Once upon a time, there lived a king named Adam. He was a strict ruler who did not yield to even the most pathetic of his citizen's plights. He heaped law after law onto his public, lusting after an idealized vision of his kingdom. While the lands began to flourish under King Adam's iron fist and the land as a whole grew richer, the citizens were not truly happy. They were bound in their actions and their lives by the controlling laws that King Adam and his faithful soldiers imposed on them.
Their ruthless, prejudiced, driven king ignited fear into all of his subjects when his name was so much as whispered. Despite his stern demeanor, King Adam had one redeeming quality: his love for his son, the young Prince Connor.
Prince Connor was a young teenager, with a soft face, sandy hair, and dazzling light coloured eyes that reminded the people of their beloved late Queen. In fact, as a whole, Prince Connor far more resembled his deceased mother. Much to the dismay of the subjects, Prince Connor's attitude was indisputably his father's – the man having been the boy's only parent since birth. While the King's love for his son was admirable, the Prince was not. The boy was just as harsh and just as domineering as his father.
Nearly.
As King Adam grew increasingly busy with his kingdom, the young prince was left in the care of his tutor, Lena, more often than he had been in the past. She had been hired as the prince's private tutor when he was five years old. Since then she, and the twins she'd adopted into her care, had lived in the palace. Her children – Jesus and Mariana – though a few years older, had acted as the prince's companions, under her encouragement. They had also played with the only other child in the castle, who was older than the twins still: Brandon, who was the son of the heads of the palace guard. Lena had hoped that, through their playtime, Prince Connor would develop his character beyond his father and come into his own.
Her plan hadn't been nearly as successful as she had hoped. While Prince Connor was undoubtedly softer and more generous than his father, there was no escaping the King's influence and, with every passing year, the Prince became more like the King. By the time the Prince reached his fourteenth year, Lena feared that the sweet little boy she had watched grow for nine years would soon be completely gone.
To celebrate Prince Connor's birthday, King Adam hosted a large party, inviting all of the important nobles. He invited so many, in fact, that not a single spare bed or piece of furniture to sleep on remained in the palace. The servants unceremoniously found themselves sleeping on the floor as the guests continued to pour into the large palace. They arrived in droves despite the fact that the week leading up to, and the day of, the birthday celebration was dark and stormy. By the time the actual day arrived, the servants were more than glad to get it over with – not because they didn't care for their prince, as they desperately tried to cling to the sweet little boy he had been – because they were run ragged as they catered to the full rooms and tried to prepare the grand feast and subsequent ball.
The grand birthday meal was well underway when a knock at the front door of the palace garnered the attention of Stef, the head guards. She answered the door with a frown, wondering who it could be in this weather. On the other side of the door stood a shrivelled old crone, wrapped in a soaking wet travelling cloak. Her impossible thinness and her plethora of wrinkles made Stef immediately pity her. She met Stef's eyes and her own dark set had a youthful air about them.
"Room for the night?" the crone croaked before Stef could speak.
She looked so pathetic that, any other night, Stef would have let her have a cot in the servants' quarters until daybreak. Tonight, Stef couldn't afford to do so. Not only were the guest rooms of the palace full but so were the servants' quarters – even the stables were piled high to the brim with both horses and their caretakers!
"There's no room," Stef said, sadly. She hated to turn anyone out in this weather, even a stranger. "We have no space for you."
"Please," the old woman begged. "Let me ask the king!"
"King Adam does not want to hear your troubles," Stef replied, honestly. She feared the harsh words that King Adam would have for the ugly beggar woman.
Before the crone could reply, Stef turned to face the footsteps that she heard echoing on the stone floor behind she and the crone. The king striding forward unhappily; the young prince was, as always, half a step behind his father.
"I can feel the wind in the dining hall!" King Adam snapped. "What is the meaning of this?"
"She wishes for board, Your Majesty," Stef explained as King Adam came to stand beside her.
Adam gave the woman a dismissive glance. Prince Connor, who was nearly hidden behind his father, shuffled to the side a step so that he could see the visitor. His face twitched awkwardly when he saw her disgusting appearance but he quickly schooled it back into the neutral face that his father had taught him. He snapped his eyes to the floor, telling himself that it would be rude to stare.
"We do not have room for you," King Adam said, sounding very much like he was speaking to a dimwitted child. "Stef, the door."
"I have payment," the woman screeched in protest.
Adam paused, greed flickering in his eyes.
The woman produced a stunning red rose in her hand. Delicately holding the stem, she offered it to the king. "For a room."
"A rose?" King Adam bellowed. He laughed condescendingly. "You think a room in my palace is worth a lowly rose?"
"It's beautiful," she said. Then she offered the rose to Prince Connor, saying, "True worth isn't always obvious, is it?"
Connor nodded, transfixed by the rose. He almost reached out to take it from the crone's hand but the moment his arm lifted, King Adam slapped his forearm down.
Prince Connor's eyes widened and he reminded himself of what he had to say, "It's just a rose. The garden is full of them."
"Beauty is more than what you see. Won't you let me stay?"
This time, King Adam simply reached for the door himself. Before he could move it more than a centimetre, there was a brilliant white light. He squinted his eyes until the light subsided and then the king and the prince gasped in unison. For there, where once the haggard woman once stood, was now a beautiful lady. She was surrounded by a mythical glow and King Adam felt his legs tremble at once. She looked like the Enchantress of legend. Connor took a step backward from the woman, immediately fearing something so alien to him. But he got no more than a step before something froze him in place. He couldn't even make a sound as the Enchantress's rose floated toward his father.
