A Cage Of Gilded Thorns

by EFAW

Once upon a time, in a mansion deep in the woods, there lived a fearsome beast, a gentle beauty, and a gardener. Fairy Tale AU. WesAlexTravis.

Summary: Once upon a time, in a mansion deep in the woods, there lived a fearsome beast, a gentle beauty, and a gardener. Fairy Tale AU. WesAlexTravis.

Warnings: Twisted fairy tale. Beauty and the Beast AU. OT3. Magic. Curses. Depression. Self-hate. Starvation. Suicidal ideation. Suicide attempt. Disassociation.

Disclaimer: I neither own nor am affiliated with Common Law in any way.

I have a huge weakness for fairy tale-type stories, ok, it's one of my favorite things, so I couldn't pass up the chance to write my own fairy tale retelling.

OOOO

A Cage Of Gilded Thorns

"How long must this go on? This cruel trick of fate? I simply made one careless wrong decision. And then the witch was gone! And left me in this state. An object of revulsion and derision…"

—Beast, "How Long Must This Go On?"

XXXX

Deep in the woods, where the trees grow tangled and the wild things roam, there is a mighty house that lies behind an even mightier wall; and within this house resides a fearsome beast. He is a wretched and gruesome creature, they say, with a mighty temper and an endless appetite.

Be cautious in the woods, they whisper, and follow the signs, for the woods twist themselves around those who lose their way, and the lost inevitably find themselves at the house of the beast.

Take care, they warn, for those who meet the beast never return.

XXXX

Once upon a time…

XXXX

The wolves draw him out. They're howling, not the cry of the hunt, but a chorus of triumph, of victory, of warning. They've found something, out in the woods, so he pulls on a cloak—more out of habit than necessity—and ventures from his home (his prison).

It isn't a long walk beyond the walls. The wolves are waiting, feet light on the snow, eyes glinting gold in the dim pre-dusk morn. They wait until they see him watching, then turn into the trees with a flash of fur. He follows.

They lead him to a clearing, snow piled knee-deep. There are more wolves, circled around a huddled, snow-covered mound, a figure buried in the snow. As he approaches, the wolves back away, retreating to a healthy distance. (He still hasn't been able to figure out if they're here to keep everyone else out, or to keep him in.)

Not one figure, he sees as he gets closer, but two, a man and a woman, lying in the snow. The man is face-down, nothing more than a flash of golden hair and colorless skin. The woman, though… She's beautiful, is his first though, with her dark hair and long lashes, stark against skin leeched pale from the chill. Snow White, he thinks, and laughs bitterly. That's the wrong fairy tale, and the prince that would kiss her awake is lying dead at her side.

"Why am I here?" he wonders aloud, voice harsh in the silence. The wolves stare at him. He waves a hand at the figures. "They're already gone."

The largest wolf, fur tan with dark lines slashing the color, pads forward, nudging the woman. She stirs, ever so slightly, the smallest puff of air escaping her mouth.

He says, "I see," and curls his hands into fists. "But why am I here?"

The wolf sits back, staring at him, eyes glinting with an intelligence no wolf should possess.

He sighs, a long, deep sound, expelling a cloud of vapor. He does not need this.

But he pulls his cloak off, kneels down beside her and wraps her into it. He lifts her, as easy as a babe, and cradles her close to his chest.

The man is gone. But he might still be able to save her.

He walks away without looking back. The wolves watch him go.

XXXX

It's nightfall before she stirs, slowly waking. He stays hidden in the shadows in the corner of the room, waiting until she's slowly pushed herself upright before asking, "How do you feel?"

She starts, squinting at the corner where he sits. "I…I'm fine," she says slowly. "Who are you?"

He chuckles, bitter and dark. "You don't want to know."

"I do." With effort, she draws herself up, lifts her chin. "I would know the man who saved me."

Man. The man who saved her. He bites back a sharp, angry bark of laughter and unfolds from his seat, rising to his full height.

Then he steps into the light.

She makes a small sound, shrinks back. He long ago broke all the mirrors in this place, unable to stand even a glimpse of what he'd become, and it's been so long he doesn't know exactly what she sees.

But he can guess. Teeth—too many, too sharp. He can feel them when he runs his tongue round his mouth. Fur, and claws, this he can see just looking at his own hands. Ears, eyes, a nose that can't be human, not even close, not with the way he can hear, see, smell the world.

He is a beast that walks on two legs, and she quails before the sight.

But only for a moment. Her jaw tightens, and she sits up once more, hiding her fear (but he can smell it, wafting off her skin).

"Where is my husband?" she asks. "Did you save him too?"

Her husband. The man in the woods, the prince with the golden hair.

"No."

Her eyes widen. "What did you do to him?"

"Nothing."

Her hands clench in the blanket. If she were strong enough, he suspects she would leap to her feet and come at him—there's a fire in her eyes, furious and smoldering.

"Then where is he?"

"You misunderstand," he says slowly, softly. "I did nothing."

The color drains from her face, and she collapses, sinks into the pillows. Her eyes are empty and dull.

"You monster," she whispers, little more than a breath, but he can hear it.

He doesn't flinch. He's been called worse.

"If you need something," he tells her, "simply ask. The house will provide."

Quietly, silent despite his bulk, he takes his leave. As the door closes behind him, he hears her start to sob.

XXXX

It's a few days before she ventures out and about. He crosses paths with her in the hall; she's dressed in a fur-lined cloak and heavy boots. Not what she was wearing when he brought her here, so the house gave her what she wanted.

And what she wants, apparently, is to go out.

He looks at her. She stares back, eyes red, chin up. "I'm leaving," she says, in a voice that brooks no argument, and he can't help but admire her bravery. Faced with a monster from a story, she nevertheless refuses to back down, refuses to give up.

He could let her go. He thinks about letting her go. It would be better for the both of them—she would go back to her life, whatever it consists of, and he would go back to…this.

But then he thinks that it's been so very long since he's spoken to anyone else, anyone who would talk back. There are the wolves, but they don't respond, and talking to himself isn't exactly scintillating.

If she leaves, he'll be all alone again.

"You can't leave," he tells her.

Fire sparks in her eyes. Without a word, she strides off. He watches her go.

Over the next few hours, he observes her attempts at escape, which are as futile as he'd said. Stepping out the front door brings her right through the back door. Going out the back has her stumbling through the servant's entrance. The windows are all the same—climbing out of one just ends with her tumbling through a different window onto the floor. At one point, she finds the cellar, tries to escape through the root doors down there. He listens to her clatter into the attic and wishes he could be amused at her faint curses.

He did not wish her to leave, so the house changed to accommodate that. The same sort of magic that supplies everything else in this place.

She finds him, later, disheveled and dirty from her many escape attempts. She stomps in front of his chair, hands curled into loose fists at her side, and demands, "Why?"

Because it's been so long, he wants to say. Because I'm tired of being alone. But he doesn't. Monsters aren't supposed to get lonely.

"You can stay in the rooms you woke in," he says instead, watching the fire. "The house is yours to explore." He has nothing to hide.

He has nothing.

"And you?" she demands. "What will you want of me?"

He's silent a long minute. "If you don't want to see me," he finally says, "then you won't."

This is a magical house that fulfills the wants of those inside. He isn't so cruel as to force her to be with him.

She doesn't say anything, just turns on her heel and storms off.

He sighs, watching the fire.

XXXX

She doesn't give up. He listens to her, for days, trying to escape the house. He can hear her, moving through the halls, slamming doors and cursing when every attempt fails. She keeps at it for days, and even listening through the walls makes something settle in his chest.

It's the sound of someone inside the home, someone filling the cold silence—it's been so long.

He listens to her moving and one side of his mouth turns up, just a little.

XXXX

He hates the winter. The days are short and the nights long—dreary grey skies and snow falling endlessly, blanketing the world, suffocating him. There's no one to talk to on these long dark nights, no one to hold, no one to pass the time with. Nothing to keep the memories from flooding inside him, drowning him. He's gone mad, he thinks, many times over the course of many long winters.

He stopped counting the passage of time long ago, when he realized how little that mattered anymore. But he is acutely, infinitely aware of each passing second, from the moment he brings her to his house to the moment he sees her again.

(it's one week, three days, and seven hours, and every moment aches)

She finds him in the study, watching the fire. He isn't in the mood to do anything else, and at least the dancing flames are interesting.

She's wearing dark violet, velvety and smooth with black trimming, the skirt trailing on the floor as she walks. "May I?" she asks quietly, and when he waves permission, she settles into the other chair.

She breaks the silence first, leaning back with her hands clasped in her lap. "My name is Alex," she says, the firelight tossing red-gold highlights into her dark hair.

Slowly, inexorably, he turns to her. "What?" His voice is a harsh rasp, the first word he's spoken since he saw her last.

She smiles gently, a touch nervously. "I thought, since we're trapped here together, we ought to get to know each other. So. My name is Alex."

He doesn't correct her, merely stares—he isn't certain his jaw isn't agape.

Her quiet smile doesn't falter. "Do you have a name?"

"I—"

He had a name, once, before, but it's been so long, and he's been so very alone all this time. There'd been no one to call for him, and he'd had no reason to call his own name. Monsters don't have names.

