“What are you doing?” She followed him as he walked back into the lounge, water delivered. The room was huge. There was a fireplace as big as her father’s kitchen, it towered halfway up the wall surrounded by a shimmering marble hearth. She looked around in awe. Huge windows at both sides of the room let the light flood in, tapestries and paintings adorned the walls. There were enough chairs and sofas to seat the entire castle effortlessly. In the corner, there was a beautiful white piano; Isabelle wondered absently how easy it would be to learn to play. The floor was white tiles, with various skins and rugs scattered around to break up the blinding brilliance of the reflective expanse. They glittered even in the waning winter sunlight, she struggled to imagine how dazzling they would be on a bright summer’s day.
The boy watched her for a minute before laughing,
“Yep. You’re definitely new,” he teased, “I’d remember somebody as pretty as you.”
“You think I’m pretty?” She asked, looking at him coyly through long dark lashes. As his eyes moved over her, Isabelle shifted her weight effortlessly, fingers twisting in her hair demurely. Dust coated her skirts. Her dark hair had long been pulled from its plait to hang wildly around her shoulders and down her back. But it didn’t hinder her confidence, not even for a second. She watched him through her lashes, appraising him as a potential ally.
“It’s not an opinion.” He spoke “it’s a fact. Look at you.” There was a blunt honesty, and Isabelle stiffened a little in surprise. Usually, when people applauded her beauty they did it poetically, admirably. This young man said it as if it were an accusation as if he was telling her the sky was blue or the grass was green. Isabelle stepped forward, scrutinising her appearance in the polished gilding around the fireplace.
There was dust smudged on her face, dirt from the days spent travelling, and her skin was reddened from the physical exertion of a day spent exploring. Her eyes narrowed, angry at her own reflection. She forced a girlish giggle from her lips, lest she spend too long brooding over her fate and lose his interest.
“Oh goodness,” she exclaimed, rubbing at her face to get the marks off. It didn’t help, it just spread it more, and shrugged helplessly. “What exactly are you doing, just throwing the buckets at the windows?” Isabelle’s dark eyes surveyed the several empty buckets stacked by the door.
“It would be easier.” He indulged, an amused smile on his lips.
“Oh.” She breathed, finally understanding as she took in the enormity of the task. The glass in some places stretched from the floor almost to the ceiling, not to mention the two huge bays looking out over the forests. He was doing this alone?
“I know. There’s usually more people to help,” a shadow passed through his eyes, “but it’s been a long winter.” It was as if he realised how dreary his tone seemed because just like that he smiled brightly at her. Isabelle was even more curious. There seemed to be something to this one. “I like cleaning the windows, it’s warm, and I get plenty of sunlight.”
“It’s a shame there’s absolutely nothing else you could do to get sunlight. Go outside for instance.” She teased.
“But then the windows would remain dirty, and I was instructed to make everything sparkle for our guest.” He was watching her with wrapt interest, Isabelle loved it. But just like that he remembered he had work to do, Isabelle watched as he carried the bucket up the ladder, balancing effortlessly.
“Somebody else is coming?”
“You’re the guest.” He chuckled.
“So much effort for a prisoner.”
“Prisoner?” He questioned, seeming genuinely confused.
“My papa begged your beast to keep me here, out of trouble.” It bothered her that he seemed more interested in his own thoughts that her words, she was losing him. In a bid to appear useful, Isabelle dipped another sponge into the water and wiped it across the window.
“You’ve met the master? Face to face?”
“Yes. Briefly. He couldn’t get away fast enough.” Isabelle sulked, she thought he might have come to check on her at least, make sure she wasn’t planning a daring escape, or at least to reprimand her for not working.
“That…it doesn’t make any sense.”
“What doesn’t? The part about the beast deciding he can keep a human prisoner on a whim? My Papa hand delivering me on a platter? Or the fact that you’re cleaning up for a guest who isn’t coming, and I have a wardrobe of gorgeous dresses whilst somehow my work attire was forgotten entirely.” Isabelle met his eyes with determination. “It is all very confusing. But what part has you looking like you can’t wait to run out of here and escape me, just like every other person has done today. And I can’t even go and confront my captor because he’s off somewhere sulking in disappointment, Lord knows why.”
