“Don’t worry, cousin. I can’t afford to feed all four of you forever. Your ‘friends’ will spend the night here and then the guards will transport them out of the kingdom at dawn.” The princess glared at Belle. “You’ll be dropped off halfway between here and Villeneuve, and you can find your way home from there on foot. If you have any notions about coming back, know that the guards will be on alert. I may not be so lenient next time.” The guards slammed Belle’s cell door shut.
“At least let them have the book of maps I brought in my satchel, to help them find their way,” the Prince called from his cell.
Princess Marianne peered suspiciously toward the Prince. “They found their way here fine, didn’t they?”
“Yes, but we were in our balloon,” Belle said, jumping in. “We were able to see the route clearly from above.”
“Ah, oui,” Lumiere added. “Without a map, we might wander for days, into forests—even jungles!”
“There are no jungles in France,” Princess Marianne scoffed. “And why should I care how long it takes you?”
“We may starve!” Cogsworth cried, sounding genuinely frightened. “Or worse! Your Highness, if you have an ounce of compassion—”
“Compassion!” Princess Marianne marched down the row of cells and back, glaring at the captives. “How dare any of you speak to me of compassion! What compassion have you—” She reached Belle’s cell again and met Belle’s pleading gaze. Belle could see the hurt in the princess’s eyes at what she viewed as a betrayal of her trust.
“I’m so sorry,” Belle told her softly. “I did lie to you about knowing the Prince. But I didn’t lie to you about wanting to help.”
A flicker of doubt passed over Princess Marianne’s face. For a moment, Belle hoped the princess might change her mind and let them continue their plans for the press.
Instead, the princess turned away and reached into the shadows near the dungeon entrance. When she straightened up, she had a knapsack in her hands. She removed the atlas and paged through it. Satisfied that it didn’t contain any hidden weapons, she tossed the book through the bars to the floor of Belle’s cell. “Fine. Take it. The last thing I need here is another book.” She spun around and marched out.
Belle picked the book up off the floor. The embossed gold title glittered up at her in the flickering light from the dungeon wall sconces: The Geography of the World.
“You need to get the atlas down to me,” the Prince said. “It only works on my command. Then I can get you all out of here.”
“Yes. All of us,” Belle said. She dropped the book outside the bars of her cell and gave it a push. It slid along the floor to Lumiere and Cogsworth’s cell next to her, and Lumiere then shoved it on. The Prince reached through the bars and grabbed it.
A moment later, the Prince appeared outside Belle’s cell, holding up the cell’s keys.
“Soon we’ll all be back in Villeneuve,” he said.
Belle pushed his hand away from the lock. “No,” she said. “You have to go alone.” She told him about her plan for the printing press. “The guards might return before dawn, but we’ll be able to stall them as long as they think we’re all still here.”
Belle instructed the Prince to unlock the cell next to her so that Cogsworth could move into the Prince’s former cell. After the Prince relocked the cells, Cogsworth crouched down, hidden by his cape to resemble the Prince. Lumiere fashioned a burlap-covered lump in his cell to represent Cogsworth. “If the guards come, we’ll pretend to be sick,” she explained. “To have all caught chills from the damp weather. We’ll tell the guards to ask the princess if we can stay one more day—you’ll be back with Papa long before that.”
“It seems risky,” the Prince said, returning to Belle’s cell. “You’ve already endangered yourself enough.”
Belle reached through the bars and laid her hand on his arm. “My mind is made up, and you know what that means.”
The Prince sighed and allowed a reluctant smile. “Unfortunately, yes.”
“Then stop wasting time! Go!”
Belle paced her cell as she waited for the Prince to return.
“They should be here by now,” she whispered to Lumiere and Cogsworth, who were still crouched in their cells nearby.
Just then, Belle heard footsteps.
“Belle!” came her father’s voice as he appeared in the dungeon corridor, the Prince right behind him. “Are you okay?”
“I am now,” replied Belle. The Prince used the Magic Atlas to free Belle, then Lumiere and Cogsworth. Belle embraced her father, being careful of his injured arm.
“The Prince told me your plan,” said Maurice, “and I think it could work. I’ll help you however I can.”
Together, the five snuck down the corridor and surprised the guards. Before they knew what was happening, the Prince had used the Magic Atlas to transport them far away from the kingdom. It would take the guards at least a day to get back to Brumeux, if not longer.
Belle led the others through the basement hallway to the storeroom. Using the light of a single candle they’d brought from the dungeon, she showed them the printing press.
“It should be much easier to get working than the balloon,” said Maurice, examining the device. “If you can collect those parts.”
That was the next step. Using the atlas again, Belle and the Prince arrived at Elise’s home, landing in front of the hearth just as the family was sitting down to supper.
“How…?” Paul began, then swallowed, as if the rest of his question had gotten caught in his throat.
“Magic!” Elise declared, bursting from her chair. She turned her excited gaze toward the Prince. “And you’re the Prince!”