She's sitting there, so open and expectant, so he tries, searching deep within his memories, looking for a glimmer of recollection, of those distant times before. He must have had a name once. He is—

"Travis," he says softly, and it hurts, like picking a scab. "My name is Travis."

She straightens, nods regally. "It's nice to meet you, Travis."

He doesn't know how sincere she is, but he nods gravely back anyway.

XXXX

He doesn't seek her out; the temptation is too great. After so long, even the knowledge of someone else in the house with him…it's too much. He would never leave her be.

So he keeps his distance, allows her to come to him. The next time, after their introduction, he's in the library, book flat on the table before him, carefully sliding his claws beneath the edge of the page to turn it. When he hears her soft, "Travis?" behind him, he startles so suddenly he tears the thin paper in half.

She apologizes as he turns, looking sheepish. When he doesn't say anything, she shifts. "I was hoping to join you," she says tentatively, holding up a book of her own.

He blinks, taking far too long to answer but she doesn't look daunted or discouraged. Finally, he nods, and she smiles, bright and warm, settling into the opposite end of the couch.

They don't talk, the only sound the quiet rustling of turning pages, but he can't remember ever being so content.

At least once a day after that, she'll come to him, will sit quietly near him and entertain herself. Sometimes it's books, taken from the library; other times she writes, pages of words spilling onto the paper, or she knits, the steady clicking of needles filling the air.

He's content to merely sit there, soaking in her presence. She's the one who speaks first—after a while, she simply starts talking—at him, in the beginning, small, polite conversation he doesn't contribute much to. Someone else might have stopped trying completely when he doesn't respond, but not Alex. She keeps trying, talking to him even when he's at his most sullen.

(It isn't as though she has anyone else to talk to.)

And it works. Eventually, he responds, and it's nothing of note, just a vague comment about how much he hates the snow, but she beams at him like he gives a speech worthy of an ovation.

All of a sudden, these dreary winter days don't seem to pass quite as slowly.

XXXX

Every so often, as he walks through the halls, he'll come across her. Often, she'll fall into step beside him, sometimes making small conversation, sometimes merely keeping him company. He ventures out more often, now that she's here, coming out of his rooms in the hope that Alex will also be there. He no longer spends hours and days at a time staring at the fire, letting time pass idly by. Now he looks forward to the passing minutes, because it's one more moment that Alex might come talk to him, that he might chance upon her in the hall.

Sometimes, he'll find her at a window, staring forlornly out at the snow-covered grounds. She'll have the window open, despite the chill of the winter air, leaning her body out as though if she just leans far enough…

But if she were to go through the window, the magic of the house would twist, and she would simply fall through another window and land inside the house.

Guilt tugs at him, in these quiet, solemn moments. He ought to let her go, he knows, ought to release her from this house and watch her disappear into the woods. This is his prison; it shouldn't be hers as well.

But then she turns, and though sadness lingers in her eyes she'll smile and say his name, a gentle, "Travis," and oh, it's been so very long…

In the spring, he tells himself. I will let her go in the spring, when the snows clear and the paths are visible.

In the spring, he decides, and puts it out of his mind.

XXXX

Once upon a time, there was a young man who lived in a very large house in the woods. This man had no family, no siblings—he was all alone in this world.

This young man always smiled, and he was quite popular with everyone he came across. Not for his wealth, but for his charm, his personality, the way he could flirt and seduce anyone who came near.

But underneath the warmth of his smile was a cold, sad heart, something no one ever saw, hidden and locked away in the depths of himself, brought out only when he was alone in the dark.

For all his wealth and popularity, this young man in this very large house was very, very lonely.

XXXX

It's been a few weeks since Alex first spoke to him when a piece of paper flutters at his feet as he walks down the hall. He pauses, gingerly picks it up in his claws and turns it over. In gilded script, it says, You are cordially invited, and a time (7PM tonight) and a place (the downstairs dining hall). At the bottom she signs her name, elegant, looping swirls spelling Alexandra.

He isn't going to go. He isn't. It's ridiculous—something like him at a dinner requiring such a fancy invitation? Especially with a gorgeous woman such as Alex? No way.

And yet, seven o'clock finds him standing outside the dining hall, wearing a dark grey jacket with gold embroidered trim, provided almost eagerly by the house.

He thinks about leaving, about retreating to his room and not coming out. Then he takes a deep breath and pushes open the door.

For a moment, as the doors swing open and he takes in the brightly-lit, glittering room, he's taken back. Back to when people would move through his home with abandon, loud and laughing gaily. Women, men, children, dozens of people swarming the halls, crowding the dining table and filling the air with sound. Food would be brought out, and everyone would eat and talk, and oh, his heart had been near to bursting but it was never enough.

Then he blinks, and the room is empty except for one lone figure standing beside the table.

Alex turns as the doors open, a vision in a long, flowing gown of deep burgundy, embroidered with the same gold trim as his jacket. Her hair is swept up off her neck, and crimson gems glitter in the dark tresses. She is beautiful, gorgeous—compared to her, he must look as ridiculous and out of place as he feels.

But when she sees him, she smiles, warm and inviting, and says, "I'm glad you came." And she sounds sincere, like she's actually been looking forward to this.

He wants to believe her.

She moves up beside him, takes his arm without any visible hesitation, and guides him to the table. The table is long, seemingly miles of polished wood, but Alex seats them right next to one another. There are plates on the table already; as they sit, food appears. The house providing, he realizes, and in all his years here, he'd never done anything like this.

(he's never seen the point, trapped here by himself)

Alex takes control of the conversation, but he volunteers more than he would have a month ago. They eat, and talk, the plates filling as they finish each course, and he can't remember the last time he's enjoyed himself like this.

He can't remember the last time he's enjoyed himself at all.

At some point between the third and fourth course (or maybe the fourth and fifth, he quickly loses count) she pauses, then carefully asks, "Can I ask you something? You don't have to answer, if you'd rather not."

He blinks, and takes a sip of his wine. "Alright."

She hesitates, then delicately asks, "What happened to you?"

Ah.

He looks down, at the furred, clawed hands, and all of a sudden this whole thing seems a farce. What is he doing? Bitterness wells in his throat, sour and cloying, thick enough to choke him.

"A curse," he spits vehemently, throwing his fork down so hard the delicate little plate cracks. "I was cursed."

There's a long silence. He waits for her to—not run away, she's much braver than that, but to at least recoil at his temper. But she doesn't. She doesn't so much as flinch, and then he debates running away himself.

Then a hand enters his vision, small and pale. She's trembling, a little, but she's brave, still reaches out and rests her hand against his. Softly, full of sympathy, she murmurs, "You poor thing."

It's funny. After all this time, he didn't know he could still cry.

XXXX

Later, as they're working their way through the dessert course, Alex asks, "Is there a cure?"

He pauses, twisting to stare at her. "A cure?"

She nods slowly, the gems in her hair glittering like fresh drops of blood. "For the curse. Is there a cure?"

He shakes his shaggy head, looking at his cake. Suddenly his appetite is gone. "It's impossible."

Alex merely lifts her chin, with that brave stubbornness he's so in awe of, and says, "Nothing is impossible."

He remembers feeling like that, back in the beginning, when he still had hope that he could end this torment. He learned quickly enough, though. There is no way to stop this.

He doesn't say anything. He simply ducks his head and takes another bite of his cake—it tastes like ashes in his mouth.

XXXX

Over the next few days, he finds books in the library, scattered on the table and floor. Some of them are books he recognizes; some of them are things he's never seen before.

Every single one is related to curses.

He doesn't try to tell her it's hopeless.

She'll learn that all too quickly on her own.

XXXX

The dinners become a common fixture. Every evening, Alex finds him and they eat together. Not always in the dining room—most days, in fact, they eat in chairs in the study, curled in front of the fire.

There's no more talk of curses and cures. Some evenings they don't talk at all, simply sitting beside each other. It's…comfortable. It's nice.

He could get used to this, he thinks.

XXXX

"How long have you been here?" Alex asks one day, her hand on his arm as they walk the halls.

He's silent for a long moment, staring at the floor beneath his feet. Alex doesn't try to fill the silence, merely matching her step to his.

How long has it been? Too long—endless seasons have blurred together, and time has no meaning—at least until Alex arrived.

"I don't know," he tells her. "A long time."

She squeezes his arm gently, voice dripping with emotion. "How lonely."

He wants to laugh—and laugh and laugh, the kind of laugh that would never, ever stop.

"You have no idea."

XXXX

He doesn't want to let her go. He should, once the snows melt and the paths are clear. It isn't fair to keep her here, trapped with him—she isn't cursed, and even widowed, she still has a long life ahead of her, free to love and get married again and oh, do all the things he can't anymore.

To keep her here, trapped with no escape, no hope, no future, oh, that is the height of cruelty. He is many things, but he's never thought of himself as cruel.

The thing is, he hasn't been lonely since Alex arrived.

So he doesn't want to let her go.

XXXX

He wanted for nothing, this young man. He had a roof over his head, and his every need was catered to by the staff. Anything he desired would quickly be found and brought to him. But despite this, the young man was not greedy or selfish. He gave freely of himself, his money and time and possessions.

The young man gave and gave of himself, hoping for something he did not have, but no matter how much he gave away, he couldn't fill the emptiness inside.

Oh, he was still so lonely.

