Chapter Twenty-Six.
The Castle.
Three months.
Three months of utter hell.
It was torture, each and every day.
This damned curse.
That evil horrid vindictive Fae.
He had cost me my happiness, my future, my world.
We were all confined to the castle grounds. There was no escape. No way out. We had tried, again and again and again, but no one could get past.
Locked up, cursed, forgotten about.
Hell seemed like a much better alternative than living like this.
Anything seemed like a better alternative than this.
What had we done to deserve such a fate? Other than what the Lord had done, why had the rest of us been dragged into this?
We had been good people, with lives and families and people we cared about. And he had taken that all away from us.
It had taken almost an entire month for the rage to die down. Not that I still wasn't angry. But in that first month….
I had spent hours pounding at the gates, screaming for them to open and let me out. Day after day, hour after hour, I would yell and shout and roar and try to beat those gates down. But nothing.
The worst day came a week after the curse.
That Saturday.
My wedding day.
It was supposed to have been the happiest day of my life. They day that I declared in front of everyone I cared about that I was going to love her for the rest of time, and that she was going to love me forever.
We had spent hours and hours together planning it, planning our future.
And he took it all away from me.
That day, all I had had done was scream. Scream in the hopes that someone on the outside would hear and open the gates.
We were going to get married. We were going to live in the tiny little cottage on the outskirts of Milton. We were going to have beautiful children who shared their mother's passion for life.
But she couldn't even remember I existed. And likely never would.
That was what hurt the most.
The knowledge that not only was I never going to see her again, but knowing that she had no clue who I was. She wouldn't be able to remember the promises we had made to each other, She wouldn't be able to remember my marriage proposal, the lines I had spent hours trying to write. She wouldn't remember our first kiss; she wouldn't remember dancing with me at the Duke's palace. She wouldn't remember just meeting by chance in the forest that afternoon, the one that completely changed my world.
I meant nothing to her. I wasn't her betrothed, or friend or anything. I wasn't even someone she used to court. I was literally nothing to her.
But she was still my everything.
Being left with the memories drove me insane. My dream were constantly full of her; and only her. I would relive our encounters, those moments when I fell more and more deeply in love with her with each passing second. But I would wake to remember that it was all over, and she was never coming back to me. I would reach out for her in the dark, and her image would fade before my eyes to moonlight.
The others tried to tell me to hope, but I knew it was pointless. The only way to break the damned curse was for someone, anyone to fall in love with the master, and for him to fall in love with them. But he had locked himself in his rooms, not even leaving to eat. Mrs Potter left plates of food outside his room, and she would return to find them empty.
There was no chance of him leaving his room, let alone finding someone to fall in love with him. Especially as he was now. I had only gotten a brief look at his new form, and it was hideous. If he couldn't get someone to fall in love with him as a human, then there was no hope of anyone falling in love with him in is current state.
Which then meant that none of us were ever going to be free of the curse. And while everyone was suffering and miserable, I was almost certain I had it the worst.
Thompson had always lived for his work, and so consequently knew very few people outside the castle, and he wasn't close enough with anyone to miss them.
Mrs Potter had Teddy. She had her son with her. And Teddy had Agnes. They still played together, distracting each other from how awful everything was.
Lucien still had Polly. At least they were cursed together. He got to see his wife every day.
Whereas the girl who was meant to be my wife didn't even know I was alive. Or care.
Three months. Anything could have happened in three months.
The thought of it kept me awake at night.
What was she doing? How was she living? What was her life like now?
Part of my hoped and prayed with all my might that she was still exactly as I left her. Working at Madam Cartwright's, filling her days sewing and talking with Amelia and Isabelle.
But part of me knew that it was only a fantasy.
She was beautiful, and fierce and just incredible. There would be someone else, of that I was almost certain. If she couldn't remember who I was, then she would find someone. No matter how much I loved her, she didn't love me anymore.
My heart had shattered completely that day. On the day that was meant to be our wedding day. Because that was the day I knew for certain that I had lost her forever.
The rational part of me knew that I should want her to be happy. And I did want her to be happy, more than anything else in the world. But I wanted her to be happy…with me.
We had been so close, just a week away from being married. If the master had had his damned party one week later, I wouldn't have been there. I would have been at the cottage with my new wife, so happy and loved.
But instead, I was here. Trapped, alone, and forgotten about.
I knew I would have to come to terms with it, one day. Knew I'd have to accept that she would have lived her life completely without me. She would fall in love with some other man, get married, have children, have a life. And that would kill me.
It was supposed be our life. Our future. Our happiness. She would maybe find it again, but as long as she was lost to me, I would not.
And no one was coming to break the curse.
There was no hope for us.
None at all.
My beautiful bride to be was lost to me forever.
And there was nothing anyone could do.
She was gone.
Marion was gone.
END OF PART 3.