“I am,” the Prince confirmed. He bent down to shake Elise’s hand. He then did the same with the rest of the family members.
“We don’t have time now to tell you everything that happened at the castle,” Belle said. “We can tell you why we’re here, though.” She explained her idea for the printing press. “We need the parts from the steam balloon to make it work.”
Paul hurried out to collect the remaining scraps of tin and wood from the other villagers, and within the hour, Belle and the Prince had everything they needed to transform the press into a steam-powered machine.
Almost everything, that is. They still needed a safe power source to test the press.
Before returning to the castle, Belle led the Prince to the field where the balloon had crashed. Even with the silvery light of the moon shining between the two mountain peaks, Belle had a hard time finding where she’d hidden the Magic Stone. She looked for the spot where the stone had burned the grass, but it seemed to have disappeared. The constant rain, combined with the stone’s magical heat, must have caused new grass to grow quickly—very quickly.
Belle pulled off her shoes. “What are you doing, Belle?” the Prince asked. “There are still shards of metal around! What if you step on a sharp—”
“I found it!” Belle reached down and tapped her palm on the ground where her foot had felt warmth. The young grass under her hand buzzed with the heat coming up through the dirt. She and the Prince dug until they reached the smooth top of the metal box in which Belle had placed the stone.
Belle smiled. “Now we can go back.”
* * *
“Papa!” Belle shushed Maurice. “Not so loud!”
Maurice paused, hammer in hand, and glanced at his daughter. “A person can hammer only so softly, Belle. I’m being as quiet as I can.”
Belle peered out into the hallway. There was nothing but darkness and silence. “I guess if we haven’t woken anyone up yet, we aren’t likely to.” She returned to the press and continued scraping the rust from the central screw. They’d been working for a few hours now, and she’d already cleaned off the metal plates she’d found under another s
heet in one corner of the room. She discovered that each of the plates had already been filled from end to end with individual letters of removable metal type—evidence that Queen Cecile had been preparing to print her first book before she fell ill.
“The walls are thick enough here to hide any sound,” the Prince assured Belle.
“And we are far, far below where they are all sleeping,” said Lumiere, who had been put to work laying out the damp blank paper to be dried.
“Except for our two guards, of course,” added Cogsworth as he struggled to hold up the boiler tank the Prince and Maurice were attaching to the back of the press.
Lumiere snickered. “Oui! They are wide awake! No doubt trying to steer clear of bears and wolves as they search for a way out of the forest.”
“I left them on a road,” the Prince said defensively. “It was a desolate road in the middle of nowhere,” he added with a shrug. “But at least it was a path that should eventually lead them…somewhere.”
The Magic Stone now sat atop its box along one wall of the storage room. Although it was a safe distance from the books and paper, it sent out more than enough heat to warm the room and dry the paper Lumiere had unrolled. The stone also sent out an orangey glow that blended with the faint golden rays of the lanterns Paul had lent them, which Belle and the Prince had placed around the floor. Light glinted off the corners of the press, the sides of the ink bottles, and the edges of the metal plates, casting diamonds on the walls and making the space seem magical.
Belle finished removing the rust from the screw, then joined her father and the Prince beside the body of the press. “How close are we?”
“Close, I hope.” Cogsworth huffed, straining to keep the boiler aloft. “I can’t…hold this…much longer.” Belle rushed over to help him.
“I just need to attach the crosshead rod to the crosshead,” Maurice said. “And the piston rod to the piston…and maybe make one or two more tweaks after that.”
Belle had occasionally glanced toward the grated window throughout the night, searching for signs of a lightening sky—a warning that dawn was near. She wasn’t sure, but it looked like the black squares between the grate’s bars had shifted to a dark gray. “We need to hurry. It’s almost dawn, and—”
“Wrong.”
The voice came from the doorway. Belle and the others looked over to find Princess Marianne glaring at them.
Cogsworth dropped his end of the boiler. It crashed to the stone floor with a deafening clang.
“How did you get out?” the princess demanded as she entered the room. The glow from the lanterns and the Magic Stone caused her shadow to loom dangerously behind her. “What did you do with the guards?” She didn’t wait for answers. “What are you doing in here? Why is the paper all over the floor? Where did this junk come from? What is that glowing thing? And who are you?”
This last question was directed at Maurice, and at last the princess paused long enough for Belle to reply.
“This is my father.” Belle took Maurice’s hand. “I told you about him. He built the steam balloon.”
“Not by myself!” Maurice said. He cast proud smiles at Belle and the Prince. “I had a lot of help.”
“How lovely that you’re such a nice happy family!” the princess exclaimed with false brightness. “Well, then you and your father will enjoy sharing a cell after I have you all locked up again.” The princess marched back toward the doorway, but before she could call for more guards, Belle dashed in front of her, blocking.
“You asked what we were doing here,” Belle said. “But you already know the answer.”