XXXX

The magic does not keep him trapped within the house. For reasons he still can't fathom, he has never been locked inside the house; the wolves circle the walls, but they never hinder him when he passes through the gate. They merely watch with glittering eyes whenever he steps into the woods, following him through the trees.

If he wanted to, he could walk down the forest paths until he came to a village, a town, a city. He could put as much distance between himself and the cursed house, until it was nothing but a distant dream.

But to what end? He is a beast, a monster. No town would ever accept him—at the first sight of him the villagers would hunt him down like an animal.

No, better to stay here. The house is a cage, but at least it is a gilded one—the magic provides him everything he could ever want.

It can't give him what he needs, but it's better to stay than to be killed.

XXXX

The house will not allow Alex to leave, because he does not wish her to go. But he himself has never been hindered. So one night, when the moon is high and Alex has already retired to her room, he dons his cloak and steps into the winter air. It is silent, the only sound the snow crunching lightly beneath his feet. He doesn't need a light; the moon guides his way.

Almost silently, he moves across the grounds, pausing before the heavy iron gates.

The gates are always open. A long time ago he'd declared them to be opened and never closed—even though no one comes to his home anymore, he can't bear to close them against the world. A reminder of who he'd once been, perhaps.

Exhaling a cloud of white vapor, he runs his fingers over the wrought iron, not even the insulating fur on his hands enough to keep the chill of cold metal from his skin. Memories threaten to assail him; he grits his teeth against them and pulls his hand away.

Slowly, on near-silent feet, he steps through the gate.

The wolves are there, waiting, at the edge of the forest where the trees thin. They come in all shapes and sizes, a dozen at least, eyes glinting silver and gold and green in the moonlight. The largest steps forward, out of the trees—in the darkness, the dark stripes of fur make the wolf blend into the shadows. Were it not for the eyes, glowing almost from within, he wouldn't have even known the creature was there.

The wolf stops some feet away, sitting on the snow and watching him. He stares right back.

"Why did you bring me to her?" he asks, and it's little more than a whisper but in the silence of the night his voice is deafening.

The wolf tilts its head to the side.

And though he knows it can't answer, knows it probably can't even understand him (then again, these are magic wolves; who knows what they can or can't do), he still asks.

"Why did you have me save her?" Not that he would have wanted Alex to die in the snow, but why him? "I can't keep her here forever. Eventually she'll leave and I'll be—"

He'll be alone again. He's been alone for so long, he almost got used to it—never content, but resigned.

But these weeks with Alex in his home have made him remember what it was like, to be surrounded by people, to have someone else to talk to. It's made him feel human again, something he hasn't felt since a curse changed his body into a monster.

But when she leaves, he'll be alone again, and the thought is too much to bear.

"Why would you do this to me?" he whispers, hoping for—something. Some sign the wolf understands, some small motion that will give him an answer.

But the wolf continues to stare at him with unblinking eyes, and he learns nothing at all.

Disgusted, hopeless, he turns his back on the animals, walking toward the gate. There is the slightest sound of crunching snow when he steps through, but he doesn't look back.

XXXX

Maybe this is just more punishment. Maybe the arbitrator of his curse has decided he isn't being punished enough, and so created this to torture him some more. Give him company, companionship, someone to ease the aching loneliness that gapes in his heart—then rip it away and leave him bleeding.

As though being turned into a monster wasn't enough.

XXXX

As he strides toward the house, he thinks he sees a pale, round face in one of the upper windows, but when he looks again there's nothing there.

He waits, in the morning, for Alex to say something. If she'd seen him outside, then she knows he'd…not lied, he'd never outright said he couldn't leave, but he'd certainly misled her into thinking they were both trapped in the house.

But she never says a word, and she greets him with the same soft smile she's always given him when she sees him in the hall.

XXXX

Though the house was large, it was not empty. The house was tended by loyal staff, people who had grown up in this house, who he cared for and who cared for him in turn. These people were close to the young man.

But they were not family. And these people, wonderful as they were, could not ease the aching loneliness in his heart.

XXXX

Slowly, winter fades to spring. One day he looks up, and the sun is shining, tiny green tufts peeking through the retreating snow. A short time after that, he sees the birds returning to their trees, back from their winter homes. Most other forest animals stay away, thanks no doubt to the wolves and the magic surrounding this house, but the birds always come back.

Spring is here.

I will let her go in the spring, he'd told himself, what felt like only yesterday, when the snows clear and the paths are visible.

But now that the time is approaching, is here, his resolve wavers.

How can he bear to let her go when he knows the emptiness waiting for him?

XXXX

Alex still looks out the window, but there is less melancholy in her gaze. Now she stares out with a smile on her lips, delight dancing in her eyes.

"Spring is my favorite season," she explains, when he asks what she's looking at. "It's a season of growth and rebirth. Everything is new again."

It has been a very long time since he's looked out a window and seen the world painted in shades of wonder; but he finds himself looking outside more and more, as though maybe if he just looks hard enough he can see the things she loves so much.

XXXX

One day when he looks outside, there is a man in the yard.

Rage fills him, utterly and completely, a terrible, resounding fury that pulses inside of him, that threatens to take over completely. He doesn't remember rushing outside—one minute he is in the hallway, looking out the window, the next he is striding across the grass, roaring. The man is on his knees by the wall, and he turns, his face transforming into a mask of horror when he sees a beast approaching.

Then Travis has crossed the distance, slamming the man against the wall by a grip on his throat, and the rage is overwhelming.

"Who are you?!" he roars, barely coherent. "What are you doing here?!"

The man chokes, hands clawing at Travis's. It takes a good ten seconds for Travis to take a few breaths, to calm down enough to release his grasp enough for the stranger to breathe.

"How did you get in here?" he demands, his words a little more intelligible this time.

The man, red-faced and gasping around the tight grip still on his throat, chokes out, "G-gate was…o-o-pen."

For a moment, he can only curse his sentimentality. It had always been an invitation, a reminder of the person he used to be, but it was rare anymore that anyone would venture far enough into the woods to even find the gate, let alone walk through. He should have known the one time he didn't want anyone coming in, someone would get lost in the woods and stumble on his home.

He snarls, tossing the man to the ground. "Get out and I won't kill you." (Not that he would—he'd never been that kind of person. But a monster would say such a thing, and a monster would be believed.)

He's already turned and started his way back to the house when he hears a harsh, soft rasp, "I can't leave."

Slowly, he turns. The man tenses, one hand rubbing his throat, but he meets Travis's gaze bravely (like Alex did, met his gaze with her chin held high). "I can't leave. I've tried."

Travis holds himself very still, and does his best to keep the rage down. "What do you mean, you can't?"

"I mean I can't." The man pushes himself to his feet, using the wall as support. "I've tried. Every time I go through the gate, I end up right back in this yard. The same thing happens when I go over the wall." He laughs, a sound with very little mirth. "I can't even get into the house. The only places I can go are this blasted yard and the groundkeeper's hut." He waves toward the back of the house, where Travis is well aware of the little groundkeeper's hut (though the hut could easily accommodate any simple village home within.)

For a long minute, Travis can only stand there, trembling. Is this just another form of punishment, then? One more person to break the solitude, to make it that much harder to be alone again?

What has he ever done to deserve this?

Without a word, he turns, storming back to the house. He can feel the stranger's gaze on his back; wisely, the man doesn't call after him.

XXXX

Later, he finds Alex in the hall, tugging at the windows. "It won't open," she says, a puzzled frown on her face. "None of them will."

And he looks and finds she's right; none of the windows on the first floor will open, and all of the shutters have closed as though they've been boarded up.

The castle twists itself to accommodate his wants; apparently this time, what he wants is to keep a very, very solid barrier between Alex and the man outside.

Travis wants to laugh, even though it isn't funny at all, but he is afraid if he starts he'll never stop.

XXXX

The young man threw parties in his home, lavish, elegant affairs filled with food and dancing. He invited all of his friends—he had many friends, this young man, dozens of people who would fill the halls and ballroom.

He was very popular, and gathered the attentions of many, both male and female. The young man did not turn down these attentions—he relished them, encouraged them, and never turned anyone down, in the hopes that by embracing these people, they might be able to give him what was missing.

But they never could, and the loneliness ate at him.

XXXX

Alex asks a few questions about the man in the yard.

Travis doesn't answer. Eventually she stops asking.

XXXX

For a week, he ignores the existence of the man in the yard. It isn't his concern—the man had wandered in where he wasn't wanted (through the, admittedly, open gate) and it isn't Travis's fault he's now caught up in the curse. It isn't his problem.

The first-floor windows are the only ones shuttered closed; the second and third floor windows can still be opened, still look out on the world. As he walks down the hall one afternoon, he sees the stranger, striding across the yard, and he pauses. He watches the man until he is out of sight, then stands there for a long time, looking down at the empty yard.

The man is alone. Travis has been alone for so long, he knows what that's like. But it's one thing to have no one around, and quite another to know there's someone there, someone just on the other side of a door he can't get through, someone who is ignoring him. They are both horrible concepts, but the latter just seems more…cruel.

Travis has never thought of himself as cruel.

He knows what it is to be alone; it isn't a torment he'd willingly wish on someone else. So one morning, when the sky is clear and there is little chill in the air, he ventures out, walking the length of the house until he finds his guest.

