-Belle-

"I could happily die right here" she thought to herself dreamily. She had finally found it after nearly a week of exploring the castle. The perfect chair. It was outside in the garden near some type of plant that smelled beautiful with the perfect amount of sun to be warm.

She had not realized how much tension that she had been holding on to since her father volunteered her at the Blood moon feast. Now that she had an ally and she knew where she stood, it didn't seem so impossible anymore.

She had only just closed her eyes taking in the sun when she heard familiar footsteps walking up to her. She could not stop her smile. It was Adam.

He usually came as the beast, not bothering to change between patrolling the forest and sleeping, but she heard his boots and was intrigued about what he could possibly want to talk to her about.

They had fallen into a content role with one another. He would find her when he was done with his duties in the forest and update her on any information that he had. It was all business the first time he talked to her, but by now they usually traded insults gleefully until one of them surrendered.

She wouldn't admit to keeping score or anything, but the score so far was 5 to 3 in her favor.

"Belle." He sounded stiff and awkward, and she sat up a little.

"Adam." She said, copying his tone.

He stalled then, running out of words, something that seemed to happen often. For someone who strikes fear into the heart of every man woman and child he almost acted as though he was the one who was afraid of her.

"You sound like you are in poor spirits. I guess the hunting party hasn't been spotted yet." She said, helping him out.

"Why do you say that?"

"Well, I think the moment you spot the hunting party you will be so thrilled with the idea of getting rid of me that everyone will hear you skipping over to tell me."

He laughed and she smiled, she liked that he was always easy to laugh. Her father was always stoic. She never had any hope of figuring out what her father was thinking, but Adam was the opposite. He thought out loud and was always quick to laugh.

"It is the opposite really. The only reason you would ever hear me skipping is if I had locked you in and thrown away the key."

"tsk tsk, someone has got to tell you at some point that there are better ways to make friends. Your highness."

"You are one to talk, love. I am not the one who wandered into the Beast King's forest on a blood moon because that was the only way you could get someone to talk to you."

Belle laughed, "That was a low blow." 5-4 her favor still.

"Peace then, please." He said, ending their exchange. "I only came to invite you to dinner."

Ever since she returned from the forest with Adam, Belle had taken dinner in the dining room with Polly, Vandy, and the rest of the castle staff, but Adam hadn't shown his face. She was beginning to think he feared her.

"Is this a trick? I did not know that you even knew where to find the dining room."

"No tricks. If you accept, I will get directions to find the dining room by tonight."

She smiled, he sounded worried that she might turn him down. Two weeks ago she would have walked through glass before accepting an invitation to dinner from the Beast, but for Adam, she was starting to realize that she liked spending time with him.

"Of course, If you are not too busy for me, I would love to."

He closed in on her and picked up her hand sending shivers down her arm that went all the way to the tips of her toes. His touch sent waves of warmth into her and she felt all the heat rush to her face.

He rarely touched her. Belle could not imagine that he cared one whit about her outside the temporary alliance they had built. Belle was shocked into silence when she felt him press a gentle kiss to the top of her wrist. Her face flamed red.

"Till tonight then." He said and then turned and walked away briskly. leaving Belle an incoherent mess behind him. Somehow at every turn Adam surprised her. Every thought and image she had conjured up about the blood thirsty King Beast were just laughable when she thought about him.

Her thoughts then wandered to what it would feel like to taste those lips. Softer than she ever would have imagined. Something strange had come over her. She tucked her hand to her chest and laughed.

-The Beast-

The Beast was pacing his rooms having a complete meltdown.

"It does not matter the way you are dressed my Lord. It seems as though you won't gain any favors from her that way." Vandy said, and Vandy was usually right.

"I know that. I just need tonight to go well." He said putting on his overcoat which was misshapen and sad looking after years of unuse.

"There are some things I am missing. Two weeks ago, it seemed as though you were content to let her rot in the dungeon until her people came to rescue her, but now you are all worked up over dinner. You say that nothing has happened between you two, but this does not seem like nothing."

"It is nothing." He emphasized. He was lying of course, because as far as he could figure, there was a lot riding on this night. It was life or death. He had been just the beast for so long that he was not sure if anything else existed. Tonight, he would figure out if he was still Adam, or if Adam was some old dream.

He thought about how Belle's touch affected him, how her laugh made his heart rate faster and how his dreams seemed to always turn to her. He was in deeper trouble than he could ever imagine.

