Darkness had brought the Rossetti Beast. Gareth's heart plummeted to his feet as an icy, unforgiving dread clutched at his chest while the villagers all but announced his arrival.
His wife stiffened beside him, clutching at the skirts of her dress as the last remnants of color drained from her face to an ashen white. "Gareth?"
"Everything will be fine, my dear," he consoled gently, but failed to quell the trepidation in his own voice.
"Papa, surely there is something else we could do?" Elsa implored, her voice strained with the effort of holding back her tears.
"I'll not let him take me!" Esme spat, anger setting flame to her blue eyes.
Despite his fears, Gareth straightened with a wince, gathering what little pride he maintained to peer sternly at his daughters. "Mind your tongues, daughters. Our lordship has provided us generously, and you will remember your manners – "
"Your manners are wasted."
Gareth froze, fear shackling him in place as his gaze swiveled to the menacing frame of the Rossetti Beast looming formidably at his threshold. A man of large and broad proportions, Rossetti's shoulders spanned the width of the door-frame, blocking all view of the villagers piling outside. He heard his daughters' hitched breaths as they gazed upon the wicked and perilous Don Rossetti. Garbed entirely in black, naught could be made of the face obscured in the shadow of his hood, but Gareth knew the harsh masculinity that lay within. All that could be perceived was the unsettling, glint of his unworldly steel-gray eyes.
He ducked beneath the door-frame and stepped further into their hut, his massive size all but overpowering the limited space of the wattle-enclosed room. Gareth cringed, a lump lodging in his throat as his daughters drew closer to his side.
He could feel Rossetti's intense perusal as he studied the four of them beneath the brim of his hood, and then he asked the question Gareth feared most.
"Where is the third?" he grumbled darkly.
Gareth blanched, "Third, my lord?"
"Do not play me for a fool, Duncan." Rossetti snarled warningly. "You have three daughters."
His stomach churned as dread prickled beneath his skin. He hadn't wanted a life of servitude for Elle. Not his gentle, fragile Elle. She could not withstand Rossetti's cruelty. He shook his head and motioned with a trembling hand to his fair-haired daughters, "My lord – "
"Do you challenge the terms of our bargain then?" Rossetti's voice became harsher, colder.
Gareth gave a morose shake of his head, "Of course not, your lordship."
"Then you will not delay any longer in producing the third to me."
His shoulders bowing, Gareth shifted to Cora who appeared all the more stricken as he instructed gingerly, "Find Elle, my dear."
**************
Rossetti studied the two women presented to him from beneath the brim of his hood and felt naught but displeasure and ire. It wasn't as though they were uncomely – on the contrary, they were both strikingly beautiful with flaxen hair and fair eyes, but 'twas the fear and revulsion that gleamed from their blue eyes that enraged him.
He could easily dismiss this senselessness and be done with it, but that would encourage the villagers to undermine his authority, and if he could not have their respect, well, he would take their contempt. But he needn't a sniveling woman to coddle and pamper, and if the third were anything like her sisters he would simply settle for the old man.
And yet, he could not fathom as to why he had entertained the peasant to begin with. It would appear that neither of his daughters was eager to be carried off like a sack of grain, not that he expected a warm greeting. Mayhap he should oblige them and return to his desolate, chipped stone walls. But that thought only fueled his anger and he nearly chuckled aloud. That's what they wanted, the Rossetti Beast to reside in his blackened hell to never intrude upon their tranquility. Well be that as it may, he was indeed a spear of cruelty, and would wield it accordingly.
A noise alerted him that the serf's wife had returned. He twisted around, fully expecting to find the third daughter resembling her fair-haired siblings, but was stunned to find that the woman presented to him was none other than the dark-haired nymph he had encountered at the edge of the forest, and in that moment, he felt the tug and pull of a gratifying grin.
***********
Elle wanted to be brave in the presence of the ruthless Don Rossetti, but was daunted by the air of distinction and menace she felt radiating from his presence.
"Your lordship – " she heard her father announce with a tremor, " – this is my youngest, Elle."
Her heart skipped a solid beat at the scrape of his boots, and somewhere within her mind an alarming bell chimed with ominous recognition. Her mouth parted and a hitched, tremulous breath escaped her.
"Tell me, Duncan, why you deemed it necessary to conceal your daughter from me?"