The man is kneeling by the wall again, poking at the ground. He sits back on his heels at Travis's approach, body tense, face guarded.

Travis pauses some small distance away, doing his best to look unassuming and unthreatening. From the look on the other man's face, he isn't sure it's doing anything effective.

The silence stretches. Travis finds that, though he's spent so many years with silence as his only company, he's grown unaccustomed to it in the short time since he'd brought Alex here.

He clears his throat. "Hello."

The man blinks, taken aback. "Um. Hello."

Considering their first meeting started with Travis's hands around his throat, Travis supposes the other man's reticence is fair.

"My name is Travis," he says.

Something very complicated passes over the stranger's face. "Wes," he says slowly, warily, offering no more.

"Wes," Travis says, nodding a greeting. It doesn't make the caution slide off Wes's face, but some of the tension eases from his shoulders.

Travis shifts, gaze roaming the vicinity for something to talk about. He spots a pair of gardening gloves by Wes's boot, along with a small trowel. "You're…doing some gardening?"

Wes starts, looking beside him like he'd forgotten the tools were there. "Well, I was…um, thinking of it, yes." He slants a quick, sideways look Travis's way, as though gauging his reaction.

Travis's reaction, quite frankly, is one of bafflement. "Why?" He'd never seen the appeal of gardening, honestly. It always seemed so…boring.

Wes shifts, lips twisting wryly. "There is literallynothing else to do out here."

And. Well. If Travis couldn't get into the house and had to spend all his time in the yard or the groundkeeper's hut, he'd probably take up gardening too.

He shifts again, feeling unaccountably guilty. It isn't his fault that Wes arrived here—the woods bring everyone here, when they become lost. But it is probably his fault that Wes is stuck here—that had never been a problem before he so desperately wished Alex to stay.

"I could…bring you some books from the library?" he offers.

Surprise flits across Wes's face, there and gone; and then he smiles, a small, hesitant thing. "I would appreciate that. Thank you."

Travis nods, short and sharp. "Alright."

The silence stretches. He'd long ago lost most of his conversational skills, with no one to talk to but himself. He'd regained some of it with Alex, since, but he rather doubts he's any good at it anymore.

"Well. Carry on, then." He makes a vague gesture to the gardening tools, taking a step toward the house. "I'll. Bring the books out later."

"…alright," Wes says, sounding less wary and more confused. Travis takes that as his cue to leave, and he turns away.

Right before he turns the corner of the house, he glances back, and finds Wes staring at him, brow furrowed as though he'd just encountered a great puzzle.

XXXX

Alex finds him in the library, pouring over the shelves. "Looking for something to read?" she asks lightly, running her fingers over the spines.

Without thinking about it, he says, "It's not for me."

Her fingers pause. "For the man in the yard?" she asks, voice studiously casual.

He supposes he shouldn't be surprised she knows of Wes. She spends so much more time looking out the window than he does. "He can't come into the house," he explains, studying the titles in front of him to avoid looking at her. He feels as though she would somehow be able to read the guilt in his features, that she would call him out on it.

After a long minute of silence, she says brightly, "Well, we'd better get a selection for him, then, hadn't we?" and she helps him pick out a sizeable stack of books for him to bring out to Wes later.

XXXX

There had been others, in the past, but it had never been like this before.

Before the curse, Travis had been popular, and well-liked, he remembered that. He'd had loyal staff and wonderful friends and crowds of people around him. After…well. After, the house seemed too huge, the silence deafening with only one person inside. Even his loyal staff had left him all alone.

He'd had more visitors, back in the beginning, when people wandered off the paths and the woods brought them here. At the time, Travis had been more than happy to scare them off, chase them out until they found themselves back on the well-trodden paths once more. He'd just wanted to be left alone with his curse.

(Oh, how he laughs now at the irony.)

He supposes, at some point, stories must have spread, of the beast who lived in a house in the woods. The paths must have been better marked, and people took greater care not to get lost, because the visitors trickled to a few a year, and then none. He'd appreciated it, at first: no one to scream at his hideousness, no one to throw things and try to attack him before he could attack them (not that he would).

It had been a blessing, to be free of people.

But time passed, and loneliness was a cancer that ate from the inside out, and now…

And now, he's been alone so long he's starving for company, so desperate his two guests can't leave if they wanted. As if it weren't bad enough he was forced to endure this, now he's subjecting it on Wes and Alex as well.

But his desire to have them stay is so much greater than his desire to see them leave, and he can't let them go.

So the house makes it so.

XXXX

Wes smiles when Travis gives him the books, a quiet, understated thing that nevertheless carries extreme emotion. "Thank you," he says fervently, the pile of books tucked to his chest like a precious thing, and Travis can only nod, his throat too tight to make any words.

XXXX

Many a time, when the sky was dark and the house was quiet, all its occupants asleep, the young man would walk the halls, trailing his fingers along the walls.

"Why do I feel this way?" he would ask the empty house. "I have everything I could possibly need. I want for nothing. But it is never enough. Is there something wrong with me, that I cannot be happy as I am?" He would sigh, pause at a window and stare at the twinkling stars high above. "What am I missing?"

But the stars did not reveal their secrets, and no one answered.

XXXX

He starts going outside a lot more, now, than he ever had before. He'd never seen the point, really. So what if he could go outside? There was nowhere for him to go, no safe haven away from this house. He'd been too jaded, too depressed to notice the beauty of nature anymore, and being outside just reminded him that he could run and run but it wouldn't made a difference. He'd still end up right back here.

Before, he'd only left the house when he had to, such as the night when the wolves called him out to rescue Alex.

But it's different now. With Wes there, he has a reason to venture into the yard again, to sit there and notice the world around him once more. It feels like he's been sleeping a very long time, and is now just starting to wake up.

They don't talk much, Travis and Wes. Travis gets his fill of conversation with Alex every day, who can patiently coax words out of him for hours on end, and Wes seems content to work in silence.

It is, really, enough to just sit there, content with the company, a gentle reminder that neither of them are alone.

Then one day, Wes asks, without pausing his work, "Would you like to help me?"

Travis, who had been studying a drooping, blossom-laden branch beyond the wall, blinks and turns to Wes. "What?"

"Would you like to help me?" Wes turns a spadeful of dirt over, revealing fresh, dark soil beneath. "You don't have to simply sit there."

Travis hesitates. "I don't have a spade."

Wes gives him a look, flat and unamused, and Travis marvels that despite their first meeting, Wes is comfortable enough to look at him like that. He's been a beast so long, it's strange to be treated so…normally.

"You have claws, don't you?" Wes asks, turning back to the plot of land before him. "Those will work just fine."

Travis has never had an interest in gardening, and he isn't particularly inclined to develop one now. But he finds himself moving up beside Wes, crouching in the grass and raking his claws through the ground in front of him. They cut easily through the grass and dirt, revealing fresh soil beneath.

Wes gives him a bright, approving smile. "Good. This will cut down the work a lot."

For the first time, Travis doesn't hate how the curse changed him.

XXXX

Alex spends most of her time on the second floor, now; she's created something of a perch for herself in front of one of the larger windows, gathering chairs and blankets and a small table from a nearby room. She spends hours sitting there, not even doing anything, simply staring outside, the gentle breeze rustling her hair. Travis knows, he's watched her sit there for hours, her gaze distant, so absorbed in her thoughts she didn't even noticed him there.

She still smiles when they talk, still comes to him every night so they can eat dinner together, but the other times of the day…

She falls asleep there, once, in front of the open window, an untouched book on her lap. He stands there for twenty minutes, waiting to see if she wakes; when she doesn't, he comes forward, gently lifting her from the chair. It's no effort at all, her weight negligible to the strength of this beastly form, and he has a striking vision of memory, of the first time he'd carried her to this house.

She stirs as he sets her on the bed, blinking blearily up at him.

"It's almost nightfall," he explains, answering her unspoken questions of why he's in her room, why he's pulling back the covers on her bed.

But that isn't the question she has. "Can the curse be lifted?" she asks drowsily, and Travis's heart twists painfully.

Slowly, he releases the covers, settles on the edge of the bed. "Yes," he murmurs, looking at his hands. Hands that had, just this morning, dug into the dirt, felt the soil under his fingertips.

And Alex, who so loves the spring, is trapped inside, unable to do more than sit at the window, staring outward.

They're both trapped in this cage, but at least he can go outside. Alex has done nothing to deserve this.

She reaches out, clutches the edge of his sleeve. "How?" she whispers, more aware now than she had been a moment ago, but still not fully awake.

It's the pain in her voice that makes him answer, the naked, aching longing. He remembers that, a long time ago, hoping and aching and praying that somehow, some way this would end. A very long time ago, before he'd given up on hope completely.

(it's a terrible thing, hope, a vicious, insidious thing that whispers words of promise and then lets you down, again and again and again)

"To break my curse," he murmurs softly, "I must find love." He sighs. "But that…" But that has nothing to do with you, with why you're here.

Alex is here because he's weak, because he is needy and greedy and can't bear to be alone again. Not now, when he knows what it's like to have someone there, when he knows what's waiting for him if she leaves.

But he can't say it; can't bear to have her look at him the way so many others have, with fear, disgust, horror on her face.

Instead, he sighs once more and tells a different truth. "But that is impossible."

