A/N: Okay. I know I promised last time that I would update soon and it's been forever, so…I'm sorry! -weeps- I honestly am! I've been busy with real life lately (did I say I have a life? Hahaha…) and I haven't really had that much time to write. BUT…I'm back, school is out at the end of the month, and I should have more time to write over the summer. -nod- So be happy!
Oh, and again! Thankies to all you lovely people who review my stories, you're too nice. -tosses cookies, and solemnly hands Giggles a box of Spearmint- Okeydokey, I'll shut up now and let you guys read the story, since I'm sure you don't care about listening to me ramble.
Meg was well on her way through the forest when terror-induced panic finally ebbed away and rational thought returned. She ran out of energy at approximately the same moment, and had to sit down on the ground, gasping and trying to catch her breath.
That was real smart, Meg, she informed herself acidly, clutching at a stitch in her side. Just run right out of there, leave all your stuff in your room, who the hell knows whether you'll even be able to find the damn place again...just because you panic doesn't mean you can't use your brain, you know!
Okay, then. Once she caught her breath, she could go back to the castle (hopefully she would be able to find it), get all her stuff, and then...and then...
And then what? Not like she had anywhere else to go.
And even though Jason had turned out to be a monster, if he had wanted to attack her or hurt her in any way, he could have done it any number of times during the past week. It was always possible that he was really totally harmless.
Recalling what he had looked like, she shivered without meaning to. Damn it, even if he was harmless, she couldn't stand living with something so...so...scary.
Thinking over the scene again, she remembered what he had said. "Now you know. I'm...a monster." He had sounded so sad...
And besides which, she had set that damned demon--Decousian or whatever its name was--free, so surely she ought to help put it back where it belonged. It only made sense for her to make up for her mistake.
And you're a mage, part of her brain whispered seductively, and Jason is the only person--or whatever--that can teach you to use magic...
By the time she finished arguing with herself, the sun had set and she had thoroughly caught her breath. She had decided at last to go back to the castle, although she somehow had a sneaking suspicion that the decision had already been made as soon as she stopped running and collapsed.
Rising, she brushed dirt from the seat of her jeans and took a deep breath. Okay. So I go back to the castle, say I was an idiot and I'm sorry, try not to scream if I happen to see him again, and ask if he can teach me to use magic so I can help put Decousian back where it belongs. Simple, right?
Trying to convince herself that things would be that easy, she started walking in the approximate direction she had run from.
After what seemed like about an hour of walking, she was fairly certain that either she was going in the wrong direction (and she didn't think she was), or else she wasn't going to be able to find the castle again. That definitely wasn't good, considering that it was now thoroughly dark, and she was out alone in the middle of woods with nothing but the clothes on her back, not even a flashlight. Hell, with this amount of light, she could walk right into the castle gate without even noticing it until she ran into it. Why couldn't it at least have been a full moon?
Dammit, she knew the castle had been right here when she left. She could have sworn it was right here, in the middle of this very spot, but it sure as hell wasn't there now.
Stopping in the approximate center of the area she had found the castle in before, she stamped her foot. "Jason! If you can hear me, you had better let me into your damn castle! I left all my stuff there, and you can't just keep it! Let me in!"
No answer, and she felt extremely stupid, yelling at nothing.
Sighing, she walked over to a tree and curled up at the base of it, using a root for a very uncomfortable pillow. Might as well try to get some sleep...
Reaching up to pull her hair out of her ponytail, she found a rose entangled by the thorns in a knot. Yanking it out, she stared at it. It looked like the same rose she had plucked from that weird rosebush, just before she had come to the castle. But she knew she hadn't taken it with her...
Taking that as a sign of hope, she cradled it against her chest as she normally would have a teddy bear, somehow managing to avoid getting pricked by the thorns. Breathing in the scent of it, she closed her eyes and tried not to think too hard about being stuck out here all by herself with nothing but a rose.
She couldn't help it. The utter hopelessness of her situation set in at last, and when she finally went to sleep, it was with tears streaking her cheeks.
She awoke at dawn, with red and puffy eyes and a rose thorn digging painfully into her arm. Wincing and digging it out, she sat up and stretched. Despite everything, she looked around somewhat hopefully anyway--but no. No huge iron gate, no large sprawling castle, nothing but the same empty forest.
The sun rose above the horizon, and a single beam of sunlight shot out across the woods, momentarily blinding her.
When she managed to shade her eyes and get them to stop watering, the castle was sitting right in front of her.
Whooping in joy, she almost dropped the rose, but stooped to pick it up before running off to the castle. Hell, she couldn't lose it now--maybe it was her good luck charm or something. Running up to the gate, she pushed on it lightly and actually skipped through, hardly even noticing when it slammed shut behind her.
Running into the entry hall, she glanced around and called, "Jason?"
The answer was instantaneous, and very cautious. "Yes?"
She took a deep breath. "Look, I'm sorry about that whole running away thing and shit--I mean, I thought about it for a while, and if you was gonna hurt me or some such you coulda done it any time during the week, right? And I mean, if I let Decousian free I oughta help to get it put back in its prison, and besides which I want to learn how to use magic and you're the only one I know that could teach me. Oh, and I also left all my stuff here."
"So..." he said, very slowly. "You're coming back? And staying?"
"Well. Yeah."
Silence for a moment, then, "You're not...scared of me?"