“Disappointed? Who said he was disappointed?”
“Some frumpy old cleaner woman, Charlotte, I think.”
“Huh.” His lips were drawn tightly together.
“You didn’t answer my question.” She rested her hands on the ladder, surreptitiously planting herself so that not only he was looking down at her cleavage, but also so that she was between him and any escape route. “Which part doesn’t make any sense?” He was ignoring her, looking at the wet windows as if the rivulets of water might hold all of the answers. “Excuse me.” Isabelle snapped, rudely. He looked down.
“Sorry.” He shook his head as if just remembering she was there, though his eyes remained aloof, even a tad stony. “I guess you just weren’t pretty enough.”
“Excuse me?” Isabelle repeated, stepping back, expression displaying her distinct offence.
“I’m sorry.” He shrugged.
“Look I don’t know what your name is-“
“It’s Thomas-.” He interrupted, Isabelle floundered, mouth open. “Is that the time?” His eyes fell on the ornate grandfather clock across the room. He jumped down from the ladder before Isabelle could react. “Look.” He put a hand on her shoulder. “Try not to take it personally, you’re a beautiful girl, but you can’t win them all.”
“Are you blind or something, men have died because I’m exactly that beautiful.”
“I really, really have to go, I’m sorry. It was so nice meeting you though, I’ll see you downstairs for lunch? I’ll save you a seat.” And just like that Thomas left Isabelle alone with empty buckets and sodden windows.
“Pretty enough for what?” She finally asked the empty room. Getting answers in this place was going to be harder than she expected.
Chapter Seven
It was enough of a mystery to spark Isabelle’s insatiable imagination. The teenager spent the rest of her first day gleaning whatever information she could, questioning whomever she found. It was the strangest thing in the world, never mind that nobody seemed to care they were working for a monster. There was no question of where he came from, nor his right to rule them. Nobody seemed interested, in the beast or in her. This was normality to them. They’d work, get paid, presumably go home, eat, sleep and come back the next day. Did he entire castle run without any input from the beast at all?
Was their obedience devotion or fear, Isabelle couldn’t tell.
All she knew was that she wasn’t afraid. She knew she should have been, it was the natural reaction to meeting a monster. Why had he brought her into his home, given her a room, clothes? Why wasn’t she frightened by the sudden knowledge that monsters existed; was it because she already knew they did, the fur was a shock, but the rest was no worse than she’d dealt with before. The beast was no more monstrous than people thought she was. But there was something that kept her at ease even as his visage made her want to run. There was a part of the puzzle she was missing, a glaring hole in the middle of the picture that nobody else even seemed able to see.
Her most significant source of information so far had been an excitable young girl called Margaret. She was a little younger than Isabelle, only just sixteen, and seemed thrilled to have finally been usurped as the
newcomer. From Margaret she had learnt that the man with the handlebar moustache was called Mr Hands, he was in fact married to Charlotte Hands, head housekeeper, together they ran the castle and served as the beast’s go-betweens. Nobody else had even so much as seen the fanged monstrosity which presided over them. In fact, Isabelle suspected Maggie thought it was all some dark ghost story made up to thrill them and keep them in line.
There a city beyond that castle, once a bustling metropolis, now a forgotten tribute to the way things were. Isabelle presumed that’s where the servants lived. It made Isabelle long to explore it, to search deeper. What Maggie didn’t know was anything else. Who had built the city? Who had built this castle? Had the beast always been the beast or had he once been human?
Isabelle wasn’t much help, as Maggie dusted, swept and changed the undisturbed sheets. Bombarding the poor maid with questions. Isabelle picked her way through empty drawers and wardrobes and lavished her attention upon the hanging tapestries and ancient artwork.
The corridors weren’t quite the maze she had believed them to be. There were two main ones upstairs which took you to the East and West wings of the castle, each punctuated with bedrooms and lavish bathrooms. Between them, at spaced out intervals, were smaller sitting rooms and cloakrooms as big as Isabelle’s own bedroom back home. At the end of each main corridor were yet more stairs.