He'd told her the truth, when she asked before. To find someone to love him, a beast, a monster from a nightmare…no. He is going to be like this forever, trapped in this empty house with only the wolves for company.

How can he ever let them go?

"Oh." Alex exhales, eyes drooping as sleep tugs at her. "That's not…so impossible…after all…" Her eyes slide closed, and she relaxes against the pillows, the lines on her face easing.

Travis stands, gently covering her. He leaves, closing the door silently behind him, and he stays awake long into the night, staring at the ceiling as her words run in circles through his head.

XXXX

"What do you know of curses?"

Wes shrugs, wiping his forehead with his sleeve. "Not much. Didn't really believe in them, until I got here." Wes slants a glance his way. "What's your curse?"

Travis sits back, dangling dirt-covered hands in front of him, and chuckles, low and empty. "Claws. Teeth. Fur. I wasn't always a beast, you know."

Wes pauses, turning to look at him. "What about the house?"

Travis sighs, tilting his head back and staring at the clouds above. "The house is my prison," he explains. "The wolves are my guard."

"Oh." Abandoning his spade completely, Wes twists, sitting cross-legged on the grass. "What happened?"

What happened. Oh, that makes a bitter, acrid taste fill his mouth, a hollow laugh fall from his lips. "I was young, and stupid, and there was an enchantress."

"I know this one." Wes sits up a little straighter, snaps his fingers. "She was a beautiful enchantress disguised as an old woman, and she asked for aid. When you refused, she changed, and cursed you for your selfishness."

Travis looks at him. "That's…not it at all."

Wes deflates. "Oh."

"You're not entirely wrong. You're not entirely right, though, either." Travis stares into the past, seeing so clearly the memory. He's forgotten so much over the empty years, but how it happened, he could never forget. "There was a beautiful enchantress, true. But there were no disguises, no lies. As for the reason…" He laughs again, the sound so dark it makes Wes shudder. "Maybe in the end, it was because I was selfish."

Wes shifts uneasily, rubbing his hands together. "What did you do?" he asks, voice hushed.

Travis stares into his past, and the memories threaten to swamp him. "It was what I didn't do. She loved me. But I didn't love her back."

A frown crosses Wes's face, and he stills. "What? That… Why, that's not fair at all! You shouldn't be punished for not loving somebody."

"Yes. Well, she felt differently." Travis pushes himself to his feet, shaking dirt off his hands. "I'm sorry. I think I'm done for the day."

"Travis? Hey, wait—"

But Travis doesn't stop. Alex is watching them from the window, and he can feel Wes's eyes on his back, but he doesn't stop until he's made it inside and locked himself in his room.

XXXX

Find love, she'd told him. An impossible cure for an unfair punishment.

Maybe that was the point. To give him a way out, to give him hope, only to watch it drain away as the torment went on.

It isn't fair, Wes had the right of it. But that doesn't change a thing.

XXXX

So the young man decided to open the doors of his great house to anyone who wished to come. "I will feed and shelter you," he promised, "for as long as you wish. All you must do is obey my rules." And the rules were simple: Do not steal, do not harm, do not lie.

And the people came in droves: The homeless from the streets, the widowed mothers with no one to turn to, the orphan children. The lost and desperate and lonely came to this great house, and soon the halls were full of running feet and laughter and chattering voices.

And the young man looked around his bustling home and smiled. But in the silence of his bedroom, when the doors were closed and he was by himself, the smile dropped away from his face, and in the dark the cold, broken pieces of his heart leaked from his eyes and fell as tears to the floor.

Though he was surrounded by people, the young man was still so lonely.

XXXX

Spring edges into summer, every day a little longer, a little hotter. One day Wes walks out with a small bag in his hands, and he says, "I guess we're planting today," spilling speeds into his palm.

Travis has never gardened before in his life, but he'd watched the gardeners and landscapers enough to know the basics. "Isn't it a bit late to be planting?"

Wes shrugs. "A bit. But these are magic seeds, so I assume the flowers will grow just fine."

"Good point," Travis allows, and helps Wes scatter the seeds in the earth they'd spent so many days turning.

It takes a week and a half to plant all the seeds—the bag, so small, never seems to empty. But finally the last seed is in the ground and the dirt gets patted down, and Wes sits back on his heels, satisfied, staring at the earth before him.

"I wonder what kind of flowers they'll be," he muses.

Travis stares at the ground, and with a sudden, intense certainty he knows.

"Roses."

Wes glances up. "Roses? How do you know?"

Travis swallows hard, feeling cold despite the heat in the air. "Because roses mean love."

XXXX

He used to love roses. He thought they were wonderful and strange, delicate velvet petals and needle-sharp thorns. An odd juxtaposition of pain and beauty. He used to fill the halls with roses, had bushes planted all over the grounds, and in the spring the scent of the blooms would fill the air.

And then he changed, and everyone left. There was no one to tend the roses, so the roses wilted died. But at that point he didn't care anymore.

Roses symbolize love, and he has none.

This is just another way for him to be tormented.

XXXX

"Do you think it's almost midsummer?" Alex asks, spinning down the hall. Her light brown peasant skirt flares out around her knees; he notes absently that her feet are bare.

"I don't know," he admits truthfully. "It's never mattered much."

She hums, lifting her arms above her head and spinning on the toes of one foot. "Our village used to hold the most wonderful midsummer festival. There would be food and drinks and dancing—oh, how I loved the dances. We would dance all night long." She swirls down the hall, a whirlwind of skirts and fabric, glancing coyly over her shoulder. "Do you know how to dance?"

"I used to," he says softly, looking down at his body. "I haven't danced in a very long time."

"Oh." The disappointment in her voice is bad enough—worse is the way she stops dancing down the hall, skirt falling still around her ankles, and Travis clenches his hands so tightly his claws dig into the pads of his hands.

XXXX

"Do you know how to dance?" he asks Wes.

Wes wipes his brow with his sleeve. "I've danced some," he says. "Why?" He casts a sideways glance Travis's way. "For the woman in the house?"

Travis pauses. "You know her?"

"I see her in the windows, sometimes, watching us work." Wes's hands are steady on the task before him, his eyes focused on his hands. "You want to dance with her. For her."

It isn't exactly a question. Travis looks at his hands. "She loves to dance. She… I can't do anything else for her. So if I could give her this…"

She is trapped in that house. If he can do even this one thing to bring light to her day…

Wes stops working, just stares at the ground before him, at the tiny sprouts of green poking through the earth. "Is she cursed too?"

Is Alex cursed too? Travis chuckles sourly, looking toward the house. "Yes." She was cursed when she lost her way in the woods and couldn't find the path, when the wolves led him to her, when he brought her back to the house.

The moment he decided he didn't want her to leave, he cursed her.

"I see," Wes says, very quietly. Then he stands, movements sharp and jerky, back stiff as he strides away.

Travis climbs to his feet. "Wes—"

"Don't." Wes's voice is cold, sharp as a blade, and it stops Travis in his tracks. Wes's hands clench at his sides, and he doesn't look back. "Just—don't."

Travis watches him walk away, and it feels like his chest is cracking open.

XXXX

"Enough," he tells the wolves, begs them. "Tell her enough. I am sorry. Let this end."

The wolves stare at him, eyes glowing in the bright summer night. Despair brings him to his knees, makes him cold all the way to his toes. His head bows, shoulders slumping, and there is no pride in his voice when he pleads, "Please."

But the wolves don't move, and his curse does not end.

XXXX

He doesn't come out of his rooms for two days. There's no point. He can't bear to face Alex, and Wes, it seems, doesn't even want to look at him. So he simply stays in his rooms, and when Alex knocks on the door to coax him out, a thought sends the magic of the house twisting her to a different hallway. From that point on, she can't reach his door anymore.

His fault. It's all his fault. She's trapped here because of him, and Wes is snared in the curse too. Everything is all his fault. Perhaps if he lays here and dies, withers away into nothing, the curse will finally end, and they'll be free—

Something clatters against the window. Travis ignores it, closed his eyes and buries his head in the blankets, but the clattering continues, just goes on and on, and he finally throws off the blanket and storms to the window, flinging it wide.

Wes, reeling up to toss a few more rocks at the window, drops the stones and puts his hands on his hips. "Well?" he demands, one eyebrow going up. "Aren't you going to come down and learn how to dance?"

XXXX

"Alright," Wes says, "put your hand on my hip."

Travis doesn't move. "Why?"

"Because that's how you do this dance, obviously."

"No, I mean…" Travis waves a helpless hand. "Why are you…?" Teaching him. Treating him like normal. Travis doesn't even know anymore.

Wes pauses, guilt flickering across his face. "I…it's not fair for me to blame you for something that's not your fault. And it's not fair to punish her because I'm unfairly blaming you." He steps up close, right into Travis's space, and says, "Now put your hand on my hip already."

Travis doesn't move. But he doesn't step back, either. "I don't…"

Wes reaches out, takes Travis's hand without any hesitation, and Travis's words die on his tongue. Wes puts Travis's hand right on his hip, reaching out to rest his own hand on Travis's shoulder, and he thinks…he thinks the last time someone was this close to him, voluntarily close to him, was before he was changed by the curse.

