Chapter VI: Faraway mountains

Retreat
Copyright © Jeffrey K. Bedrick 1992.
Used with permission.

And then, one evening, I finally dared to tackle the subject, in spite of what that cost me. I had succeeded in making her change hr practices and, instead of sharing her dinner with the servants, she took it with me in the dining room, whereas she ate her lunch in the kitchen. To say that she dined in my company was a quite great word, since I refused to swallow the least food in front of her: it was hardly appetising.
She immediately heard to my tone that the subject was serious and she put back her fork to fix me with an interrogative look. It seemed to me suddenly that my saliva made a large ball in my throat and that I was unable to pronounce the least word.
"Beauty, dear child, I appreciate your company infinitely, but I thought... that perhaps... you... you don't really enjoy being in my castle. I am decided to give you back your freedom if you wish it," I completed without stopping.
Strangely, these words appeared more difficult to me to pronounce than when I had announced to Katherine that I was going to send her back to her parents. Beauty still looked at me, without saying anything, then she lowered her glance towards her plate whose contents cooled; she held out the hand towards her fork, but never achieved her goal. She raised the head towards me and looked me right in the eyes.
"You dismiss me, Milord?" she asked with the voice of a small girl.
"No! Oh no... Beauty, I would like to keep you always with me, but... but my selfishness should not pass first. I know that you only dream to leave, Beauty, to find Jod and the life which you know before I force you to come here. I... I realised my mistake, Beauty, and if you want to leave, Sevulf will accompany you back to your home. I will cancel the decree that moves away the women from the place of work."
Beauty said nothing; she looked at me simply and I had the impression that her glance was a charge. Once more, she used this formula I hated hearing her use:
"Since my lord wishes it, I will leave tomorrow morning."
She took again her fork and finished her plate before all was completely cold. I surprised the disapproving glance of Fiona when she disencumbered the table. In fact, the servants did not even wait until Beauty closed the gate behind her to make known to me what they thought of my behaviour.
"Milord, it's her, I am sure!" exclaimed Sevulf first. "I feel it! The fairy couldn't do anything against her and... and you love her, don't you, Milord?"
Before I had time to protest, Gilla intervened:
"And she cares for you, Milord. I do not know yet if her feelings are the same ones as those which Katherine had for you before her disease, but she overcame her fear of you and tries to satisfy you in any point!"
"Shut up!" ordered Stoat. "Do you thus think that the Master does not know it? He tries to think of what is best for her, but I think, Master, that you are nevertheless wrong to dismiss her like that. First, she is not like the other girls: you dismiss her not because she doesn't love you, but because you are afraid to play the game of the fairy, i.e. to love Beauty - because you believe that you still do not love her, it in what you are heavily mistaken. Then, as much she was shifted while arriving here, as much she will be shifted while going back to her village, with Jod and the sadistic foreman. She does not have any more her manners of a real tomboy and I think that she will regret certain things that she had here, like the books, for example, and an immense space to create roses."
"And the freedom to be able to do horse-riding," added timidly Eponerius, recognising finally that he had taught to Beauty how to ride a horse - was I to say to ride a centaur?
I cut short the discussion which would have carried out nowhere.
"The choice is her," I declared.
The servants kept silence, then, to my great surprise, Geolf intervened, pronouncing a perfectly comprehensible sentence:
"You are wrong, Master. She will leave, because she is not sure of her and that she believes that she annoys you."
I was amazed to hear him speak; Geolf wasn't the kind of person - of animal? - who spoke often, and even less with built sentences and in human language. She had to really care about Beauty to protest thus. I looked at my servants who looked at me with hope, waiting for me to change my decision.
"Very well," I finally said. "I give you the right to say to her that I do not drive her out, that her presence is pleasant for me, everything you want! and that I just give her the choice."
Stoat shook the head.
"No, Master. She will be torn between two alternatives: to remain here, to live what she calls the 'beautiful life', therefore close to you and to us, who want her to stay, or to turn over towards Jod to who she owes her life. Despite everything the love that we have for her, her conscience will lead her to choose to leave, to refund the debt she believes she had towards Jod."
