In the time I have been upstairs, Beast has carted away the sheltering hay bales and trained the center bushes up on stakes to form an elegant arch over the drive from the gilded gate all the way up to the front steps. His roses must be visible all the way to the town. I recall my first glimpse of the chateau from the tavern at the inn, shining like gold on the crest of the green hill. What must it look like now, bursting with red roses in the late-winter landscape?
In another moment, the sun has drawn Beast outside. Indeed, he’s in such a hurry to get to his garden, launching himself downstairs at a gallop, paws-first, that he misses his footing on the dew-slicked steps. I see his body stretch out in midair for an instant, paws flailing for balance, as he plunges helplessly forward. And then, impossibly, the feathers down his back spread apart into two giant sail-like spans that catch the air for a heartbeat until Beast can get his hooves under him again.
For that one moment, he is flying.
Beast is no less astonished than I am. After landing on the gravel track, he rises up on his hooves, his great shaggy head twisting backward as far as it will go, muzzle snuffling at the feathers that carpet his shoulders, under his mane. He reaches one paw back, grooming at the feathers with his claws, then straightens his posture a little more, poised on his hooves, and gives his shoulders a mighty shake. But the wings do not rise again; the feathers have all resettled themselves back into their dormant position. He is quiet for some time, pondering. Then he slowly turns his head back to look up at me, my light burning still in the window. His witness.
Beast retrieves me every evening after he has hunted and fed, and we make our nightly progress to the library. His touch is tender in a way it never was when his hands were human. He composes no more verses but still browses among the books. Sometimes he sprawls across the carpet as he reads or stretches his huge bulk in the armchair, his hooves propped up on the padded footstool. It’s a curiously human posture, almost grotesquely so, yet it seems to suit him. His wings do not stir again; the rows of feathers down his back are just another mismatched body part, like his fur and mane and hooves, to be managed as best they can.
Tonight, when Beast takes me up to the library, he is also carrying a large leather pouch bound with a dark ribbon that he found in Jean-Loup’s study downstairs, the room in which the chevalier once condemned his secretary to the stocks. When he folds the pouch open on the writing table, under my light, I see that it contains scores of papers, some loose, others bound in small ledger books; they are mostly marked with columns of figures, but there are other lengthier notations as well, in a neat, crimped hand that must be Monsieur Treville’s. Beast is entirely absorbed in reading through the papers for a long while, his expression growing ever darker until he is scowling down at them. What can it matter now if the chevalier’s accounts are out of order? But Beast finds them so disturbing that, at last, with an angry groan, he shoves aside pouch, papers, and all.
“What poor use Jean-Loup made of his life,” Beast grumbles. “What did he need with more wealth, titles, and possessions?” He glances again at the pile of papers. “Fruitless lawsuits, crippling taxes, selfish extravagances,” he mutters, shaking his head. “And what is there now to show for it? This empty house, these lonely grounds.”
He rises to his hooves, catches me up, and sets me on a higher bookshelf nearby, as if to deny my illumination to the papers and the grim evidence they contain. He sinks down to the chair again, but he is still agitated.
“The Villeneuve estate,” he goes on glumly. “What good was it? Was there not honor enough in this property, this house, this lineage? And never a thought spared for the welfare of the seigneurie or the dependents who labored for him. He did not value these things, or his affairs would not be such — such a testament to arrogance and cruelty.”
It amazes me to hear these words in Beast’s mouth, but it angers me, too, to think he would try to deny any part in Jean-Loup’s crimes. I feel my flames burning hotter.
Beast glances again at the papers, shaking his head in disgust. “What a mess he made of everything,” he mutters.
I suppose you could have done better.
Beast freezes to the spot for an instant, staring at me, ears pricked up, his tufted jaw dropping open an inch or two. Then he clambers up to peer at me more intently, his expression wonderstruck, his dark eyes aglow in my flame. “I heard that,” he says, his voice hushed. “I am not dreaming. That was you! You can . . .”
Yes, I can, I agree, shaping my thoughts with care, the ones I wish to share with him. Never have I felt so moved to communicate with him, not since the day I urged him to water his roses. When it’s important enough.
Beast peels his gaze off me for an instant to glance at the tabletop crowded with Jean-Loup’s papers, and then his eyes rise again to me.
“I could scarcely have done any worse,” he huffs, shaking his head, “if I had been here. But . . .”
Then a new thought takes hold of him; I can see it in his widening eyes.
“Were you here?” Then he frowns at me. “You weren’t him, were you?”
My flames shoot up so suddenly in outrage that Beast actually backs away a step, but his expression looks relieved.
“Then who were . . .” He pauses, reconsiders. “Who are you?”
I was called Lucie.
If my name is familiar to him for any reason, he gives no indication, only continues to hover there, afraid to move, lest the fragile connection between us should burst like a bubble of soap.
“And you lived here? At the chateau? Were you mistress of this place?”
And as wary as I am, I’m surprised at how exhilarating it is, to have a kind of voice again. And someone to hear it.
Mistress of a chamber or two, where I swept and scrubbed.
“A maid!” he cries, as if it were the noblest occupation on earth, and I the queen of all maids.
Yes. One of many.
“That must have been a thankless enough task in this big place,” says Beast. “Were you happy here?”
I would be frowning in confusion if I could. Jean-Loup cared no more for the feelings of a servant than he did for the beauty of a rose. And the chevalier would know better than anyone how little reason I had to be happy here.
But Beast continues to gaze at me, expecting an answer, in all apparent innocence. As I study his face, from where I’ve been stuck up here among the books, I also notice a spider busily spinning in a shadowy corner of this shelf just out of my light. Beast’s gaze is too intent on me at the moment to see it. If he is playing some game, it is my turn to move.
I would be happier now down on the desk, where I could see you better.
Beast reaches for me, so eagerly he doesn’t notice when his paw snags the new web — until the spider drops into his fur and starts scrambling up his arm.
I wait for his shriek of terror at the very least. But when Beast catches sight of the spider, he only pauses for a moment, arm still outstretched.
“Sorry, old goodwife,” he murmurs, sliding his other paw under the creature and lifting her gently back up to her shelf.
He takes me up and calmly sets me back down to the writing desk, not the least bit disturbed by the encounter.
But my thoughts are reeling.
The only time I ever saw the chevalier completely lose command of himself, shuddering in horror, was when an unfortunate spider touched him. He could not help his response at that time; it was an impulse he could not control. How could he now pretend not to be affected?
I can think of only one answer.
Somehow, as impossible as it seems, this is not Jean-Loup.
It’s grown darker outside. A storm is gathering. The wind whistles like an eerie flute, and rain spits at the window like handfuls of gravel. The weather seems as disturbed as my thoughts.