Beauty and Her Beast
Chapter 23

-ANNA-

Anna sat at her looking glass as Agnes brushed her hair till it shone.

“Agnes,” she said, “what happened to Christian? I mean his face, his body. Was he born that way?”

Agnes paused in her brushing.

“That is a question,” she said with a sigh, “I think, is best answered by Christian himself. It’s not my tale to tell.”

Anna nodded and reached up to pat the older woman on the hand.

“Thank you Agnes,” she said, “thank you for everything.”

Agnes put down the brush and kissed Anna on the top of her head.

“You are welcome my child,” she said, praying the nightmare would be over soon.

After Agnes departed, Anna wrapped herself in the shawl he'd conjured for her and walked out onto the balcony. The air was brisk with a bite of winter to it, soon snow would be falling and the animals would all hide from the cold. As she turned to go back inside, Anna saw that the light in Christian’s tower window was still burning.

She bit her lip as she pondered a moment. Should she go to Christian? When he'd kissed her, she’d felt a thrill go through her heart.

Anna thought of all the fairy tales she had read since she was a child. There was always a handsome prince and a beautiful princess and they lived happily ever after. Though she was not a princess and he was not a prince, maybe there could be a happily ever after for them anyway.

Taking a deep breath, Anna walked back into her room and picking up a candelabra headed for Christian’s room.

‘I will tell him what I feel,’ she thought as she headed up the last of the winding staircase to his rooms.

With the slightest of pauses, she reached up to knock on his door.

-CHRISTIAN-

Christian had been thinking of Anna constantly since parting from her at the greenhouse. Her touch had been so gentle as they’d spun together in the candlelight. She had not flinched from his ugliness when he'd kissed her, and by god she was so beautiful.

Even now he could see her, standing in front of him, her breasts rising and falling beneath her bodice as she laughed. He could still feel her hand as it took his, the gentle pressure she used to reassure him.

Christian jumped to his feet, need filling his mind. He needed her, he wanted her.

‘Dear god,’ he thought, running his clawed fingers through the fur on her head. ‘What is happening to me?’

Hearing the tentative knock at his door, he pulled it open and there she was, clad in a shawl, his shawl and an almost transparent sleeping gown. The fabric of it was so sheer, he could see her breasts rising and falling in rhythm to her breathing; those beautiful little breasts.

“My lord,” she began, but paused when she noticed his ragged appearance. “Are you well Christian?”

Seeing her there, her hair in a loose braid falling over her shoulder, he lost himself in his need. Unable to stop himself, Christian reached out and pulled her into his crushing embrace, tearing into both fabric and flesh with his clawed hands.

Anna was so taken by surprise that she did not have time to cry out as she was hauled off the floor and pressed into a brutal kiss.

Christian’s sharp teeth cut her lips as his fingernails dug into her back, roughly hauling her into the room. Gone was his gentleness and kindness, replaced by lust and pain.

Here she was, he could feel her body, so soft and small, against him again. Desire clouded his senses as he tightened his paws around her, heedless of her cries of pain.

Dazed by the suddenness of his embrace and savage kiss, Anna didn’t have time to respond. Before she could make any sense of what was happening, she found herself being carried towards his bed, his left paw squeezing her tightly around the waist making it difficult to breath, while his right began tearing at her shawl and nightdress.

“No, please,” Anna rasped against his lips, trying desperately to push away from him, his grip on her too tight. His claws leaving deep cuts in her flesh as he ripped at her clothes, nothing she was able to do could make him stop.

“Christian!” she sobbed as his fangs raked deeply into her chest as he kissed his way down her body.

Unable to hear her, Christian continued pawing and gnawing at her body, her blood slowly seeping into the sheets of his bed as he climbed on top of her. It wasn’t until Agnes began beating him across the back with her bare fists that he realized what he was doing.

Stunned, Christian let go of Anna and fell back off his bed.

Slowly his senses returned and he became aware of Anna’s gurgling sobs and Agnes’ cries of anger. Rubbing his eyes with blood soaked hands, he looked down into a face that was a mere shadow of the woman he had set out to love. Gone was her trust and faith in him, replaced with terror, sorrow and pain.

Seeing her in the firelight, Christian was confronted with the bloody aftermath of his lust. Anna laid, broken, barely breathing on his bed, her body covered with not only the claw marks he had left in his haste to remove her clothing, but also from bites he had made in the heat of his own passion.

Covering his face with his hands, Christian fell to his knees in supplication and shame.

“Oh God,” he cried out. “What have I done?”

“You’ve killed her” Agnes screamed, rushing to Anna, unable to believe what she was seeing, there was no way the poor girl would survive.

Christian reached out to put his arms around her tortured body only to have her flinch from him, crying out in pain at the movement. He could barely bring himself to face the awful truth of what he’d done. She had come to him tonight, believing that he was the dearest friend in her world, and now she lay bloody and battered by his own hand, in his own bed no less. How had it all gone so wrong? He had never meant to hurt her.

Over the last half year, she had become the greatest joy in his wretched life. In over two hundred years, she was the first person to touch him and allow his touch without running in fear, and he had just killed her.