As Old As Time: A Twisted Tale (Twisted Tale, A) (30 page)

The funeral was simple and sad. The Beast insisted Alaric be buried in the cemetery reserved for royalty, with a headstone remarking on what a brave and selfless man he was. All of the castle occupants stood around while an animated secretary—once a real secretary—gave the service. Many members of the staff, including Cogsworth and Lumière, got up and said a few words, praising the quality of Alaric’s character and some of his more charming habits.

Despite a certain dustmaid’s disgust with the stablemaster’s charity to one of
les charmantes,
she remained silent and pious. Belle eyed her suspiciously. Alaric had been murdered and her mother had said something about
betrayal.
While the dustmaid seemed harmless in her little prejudices, who knew what she had been like before she was all feathers….

A light snow fell, but only Belle could feel it. She looked across the strange crowd of creatures, all of whom had tried to decorate themselves with a little bit of black: a dresser wore a black doily; Cogsworth and Lumière tied black ribbands around their narrower parts.

Mrs. Potts wore a black cozy. She looked sad and brave with her boy, Chip, cuddled beneath her, confused and plaintive. It had been over a decade since his father had passed away; the man was merely legend or myth in the child’s mind. He only knew something terrible and final had occurred to someone he was supposed to have loved.

It had taken the Beast’s strength to break through frozen ground and dig down below where the earth was still soft; it was he who had to lower the hastily built coffin down into the pit. From there everyone took turns throwing in a handful of dirt as best as he or she or it could. Finally, the old gardener and his implements took over.

Mrs. Potts lingered, taking a last look at the grave while everyone else filed past her to go in. Chip had already rushed on ahead with the other children, only understanding that the strange, terrible, and solemn thing was over. Belle knelt in the snow in front of her.

“I am so, so sorry.”

I have been saying that so often recently,
she couldn’t help observing sadly.

“No, child, it really is for the best that you found him,” the teapot said, shaking her spout but still keeping it directed at the grave. “My mind can rest a bit now…now that I know what really happened to him. And such a hero! I always suspected, you know,” she added confidentially. “He was always having me make up and steal little packets of food from the kitchen. But he never told me outright. Didn’t want me or Chip getting into trouble if anything happened, I’ll wager.”

“It might have saved your life,” Belle agreed. She and the Beast had decided not to show her the knife just yet; they would wait for a day or two while the poor woman recovered from the shock of her dead husband suddenly being found.

“It’s just…” Mrs. Potts trailed off helplessly. “It’s just…part of me had always
hoped
, just a little, that maybe he had just…I don’t know, disappeared with
les charmantes.
Kidnapped by some sort of pretty elf queen or something to the Summer Lands. That he was still alive, somewhere, and could come back someday….”

She shook herself.

Belle turned her head to wipe away a tear; it wasn’t for
her,
after all, to show high emotion at this funeral. This was for Mrs. Potts.

“I wonder what he would have been turned into, if he had lived,” the little teapot said thoughtfully. “A horsewhip? He never liked using them. A bridle, maybe, or a talking horseshoe—there’s a funny image….”

She hopped back into the castle, shaking her head and murmuring to herself. Belle and the Beast were the last to go in.

The eerie webbing had made good strides in overcoming the wall. Thick white runners crisscrossed over and under the snow across the courtyards, almost visibly eager to attack the castle itself. In places it had already begun to scale the sides, like a ghostly winter ivy.

Thinner bits of the strands ran between the main lines, supporting or strengthening them, like leaded glass. Sometimes the enclosed spaces formed by these intersections glittered exactly like glass—and if the sun wasn’t directly on them, they showed strange images. Each was a little slice of memory from the Enchantress, repeating over and over. Picking a rose. Casting a spell. Pouring the last of too many glasses of wine…

Belle let out a breath which she hadn’t even realized she had been holding. The castle was, in a way, a living monument to the person her mother had been. Her presence infiltrated the entire place.

Belle watched, both fascinated and beginning to panic.

“It’s like…my mirror…” the Beast said, his voice full of wonder—and horror. “Someone
else’s
mirror.”

“The webs are everywhere now. There’s no stopping them,” Belle whispered.

The Beast couldn’t hide the look of despair that flicked across his face, adding to all the other sad and dark emotions of the day.

The two just looked at each other, wordlessly, and went in.

A light coating of snow covered both of them by then; the Beast shook himself like a dog, starting with his enormous head and then working down his neck and his chest and finally his lower half. Belle almost smiled at the light moment in an otherwise very dark day.

She hung her own cloak up on a hook. That one act seemed to take the rest of the energy out of her. She slumped against the wall, feeling like maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to get pulled down into the silent, cold earth. There was nothing but misery and sadness for this terrible land—and maybe for her as well.

The Beast ran his paws through his mane in frustration. But there was nothing
beastly
about it…it was pure human. “So maybe your mother was also murdered, or something, and maybe it had something to do with Alaric. And saving the
charmantes
. But how…?”

Belle gave him a tired look. She noticed that his eyes looked raw and red.

“I think it might be time for a break. A short one,” she said, thinking. “You’re at the end of your rope and, frankly, so am I. We’re just…going around in circles with the same thoughts.”

But what to do? What
did
people do when they were trapped in an enchanted castle, terrified and dispirited, exhausted and out of ideas? Drink? Throw a party? Torture prisoners? Play cards?

She couldn’t see the Beast liking, or agreeing to, any of that.

What did
she
do when she was down?

“Let’s…go back to the library. I think it’s time for a book.”

The Beast made a noise that sounded somewhere between an angry goat and a foghorn of doom.

