Chapter 29

Hey everyone! Hope this finds you healthy and happy! I meant to put it out earlier as it's just a little chapter but it needed some adjustments and that took a couple of days.

-WriteYourDreamsTheyWillCome: I loved your review! I always knew that I had really intelligent readers and it makes me want to be a really intelligent writer in return. There were a lot of ways this story could have gone but every step was a conscious choice and I hope I am doing it justice. I am honored that you are reading and reviewing my work. I hope you continue to do so.

SC (Guest): Isn't it so exciting! I've been waiting for those two to show up for ages...and I wrote this! And OMG! Now I have fifteen little side stories of interactions with Chip, Lumiere, and Adam swirling around in my head! They are literally my favorite people to write about. We're entering a different part of the story so they won't be as prevalent but I still have some good stuff up my sleeve with those three.

To the other Guest who reviewed: I am so glad you like the songs. My favorite part of writing a chapter is attaching a good song lyric!

Alrighty, well other then that this is a good build-up chapter. There are some subtle, beautiful moments and I am enjoying it immensely. Hope you do too! I will post another chapter by the weekend and I would love some reviews in the meantime! Thanks again everyone!


"Glitter in the Air" Pink

Have you ever hated yourself for staring at the phone?
You're whole life waiting on the ring to prove you're not alone
Have you ever been touched so gently you had to cry?
Have you ever invited a stranger to come inside?

And it's only half past the point of no return
The tip of the iceberg
The sun before the burn
The thunder before the lightning
Breath before the phrase
Have you ever felt this way?


Mrs. Potts was a miracle worker. Both Lumiere and Cogsworth sent Chip to retrieve her. It was his fault in the first place that they now had guests to both entertain and hide from finding out about Adam. She listened to his story carefully as he told her every detail about the pair of strangers shivering in the entry drawing room.

A concerned look came to her eyes when he mentioned the times that both Adam and the other Heads of House had seen a resemblance in Mistress Marie's countenance. Then without another word she had dressed herself and went to work getting the maids up and about. In no time they had opened up the blue quarters, set large fires in the grates, found entire wardrobes for both the frail little woman and her son. Food was prepared and warm baths were drawn.

When Mrs. Potts finally went to meet her new guests she had to take a deep breath, steeling herself for what she might see when she came into the room.

It was stifling hot and the two lumps on the couch seemed to both be asleep. She approached them with several maids, hot on her heels.

After pulling back the blankets she was met with a pale face, sweating and breathing shallow. The woman attached to the face was holding her sleeping son and Mrs. Potts could clearly see the shiny tears still clinging to her eyelashes.

For a quiet moment, Mrs. Potts reached for the other woman's hand and to her surprise she didn't pull away. Marie looked up at the older woman with her one cinnamon colored eye and seemed to crumple in herself.

"There there, now. No need to fret. We've come to help."

"Who are you?"

"I'm Mrs. Potts, dear. You've met my son Chip. He tells me you had quite an adventure out in the woods."

"Will the Prince be angry when he finds out we intruded on his castle?"

"Why do you ask that?"

"He was so upset when I met him...he thought...he thought..."

"Don't you worry a trifle what he thought. In fact..." Mrs. Potts paused for a moment, biting on the lie she was about to tell. She had sworn that after the spell she would no longer have to live the lies that once dominated their lives. But the look of concern on the poor woman's face was almost too much and so she blundered on, hoping she was doing the right thing. "He is no longer in residence here. It's just us."

As if she were melting, the woman seemed to immediately relax and even gave a ghost of a smile.

"Now, I was led to believe that you are in need of some ministrations. May I?"

The younger woman nodded her head and began to remove the blankets. She winced as Mrs. Potts gently put her hand on her ankle and as slowly as she could, she began to turn it. A startled cry made her stop.

"Courage, dear. It could be broken and we need to find out."

"Marie." Came gritted reply.

"What is that?"

"I'm called Marie and I will try to hold still. Please continue."

After what felt like an interminable amount of time for Marie, Mrs. Potts smiled and looked her full in the face. "It is not broken. However, that awful boot must come off."

Several maids were set to work cutting her boot off her swollen foot. Gabriel was roused from his deep sleep and taken up to the Blue quarters in a groggy state of consciousness for a bath and food.

Mrs. Potts sat down on the vacant seat next to Marie and started to do all manner of little things that appeared important but were mostly for the older woman's peace of mind. Chip was right. Their guest was unnerving in her resemblance and it made Cordelia Potts' breath catch in her throat a little. With a gentle hand she helped the younger woman adjust her position on the sofa and the scarf covering her face slipped a little to reveal the shorn hair on Marie's head. Without thinking Mrs. Potts put a gentle hand out and brushed a few cut locks of the richest brown hair around Marie's ear.

As if she couldn't help herself, an explanation fell out of her mouth before Mrs. Potts even had a thought to make a comment. "It brought food for a month. I just wish they had let me cut it myself."

