Author's note:  Now, after the masque ball, things begin to change – but are they for better or for worse?  Read on if you wish to decide…  (And r&r if you don't mind!  ^_^ )

Beauty:

On the Education of a Thief

"Well," said she to herself, "I see they will not let my time hang heavy upon my hands…"

What were dreams after that night?  It seemed as if nothing in my life could have surpassed the events of that evening – in fact, I don't think that anything really could.  I had had my first dance, a waltz…and I had been given my first kiss.

And what a kiss it was.

Reality desired me to realize that something like that could not truly happen to a child of my age and class, a seventeen-year-old girl with not a penny to her name: only the generosity and friendship of a very kind and wonderful entity to thank for her current prosperity.  And for her first real kiss.  Nelisia had always told me that I wasn't the kind of girl who would ever experience a passionate embrace.  No, I was a poor little pauper, and if I was to ever be kissed, it would either come from my husband, another poor little pauper like myself: some country farmer with no expectations in his life other than to raise the next year's potato crop, or from some rich old geezer who was fool enough to accept me as his bride.

But I had been kissed, and passionately and truly at that. 

It hadn't been just a small, hesitant brush of the lips; no, it was a full-fledged, passionate embrace of the lips.  I hadn't known anything about what I was to do in such a situation, how I was to react when kissed…but he had made it unnecessary for me to think about that, just as he had when we had danced together.  He showed me.  And when it was time for him to resume his usual form, I had shown him something else entirely – my ability to accept him, as he was, no matter what form he happened to inhabit. 

At least so I hoped. 

Oh, but the beauty of his human – or faery, since he was so fair to look upon then? – form still dwelt in my dreams at night.  I would always cherish my Beast for who he was, no matter what he looked like, but it seemed to me that the appearance of his other self on that night had been a reflection of the inner beauty of his heart, soul, and mind.  I would never forget that beauty.  Tall, slender, and well formed, with gentle, artistic hands and somehow devastatingly romantic wrists, graceful and strong arms, a proud neck and carriage – who could have forgotten? 

And his face…his face… 

I hadn't been able to see much of it because he had kept the harlequin mask that accompanied his costume on for the entire duration of the evening, but even so, that mask did not quite completely hide his face from my view.  He had had thick, warm golden-brown hair that seemed to glow in the soft candlelight: it wasn't all the way straight hair, but a mix of wavy and curly and straight instead.  His skin reminded me of both snow and gold, and his features were youthful, intelligent, chiseled, and smooth, with pensive, sensuous lips, a firm chin, and dazzlingly white, straight teeth …and the most beautiful eyes that I had ever seen in my life.  They were a startling, vivid blue: bluer than forget-me-nots, bluer than the calm sea after a storm, bluer than the sky after the raging of the gray winter months, bluer than imagination, fringed with long, ample golden eyelashes.  They were the kind of eyes that saw straight into my soul itself.

And yet when I looked at him, into those eyes that stared out at me from behind the black velvet mask that he wore, I saw my Beast there.

We didn't speak of the kiss after that evening, nor did our behavior towards one another greatly alter in the days that followed it.  I tried to tell myself that it was something that we only would have done once, as a zenith to the peerless wonder of the evening that we had spent together, dancing and laughing the night away in each other's arms.  That it was something that he had asked me to do only because it was on the whim of a moment.  That it didn't have to mean anything.  But my thought, more and more, became…  It did mean something.

It always will.

Several days after that episode, I went on a mid-morning journey through the castle to find the Beast's rooms, hoping that he would be somewhere in them.  I had been working, with Elenette: my Spryte, on deciphering a runic-encoded recipe in an ancient cookbook that the Beast and I had discovered in the library.  Now, however, that was over with and I wanted to see my teacher in the magical arts.  I had never been to the Beast's quarters before, and I really hadn't any idea of how to find them. 

But, I thought, optimistically, as I walked down a long white marble and gold-embellished corridor that was lined with graceful sylvan statues, with enough searching and hopefully very few instances of getting lost in here, I might just come up with what I'm looking for.

I must have passed hundreds of rooms – for the castle surely had a thousand, if not more – in my exploration, but it seemed as if scarcely a few moments had gone by when I felt the sensation that I had passed through some sort of border and into a different area entirely.  The part of the castle that I was most used to frequenting was bright, cheery, and shining, with the sun shining in through countless numbers of tall, crystalline windows and the songs of tiny wild birds lilting sweetly through the air.  This part of the castle now, I realized, was different. 

