The following story is an alternative storyline for "Beauty and the Beast, Part2". Means, it contains spoilers for both episodes.

Queen Catrina

Part 1:

Slowly Gwen walked down the streets of Camelot and veered toward the main building. Day by day it became harder to go there, to force herself to go there. She would rather turn around, pack her things and leave as so many others already had done.

They had left a morbid silence, empty houses, empty streets, dust and dirt. More than half of the people had fled the strange events of the last months, had run away as quickly as possible. But neither because of fear for the strange creatures appearing every now and then, nor because of the rumours of kings of adjacent kingdoms arming to overrun Camelot. No, they had left due to the shame sitting on their throne.

"Gwen", someone whispered next to her and she turned around. An old friend of her father's stood there, looking around anxiously as if he were afraid of being traced.

"Go as long as you still can", he advised her silently while gesturing at his wife to pack faster. "They will destroy Camelot if not this monster of a queen will do it herself."

Gwen just nodded, blushed and lowered her sight.

"I just can't", she answered and shrugged, compressing her lips and looking at the man in search of help. He watched her with a face marked by sorrow, went to his wife and helped her to pack.

Gwen looked at them a second longer, then turned around sadly and went on.

She would have loved to leave but she could not. Leaving would mean abandoning her friends but she had to help them. Something just was wrong. Under normal conditions Arthur would never have allowed the events of the last months. Merlin would never have accepted Gaius' imprisonment and Uther would never have tolerated magical creatures overrunning Camelot as they did now. But still they did all of that.

Everyone but the inhabitants laughed about Camelot and its queen.

Queen Catrina.

For a long time she had hidden her true form with a spell, had sneaked into Uther's heart, had enchanted him, married him. By the time she revealed her true form it had seemed as if Arthur wanted to do something about it. But suddenly, from one day to the other, he had changed. He now seemed to adore his stepmother, did everything she commanded him, even looking after those disgusting little things Catrina called 'children'.

Merlin did not behave as usual either. He was only a servant, a slave. Nothing else. He did his job without moaning or complaining. He just did what he was ordered to do.

But the strangest thing was that they all wore similar necklaces.

Gwen just knew that those necklaces had something to do with all of this. Catrina must have enchanted Uther, Arthur and Merlin. Because it was only them who did not realize what everyone else could see: Camelot's throne was taken by a troll.

There was chaos in the throne room.

The disgusting little things Catrina called her children ran around in childish excitement, crashed into each other with laughter, rolled around with each other and created as much chaos and destruction as possible. Long ago Gwen had wondered how the castle still could be furnished with all this vandalism.

Just one of the beasts usually sat in a corner quietly and got bullied by its silblings because it looked a little bit more like a human than a troll. From its facial features one surely could tell that it was Uther's son.

Another shiver of disgusted horror ran down Gwen's spine.

"Ah, Gwen", something muttered from the shadows. "Are you here to help my son-in-law?"

Dressed in completely dirty clothes Catrina sat at the table and ate munching the still steaming dung placed on a bed of maggots. Farting, burping and laughing she wobbled from left to right whenever her beloved children destroyed something.

Gwen clenched her teeth-

„I just wanted to change the flowers, Milady", she mumbled as friendly as she possibly could.

"Flowers?", Catrina burped in disgust. "Not tasty." Then she continued munching, took one of the maggots, looked at it quite excited and ate it with pleasure.

Nauseated the maidservant turned around to leave the room as all of a sudden two little creatures ran towards her, reaching out for her and clenching their hands to fists over and over again. Anxiously Gwen looked around not knowing how to escape or where to find help, she stood still as a stature, was about to close her eyes in contemplation of death as suddenly Arthur jumped in, put himself in front of her for protection and brutally kicked away the beasts.

Catrina cried out as loud as short and burst into a troll-like guffaw similar to a seizure which made her fall down to the floor, reaching it farting and rolling there in laughter.

Both Gwen and Arthur watched her but the Gwenn shook her head, turned around to the prince and said in relief: "Thank you." Gently she touched his arm but he did not react at all. He just stared at the queen with widened eyes, suddenly cringed and then he ran towards her, helping her up.

"Did you hurt yourself, stepmother?", he asked caring.

Catrina looked at him with her big watery eyes, farted and jumped up and down in excitement before sitting down again.

"Isn't he a good boy?", she asked Gwen. "Be nice and watch my babies, Arthur. Who would believe that they'll be kings and queens once …"

Gwen could not believe it.

Those disgusting beasts (and she could not tell which ones were girls and which boys) should rule over lands? The dreamy look in Catrina's eyes showed that the queen already had planned the future of her children. The only question was: Who voluntarily would marry a creature which was a mixture between human and troll?

Gwen really did not like to go on thinking about this and kept still. She once dared to speak up to the queen. Arthur had thrown her into the dungeons and she had to be there for three days. Only for the queen's mercy had he let her out.

The red amulet around his neck lit up over and over again and Arthur still did what Catrina told him to do.

Gwen could not take this anymore.

Quickly she turned around, held on tight to the flowers and ran out of the room.

