-Belle-
She was walking, arms linked, with the king of Beasts.
She had recognized his voice to begin with, but she thought she was crazy when she started theorizing about who it belongs to. It was the way he spoke, with care, and the musicality of his voice. It was deep, not nearly as deep as the beast, but it was the unmistakable timbre. She hadn't spoken to the beast very much, but it was enough to memorize his voice. She would have described as monstrous, but now seemed normal in comparison.
"The weather is perfect for a midnight stroll" he said. He had been desperately grasping for conversational straws for a few minutes now and Belle was content to let him flounder as she panicked silently.
"Yes" was all she managed to respond with. The Beast was walking her, who knows where, to do who knows what, she was completely helpless, and here he was talking about the weather.
"It'll get windy here in a few weeks though."
How could she have been so stupid as to trust him and let him get this close?
"Interesting." She said, but she didn't find it interesting. She didn't even know why she said it except for something to say.
There was silence and every second she could feel her arm through his and feel the warmth that radiated off his body.
They heard howling off in the distance that had the hair on the back of her neck stand up. She tried to picture what beast was out in the forest, hunting, but it just made her laugh. She couldn't be scared of some faceless evil out in the woods when the King of Beasts was at her side talking about the weather.
"Maybe coming out here alone wasn't the smartest idea." She said, downplaying her thoughts and feelings.
He let out his breath as if he had been holding it and he chuckled in a high pitch letting her know that he had been thinking a similar thought.
"I wish the forest was safer." He said suddenly, "There's never any end to the carnage that happens around here."
"You need to find a new place to live." She said in a light tone and to her surprise he laughed.
"You might actually be on to something. Maybe I'll join you in your new town and get a fresh start. That would be nice." She would have thought that he was just playing along to keep from talking about the weather again, but there was an old bitterness in his voice.
"I'd be happy to just have people leave me alone." She didn't need a fresh start. It is nice to no longer be a target.
"Being left alone sounds nice enough, but I want a job. Something that at the end of every day I kick up my feet knowing that I had done a good days of work and be able to rest."
She smiled at the thought of the beast patching a roof or making shoes. "The Beast King doesn't give you enough to do?" She asked, poking fun at the lies he's told.
"yes- he uh-" He stopped looking for right words and Belle laughed silently. The King of Beasts, the Monster of every child's dream could not tell a lie to save his life. "I DO have a job to do but it's one of those things that is never really done. It actually just seems to get worse the longer I'm at it."
Belle was looking for the truth in his words. She supposed he meant ruling over the monsters. She wondered aimlessly what would happen if the monsters were left to run rampant. Death and destruction came to mind, and she shivered.
"Why did you come out here Belle?" He asked, taking advantage of the silence.
"I had to get out of the castle."
"No- I mean yes, anyone in your place would want to flee the Beast King's castle, but every nightmare you've ever had lies out here in the dark. Were you so miserable?"
-The Beast-
He was walking, arm's linked, with the woman he'd abducted who was too beautiful to look at, and who was completely and most assuredly blind.
He didn't know how he had missed it earlier, he wasn't used to people meeting his animalistic eyes easily, but she led with her ears not her eyes. Every subtle sound in the forest she would angle her ears toward and eyes away from.
"No. I was not miserable. Can I tell you a secret?"
"Yes." He said, staring at the way her hair reflected the moonlight.
"I left when I realized I wasn't a prisoner there."
He searched her face and voice for contempt but found none.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that I wasn't being held captive. I'm not talking about being under lock and key, but that there was no evil or selfish motive. I wasn't there because the Beast King wanted me as a possession or to eat me. He was doing me a favor."
He blinked. He needed to know what she meant. He needed to know how she had come to imagine innocent motives behind anything he had done to her. Where he was standing, he was just as bad as those men who tied her up.
"Did the Beast tell you that?" He asked.
"He didn't need too. I have spent my entire life being protected for my own good. I know how it feels."
"You don't want to accept a Beast's help then?"
"No. That's not it." She scoffed, "I am not someone who is at liberty to pick and choose the help I accept, but I am very much against letting others get harmed because of a scheme I am part of even if my participation is unwilling."
"You cannot be worried over the lives of the men who left you out here." He said bluntly. She would not feel responsible over the safety of those men. He would not allow her to take on the guilt, especially not when he planned on maiming them himself.