Upon finishing the last room before the stairs, Isabelle was surprised that instead of going up to the higher floor, Maggie turned around to head back down the corridor. Her disappointment was palpable, she had waited patiently while Maggie cleaned each room, just hoping for a glimpse at what she assumed were the royal living quarters.
“What’s up there?” Isabelle peered up the sweeping staircase, it was carpeted with the same thick pile that lined the corridors. Intricate, individual carvings adorned each of the spindles that supported the polished handrail.
“Those are the Master’s rooms,” Maggie replied sweetly. Isabelle hadn’t quite worked out whether Margaret’s sickly innocence was genuine, or a genius façade used to ingratiate herself under the wing of Charlotte. If it was pretence, it was flawless. Even if it wasn’t, perhaps Isabelle could learn how to fake it herself. Sweet had never been a word anybody had used to describe her; maybe it would serve her well here.
“Shouldn’t we clean those?” Isabelle tried not to sound too desperate. It was a little obscene how much she wanted to see the beast in the cold light of day, to prove to herself that she wasn’t crazy. To ask him why she wasn’t good enough for whatever deviant life he’d intended her for.
“No,” Maggie shook her head, eyes wide. “He’s in there sometimes. We let him have his privacy. He lets us have ours.”
“Why does he need privacy?” Isabelle placed a foot on the first step leading up, trying to see around where the flight curved.
“Isabelle!” Maggie protested, gripping her arm, “we can’t go up there.”
“Don’t you want to see him? To talk to him?”
“No!” She shook her head frantically, Isabelle’s eyes narrowed a bit. It was looking a lot more like fear than loyalty. Seeing just how frightened Maggie had gotten, Isabelle dropped the point and allowed her to pull her from the step, not wanting to lose her first potential ally this quickly. With a final glimpse upwards, she reluctantly followed the young blonde back downstairs.
This whole thing felt like something out of a book, some twisted fable that children would tell each other in the dead of night to frighten themselves. Isabelle knew magic was not real, she knew monsters didn’t care about living in neat castles, or about keeping people in jobs. If she hadn’t seen him with her own eyes, then she would be inclined to think that the Beast didn’t exist at all. She couldn’t blame Maggie for wanting to keep the veil of disbelief.
They were adults, not children, fairy tales and monsters were not real.
So what, pray tell, was the beast?
Maybe there was some sort of logical explanation? Some smoke and mirrors trickery going on. ‘You were half-frozen’, she reasoned to herself, ‘tired, delirious with fear.’
No, he was real. Those eyes. The arrogant superiority that dripped from his fierce fangs. Isabelle trilled. Perhaps it was a disguise? Or some scientific experiment gone wrong? Isabelle had absolutely no idea, but she was resolutely determined to find out.
“So, what now?” Isabelle asked as she watched Maggie put all her cleaning equipment away.
“Now we help with dinner,” Maggie said simply, wiping her hands down on her apron, not an ounce of contention in her voice.
“But you’ve not stopped all day long, and now you’re going to help the kitchen staff?”
“Of course. Come on.” Maggie laughed, blonde ringlets bouncing around her face. Isabelle followed her obediently into the kitchen. It was big, but dark, and looked like it had been designed a few centuries prior. There was a wood-burning stove, no gas or electricity to be seen. She had expected a lot of meals being prepared, a sumptuous banquet; what she saw was certainly not that. There were a couple of pots on the huge cooker, a cauldron over the open fire and Charlotte was pulling a single loaf from one of the many ovens.
“Is this it?” Isabelle asked incredulously.
“There’s only twelve of us, what were you expecting?” Charlotte answered simply, her tone clipped. Isabelle suspected she was still annoyed about how she had behaved earlier, to her credit, she felt a little ashamed.
Maybe because they had spent the entire day changing the sheets of beds which would never be slept in? Or cleaning windows that nobody would look out of. It seemed like cooking a banquet for nobody to eat would be par for the course. She was about to ask what the beast ate when a dull thud from outside caught her attention. She headed to the door, and almost yelped at the bloody sight which awaited her in the snow.