Drenched in tears she ran down the corridors. Long ago she had dropped the flowers, had thrown them away. There was just one person she could go to now. Morgana.
Gwen turned around the corner and suddenly collided with someone. At first she could only see dirty clothes flying through the air, then Merlin in the middle of this bunch of crud and finally the clothes falling down, half to the ground, half on Merlin while the dirt dizzeled after.
The maidservant stared at Merlin and he stared back.
Just as she wanted to say something she saw his amulet flashing up.
„They were freshly wallowed in mud!" he shouted angrily, took up one dress and noticed, that half of its dirt had fallen off. "Now I have to do that again!"
Quickly he got down and collected the clothes with rapid agitation. Gwen forced herself to stop crying, kneeled next to him, touched his shoulder and told him softly: "They still are quite dirty."
Inflamed with rage Merlin slapped her hand away.
„You have no idea! You are as stupid as our wise queen tells us all the time", he snubbed her without looking at her. While he went on collecting the clothes he mumbled: "Quite dirty, tz … there has to be clot, hay, bugs have to be teeming in the wrinkles and the right fragrance is that hard to find. Easy for her to say, this maidservant …".
As soon as he had picked up everything he jumped up and ran back the direction he had come from.
Shocked Gwen remained where she was.
So far she had been forced to tolerate more than ever before. Bad times, hunger, misery, losses. Everything she had endured. But seeing what was done to her friends was more than she was able to bear.

The guards in front of Morgana's door did not dare to look at Gwen. They were too ashamed for staying around and serving Catrina by watching Morgana.

But Gwen knew that the guards did not pay as much attention to their job as Catrina would have liked it. When the Queen was not around Morgana was allowed to leave the room for a short while.

Gwen smiled encouraging, knocked the door gently, waited a few seconds and then went inside. Morgana sat in front of her mirror, looking at herself thoughtfully.

As Gwen closed the door Morgana turned around and Gwen grew scared. Morgana's face was so tense, pale. Her eyes dark and tired, her mouth narrowed.

"What has happened?", Gwen asked and stepped towards Morgana.

"She finally wants to get rid of me for good", Morgana whispered weakly and turned back to the mirror. "I shall get married. The day after tomorrow."

"What?", Gwen asked in disbelief, went over to her mistress and put a hand on her shoulder. "When was this decided? And to whom will you get married?"

Morgana put her hand on her maidservant's.

"I don't know. Some prince from a kingdom far away. I just found out this morning. Arthur told me", she explained bitterly. "Oh, Gwen", she then sighed. "We have to do something about this. Arthur, Uther and Merlin are not behaving normally. It has to be those amulets. Catrina must have bewitched them."

Gwen sat down.

"I know", she said eagerly. "I've been thinking the same. Maybe all one has to do is destroy those amulets and everything goes back to normal."

"Nothing ever will be normal again", Morgana flared up. "Uther has made a mockery of himself. Even more when those disgusting little monsters started crawling on his lap. Nobody will forget this that quickly."

Gwen put more pressure on Morgana's shoulder to calm the Lady down, to give her strength.

"We've been through other worse things. By the time Uther is himself again he will rule with a firm hand. Camelot will not be harmed. We just have to take this into our own hands." Gwen pondered.

"But how?" her Mistress asked hopelessly. "What can we possibly do? I am trapped in this room and if you tried to revolt, Catrina would make Arthur come after you."

"Will the wedding take place in Camelot?" Gwen suddenly asked silently.

"Yes," Morgana answered not knowing what her maidservant was up to. "But how can we use that?"

"Everyone will be busy preparing for the wedding. Maybe Catrina will be distracted from us. And maybe Gaius can help us", Gwen shared her thoughts.

"Gaius?" Morgana laughed, but became silent very fast and depressed. "First you would have to get him out of the dungeons. And even if you can do that, he will be very weak. How could he help us?"

"Maybe he knows what kind of amulets those are. How to destroy them", Gwen was scheming already.

Slowly some hope became visible on Morgana's face. Carefully she turned around to Gwen, looked her maidservant straight into the eyes.

"Do you really think we can do that?", she asked almost begging. Gwen gave her a resolute look.

"Yes" ,she said confident, brave and full of anticipation to score off the troll. "You just have to try everything to keep the people as busy as possible."

Morgana laughed out loud. "Believe me", she said giggling. „That is something I am good at."

Gwen got up to leave. Once again she turned around to Morgana and this time it was Morgana giving Gwen an encouraging nod. Along with dozens of plans in her head Gwen went on her way home.

She kept thinking on her way.

She would have to talk to Gaius first to describe the amulet to him. Then she would have to bribe the guards, if that was necessary at all. She either had to get Gaius out of the dungeons without anybody seeing it or she would have to get his books to him.

After that she would have to free Merlin from the spell, because he was the one who could get close enough to Arthur to help him. Then it would be Uther's turn. And then the troll.

Gwen passed by the throne room. Still the little beasts were up to mischief. Hitting Arthur's fibular, running around wildly, crawling up everything they could find, farting and burping in a volume you would not expect from such a little, ugly body.

Merlin stood next to Catrina, showing her the dirty clothes and the queen was excited about every stain she saw. So about everything.

This time it wasn't disgust floating through Gwen. It was anticipation. Anticipation for ending this. Catrina's days as queen were numbered.

"She won't survive the next wedding", the maidservant thought happily.

She got down to work.

Finishing part 2 will take a bit