It was surreal waking up in that house. It was as if she had been sleeping, but when she had woken, she'd woken up in a dream. She was in a bedroom she had only seen a handful of times before. It was decorated in hunter greens and harvest golds. She took it be that girl's room, that Asian girl with the haunted smile and the fierce eyes. She felt like she needed to remember something – something that had happened when she had been with that girl – but she couldn't quite remember it and so she let it slip away.
She turned and was startled to see her own reflection in a mirror. She had to take a step closer just to be sure.
When she had lived here, he had covered up every mirror in the house with heavy tapestries. But that girl had probably removed this one – uncovered it so that she could look into it. But the reflection looking back at Belle didn't look like what she remembered of herself at all. She was gaunt and drawn-looking, with hollows in her cheeks and beneath her eyes. Her arms had lost their natural curves and looked thin and wispy hanging at her sides. Her body had lost some its natural fullness, and the white nightgown – her nightgown – which had fit her perfectly a few months before now hung loosely around her and seemed to swallow her up inside of it. And the worst part – she hated to even turn around so that she could see them – were the scars. They criss-crossed her back like a roadmap. She could only stand to look at them for a second, before pulling the nightgown off over her head and pulling out a clean, long-sleeved shirt from her bag. She pulled it on, glad to be covered, and for the first time realized how painful it must have been for him all this time to feel that he was ugly – that he was a monster that no one could ever truly love.
Belle put on a heavy leather vest over the shirt, feeling like she needed an extra layer of clothing to cover up her scars. And then last, she picked up his jacket – the one with the reddish patch on the back – and slipped it on over the rest of her clothes. It still smelled like him, and even though he was far away, it still made her feel safe.
Belle climbed the steps slowly, stopping to take a full breath on each stair. She found she had to hold onto the railings in order to keep herself from turning around and running back down. It had been painful walking down the hallway toward his bedroom – painful more still to cross the dining room where they had spent so much time together – and it knocked the breath out of her to see his spinning wheel standing empty, layers of golden threads piled up in a basket on the floor. She thought the site of the library – his library – their library – standing empty and desolate without him would be her undoing.
She hovered on the landing just outside the library door, forcing her heart to slow – bracing herself for what it would look like without him standing in it. But when she pushed herself in through the open doorway, the library was nothing like she had expected it. Every surface – every table – every chair – every desk – every inch of the floor was covered. There were books laying open everywhere and stacks of them piled up like little turrets between rows upon rows of open books. And there were papers scattered all over. Many seemed to be stacked on top of or beside the little turrets, but several sheets lay scattered haphazardly on the floor. And that girl sat right in the middle of them pouring over one of the open books, running her finger down the edge of a page from one of the leather volumes that Belle recognized as coming from the top shelf, searching for something on the page. She stopped when she found it and dragged another sheet of paper across the floor toward her, lifting it and jotting down some quick notes, before returning to the open book in her lap.
Belle stared for a minute – not certain how this made her feel. It was terrible to realize that someone else had been living here all this time – someone she didn't even know had been walking the floors, sleeping in the beds, eating at the tables, reading in the library. Had he replaced her just like that? Had he gone out and gotten himself a new girl and turned his wheel and forgotten that she had ever been there? This girl said she had been searching for her for nearly three months. Nearly three months – that was the exact length of time she, herself, had lived in this house. Did he always do this – bring a girl home for two or three months and then kick her out or abandon her? Was it some kind of twisted game? Did he have many of these castles scattered all over the countryside where at that very minute there were other girls – just like them – pouring over books or running away – believing that they were the only ones?
Get ahold of yourself.
Belle took a deep breath and closed her eyes, forcing the darkness down from her mind. She would think of these things later. She would sort them out later. Right now, she needed to breathe. Right now she needed to concentrate.
Belle opened her eyes and the scene looked the same – but different somehow at the same time. She saw again, that strange sullen girl, jet black hair pulled back into a messy French braid, tight black tank top stretched across the lean muscles of her shoulders and back. She saw the books and the papers littering the room, but the feeling that came with them were relief. She had been afraid to find the room empty – as empty and cold and hollow as his bedroom, the dining room, everything had been without him. But here in the library, with the books and papers scattered everywhere – there was life. This girl had filled up the space with work and energy and objects, and it had resurrected this room back to life. And Belle found that looking at it was like a stay of execution – a brief, momentary sense of relief standing stalwart within all the darkness.
