Anwen smelled beeswax candles. It was odd that Avice chose to use good candles rather than the fatty smelling rushlights they usually burned. It was wasteful, even by her sister’s standards. She opened her eyes and saw that the candles were set atop a small table. On the other side stood a screen, and beneath her was a soft bed, its linens smelling delicately of lavender, not straw.
Where am I?
A sharp pain shot up her arm and she hissed as she tried to roll onto her side. Everything ached.
“Dear God. It wasn’t a dream.”
She racked her brain, trying to remember. She was in an enchanted castle, far from Llanarth. Lord de Mareys must have found her and brought her back. She remembered her idiotic attempt to follow him. She’d done everything wrong, and ended up in the seething, swirling chaos of a fairy dance in a circle of sinister yew trees. Anwen groaned in pain and mortification. How stupid she was! The mimicking of Godric, the will-o-the-wisps, the naive trust that a greenway would take her wherever she wished—! She deserved the dull ache over her ribs. Her mind was fuddled. There was a beast, a huge creature that leapt into the clearing and ended the folk’s revels. The beast gained her enough time to start crawling away. She’d been rescued by some warm, strong person and brought back to Castel de Mareys.
How everything hurt! Anwen quickly looked down and saw that while her cotehardie had been removed and the left sleeve of her underdress cut away, she was otherwise fully clad. Clumsily wrapped bandages wound around her upper arm, and she peeked beneath her underdress to see that her side was covered in dark colored bruises.
“You’re awake.”
Lord de Mareys stood unsmilingly beside her. He looked as worn out as she felt, with a loose bandage falling down over his left eye. His face was riddled with worry and, to her surprise, embarrassment. “I brought you here, not knowing if you’d want me to enter your chamber while you were unconscious.”
“Oh,” Anwen glanced around her and realized she was sitting in Lord de Mareys’s bed in his private room. “Oh!” She clutched at her blanket, her face burning as she realized he must have cut away the sleeve and wrapped her arm. “It was good of you. Thank you.” She stared up at him. The bandage over his eye was very inexpertly placed, and blood seeped through.
“You’re hurt.”
“So are you.”
“How did I come here? Someone brought me, but—”
“Later. Tell me about your scratches. I bound them up as well as I could, but they need medicine. Are you in pain?”
Anwen moved her bandaged arm and winced. “My arm is very sore, but the cuts don’t feel deep.”
“The fair folk’s nails are sharp as needles. If you will allow me to unwrap the bandages you can tell me what to do next. I haven’t tended anybody’s wounds but my own for a long time.”
“No, no—” Anwen’s voiced hitched in her throat. The scratches really did hurt; her whole arm throbbed. “I mean, yes, thank you.” She blinked back tears as the pain and the memory of her foolishness began to overwhelm her. He was being very kind.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I should not have followed you. I only wished—”
“Never mind that now,” he said quietly. He picked up the edge of the linen wound around her arm. “May I?”
She held up her arm meekly. “Yes, please. Did the wounds bleed?”
“Yes, a good deal. I washed them with boiled water so I could see how deep they were.”
“That was good,” Anwen winced as the bandage tugged at the scratches. “They don’t not seem very deep. There is no poison in the fair folk is there?”
He allowed himself a small snort. “No. Only callousness and casual, unthinking malice.”
Anwen watched him slowly, carefully remove the cloth. “I have a salve that will help them heal. I left a few things from my medicine chest on your table, I believe. There is a little pot of rose infused honey. It is labeled.”
“Anything else?”
“Wine, if you have it.”
He was only gone a moment, but Anwen took the chance to breathe deeply and look at her scratches. There were five long marks, like cat scratches, streaking up her arm. She hoped they would heal well—she’d known people to sicken from cat scratches. Lord de Mareys returned with the salve, a flagon of wine, and a length of linen.
“They’re livid,” he observed, looking at her arm.
“I think they will be all right, if tended properly.” She held out her hand.