Elle paled beneath that velvety, masculine pitch as panic slithered down her spine like icy, skeletal fingers. Nay. How could she have not known? She had been alone with the Rossetti Beast? He had been the one conversing so casually of kissing her? Her heart all but accelerated tenfold, pushing short, fleeting breaths from her lungs as her knees threatened to buckle out of fear.
Her father cleared his throat nervously, "She is different, my lord. I did not think she could serve you well as oppose to my elder daughters."
Elle winced as if struck. Her father had never openly addressed her blindness and though she imagined it was meant to thwart Rossetti; his insensitive remark essentially implied that she was useless – and it stung. She felt belittled and though matters of vanity had never concerned her before, a small voice at the back of her mind couldn't help but wonder if Rossetti found her becoming in the slightest. The village men had never pursued her, not like her sisters, they were the pretty ones. She was the village oddity; the plain one. What man, even one as frightening and fearsome as the Rossetti Beast, would find her comely?
Yet, somehow she sensed her father's thoughtless comment had struck an angry chord in Rossetti. She felt a sudden shift in the air, a darkening tide of bristling anger that emanated from him like an imminent flaring of flames.
"Mayhap I should relieve you of your burden then," he snarled ominously.
Elle's heart sank until she felt it's deadening weight in her belly. She felt Rossetti's eyes on her and rather than unleash the tears stabbing at the back of her eyes, she pursued her mouth to still its trembling.
"My lord, I beseech you, please do not take my daughter," her father pleaded, "I cannot bear to part with her."
"You cannot bear to part with her?" Rossetti sneered. "But you readily insult her?"
"S-she is my youngest," her father murmured dejectedly.
"And clearly your heart," Rossetti grumbled harshly. "So, I will claim her to pay your debt to me."
Cora let out a cry and hastened forward to embrace Elle.
"M-may I inquire as to how long, your lordship?"
"When I feel that your debt is paid in full, Duncan. I will return your daughter when I see fit."
"My lord, excuse my frankness, but is there not another way – "
A menacing and otherworldly growl arose from Rossetti's throat as he stalked forward, "You forget yourself, Duncan. We had an agreement, one which I fulfilled sparing no expense. However and whichever means I choose to see your debt settled, is my decision solely, understood?"
Gareth bowed his head and gave a begrudging nod. "Aye, forgive me, your lordship."
"See to your farewells," Rossetti muttered gravely before stalking out into the night.
Her mother managed to gather some of her belongings, stuffing them into a leather satchel. Elle felt numb inside as she pressed a kiss to her mother's tear-laden cheek and then turned to hug her sisters. When it came to bidding her father goodbye, she could do no more than envelop him stiffly. She knew he hadn't meant offense, but his words had left a residual sting on her heart.
As her mother led her outside, the night air seemed colder and harsher against her face. She shivered within her cloak as she clutched at its edges. Her ears burning once more with the rustling of flagrant whispers roused from villagers gathering nearby, likely to catch a glimpse of the Rossetti Beast.
"It is him! It is the beast!" a man exclaimed alarmingly, rousing a tide of tangible fear and panic as a collective amount of hushed tones and gasps carried to Elle's ears.
"Surely Duncan is not permitting this!" a woman interjected from the crowd, "William, you must stop this!" she implored.
Elle recognized the older couple as Rowena and William Harcourt. William worked alongside her father in the fields and Rowena dabbled with herbs and medicine. They were a sensible couple and had always been kind to her – but like all the others, had kept their distance.
"God's teeth, woman, what would you have me do?" William asked with a hint of incredulity and apprehension. "There is naught we can do for the lass."
"We shan't let him take her! Just what will that poor girl suffer at his hands?" Rowena insisted, stirring other voices to mirror her concern.
"Your wife is right, William, there are more than enough men here to overthrow the beast! Is their not strength in numbers?" Elle recognized the younger man's voice from earlier. It was Abram. "Let's put an end to his tyranny!" he shouted, his voice carrying raucously over the assemblage of voices.
A simultaneous round of murmurs, both concurring and opposing, circulated the crowd. Words like monstrous and vicious falling subsequently on the air.
"Confound it, lad!" William snapped, "Don't be a fool! Abandon that notion at once before you get us all killed!"
