13

She stood by the castle gates, feeling lost.

The day had changed, drastically – sunny morning was chased away by dark, oppressive clouds. It felt like twilight, while it must have been afternoon still. She thought, dismally: what if the weather around here changes just as abruptly as His moods? She pictured the scene in the dining room, the scene that took place less then an hour ago. All seemed to be going well – he was in a good mood, and they were talking, at last; he answered her questions seriously, and he listened to her, really listened, with kindness and attention she rarely, if ever, received in her entire life. She blushed when she remembered the things she told him – somehow his kind eyes prompted her to voice dreams and hopes she never dared express before. It must have sounded like a silly girlish prattle to him, but he never showed any irritation. He asked her more questions. He smiled at her answers as if he understood.

And there was a moment, when he asked her about Gaston (gosh, she could hardly remember what the boy looked like!), and she started to tell him what her idea of love was… Well, it was a very strange, very delicate moment, for while voicing her rather abstract wishes, she suddenly felt it again – that gentle stirring of the heart she experienced when she looked at him in the carriage on the day when they were chasing the thief. She said that for her love was a mystery to be uncovered, and she thought of the mystery that He was for her, and of how much she wanted to solve it. And there was such a look in his eyes as she spoke that something in her soul whispered, softly, and urged her to tell him, aloud: 'Love is… like you'.

She blushed at the thought, and changed the subject, asking him about his son again.

And he seemed to clamp, instantly – not in the way he did before, when she just felt his pain at the loss, or at the memory of a loss. Then it was instinctive, he shunned from her to protect himself, and how could she blame him? It must be unbearable to lose a child. But this time, there was nothing spontaneous in his reaction to her question. He made some conscious decision; he spent a moment casting some inner vote with himself, and then he voiced his 'deal': he'd tell her the story if she came back from her errand in town. And then he told her, expressly, that he didn't expect her to come back.

Did he let her go? Or was he just so unwilling to share his past that it was easier to get rid of her then to talk to her?

On the surface of things, all was simple. She had an errand, and once she came back, she'd get a reward. That felt… belittling, as if she were a child who was promised a sweet for fetching something, but it was straightforward. On some other, deeper level she felt that something else has happened. His voice, his look, everything in his distanced manner told her that he was actually setting her free. He was calling off the deal they've made back in her father's castle. He didn't want her 'forever', not any more. He didn't want her at all.

She wondered why, and felt a pricking of angry tears. Why would he cast her away? Wasn't she good to him? Didn't she do all his bidding? Weren't they friends – well, companions, at least? Didn't he like her? Oh, it was so unjust. She tried so hard, she centered her whole existence around him; she thought of him constantly – sleeping or awake, he always seemed to fill her mind. She felt for his suffering, she shared his gloom and she laughed at his jokes, she wondered at his dark fate, she felt anguished because of his curse. She wanted to help him. She cared for him, as he asked her to. And now, being suddenly without warning or explanation relieved from all responsibilities, she felt… cheated.

It didn't feel real, this sudden 'freedom'. Somewhere inside her she still felt bounded to him – connected with him. When she pictured that dark and barren land her life became when they've met, the land where he was her only companion, he was still there. He just stood at a distance, observing her dispassionately, as if wanting to know what she'd do.

Well, she'd show him! Let this cold, unfeeling man, unable to appreciate when people cared about him get a taste of his own medicine. He didn't expect to ever see her again? Well, he wouldn't. She will go away, just as she was told. She would obey her 'master'. And if he needed some more straw, let him fetch it himself. And if he wanted her again, forever or otherwise, let him go and find her. He was the Dark One, right? He could do anything. Surely he would have no difficulty in finding a person he has lost.

She pulled her hood closer over her head, jerked the basket for the straw angrily (it felt stupid to carry it with her now, but what could she do – throw it away?), and started walking away from the Dark Castle. With each step the practical Belle rejoiced. She was doing the right thing; she was getting free from a place that befuddled her mind, from a man who disturbed her soul. Did she, in all her fascination with him, forget that she was his prisoner – that her 'room', however comfortable now with all the beds and dressing-tables, was still a cell in a dungeon? Did she, in all her enthusiasm for bringing him teas and cleaning his floors, forget that she was a princess? Did she, with all her feeling of being irrevocably bounded with him, forget that hers was a free spirit, and she could make her own decisions? He never told her what he wanted from her, and he was a dark wizard with a reputation of a ruthless monster. How could she be even sure that her interest in him and her fascination with his mystery were her real feelings, and not a result of him meddling with her mind for some devious reasons of his own?

She had to get away, even if just to check whenever being away from his influence would alter her feelings. She needed a breath of air, a bit of space to think and reflect. Her life was so full of him since the second they've met, she hardly knew herself anymore. Her entire soul seemed to be… crowded by him; he was in every nook and corner of her mind. She needed to be free to think and feel freely, then she'd know what she really thought of him, and how she felt.

Thus reasoned the practical Belle; the dreaming Belle, deaf to the voice of reason, kept repeating dully: 'I have to come back'. Whatever he meant, however he offended her with his sudden dismissal, he was hurting – that was obvious. Something hurt him. May be she hurt him, somehow? Perhaps she could help him. What if he was sitting there alone in the dark, desolate, as she sometimes saw him? What if he unleashed his frustration on someone innocent? What if he moaned now, as she heard him moan sometimes? What happened to her wish to comfort him, to ease his pain? Surely that wish was not induced by his dark magic – he was too proud to induce in her anything like that; something in her nature made her sorry for him. She did not need the time and space to feel compassion. She did not need a clear mind to see that he fascinated her, still. She kept seeing the sad and resigned look in his eyes. She kept feeling how his hand trembled when she held it. She kept blushing remembering how he gave her the flower. And moreover, the questions about him – what was he, why was he like that, what made him so sad – kept nudging at her brain. And that had nothing to do with his influence, evil or not. It was about herself – her own soul, her own mind, her own curiosity. She would never be at peace with herself until she knew him. It was worse than having a good book snatched from her, unfinished.