“No, let me,” he sat beside her. “My earlier attempt was clumsy but I’m more myself now. Just tell me what to do.”
Anwen wondered why he was quite pink in the candlelight, and why he wouldn’t meet her eyes. “If you insist,” she moved closed to him. “Spread the honey directly on the wounds and then soak the bandage in the wine, wring it out well, and wrap my arm up with it.”
“What will the wine do?”
“It helps keep the wound from becoming putrid. It will smell a bit like a tavern,” she smiled up at him, “But it’s well worth the smell.”
He kept his eyes on his work, gently applying the sticky salve along each scratch.
“My lord?”
“Yes?”
“Who brought me back? I didn’t recognize his voice; it was very rough sounding. Is he still here? I would like to thank him.”
“A moment, Anwen. Let me finish this.”
“I remember clearly what happened,” Anwen continued. Talking felt necessary; it was awkward to sit in silence with Lord de Mareys in the dimly lit room. “A beast jumped into the yew circle, and there was a panic. It looked like what I’d seen long ago, in Llanarth, near our orchard.”
“What kind of beast?”
“I believed it was the black beast of Llanarth. It was big, and very strange, but it did not stand on two legs. This one did, though otherwise it looked the same. Perhaps this thing is akin to it.” She trailed off. Surely it was impossible for there to be two such creatures.
He was silent, brows furrowed. He wrung out the linen strip and began to wind it up her arm. It stung, but she was pleased to see how carefully he worked.
“There. A better job this time,” he eased her arm gently down and disappeared behind the screen. A moment later he returned with two cups of warm spiced wine and handed her one.
“Drink this.”
Anwen accepted the cup and sipped. It was delicious, the warmth soothing to her body and mind. Lord de Mareys sat beside her on a cushioned stool, as still as a statue except when he took a sip from his cup. Light crept into the room as dawn began to lighten the darkness outside.
Anwen finished her wine and swung her legs out of the bed.
“You should stay in bed,” Lord de Mareys frowned. “I’m sure you wish to sleep.”
“It is your bed, my lord. I can go to my own room,” She looked down at her bare feet and tucked them underneath her gown. “Thank you. For tending my wounds. I am sorry I didn’t obey your orders. It won’t happen again. I’d better go.” She stood up.
“Why did you do it?” He did not look at her, but she saw his face was set in a scowl.
Kind he may be, but he was not going to let me get away with disobeying his orders.
Anwen flushed. “I wanted to see that you were recovering from your sudden illness. You looked so poorly when you showed me the chapel, and then I had a bad dream. I was worried.”
“My feeling a little unwell and a bad dream are bad reasons to follow me out of the castle. Were you watching for me at your window?”
“No,” she shook her head. “I went to your chamber. The door burst open, and you ran out. I didn’t stop to think.”
“Why would you follow me? Why not try to stop me instead?”
“I was curious. I wanted to know where you were going.”
“I thought perhaps you were running away back to Llanarth.”
“No,” glared at him. “I said I would stay here, my lord. I meant what I said.”
“But you also said you would stay in your chamber at night. Curiosity seems to have been all it took for you to break your word. What was so important to you that you would do such a thing?”
“I followed you, my lord, to see if I could trail along behind you to wherever it was you were going,” she tried to keep the annoyance out of her voice, all the more difficult because she knew she had done wrong. “I assumed you’d be going to the village and that there would be a greenway as the woods seem to be impenetrable without one. I thought there might be other people.”
He looked up at her. “Other people?”
“You taking me to the chapel reminded me of how much I wanted to find a priest, to come back with me or-or to leave a message with.”
“I see. You wished for a priest to come here.”
“Yes.”
He ran his hands through his hair, exasperated. “Did you stop to think why I told you not to leave your chamber by night? That it was not simply because I’m the lord and master here? Are you so headstrong? Never mind, I know you are. You came here on your own without word to or permission from your own father.”
“I thought it would be no different than any other time I’ve walked that path. I—I did not think I would be easily fooled.” She wrung her hands.