“No, no,” Belle said with a gentle smile, “
I’ll
read to
you
. A story. Something to cheer us up. One of my favorites.”

“It better be a good one,” the Beast said grudgingly. “With a…a happy ending.”

“You’re in luck. It
is
a good one, with a happy ending.
Jack and the Beanstalk
. It’s about a poor boy overcoming almost insurmountable odds, defeating a giant, and living happily ever after!”

“What did the giant do to deserve getting defeated?” he demanded with a pout.

“It was a bad giant. Not like you at all. Come on!”

Someone must have heard her plan. When they got to the library, it looked like furniture was magically gliding across the floor by itself—which was entirely possible in this enchanted castle—but on closer inspection, Cogsworth and Lumière were pushing a couple of chaises and fainting couches together in front of the fire so she and the Beast could sit next to each other comfortably.

“Thank you,” Belle said, not just a little suspicious of their otherwise helpful and innocent motivations. “I think we, uh, just need a little quiet time now.”

“But of course,
ma chérie
,” Lumière said with a bow. His flames waggled yellow. He turned to exchange a look with Cogsworth.

The little clock laughed nervously. “Of course. Just trying to make you and the master comfortable. If you need anything…we might not be available.”

Belle and the Beast both blinked in surprise.

“We are arranging a little wake for the staff,” Lumière explained. “If you don’t mind. A fitting end for a man who enjoyed a good time.”

“Of course,” the Beast said gruffly. “I understand. Please open the wine cellar, with my compliments.”

Lumière’s flames waggled for a moment; perhaps it was his equivalent of blinking in surprise.

“Thank you, your grace,” Cogsworth said swiftly, with a bow.

Just as he dragged Lumière out the door, Chip and a number of his little cup friends came scooting in, in a hastily arranged phalanx. They dragged the duvet from the study with them—not noticing, in their enthusiasm, that it had unfolded and spilled out behind them.

They didn’t look tired or drawn from the funeral; then again, they were teacups.

“Thank you,” Belle said politely, picking up the quilt.

“Mama said you would like it, but she’s busy. Are you going to marry him?” Chip asked. Loudly.

A couple of the other teacups snickered and clicked their handles together.

“We’ve only just met,” Belle managed, deciding it was the most politic thing to say.
Plus, you know, he’s a beast.
She wondered what Père Colbert would say about such a union.

With a gentle swoosh of her hands, she bade the army of teacups go.

“Good night!” she said. “And thank you!”

“Awww,” Chip moaned. “We want to hear a story, too!”

“We’ll be quiet,” another one piped up. Possibly a girl? It was hard to tell. She looked exactly like all the others. “We’ll hop up on the table. Please?”

Belle looked at the little creatures. What a peculiar scene—as white as eggs, all straining at her in ways porcelain just shouldn’t. Dishware begging for a nighttime story.

“Please,” Chip said quietly. “I can’t sleep. I’m sad. My papa died.”

Belle felt her heart physically wrench. Even if Chip didn’t know exactly what he was talking about…even if he was just using it as an excuse…

“All right. Just…try to settle down and be quiet,
d’accord
?”

“We will!” Chip promised.

Giggling and making little tinkling noises on the floor, the teacups scurried over to the marble-topped occasional table. There was a pretty woven and quilted hot pad on it, which they carefully arranged themselves on like a pile of puppies bedding down for the night.

Belle shook her head and stepped lightly over to where she thought she remembered the Myths and Legends of the World section was. Jack was an English fairy tale…the shelf for stories from that part of the world fairly sagged under their weight. She pulled out a likely looking leather-bound and portfolio-sized book with gold lettering on its spine, and lovely—if monotone—engraved illustrations on almost every page. There were many Jack stories in this one, she realized with a skipped heartbeat. Not just her favorite.

More Jack stories!

Was there no end to the wonders of this enchanted castle?

She took the book—and the one next to it, for later—and the quilt, still on the floor, over to where the couches were set up. With a graceful turn she managed to plump herself right in the middle of the extra-wide space, and flung the duvet over her.

It was devilishly comfortable there in front of the fire and under the warm quilt. The heat of the Beast also pressed up against her, though he chivalrously pulled his legs as far back as they would go, tucking them under his haunches like a dog, his arms resting, crossed, on the armrest—also like a dog.

“This is nice,” the Beast said with a sigh. “Like…one of those paintings where a nymph or Athena is reading to the gods and goddesses.”

“And here I was thinking you were an utterly uneducated beast,” Belle said teasingly.

“I am a
prince
,” he responded with hauteur. “I am
classically educated
.

“Plus, nymphs are pretty,” he added.

Belle laughed.

“I could stare at them all day,” he continued. His tone was carefully neutral, but his eyes never left hers.

And Belle found she could look back. And not blush. And not have to look away.

Snow was still falling lightly outside. The cups were making more little tinkling noises as they shifted and waited for her to begin. It was very cozy.

She opened the book and began.

“‘Once upon a time…’”

Maurice was struggling a little in the woods. He was not as young as he once was, and he hadn’t had a moment’s rest for what seemed like days. Phillipe, who had shown up in his pen like nothing had ever happened, steadfastly refused to go anywhere. The horse was done with adventures, that much was obvious—even when Maurice tried to pull him along and yelled.

So the inventor marched through the cold, dark forest alone, a small lantern hanging from a stick held before him and a pack of useful things on his back—a very strange and lonely Kris Kringle making his way through the dark. In it were ropes and hooks and gunpowder and what little money he had, everything he could think of to either bribe the Beast or help Belle escape secretly. He would literally scale the walls of the place to get her back, if he needed to.