Beastly Beauty

Seventy-Five

Camille patted the beautiful orange pumpkin Gustave had just brought her. She reached for her cleaver.

“What will you make with it?” he asked.

“A charlotte. For supper tonight,” she replied. “Filled with a spiced pumpkin mousse and edged with chocolate ladyfingers.”

“Mmm! I’ll be your taster!” Josette said, piling still-warm croissants onto a tray for Arabella and Beau’s breakfast.

The kitchen was filled with a bustling sense of excitement. Word had traveled through the castle—thanks to Hope and Faith, who were gifted at the art of eavesdropping—about what had happened in Beau’s room.

“Love …” Valmont had said skeptically, his bushy eyebrows drawn together, as the servants had huddled around the two girls an hour ago.

“Yes,” Hope had replied.

“Love love?” Lucile had asked.

“Yes!” Hope had crowed.

“L-O-V-E?” Florian had added.

“Florian, you know how to spell!” Faith had said, fake clapping. “Want me to teach you some more four-letter words?”

“She’s here, then. Somewhere. Your other sister?” Valmont had asked the girls. “No one has seen her.”

“She must be,” Hope had replied. “Arabella has fallen in love, hasn’t she?”

“We just haven’t found her yet,” Faith had said.

“But we will. We will,” Hope had added, as if trying to convince them all. And herself.

“Do you know what this means?” Percival had asked, his voice hushed.

“It means Lady Arabella will cross the bridge. And the curse will be broken,” Phillipe had replied. “It means we will live.”

Percival had squeezed the kitchen rag he’d been holding until his knuckles turned white. He looked at Phillipe. “Do you remember?” he asked him. “The little stone cottage in the forest?”

Everyone remembered. The two had bought the cottage with their hard-earned savings, hoping to retire there one day.

For a long moment, Phillipe could not reply. “I do,” he’d finally said, exchanging a look of longing and hope with Percival that had been a century in the making.

All the servants hoped, though it frightened them to do so. They hoped they would walk out of the castle and across the bridge, too. They hoped they would never again hear the golden clock ticking away the minutes, hours, and years of their lives. But others in the castle had not greeted the news with happiness.

Lady Hesma and Lady Elge burst into the kitchen in a swirl of gray and red now, shrilling at the servants. One was carrying a length of rope, the other a pair of iron shackles.

“Where are they? Sticking their grimy fingers into the batter? Filching sweets?” Elge demanded.

“The children that you seek are not here, Your Ladyships,” Percival replied, his voice seething with contempt.

Elge heard it. “Watch yourself, old boy,” she cautioned. “We’re still in charge here. How would you like to spend some time locked away in the cellar? I can arrange it.”

As she spoke, Rémy approached them, carrying a platter of breakfast sausages. He was as filthy as ever, spattered with fat, smudged with ash, trailing the scents of sage, thyme, and nutmeg.

Elge’s clumsily rouged lips collapsed into a grimace as he passed by. She clutched the large, garish pearls around her neck, then began to convulse like a cat with a hairball. “Dear God, the stench!” she cried.

Rémy came to a stop. He looked at her uncertainly.

Hesma pounced. “Yes, that’s right. She’s talking about you, you smelly guttersnipe.”

The little boy flinched. His cheeks colored under the grime.

Hesma saw his humiliation; her eyes glittered cruelly. “You stink. You’re filthy and disgusting. Don’t you ever wash?”

Rémy’s eyes filled with tears. He backed away like a puppy that had been kicked. Camille’s grip tightened on her cleaver.

“Come on, Rem. Chef needs some eggs.”

It was Henri. He motioned the boy over to Phillipe’s worktable, took the platter from him, and set it down. Rémy rubbed his eyes with a balled fist.

Henri knelt down by him. “Chef also needs potatoes and onions. Can you help me carry them?”

Rémy nodded.

“Good man,” Henri said, clapping him on the back. He set off, with the little boy trotting close at his heels.

“Happy, Lady Hesma? You made a child cry,” Camille said.

“Happy? Goodness no. I’m euphoric!” Hesma replied.

Camille raised her cleaver. “Get out of here. Before I toss you out. In pieces.”

Hesma gasped. Elge’s head swiveled in Camille’s direction. Her doll eyes narrowed; her grin widened. “Poor thing, you really think this is it, don’t you?” she said. “The grand, soaring happily ever after? Just because Hope and Faith are running around the castle like two escaped lunatics. But you’re forgetting something … Love is not here. Has anyone found her? No. Whatever Arabella and the thief think they feel for each other—attraction, infatuation, lust—it is not love.”

Camille brought her cleaver down on the pumpkin with such force that it split cleanly in two.

Elge looked at the raw, fleshy halves, rocking back and forth on the table. Her fingers fluttered nervously with a button on her dress. “Come, Hesma,” she said. “We’re distracting the help.”

The two ladies flounced out of the kitchen and started down the corridor toward the great hall but stopped to listen as the servants’ voices carried after them.

“We can’t give up. Hope and Faith are strong,” Camille said.

“They’ve survived all these years,” Percival added.

“Maybe they’ll be enough,” said Josette.

Elge clutched at Hesma’s arm, jubilant. “Did you hear the wonderful worry in their voices? The awesome anxiety? The fabulous fear?”

Hesma arched an eyebrow. “I hear the asinine alliteration in yours.”

Elge kissed Hesma’s greasy cheek, leaving a smear of lip rouge, then grabbed her arm and pulled her along. “Mortals are such fools,” she said. “They break their own hearts again and again and again, then stand amid the shattered pieces and declare that love conquers all.” She burst into screechy laughter. “Four days, Hesma, my dear. Just four more days. Then the clock will run out, the castle will crumble, and we will win.”