"Hello," Belle said. She said it softly, almost hoping the girl wouldn't hear her. She lingered in the doorway still, unable to make herself cross the threshold, one hand lingering on the doorframe at her side.
The girl glanced back over her shoulder and caught sight of Belle.
"Belle," the girl said.
She gave Belle a warm smile that lit her face all the way to her eyes. It was as if she were seeing a long-awaited friend, and the expression in her eyes was warm and almost affectionate.
Belle leaned away from it a little bit. She didn't know this girl. This girl was a stranger to her. But the way this girl reacted to her, it was as if she had known Belle forever.
It was a sensation like having amnesia – finding yourself in a home that looks the same but slightly off from what you remember and finding people who know you – who seem to love you – but having no idea who they are.
Belle dropped her eyes to the floor, feeling an irrational sense of guilt at not knowing this girl, at not returning her sentiments or even remembering them.
When she looked back up, the girl was still smiling at her.
"Jade," the girl said. She pointed at herself with the top of the pen she had been holding.
Belle nodded and worked up a half-smile.
The girl stood up, unfolding herself from her seat on the floor, still holding the book she had been reading.
"What is all this?" Belle asked. Her eyes scanned the room.
The girl gave a plaintive laugh, and closed her eyes momentarily. She sighed. "Research?" the girl said. She chewed on her bottom lip absently. "But I'm no good at this," the girl said. She surveyed the contents of the room with obvious sadness. "I could – I could really use your help," the girl said. She tilted her head and pressed her lips together, giving Belle a half smile.
"My help?" Belle asked.
Belle surveyed the room quickly. She had no idea where to start among all of this.
"You're smart. You know all kinds of things about books and history and finding answers," the girl said. She gestured to the floor-covering of books she had laid out.
"I'm sure you're smart," Belle said.
"Not like you," the girl said. She shook her head and let her eyes wander over the room. Her eyes seemed to get larger as they took in the paper blizzard before her.
Belle pressed her lips together and felt a small smile appearing on her face. It had been a very long time since she had smiled, and she was surprised at how natural it still felt. "I'm, um," Belle said. She took a few tentative steps into the room. "I'm not sure how your, um, your system works," she said. She felt the small smile return.
"That makes two of us," the girl said. She let out a sigh and shook her head. "I'll – try – to show you."
Belle let out a soft laugh, and the girl smiled in return.
"So, the closed books are the ones I haven't opened. The open books are open to a page I think might be helpful?" the girl said.
She wandered through the room, stepping carefully around the stacks of books and placing her feet into tiny open spaces in the floor that seemed to form a little trail around the room.
Belle moved in closer, but stayed toward the edge of the fray so that she wouldn't disturb any of the loose-laying papers.
"And this?" Belle asked. She touched the surface of the worktable lightly with her fingertips, where there was a blue solution bubbling over low heat in a glass beaker.
The girl stopped, her eyes resting on it for two heartbeats. Then slowly, she reached across the distance between herself and Belle and turned the flame off.
"That's nothing," the girl said. She said it softly.
Belle tilted her head and looked at the girl.
The girl took a breath and then turned to Belle, with a smile.
"So, should we get started?" she said.
Belle sat perfectly still, reading over page after page of neatly penned script in one of the old books. Jade leaned her head back against the cold stone behind her. She had a raging headache, and her muscles felt stiff and sore all over. She had no idea how Belle could sit there for hour after hour without moving, without stretching, without doing anything but pouring over these old books.
Jade returned her eyes to the notes she had been writing up, but even her own handwriting seemed to swim before her eyes like it was written in a foreign language. Jade sighed. She looked out the open window at her shoulder. The window seat she was sitting in had gotten very warm now that the sun was setting. She moved her boot out a little farther on the seat in front of her.
Belle looked up at her. "You know, it's okay if you want to take a break," she said tentatively.
Jade took in a breath and let it out. "No, I can keep going," Jade said. She tried to convince herself it was true.
Belle smiled. The sunlight coming in from the picture windows had turned a deep russet orange, and it bathed Belle in a luminous glow.
Jade tilted her head, looking at Belle. The girl was lovely when she smiled, creamy skin warming to pink cheeks in the heat of the sunlight, eyes so clear and blue you could almost see right through them and soft, baby-round face and cheeks smoothing her every edge and angle until she looked just like a doll. The breeze from the open windows brushed her hair back, and the light gleam of sweat coating her face and arms caught the sunlight and made her glow. Jade smiled.
