Short, I know, but it's all I've got right now. This is more the classic version of Beauty and the Beast rather than the Disneyfied version.
Brielle watched her three older sisters laughing and admiring each other's new jewelry and dresses. They did not once cast a glance in her direction. She knew that if she even so much as dared to take three steps from the shaded corner that she hid herself in, her sisters would begin their accusations all over again. They would weep and wail and lament and lay aside their pretty things and blame her for everything. She could not face that again. Her eyes still burned from her last bitter tears. She was not normally so quick to tears; not normally so worried about what her sisters said to or about her—for they said a great many things—but this time Brielle had succumbed to sorrow and let it wash over her. She had given in because she knew that they were right. It was her fault. It was entirely her fault. Their father had been locked in his room for two days, mourning over the decision that lay before him, all because of her.
Upstairs, father wept, and all Brielle's sisters could think about was jewels and satin—trinkets and cloth. Her sisters reveled in their newfound wealth. Such trivial matters, because all the wealth in the world could not ease father's heart. Trivial matters which, if Brielle had appreciated them too, would have spared father all of his tears. She had not wanted baubles, and so the blame had fallen on her shoulders.
Brielle's hands tightened in anger around the single rose in her hand and recoiled in pain as thorns drove into her flesh. She opened her hand slowly. Tiny drops of blood dotted her palm.
It was her fault. She should be the one to make it better.
Firmly resolved, she gripped the rose tighter, disregarding the thorns, and slipped silently out of the shadows and to the door. A cloak thrown hastily over her shoulders to protect her from the cold night, and she left the comfort of her home.
The sounds of her sisters' laughter muffled the grating of the heavy door as she pulled it shut behind her and stepped into the night. Candlelight flickering merrily through the windows illuminated the ground around the house, but the forest loomed darkly before her. Tall trees shivered in the nonexistent howl of the wind. A lonely wolf's cry resonated through the immense valley. Something as inconsequential as the snapping of a twig echoed in the overpowering silence that had formed in her mind. The full moon basked in its self-induced halo of light, but rather than giving her comfort, cast eerie shadows that danced and jumped, swayed and slithered, crept into her body and tightened its icy hand around her quaking heart.
She clutched the rose tightly, and her pain broke the spell. The shadows ceased to move, and the natural stillness was returned. A single step restored her courage. She cast one last sorrowful glance at her house, one last regretful gaze towards her father's window, and, clutching her cloak tightly around her, hurried into the woods before her better sense overcame her determination.
She would go to the Beast.