“And yet you were. You’re not a fool, but you thought a path would appear and take you where you wanted to go, despite having no assurance there are people in this village you’ve never seen?” He began to pace the room, coming back to stand only a foot away front her. “You know better than that! Do you think that when I leave the walls it is to find a village, after curfew, when nothing will be open, and no one will want to risk running into their lord? Or that their roads simply appear for my asking? They do not. You may be gifted with more sight than most, Anwen, but if I can’t expect there to be a path through their wood, you certainly should not. In their territory you are a nobody.”
It was true. She had assumed too much, and he was right. There was no real reason for her to think that fairy roads would simply appear for anybody, not even the lord of Castel de Mareys. She’d let her hopes get too high, and, since she had avoided any real harm from the fae things she’d seen, believed she was a little bit invincible.
“I only wanted to find a priest.”
“Why?”
“It is heathenish to go so long without mass, my lord.”
“Reconcile yourself to a temporary heathendom, then,” he said sharply. “No priest would set foot in this place as soon as he realized—”
“Realized what? It seems to me the only way to set things right would be with a priest’s help,” Anwen stubbornly insisted.
“How?”
“To drive them out! To give blessings and have mass and the sacrament here would surely drive off whatever has you trapped here!”
Anwen immediately regretted her outburst. As frightening and frustrating as Castel de Mareys was, she knew her anger was born out of fear and embarrassment at her failure. She was unused to being unable to solve a problem; she hadn’t stopped to think that maybe the man who had been trapped for so long had already tried and failed.
“My lord, I am sorry for—”
“Anwen—”
She fell silent, watching him pace back and forth.
He sighed and turned to her with a grim expression. “Are you able to come with me to the hall? Or do you wish to sleep some more?”
“I don’t think I could sleep now.”
“Nor could I.”
The hall was chilly and damp, and Anwen was grateful for the fur lined cloak Lord de Mareys clasped around her shoulders.
“It won’t do for you to catch a chill,” he said. “Come.”
Anwen twisted the edge of the cloak between her fingers. It was soft and familiar. Like the one I was wrapped up in while I was carried by the stranger with the gravelly voice.
“My lord!”
Lord de Mareys glanced down at her as he held one of the great doors open.
“Yes?”
“It was you who brought me home, wasn’t it? I didn’t recognize your voice.”
“I told you. You didn’t believe it.”
“You sounded so different, and I didn’t see your face.”
“No, I made sure you were facing away.”
The rosy light of dawn peeked over the castle walls. It would be a fine day. Anwen thought how good it would be to spend the day in the rose garden. She had plans to root the bloom that refused to die. It still sat in her chamber, as red and sweet smelling as ever. She almost mentioned it to Lord de Mareys, but stopped herself when she saw his expression. He looked frightened. He led her through the wards, stopping beside the guardhouse at the main gates. Ahead of them was the portcullis and a little postern door. To the side was the door to the outer guardhouse. It was chilly beneath the great stone gateway, and despite her warm cloak, Anwen shivered.
“Why are we at the gates?” she asked.
Lord de Mareys pressed his lips into a thin line and looked at the door nervously.
“What is wrong?” Anwen sought out his eyes, but he kept them fixed ahead.
“You thought a priest might unenchant Castel de Mareys,” he said after a minute. “It’s a good thought, Anwen. It just won’t work.”
“Why not?” Anwen was baffled. As impious as Lord de Mareys seemed to be, it was common knowledge that priests drove away bad magic. Sir Madoc in the village had done so time and again when witches and smiths went too far in their works.
Lord de Mareys grimaced. “I hoped to spare you this, but as you’ve already seen so much, I can’t keep it from you any longer. The castle isn’t what’s enchanted. I am.”
Fear crept through Anwen’s mind. “What do you mean?”
“The castle—it creates a hedge about the enchantment,” he looked down, not daring to meet Anwen’s eyes. He heard the frightened tone in her voice. “Inside its walls, I am as you see me. It protects and imprisons. But sometimes I must leave.”