"Moreover, you forget that your secret will be in danger," added a new voice.
We all froze and I swivelled slowly close on my heels to discover Beauty who stood in the embrasure of the door. She was pale and her fingers were painfully clenched on the upright.
"I am sorry," she began again while reddening violently, "I heard your discussion. The analysis of Stoat is perfectly correct. If you give me the choice, even if I would be dying to stay here, I would feel obliged to go back to Jod. He has only me and, until I met you, I had only him. He risked a lot by saving my life, because I ate part of the rations, when he did not have any enough for himself. I cannot allow myself to desert him if I have the choice between going back to help him and remaining here, making as if I had forgotten everything. But... if I go back, they all will ask me what occurred, why you kept me a so long time; they thought at the origin that it was Bo who had been taken along by your guards, but the women had to announce my disappearance and they understood certainly that Beauty and Bo did only one. They can thus deduce the reason of my... arrest. What would they deduce from my return and the cancellation of the decree on the village of the women?"
I did not answer. I hardly saw where she wanted to arrive from there. Embarrassed, red to the ears, she continued in front of the silence:
"I will tell you: they will believe that you seduced me and that you modified this decree either to compensate me for the child I carry, or to be able to see me more easily. Don't all look at me like that! It is current thing for the powerful ones to profit from the weakest who are in need."
"Beauty," I said, panting, "are you saying to me that such things exist in my kingdom?"
"Yes, Milord," she answered with a low voice. "I have a friend who worked as maidservant at a rich man and he drove her out when he discovered that she carried his child."
"Beauty, I refuse to have your reputation tarnished in such a way!" I exclaimed, without a good knowledge of how I could prevent such a thing.
She looked me with amazement.
"My reputation? But nobody is concerned with my reputation! I could have fifteen children, all of unknown father, nobody would bat an eyelid! It is yours which imports me! Just imagine the anger of all these women of the high society who dream night and day of you, thinking that you chose me, me, a small nothing, a beggar!"
Stoat had a amused smile at Beauty's words; I didn't immediately understand why, then I remembered that Beauty had just said that she was concerned with my reputation towards my subjects and that she also had, in fact, almost told me that it was better if I didn't dismiss her, so that the secret of my aspect would not revealed. It was the proof that my little Beauty really cared about me and I felt happy of it.

Officially, the question of the departure of Beauty remained outstanding; unofficially, we had implicitly decided that she would remain within the castle. The night, I looked at her sleeping, a simple act which however brought a deep peace to me. Sometimes, the dream-catcher above her head was illuminated with an unpleasant red, but the nightmare was always pushed back, or destroyed. The fairy had not found the parade yet, or then she was testing my aptitudes for the magic.
Beauty appeared rather glad to remain within the castle, but I sometimes surprised her on a terrace looking at the mountains far off, sighing after a freedom which seemed to her lost forever. Strangely, the mountains which attracted her glance were opposite to her village. She was in a place she liked, where she learned quantity of things which interested her, where she was not beaten any more, and yet, she felt captive.
Her only freedom consisted in the walks with Eponerius, where the gallop could give her the impression that the world opened in front of her. But as soon as Eponerius returned towards the castle, her glance darkened and, as soon as arrived, she ran to the terrace to look at her mountains. In those cases, often, the heart wounded by her sadness, I ordered to my mirror to show something else.
It came to me one day that I had always observed only the village near the castle and which I had completely forsaken the remainder of my kingdom. That day also, I cancelled the decree on the village of the women who returned to work with their husbands, sons or brothers, without entirely forsaking the other village. Sevulf did not entirely approve my decision, but he only knew it too late, because I had sent Eponerius to make the statement and the latter never asked me questions.
When my mirror roved on the other villages of my kingdom, I hardly paid attention, because all resembled to each other. Then it was a city, more worked out, and, in the middle of all the faces, there was one of them which was familiar to me. One moment, I struggled against this idea: no face could be familiar for me, since all those I knew had died. I have at this time a thought for my parents - undoubtedly the first that I had for them since the curse, unworthy son that I was - who were now dead, without knowing what had occurred of their son.