"What?" Belle asked. She shook her head, smiling too, her chestnut curls bouncing over her shoulders when she did it.
"You're lovely," Jade said. The words had passed out of her so quickly she hadn't even thought them before she'd said them.
Belle shook her head. "No," she said. She smiled reflexively and wiped the sweat from off her forehead with a pass of her hand.
"No, you really are," Jade said. She shook her head, trying to put her hands on the right words in her mind. "You're – you're radiant."
At this, Belle's eyes dropped and a look of pain crossed her face.
"I'm – I'm sorry," Jade said. She shook her head. She had no idea how to talk to another girl. "I shouldn't have said that. I don't know – I'm not very good – with other people," she said. She shook her head and gave a small laugh. "I didn't mean anything by it. I'm – I'm sorry."
"No," Belle said. She furrowed her eyebrows and shook her head. "No, I," she said. She seemed to have no idea how to finish that sentence. "It's just," Belle said. She looked down, and for a moment she seemed to be trying to blend in to the furniture behind her. She shook her head again and looked back up at Jade. "I guess I just don't – don't feel lovely – anymore."
Jade tilted her head. She tried not to look sympathetic. The girls she had met while she was growing up had often expressed a similar sentiment, and a look of sympathy could land you in a fight. It happened often, after the first time you had to do something unthinkable, whatever the nature of it was – it changed you. And although she and the other girls had almost always been kept separate, they were brought together for a few moments just before and immediately after completing such a mission. And on those occasions, the most beautiful – the most graceful – the most talented among them, would come back feeling ugly and jaded and old. She pressed her lips together into a thin line, and said the thing she always said when one of those girls admitted that feeling.
"Whatever has happened to you is in the past now. It'll be hard to forget, but as time goes on, it'll be easier. And someday soon you'll look in the mirror, and although you might not look the same to you, you'll still be beautiful," she said.
Belle stared at her, her mouth dropping slightly open. There was a look of alarm and dawning realization, mixed with confusion and a touch of uncertainty.
"I'm not sure I understand what you're saying to me," Belle said. She said it softly, and Jade could tell she was treading lightly.
Jade shook her head. "I'm just saying, the things you've done can sometimes make you feel sick inside. But that as time goes on, those memories fade and you can start to forget them," Jade said.
"But, I didn't do," Belle said. She shook her head, with a look of confusion. "I didn't do anything to make myself feel ugly," Belle said. She stared at Jade hard. "It's what was done to me – it's what I can't erase," Belle said. She drew one hand up her arm and laid it on her shoulder, as if she were trying to cover herself up completely.
"Oh," Jade said. That made sense as well. "You have scars. Is that what you're talking about?"
Belle looked down, angry for a moment, feeling belittled.
"No, I understand," Jade said. She stood up and crossed the room to Belle quickly. She dropped down onto one knee at Belle's side and swept her hair over one shoulder, turning her back so Belle could see.
She heard Belle gasp.
When she turned around, Belle's eyes were huge – like floating glass orbs on the surface of water. She held one delicate hand up in front of her mouth, and she had stopped breathing altogether.
"See, I have them too," Jade said. She smiled. "At first, I covered mine up all the time. I felt like I needed layers and layers of clothes to conceal them," she said. "But after a while, you realize that they're not so bad. They're like battle scars – you earned them with your blood – and that makes you brave and powerful and strong. And then after a little more time has gone by, you realize that people don't always notice the things about you that you, yourself, are so aware of. Like, you've seen me from behind a few times already today, and you didn't notice them before now. Isn't that right?" Jade asked. She smiled warmly at Belle. She was a bit taken aback when Belle started crying.
She couldn't imagine – she couldn't understand – how this girl could talk about these things, these unthinkable things, as if they were nothing – as if they were just having any ordinary conversation. It was too much. She couldn't handle all of this at once. It was just too much.
She could feel Jade's strong arms wrapping around her and hear that same soothing string of syllables Jade had used with her this morning. And although Belle didn't want to, although she really wanted to lean away, she leaned in toward this source of warmth and comfort and strength. She didn't know this girl – she wasn't sure if she even wanted to know this girl – but somehow, she was beginning to learn her.
