome. Rather than pretty, they are heartfelt. Letters and passages recounting lives filled with love, hate, envy, greed, pain, suffering, and incredible joy. I read about men going out into the world to make their fortune. About the wives and children they left behind.

  I read these things and they shock me with their poignancy. So much raw emotion, written into books by people whose lives were distinguished not by grand deeds of heroism or martyrdom, but by the silent tears they wept late at night when no one would see them. By the heartsick sighs hidden behind sociable smiles, while their coveted love flirted with another. By the cries of joy torn from them in those secret moments shared with their lover.

  I seek out these book because I crave those feelings I’ve hardly experienced. I’ve never felt love so deep it cut me to the quick. I’ve never known anguish so great I thought to end it by my own hand. Though I’ve felt joy, it has always been tempered by other things.

  It shames me to admit that the stories which captivate me most are ones of passion.

  The very books I’ve blushed over in Bastien’s chamber are ones I have read again and again, seeking meaning in the minutest details. I can hardly admit even to myself that more and more now I steal away from company to hide where no one will see me read such shocking things. Though I am careful, always keeping a proper book nearby, I’m afraid I could not tear my gaze away from those pages even long enough to cover my indiscretion. I would not even notice anyone nearby.

  This is how I while away the time until the moon rises full again. I tell myself it is merely to be prepared, so that next time I will not blush so fiercely to read such things aloud. I tell myself that if I can only show Bastien that his tactics no longer shock me, we can find some common ground.

  I tell myself anything I must to justify taking the next book off the shelf.

  I read until I am too tired to make out the words, and fall asleep with the book still in my hands. What the writers have begun, my mind continues in sleep. I dream of things that cannot be put into words. It is as though I am the one living those things, wholeheartedly engaging in one lurid act or another.

  I dream of being kissed so deeply that breath becomes secondary. Of being stripped of my gown and watched by a burning, lustful gaze. I dream of hands caressing my skin and sifting through my hair. At times I can feel lips on mine, hot breath searing me. My heartbeat quickens at such dreams and I awake in a tangle of sheets, overheated and a little frightened. I fight to catch my breath and dread falling asleep once more, but eventually I always do.

  And he is always there, waiting for me to return to him. His insatiable eyes roam over me; his words are gruff praise that makes me shiver. I long for him to take me in his arms again. My body aches without him nearby. I’ve never felt such things before and cannot seem to control them. They overwhelm me until, if he does not come to me, I rush to him and cover his face with kisses, pleading. For what, I do not know.

  From the welling tension, I jar awake crying his name: �
�Bastien!”

  I have, indeed, changed.

  I am no longer the same Lyssette who boldly walked through the gate and stood before the raging beast, daring him to claim his demanded prize.

  I am the wiser, foolish one who would run through the doors and throw herself at the cruel man, begging him to do so.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Amalia has another new gown. The expensive blue silk with silver ribbon trimming is the most extravagant thing I’ve ever seen. It shimmers in the light, like ocean waves. Noelle beams, watching Amalia twirl about. She is quite proud of the work she’s done on the gown. It flatters Amalia beautifully, just like all the other gowns do.

  “Isn’t it beautiful, Lys?”

  “Indeed.”

  “Have you ever seen anything so beautiful?”

  “I have not,” I say.

  “You look stunning, Mademoiselle.”

  “And don’t I look like a princess?”

  Neither I nor Noelle have an answer for this but Amalia doesn’t mind or notice. She laughs in delight and twirls in front of the gilded mirror she ordered to be brought for her. “I want one just like this in every colour!”

  Noelle looks at me aghast but I shake my head, assuring her that no more gowns will be necessary for Amalia’s ever growing wardrobe.

  Amalia screams in terror, shocking us to our feet. Heart racing out of control I look to see what frightened her so. Pale faced, frozen to the spot, my sister stares into the mirror. It is not her own reflection that scared her so. In the long shadows of dying day, close to the floor on all fours glowers the Beast.

  He bares his teeth at the noise, his fur rising in agitation, but he does not growl. Nor, however, does he disappear as he is wont to.

  “God preserve us,” Amalia whispers, crossing herself.

  Now the surly beast growls. “God?” He slinks forward a step, just enough to come into the light. I’ve seen that fierce look in his eyes before. Something must have angered him enough to come out of hiding. “God did not make me this way. He did not lift a finger to preserve me. Why should he bother to spare you?”