It seemed larger, more empty and echoing: wild and unexplored and untouched as a millennium-old tomb.  In this place, I would be more likely to find towering evergreen trees to be used as lawn ornaments outside in the gardens instead of violets and tulips and sweet peas, and great forest stags with heavy, proud antlers crowning their heads instead of chipmunks and songbirds. 

This, most definitely, would be a place where one might think to find a beast.

I stepped forward, gathering my skirts in both of my hands so that they wouldn't rustle against the floor and disturb the perfect silence.  I felt as if I was entering a solemn, hidden sanctuary of sorts…as if I was intruding and should leave that instant. 

My Beast – I must find my Beast, that's all…

I continued on my way down the silent hallway, eyeing my surroundings and wondering why I wasn't seeing any of the Sprytes hurrying about on their usual business, hovering stationary in the air for a moment or two and then sizzling on their way.  Even the sound of the wind blowing outside seemed somehow more untamed, larger.

After a few moments more of this, I found myself rounding a corner in the hallway, trailing up a winding set of dark stairs, entering yet another hallway, and then looking directly at a set of heavy, massive doors entirely composed of some sort of black wood, bound with silvery iron, with no other ornaments or markings whatsoever. 

The doors to my room, like many others, were decorated and had plates with their names engraved onto them.  Framing the doors to my room, there was a delicate, scrolling network of silver leaves and vines, studded with sparkling diamonds the size of my clenched fist, and the doors themselves were made of a light-coloured wood that appeared to be ash.  They reminded me of an undisturbed pool in the middle of the forest, or a cluster of brilliant stars in the night sky.  These doors were grave and foreboding, seemingly there to ask whomever marked them: do you really wish to enter? 

But what was I thinking?  There was nothing for me to balk at here.  The Beast had said, "There is nothing here that will serve to harm you, milady; you must not be afraid.  As long as I am the master here, you are the mistress.  Everything is at your command."

I wasn't to be afraid.

So I squared my shoulders, pursed my lips and narrowed my eyes in grim determination, and moved towards the doors.  However, just as I was about to put out my hand to push one open, it glided inwards, exposing a room full of dark shadows and faint light beyond.  I hesitated. 

Would he be angry with me if I suddenly simply appeared in his quarters, looking as if I was nosing about like some country simpleton?

But he kissed you…he must know more than that!

I blushed furiously at that thought and paused, regardless of the moment, reminded of how fiercely his arms had tightened about me that night, and how I had wanted that moment to go on and on forever.  What a strange adolescent child I was!  I stepped forward then, summoning my mind back to reality, and entered the room.  I paused again once I had passed over the thresh hold, and looked about myself.

"Beast?"

My voice, quiet as it had been, echoed in the room and again, I heard the seemingly very loud sighing of the wind outside.  I bit my lower lip, frowning as a sense of nervousness gripped me.  Was this a bad idea?

"Beast, are you here? I…"

Then I trailed off, not knowing quite what to say next, and stepped further into the room.  Like my own chambers, his were fronted by a spacious drawing room, with several other doors leading off to the suite's accompanying rooms.  Since everything was very dark here, lit only by glimpses of the pale light from the windows, shining through the heavy, thick drapes that hung at them, I couldn't see much.  I shivered suddenly.

He could be just a few feet to my side, and I wouldn't know it.

My uneasiness was getting the better of me, and I really didn't want to look as if I was a nosy little child, poking about where she shouldn't be, so I turned to go.  The floor beneath my feet – which I supposed had to be some sort of wood – obligingly creaked as I stepped upon it.  I suppressed a sickened groan when I heard it, and then at the exact moment, the curtains at the window that was nearest to me blew open with a sudden gust of wind, and I was hit by a blast of cool air, abruptly covered in light, exposed, and there were leaves swirling in the air around me.  I squinted a bit, my eyes racing to adjust themselves to the increase of light. 

A dark figure stood there in the space at the window, I saw then: looking as if it had just come up onto the balcony that was there, having landed in a perfect, almost cat-like crouch.  I blushed furiously – again.

"Looking for something?"

I twisted my fingers into my skirts, embarrassed.

"Mmm…you."

The dark figure, its face and form shadowed by the darkness in the room, made a quick, fluidly graceful movement, and suddenly candles around the room burst into flame and a fire roared into being at the fireplace.  I raised my eyes to look, sheepishly, up into the face of my Beast.  He was wearing a surprisingly amused expression on his dragon-like features, grinning a bit, which showed off his startlingly white fangs.

"Well, I'm glad to oblige."