She pulled the scarf further over her head and Mrs. Potts helped her tie it so that it was secure. "Perhaps, I can help you with that."

Another ghost of a smile graced Marie's lips. "I would like that."

Chip was called back into the room and with a kind smile, again lifted Marie into his arms and carried her up to the Blue quarters behind his mother. Once deposited, he was immediately shooed away and Mrs. Potts took over once more.

Gabriel had never tasted food like what was presented to him that night and Marie felt like she was floating in a cloud when they finally wrapped her in a soft linen night dress. They were given the royal treatment and Marie bit her lip with guilt. If she had not been so exhausted she might have protested as the giggling maids wrapped what little hair she had left in a warm scarf and helped her to her own massive feather bed.

Surely she had stumbled on a dream and they were not being fed and clothed by the Prince's own household. Surely the other shoe would fall very very soon.


Adam paced. It was soothing and he had half a mind to go for a run out in the woods and then... just never come back. Why was it that when things were just starting to feel like the world was not, in fact, coming to an end, some other tragedy had to strike.

Chip found his Master in his frazzled state and almost laughed out loud. "Right as I left you."

"Shut it, Chip."

"We have guests! You should be thrilled!"

"Correction, YOU have guests."

"Last I checked, this was still your castle, Your Highness."

"Oh, grand idea! Let's just hold a formal court while the reigning sovereign looks like an abomination strait out of Hell."

"Well now, you don't look all that bad."

Adam gave Chip an impressive glare that would have frightened several grown men.

"You won't be able to keep yourself entirely a secret forever. If I recall that boy doesn't mind his mother nearly as well as I did."

"You never minded your mother."

"Exactly."

"What will you tell them then? The Prince is here, he just looks a little more like Cerberus now and less like Hades?"

"I doubt they would understand that reference."

Adam stopped pacing and looked out the window at the pink clouds just starting to indicate sunrise. "I would not wish to endure their looks...of horror at seeing me. I wouldn't have anyone see me if I could."

"That is no way to live, my friend."

"So what will you tell them?"

"My mother already told Mistress Marie that you weren't in residence anymore. The poor woman seemed to think the Prince was going to come barging in and throw her back out into the snow."

"Ridiculous! What could I possibly gain from doing that?"

"Need I remind you, sire, the last time she met you she-"

"You don't need to remind me."

"Her concerns are valid until we prove otherwise."

Adam paused for a moment before shaking his head as if to shrug off the whole idea altogether.

"I don't know how to do that."

Chip leaned against the windowsill and gazed back at his beastly friend. "Well, you won't have to do it alone."

At that moment Lumiere and Cogsworth found their master and Chip. Lumiere caught the very last word of the conversation. "Alone?"

Adam rolled his eyes dramatically. "Master Christoph has been spouting to me the virtues of full disclosure with our new guests."

"Hardly. But we are all in agreement that we will have to tell them something."

Lumiere's face quirked just a little in a smirk, as if remembering something only he found funny.

"Indeed. It zeems zat zey might be wiz us for quite some time."

"And we can't just all hide and pretend that no one is home?" Adam looked at his advisors from the corner of his eye, knowing his suggestion was ridiculous.

Cogsworth gave him a reproving glare. "And how do you think that will turn out?"

"I suppose that would depend on how good we all are at hiding. I happen to have some skill in that arena."

"And yet, Belle found you and her fazer wizout much difficulty at all."

"You led her to the tower, wax brain. And I found her, I do recall."

"So we are to just tell our guests that no one is home?" Cogsworth was still stuck on Adam's suggestion and the more he mentioned it the more ridiculous it sounded.

"She won't believe zat a bunch of servants just run rampant zrough zis castle wizout someone keeping zem in check. It doesn't work like zat."

"Perhaps we work for some kind of steward or Lord at the Prince's behest?"

Adam snorted a little at Chip's misunderstanding of aristocratic politics. "I am definitely not important enough to my uncle for that to be a reality."

"But it is a possibility. Your fazer 'ad a Duke who often stayed at ze winter palace. 'E was a braggart and a zief!"

Cogsworth nodded his head at the memory. "It could work, Your Highness."

"So I am someone….er…something that the prince leaves here? A guardian of sorts?

"Zat could work, I suppose. At least for ze time being. It will keep up pretenses wiz ze staff while around our new guests."

"And what would we call you?" Cogsworth looked apprehensive at the idea of calling Adam anything below his station.

"The Beast, will do." Adam replied warily.

The former mantel clock looked like a frog puffing out its belly. "Over my dead body!"

"His Lordship, then?" Chip said with a slow chuckle.

Cogsworth still looked ill at the idea but seemed to accept that he would have to compromise for their plan to work. Adam and the rest of his staff nodded at the same time.

"His Lordship, the Beast, it is."