(He's carried Alex a couple of times, but she's been unconscious or sleeping. When she's awake, there's always a polite amount of distance between them, and he's not sure if that's her decision or his.)

"A little firmer, Travis, I'm not going to break," Wes orders. "She won't either."

"But—"

"Shut up, I'm trying to figure out how this dance goes backwards." Wes hums under his breath, face screwed up in concentration, then nods to himself. "Okay. Now follow me. Step, and step, and slide, and step…"

He used to dance all the time, gliding across the floor like it was made of glass, a vision in silk. There wasn't a man or woman he'd turn down, always willing to have one more dance, to hold them close, and for once brief shining moment it was the two of them alone in the world, spinning on threads of music.

Now… He's clumsy, this body unfamiliar and strange. He's grown used to how his limbs are different, his bulk distributed oddly, can walk without trouble, but he's never tried to dance like this. It's a different kind of movement, dancing, and there's no effortless glide, no smooth sweeping across the ground.

But Wes is patient, in his sharply sarcastic way, guiding Travis through the steps and correcting his mistakes. And it takes a little bit, but then something clicks and Travis gets it, can feel the connection to his limbs and—

They're sweeping across the lawn, and Travis closes his eyes and holds Wes close.

XXXX

It takes time, learning how to dance, how to become effortless again. It's not easy, or painless—more than once Travis steps on Wes's foot, and Wes always curses and has them take a break for five minutes.

(The first time, Wes had cursed so vehemently it shocked Travis into laughter. He'd been so surprised that Wes, normally so reserved, would use that sort of language that the sound burst out of him, startling them both, and the look of startled, wide-eyed surprise on Wes's face just made him laugh that much harder.

He hadn't known he could still laugh like that.)

Around them, the roses grow. Thorny branches spring up, twining and twisting, tangled with wicked sharp points. And then the flowers bloom, tiny rosebuds in every shade sprouting blossoms as big as his palm. It's a poignant reminder, of his curse and the cure and how futile it all is, but when he's learning to dance with Wes, it hardly crosses his mind.

Wes teaches him half a dozen dances, the scent of roses heavy in the air, and for a short period of time every day, Travis closes his eyes and it's like nothing happened at all.

XXXX

The ballroom has been closed since the curse—he's had no reason to go inside since, no one to dance with.

He swings open the doors, admires the way Alex's eyes widen, cheeks flushing. She's in dark green, hair swept up off her neck with little tendrils curling around her face. She's beautiful like this, the lights sparkling in her eyes, bathing her in gold.

"Oh," she says, sweeping into the room. "Oh, Travis, it's lovely."

He tries to see it as she does, as someone who's never seen this room before, with the polished wood floors and the high ceilings, floor-to-ceiling windows and an elegant, dangling chandelier. It's a sight to see, for sure, but it's nothing compared to the light in her eyes, the glow in her skin, the warmth of her smile.

The ballroom is beautiful, but nothing can compare to Alex.

He shifts nervously, clears his throat. When she turns to look at him, he runs his hands down his jacket, careful not to snag his claws on the fabric. "Would you care to dance with me?" he asks, and hold out his hand.

If he thought Alex was beautiful before, then the smile that crosses her face now makes her absolutely stunning.

"I would be delighted," she says grandly, and steps up to him, sliding her hand into his.

And they dance, gliding across the floor like it's made of ice. There's no music, at first—then there suddenly is, gentle chords filling the air, coming from the very walls itself. Alex makes a small sound of wonder, tilting her head back and closing her eyes, and Travis's heart swells in his chest. He didn't know the house could do that, but he's glad it did, that it was able to put that look on her face.

He's glad he can give her this, no matter how inadequately it makes up for everything else.

They dance for a long time, hours, until the sun has gone down and the only illumination is the brilliant, soft glow of the chandelier above. Travis feels weightless, feels like he could go on like this forever, but Alex is the one who finally, laughingly, pulls him to a stop.

"My feet hurt, and I'm tired," she says, looking up at him. "But oh, Travis, thank you."

And she steps in close, puts one hand on his arm and lifts onto her toes—

And presses a quiet little kiss to the corner of his mouth.

Travis goes blank.

She smiles, steps back, puts a polite distance between them. "Thank you," she whispers again, and then she's gone like Cinderella in the night, leaving behind only the scent of her perfume and the faint touch of her lips.

XXXX

He didn't come out here to find Wes—didn't, honestly, think Wes would be awake. But the other man pushes off the wall as Travis emerges from the house, falling into step beside him.

"Did she enjoy it?" he asks, looking into the brightly lit ballroom—from here, Wes could see every single moment of the dancing.

Travis doesn't follow his gaze. Instead, he looks at Wes, the long line of his neck and the sharp cut of his profile. He wonders how long Wes watched them dance, if Wes, all alone in the dark, stood in the yard and looked through the windows, wishing he were inside, wishing he could dance with her too.

"Would you like to dance?" Travis asks, holding out his hand.

Wes's eyes snap to him, wide and startled. "I…I'm not dressed for dancing," he protests feebly. But he doesn't move away.

"You're fine," Travis assures him. "You're perfect." And it's true—Travis doesn't care that Wes is in dirt-stained gardening clothes. In the soft silver light of the moon, he's as lovely as Alex was in green satin.

Wes looks at Travis's outstretched hand, and he doesn't say a word.

Then, slowly, he reaches out, and Travis pulls him close.

XXXX

It's been so long since he felt like this, it takes Travis a very long time to realize he's feeling happy.

Slowly, he begins to hope.

XXXX

For so very long the young man did not know what was missing in his life. But he looked around at his happy, full house, at the children and the men and the women, and he watched them. He saw how they interacted, how they cared for one another, their faces soft and hands gentle with—love.

Of course. Love.

And the young man realized that was what he'd been missing all along. For though he was surrounded by people, though he had the attentions of many, he had no one to love, no one who would love him in turn. And oh, how it broke his heart.

"When will I find love?" he begged the stars. "Who could ever love me?" For how was he to tell the ones who truly cared from the ones who simply wanted part of his wealth, his power, his popularity?

How was he to find love?

XXXX

The days grow shorter. Over the wall, the leaves of the trees start to turn orange, yellow, red, a fire of autumn. Inside the wall, the roses stay thick and plentiful on the bushes, and Wes marvels at the tenacity of magic roses. Alex dances down the halls, humming, and whenever she comes upon Travis she takes his hand and spins with him a few turns.

Travis. Oh, Travis hopes. Hopes that, despite their confinement, they could begin to develop feelings for him. Hopes that they could possibly love a beast.

Hopes that the curse might finally be at an end.

He hopes, and oh, he's never felt brighter in his life, even before all of this happened.

XXXX

He hopes, and that's when it all comes crashing down.

XXXX

It's beautiful outside, the ground dusted with fiery leaves, just a hint of a chill in the air. Travis walks the yard, searching for Wes, knowing the other man must be out here somewhere—the groundskeeper's cottage was empty when he checked.

He finds Wes at the front of the house, a rake abandoned in the yard beside a pile of leaves. But Wes isn't by the rake—he's standing at the wall of the house, hand stretched above his head, looking up.

In the window above him, her arm dangling down, is Alex.

There's feet between their hands, but the attempt is clear, the wistful, longing desire etched on their faces. They look like lovers, separated by a great divide.

Travis's hope crumbles to ashes in his chest, leaving behind the bitter, cold taste of despair.

All this time, he'd thought…he'd hoped…and here they'd been, playing him for a fool!

He roars, a sound of heartbreak and rage, and rushes forward.

Wes leaps back from the wall, already turning to run, and in the window above, Alex is screaming, "No, Travis, no!" –but with a thought, the shutters slam closed, and though he can hear her pounding on the windows, the shape of her words is distorted, muffled into incoherency.

Wes tries to get away, but he's no match for the beast Travis has become—the beast he is. He slams into Wes's back, knocking him to the ground. Wes hits hard and doesn't move, gasping for breath.

"How long?" Travis roars, looming over the fallen man. "How long? Have you spent all this time laughing at the beast? Plotting and scheming to steal her away?"

Then he looks down, at the fallen shape before him, golden hair glinting in the sun, and he realizes he was wrong. Wes wasn't trying to steal her away.

Snow White and the golden prince in the snow.

Travis never had her at all.

"The husband." Travis staggers back, dread curling around his heart. "You're the husband."

Slowly, clutching his ribs, Wes rolls over, and the look in his eyes—

Travis stumbles back another step.

Alex suddenly—appears, tumbling out of thin air onto the grass. Another time, this would have been all she wanted. Now, she casts a wild-eyed, terrified look at Travis, then rushes to Wes's side, hands gentle as she helps him sit up.

It all makes sense, now. Marriage is a different kind of magic, more simple and delicate than the curse that binds him, tying two people together for all time. Wes must have woken up in the snow, found himself alone, and stumbled through the woods, trying to find help, to find his wife. The wolves led him to the house, and the magic of their marriage tangled with the magic of Travis's curse, trapping Wes in the yard as solidly as Alex was trapped inside.

It's all so obvious, and oh, what a fool he'd been.

He had hoped…

But the hope is gone, and even the rage has died away, leaving behind only despair.

"Go," he whispers, but the woods are silent and the words can easily be heard. "Get out of here."