He then stepped forward, and only then did I belatedly realize that he had risen and stood away from the balcony, the draperies sliding shut behind him.  He crossed the room to the fireplace and began to remove the black velvet gloves that he was wearing, eyeing me as he did so, and asked, "How did you and Elenette make out with the runes?"

I shrugged, feeling my uneasiness slip away from me, and laughed lightly, throwing my hands up in the air, replying, "As best as is possible.  I really can't see how we're supposed to work this out, because I have only a little more than the faintest idea of how to decipher ancient writings."

"It's good practice – you'll keep at it," he returned, casting me a stern teacher's look, placing the gloves on the mantelpiece, draping one paw-hand carelessly atop it. "So…what was it that you needed, milady Beauty?  Or was it simply my company that you desired?"

I looked down, my fingers straying to brush the leather top of a pile of book that were lying on the table that I stood beside, and told him, "I needed nothing…I came to find you…but I really don't know why.  No particular reason."

It was his turn to avert his gaze then, and I heard him mutter, part to me, part to himself, and part to the room in general, "Fate has a sense of irony to it, I suppose." I was unable to ask him for clarification before he gave it to me himself.  When I looked into his deep, golden-yellow eyes then, I saw a vast depth of varied emotions in them: guilt, sorrow, despair, and pleading – much pleading. "Beauty, I'm sorry…there's something that I have been keeping from you, and I've known that I should have told you before now, but…" He trailed off, never taking his eyes from mine. "But I simply didn't.  There's no better reason than that."

I was confused now.  What had he not told me?

"Beast, what are you talking about?"

He moved restlessly, and brusquely gestured for me to take a seat on the richly upholstered chaise lounge that had been pulled up in front of the fire, just opposite of the tall brass-and-leather wingback chair that was also there.

"Sit down, please.  This may take a while."

I did as I was commanded and seated myself, staring at him with – I knew – a mixture of curiosity, wonder, and concern in my eyes.  He settled himself into the shadows of the large chair, so that I could only see a glitter of the firelight on his eyes every now and then, and the gleam of his claws and the velvet that he wore that day: black as midnight.  There was a long silence.

"Beauty…"

Another long pause.

"I have to leave for a while."

I almost flew up out of my chair, like a hen who had just had her feathers doused with ice cold water, but as it was, I gripped the arm of the chaise lounge, eyes widening and my body going rigid, and asked, incredulously, "You have to what?"

Of course, I knew that I wasn't making this easy but—

He was leaving?  He was going to go somewhere else and leave me here?  Why – how?  Where was he going to, and why was he going?  I didn't understand!

"Beauty, please."

He sat forward in his chair, eyes gazing into mine, truly earnest and pleading now.  His poor, mangled paws that could never hold a quill-pen or wield a paintbrush reached for my own quivering hands, to imprison them and keep them from shaking.

"Please," he repeated. "I'm sorry, but there's something that I…that I must do, and I don't want to leave you, but it has to be done!"

"But why?"

I felt hurt, betrayed – abandoned by the only living soul, other than my father, who had ever truly loved me.

"Why, and how can this be?"

He dropped his head, in defeat, it seemed, and I felt pricked by guilt and pity.  I reached out and gently let my fingertips drop to rest on his mane, running through its coarse, thick, golden roughness.  He made a low, rumbling sound that seemed to be some sort of a half-contented, half-miserable groan, the sound that an animal made when it was pained by an agonizing turn of events in its life. 

"I don't want to go," he said, still without raising his head. "But Beauty," finally looking up at me, into my eyes, "It's something that I have to do."

I nodded, knowing that I had to understand.  He had a life, and things to do, even if I never learned or comprehended or liked any of them at all.  I couldn't be selfish.

"I know."

He regarded me with completely emotionless eyes for another long moment then, and I felt as if he was reading my soul.

Whatever you find there, I pray that it is what you are searching for…

"A long time ago, before I ever came here," he began, his hands reaching to take both of mine in one of his, folding them together, "both Griff and I had some…foul dealings," It sounded as if he was hard-pressed to find the correct description of it, "in our business with a wizard of the White Realm.  His name was Saruptal." There was an unmistakable – a quiet and low but very unmistakable – growl in the undertones of that name.  "That was why I came here…he has been searching for us, world over, since that time, for we know two of his greatest secrets."

He paused again.

"He has turned against the White Realm, having fallen to the corruption of the dark side of the world's mortal magic, and he has stolen a rather powerful manuscript from the halls in the fortress of Avalennon itself – the Book of Hours."

I felt as if my head might burst.  The Book of Hours!

Then it suddenly all came clear to me.