Belle followed the sounds of the grinding steel as she wound her way up the circular stairway, approaching the top of the north tower. She had never actually been in the north tower before, because she had never seen him go there and had always assumed it just lay empty. Everything about the north tower's downstairs had looked completely different from everything she had seen in the south and west towers. Where the south tower was bathed in warm burgundies and golds, the north tower was filled with icy blues and inky blacks, that gave it a forbidding feel. She crept up the stairs slowly, feeling as if she didn't belong, feeling as if she were in a completely different house than the one she had just come from.
She found a heavy wooden door – made of oak or some other wood that she hadn't seen in the south and west towers before – and it was affixed to the doorframe with wrought iron fixtures, instead of the delicate brass ones in the rest of the house. She pushed it open.
Inside, Jade was sitting perched on top of a stone stool sharpening a small blade Belle had never seen before on an anvil. She looked up.
"Oh, hey," Jade said. She pushed a loose strand of hair away from her face with the back of her hand, leaving a dark streak of oil across her forehead.
"Hi," Belle said. She took a tentative step inside the room. She looked around and shook her head. Her ice blue eyes settling back on Jade. "What is all this stuff? Is it yours?" she asked.
"All this?" Jade asked. She gestured with the knife she was holding at the array of tortuous-looking weapons lining the four walls of the room. "No," Jade said. She laughed and ran the whetstone again lightly over the blade of the knife. "No, these belong to the Dark One," she said. She poured a few drops of water onto the surface of the blade and then ran the whetstone over it again.
"These are his?" Belle asked. She furrowed her brows, taking in the sight around her. How could these be his? What kind of person would use such things? Had he been hiding these from her all this time?
"Well, not his," Jade said. She shrugged. "These belonged to the other ones – the other Dark Ones before him," Jade said.
Belle turned and stared at Jade hard. "What other Dark Ones?" Belle asked.
"The ones who lived here before he did, the ones who wrote those book upstairs," Jade said. She dropped her hands, one still holding the knife and the other still holding the whetstone, resting both on the surface of the anvil.
"But those books – they're just magic books. What makes you think there were others before him? What makes you think a Dark One wrote them?" Belle asked.
"He told me," Jade said. She tilted her head, not seeming to quite understand. "When I asked him to help me get home, he said he didn't know how to do it but that the other Dark Ones had written some spells and things down, that he could read them to find out if they knew how to do it."
Belle stared at her.
"Wait," she said. She entered the room and crossed it in measured steps toward Jade. She pulled up a little wooden chair and sat down on it. "You're saying there were many – many other Dark Ones before him?"
Jade shook her head.
"I don't know if there were many. I just know there were some. And because I saw a few different kinds of handwriting in those books, I assumed there were at least a few," Jade said. "But I think this house belonged to them – to each of them when they were the Dark One. When I found this weapons room, he said he had almost forgotten it was here, and that all the weapons in it were collected by the Dark One before him."
"That's why he never comes up here," Belle said. She said it quietly, working the new information into her mind. "That's why this tower looks so different – he didn't decorate it – never lived in it. That's why nothing in this tower feels like him."
Jade nodded.
"That's what I think too," she said.
"But, so why do you come up here then?" Belle asked.
Jade laughed, and ran the whetstone over the blade of the knife again.
"I think I used to get on his nerves," Jade said. She laughed.
Belle laughed too.
"He used to banish me up here when I was making too much noise, when I was training with my weapons or sharpening them," Jade said. She smiled and shook her head. "I'm guessing he banished me here because he never used it before I came so he wouldn't really miss it if I were in here. Plus, it's pretty far away."
Belle laughed. She shook her head. She had been surprised how easily she had gotten along with him when she had first moved into the house, and she had wondered if he were just easy to get along with. Now, the thought of someone constantly getting under foot – working his nerves – was almost funny.
Jade laughed too. "Yeah, he used to 'accidentally' lock me in places before I started using the north tower," Jade said. She smirked.
Belle laughed again.
"But I think some of the stuff in this room could help us," Jade said. She lowered the blade she was wiping down with a soft, linen cloth.
"What do you mean?" Belle asked.
"I read in one of those books that the things owned by the Dark One, especially the things made by the Dark One, retained a little bit of his power," Jade said.
"And the book on containing magical power," Belle said. She stood up and began pacing the floor in small circles at Jade's side. "It said that binding spells or things that contain a magical power can only do it by draining the power of the magic contained."
"So, if that's the case," Jade said. "If we can somehow get him some of these weapons or just anything that would make him stronger," Jade said.
"He might be able to escape," Belle finished.
Jade nodded.
