When Guinevere Rousseau reached her quaint little home, just a few hours before sunrise, she decided to go to her mother's room. As expected, the older woman was fast sleeping. Quietly, Gwen walked to her bedside and sat there and dipped herself in her thoughts.

What should I tell Mom about Reine? A hunting trip?

Reine did usually go on hunting trips during these times, before the snow fell, so that they could cure some meat for winter supply. But she would always come back on the last day of fall—and that day would come in two weeks time.

Will Reine be able to get out of there before then?

"Pssst! Pssst!"

Gwen turned around and saw something reddish and sparkling on the floor. The brunette rose from her seat and tiptoed out from her mother's room. When she had a closer look on the sparkling being, she saw a tiny human, dressed like Santa Claus, with green hair and unbelievably large eyes compared to his face. "Hey, I'm Aaron!" he said.

Gwen blinked her eyes in disbelief. "There is someone who wishes to meet you!"

"O… okay."

"Close your eyes! We're going to get there in a blink!"

Gwen closed her eyes, and true enough, when she opened them again they were already transported into a small pond that she had never seen before, The pond was surrounded by flowers of all seasons—as if seasons didn't govern this place.

"Dum-Da-Da-DAA!"

Gwen took a small step back in surprise as suddenly a green-haired woman appeared in front of her. Her hair was unbelievably long, arranged in a combination of bun and braid at the same time but it still reached her feet, anyway. She wore an earring on her left ear resembling an arrangement of seeds coloured in golden, and there was a certain light aura about her.

"You must be Gwen!"

"Um… yes." Gwen replied hesitantly, "but… who are you?"

"Well, I am known by many names—people even mistake me for my sisters! You can just call me Harvest Goddess, though, since I am the Goddess of Harvest." The goddess replied, still in her light-hearted mood. "But, before my sister rebukes me, your small lovely town isn't my jurisdiction. It's under my elder sister's."

"Okaay…"

"You must be wondering why I called you, right?" the goddess asked understandingly, "Well, this is for introduction, as well as to tell you that you don't need to worry about your sister. The Beast can be scary, but he is no evil."

"But…"

"My sister will take care of yours, Gwen, trust me." She assured, "Likewise, I will take care of you and your mother."

"What should I tell my mother, though?"

"A little magic will ease her worry, don't worry about that!" The Harvest Goddess smiled, "and I would suggest that you don't take off that ring."

Gwen held her hand up and saw the sapphire ring. "This?"

"Yes! That ring is a family heirloom of the Rosenkrantz family—and I have been their patroness since the beginning of that line." She explained, "in fact, I can contact you now because you are wearing the ring!"

"Is this… the magic that the note said?"

The Goddess chuckled, "No. He meant something else." She told her, "but, yes, consider this as part of the magic."

Gwen nodded hesitantly. Her life these days had been nothing ordinary, anyway.

"In any case, I'll keep in touch with you through Aaron when I need to. For now, go back, have a good rest, and go about your day as usual. As usual, you hear me? That's very important!"

Gwen quickly nodded. The Goddess could pass as a nagging mother, but she quickly returned to her more cheerful demeanour. "Okay, nice to see you, Gwen! Toodles!"

Everything went by like a flash, and in another blink of an eye, Gwen was back in her room, alone. No pond, no Aaron, no Goddess.

Of course, no Reine as well.

Reine was quickly immersed in her mission to find the names of all the castle's cursed occupants. Of course, what she had done didn't miss Beast's sharp ears—sharpened after years of living in a chimeric, feral condition.

He passed her on the hallway. She wore a loose, one-shoulder teal dress with a golden-coloured belt hung rather loosely around her waist. Her soft pink hair was held together with a teal ribbon into a ponytail. Even indoor, she still carried her quiver and bow on her back, but now her nose was stuck on the blue tome, which carried almost all information on this castle. His steps revealed his presence to the huntress, though, and she simply looked up and met his deep wine-coloured eyes. "Oh, hey."

The Beast was struck by her easiness around him; he couldn't feel even an ounce of fear in her voice, or her face, or anything about her. She stared at him as if he was another human being—nothing unusual.

"Hey," her voice snapped him back to the reality again, "Do you happen to remember you name? The book simply refers to you as the Prince—not helping at all."

"Huh?"

"Your name." She repeated, this time with a sense of impatience in her voice. "What should I call you? Do you want me to call you the Prince? But I'm honestly curious about your name."

"Don't you know?" he asked her back, "I'm The Beast—isn't that what you people call me?"

Reine clasped the tome in her hand, and it closed with a heavy sound, before carrying it on her side as she glared at him with her free hand resting easily on her hip (not helping him in not noticing the curves of her body, if he could be honest). "Listen, are you telling me that your name is Beast? That your parents have named you 'Beast', B-E-A-S-T?" she asked sharply, "I'm sure even if you cried at the top of your lungs and it shattered the walls between which you were born and you clawed the midwife until her skin bled your parents still wouldn't name you as such. Even if your mother or your father had thought about it, I'm sure the other would've disagreed. Well, personally, I would never name my son Beast. I don't know whether things are different among nobilities, though."

A slight annoyance and irritation rose inside him. When was the last time someone dared to talk back to him in such a manner? When was the last time he could see someone's eyes so clearly before his own and they weren't trembling in fear?

"Why do you care so much?!" he roared, "What's in a name?! The rose would still stay as a rose!"

Reine rolled her eyes, obviously not deterred by his mini outburst. "A human is not a rose. Yeah, yeah, the rose will still smell as sweet even if its name is not 'rose', but things are slightly different with humans, you see? We call all pink rose 'pink rose', but we don't call all white people 'whites', right?"

Now, she piqued his interest. Considering her gender and social background, she was surely knowledgeable—and she obviously knew how to talk back.

"You want to know what lies inside a human's name?" she asked in a slightly gentler voice. "It's your parents' hope and dreams for you."

Hope… and dreams? The Beast found himself asking.

"I don't care what's your attitude towards your own name—I'm doing this for my own. I want to respect that hope and dreams they have for you."

Having said her piece, Reine shrugged and continued walking down the hall, leaving the Beast behind; stunned, but not exactly displeased by her brave display of audacity.

Reine's bold display of her frankness towards the Beast at full throttle!

Will this make them or break them?

Stay tuned for the next chapter! ^^

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