She thought of his sickly spells. “Then—I was to keep to my chamber because of you?”
He nodded.
“But you would do me no harm, my lord.”
“Not intentionally, no. I did not know what might happen if you were to come upon me when I was changed. I know now, though, that I would not harm you.”
“Changed! You make it sound as though you became a fiend!” Anwen tried to smile and failed. “What-what kind of change, my lord?”
“Tell me what you remember of last night.”
“I left the gates, thinking you’d only be a little farther ahead, but I couldn’t see you anywhere. My mind became clouded soon after I stepped on the path. I’d never felt that way on a greenway before, like everything was muddled. I couldn’t remember things very well.” She shook her head as thought to shake off some lingering confusion. “The path disappeared underfoot, and then the thing I thought was Godric appeared.”
“Godric? Your brother?” He looked up sharply.
Anwen nodded. “One of the fair folk disguised himself as Godric. He bade me come further into the wood and he was so kind—so unlike my real brother! I followed him into a horrid circle of yew trees. Everything I knew not to do, I did,” she looked at her hands, weaving her fingers together. “It was stupid of me. And then they tried to get me to stay with them and danced until I was ready to scream. I didn’t think I’d ever get away.”
“And that is where I found you.”
“That can’t be. Forgive me for contradicting you, but no,” she said slowly. “That is when the beast showed up. You must have found me later. I was attacked. That’s how I came to have all these scratches. I fainted as I tried to crawl away.”
“What do you remember after that?”
“Someone carrying me. That must have been you,” Anwen shook her head. “I couldn’t stay awake. And then I woke up a little more and there was torchlight. I thought they were the lights of the fair folk, so I kicked against them, but then my rescuer spoke to me. It didn’t sound like you, my lord, I must say, but I suppose you are telling the truth because I was wrapped up in this very cloak.” She blushed. “I said it wasn’t you. I had the oddest idea whoever was carrying me was very dark and shadowy, but my sight was poor. Forgive me for my impertinence.”
“Not at all. I was flattered. I haven’t been called handsome in a very long time. Tell me more of this creature. You’d seen it before.”
She nodded again. “I thought it was a bear at first, but its shoulders were too broad and there was something about the shape of its head that didn’t seem entirely bear like. It looked like several animals in one, if you understand me, my lord. It walked like a man does, not at all the way a bear does when he stands on his hind legs. It was fearsome! He tore into the fair folk easily, and looked back at me a number of times, as though he wanted to see that I was safe.”
“It’s good you saw that,” muttered Lord de Mareys. “God above, what a mess.”
Anwen eyed him warily. “You say you are enchanted, not merely a prisoner of an enchanted place. How so?”
“I made them angry once. I will tell you that tale, but for now I must show you the result. I swear no harm will come to you. Please believe me.”
Before she could say anything else, Lord de Mareys placed his hands on her shoulders and guided her towards the postern. He opened the larger door, leaving the small door she’d ducked through upon her arrival shut tight, and positioned her so she could see the few yards that separated the castle from the woods that stood dark and bleak before them.
Lord de Mareys glacned at her. “I am sorry, Anwen.”
Something is very wrong.
“Wait!”
It was too late; Lord de Mareys ducked through the door and stood halfway between the woods and the walls.
“Stay where you are!” he called.
He changed.
His body contorted, arching backwards from his waist as his head fell back. The very bones of his body seemed to shift, changing their positions underneath his skin. He fell to his knees, bracing himself with his hands as his shoulders broadened and arms lengthened. Hideous cracking filled her ears as his legs twisted; the joints of his knees faced the wrong way. Anwen started forward, her heart racing, thinking to help, somehow, despite the horror of what she was seeing, and stopped short when she saw her friend hold up his hand warningly.
“Stop there,” he shouted. It was the voice she’d heard earlier, a gravelly, rasping voice she now realized had a slight similarity to Lord de Mareys’s. “Don’t come nearer now. You’d be too near the woods.”