Chapter Eight
“Get out of the way, girl.” Charlotte tutted, as she called Maggie over and the two opened the door. Isabelle was frozen to the spot, she’d grown up on a farm, yes, but she’d never seen anything like this. They had farmhands to deal with the grislier jobs and even the simpler ones that Isabelle was supposed to do but didn’t.
There was a stag lying in the snow, something had ripped out his throat. “Come on Isabelle, we’re going to need your help lifting it.” As she barked her order, Charlotte got behind the stag and gripped its legs with both of her plump hands. Maggie pulled at the front end, but it was too heavy for them to lift. Isabelle stepped forward and tentatively touched the middle before recoiling her hand away in revulsion.
“It’s still warm!” Isabelle flinched just as the window cleaner stepped into the kitchen.
“Thomas, thank goodness, give us a hand getting this stag inside,” Charlotte ordered. Isabelle watched as the three of them carried the stag in and put him on the table in the middle of the room. Red stained the snow, it turned Isabelle’s stomach. It wasn’t the meat that bothered her, or that a corpse was bleeding all over the table. It was knowing not minutes before the stag had been alive, happy.
Yes, she had killed before; but nothing as barbaric as this. Poison was simple, it was just like falling asleep, it was neater, civilised.
The Beast had ripped life away in a bloody flash.
Was he going to do the same to her now that he had found her wanting?
“Where did-” but she was interrupted, everybody had gone back to their own business cooking, and the stag was just lying there, staring at her with dead glassy eyes, bleeding onto the floor.
“The master looks after us.” Was Charlotte’s response to her unfinished question. Isabelle frowned. So, he fed them his leftovers? The thought ignited her indignation more than her squeamishness, they were grateful for his pitiful offerings. This was ridiculous, she didn’t want to be here talking to sheep with no idea what was going on. She wanted to speak to their Master. As horrible as it had been, assuming she would be locked up with him, having him abandon her to the simple-minded imbec
iles he employed was worse. “Grab that knife from behind you,” Charlotte ordered, Isabelle obeyed tentatively, resenting her anticipated obedience. “We need to harden your stomach. Come over here, and I’ll show you how to skin it.”
“I don’t want to.” Isabelle countered levelly.
“If you want to eat, then you’ll work too. It’s your first day, so we’ve been lenient, but we all have to pull our weight here.” The simpering voice had turned stern once more, and Isabelle was all too aware, all eyes were on her. This was a pivotal moment for how these people thought of her; she could put her foot down and let her will be known as the unmovable force that it was. Or Isabelle could acquiesce and mislead them, play her cards close to her chest. The latter was the smarter choice, she didn’t know these people, nor what they were capable of, not deep down. After all, none of them had blinked at the atrocity of keeping a human being prisoner.
Charlotte was watching her patiently. “Bring the knife. You’ll want to cut down the stomach, right here,” she pointed. Isabelle swallowed thickly and placed the blade against the flesh, she pressed, but the knife didn’t cut through. With everybody watching her, she risked a glance at Charlotte who nodded encouragingly, placated by Isabelle’s cooperation. “Give it some welly dear.”
Isabelle pressed harder, and the knife punctured the flesh with a pop, a gush of blood flowed out, enough to make the brunette shout and jump back as the spray splattered her legs and shoes. The people around her erupted with laughter, and Isabelle’s cheeks burned scarlet.
“I-” but the laughter interrupted her. Isabelle clenched her teeth, refusing to be the butt of every single joke during her time here. Was this the lesson they were trying to teach her; that she needed to get used to being messy? Stepping forward Isabelle put the knife back into the wound and began sawing through the flesh. It wasn’t as difficult as she imagined, once she got used to the metallic smell and warmth engulfing her fingers. The blood was beginning to coagulate, turning into something more like jelly than liquid. It was strangely invigorating, Isabelle had learnt a lot about human anatomy in her studies, but she had never seen organs before. It was strange to think that the lumps of meat she was pulling from the stag now, were what sustained life. She was so focused, she physically jumped when she felt a hand on her arm.
The Beast Queen Page 5
