storypaint (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
storypaint) wrote2009-01-05 01:40 pm
storypaint) wrote2009-01-05 01:40 pm
the Nature (of) (Beast/Belle)
Title: the Nature (of)
Day/Theme: Oct 1 // Waiting in the wings
Series: Disney's Beauty and the Beast
Pairing: Beauty/Beast
Rating: G
Excerpt: It was not a commonly known fact, in those days, that broken spells sometimes fractured, much like a poorly-broken egg. Sometimes bits and pieces remained.
Belle was used to waiting; it was a familiar thing. Before she met the Beast, she'd been waiting for her life to begin-- properly, like a girl from a storybook. Then she was waiting to leave, and hoping to stay, drowning in a sea of books without the right words to give him.
Now Belle waited for full moons.
It was not a commonly known fact, in those days, that broken spells sometimes fractured, much like a poorly-broken egg. Sometimes bits and pieces remained. The spell was old and the witch hadn't expected that it would ever be broken, in her bitterness, underestimating young hearts and dance steps and smart young women.
On full moon nights, the transformation burned, and it was on one of these nights that their son was born. He slipped from her body with blood on his fur and a feral glint in his newborn eyes.
They loved him, but the staff was very quiet.
*
Belle raised her son and loved her Beast, no matter what form either of them wore, but though the servants were quiet, the village gossiped. There was unease in their home, and as Belle rocked her babe to sleep, she rocked herself as well, from the ball of her foot to the heel, as though she was preparing to run.
She wondered why she still felt like she was waiting.
After six months, people began to carefully loiter around the gate, and when Maurice stumbled in one day, face bloody and bruised, the tension snapped.
The carriage scattered the loiterers when Belle left, but they returned to hovering like flies over carrion.
*
She had always been good at finding things, but it took her almost a year to find the right book. She returned to the castle on foot, with her son toddling alongside and the book tucked beneath her cloak.
The castle wasn't there anymore.
*
Finding her husband was not a difficult thing, but finding him alive was a honest surprise for her. There were burrs matted into his hair and old dirt on his cheek, but he was alive. It was the work of minutes to break him free. She whispered apologies the whole time, tears running down her face, but he pulled her into an embrace as soon as the chains were loosed. Their son hung back a little, wary of the father he hadn't seen in twelve months, but that could be soon redeemed.
This was the time.
They stumbled in the darkness to the edge of the forest, guided by the tiny sliver of moon, and the Beast clung as tightly to her hand as her son clung to her neck. The spell was simple and quick-- a good thing, since the dogs barked warning in the distance. Belle kissed him one last time and then spoke the words.
Three large beasts ran off into the dark.
Day/Theme: Oct 1 // Waiting in the wings
Series: Disney's Beauty and the Beast
Pairing: Beauty/Beast
Rating: G
Excerpt: It was not a commonly known fact, in those days, that broken spells sometimes fractured, much like a poorly-broken egg. Sometimes bits and pieces remained.
Belle was used to waiting; it was a familiar thing. Before she met the Beast, she'd been waiting for her life to begin-- properly, like a girl from a storybook. Then she was waiting to leave, and hoping to stay, drowning in a sea of books without the right words to give him.
Now Belle waited for full moons.
It was not a commonly known fact, in those days, that broken spells sometimes fractured, much like a poorly-broken egg. Sometimes bits and pieces remained. The spell was old and the witch hadn't expected that it would ever be broken, in her bitterness, underestimating young hearts and dance steps and smart young women.
On full moon nights, the transformation burned, and it was on one of these nights that their son was born. He slipped from her body with blood on his fur and a feral glint in his newborn eyes.
They loved him, but the staff was very quiet.
*
Belle raised her son and loved her Beast, no matter what form either of them wore, but though the servants were quiet, the village gossiped. There was unease in their home, and as Belle rocked her babe to sleep, she rocked herself as well, from the ball of her foot to the heel, as though she was preparing to run.
She wondered why she still felt like she was waiting.
After six months, people began to carefully loiter around the gate, and when Maurice stumbled in one day, face bloody and bruised, the tension snapped.
The carriage scattered the loiterers when Belle left, but they returned to hovering like flies over carrion.
*
She had always been good at finding things, but it took her almost a year to find the right book. She returned to the castle on foot, with her son toddling alongside and the book tucked beneath her cloak.
The castle wasn't there anymore.
*
Finding her husband was not a difficult thing, but finding him alive was a honest surprise for her. There were burrs matted into his hair and old dirt on his cheek, but he was alive. It was the work of minutes to break him free. She whispered apologies the whole time, tears running down her face, but he pulled her into an embrace as soon as the chains were loosed. Their son hung back a little, wary of the father he hadn't seen in twelve months, but that could be soon redeemed.
This was the time.
They stumbled in the darkness to the edge of the forest, guided by the tiny sliver of moon, and the Beast clung as tightly to her hand as her son clung to her neck. The spell was simple and quick-- a good thing, since the dogs barked warning in the distance. Belle kissed him one last time and then spoke the words.
Three large beasts ran off into the dark.
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