The princess shrugged. “It’s too late for you to win your freedom by pretending to fancy up the printing press,” she said. “The deal was off once I knew you and the Prince—”
“We’re not doing it for us,” Belle interrupted. “We escaped from our cells. The atlas the Prince brought with him is magic. That’s how he got here and how we got out. We could have used it to go back to Villeneuve for good, but we didn’t. We stayed.” The princess didn’t answer, but Belle could tell her words were sinking in.
“Don’t let your anger at me stop you from saving your kingdom, Marianne,” the Prince said. “I know what it’s like to be so overpowered with grief and bitterness that they’re a part of you. That’s how I felt after my parents died.”
The princess stared at the Prince. Belle squeezed her father’s hand and hoped the Prince was getting through to his cousin.
“I was so lost back then,” the Prince continued. “Lost in my own selfishness. I was convinced I was alone, and that no one was worse off than me. That’s why I turned away your messenger before I even knew who had sent him. It wasn’t until Belle came along that I realized I wasn’t alone—that I’d never been alone.”
He smiled at Cogsworth and Lumiere, who bowed in response.
“I wish I could go back in time and change things,” the Prince told the princess. “Unfortunately, the Magic Atlas doesn’t work like that. It can’t help you fix the past. I only hoped it might be able to help me fix the present—and bring our family back together. But if you can’t forgive me, I understand. Forget about me. Think about what you want.”
“And what your mother would want,” Belle added.
The princess walked over to the printing press. The sun had begun to rise, sending a silvery light through the window grate onto the machine’s gleaming metal parts. “Even if it was possible”—she waved at the press—“the king would never…”
“Would never what?”
A gaunt man in a crimson jacket stood in the entryway, flanked by the two guards the Prince had transported out of the kingdom. They’d lost their helmets, and their hair was as disheveled as their uniforms. Their boots were covered in mud.
“Father!” Princess Marianne cried. “What are you doing down here?”
“I was awakened by these two fools,” he said, indicating the guards, who cowered shamefully. “They had a wild tale of an enchanted book and being magically flown to the middle of the Sauvage Valley! They also told me about a crew of interlopers who’d appeared in our kingdom out of nowhere….” He looked around. “But I see the tale might not be so wild after all.”
“It seems you did not transport them far enough, Your Highness,” Lumiere whispered to the Prince.
“Maybe they’re unusually fast walkers,” Cogsworth suggested.
“We got a ride,” the squeaky-voiced guard snapped.
“Ha!” barked the other, sneering at the Prince. “You didn’t think we’d run into anyone in the middle of the night, did you? But it so happened there was a farmer out hunting for mushrooms, and—”
“Enough!” the king shouted. “Your story may be true, but you’re still clods.” He turned to the princess. “Marianne? Do you care to explain all this?”
Belle could tell from the silence in the room that she wasn’t the only one holding her breath. She, the Prince, Lumiere, Cogsworth, and her father stood so still they might have been statues.
“This is Queen Adele’s son,” Princess Marianne said finally, gesturing to the Prince.
The king glared at the Prince. “What is he doing here?”
“He came to apologize for not helping us, for turning away our messenger,” the princess replied. “I locked him up, but he got out, along with the rest of them.”
“How did I not know who was in my own dungeon?” The king cast an accusing look at his daughter.
Princess Marianne shook her head. “Because you’ve been locked away, too, by your own doing.”
The king ignored her and turned to the Prince. “Your apology is worthless. It’s come too late to—”
“He didn’t know we’d sent the message,” the princess said. “He didn’t know about Mama.”
“My mother had died, too,” the Pr
ince said. “And my father. And I…I hid behind my castle gates. I kept everyone out.”
“Just like us,” Princess Marianne said.
“Yes, well…we heard about Queen Adele,” the king said softly. “I’m very sorry for your loss, but—”
“He wants to help now,” the princess went on. “They all want to help. They think the printing press—”
“I stored these things away for a reason, Marianne!” the king snapped. “I never want to see any of it again.”
“Then why did you keep it?” the princess asked.
The king hesitated. “Well…I couldn’t just—”
“But you could have,” interrupted his daughter. “You could have destroyed the books. You could have burned the paper and the wood from the printing press to warm the castle. You could have gotten rid of it all!”
“I intended to,” the king said defensively. “Someday…I just…I just forgot about it.”
The princess shook her head. “I don’t believe you. Throwing all this away would have been like throwing out my mother’s dreams. You could have never done that. But leaving it here, Father—Papa—it’s just as bad.” Princess Marianne took the king’s hand. “We can’t bring Mama back to life,” she said quietly. “But her dreams don’t have to die.”
The king was silent. He seemed torn. He glanced around the room at the press and the paper and the ink—the symbols of Queen Cecile’s wish to bring books and learning to the kingdom’s village.
“She’d be proud of what we’re trying to do,” the princess continued. “If we can make this machine work, we’ll be able to print hundreds of books—not just for us, but for other cities and kingdoms, too.”
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