Clouds gather in an instant on a wicked faery wind, obscuring the night sky. I feel my mare tense and snort as lightning strikes in the distance but she stays her course, flying so fast through the woods I would think she wasn’t moving at all, were it not for the beat of her hooves. Then we emerge onto the open fields and the sound is lost amidst the furious thunderclaps.
Lightning strikes a lone tree nearby. The mare rears and I grasp onto her mane to keep my seat. By sheer force of will I remain on her back and calm her enough to continue past the burning trunk toward my village. The driving rain stings my face and eyes; my hands are numb holding the reins. I do not let up.
Our cottage is near the edge of the village, just past the bridge now threatened by the swollen, churning waters of the creek. I race across it, heading toward the only home I’ve ever known. I hope and pray that I will find Marguerite there.
The cottage is dark. No candlelight flickers in the windows, no gentle puff of smoke rises up from the weathered chimney. My head knows what my heart refuses to accept: Marguerite would not be without a fire on a night like this. I dismount and push open the groaning door, shouting Marguerite’s name even though I know she is not there. I call out again and again. I search around the cottage and in the small barn. It is empty, as it has been for years.
My dress is soaked through, the skirts tangling around my legs as I make my way back to the mare waiting trustingly where I left her. I am chilled to the bone but strangely the cold does not bother me. My shaking now has nothing to do with the icy rain and everything to do with my horrifying suspicion. I know where to find Marguerite.
“Please God let me be wrong,” I pray, mounting the mare again. I slow my pace through the flooding village streets, dreading my destination. Water splashes up with each step my mare takes. The mud will loosen soon, making the going too treacherous to continue. I must make it to Marguerite before then.
Past the church square the streets widen. It is a straight road through the village to the hill where the Lafarge estate towers over everything, a majestic monarch watching over its subjects. Torches are burning on either side of the entrance, and every window of the house is aglow with light. No doubt there is a fire lit in every hearth but there is nothing warm about it.
I leave the mare untethered and pick up skirts weighted down with water to climb the marble staircase. The door before me is iron like a prison cage and the knocker is in the shape of a demonic gargoyle. Not even the Beast’s lion head knocker had ever infused me with so much dread. I raise the heavy thing and let it drop. The ominous gong is underscored by thunder.
A flash of lightning turns the world briefly blue and when darkness returns, there is only the smoking torchlight to see by when the heavy door slowly opens.
“Lyssette,” Monsieur Lafarge says in greeting, his sickly wrinkled face creasing into a semblance of a smile. He is nearly of a height with me, his weathered body disguised with expensive clothes. His hair has been white for as long as I have known him and in his advanced age it is thinning, making him appear even more skeletal. “I rather hoped to see you again.”
“I received your message,” I tell him, grateful that my teeth stopped chattering long enough for me to speak clearly.
“Did you? Then you’ve come to offer your congratulations? I humbly accept.”
“I’ve come to take my sister home.”
His laugh is more of a cough. “Fanciful child. What do you imagine she will say to that?”
“Whatever is on her mind, she will say it to me directly.”
I put all my weight against that door to open it fully. He has no choice but to allow it, weak as he is. I care nothing for the frailty of his age. “I want to see her now,” I say coming inside. It is terribly rude to barge into someone’s home uninvited. Then again, so is coercing one’s sister into an ill suited marriage.
“Of course,” Lafarge says. “I live but to serve.” A devil’s words. The door closes behind me with a resounding gong like a massive church bell. “I believe your sister is in the back parlor.”
I take that as an invitation to find my own way. The halls I pass through are filled with portraits looking down on me. The Lafarge mansion is not one tenth the size of the Beast’s castle, yet the maze-like passages make it seem endless. I call out Marguerite’s name again and again, getting more worried each time she does not respond.
“Marguerite, answer me! Where are you?”
At last I hear her reedy voice and hasten my footsteps to the parlor at the end of the hall. Only the hearth fire burns low to illuminate the room. My sister sits primly in a rocking chair which does not move. She is composed and dressed in a lovely violet gown but her hair is loose, falling in unruly waves to her waist and hiding one side of her face.
“Why are you here?” she asks in a brittle voice.
I draw nearer. “I received word that you are to be married. I had to see for myself.”
“You’ve seen me. It is true.” She smiles cruelly. “I’m to be married to a man of means. You can go back to your monster.”
“Is this truly what you want?” It cannot be. Everything about this place, about Lafarge and my sister is wrong. I don’t know what it is, but dread ties my insides into knots.
“It is,” Marguerite says. “I want you to leave. You are not welcome in this house.”
“Marguerite, I—”
“Go!” she shouts and her eyes glitter as her hands curl into fists in her lap. More softly, she adds, “For God’s sake, Lyssette, get out of here.”
I rush to her and take her face in my hands. She flinches and I brush her hair aside, gasping at the sight her face presents. Her eye is swollen nearly shut and a dark bruise mars her features from her temple to her chin. “My God, Marguerite. Who did this to you?”