His face was strained and full of pain as it pulled backwards and forwards all at once, shifting into a kind of animal muzzle. He was a beast. He clutched at the air with terrible, long claws. Anwen saw how easily he could kill with one swipe of those claws. His fair shaggy hair took on the appearance of a beast’s mane, a little lighter than the rest of the fur that coated his body. His clothes lay in heaps beside him, shredded as he grew, a towering figure dark against the trees. He twisted, groaning in pain, his voice was now more like an animal’s growl. Anwen could smell him, even at a distance—he reeked like a beast, musky and dank.
It all took only a few moments, too fast a transformation for Anwen’s mind to catch up with what her eyes saw. She dropped to her knees with a strangled cry and crossed herself against the magic that cursed her friend. He must have heard her, for he turned, and she saw his human eyes, anguished and unchanged in his beastly face. Pity filled her heart for a moment. He began to lope towards her.
All you angels and saints above, help!
Her belly churned. The moment of pity was gone. The sight and smell, the complete wrongness of this change overwhelmed her. She bent over to be sick, gagging as a cold sweat trickled down her back. Her vision began to darken.
I won’t faint. I won’t!
The heavy footsteps of the beast came steadily closer to the doorway. She lurched to her feet, her head swimming. She had to get away. For a moment she thought she was back in the yew circle. Now, no one was going to rescue her. Her dreams told her the truth; the castle was home to a monster. Gone were the memories of Lord de Mareys sitting in the sun or chatting with her over the evening meal. She could not remember how he bound up her wounds, or the gentleness of his arms as he carried her to safety. All she could do was run. She sprinted through the outer courtyard, around corners, skidding down a covered passage and down to the humbler parts of Castel de Mareys. She ran like prey, not daring to look behind to see what followed. She heard her name, the voice that uttered it still too deep, too other, and her heart pounded in her ears. She only thought of getting away.
A door appeared at the end of a passageway, and she crashed into it with a thud. Her sore arm smarted, but the pain helped to clear her head enough to turn the handle, tumble through, and slam the door behind her. She ran, looking behind her despite knowing nobody was there, and smacked into a stone wall.
The smack stunned her out of her blind panic. She was in the rose garden. Her barrow and pots, her tools were all there, the beds full of newly sprouting flowers. It was quiet. Somewhere a bird sang. She sank down against the wall, the same wall that had supported the rose that was the cause of all her trouble, and watched the door, her breath coming in ragged gasps as she tried to quiet her mind. An hour ago, she was safe, gratefully delivered from deadly danger. And now—
He’s cursed. Why? What had he done?
He’d angered them, he said. That could have been a real sin, or nothing at all. They were unpredictable. He wasn’t wicked, she reminded herself, pressing her knuckles to her eyes. He fought the fair folk who tricked her, even though he was angry with her for leaving her chamber. He carried her back to Castel de Mareys. He tended her wounds with care and gentleness. She thought back to when she first realized she’d been carried away from the yew circle. She wasn’t wearing a cloak when they left the trees, but the beast had been. She remembered thinking how soft the sleeves of her rescuer were, just before she fainted again.
That must have been his arms.
She shuddered. He must have wrapped her up in his cloak later, when they got far enough away. He would have changed again, once at the castle. She had no desire to see him transform back. A wave of nausea hit her, and she braced herself to be sick again. Nothing came up. She retched and slumped over. Could she look at him again after this? She did not know. He’d never hurt her. He’d only been kind, if not entirely forthcoming about the nature of his curse. But he wasn’t evil. She repeated that to herself. Lord de Mareys wasn’t evil. He was not going to hurt her. Her breathing slowed; she was growing calm again. She knew that eventually tears would come, but for now the calm was a welcome distraction from panic. When a polite knock sounded against the garden door, she was able to stand up, brush off her gown, and make her way to the door.
At least he isn’t pounding on it. Or growling.
