I notice lots of people in the cartoon x-overs section are doing only gender-based parodies. I also notice that the characters playing the roles does not match their characters. I will not say one example, but all I see are rehashes. I'm sorry, but that is my opinion.
I love Beauty and the Beast ever since I watch it. I admired Belle because I'm like her in almost every way. When I watch How to Train Your Dragon, I can't help but feel Hiccup is like Belle. An outsider, intelligent, and strange according to everyone in the village.
This is a Demo fiction. So if I am recieved well (alerts, reviews, etc.), I'll upload the rest.
Love the Beauty Within
Prologue
Once upon a time, in a far away land, a young princess lived in a shining castle. Although she had everything her heart desired, the princess was spoiled, selfish and unkind.
Eight years old Princess Astrid Hofferson watched a ship carrying two lumps covered in white sheets emotionlessly. One could say she is unaffected by the funeral, but that is just a mask.
Recently the Princess Sigrid and Prince Beigan died in the hands of the Outcast Tribe, fighting for their lives in the raid.
Days after the funeral, Astrid withdraws herself from society. Most of her time was training to be the best Viking in the Barbaric Archipelago or locked herself in her room.
People tried to console her, but a snide remark or an axe pointed to their throats hinders the support.
King Humongous Hotshot the current ruler of the Barbaric Archipelago and brother of Prince Beigan showered her with gold and jewels in hopes of getting the old Astrid he knows back but to no use. Astrid disregarded the gifts coldly.
"Where is the energetic and generous Astrid I know?" the King whined to his wife Queen Tantrum O'Urgly.
The Queen groaned in pure annoyance. She loves her husband certainly, but sometimes he is a child. "Astrid needs her time alone, sweetheart. Let her have some time alone."
"But it's been months since Astrid began acting like this!" Humongous bleated, "What are we going to do!"
"How about we send her to the summer castle in Berk?" the Queen suggested. Perhaps this is the answer to the princess's problems, Tantrum decided, she just need solitary. "We can send her to live there with an abundant amount of slaves."
"What about her tutelage?"
"Don't worry, we would send with her, her tutelage too, darling." Tantrum reassured her husband. "Tomorrow we will tell her the plans."
And so Princess Astrid departed for Berk days afterward. Tantrum and Humongous send many of their trusted subjects with her including the flamboyant maitre'd Kiiro, punctual Aka, gentle head maidservant Momoiro, and imperturbable Lady Aoi.
But Astrid ignored them. When they reached the castle, Astrid immediately went to the palace's training grounds.
The castle subjects gave up hopes in ever melting the young Astrid's heart. They prayed every night for the princess to alleviate her pain.
But then, one winter's night, an old beggar-woman came to the castle and offered her a single rose, in return for shelter from the bitter cold.
It has been three years since Astrid and the servants were sent to live in the castle. The eleven year old princess grumbled cantankerously walking through the palace's halls.
Just today Lady Aoi announced the princess is to attend all her lessons from now on. Astrid shouted (unladylike, I tell you) uproariously against the order. She is the princess and only she makes the rules in the palace. But the Lady told her that it was the Queen's orders not hers.
That was when she heard a knocking on the entrance. A frown crosses Astrid's face. Who has the smarts to brave a rainstorm out there?
Knowing she is the only one who could answer the door, she walked to the entrance. When she opened the doorway, she almost retches at the sight.
Before the princess is an old woman. Wrinkled covered skin shivered from the cold, grey eyes bleak and sorrowful, and a hunchback disfigured her body. The woman is overall ugly.
"Please I want shelter from the cold." The woman pleaded.
"Shelter?" Astrid raised an eyebrow. "I believe you don't have-."
"I have this rose." The woman uncovers underneath her shabby cloak a crimson red rose ready to bloom. Astrid fell under the tantalizing flower. "For shelter, I will give my only precious rose to you."
Repulsed by her haggard appearance, the princess refused the gift and turned the old woman away. But she warned her not to be deceived by appearances, for beauty is found within.
"For that rose, I will take." Astrid said grinning coldly. "The stables are just behind that corner. I hope you like horses."
"But dearie," the hag protested. "I cannot take another step. Please let me stay. At least for one night."
"No!" Astrid shouted, "I'm already in a bad mood! Go to the stables! Get! If you want shelter in my castle, find somewhere else to stay or give me something greater than a pathetic flower."
And when she dismissed her again, the old woman's ugliness melted away to reveal a beautiful goddess. The Princess tried to apologize, but it was too late, for she had seen that there was no love in her heart.
"Why," said the old woman, "I am nothing, worthless, unable to give you anything at all." As the woman spoke, she rose at least three feet above Astrid. Her ragged cloak blew away in the wind revealing an hourglass figure. Her blue eyes were that of far more valuable sapphires found only in Valhalla and her gown seemed to be almost sewn with actual gold.
Astrid never paid attention to her lectures, but she did when she is told legends of the Norse gods and goddesses. "Forgive me, I didn't know!" she whimpered, falling to her knees. "I had thought goddesses were myths and fairy tales, if I had known who you were, I would have never-"
"Never what?" interrupted Freyja in a voice as clear and cold as glass, "Never thrown out a poor, old woman on a dangerous night like this. I am Freyja, the Goddess of Love and Beauty, as you guessed, what need have I for your pitiful hospitality?"