I wrinkled the eyebrows - what was to give me an air really terrifying, because my usual aspect was already not very reassuring - and brought back my thoughts on this familiar face, rather than on my parents. And the memory returned to me: I had already seen this young man in Beauty's nightmare; he was the one the fairy had placed at the end of the nightmare for saying to Beauty that she could only trust in him.
For me, that could mean only one thing: this young man was accomplice with the fairy, in an unspecified manner, and I did not want to know which. I heard the words he pronounced without really listening to them, then a name struck my ear: it was that of the village, of my village, that from which came Beauty. Suddenly, my attention increased and I heard thus that he intended to go on a journey until here, to see their mysterious lord on one hand, and on the other hand, to meet a marvellous girl about who he had been told.
My mirror understood at once that it was better that he dies out and he did it at once. I pushed myself further in my armchair and considered, the forehead wrinkled - the result must be quite amusing to see - nibbling my lower lip with one of my long canines - that have be one of my practice as human and I had needed a lot of time to be able to do that with my fangs of animal.
The fairy cooked up something, it was obvious. If not, for which reason would she like to send this young man here? The 'one' who had spoken to him about the marvellous girl was not different from my old enemy and I feared that the marvellous girl was my little Beauty. This idea made me tighten the fists, driving my long sharp-edged claws in the palm of my hands. Blood ran on the ground without me paying attention to it. Once more, anger invaded me and I would have liked to have the fairy in front of me, to make her understand what inspired to me her sordid operations. But she would certainly have laughed at it.
To divert my thoughts of these unpleasant flashes of comprehension, I ordered to my mirror to speak to me about magic. I had decided to divert the intentions of the fairy: she wanted that I recovered my human shape only by meeting an impossible condition, I wanted to become again human by cancelling her spell by magic. I also cherished the dream to become so gifted in magic that I could have opposed directly to the fairy of the roses and, why not, destroy her, so that I generally spent my evenings - in alternation with the observation of Beauty - to study with eagerness the magic, with my mirror.
This mirror still filled me with wonder as much. A long time, I had taken it for a completely banal mirror, fixed on the wall of my room, as I had had one in the castle of my parents - my mother estimated that it was a necessary accessory; as far as I was concerned, I hardly saw the interest of it, because my roses did not deal with the aspect of who looked after them. At the time of my transformation, I had broken all the mirror of the castle of which the fairy had give me - that still remained me across the throat, to see, and know, that this fairy had be able to provide this castle with all what interested me, with a good taste which granted itself with all that I like myself - and, without too know how, nor why, this mirror had succeeded to escape to the massacre.
Later, much later, I had ended up noticing this mirror which was drawn up insolently in front of me every morning when I rose from the bed where I had vainly tried to find sleep during a whole night. Strangely, this mirror, even if it seemed to scoff at me, never reflected my image. I did see the room where I was, but my person did not appear there. Initially furious, I had raised the paw on him, ready to destroy it of only one blow; something had prevented me from it and I had given up, without knowing why. Then, this mirror had intrigued me: it revealed me like a vampire of the old stories, who were not reflected in the mirrors, and moreover, it had succeeded in passing through all my accesses of anger.
Attracted little by little in spite of me, I had been interested in this strange mirror. I sometimes had spent long hours sitting in front of it, to contemplate it, not really understanding how a mirror seemingly so banal could intrigue me to this point, to make me lose invaluable hours that I could have employed with controlling better my too great force. And finally, a day, whereas my mind roved, the image in the mirror had changed, the reflection of my room giving way to the garden of an old man impassioned of roses, to who I had bought some rose trees, and to who I was precisely thinking. From that day, having finally understood the utility of this mirror, I had been able to observe the surrounding region, to find the girl who was to save my roses.