"And so you're going to go find him, take back the Book, and return it to the faeries, thereby winning their favor and proving your…alliance, to them?"

I could only guess at what his relationship was to the White Realm.  But he nodded, gravely, and I saw that I was right.

"Yes.  That's why I have to go – if I have such an enemy as great as Saruptal chasing me down like a pack of hounds on the hunt, I cannot expect to live my life freely for very much longer.  If I can earn the White Realm's friendship and esteem…  You'll be safe then, Beauty, and that's all that I care about."

I stared at him.

From anyone else's lips, those words might have seemed trite – taken straight out of a book.  But I had never heard them used in my regard before.  I felt my lips trembling, and my vision blurred, and I pulled my hands out of his, reaching towards his face.

"Oh Beast…"

My voice broke.

"Please, Beauty." I heard him say, pleadingly. "Don't cry – I can't bear it."

I fought off my tears and said, trying to be coherent, "I don't care what happens to me…but if you go, and this wizard finds you…and you never come back…"

Then I caught myself up on a sob.

"I couldn't bear that.  You're the only person who has ever loved me for who I am, in spite of all my failings, in spite of everything…I couldn't bear to lose you!"

"Beauty, Beauty…" he said, soothingly, and then he had come to sit beside me on the chaise lounge, my skirts pooling and bunching up around the both of us, and his paws came around my head and back, cradling me and holding me against his chest, so that I could hear his steady, rhythmic heartbeat and deep, calm breathing. "You'll never lose me." I pulled away, hair and tears blurring my vision, and looked up at him.

"Don't say that – I will lose you, if you do this!"

"I haven't any choice."

My mind filled with blankness at that statement, and I didn't want to face the harsh reality that lay beyond me.  I simply wanted to go into shock.  He was leaving, and his mission would take him directly into the path of his archenemy, and then…

I didn't want to face that.

No, I wouldn't face that.

"Let me go."

He jerked, almost convulsively, and stared at me, eyes wide and astonished, very nearly afraid. "Beauty, no!" he said, sounding as if he was horrified.

"Please."

I had calmed myself by then, even if there were still tears in my eyes.

"I'll come back as soon as I can…let me go instead – I'll bring you the Book, and you can give it back to the faeries, and then everything will be all right…  Beast, they aren't looking for me.  They want you, but…"

"And if they discover you, and take you…?" he asked, seriously. "I'm only a beast, sweetest Beauty – and what have beasts to do, when they lose the thing that they cherish the most, the only thing that they cherish?"

"What would I do if I lost you?"

He looked at me, and I looked back at him, and we sat, wrapped up in each other's arms, for several moments that seemed to stretch into eternity.

Then, he shook his head and said, slowly and decidedly, "You would risk whatever dangers lie in this path for me.  I have never known such devotion from any living soul, and it is likely that I never will again.  I can refuse you nothing, Beauty…I do not have the power to predict the future, or to control all events…but I cannot refuse you." He sat up straight, the fingers of one paw coming up to run gently along the side of my face, in the only form of a caress that he could possibly enact.

"My Beauty."

*                       *                       *

After that episode, things had to change rather quickly.  The best chance that we – for it was 'we' now, instead of simply 'him' – would have to secure the Book of Hours without being detected would be during a large social event for the wizards of the mortal and magical worlds, held in the fortress belonging to none other than the Beast's old archenemy, Saruptal.  How he had learned of the traitor's whereabouts and the location of the Book, or anything about the whole situation at all, I didn't know, and there wasn't enough time for me to ask.  If I were to go as the Beast's thief of sorts, I would have to be educated on how to be a thief before anything else happened. 

So I learned every form of the martial arts that had ever been created, sword fighting, archery, and espionage, along with not a few techniques on how to disguise myself in order to avoid detection.  If before I had considered the haste of my learning the ways of magic and enchantment to be breath taking, it was nothing in comparison to this.  Within scarcely two weeks, I was able to send an arrow directly into the bull's-eye of a target set ninety feet away, focusing on it with one eye closed. 

Being faery had its advantages, I must say.

However, one of the most interesting moments of my 'thievery-training', as the Beast and I came to call it, came about on the misty gray afternoon when he led me out deep into the forests beyond the castle, taking us so far away that I couldn't begin to recognize my surroundings.  When he had turned me around in a circle several times, as if to ensure his confidence that I was in absolute oblivion in regard to my position, he made me face him and looked squarely into my eyes, a mixture of solemnity and amusement in his topaz-coloured eyes, his scaly hands resting on my shoulders.