"Then why were you here?"
Freyja laughed. "Rumors of a sad and suffering princess had reached my ears in Valhalla and I came to see what I could do for her. Yet it is no sad and suffering princess that I find, but an arrogant, royal brat with no thought for anyone but herself and no interest in anything but being left alone. You wish to be away from all humans, is that it?"
"No!" Ástríður protested, sobbing and clutching at the goddess's gown. "You said you could help me, can you please help me? Can you give me back my parents, please?"
The enchantress looked down at her with a stony gaze. "Why should I take pity on you?" she asked coldly. "You had already decided your fate even if you did not realize it. Henceforth, there will be no human presence in this castle." And she clapped her hands together with a sound like thunder.
As punishment, she transformed her into a hideous dragon and placed a powerful spell on the castle and all who lived there.
Ástríður screamed as the spell took hold. It was surprisingly painless, watching her hands lengthen and cover themselves with dark scales. She felt, rather than saw, her head bulge and two long fangs grow up from her bottom teeth. She tried to get to her feet, but found that there was something wrong with her knees and her back and something long and swishy kept getting in the way. She grabbed the spiky tail angrily then howled in pain as she realized it was now a part of her. Ástríður dropped to her own two feet and ran through the castle, destroying everything she could find in her rampage.
All over the castle, servants were awakening to find themselves in the most peculiar of predicaments. Kiiro was, by far, the worst off. He had become a candelabrum and was currently engaged in putting out the flaming mess that his new hands had created out of his silk bed sheets. He would later be grateful that his love was not present at the time, for the feather duster might have been burnt as well.
Aka was panicking, simply because it was really the only natural reaction upon being turned into an enchanted object. He was running around, ticking madly and trying to find a way to open a door with a handle that was now three feet above his head.
There were screams and shouts coming from all four corners of the place. The souse chef was flaming mad to have woken up as a broiler and even the usually unflappable Lady Aoi was causing quite the commotion while she lumbered around Ástríður's rooms as a wardrobe and tried to find a mirror to look into that was not now part of her body. She got one good look at herself before Ástríður came racing in.
Ashamed of her monstrous form, the Dragon concealed herself inside her castle with a magic mirror as her only window to the outside world.
By the time Ástríður was done, there were no pictures or mirrors left in the castle. She had destroyed them all, either by shattering them with her powerful paws or tearing through them with tooth and nail. She wanted to erase every memory of what was before, everything that could remind her that her solitude was not of her own devising and not perfectly normal. She would not harm any of the people, though. The thought of destroying them all had occurred to her once, but she was not a killer and still saw each and every enchanted object as a servant. Her parents had spent nine long years ingraining into her that servants were there to be used, not abused. And even in her greatest anger, she had never raised a finger against someone in her employ—she could not without hearing her mother's voice lecturing her and breaking down into sobs. So while she would ignore them and hate them, she could not hurt them.
After her magnificent destruction of anything and everything she could find, the princess retreated to her bedroom in the West Wing. Resting on an end table, by the balcony, was a hand held mirror that Ástríður did not remember owning. She picked it up in order to destroy that one too, but a chillingly familiar voice stopped her.
"I wouldn't do that, if I were you," said Freyja.
"Where are you?" Ástríður asked, spinning around wildly in search of the woman. "Why can't I see you?"
"Look in the mirror." Ástríður did as she was bade, albeit slowly for she dreaded to see her own visage. It was not her own face that stared out at her, however, but that of the goddess. "This is my first gift to you," said Freyja. "This mirror has the power to show you anything in the world, anything you should ever wish to see. It will allow you to keep track of all that you wish without ever setting foot outside these castle walls."
Ástríður raised her fist to shatter it anyway. "And it's unbreakable," Freyja added. "Just in case your beastly strength becomes too much for you."
Ástríður dropped it on the ground, a small spark of hope still present that it would shatter after all, but she had no such luck. She began to walk slowly away.
"My second gift," continued the goddess "Is this rose." Ástríður turned around helplessly to gaze at the flawless flower that had first drawn her in. "Let it serve as a reminder to you of the beautiful outside world which you have rejected. This rose is truly an enchanted rose, which will bloom until your eighteen year. If you can learn to love another and earn his love in return by the time the last petal falls, then the spell will be broken. If not, you will be doomed to remain a dragon for all time."
And then the goddess was gone, as surely as if Ástríður had seen her walk out of the room.
Ástríður roared in pain, shaking as she stared at the glass-covered rose. She was so angry at the goddess for giving her this terrible way out and this end to her solitude. She did not want to learn to love anyone. And yet a seed of hope budded in her chest. Perhaps there is nothing wrong falling in love…
As the years past, she fell into despair and lost all hope. For who could ever learn to love a beast?
Hope you like this chapter. I'm a 'quality over quantity' type of person. Sorry if it is too long. Review if you want. Constructive criticism is allowed. I need help. Absolutely no flames, please.
