Chapter 6: Cour

Misrak entered the throne room quietly, and threw himself on the pillows. He sat there, perfectly still for several minutes, and only stirred to remove a long piece of lion hair from his arm. He stared at it in disgust.

"You are truly despicable.." He said quietly, and flicked it away. Though he had addressed the hair, he was actually speaking to himself, the curse, and his father. Much to his surprise, the last one responded.

"I have always thought so." Samson said, gliding into the room, a vision of gold. "However, I am astonished. You have never addressed me as such."

Misrak resisted the urge to run and said, gathering his wits, "Perhaps I ought to have."

Samson laughed.

"This Belle. She is good for you. Already you have such strength!"

"I do not need her. What you are doing is cruel."

Samson perched himself on a gold pillow, carefully out of Misrak's reach.

"Her father bartering her off was cruel, Misrak. She is better off here, where we do not play such tricks."

"We did not tell her the truth about us!"

"No, Misrak. You did not tell her."

Misrak clenched his jaw. It was only at his father's instruction that he had said nothing.

"Why do you fear me, my son? I see you with others, and you are not nearly so meek."

"I do not fear you."

It was a lie, and both of them knew it. Misrak had hated and feared his father for as long as he could remember, and Samson had only asked the question to irk him.

"You lie, Misrak. Must a new heir be found?"

Misrak's self control evaporated.

"Stop these games father! All I asked was that you let her go!" His lion instincts began to take hold, and he found himself baring his teeth and allowing a low growl to escape his throat.

"And I said no." Samson said coolly.

"What is to be gained from all of this?"

"Why Misrak," Samson said mockingly, "I am surprised you should ask. A bit of fun, nothing more, nothing less. Is that not what you always hope to get from your teasing?"

"I have never done anything like this."

"That is your affair. But you shall serve me until the day the crown falls from my head, and I do not intend to make that happen soon."

"And you wonder at how I could resent you…" Misrak muttered, but he reclined on his pillows, waiting for his father to leave.

At that moment, Alitash stormed in, her husband, Nishan, by her side. He was sternly trying to shush her, but she would have none of it.

"How long shall I have to endure her presence?" she snarled, "How much longer until she leaves our home, or you at least allow me access to that perfectly pale throat…" These last words she said with bitter mocking.

Misrak glowered at his sister, but did not speak. There was a history there, still fresh to her, and he dared not broach it. Nishan, understanding his dilemma, gave him a thankful look.

Samson was not so kind.

"Alitash, I thought that I had taught you more kindness for your guests."

Her laughter rang throughout the chamber.

"What words you speak!" She screeched, "What words, from this cruel man before me!"

Samson slapped her, and she, not expecting it, fell to the floor. Nishan started toward Samson angrily, but he held up one calm hand.

"Come any closer, and you will be dead in one day's time."

"Nishan, stop." Alitash said through obviously clenched teeth, "Do not lower yourself."

Nishan glanced at Samson with hate, and then helped his wife to her feet. After rubbing her reddening cheek, she continued to speak as though nothing had happened.

"She is no guest to us." She said, "She is an oblivious girl, one of these pale French girls who are so stupid and sheltered that they do not realize how they have trodden upon others for their own means."

Misrak rubbed his eyes.

"We are in France, Alitash. You shall see nothing but pale French girls. They were raised oblivious."

"And you do not know how I wish I could kill them all, as I wish to kill this one."

"Quiet now, Alitash." Nishan whispered, "Do not speak so. It has been three years…"

Her appearance, which only a moment before had been utter calm, flared up into barely suppressed rage.

"Three years! The most lonely three years I have ever felt Nishan! Three years of agony, and of pain! Our son is dead, never to return, and everybody wants me to forget it. Even you now! His father!"

Tears that seemed familiar with her face in their regularity came and poured down.

"None of you…none of you loved him…as I did…do…"

She sobbed into her husband's shoulder, forgetting her anger. Samson stared in disgust.

"Such emotion over such an old cause. And she cries so often."

Misrak turned to him and said angrily,

"Not all people hate their sons as you hate me."

Samson regarded him over his hooked nose, misplaced in the wrinkled softness of his skin.

"Perhaps if they did, there would not be so many weeping fools." He said, unmoved. He cast his daughter one last look, then left as sweepingly as he had come.