“Anwen!” Lord de Mareys’s voice, his ordinary voice, came from the other side. “Anwen, will you please let me in? It’s over. I’m myself again.”
“I’m afraid I don’t know that, my lord.”
It won’t hurt to be cautious.
“True, you don’t. Look through the gap in the door. See for yourself.”
She bent down and peered through the gap where the oaken boards had splintered. Lord de Mareys’s legs, bare from the knees, and his bare feet were all she could see. His lower half, at least, was back to normal. Then, an eye appeared in the crack, causing Anwen to gasp and fall backwards. It was his eye-his human eye- with his fair hair falling in its way.
“Are you truly yourself again?” she demanded.
“I am.”
“I will let you in, but you must stay back.”
“As you wish.”
Get it over with.
She opened the door and saw Lord de Mareys standing before her in a fresh tunic.
“You are wearing clothes,” Anwen murmured.
“I keep some in the guardhouse.”
How practical.
They held each other’s gazes silently. He was pale and drawn, a weak, human contrast to the horror she’d witnessed.
“I am sorry.”
Anwen could not speak. She was beginning to shake. Her mind was still calm, though it was hard for her to tell the difference between that and numbness. Everything felt like it was happening in the distance. She moved to leave.
“Wait! Let me help you,” Lord de Mareys reached out his hand as though to take her arm. There was nothing rough or sudden in his movement. It was a kind gesture of concern, but all she could think of were his clawed paws. She shrank back.
“Pray my lord, do not touch me!”
Now it was his turn to shrink back.
“I’m sorry,” he said again. “You must be revolted by me.”
She said nothing.
“I meant no harm. Only to let you see—devil take it! It’s hopeless.” He muttered these last words to himself.
Anwen swallowed, forcing herself to speak. “I know you meant no harm, my lord.”
“If you can stomach it, please allow me to assist you back to your chamber. You need rest after your ordeals. I should never—”
“You had to eventually,” she cut him off. She looked into his face, determined not to look away. He was still handsome, despite his scars. The bandage that had been above his eye was gone, and the cut was open and bleeding. Anwen felt a twinge of pity cut through the strange calm flooding her mind.
“Your head needs bandaging, my lord.”
She swept past him, giving him a wide berth. She led the way slowly back his chamber, where Anwen immediately ordered him to sit down.
“You’re bleeding, my lord. I will tend to it now.”
“I can manage,” began Lord de Mareys. “You really shouldn’t—”
Anwen faced him, her hands on her hips, a serious look on her pale face. “I find that when I’ve had a shock, I recover quickest if I have something definite to do,” she said bluntly. “This has been a tremendous shock, my lord. Getting to work right away is what I’ve always done, and it will be best if you reconcile yourself to me keeping busy until I start getting weak and weepy. Then I will do as you bid.”
“If you insist.”
“I do.”
Anwen approached Lord de Mareys with a wine-soaked cloth. Her brows snapped together as she forced the memory of the beast’s face away.
He’s the same as he ever was, she told herself firmly.
“Please tilt your head back little, sir. If you will allow me to brush your hair away so I might see…”
“Do whatever you must,” he closed his eyes. “Will this hurt?”
She stared at him in disbelief, her hand hovering just over the cut.
“Will this hurt? Are you jesting?”
He quirked up one side of his mouth in a small smile, relieved at the almost laugh in her voice. “Will it?”
“I thought you’d be impervious to pain by now. What just happened looked torturous.”
“I am unused to dagger wounds,” he explained.
“Oh. Well then, yes, it will hurt.”
Without waiting, she briskly dabbed the inch long cut as Lord de Mareys winced in pain. Satisfied that it was clean, she tossed the dirty cloth into the fire and guided Lord de Mareys’s hand to his forehead.
“Hold this linen against it until it stops bleeding, please.” Turning towards the table she unstopped the little bottle of ointment. The aroma of roses wafted towards Lord de Mareys.
“You must hate roses by now,” he said.
“No,” she replied. “I love them.”
“They’ve caused too much trouble for you.”