Alex pauses, looking towards the gate. "But…the curse…"

The curse, the curse, he doesn't want to hear about the curse from her. "Get out of here!" he screams, but it's not the shout of a man, it's the violent rumble of a beast.

Alex wraps Wes's arm around her shoulder, and they go.

Travis watches them leave. With every step they take, he can feel his heart sinking lower—he didn't know it was possible to hurt this much and still be whole. He feels like he's breaking into pieces.

Alex looks back, once, when she passes through the gate. She pauses like she's going to say something. But the heavy gates clang shut behind her, barring her way, and she closes her mouth and leads Wes into the woods. Within moments, they're lost in the trees.

The wolves step out of the shadows, a dozen of them staring at him through the bars.

He turns and stumbles inside.

XXXX

It's better this way. They'll go back to their lives, happy and unburdened by curses and wolves and monsters. They'll grow old and have children and tell stories of the time they were young, when they got lost in the forest and found a house behind a mighty stone wall. Travis will fade away to a memory, a warning, the beast in the woods.

Travis will…

XXXX

"Was this your plan?" he screams, raging at the empty house. "Was this the goal? To make me hope, then take it away?"

He whirls, claws out, leaving gouges in the walls. "Are you happy now?!"

There's no answer. He is well and truly alone.

XXXX

His claws are sharp, wicked things.

He tries to tear his heart out.

It doesn't work.

XXXX

One day, a beautiful enchantress came to the house in the woods. She asked for refuge, and the young man gave it, for no one was turned away from his home.

The enchantress had long, dark hair and eyes that could see so much, and she was kind. She smiled at the children and helped the women and eased the suffering of the injured. Though she had great power at her fingertips, she did not misuse it, and the lonely young man became awed by this enchantress.

They grew close, the young man and the enchantress, close enough to share many things with each other. But they did not share everything, and one day, when the enchantress whispered the words the young man had so been dying to hear, he could not say it back. Though she said she loved him, he did not feel the same.

The enchantress grew angry. "You have played with my heart," she cried, power swirling at her fingertips, "and for this you shall be cursed! Until you find love, you shall live as a beast!"

And the power flew from her hands and struck the young man, changing him, twisting his body into something—different. He grew claws, and fur, and horns, and when he cried out, it was the roar of a beast, not a man.

When they saw what he had become, the people in his mighty house fled in terror, until the halls were empty and the house silent, and the young man was now truly, absolutely alone.

XXXX

He stops eating. For three days he lies in front of the fire and he does nothing. He doesn't move, he doesn't talk, he barely blinks.

The fourth day, a tray of food appears beside his head. Now he moves, one single arm, hooking around the edge of the tray and flinging it into the fire. As the flames greedily devour this new fuel, he closes his eyes.

He can feel himself shrinking, skin growing tight over his bones, confining and suffocating. His claws become brittle, start to chip, to fall out. His hair falls out, though he doesn't move enough to realize this at first—one day he wakes up and there are tufts of hair in front of him, shed as he slept. He throws those into the fire too.

Maybe this, this is how he'll finally end. He'll simply fade away. Maybe someday in the future, travelers will find an empty house and the bones of the beast, and they'll wonder.

Maybe.

He can only hope.

(Ha.)

XXXX

One day—he doesn't know how long it's been, time is as meaningless as it once was—there's a voice.

He thinks he's dreaming, at first. He opens his eyes, stares at the flickering, neverending flames, and digs broken claws into his arm to wake himself up.

Pain scrapes along his skin, sharp and hot and absolutely nothing compared to the void in his chest.

The voice comes again.

"What are you doing, Travis?"

With effort, he rolls over. In the chair before the fire is a slim, beautiful brunette, dressed all in black. She looks young, but her eyes—oh, her eyes are old.

"You," he whispers, voice a dry rash, too empty to even put any anger behind it.

Jonelle leans forward, clasping her hands in front of her. "What are you doing, Travis?"

He wants to close his eyes, slip back into that empty sleep. At least when he's asleep, it doesn't hurt as much. But he doesn't dare. "Want it to end," he tells her, and he's not just talking about the curse.

Her gaze is sharp enough to cut, raking across his body. "I take it you haven't looked in a mirror lately."

He growls. It's weak, but there's a spark—just a spark—of feeling behind it.

She sits back with a sigh. "You idiot," she groans, though not unkindly. "What are you doing? What have you been doing?"

"No point," he whispers, letting his eyes fall closed. "No one will love me like this."

"Love you?" she asks, and the incredulity in her voice makes him open his eyes once more. She's gaping at him, absolutely stunned, and another time he'd be pleased as punch to put that look on her face.

"You…" Jonelle drops her hands into her face. "You idiot. I didn't tell you to find someone to love you. I told you to find love."

"What's the difference?" he wonders dully.

"The difference?" She looks up, glares at him. "The difference is that you had to love someone. The problem wasn't that people didn't love you. Everyone loved you, Travis. The problem was that you never loved anyone around you. You were surrounded by people who would die for you, who would do anything for you, and you were still convinced you were completely alone!"

People who would do anything for him? Yeah right. Where were they now?

"You left a trail of broken hearts in your wake," Jonelle continues. "All these people who loved you, but you couldn't bother opening your heart to any of them."

"And that was enough?" Somehow, he finds the strength to push himself up on his elbows, scowling at her. "That was a good enough reason to curse me? To turn me into this?!"

Her gaze turns inward and becomes something bitter. "No."

He's so surprised to hear her say that he can't move.

"I was young," she says softly, "and I was angry. You broke my heart. That's not an excuse, but it's a reason. And as soon as I cooled off, I realized what I'd done, and I wanted to… but these kinds of curses can't be taken away. They can only be broken." She looks at her clasped hands, knuckles white she's gripping herself so tightly. "I tried to help."

"Help," he scoffs, "how could you help?"

"I gave the house magic, so you could live," she said. "I twisted the woods, so you could care for someone lost, maybe find the love that would break the curse. I gave you the wolves—"

He laughs, harsh and loud. "Oh yes, the wolves, thank you so much."

She startles. "You aren't… I thought you might find comfort in them."

Comfort, in his jailers? Why would she possibly assume that?

He slumps back to the floor, closing his eyes. "Go away, Jonelle. Just leave me alone."

"I'm sorry, Travis. I'm so sorry."

"Get out!" He swipes at her. He doesn't have the strength to put any force behind it, and his broken claws scrape emptily inches from her legs.

She gazes down at him, whispers, "I'm sorry," and then she's gone.

Travis sighs and rolls back towards the fire and closes his eyes.

XXXX

Food continues to appear; he continues to throw it into the fire. It takes a long time to put together a coherent thought about that.

I gave the house magic, Jonelle said, so you could live.

Slowly, he climbs to his feet.

If the house has magic to keep him alive, then maybe if he leaves the house, this will finally end.

He's not sure how he finds the strength, but he dredges it up deep, and staggers outside.

XXXX

The smell of dying roses fills the air as he exits the house. Dozens, hundreds of roses, finally fallen after all this time. It's a blanket of petals on the ground, roses of every color. Hundreds of roses, broken on the ground. He wants to laugh at the symbolism.

There are still a few stubborn roses, clinging to the bushes by the gate. He snarls when he sees those, fingers curling into fists, and he's suddenly angry, angry like he hasn't been since he saw Wes and Alex together.

He's angry at them, for making him hope, for making him believe. He's angry at Jonelle, who gave him roses, who claimed she was trying to help but did this in the first place. He's angry at the wolves, who won't leave him alone, and at everybody who ever left, and he's angry at himself, god, he's so angry at himself, for going out when the wolves called, for not letting them go when he should have, for bringing this on in the first place—!

With a yell, he tears a rose off the bush, ripping it in half. The petals flutter to the ground, stomped flat as he grinds them beneath his feet. He doesn't look down, just moves onto the next rose, and the next, heedless of the thorns tearing into his hands, of the tears running down his face because love, god, there's no such thing as love.

When the last rose is on the ground and the bushes are laid bare, he falls to his knees and throws his head back and weeps.

XXXX

The gate opens easily under his hand, swinging open as though it weighs no more than a drapery. He stumbles through without looking back. He's done with that house, that cage. No more.

No more.

He barely makes it past the tree line before his legs give out. He crumples to the ground, the blow softened by a cushion of fallen leaves.

His claws are too short to dig into his skin anymore, to test if the magic of the house extends to the forest. But that's fine. He'll just lay here and fade away.

There's the softest sound of crunching leaves to the side. With effort, he turns his head, glaring at the wolf, the big one with the dark slashes through its fur.

"Go away," he snaps, waving a weary hand. "Leave me to die in peace."

The wolf stares at him a long, long minute, eyes flashing gold.

Then it turns, disappearing with one last flick of its tail, and Travis is alone once more.

(He never stopped being alone.)

He buries his face in the leaves and closes his eyes.

Above him, it gently starts snowing.

XXXX

But the young man's staff were loyal, and would not leave. They found the enchantress, and got down on their knees before her.

"Change us too," they asked, "For we do not wish to leave him alone."

"Why?" she demanded. "Why do you do this for him?"

"Because we are loyal," they said, "and we care. We shall not abandon him."

And the enchantress looked at these faithful people and wondered how a man who had so much could think he had so little.

