"You idiot! They were both in your hands! How could you miss? How could you possibly miss when he was ten feet from you? You-,"
"It was a blizzard! You expect me to shoot straight in that?" Avoln spat.
"I expect you to do the job I'm paying you to do!" the Enchantress shrieked.
"Well a little backup would have been helpful!"
"You shouldn't need backup!" she shot back, getting in the hunter's face. She looked about ready to breathe fire. She didn't look pretty when she was angry. In fact, she looked more monstrous than the Beast.
"Coward!" Avoln bellowed. He saw the tiniest change in her steely eyes that was quickly concealed, but for him it was enough.
"You're just as scared as everyone else of that monster," Avoln continued with a grin. "That's why you won't do it yourself, isn't it?"
"How dare you! I should add you to my pack for that insult! I should-,"
"But you won't," Avoln said, calm now. "You know there's no one else crazy enough to hunt the Beast in the middle of winter. Or hunt it at all for that matter. And you're too scared to do it yourself."
"You-,"
Avoln raised a hand and waved away the rest of her sentence.
"Come find me when you've finished your temper tantrum, Enchantress. Our deal is still on, so long as I don't end up as a wolf. I'll be waiting."
* * *
I groaned. The noise hurt my head. My eyelids felt heavy and I wanted to slip away into unconsciousness again. I forced my head to turn and I squirmed in place a little to keep myself awake. It was important that I woke up. I needed to wake up.
I moved my shoulder and winced. I lay still again and groaned.
"Come on Annalise, get up," I muttered, "come on girl." I sounded like I was calling to a puppy in my sleep. I forced my uninjured shoulder up with an enormous heave and toppled off the couch, smashing my injured shoulder and ankle into the black marble. I shrieked and my eyes snapped open wide at the intense pain. I rolled off my injured side of my body and onto my back, wide awake now, and panting like a bloodhound. My chest heaved and the pain in my shoulder blazed to new life. Stabbing pains ran up my ankle. I gritted my teeth and tensed.
After a few more moments I felt my shoulder. My hand came back bloodless, and I sighed in relief. I twisted my head slightly to look and my shoulder and saw that the sleeve of my earth colored dress had been cut off so my shoulder was exposed to the open air. A white bandage had been bound tightly around it with a dry, brown splotch staining the middle. My ankle had been wrapped up as well. Had one of the servants done it? Rowena maybe?
I looked around from my position on the floor but saw no one. The ceiling was high and dark, lined with wooden buttresses, but there was cold, white marble beneath me as well. At this point I could have been anywhere in the castle, but as soon as I turned my head I realized that I was in a place I'd never visited before. A furry mound lay before a giant hearth, which had a strong fire blazing in its belly. On the wall above it was a massive engraving of a coat of arms, which proudly displayed a male lion's regal head, mid-roar, with two crossed swords just behind it. Heads of animals, hunting trophies I presumed, bordered the insignia.
I closed my eyes and thought of the tavern back in the village. It was similar in the way of hunting trophies and large fire, but not the coat of arms. This scene was more similar to the inside of Avoln's hunting lodge, which I had once had the displeasure of being given an extensive tour of. This was warm though, unlike Avoln's cabin. The animals on the wall seemed regal and majestic instead of dull and lifeless.
Adam did say he liked hunting.
But my mind didn't stay put for long.
But how did I get here? I guess the servants must have carried me in. I must have gotten knocked out when the Beast fell- The Beast! Where is he?
I scrambled into a sitting position, ignoring the protesting pain coming from my shoulder and frantically scanned the room. He was there, lying in a furry heap before the fire, and I had failed to recognize his black silhouette. I crawled over to him with a throbbing head, arm and ankle.
I pressed my bare palm gently in the center of his chest, felt the thunderous thumping beneath his fur and breathed a sigh of relief. It was weaker than the first night I'd spent in the castle, but not gone. I could barely see the slight rise and fall of his chest, and without a heartbeat to reassure me I might not have believed him to be alive.
He'd been attended to as well while unconscious. The arrow had been removed from his shoulder and someone had tightly bandaged it so that the only clue of the wound was the dried, rusty splotch that stained the cloth. The fur on his chest was warm, thick, and had a golden sheen to it when it caught the firelight. I glanced at his face. Despite its twistedness it looked...peaceful. The Beast's thick mane of shaggy, golden-brown fur was splayed across the floor like the lion's in the coat of arms above the fireplace. His dark, crimson cloak lay in ragged folds around him and for the first time I failed to see a monster.