"No, I am worried about whatever creatures cross their path while the idiots are play acting gallantry and slaughtering everything in their path to rescue me."
His whole entire being stilled. She could not be talking about the beasts. A howl sounded somewhere in the forest that made his senses heighten, but she still controlled most of his attention.
"You cannot be sympathetic towards the monsters in this forest."
Her jaw set forward and she challenged him with her stance.
"You would think me devoid of such feelings? Perhaps we should part now if you imagine I am a person who would allow countless others to be killed just so that I may experience a few comforts in life."
"They are just Beasts."
"Do you imagine the men coming to rescue me are better than the creatures they despise? They hunt for food, feed their families, fight for dominance, and gorge themselves on their own desires. Who are the beasts? Anyone in that castle has shown me more human decency than the men who put me out here. I'm not worth the deaths they would bring. I left the castle so that I could make this right. No one is going to die for me."
How could she stand here and lecture him on the humanity of beasts? How could she care after what he had done? She was so beautiful, and so wrong. She is worth all the deaths that they would bring and more. Something carnal emerged in him and he wanted to take her again, but this time she would be a possession. She would be his. They weren't walking anymore. His arm was wrapped through hers, but it wasn't enough.
His hand found her other arm and he was fighting himself back when another howl sounded off in the night behind them. The bone chilling sound was intended to intimidate it their prey and the only creatures stupid enough to be out in the forest tonight during the month of the blood moon was a beauty and beasts.
"They're coming." Belle said softly and the beast stopped them in their tracks.
"We're close to the town." he said, straining his eyes to find the faint dull of the town lights over the trees.
"Are we close enough?"
"No, we are not."
There was then a short silence and he heard movement. He knew their tactics and understood that they were being surrounded.
"Is there anything we can do?" She was nearly pushed against him in a way that he was practically holding her up. All he could smell was her and he desperately tried to focus his mind on the task at hand. The only thing that snapped him out of his own fantasies was how scared she was. She was shaking from head to toe. He wished that he had kept the forgotten rapier that lay on the forest floor somewhere behind them.
"I have a plan." he said, his heart racing for reasons unrelated to the werewolves currently minutes away from pouncing on them.
"You can't go out there alone, you don't even have a weapon. You are going to die!" she tried, but her voice was weak.
He laughed, feeling the sound deep in his chest. She wasn't scared of him, she was scared for him.
"I will be fine." he said and grabbed her hands and slowly pushed her into the trunk of a nearby tree. "Stay here, do not draw any attention to yourself and whatever you do. Do not run."
She nodded and he let go of her, reluctant to do so. He turned towards the werewolves and shed his human form. He thought that maybe they would think twice about attacking the King of Beasts but with one last rich screaming howl, they charged.
-Belle-
Belle had no idea what was happening. She had some vague notion of fighting happening all around her, but there was no indication of a winner or a loser. There were loud roars and the sound of hits landing and flesh tearing.
Belle could not stand listening to carnage anymore. Frightened and disgusted, she had her head tucked into her knees and her arms pressed tightly against her ears and she was humming. Even then she could still hear the unseen horrors that played out in front while she desperately tried tuning it out.
She did not know how long it took before she felt a hand on her back.
She jumped again, and for a second time in one night, she screamed.
"Sorry, I just- they are gone."
"They are dead."
"The ones who did not flee are dead." He agreed and there was a pause where there was nothing to say.
"Who are you?" Belle asked.
"I told you, I am-"
"No more lies." Belle cut him off. She was tired of being afraid and tired of monsters, but she was especially tired of secrets and lies.
He met her with nothing but silence, so Belle decided to help him out. "You don't need to lie to me because I already know who you are."
"You might think you're fooling me because you can masquerade as a human, but you cannot change your voice."
"Well, if I am a liar then what are you? You've been trying to conceal the fact that you are blind!"
She rolled her eyes and wondered how long it took him to figure it out.
"Only an idiot couldn't tell I was blind. I am out here barely feeling my way around with a walking stick! I did not think you needed everything spelled out for you!"
She could hear his hard shallow breathing from the fight and a little breathy laugh.
"So, it seems like all of our cards are out on the table." He said.
"Yes."
"Maybe then, we should have a conversation and get some real answers from each other."
Belle could still feel her hands shaking a bit and she had to laugh at the thought of Sitting across the King of Beasts having a nice chat, but right now in the King Beast's Forest, he seemed to be the only one who could help her.