We were then in middle of afternoon and I thought suddenly that I had found the girl who was to save my roses. As if answering my thoughts, my mirror showed me my garden of roses, so splendid since Beauty cared for it. The girl was there, equipped with her dreadful male rags, sitting in the wet and carefully hoed soil, telling them the adventures of the young princess who had lived with the palace of ice. Strange thing in her stories, even if the beautiful princess was made herself of ice, she did not seem to suffer from heat. Admittedly, I listened to the tales of Beauty only of one distracted ear, but I found odd the fact that she did not take account of such a factor.
The part of my brain which remained always lucid whatever the circumstances pointed out me that the mirror had again led me to think of Beauty, in the way in which, precisely, I did not want to think. Again, the rage seized me.
"What do you hope to make me do?" I thundered to the address of my mirror, which I had ended up regarding as a human being - that is, as human as me. "If I become again what I was before, what will you become, you? Is it your loss you want to sign?"
"No, Master," said a voice in my back. "But perhaps it wants simply to release many people."
It was Weaverbird who had entered silently. He continued: "Master, thus think that if Beauty is the one who will release you from the spell, you are denying to nine people, one of which is yourself, the right to become human again. To be a bird has its advantages, but I prefer my original shape. Even if I never heard Stoat or Fiona complain about their condition, I am sure that they would prefer to become women again."
I initially tried to remain calm; my servants - who had rather become like friends, after so much of years spent together, sharing the same fate - did really not realise which was the requirement of the fairy. Raynal alone had understood, but Raynal had more often mix up with me when I had not met Rose Line yet.
"Weaverbird," I said of an almost peaceful tone, "what wants the fairy of the roses is that Beauty loves me and that I love her. It is an impossible condition! Even if I, I managed to love Beauty, which would however not be so difficult, even taking into account my total disinterest regards to the women, she would certainly not love me. Which woman in her common sense could love a monster such as me? That she regards me as a friend, certainly, that can still happen, although I think that she rather sees me like her lord, to whom she owes obedience and respect, but never ever will my little Beauty be able to fall in love with me."
Weaverbird allowed himself to insist, which was hardly in his practices.
"Master, if only you give her a chance... If you try to love her, to interest you to her in the same way that you were interested in lady Katherine..."
I rose abruptly, the fists tightened.
"Katherine had never seen me! She could love me, she did not know what I looked like and never had I maltreated her and threatened her as I did with Beauty!"
But Weaverbird was not listening to me: he fixed the ground with the eyes almost bulging, which made appear his small body of bird ridiculous. In my turn, I lowered the eyes and I saw the broad reddish spots which marked the slats of the parquet floor carefully maintained by Stoat, Fiona and Gilla. A large drop of blood ran from my tightened fist and crushed on the ground, sending some red droplets on my bare foot.
"I will seek someone," declared Weaverbird with a voice which trembled a little.
He flew away precipitately and I sighed at the idea that he was certainly going to send Stoat or Maguy to me, who would undoubtedly serve a sermon to me on the fact that I did not act correctly towards Beauty.
But I had underestimated Weaverbird: the step I heard resembled of nothing to Maguy's, nor even to the slipped step of Stoat. I hardly believed my eyes when I saw the thin silhouette of Beauty framing within the gate; she had had time, I did not know how, to get rid of her boy's wears and wore a dress of a pale green which was very well harmonised with the coppery wicks of her hair which hung each side of her face.
"Milord," she said with a small timid voice, outlining a rapid bow. "I was told you were wounded..."
I was going to protest, but I was suddenly voiceless; Beauty knelt in front of me, avoiding the bloodstains, and seized one of my large paws in her small hands. She shook the head of a reproachful air, but didn't say anything. She had brought with her clean linens, which she wet, and with which she cleaned the blood which covered my palm. I had shame to let her see closely what I regarded as my disgrace, but she did not seem to be concerned with it. It was the first time that Beauty touched me of her full liking and the softness of her fingers was astonishing.
