Chapter 21 Gaspard #2
Margaret scrambled to collect the fallen dishes, her hands shaking so badly she could barely hold them.
She wouldn’t speak of this. The fear in her eyes told me she understood the consequences all too well.
The threats I delivered about my bastard son.
Still, I made a mental note to replace her soon and not just for her aging body.
Fear made people unpredictable, and unpredictability was a liability I couldn’t afford.
Sadly, ending her duty with me would result in her death.
Once she’d fled, I turned back to the spirit, who hovered near the ceiling, waiting for my command.
“Go,” I ordered, lifting the mirror. “Find Isabeau Dubois and show me where she hides.”
Her white form elongated, stretched, then shot through the window like mist carried on a violent wind. The mirror in my hand went dark momentarily before flickering back to life, now showing not my reflection but what the spirit saw as she traveled.
The landscape blurred beneath her spectral flight, trees and fields streaking past at impossible speed. She moved faster than any living creature could, unbound by physical limitations.
The setting sun cast long shadows across the land as she approached the edge of the Forbidden Forest.
My breath caught as she plunged into those cursed woods without hesitation.
The healthy trees at the forest’s edge quickly gave way to the diseased, twisted specimens I’d seen during my hunt for Isabeau.
Her vision showed me what I had sensed but not fully comprehended.
How the corruption grew worse the deeper one ventured.
Trees wept black sap like blood from open wounds. Fungi with colors no living thing should possess erupted from rotting trunks. And occasionally, small animals lay dead along her path, their bodies twisted in unnatural poses, as if death had caught them mid-transformation into something else.
This was no ordinary blight. This was magic, dark, corrupted magic that turned nature against itself.
My wraith flew onward, deeper into the heart of death and decay. Just when I thought nothing could survive in such corruption, the trees began to thin, revealing a structure I hadn’t expected.
A castle.
Not a hunter’s lodge or forgotten watchtower, but a genuine castle of gray stone and soaring towers, partially collapsed in places but unmistakably grand in its original design. Its walls rose from the dying forest like a specter from a nightmare, surrounded by a moat of black, stagnant water.
“Impossible,” I whispered.
No castle stood within the Forbidden Forest. Everyone knew that.
The forest had been cursed for generations, its boundaries clearly marked, its dangers well-documented by those few who ventured near its edges and returned.
If such a structure existed within the forest’s depths, surely someone would have known.
Unless...
Unless the curse did more than corrupt the land. Unless it erased memory itself.
The spirit carried me over the castle walls, through an open window, and into dark corridors lined with dust and cobwebs. She moved with purpose now, sensing her quarry, drawn to the life force of the girl I sought.
Up winding stairs, through abandoned halls where furniture lay draped in sheets like forgotten ghosts, past rooms where moonlight filtered through broken windows to illuminate scenes of bygone elegance. This had been a place of wealth and power once. A kingdom forgotten by time and magic.
Finally, the spirit paused before a heavy wooden door. Without hesitation, she passed through it, her insubstantial form unhindered by physical barriers.
The scene that greeted me through the mirror made my blood boil.
Isabeau—my Isabeau—lay in a massive bed, her glorious auburn hair spilled across pillows like liquid fire.
A fur blanket covered her, but not completely.
One perfect shoulder remained exposed, bearing clear marks of teeth.
Not human teeth, but the savage bite of a beast. Her expression in sleep was one of contentment, of peace.
And wrapped around her, one massive arm draped possessively across her waist, lay a monster.
The creature defied description. Part wolf, part lion, part bull with those wicked horns curling from its head.
Fur covered its massive body, rich brown with honey highlights that caught the moonlight streaming through the broken window.
Its face, relaxed in sleep, still bore the savage features of a predator.
A snout filled with teeth that could tear flesh from bone, eyes shut now but surely bestial when open.
Between its legs, visible where the blanket had shifted, I could see its member. Still semi-erect, glistening with evidence of recent use. The beast had claimed her, had taken what was mine, had sullied my perfect prize with its monstrous seed.
Rage exploded in my chest, a roar building that I barely managed to contain behind clenched teeth. I would kill it. I would mount its head above my mantle. I would wear its fur as a cloak and fashion drinking cups from its horns.
As if sensing my murderous thoughts, Isabeau stirred in her sleep. Her eyes fluttered open, disoriented at first, then focusing with sudden clarity on the ghostly form hovering at the foot of her bed.
Her scream split the night, startling the beast awake beside her. It rose with alarming speed, massive body positioning itself protectively between Isabeau and the perceived threat. His amber eyes, so like Isabeau’s, fixed on my spirit with intelligence no animal should possess.
“Return,” I commanded, unable to watch another moment of this abomination. “You’ve shown me enough.”
The spirit streaked back through the window, across the dying forest, and into my room within moments. She hovered before me, her eternal suffering briefly forgotten in her confusion at being recalled so abruptly.
I placed the mirror face-down on the chest, severing the connection and sending her back into her prison. My hands shook with fury, my breath coming in short, harsh gasps as I struggled to control the murderous impulse coursing through my veins.
So. Not just a beast, but an intelligent one.
A creature that could think, could plan, could deliberately take what belonged to me.
And Isabeau… my beautiful, innocent Isabeau had given herself willingly to this monster.
The marks on her skin told that story clearly enough, as did the peaceful expression I’d glimpsed before she woke.
I’d been wrong. I’d assumed she needed rescuing, that she was a captive to be saved from mother nature. Now I understood she was something far worse. A willing whore to a beast, tainted by its touch, corrupted by whatever magic sustained it.
But I would have her still. I would cleanse her of the beast’s pollution. I would reclaim what was mine and make her forget she’d ever known any touch but my own.
My fingers found the silver medallion I kept hidden beneath my shirt—my grandfather’s amulet, bearing the sigil of the Dark Lord. I’d never used it, never called upon the powers my family had flirted with for generations. I’d hunted magical creatures, yes, but I hadn’t given my soul to darkness.
Not yet.
But for Isabeau, for the perfect beauty who had been promised to me by fate itself, I would cross that final line.
The bog witch waited in the northern marshes, her hut hidden among mists that never lifted.
Legend claimed she served the Dark Lord directly, channeling his power into potions and curses for those brave or desperate enough to seek her out.
My grandfather had visited her once, returning with knowledge that had allowed him to bind this spirit to the mirror.
The merchant learned too, and that’s why my grandfather had me turn him in.
Only the noblest could know the dark arts.
Now I had to prepare to leave, where no mortal willing chose to go.
What might she give me, if I came bearing my family’s medallion and the promise of my soul?
I closed the chest, locking away the mirror for now. Its purpose was fulfilled. I knew where Isabeau was, knew what kept her from me. The rest would require darker, more potent magic than mere scrying.
“Soon,” I whispered to the empty room, imagining Isabeau’s face, her body, her submission. “Soon you’ll be where you belong. And your beast will adorn my wall, a permanent reminder of what happens to those who take what’s mine.”
Outside my window, the crescent moon rose and cold over the sleeping village, unaware of the darkness stirring in their midst. By this time tomorrow, I would be on the road north, seeking powers no sane man would dare invoke.
For Isabeau, I would embrace insanity gladly.