Nishan and Misrak looked at each other, and Misrak stood up. He patted Alitash awkwardly and said to her,

"It is time to go."

"How can you stand her? That Belle? How can you be kind to someone of the people who could kill your nephew?"

He smiled softly at her.

"The same way our people accepted mother."

Alitash snorted.

"Considering who our father is, it is not the most wonderful answer, brother."

"That is true." Misrak sighed. Together, the three went back to the Great Hall.

There, all of the people who had disappeared had returned. The air about them was unsatisfied, as it was every night. That unnatural light had begun to filter through the window, and the magic of the imminent transformation began to tug at their insides. Families and lovers were kissing each other goodbye until the next night, and as the royal family reentered, they began to drift out. Many bowed respectfully as they went. During the day, they stayed separated, due to the simplification of their emotions. Women slept in one chamber, children in a nearby one, and each man slept in his own. When they were lions, they might inadvertently hurt or mate with those they might not have approached in their human form.

Misrak kissed his sister and brother-in-law goodbye and stood alone in the hall for a while afterward. He only left for his room when he felt the beginnings of the transformation grab hold.

Amara shuffled along with the other women to their chamber, feeling old and weary. She felt she could scarcely remember a time when they had not gone through this bitter routine; and yet, if she strained her memory hard enough, she found she could find flashes of it. She sighed as she ushered the rest of the women through the entrance in the wall, and then made sure that the door closed. After what had happened earlier with Belle, she did not want to take any risks when it came to Alitash's volatile behavior.

Amara had known Alitash since the princess had been a baby. After Alitash and Misrak's mother had died, she had watched over them, and had become like a second mother to them. Her status went without saying; she was one of the most elevated people in their court. During the day she was Lion Mother, and at night she was Her Ladyship. Even now, when Samson was perhaps at his most disagreeable age yet, her word held leverage.

When she stepped down to be with the other ladies, she spotted Alitash, sitting huddled in the corner, hair askew and expression dark. Amara made a move to walk toward her but then stopped. She stiffened. Quickly, she stripped out of her dress and jewelry as the rest of them had, putting them carefully out of the way of her lioness form, knowing that the transformation was upon her.

She had barely stored it in a cavity in the stone wall when her muscles began to tighten painfully. In spite of herself, she began to spasm jerkily. She doubled over, muscles, tendons bending and snapping. The babies and young children who had come with their mothers were the first ones to scream and their lusty cries echoed through the room. Soon, their cries were joined with those of their mothers, and all of the women, as their bones twisted and their shapes changed. Teeth knotted and hair came through Amara's skin like needles through paper, and she fell all the way to the ground. The cold rock caressed her burning flesh, and her voice, which had been withheld behind her teeth, broke free and joined all of the others. It was a haunting chorus that spoke of unimaginable agony. The aching finally stopped, and was replaced with waves of pain that washed in and out like the sea. The waves slowed as time passed, and her voice was swallowed back down inside of her. She drew ragged breaths as the last of the pain subsided, leaving her form undeniably one of a lioness.

Amara rose, a new feeling settling, one she felt every morning. It was an unpleasant itch, the itch of newness that came with an unfamiliar (and yet very familiar, in a primal way) body. She regarded the women and young children around her. Their dark brown skins had become the color of butternut, and their shapes were all clean lines. She smiled, her newly sharp teeth brushing against her lips. As she did so, the human mindset slipped from her mind, forgotten, all but her speech.

"Alitash." She rasped, her voice gone into the screams that had barely stopped reverberating off the walls. "Come, Daughter."

A handsome lioness approached her.

"Why were you so-so-" she struggled for the word. When she was a lioness, she felt more inclined to use her native tongue. She resisted. "angry?"

"I shall kill them." the younger lioness replied, "The pale girl, my father- even my brother, if I have to. Nishan is the only one of them I care for, really."

Alitash began to gnaw a bone she found on the ground. Amara knew she imagined it to be the head- or all the heads, for that matter- of one of her victims. She watched her maul it passively.

"Why do you lower yourself to such hatred, dear Daughter? You are above it."

"My Mother," she replied quietly "so long I have thought now that it is impossible to feel. This is all I feel, besides pain. When you live as I have lived and thought as I have thought, you do not find yourself above anything. My mate-" the word husband was foreign to lions "is one who I would never allow to lower himself. But me? It is not of importance what I do or what rules I break."

