Chapter Text
Once upon a time, there was a kingdom ruled by a long line benevolent king who lived longer than normal humans and was guarded by a beast that kept everything from evading armies to dragons at bay. Those who saw the beast described said creature as a giant winged lion with the horns of a bull and lush black fur, a fearsome sight indeed.
Except, one day the current king stopped appearing to his people and the guardian beast demanded a price. One fair maiden aged eighteenth who was a virgin would every year serve as a sacrifice, hauled into the forest surrounding the castle never to be seen again. For a hundred years or more the beast demanded a sacrifice and families moved away from the giant city which was the center of the giant kingdom not wanting their daughters to be the ones sacrificed, lost to the forest of perpetual winter, knowing full well the one day a year when the winter faded would be the day a virgin sacrifice would be demanded.
But this was just one of the legends regarding the kingdom.
~
Prince Adam looked out the window as the snow continued falling. The years which passed him by were as eternal as the winter outside the castle windows, yet he’d become used to the sight of winter everywhere except for the rose garden, not remembering a time when this wasn’t the case, but then—despite the painting showing otherwise, he didn’t remember a time he didn’t look like a beast.
The servants whispered of one day a year when there would be spring both within the forest and outside, yet Adam wondered why they didn’t use that day to leave, if it should exist, given how cold he treated the men and women, though Cogsworth said something about normal men and women not looking like the furniture, making him wonder if they, like him and the forest were cursed.
In the back of his mind, he remembered being given a rose by an old woman let alone how she’d mentioned something about true love, yet as the petals fell, he couldn’t remember the details. Yet he, his dark-haired father who actually looked human and cared about him despite the fact he no longer looked human told him the reason for the curse.
“Don’t trust women for starters. After all, your mother left us, Adam.”
Adam of course didn’t remember, something his father argued was a part of the curse.
“Some witch was angry that we, or more of you as you were the one who greeted you as you’re the one she gave the rose to and cursed, happened to not give her shelter one winter which proved our narcissism and inability to rule this kingdom, so they separated us from our people except for that one time a year when I can pass an edict down on them, for nobody is willing to go out in that winter that plagues the forest.”
Every time his father would say this, Adam would look out the window, but every year his father would bring a different woman home and she would react by calling him a monster, yet more often than not he didn’t see his father and the servants refused to talk about the king when he wasn’t there, or the girls who rejected Adam. The one day a year that Adam always forgot was approaching, which he knew because Cogsworth’s face not only told the time of day, but the passing of the seasons and how long until that day would come.
The rose which was tied to him finding true love and supposed happiness was dying as well, yet with the way every girl reacted to his face... “I don’t think I want to find true love Cogsworth.”
“Sir?”
“I don’t think it is worth it if I’ll always be rejected. Perhaps that’s the whole point, for who could love a beast?”
“Don’t give up your highness. I’m sure she’ll come someday.”
~
There was also a story involving a prince, one less known than the tale of the beast, about how he was cursed to live inside the castle because indeed he had gone and committed some atrocious deed, yet some argued he was the beast, feasting on a fair maiden every year because he didn’t find her beautiful enough to be his wife, for—his mother had been quite fair of face, radiant in beauty to which nobody could compare, but rumor had it that he’d also killed his father to gain control of the kingdom, which was why nobody saw the king, though edicts and rulings were passed by a box in the forest on that one day per year when they brought the virgin.
And they were running out of them. More specifically, there was talk of searching other places in the kingdom for the young woman that they would sacrifice to ensure that the beast didn’t turn upon the kingdom.
~
“That’s the story, and that’s why your parents are moving you away from the city,” Belle stated to the little girl listening to her retell the story, though it didn’t do any good. Belle was her name, but she instead went by the name of Bel, for a long time ago her father came up with the idea of passing his daughter off as a boy, not that Belle minded as she was allowed to do things such as hunting and building that other girls were not.
“Why don’t they sacrifice the Bimbettes?”
Belle’s mouth twisted in a frown, not wanting to bring up the fact the reason the three were called the Bimbettes wasn’t just because they were lacking in intelligence or frivolous. Whenever Belle went into the tavern, she’d overheard Gaston boast about how he’d taken all three on the night of their eighteenth birthday, but how he’d taken many others.
He was paid to take their virginity by the more wealthy parents who hadn’t moved away already, nobles who were corrupt, or merchants who simply wanted to keep their business intact without sacrificing their daughters. Those unable to move away from the city were thus doomed to become the bride of the beast, or as everyone said the reality was, food for the beast’s stomach so he could hibernate for another year.
“Because they’re such idiots that they’d give the beast a stomach ache,” Belle quipped.
“Maybe that would actually, you know, kill the beast?” One of the girls chimed in, still quite young, the fear is that the city might move on younger daughters rather than seeking them elsewhere.
“True.”
“Are you going hunting today, Bel?”
“Yup. I’m going into the inner circle, the forest. My father, after all, can’t hurt.”
“Aren’t you afraid of the beast?”
“What do you mean?”
“Because while the sacrifice only happens once a year, it is rumored to still be lurking in the forest.”
“I’ve never seen a beast.”
“Has anyone ever seen the beast?”
“Not in recent memory.”
“Then how do they know it is real.”
“Because, silly—“ One of the other girls chimed in. “—the girl always disappears and is never seen from again.”
Yet, Belle knew that might happen simply because the winter set in again, yet the perpetual winter in the forest was enough to know some kind of curse was going on and that magic did exist.