"All right, milady," he said: evenly, coolly. "This afternoon you are to learn a very important lesson, one which may prove imperative to the success of your mission to the wizards' convention.  We are now in a part of the castle's lands that borders on that of the world beyond: however, I have made certain that you have absolutely no idea of where we are.  Am I correct in this?"

I rolled my eyes, thinking this obvious.

"Oh, only too correct."

Suddenly, I felt even more exasperated that I had the moment before and asked him, as he turned away, going to look at something behind us in the thick density of the forest, "Beast, is this necessary?  I mean, I know that you just told me it was totally crucial to getting the Book, but I can't really say that I know for sure that you're not simply doing this to play around with my mind.  What exactly am I supposed to do out here?  Please."

He flashed me a brilliant grin and replied, cool laugher in his tone, "Of course it's absolutely necessary, milady.  I wouldn't have asked you do it otherwise."

I folded my arms across my chest and shot him a very dry, skeptical look.  He reacted by merely broadening his grin.

"Look, it goes something like this – I brought you out here where you don't know your way around so that you can learn one thing: how to depend on no one, on nothing, but yourself to get your bearings and find your way out of any forest…be it a true forest, a labyrinth deep underground, or something else entirely."

"So you're going to tell me to find my way back to the castle now using nothing but my raw powers, instinct, and womanly intuition?" I replied, dryly, and he swept me a bow, the movement creating a blur of deep red in the gray mists around us.

"Precisely.  I'll be with you the entire time…invisible, so that you don't know where to hit at if this escapade frustrates you—"

"Beast, if I didn't know better, I'd think that you've had younger sisters sometime before now, because that's certainly the way an older brother might tease." I drawled, narrowing my eyes and giving him a long, hardly appreciative glare.  Something flashed across his eyes, something like the recognition of an old, long-dead memory, and then it was gone, almost before I had seen it.

"Yes, well…if sisters were something that I might have had, be assured, Lady Beauty, that they would be receiving an entirely different sort of jesting on my part than you are receiving right now."

"Receiving?" I fired back. "More like 'being the brunt of'!"

"The verb you choose to describe my teasing matters little.  I shall be invisible to your eyes – and to anyone else's, for that matter," he added, more seriously, "and I shall remain so until you have found your way out of this forest.  I won't leave you here to fend for yourself."

"So you're simply going to stand by and laugh at me while I stumble along on my way, tripping over tree roots and making an utter idiot out of myself?" I shrugged. "It sounds easy enough.  Are there any conditions, rules, what-have-you, to this highly intriguing little game that you propose, milord Beast?"

His eyes were suddenly staring deeply into mine, and I only vaguely heard his reply before it began to resound and register into my mind.  "Only that you do not use your powers to transport yourself back to the castle.  If you are to find your way out of any forest in your life…"

"The quickest way out isn't always the best." I murmured, finishing his statement for him.  He nodded, gravely, still staring into my eyes.

"Yes."

He then stepped close to me, very close, so that we were now touching, and one of his paws lifted to run its fingers, talons and all, through my hair.  I closed my eyes, feeling the gentle whisper of his breath on my face, and the greater whisk of the wind against our still forms as we stood there in the middle of the trees. 

"You have proven yourself to be much more intelligent, thoughtful, perceptive, and courageous than any other woman that I have known, Beauty – I have faith in you."

And when it comes down it, in the end of all things, your faith is all that matters.

For a moment, it seemed as if my thought had been said aloud.  The forest became very still and I wondered if we had both stopped breathing.  Then, I inhaled a long, shuddering breath and looked at him, raising my eyes to gaze upwards so that I was peering through the quivering haze of my eyelashes.

"You'll be here?" I asked him, and he nodded.

"I'll be here."

I stepped away then, pacing a few steps in front of him, and gazed for a silent, pensive moment at the forest around myself. 

The trees seemed tall, spindly, and dark amidst the thick gray mist that swathed them; I could have easily pictured myself as a young child, lost in a great somewhere that she knew nothing of, with no one to find her, to rescue her and tell her that they would take her home, where she would be safe.  I shook this off and took another deep, resolving breath.  The Beast was behind me still, I knew it.  Even though he made no movement, gave no sound, I knew that he was there: standing behind me, watching my back, watching, waiting, considering.

Knowing.

"Well, I've got to start somewhere."

I moved off, sending out threads of my magic into the forest and casting them towards wherever the castle happened to be, hoping that – wherever I was and whatever came to pass next – I would somehow find the bravery in myself to learn not only the mysteries of my own heart, but that of my Beast's sadness, which haunted me whenever I looked into his eyes.

*                       *                       *