I had completely forgotten the pomade with the odour of rose which I had given to Beauty for her back, but the girl had taken care not to forget it, so that I was rather surprised to see her produce the pot from I did not know which secret pocket. She made penetrate the ointment deeply in my wounded and painful palm, her small fingers getting however light not to hurt me, and she finished by bandaging my two hands carefully. Then, using the linens which she had brought, she summarily cleaned the bloodstains on the parquet floor.
She stood up and was going to withdraw herself when I held out the hand towards her, without touch her, recalling me to the last moment that she did not like to be touched.
"Remain a moment, Beauty, if that does not bother you. Could you read me some chapters of the book which is on my night table, please? My pa... hands make me suffer."
"Of course, Milord," she said, undoubtedly believing that I took this pretext to continue to teach her how to read.
She sat down on the only free chair - and the lucid part of my brain noted that this chair had never been in my room before - which was located quite far from the source of light which was already not very strong, and opened the book. She did not show any surprise by noting that the book was written in ancient Greek and, with a posed tone, she started by reading the first lines.
I relaxed internally; I had a little dreaded the moment when she would understand that I knew about her new readings. Then, something struck my ear: Beauty read obviously fluently the ancient Greek, but especially, she read it with an accent which I had not heard for a long time! In fact, she read - or spoke - the ancient Greek like had done my professor from a long time, when I took courses of Greek at the house of my parents. She pronounced the stresses with the singing tone, her voice rising of a fifth each time, rather than by the usual reinforcement which was almost required nowadays.
Rocked by the sound of her voice, believing almost to hear an old Greek speak - even if the last of them had died a long time before I was born -, I let myself go in my armchair, forgetting almost that my poor little Beauty wore out her eyes on a very small printed book and by an insufficient light.
I startled and blinked the eyes in front of the abrupt light which invaded my room: Sevulf stood in the embrasure of the gate and he had just created a magic light, which illuminated the room as if the heavy double drapes had not been drawn. I wrinkled the eyebrows: Sevulf knew perfectly that I detested the sharp lights. I was going to reprimand him, when he outstripped me:
"How do you dare to leave this poor lady Beauty tire her eyes just for satisfying your small whim?" he exclaimed with a fiery tone which he did not even try to dissimulate.
Without even leaving me time to answer, he took the book of the hands of Beauty, who was so surprised that she did not carry out the least gesture for preventing him to do so.
"Ancient Greek!" continued Sevulf. "You really have no excuse!"
Carried by his anger, he seemed to half forget how to speak correctly and his accents became increasingly intersected by wolf growls. That made me remember that, I also, I could act like an animal and that I had absolutely control me before that happened to me. But it was already too late: I stood straight highly and thundered:
"Sevulf! You forget yourself, it seems! Take care to hold your language in my presence! Your seniority in the house and your fidelity will not protect you always!"
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Beauty stand up; she was very pale and outlined a movement towards me, like asking me to calm down, but I did not care about it.
"Master...," said Sevulf with a little strangled voice, "master, calm down!"
I went towards him in large steps.
"Master! You said it! I am your Master, Sevulf, as I am the Master of all this region! Stop saying to me what I must do!"
The lucid part of my brain once more confirmed that the more time passed, the more the influence of the animal shape hardened. A few years more - how much did I have left of them? - and I would be more beast than man; I understood the perversity of the curse better and better.
"I am not any more the little boy whom you knew, Sevulf! I grew and even if the curse preserves us the age which we had at this time, I matured and I learned lots of things. How many years passed? Hundred? More?"
A strangled cry in my back cut me dead in my anger: Beauty looked at me, the eyes bulging, the fists pressed on her mouth:
"You! You did the decree which exiled the women! It's to you that I owe my life of misery! Oh! And when I think that..."
She shook the head, dislodging the tears which pressed in her eyes, and fled by the gate remained open. I tightened the fists and rushed on my mirror.
"Where does she go?" I howled.
And my mirror showed me the terraces from where she contemplated the mountains. I felt my anger disappear and my heart tightened. I didn't want to lose Beauty. The lucid part of my brain blew me that this desire could be very well due to something which I did not want especially: I was in love with Beauty.