“Hold still,” was her reply.
“You lack a certain gentlelesse, Anwen.”
“I am not a noblewoman, my lord. I don’t need to behave like one.” She gently brushed his hair away from his forehead and began to wind a fresh piece of linen around his head. “It is a nasty cut.”
“I daresay it looks worse than it is.”
“It was a clean wound. As long as the dagger wasn’t poisoned it will heal up nicely.”
She put away her medicine and leaned against the table, breathing deeply and deliberately. If she could stay calm and focused on her immediate surroundings, she would not cry. Unless he changed again, she would be well.
“It doesn’t happen inside the castle,” he said, as though reading her thoughts. “Only if I leave. You are quite safe, I swear.”
Anwen nodded, brushing a tear that fell silently down her nose. “I know you wouldn’t hurt me, even as a—,” she didn’t finish.
“A beast. I meant you are safe from having to see it again.”
“I won’t be silly or fall to pieces again if I do.” she sniffed. “It’s only the shock. I-I will probably need to lie down soon.”
“Sit down,” he offered her his seat. “Please. You should not have bothered with my cut.”
Anwen gratefully sank into his chair while he leaned against the mantel. He was completely recovered; no sign of pallor or sickness hung about him. In his plain tunic unearthed from the guardhouse he looked downright ordinary.
“You’re the beast of Llanarth, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“But it’s been seen for a hundred years. You’re not old.”
“That’s the castle. Time works oddly inside its walls. I haven’t grown any older.”
Anwen nodded. “I see. So then, you leave the castle to hunt? You’ve never eaten much at table.”
Lord de Mareys nodded. “I also travel to Llanarth once in a great while to see how the manor fares.”
“That is how I saw you.”
“Yes. You were very brave. I liked that about you.”
She smiled a little at that, sending a wave of relief through Lord de Mareys. She could still smile.
“I am so sorry I did not tell you sooner.”
“You had to show me,” Anwen shrugged. “How else would I believe you?”
She shivered. It was, suddenly, bitterly cold. The clarity and calm ebbed away, replaced by fog. Her arm was so sore, her mind so full, that the tears streamed silently from her eyes. “I told you I would get weak and weepy,” she sniffed. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize to me. Come, let me see you to your own room. You’ll be wishing yourself far from me.”
“No!”
Anwen could not bear to think of staying alone in her isolated room. A solid human being, however cursed he was, seemed infinitely preferable to the possibility of unseen fae servants lurking in her chamber. “I don’t want to be alone, please. I’m very cold.”
“It’s the cold that comes from shock. I should not have let you tend my wound. You needed warmth.” He held her hand and raised her up from her seat.
“Someone had to help you,” she said quietly. “Paws must be very difficult. Is that why the bandages were a mess?”
“Yes.” He slipped his arm around her shoulders, and she leaned against him as he helped her to the bed. "Paws are terrible. My hands don’t always do as I wish after I change back.” He eased her down and began to pile blankets on top of her. She gazed up at him, her teeth chattering and her limbs heavy, but no longer afraid.
He looks so tired.
How had she not noticed how utterly exhausted the man looked? He had more crow’s feet around his eyes than was usual for a young man. His hair had a few flecks of white. He met her look briefly and, in that instant, she saw his blue eyes were full of sadness. He was a defeated man. Anwen’s heart stirred with pity even as the image of his beastly appearance loomed in her mind.
“I am glad I know the truth, my lord.”
“Please don’t call me that. You’ve seen the worst. I am a beast. You ought to address me as such.”
"Certainly not,” she said firmly, rolling herself snugly into the blankets. “If you wish it, I won’t call you by your title, but I’ll not call you Beast. It would be unseemly.”
“Unseemly. That is your objection?”
“Yes.” She needed sleep. He could fuss about how she ought to address him later. Right now, her eyes felt heavy as the warmth of the blankets chased her chills away. “I will dine with you tonight as usual, sir.”
“As you please, Mistress Anwen.”
Wonderful.