She had to get away. She had to come back. Oh, why was she so confused?..

She stood in the middle of the road, knowing she must make some sort of decision, soon. And then she heard a carriage behind her, and looked back to see if perhaps it was Him – coming to ask her to get back, for his mood changed, yet again. But it was a strange carriage, and it stopped by, and a beautiful woman came out and insisted on walking by her side, drawing her into an uncomfortably intimate conversation.

The woman was smiling at her and asking kind questions, but Belle couldn't help feeling there was something sinister about her. Her skin was dark, her eyes and hair black and, despite her rich dress, she looked like a gypsy. And, as one does when approached by gypsies, Belle felt unable to control the situation. She felt that she was being fooled, but couldn't disengage herself. She did not want to talk to this woman, let alone tell her anything important. Yet she found herself telling her secrets and sharing intimate thoughts. She did not want to discuss her master, yet she was doing it. She did not want to ask for advice, yet she did. She did not want to trust this woman, but she trusted her.

She felt as if she has fallen under some dark spell, and wondered vaguely how could she, just moments ago, suspect her master of meddling with her mind? With him, she never felt like that – captured, helpless, completely in somebody else's power.

The dark woman seemed to look deep into her soul, and brought to light something that Belle didn't see for herself – something that she, until now, hasn't even considered.

The woman asked her if she was running from her lover. And this word, this idea made Belle's world stop for a second.

Her lover. A person she loves. Could it be true? Could it be Him?

In her childhood and teenage years, as she read her books, of course she had thought of love – dreamed of being in love, of meeting a man who will turn her world around, filling her life with new meaning. Any girl does that. She generally preferred dark strangers to handsome princes – the former were intriguing, the latter rather boring. But she never really got around to building a mental image – it was pointless, not practical; she was promised, her life was mapped out for her, what was the point of dreaming of something different? She dreamed of love, yet she never expected to fall in love. Such things just didn't happen to princesses in real life, for a life of a real princess is as unlike a fairy-tale as could be.

Yet a man came into her life, and turned her world around. He carried her away from her father's castle, just as heroes in books did, and he filled her life with new meaning. With him, nothing was ordinary or dull or expected. With him, everything was amazing and strange. He filled her with wonder and awe. She feared him, a little. He invaded her thoughts during the day and her dreams at night. She wanted to sit at his feet and feel his hand on her hair. Something in her soul leaned his way, all the time. Her heartbeat fastened when he entered the room. He teased her, and gave her flowers. He was graceful. His body was warm, and it felt wonderful to be embraced by him. She liked his laugh. His gilded skin was beautiful. He was the most powerful man in the world. He was lonely. He looked at her with tenderness and longing. He trembled at her touch. He needed her. He suffered. He hid his true nature and his true feelings. She wanted to help him. He was the mystery she wanted to spend her life uncovering.

He held her captive in so many ways.

He sent her away so that she could come back. He just pretended he didn't want her.

He did want her – forever.

She promised to be with him forever, and she was so glad of this promise now.

She pictured that desert where she imagined them standing together, and it didn't seem so dark and chilly any more. The darkness was ebbing away.

If only there was a way to help him – to ease his pain, to take away the shadow that hang over him, making him angry, volatile, secretive, and unhappy. That shadow made him stay away from her – that shadow stopped him from being open and free with her. That shadow was evil, for it brought him pain; it pulled him into darkness, and it kept merging the man and the beast in such a complicated way that it was impossible to help him.

That shadow didn't let her see him clearly, and know him fully. And right now she could have given anything to know him as he really was.

The dark woman smiled at her, with a weird sort of triumph, and said there was a way to dispel this shadow. She said it was a curse, and it could be broken. And at this moment, in her eagerness to believe the best, Belle forgot all her mistrust and misgivings and all her thoughts of dark magic. The woman told her what she most wanted to hear.

She knew it was a curse, always, and now she knew there was a way to help him – a magical one, but how else could it be, if everything about him was magical?

There were words that He, her master, said often enough: magic always comes with a price. Eager to cling to his every word usually, she didn't remember those ones. Not then.

The dark woman was gone as suddenly as she appeared.

She was alone in the middle of the road again. Night was approaching. She had to hurry. She was thinking, fast. She must return, and behave as naturally as she could – he mustn't think that anything was out of the ordinary. He sent her to fetch some straw, he promised her a story – she must return with this straw, and ask for her story. She mustn't betray her newly found goal. She also mustn't let him suspect that she hesitated, that she didn't want to come back, even for a second; he will be hurt, and would withdraw from her, and she didn't want that.

All that meant that she couldn't return at once, as she wanted to. She had to get to town and find the straw first. She ran all the way to the village, and half the way back, slowing down only when she approached the castle. She needed to slow her breathing, to collect her thoughts a little bit – she reminded herself he mustn't notice how exited she was.

Her heart was singing, and she couldn't stop smiling. Her master. Her lover. How strange and how beautiful the word sounded. She never imagined it would be like that, yet it felt so right. She never looked at him that way, yet once she did she wondered – what other way was there to look at him, ever?

She never imagined that the man she'd love would be like him. Yet now it was obvious there could be no other man.