He'd come after me and saved my life. He'd taken an arrow in my defense. He was...
I mulled over the word to use. Was he evil? Animal? Monstrous? Maybe...good? And yet at the thought of that last word I had to wonder, could I think of him that way? Moments before rescuing me he'd been, well, a beast. I'd seen first hand the savagery he was capable of, the bloodshed he'd wrought. Today alone, he'd scared me half to death, and could have killed me.
But he hadn't.
In fact, every time the Beast had come close to harming me, he'd always restrained himself, no matter how hard he'd had to fight his animal side. There wasn't a scratch on my body inflicted by the Beast.
So what was I supposed to think? Was he a monster, or was he kind and gentle disguised under an unpredictable, violent nature? Was there good hidden beneath his beastly exterior? I laid my head on his chest, drinking in his comforting heartbeat and closed my eyes. The Beast let out something that sounded like a contented sigh.
"What are you?" I murmured. No. No, that wasn't the right word. Not anymore.
I revised myself,
"Who are you?"
Was it me, or did his heart race along a little faster? The barest smile played across my lips. lay myself back down with my head nestled in the Beast's chest. It was warm and soft like a slightly firm pillow, and his heartbeat was soothing...
As I drifted off again I heard a faint whispering. Perhaps it was my sleepy mind making voices. Perhaps they were angels watching over me. Maybe it was the spirit of my mother. I didn't know, but the words the voices spoke soothed my troubled mind.
"I told you so."
"One moment doesn't mean it's for a lifetime."
"You're right of course, but I think there's hope at least."
"You really think she can do it?"
"Of course she can, I just hope it's in time."
* * *
"Annalise!"
I turned just in time to receive a crushing hug. I spent a few disoriented moments in his arms before I realized who was holding me.
"Adam?"
He drew away quickly, holding me at arm's length, a hand on each of my shoulders.
"Are you okay? The Beast didn't hurt you, did he?" he said. His green eyes betrayed concern, an emotion I couldn't remember seeing in them before.
"Yes, yes, I'm okay," I said.
"What about the hunter? He didn't-"
"The arrow just grazed me. It was scary, but it's not too bad. It just hurts. I think my ankle is twisted or sprained or something, but I don't know. Although," I said, my expression morphing into one of confusion, "I can't feel it now. I guess the dreams are different."
"I thought you were going to die out there," Adam said.
I looked down.
"So did I."
"What about the Beast? Is he...still a monster?"
"A monster," I murmured. "No. No, he's not a monster. He never was. That's not him. At least, I don't think so. I can't really explain it."
"Do you really believe that? Do you really believe you could ever trust the likes of him?"
There was something soft and painful in his voice, something I didn't understand.
"I- I don't know," I said, truthfully. "but I guess he just needs another chance. We all make mistakes. He just...makes more than others."
His emerald gaze turned soft for a moment, like the shutters on a window opening the barest crack. Through it, I thought I saw a sliver of hope shining through. But then the shutters closed, and they were back to adamant crystal.
"I'm sorry about your fiance."
"Oh."
Fresh memories of Jean rushed forward but I stuffed them away.
"He was good in the end I guess. And it really wasn't the Beast's fault. I just don't understand why he kept him alive."
A small breeze tickled my neck and blew a few locks of my hair out of place.
"Maybe you should ask him," Adam said. "I'm sure he had a reason."
"Everyone has reasons," I said. "Jean and Avoln had reasons. My father has reasons, my sisters have reasons, the Beast has reasons. Just because they have them, doesn't mean they're good ones."
The wind began to pick up, buffeting my skirt and hair in every direction.
"Can't say I disagree. The Enchantress had hers. I have mine. Though I find they're changing of late."
"What-"
But before I could get the rest of the sentence out the wind howled as fiercely as any wolf. Adam was fading, dissolving into darkness. I stretched out a hand but couldn't touch him. Everything was lost in a howl of wind but one last outraged shout from Adam burst in my ears,
"Jayla!"
And then the last wisps of my dream vanished into a wolfish howl and darkness thick as tar.
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So...lots of reaction and not a terribly large amount of reaction. Sorry. I know it's been a while, but I promise, after the swim team season is over I will be putting up updates much faster than this.
Also, Marty Mcfly arrives in the future in about five days or so. So where the heck are the hoverboards?!
And I'm getting off track and should be doing my homework...
So, please leave questions and predictions in the comments, vote and I will see you all soon!