"I … I'm sure we have space for you somewhere," King Adam managed. He couldn't take his eyes off the floating rose. King Adam hated things that he couldn't control and this was so far beyond his reach that his desperation showed on every inch of his face.
"You have shown me your true self, King Adam." The Enchantress's voice was now made of honey, where the crone's had been a steely rasp. "And you are unrepentant. There must be consequences for all of your past cruelty."
The edge of the rose's outermost petal brushed against King Adam's face. In the next moment, King Adam was gone.
A scream swelled in Prince Connor's throat, but he couldn't express the pain inside of him. Despite his domineering qualities, King Adam was his father and Prince Connor didn't know how to be without him. His heart seemed to stop as the Enchantress turned to stare at him. He wondered if he would be next. He wondered if he would go where his father was or if his father was already dead. The rose floated toward him and Prince Connor felt his trepidation grow.
"There is something about you that can be redeemed," the Enchantress mused. Connor looked into her dark eyes and he could not seem to look away. "You are young. There is goodness in you yet. But you are also like your father. You have a lot to learn about love."
The rose was almost touching him and Connor couldn't take it anymore. He just wanted it to be over. Whatever it was going to be.
The rose brushed his cheek and Connor waited for oblivion to come. But it never did. Instead, he felt himself lift from the ground and then there was terrible, terrible pain. Everywhere hurt – like he had needles sprouting from every inch of his skin. He was finally able to scream and he did – he screamed until the sound turned into a hoarse, broken chorus of sobs and then into something so grotesque and frightening that Prince Connor horrified even himself. When the pain finally abated and Connor returned to the ground, he stretched out his hands to catch himself. But he no longer hand hands. Instead, there were furry paws, topped off by long claws.
Prince Connor had become as beastly on the outside as he was becoming on the inside. He was covered in sandy fur; the same colour that his hair had once been. His fingers and toes had turned into sharp claws, with paws instead of hands and strange feet instead of his human once. He could walk as easily on all fours as he could on both feet. His once handsome face had become a mishmash of different animals, none of them pleasant: he had a squashed nose, horns, fangs, and a thick mane of hair. He was both taller and broader than he had been as a human, with the promise that it would become even worse as he grew up.
Prince Connor didn't even have to see his reflection to know that he was disgusting. He forced himself onto his new legs and then fled to his wing of the palace; what had always been his sanctuary. He stumbled as he went, unused to operating his animal appendages. As he fled, he tore into tapestries and destroyed whatever he could get his paws on, although he would never be able to tell exactly why. He just wanted to feel destruction against his new palms.
The loud crashing noises echoed throughout the palace and the birthday guests were no longer content to stay hiding in the dining hall. They came crowding forward to see what the commotion was about. The Enchantress studied the crowd for a moment. The guests were a complication that she did not want to worry about. With a wave of her delicate hand, the guests, along with their servants were transported back to their own homes, with no memory of the young Prince and his ruthless father. It would have to be this way, she decided.
Now, the Enchantress was faced with the Prince's servants. She already had plans for them. She flicked her hand again and she sent the rose spinning toward them. These servants cared for the prince; the prince cared for them. They would help him in holding onto his humanity, even as it became more and more tempting to give into the beast. Perhaps an extension of the curse would help Prince Connor with his motivation. As the rose touched the servants, they turned into various household objects.
Her work was almost done here. But it would not be fair for her to turn her back on the prince and his servants without explaining the rules to them. How else could they hope to break the curse that had been put upon them? The Enchantress made sure that her voice would echo to the furthest reaches of the palace so that even the grieving monster would be able to hear her.
"By the end of his eighteenth year, Prince Connor must learn to love and must be truly loved in return. Only then may the spell be broken."
As her final parting gifts, the Enchantress created a hand mirror to reflect whatever part of the outside world was requested of it and then she left the rose, which would count down the time to the end of the spell. When the last petal fell, it would be all over.
For the first year of the enchantment, the palace was in chaos as everyone learnt to adjust to their new forms. The population of the palace spent much of their time comforting Prince Connor, who was inconsolable – his father was gone, he was a beast, and, by association, the only people who had ever paid attention to him as a person were damned along with him. At Lena's suggestion, in an effort to break the spell, Prince Connor opened himself up to her. He told his servant everything he had never been able to admit to his father or even himself. The hope was that it didn't have to be romantic love to break the curse; that simply knowing Prince Connor and loving who he was would be enough to save them. But nothing came from Connor spilling his soul to Lena, and though the other servants hadn't been there during the baring of his soul, they had known about it and were disappointed at the lack of result.
During the second year, the time when Prince Connor was fifteen, he fell into a depression. He could not be coaxed from the roof above his bedroom – no matter the weather, the temperature, or the time of day – he could be found there, simply sitting. His beastly fur kept him very warm and, besides, he deserved to suffer. His beastly muscle wasted away as he refused to eat and barely slept. Prince Connor stayed in his sadness for over a year and half, and then the anger swept in full-force. Prince Connor gave into the beast he'd been transformed into. He ranted and raved; he destroyed all objects he came in contact with. He became bitter to the world. What good was love when it had condemned him?
The servants stayed faithfully, clinging to hopes that seemed further away with every passing day. They stayed this way for years, frozen in their ineffectiveness, waiting for the day when their lives would change again – this time, for the better. That day would come at the beginning of the prince's eighteenth year, but the servants were ignorant of that fast approaching milestone, and they despaired.
For who could ever learn to love a beast?
Well, here we go again, babes! For those who don't know, this is my favourite Disney movie. I thought it would be fun to see it done this way – there will be some changes and some of the exact story we know and love. And I hope you like it too! Future updates will continue on at 12:05 A.M. on the 29th of every month in the Pacific time zone!
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~TLL~