Beauty and The Beast {Klance AU}

Paris Of My Childhood

A few days later, Lance finds himself looking for Keith. Wondering around the garden he spots him sitting on the edge of the fountain. Lance smiles to himself and approaches him and sees he's reading a book, "What are you reading?"

Keith tries to hide the book from Lance but he still got a glimpse of the title, "Nothing."

"Guinevere and Lancelot?" Lance questions Keith.

"Well actually, King Arthur and the Round Table. Knights, and men, and swords and things..." Keith blushes.

Lance sit's on the fountain's ledge, next to Keith, "But still... it's a romance."

Keith looks away and nods, "All right. I felt like a change."

Lance doesn't pick up on the mood of the conversation and continues with what he wanted to talk about, "Anyways, I never thanked you for saving my life."

"Well, I never thanked you... for not leaving me to be eaten by wolves," Keith replies.

Lance chuckles and looks at Keith, studying his face in silence. That silence is soon interrupted by some of the servants howling in laughter from a castle window. Keith and Lance look to the window where some of the servants sit laughing and joking around before turning their attention back to each other. Exchanging some small smiles Lance and Keith chuckle.

"They know how to have a good time." Lance motions towards the castle.

"Yes. But when I enter the room, laughter dies." Keith says solemnly. 

"Me, too. The villagers say that I'm a 'funny guy,' but I don't think they mean it as a compliment."

"I'm sorry. Your village sounds terrible."

"Almost as lonely as your castle."

The two share a moment of silence before Keith turns to Lance with a small smile, "What do you say we run away?"

"We what?" Lance raises an eyebrow at Keith. But before he can get an answer Keith has a tight grip on his arm and is dragging him up the stairs into the castle.

"Keith, what are you planning?!" Lance asks but gets no reply.

Keith only walks quicker as he drags Lance into the library. He drags Lance over to the table that they had previously had stacked up books on. He lets go of Lance who is fairly confused and unlocks one of drawers of the cabinets under the table and pulls out an old dusty book. He sets the book on the table and looks at Lance, "Another little 'gift' from the Enchantress..."

Keith opens the book up to an atlas of the world. There are no country names, just land, and sea, "A book that truly allows you to escape."

"How amazing..." Lance says, moving closer to the dusty golden glowing book. 

He looks to Keith who has his gaze stuck to the book, "It was her cruelest trick of all. The outside world has no place for a creature like me. But it can for you."

Keith places his hand on the book and looks to Lance. Lance nods and places his hand on top of Keith's then looks back to him for more instructions.

"Think of the place you've most wanted to see. First, see it in your mind's eye. Now feel it in your heart." Keith says.

It doesn't take Lance long to think of a place. A bright light surrounds the two but disappears quickly, leaving the pair in an old dusty attic of a windmill.

"Where did you take us?" Keith asks.

"Paris,"

Keith looks out a small circle shaped window, "Oh, I love Paris. What would you like to see first? Notre Dame? The Champs- Elysées? No? Too touristy?"

He looks back to Lance, who is on the verge of tears, "It’s so much smaller than I imagined..."

Lance walks around the crumbling room, seeing his mother's old easel and old music boxes. He stumbles upon the old cribs that his siblings once slept in, now falling apart along with the rest of the home. Biting back tears Lance sings quietly, "This is the Paris of my childhood..  These were the borders of my life.  In this crumbling dusty attic...  Where an artist loved her life. I thought that I would find an answer.. Here where her heart has always lived.. Now I see it’s empty and abandoned...  Easy to remember..  Harder to move on..  Knowing that the Paris of my childhood Is gone... "

Letting a tear fall from his watery eyes,  Lance looks around once more and spots something shiny tucked into the side of a crib. He grabs the object and realizes it's something his mother was making for his sister.  An old heart shaped rattle. Keith looks over Lance's should and at the heart shaped rattle then back to the crumbling home, "What happened to your father?"

"That’s the only story Mama could never
bring herself to tell. And I knew better than to ask..." Lance whispers.

As Lance explains, Keith looks around once more and spots an old pointy mask on a chair and mutters, "Plague.."

Lance looks around as memories come flooding back. His mother rushing him out with his younger brother Marco. Waiting in the horse drawn carriage for their parents. Then the memories change to his mother's. His mother is holding baby Luis and the heart shaped rattle. His father on his death bed.

"Leave... Before it takes them too.. " His father whispers.

Luis takes the rattle from their mother, but as she turns to leave he accidentally drops it. Leaving the heart shaped rattle for his future sister behind with their dying father.

The vision-like memories stop and Lance turns to Keith with red watery eyes. Keith had seen the memories as well.

"I am sorry I ever called your mother a thief.." Keith apologies.

Lance looks back to the old rattle and mutters, "Let's go home..."

Keith nods and takes his hand. The same bright light surrounds the pair once more and disappears just quickly as they return back to the castle's library.