"Well, um," she said, then cleared her throat. "Yeah, I kinda am, but--well--I mean, you seem nice enough, you know? And you said you wouldn't hurt me or make me do anything against my will--right?"
Another moment of silence, and then a soft and fairly humorless chuckle. "You, Meg, are quite insane. Very few people would trust a monster's word."
She shrugged. "Yeah, well...maybe I am a little crazy. But oh well." There was a pause. "Um...so why are you--you know--like you are?"
"Why am I a beast, you mean."
"Well. Yeah. I mean, were you born that way, or did you used to be human? Is it a curse or something, like Beauty and the Beast?"
"Like--like what?"
"Like Beauty and the Beast. Y'know, the fairy tale? Oh, c'mon, don't tell me you've never heard of Beauty and the Beast. Disney even made a movie of it." She thought about it for a minute. "Although the Beast was way too fluffy in the movie. No way Belle would have actually been scared of him."
"No...I've never heard of Beauty and the Beast. It sounds...interesting."
She shrugged. "Maybe I'll tell it to you sometime. But you still haven't answered my question. Why are you a beast?"
He paused. "It's something of a long story," he said at last.
She shrugged. "Well, I've got plenty of time." She waited, but he didn't say anything. "Look," she said in exasperation, starting up the stairs, "I want an explanation and I want it now. I wanna know why you're a monster, what the hell a demon is, and I want to learn how to use magic. You can't just avoid answering questions forever."
Arriving at last at the double doors into the master bedroom, she knocked. When there was no answer, she tried to turn the knob, only to find it locked. "Come on! I already know what you look like!"
The doors swung open, and she walked inside, a candle on the wall lighting as she went. "Jason?" she called, voice quivering a little bit despite herself.
"I still think you're insane," he said conversationally, waving a clawed hand to light the candle on the table in front of him.
"I told you, I probably am." She glanced around, getting a good look at the room for the first time. The walls really were covered with bookshelves; the only part of the room that didn't have a bookshelf on every available bit of wall space was the area off to the right that contained the bed and chest of drawers. Oddly enough, none of the books seemed to have been used in quite some time; they were all covered in thick dust.
She stared across the room at Jason, who was sitting at the desk in the center of the room. He gazed back at her thoughtfully, the eery horizontal and vertical slits of his eyes just visible underneath the hood of the robe he wore.
"So," she said, just for something to break the silence. "What exactly is a demon, anyway?"
He shrugged. "A demon is a creature of darkness. They come in various forms, but each and every one of them has a body designed to inspire fear. That's what they thrive on, fear. They can feed off of all sorts of negative emotions--hate, anger, sadness--but fear is where they get their true nourishment."
"So do they have any kind of a weakness?" She scratched absently at her arm, trying to ignore the fact that she was talking to a beast that was taller sitting down than she was standing up. "I mean, how can we defeat this thing? There has to be a way, right? I mean, it was in that dagger in the first place, so..."
"They're weak against positive emotions such as love and happiness, but that alone wouldn't be anywhere near enough to put Decousian back into its prison. Usually they can only be imprisoned by a group of mages."
"So can we not do it, then? I mean, since there's only the two of us."
"Two mages could imprison Decousian once more, theoretically. If they were both extremely powerful."
She sighed. "Can we do it or not?"
"I don't know. Whatever we do, the first step would appear to be teaching you to use your powers."
"Okay. So can we do that?"
"Yes, but..." He hesitated. "Even if you do turn out to be powerful enough to assist me in imprisoning Decousian, you would have to be fully trained before you were ready to even think about doing such a thing. And training you fully could take quite some time."
"And you want to get rid of Decousian before that?"
"I would like to, yes. But as I haven't kept in touch with my fellow mages for quite some time now, I don't really have much of a choice--I have to work with the only other mage available to me. The thing is, staying here with Decousian loose in the castle could be quite harrowing--not to mention hazardous." He shook his head. "As I mentioned, demons feed off negative emotions, especially fear--so Decousian will be doing everything it can to try to inspire that emotion in both of us. It will read your mind, see all your worst fears, and subject you to them. It will want to make you angry at it, as it can feed off that, as well--it will make you drop things, fall down stairs, and generally be a nuisance. It might even end up hurting you, to feed off your pain. If you want to back out now--if you don't want to go through with this--then I'll respect your decision."
Meg tried not to think too much about how insane she was. "Like I said--I'm the one that set Decousian free, so I should help put it back where it came from. Besides which, where else would I go? It's not like there's invisible castles willing to shelter me all over the country." She considered that for a moment. "Then again, how the hell do I know? Maybe there are." She shook her head in bemusement.
She thought Jason smiled, but she couldn't really see his face in the shadows of his hood--something she was grateful for. "If you're sure. If you change your mind, after having experienced life with a demon for a few days--I'll respect that, too."
"'Kay." She shifted position. "So when do these magic lessons start?"
"Whenever you are ready."
Meg shrugged. "Well, there's no time like the present, right?"
A/N: And that's that. -noddity- I apologize about the length of the chapters lately; I know the last two have been shorter than all the earlier ones. The next one will be much longer, I promise.
Will they ever imprison Decousian? Will magic lessons be interesting? Will Meg ever find out why Jason is a beast? Will I actually update less than a month in the future?! All that and…another free box of Spearmint, coming (hopefully) soon. So don't touch those remotes! -runs away-