Marguerite’s tears spill down her cheeks. “It’s you he wants,” she whispers.
I do not waste time. Taking her hand, I pull her to her feet. “We’re leaving. Now.” Lafarge has not yet caught up to me. There is no telling what he is planning but I don’t intend to be here when he gets around to it.
The parlor, more of a gentleman’s smoking room, has no other door except the one I entered through. There are swords crossed above the hearth, too far for me to reach, but a pair of pistols gleams in an intricate case on the mantle. I know nothing of weapons; not even how to check if it is loaded. The weight of it in my hand comforts me, as it frightens me.
I lead the way out into the hall but cannot remember the way I came. I turn corner after corner, try every door I come to. The ones which are unlocked open onto more rooms with no other way out. Lafarge’s laughter echoes all around; it is impossible to tell where the sound is coming from. He is mocking us and Marguerite is already weeping with fright.
Just as I am about to lose hope, I open a door and see the garden through the windows. We will have to climb through them. I thank God they are low enough to the ground to do it. I help Marguerite through as quietly as possible and follow her outside.
The lightning has abated but the rain is still strong.
“Lyssette!” Lafarge’s furious roar is much louder than should be possible from a man of his constitution.
Marguerite cries out, her fingers digging painfully into my arm. “Lyssette, let’s go!”
But where? I look around and see nothing familiar. No one I know has ever come this far east of the village. Beyond the baker’s house, the land belongs to Lafarge and he is insistent upon his privacy. Now I can see why. Beyond the fields which make all farmers jealous, the land is dead and barren. The ground will not drink of the rain water and so it pools and floods.
There is nowhere to hide and too far to run for shelter. It would be too far to run to get out of sight; Lafarge would see us. “Stay behind me, Marguerite.”
“No,” she cries, pulling me away. “We need leave. We can outrun him!”
Perhaps, but where would we go? Where would he not find us?
“Lyssette!”
Marguerite screams. Lafarge is coming around from a side balcony and he has a musket in hand.
“You won’t get away from me again, Lyssette!”
Shock makes my arms numb and I nearly drop the pistol. It takes strength I do not feel to raise it. I pull back the flint lock, my hand shaking. “Stay back!”
“You belong to me!”
I close my eyes and pull the trigger. Nothing happens. My heart sinks. The pistol isn’t loaded.
Lafarge raises the musket to his shoulder. “You’ll stay here one way or another!”
Marguerite screams and runs. I pray she finds shelter; my own feet are rooted to the spot. Fear grips me and I cannot move, not even to duck for cover. The rain eases and I think I hear hoof beats. It is nothing but the hammering of my own heart.
“You abandoned me!”
I hear someone scream my name and my vision clears to take in more of what surrounds me, though I cannot believe what I am seeing. A dark rider approaches at a furious pace, a sword gleaming in his hand. Lafarge doesn’t see him. His arms shake as he levels his musket at me. The ground shakes at the rider’s approach; he is upon us.
His gleaming blade slashes down and Lafarge cries out. The musket drops from his grasp as the rider dismounts at full gallop, taking a stand between me and the weathered demon. Past his massive shoulders rising with each breath, I see Lafarge on the ground, his eyes wide as an owl. “Demon!” he screams.
My rescuer says not a word, though his hold on the sword tightens.
“Please,” I hear myself saying.
He tenses. “I should have killed you all those years ago,” he snarls and my legs nearly give way. Bastien? Impossible.
“It can’t be you!” Lafarge says. “My God… you haven’t aged a day…”
“And now you’d dare take what’s mine?”
“I… she belongs to me!”
Bastien rushes the old man.
“No!” I cry and to my shock, he stops. “Please, just take me away from here.”
He turns to me, his face a mask of fury. “I told you not to leave my castle,” he growls.
“Is that why you’re here? Because I disobeyed you?”
“You should have listened! You knew how mad he is and still you threw yourself right into his arms!”
Behind him I see movement. Lafarge! “Bastien!” I shout.
He dives for me. His arms squeeze me so tight it hurts and his body bows over me, shielding me completely. A shot from the musket deafens me. I feel the impact; hear Bastien’s breath explode from his chest. He holds me tight while my ears continue to ring.
Bastien’s groan of pain terrifies me. He shudders against me and his hold loosens. I am able to stand and turn to see him stagger away from me. Sword still in hand, he turns on Lafarge and stalks him on unsteady legs. Lightning strikes, illuminating his bloodied back. I hold back my cry, knowing instinctively that he cannot last much longer.
Lafarge scrambles back in retreat. He slips in the gathering mud and his moans of terror make me shake with fear. But I fear for Bastien more. Once again, the man I thought a monster raises his sword and brings it down on Lafarge, silencing his bleating cries.
Bastien releases the sword and stumbles back, turning unsteadily to face me. Tears blur my vision as I go to him. He breathes my name as his eyelids droop, and then he falls to his knees and collapses on the ground.
My own scream echoes across the night.