"It isn't right, William," Rowena's voice came again but this time her conviction was half-hearted, having a good sense of fear.
"Rowena – " William growled in warning and at last, his wife acquiesced him, deserting Elle to her fate.
"Let him take the plain Duncan! Better her than any of us!"
"Aye!" several voices cried in earnest.
Elle blanched; her mouth slackening with disbelief. Their forsaking her was the equivalent of a slap, and for a moment, her expression gave way to heartbreak. There was no one that would fight for her. They had all abandoned her; eager to forfeit her, the village oddity, in lieu of them.
She hardened her expression, quickly rivaling the tears that threatened to undo her; the trembling of her lower lip being the only breach in her composure before she managed to rein it back.
"You cowards!" Abram bellowed with a bloodthirstiness that made Elle flinch. "Now is the time to fight!"
An ominous peal of rustic laughter rang out before Rossetti's voice thundered above the rising chaos, the rage and challenge in his gruff tone unmistakable, "Do you think it wise to rise against me? Do you think to draw your blades or mayhap instill propriety in me? Your efforts are in vain, but by all means, I implore you to try."
Elle's heart plummeted at the warning as a frightened breath snagged in her throat. With some of the villagers' opinions voiced aloud, it put her current plight into perspective. What dreaded fate awaited her while in Lord Rossetti's possession? Did he intend to harm her? Did he expect her to share his bed?
Inhaling deeply of the cold, autumn air, she tried to subdue her fears. It wouldn't be long before Elsa married. She would bear children and live a life of intended happiness. And Esme, being the most willful and strongest of the three, could aid her parents in a way she never could.
No. It had to be her. At least in this sense, she could prove them wrong and be of value to her family. She would no longer be a burden to them.
The villagers fell silent against Rossetti's deadly warning. No one dared to dispute him, not even Abram who had settled into an enraged silence.
*************
Don mounted his horse, gnashing his teeth against the sudden rage running rampant in his veins as he scowled from beneath his hood at the crowd of onlookers. The bastards. He would not encourage their beliefs of him any further but instead, turned his steed about to better survey his acquired prize. With her small hand nestled trustingly in the crook of her mother's arm, she trudged forward with an aura of fortitude that the entire village lacked. She did not weep like her fair-haired sisters trailing her heels, or betray a hint of fear, though he surmised it was just beneath the surface. Nay, she accepted her fate wholeheartedly in place of her family.
"My lord," Duncan stepped forward, noticing the mare alongside him. "She cannot ride alone."
"I will guide her horse. Make haste." Don averted his gaze to glare from beneath his hooded brim to the remaining crowd of spectators as their scrutinizing stares reached to his face.
His gaze swung back around as Duncan led his daughter toward the mare. He watched as she reached with trembling hands to the animal, but sensing her unease, the mare shifted nervously away with a neigh of protest.
Muttering a curse, Don swung his leg over and leapt to the ground.
He noticed the stiffening of her shoulders at his abrupt approach, giving him a moment's pause before nudging Duncan aside. He swept her effortlessly into his arms and deposited her in the saddle. It was a brief contact, but one that left a lasting, shocking desire to hold her once again in his arms.
He grabbed her small hand and fastened it firmly around the pommel, commanding brusquely, "Hold tight."
Don mounted his horse once more and seized their reins all in one motion, and with a swift nudge to his steed's flank, proceeded onward. The villagers scrambled from his path, their churlish manners burdening his ears as their eyes sought to catch a glimpse of what lay beyond his brim. He ground his teeth and suppressed a snarl. Their condemning stares bespoke their adverse thoughts, some eyeing the girl as though she were a sacrificial lamb and he, the devil incarnate.
The thought enraged him and he would have gladly swept down from his horse to demonstrate just how beastly he could be, but something stayed him in his pending violence.
He peered back at the girl. Her slender shoulders bowed beneath her coarse cloak, her staid demeanor splintering away at her strength, imparting to him a glimpse of that anguish and pain he had perceived earlier when affronted with the villagers' callous remarks.
Contemptible swine, all of them!
Her mouth quivered with only the faintest indication of arrested tears. Her dark hair, which was restrained to a plait, caught the wind, pulling unruly strands to frame her solemn face.
And yet, she still did not cry.
**********