"I will change you," she said, gathering the power at her fingertips. "I will change you, but know this: Your spell will not end until his does. He may never find love, and you may never return to your bodies."

"Be that as it may," they said, "but we shall not leave him."

And so the spell flew forth, and the enchantress changed them and set them upon the house in the woods.

XXXX

He has these dreams. He dreams there are hands, dozens of hands, lifting him from the snow, carrying him through the trees, back to the house. He tries to fight it, but he's too weak, and the hands are too strong.

He dreams of being placed in his bed, the covers drawn up to his chin, and though he tries to fling them off and run back outside, to escape this hell, those hands push him back and cover him again and again and again.

He dreams, in his delirium, of faces, familiar and cherished, faces he hasn't seen in so very long, leaning over him and whispering comfort and instructions to rest, Travis, just rest now. He grabs them, these phantoms of memory, begs them for reprieve, for answers, why why why did you leave me?

It's okay, the phantoms whisper, it's all okay now, and hands run across his brow and soothe him into sleep once more.

XXXX

He fades in and out, a grey haze covering everything. Nothing seems quite real.

They feed him, the ghosts, feed him and bathe him and put him back to bed. There is always someone there, different faces, sitting by his bedside, reading to him or talking to him.

On good days, he talks back, sometimes even manages to have an entire conversation. On bad days, he screams and rages and sobs, begs them to leave him alone, to stay, to make this end. In the beginning, there are more bad days than good days.

Is this what dying feels like? he wonders once.

No, the ghost at his side says, this is what living feels like, which sends him into hysterics and three of the phantoms have to hold him down to contain his thrashing. (That is not a good day.)

Still. As the weeks go on and the snow blankets the world outside in white, the good days slowly outnumber the bad.

Sometimes it even seems like the haze in his mind is slowly easing away.

XXXX

And then, one day, he wakes up, and his head is completely clear.

XXXX

There are voices in his house.

He stares at the ceiling for a long time, listening. The voices are soft, a gentle, indistinct murmur through the walls. But very definitely real.

There haven't been voices in his house since… well, there was Alex, but she was just one voice, so not quite the same. It's been ages since there were multiple voices.

He throws the covers off and slowly pushes himself upright. The world spins a bit, but he grips the edge of the bed and closes his eyes, and it settles beneath him. Standing takes a bit more effort, but he makes it to his feet. Walking is less of an art and more just listing forward and hoping his feet remember to catch him, but it gets him across the room. He drags the door open, moves down the hall in the direction of the voices, leaning against the wall for support.

They're at the bottom of the stairs, leaning together, talking in low, urgent voices, as beautiful as ever. Alex, with her dark hair and pale skin, cheeks flushed from the cold, Wes, his hair bright as spun gold, and Travis has to grip the railing tight to keep from flinging himself down at them.

"What are you doing here?"

His voice is a hollow rasp, but it's enough. Both of their heads snap around. He waits for…an explanation, an excuse, anything, but they just. Stand there, staring.

He growls, taking one step down the stairs. "I told you to leave. What are you doing here?"

Alex gasps, hand flying to her mouth. Wes takes a small step forward, asking uncertainly, "Travis?"

Travis would totally roll his eyes if he wasn't afraid it would send the world reeling. "No, it's the other beast you left in a house in the woods."

Wes an Alex exchange a look Travis can't decipher. "Travis," Wes says slowly, "have you looked in a mirror lately?"

"I don't like mirrors," Travis growls, advancing another step down the stairs. "Why does everyone keep asking me that?"

"Travis," Alex says gently, carefully, moving towards him. "Travis, look at your hands."

Travis knows what his hands look like—they're the most visible part of him. He doesn't need to look at his hands.

"Why are you here?"

"Travis." Alex ascends another step, Wes following in her wake. "Please look at your hands."

With a great sigh and a roll of his eyes, Travis dutifully looks at the hand clutching the banister.

He stares.

It doesn't register what he's looking at, at first. It's…strange, without the fur and the claws. It's been so long since he's seen his own hand, his own skin, that he almost can't comprehend what he's seeing.

And then he does realize, and his knees go wobbly.

Alex and Wes are there, catching him, easing him onto the stair. Travis can't respond, can barely think, gaping at his hands—his hands! "I don't…" Disbelievingly, he brings his hands to his face, feeling—smooth skin, and dull teeth, and the complete absence of horns.

"Is this a dream?" he whispers. Oh, if he wakes up from this, he doesn't think he can be put back together again.

"No." Alex wraps her arms around him, presses her lips to his temple. He can feel tears in his hair—his hair, not fur. "No, Travis, this isn't a dream."

He looks at Wes, and for the last time, asks, "Why are you here?"

Wes reaches out, fingers ghosting over Travis's cheek. "Because we didn't want to go."

Before he thinks about it too much, Travis surges forward, grasping Wes's face in his hands (his hands!) and crashes their mouths together. It's inelegant, and Travis is pretty sure he's crying—but Wes is crying too, so maybe the tears on his cheeks are from Wes.

"Travis," Alex says behind him, joyful and just as full of tears, and Travis twists to kiss her too, and, god, he just wants to wrap himself around both of them, they came back for him, and he—

He loves them.

Apparently.

He's not sure if it's the realization or the kissing that sends his head reeling, but things go a little grey around the edges for a bit. When the world comes back into focus, he's curled up on Alex's shoulder, and the two of them are whispering furiously over his head.

He shifts, groans, and the whispering instantly stops. "Travis?" Alex asks, leaning into his field of vision. "How are you feeling?"

"Your people said you weren't well," Wes says, worry making his words sharp. "Should you even be out of bed right now?"

Travis blinks, lifts his head. "My what?"

XXXX

"I don't have people," Travis says as Wes and Alex help him down the stairs. "They all left." Abandoned him, left him alone in this empty house until he went a little bit mad.

They left him.

"Don't know what to tell you," Wes says, "but there's a bunch of people downstairs who say they're yours."

He looks to Alex for confirmation. She simply nods, and that hope sparks in his chest.

"They left me," he says, but it's not very convincing even to his own ears. He hopes…

Alex gives his hand a little squeeze, and Wes holds him tight, and they go down the stairs.

There are more voices, the soft murmur of conversation, and oh, it reminds him of before, when the house was full of people and life—but that can't be. They left him. Everyone left. There are no people here.

Except they get to the ground floor, and—there are people, moving through the rooms, talking to each other in low voices and all he can do is stare.

There are people in his house, and knows every one of the. Money, who kept the grounds, who was the best friend a guy could have. Jason, fierce and ruthless, who kept the best security. Lorianne, sweet Lorianne, always with a smile when he walked by.

He knows them all, but he can't quite believe they're here.

He's had dreams like this, where everyone who'd left came back and filled the house again. But he always woke up.

He shrugs free of Wes and takes a shaky step into the room. "You came back?" he asks, and even to his own ears his voice sounds small.

The voices in the room stop, and a dozen eyes turn to him. Money steps forward, big hands wrapping around his arms, and this…his dreams never felt as solid as this.

"Travis," Money says softly. "We never left."

"What?" Travis frowns, shakes his head. "No, no, I…you…" They left. They abandoned him. Until Alex and Wes came, it was just him in this big house, him and the wolves—

"I gave you the wolves—I thought you might find comfort in them."

"The wolves," he whispered, running his hands over Money's arms, tracing the ink in his skin. The largest wolf, fur tan with dark lines slashing the color, slashes of color like tattoos. "You were…the wolves?" That doesn't even… "Why…?"

He can't wrap his head around it, why they would let themselves be changed, why Wes and Alex would come back, why why why—?

Money's hands cup his cheeks, bring his face up so they're eye to eye. Slowly, clearly, he says, "We never left you."

There's something in his eyes, his voice, that Travis almost thinks he recognizes. His gaze slides past the bigger man, to the others, and the same emotion is written in their faces and—oh.

Oh.

His throat goes tight, and Travis is already sick and tired of crying. But Wes and Alex move up behind him, and his—his family steps up to surround him, and Travis closes his eyes and lets the tears fall.

But they're tears of joy.

XXXX

And one day there came two travelers to the mansion in the woods. And though the young man had kept his heart shielded, he found himself becoming fond of these two travelers, even, dare he say it, falling in love.

Alas, things are never so easy, and the young man drove away the two travelers in his midst and decided to die, to end the torment and the ache of always being alone. But he did not die, and the travelers returned, and the spell was lifted, and it turned out his faithful staff had not abandoned him after all.

And so the young man learned that love is not so easily gotten without giving it in turn, and blood is not the only thing that makes up family, and he surrounded himself with these people he loved, who loved him.

And he was lonely no more.

XXXX

Deep in the woods, where the trees grow tangled and the wild things roam, there stands a house behind a mighty wall. And within this house lives a young man, a beauty, a gardener, and the most loyal staff known to man.

Do not fear getting lost in the woods, they say, for the woods will shift around you, bringing you right to that mighty wall where the gate is always open. It is a safe haven, this house in the woods, for those who have wandered off the path and lost their way.

All are welcome in this house in the woods.

And they all lived happily ever after.

OOOO

The quote is a song lyric from The Beauty And The Beast stage musical.

This ended up being way longer than I initially anticipated, but I really like how it turned out. I hope you did too. Reviews, comments, and constructive criticism are always welcome.

Until next time~!