The Beast and the Beauty

Page 1

Bleddyn's head snapped up; his tail thumped a steady rhythm against the floor. His master was home.

I held my breath in the darkness until I heard his foot on the stair. The door opened silently, and the dim light from the hall silhouetted him in the doorway. A stray flicker from a distant torch glinted off his helm before he closed the door softly, trying not to wake me. He stopped to pet the dog, I knew, because I heard Bleddyn lick his hand. I lay still, listening to the soft clinking of chain as he removed his armor.

The small windows of our room still let in enough moonlight that I could almost make out his features. The dark drape across his shoulders was probably his hair, but was it black or brown? His profile seemed sharp, his chin strong, or was that just the way the shadows fell across his face?

His quiet steps crossed the room, and the bed sank under his weight. Whenever I doubted he was real, I had only to remember the shifting of the mattress in the night, the dent in the pillow in the morning. I heard the whipping of the leather straps as he freed his feet from his boots and remembered the surprise I'd felt when I first found out he wore shoes like any other man.

There was a slight tug on the blanket as he slipped under it, a brush of satin as his head nestled against the pillow. I rolled onto my elbow. "M'lord?"

"I am sorry I woke you, Lady." As usual, he spoke in a whisper; I often wondered if he had a voice.

"I couldn't sleep," I confessed. "I was waiting for you."

He reacted to something in the tone of my voice. "Lady, is anything wrong?"

"Nothing. I just wanted to... to meet you." I managed to catch myself before I'd said "see."

There was long pause; I guessed he didn't know what to say. "I... how was your day, Lady?"

"Fine. Corwyn finally trapped that fox that's been killing the chickens. I gave him the pelt."

He laughed in the same airy, voiceless way he talked. It was the first time I'd ever heard him laugh, and I liked it. "No wonder the servants like you more." It was also the first time he'd spoken to me without calling me "Lady."

"And your day, m'lord? You bore arms today."

"A precaution only, Lady. Do not concern yourself." He shrugged, gasping as he did.

"You're hurt! I'll send Corwyn for a healer...."

"No!" he hissed, shocking me to silence. He sucked in his breath as soon as he said it, as if he would take it back if he could: until now he had always spoken to me with distant respect in his voice. "Forgive me, Lady. My shoulder is only sore, through my own foolishness. I fell from my horse, nothing more. Please believe me."

His whisper was insistent, almost afraid. Of course. A man who shied away from lamps wouldn't want a healer to attend him. In my concern for my lord, I'd forgotten he always came after sunset and left before dawn, that none of the servants ever saw him by daylight, that no torches ever lit his way to bed.

"At least let me massage it for you."

"That is not a job for my lady...."

"Oh, stop it," I snapped. "Roll over, sir, or I will send Corwyn to town. Now."

"As you wish, Lady," he said with a sigh. He groaned slightly as my fingers prodded his shoulders.

I must admit I was surprised to find muscle and bone beneath my fingers, even more surprised as he winced in pain at my touch. He had substance, that much I knew; why shouldn't he be able to feel pain, too? "Well, nothing is broken, at least."

"I have never lied to you, Lady."

"No, m'lord, you haven't." But neither have you shown me your face, nor told me your name.

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