Amara stared at her, and she could see it was true. She decided not to argue with her.

"I cannot justify nor condemn how you feel. Just know that I think that you are above it. And you must remember…" she hesitated.

"What, Mother?

"It is ignorant to hold all responsible for what that one white man did to Yeshi. Especially because it was not out of spite. He attacked the man."

Alitash's slit-like eyes darted to Amara's face. "You dare speak as though it is Yeshi's fault? How dare you? How dare you!"

"Do not take that tone with me, child." Amara snapped, "Don't presume that you have the authority to speak so familiarly."

"You think my son deserved what he got?"

"I have had enough, Alitash." She sighed again, feeling tiredness overcome her, "You know full well what I meant. Do not argue just for the sake of argument." Amara strode away to find a corner to sleep in, and could feel Alitash's eyes continue to bore into her back. She could ignore it only when she answered sleep's beckons.

The sweet scent of gingerbread filled the air.

It was Christmastime, and Aurelie was preparing the house. Ten year old Belle was brimming with excitement. Papa was expected to come home soon and perhaps-perhaps this year they'd be able to have Christmas as a family!

Belle let out a squeal of delight as she heard the door creak open on its rusting hinges. She dropped the sewing she had been doing and flew to the door, ready to jump into her father's arms. She stopped just in time, skidding across the floor. Her heartbeat had frozen, and then increased to twice its normal speed. Standing before her was not her father, but a lion. From his mouth spilled crimson blood, and blood was smeared all over his face. She knew at once that it was her Papa's blood.

She began screaming, high and horrified, and knew that she could scream forever and ever…

Belle jolted herself from sleep, and it took her a whole minute to realize that it had all been a dream. Even so, the dream left her shaking. She was naïve, she knew the dream was telling her. She was very foolish to think she could get off talking to lions the way she had that night. She found solace only in knowing her Papa was alive.

"From now on, I shan't speak more than I have to." she said, wanting the words to actually pass her lips. Once her tongue had wrapped around them and her ears had translated them, it would be a hard treaty with herself to break.

She could no longer fall asleep, so she decided to busy herself with the things in the drawers of the wardrobe. She found there dresses, several in what she could remember from Colette's dress sketches as the latest fashions. She smiled ruefully. Colette would not mind being imprisoned here, if it meant access to such dresses. She, however, was hopeless at that sort of thing. So she simply selected a periwinkle gown, modest and not quite so fashionable as some of the more voluminous ones. After she taken off her own simple dress and put this one on, she felt somewhat foolish. It just touched the ground, and was held from her body from rather thick petticoats. The neck swooped down, but not ridiculously so. It had sleeves that ended at her elbows, and from there came some lacy material an inch long. Observing herself in the mirror, she said,

"It is not as though anyone shall see it anyway. It is silly looking."

"On the contrary," a voice came, "I think it quite nice."

Belle whirled around, her cheeks patches of pink at having been discovered talking to herself. Standing in the doorway was Misrak, a lion once more.

"Well-" she hesitated, remembering what she had told herself a few moments before, "Well." she said lamely.

"Witty." Misrak said.

"Why are you here?" She retorted, turning redder.

"Do not complain." He said, a smile playing across his lips. "I am the only company you shall be getting until tonight, when we dine."

"I shall not have any more company tonight. I am staying here."

"No you are not."

Belle quirked a smile, and ventured to say, polite though she felt anything but,

"It is amusing how much more authoritive you are when your father is not about."

Misrak stared up at her with no emotion on his face. She bit her lip, knowing she had gone too far. They both stood in silence.

"Would you like to hear about the curse over us, Belle?" He asked suddenly. Seeing her stare, he continued, "I mean, of course, how it came about."

Belle was surprised, and not a little curious at this change of subject. She wanted to ask about it, but her curiosity over the story overpowered her other questions.

"…Yes." she said finally

She sat upon the bed, and Misrak sat at her feet. Once they were both in comfortable positions, he began his tale.

Author's note: Thank you again to those lovely people who reviewed! (I ought to leave a note like that after every chapter, I think. I just need to think of ways to say it so I'm not saying the same thing at the end of every chapter) I probably shouldn't be saying this, as it might sound a bit pathetic, but it's amazing how just a few words can make my day!