Isabeau
My body was a battlefield where starvation and healing fought their daily war. Each spoonful of broth, every carefully chewed bite of bread served as reinforcements for the side of recovery, while the throbbing bite mark on my shoulder reminded me of who I was fighting for.
The men who thought they’d saved me had no idea I was already claimed. Three times over, in fact, by princes they’d call monsters if they knew the truth. Princes I could still feel, barely,across the veil between worlds, suffering while I grew stronger in this gilded cage.
I stood by the window, testing my legs as I did every evening when Brigida helped me from the bed. Two weeks since Prince Alain had dragged me from my dungeon, and I could finally remain upright for more than a few minutes without trembling like a newborn fawn. The hollows between my ribs had begun to fill, and my face in the mirror no longer resembled a skull with skin stretched too tightly across it.
Progress, they called it. The prince’s healers visited daily, clucking with satisfaction as they measured the circumference of my wrists and noted the fading blue tint beneath my fingernails. They spoke about me as if I weren’t present, discussing my body like it was a project they’d undertaken rather than the vessel that housed my soul.
“The lady is responding well to the increased portions.”
“Her color is much improved since yesterday.”
“Another few days and we might allow her short walks in the corridor.”
They never asked what I wanted. They never considered that strength might mean something different to me than it did to them. That I might be gathering it for purposes that would horrify their sensibilities.
I placed my palm flat against the cold window glass, feeling the bite of winter beyond. Night had fallen hours ago, turning the pane into a mirror that reflected my gaunt face superimposed over the distant lights of Durand. Somewhere beyond those lights, far beyond the castle walls, lay the Forbidden Forest. And within it, the castle where I’d left pieces of my heart.
Closing my eyes, I reached for them through the claiming mark on my shoulder. The connection had grown dangerously thin since my removal from the nexus point, but I could still feel them if I concentrated hard enough now that I had more zeal.Three distinct energies, three princes bound to me by blood and magic and something deeper than both. Love.
Marcel, the leader, his presence a steady flame that refused to be extinguished despite whatever torments he endured. Laurent, the philosopher, whose essence felt like cool water flowing over smooth stones. And Bastien, the protector, wild and fierce even in his suffering.
All three in pain. All three fighting to survive in whatever hell the Dark Lord had thrust them into. All three reaching back to me across the barrier between worlds, clinging to our connection like drowning men to a lifeline.
I’m here, I promised them silently. I’m getting stronger. I’ll find a way back to you.
Their response came as a collective surge of emotion rather than words. Relief, desperation, and underneath it all, a primal possessiveness that made the claiming mark throb with renewed intensity.Mine, the feeling said.Ours. The emotion was powerful enough to make my knees buckle, forcing me to grab the window frame for support.
They were suffering. That knowledge tore at me, made food taste like ash in my mouth and sleep impossible most nights. I’d failed them by being too weak to resist Prince Alain’s “rescue.” By allowing myself to be taken from the castle where our bond was strongest. By not finding a way back yet.
The door opened behind me, the soft click of the lock followed by measured footsteps I’d come to recognize over the past fortnight. Prince Alain’s evening visit, right on schedule. He was nothing if not predictable in his routines.
I didn’t turn to greet him. Let him stare at my back if he wanted to have another frustrating conversation about my mysterious captors and his delusional belief that I suffered from some form of magical Stockholm syndrome. I wasn’t in themood tonight. Not after feeling my princes’ agony so acutely just moments before.
“The healers tell me you’re gaining strength,” he said, his voice a deep rumble that seemed to fill the room despite his effort to keep it soft.
I continued staring out the window. “Is that why you’ve come? To check on your investment?”
His sigh carried across the room. I could picture him running a hand through his dark hair as he always did when I tested his patience. “I’ve come because I care about your recovery. Because I want to understand you.”
He spoke to me as a friend, losing his manners when addressing me. Not that I minded. I grew up with the same instillment for proper etiquette, but I hadn’t used it much here. I didn’t use it with the Beast until I learned his human identity. All three of them. God, I missed them.
“You want to understand why I’m not appropriately grateful,” I corrected, finally turning to face him. “Why I don’t fall to my knees and thank you for ‘saving’ me from one prison just to lock me in another.”
He remained by the door, keeping his distance as he had since that unexpected moment of tenderness when he’d kissed my forehead days ago. The memory still unsettled me, not because the gesture itself was unwelcome but because of how my body had responded to it. The momentary flutter in my stomach, the catch in my breath. The betrayals of the flesh when my heart belonged elsewhere.
“I want to understand who you were before the forest claimed you,” he said quietly. “Before... whatever happened in that castle happened.”
The request caught me off guard. In all our previous conversations, he’d focused on my captivity, on the beasts hebelieved had tormented me. Never on the woman I’d been before.
I studied him in the dim light, this prince who’d inserted himself into my story without understanding the narrative he was disrupting. His blue eyes held genuine curiosity, and perhaps something else. A hunger for connection I recognized because I’d seen it in my own reflection before Marcel, Laurent, and Bastien had filled that void.
“Why?” I asked, suddenly exhausted by the constant tension between us. “What does it matter who I was?”
“It matters because that woman still exists,” he said. “Beneath whatever the forest did to you, she’s still there. And I’d like to meet her.”
The earnestness in his voice disarmed me. I’d been braced for another interrogation about the beasts, another demand that I renounce my connection to them. This gentler approach left me without my usual defenses. Though, I still disdained his way of pointing to something being wrong with me.