He turned to Vandy after struggling with the buttons on his coat, "What do you think?"

Vandy looked him up and down and shook his head, "I think you should go with the Maroon one."

"You said that the color looked horrible on that one."

Vandy smiled a wicked grin and leaned back, folding his arms, "Well, the maroon one is the best fit and the best fabric. The blue one is a far superior color, but the sleeves are far too short. I'd say wear the blue one if you are trying to impress Polly and wear the Maroon if you are trying to impress her."

The beast turned away, unbuttoning his blue overcoat.

"This means nothing." He said, irritated at Vandy's restrained laughter.

"Of course not sir." Vandy set the Maroon coat down on the bed.

"This is a mistake. I should have never-" He died out not willing to voice his self-deprecating feelings in front of someone else.

He put on his coat and became more and more nervous. He should not be having dinner. He should be out in the forest waiting for challengers or watching the boundaries of the forest, or literally anything besides leading himself into a trap of his own making.

Vandy came up behind him securing cuff links into the end of his sleeves. "The only mistake you could possibly make is doing nothing. That girl will not be here for long, and you have already got more than enough regret than to add her to the list.

-Polly-

Leaving was not Polly's idea. It was Vandy who plotted and ultimately convinced her to agree to his crazy idea.

She was not convinced of the matter until she had spoken to Belle about dinner and realized that she was giddy. Her excitement was contagious, and Polly was equal parts happy and worried.

"Those kids do not need two annoying elders to interrupts their dinner!" Vandy had said, but now, standing up in the middle of dinner, going along with whatever excuse Vandy was saying, it seemed like the Beast was much more terrified of them leaving than Belle was.

All the staff poured into the kitchens and crowded around the door adjacent to the dining room.

"Are they going to get married?" Emma asked with an enthusiasm that could only come from a young child, and everybody laughed quietly.

"shhh, hush now Emma." Anette responded.

In all reality there was nothing but tension amongst the group. They were all waiting for the worst to happen. The last time there had been a woman in the castle they had all been filled with enthusiasm and went out of their way to push her towards the beast, but now with Belle no one was sure what would happen.

-Beast-

He was doing this wrong. "Make a friend" that's what Vandy said. Well making a friend is something obviously easier said than done.

The Beast did not know what to do with himself, every time he said the right thing that made her talk for a minute it was like a weight was taken off his shoulders until she directed the conversation back to him.

He was getting desperate in his conversation topics; they had both finished dinner and he was stuck between wanting to be put out of his misery and not wanting her to leave.

"No, I do not do much reading." Belle said, trying to hide a smile behind her napkin. His inability to remember that she was blind was somewhat charming and endlessly entertaining every time he realized what he had said.

"No of course you- I did not- that is too bad." He finished lamely then she laughed at him making him flinch internally. Wanting to be put out of his misery was beginning to win out.

"Yes, I agree. It would be nice to be able to read and have an escape from my thoughts sometimes."

Belle picked at what little food was left on her plate as the Beast began panicking, trying to think of literally anything that could steer the conversation away from reading, clearly not a good subject.

He floundered, and then she took pity on him.

-Belle-

Belle was surprised how much she was enjoying herself.

"Can I ask you a personal question?" Belle asked.

The Beast shifted in his chair, making the chair creak uncomfortably, "It depends on the question."

"Why did you invite me to dinner?" She asked.

He tried to find any bitterness or regret in accepting his invitation, goodness knows he was feeling a lot of bitterness and regret for extending it.

"You regret coming then?" he asked.

"No, I just want to know what changed."

He sighed long as if she was forcing the answer from his lips, "I did all of this wrong in the beginning. After that I- I assumed you wanted nothing more to do with me. I had hoped that I was wrong, so here we are."

"Can I speak openly?" She asked.

"Always."

"It's just that... you seem a bit..." She stopped searching for the right word before finally throwing out the word she meant, "miserable."

There was silence until he realized what she said and then he could not hold back his laughter. He laughed until his sides hurt. He must have been a worst actor than he had ever thought if even the blind can see through his charade.

"I was not trying to be funny! I thought I have been very perfectly pleasant company!" She said in jest.

Her words had their intended effect and he immediately sobered up, not realizing that she was just kidding.

Quickly he rushed to defend his laughter, "No, no, you are perfect! I am not used to company, I do not know what to say, and I hate just sitting here and... you were just trying to get a rise out of me." He said, realizing that her shoulders were shaking lightly with laughter.

