Chapter One

Rattling chains and muffled curses pierced every corridor and floor of the palace until reaching the chamber of the youngest Phoenix.

Belle shot upright in her four-poster bed, eyes wide with fear. Sweat beaded and dripped from her brow, entering her wide-open mouth. Her breaths came quicker, echoing in the silence. Belle pressed a shaking hand to her breast and found her immortal heart beating hard against her ribs. She couldn't hide the truth from herself. She was terrified.

'Belle.' A voice called out from behind her blood red curtains. Rose. Belle had disturbed her big sister's sleep. 'What's wrong now?' The empathy continued in her sleepy tone. Belle knew Rose was judging her she didn't have to see her face. Rose had always been judgmental, all of her older sisters had.

Belle was afraid, of almost everything, and was the weakest of all Phoenixes. And she knew that was because she was the youngest physically as well as chronologically. Belle had frozen into her immortality at the young age of twenty, shocking her entire family, including her father. She was so different to her sisters; they had all frozen in their late twenties and early thirties, strong and brave. Unlike Belle they'd had years to train, learning to fight and fully understand their powers. Unfortunately for Belle she had been far too protected.

As the baby sister Belle's older sisters, all four hundred and ninety nine of them, had fought their father on her upbringing. They'd wanted her to have the childhood they'd all had to foregone, that normal immortal children forego. Little Belle had gotten to play, drool over boys and go to school because they all thought she had time. Statistically it should have been impossible for her to transition so young. The kindness of the Phoenixes had cursed the youngest of them all.

'Just, go back to sleep, you've got a busy day ahead of you.' They both had. The twenty years older, chronologically, Rose had taken it upon herself to not only be a big sister but a mentor and a mother, protector.

Rose refused to give up on Belle; she swore she could make Belle just as strong as the rest of their family, early transition be damned. And when she became strong enough, the five hundred-year-old Phoenix could finally join her sisters.

'Okay Rose,' Belle agreed, crawling out of her covers and pulling back her velvet curtains to discover that her empathic sister was fast asleep. As she watched Belle wondered, not for the first time, how Rose did that, experiencing the emotions of others whilst fast asleep.

Belle climbed out of the curtains and crept along the bedroom, quiet as a mouse. She managed to make it to the door too. Until an animalistic roar echoed up from the lower floors, startling her and causing an anxious cry to escape her lips.

'Belle?' Rose muttered in sleep but Belle ignored the concerned tone and slipped through the door and out into the darkened corridor.

There she acquired a sconce and proceeded to make her way down the long hallway. The Beast cried out over and over again as she made her way to the dungeons, down the flights of carpeted stairs, taking some two at a time.

When she reached the next floor she raised her light to the walls, illuminating portraits of the entire royal family, from Queen Katharina and her consort Angus to the Phoenix sisters. Buttercup the eldest was featured many times as the only blood daughter of Maia. Belle had never sat for a portrait, afraid of how she would be perceived. Not that it mattered. She was one of five hundred daughters; there were enough blonde haired, blue eyed, fair goddesses.

Belle had always found it curious that each of Hyperion's daughters were of the same appearance as him, considering that he had bedded hundreds of immortal women. Belle's sisters were all almost identical which had always confused her, except for the twins and triplets and quadruplets who were actually identical.

Another Beastly scream of agony pierced her thoughts and concern her fear. She needed to reach the Beast, to heal it in anyway she could. And with that thought she raced down the rest of the stairs before her and entered the dungeon.

Belle's journey still took twice as long as her sisters and when she reached the steel dungeon doors she hesitated. Her heart rate had increased once more and the blonde hair at her nape stood on end. Belle was afraid, afraid that once she entered the dungeon that her life would be altered forever.

'Get a hold of yourself; Rose and Buttercup would be in there already. Sure they'd be interrogating him instead of healing him, but still!' They would be ashamed if they could see how her pale hand shook as she reached for the handle.