She could not restrain her laughter anymore and he eventually joined in until the laughter died out into a comfortable silence.

"Yes, I was just trying to get a rise out of you. You are too worried about saying the right thing. Just relax, this was your idea after all."

"I am not sure I knew what I signed up for."

"Please, you can ask me anything and I will answer it honestly. As for your misplaced anger and aggression early on, it is forgiven. If you had left me alone in the forest that night I would have died. Plus, you are the only fun person here to tease, you know the best chairs in the place, and you are secretly the kindest person here."

When she was finished, she blushed. She hadn't meant to blurt all of that out, and she thought that maybe she had crossed a line. When he had nothing to say back to her, she needed a sudden distraction to keep the attention off of her before the feel of his eyes on her scalded her skin.

"Will you show me the library?" She asked, already standing up. She knew he would not say no, he never told her no.

"er- yes." he said, clearly panicked. She smiled; she was beginning to think that she had an addiction to throwing him off guard. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that she loved his voice when he panicked. She walked towards his end of the table and waited to hear him get up from his chair.

"I will not bite." she said after he hesitated and that made him stand up quickly.

-Adam-

He gulped, he actually gulped and then immediately turned his back to her, fleeing to the door and he opened it for them both. Belle was still standing back, one hand on the table, with a secretive smile.

"Er- um- it is this way." He said awkwardly, standing there as useless as a loaf of bread.

She held out her arm expectantly and his heart rate shot up. He should not go over and take her arm. That is all he was thinking as he crossed the room and linked his arm through hers.

"Sorry to be so helpless." She said, grinning at him.

"Something tells me that you are a lot less helpless than you pretend to be." Adam said, leading her to his favorite part of the castle.

It was the sweetest kind of torture, to have her in his arms. Her smell was intoxicating and the longer he was close to her the more he wanted to never leave her side. He was in trouble. His alarm bells were going off and all he could think was that they had such a great plan and that plan ended with him alone. Again.

"You know you are somewhat of a celebrity outside of the forest." She said suddenly.

Belle never seemed to stop surprising him in her choice of conversation. His famed reputation was the last thing he wanted to talk about, but he would indulge her.

"You know, I am also somewhat of a celebrity inside the forest as well." He said in his most predatory voice.

She laughed and suddenly it hit him. This could be the last time. The last time he would ever be able to talk to her, the last time he would get to hear her laugh or see her wit and humor.

Soon she would be in the arms of someone else which just felt so inherently wrong, and he wanted to fight. He had never wanted to fight more for anything in his life. Fight for every minute of her time. Fight to remember every word she said. Fight to keep her here.

He thought of the silence that will come on the day she leaves. He thought of locking up the East wing the day she leaves, another place in his castle forbidden to him by painful memories and suddenly he could not do it anymore. He did not have the self-discipline to hold himself back from her. She was in danger.

"You know. I can feel you staring at me." She said, her face angled up towards him and she smiled.

"Yes." Was all he managed. Every inch of him wanted to reach down and kiss her except for his last shred of common sense which decried the uncivility of it all. He was holding himself back by a thread.

"I think we have stopped walking."

"Yes."

"It does not sound like we are in a library."

"And what does a library sound like?" he mused.

"Well, I would hope it does not sound like a hall way. You said it was your favorite place in the whole world. I was expecting something a little more... magical."

When that word fell from her lips, he grinned at the idea that was beginning to form in his mind. If she wanted something magical, she was going to get it.

"The library doors are right in front of us." He said.

"Oh." She said, tilting her head away from him.

He shifted his weight between each foot daring himself to enact the plan forming in his head. 'This could be your only chance' those words spurred him on, desperately. He unlaced his arm through hers and grabbed her wrist, he intended to guide it safely to the wall, but could not help but press her hand to his mouth first, inhaling the smell of her and savoring the touch.

He grinned when she flushed and she opened her mouth, but no sound came out.

"I will be right back, stay here." he said, finally guiding her hand to the wall next to her.

-Belle-

Belle was confused to say the least. She thought everything was going well, great even until he left suddenly. Excitement built up in her, excitement for him to come back when he had only just left her alone. Excited for whatever plan he had just had that made him jump around like a boy on Christmas.

She heard him walk briskly down the hall away from her, and then he turned down the hallway out of the line of sight, and then she heard him break out into a run and she could not help but laugh out loud.

She had never smiled so much she cupped her hands over her face trying to memorize what it feels like to be happy.