mon père

[beheld_beauty]

Belle probably wouldn't have gone into the forest looking for her father if it weren't for the fact that, were he home, she'd never be allowed.

She understands his concerns. Really she does. If it weren't for the fact that he's the local lawman, she wouldn't even be allowed out into town on her own. She's beautiful (as no one can shut up about for thirty seconds at a stretch; is it any wonder she prefers books?) and while he can protect her in their tiny town, the Witchwood is another matter. People get lost there - sometimes the Wood spits out men and women and children from other villages entirely, near theirs instead, and they have to be given maps and sent the long way around to get home - and anything could happen and he has no jurisdiction over crimes committed there.

But the woods are beautiful, and she's going to bring a blank book to draw a map in, and her father has been missing for four days and even if Belle's only concern were her safety she'd need to find him. Because orphaned seventeen-year-old girls tend to find it in their own best interest to get married, and if she wanted to get married, it would not be to anyone in the village.

He chased in a highwayman (whose crime was not committed in the forest, so all is in its proper order).

The highwayman came out.

Charlie did not.

Charlie, apparently, has gotten lost.

And Belle is going to go in and get him.

---

Her map is wrong.

No - no, she was very careful. She knows people get lost here; she knows the woods are twisty, suspects the landmarks must include duplicates. She brought bits of ribbon to mark her way. She's been changing colors as she gets deeper into the forest, and she's been traveling for almost a day now, and that ribbon right there was tied in the first hour. She's not that turned around; it's broad daylight and she's been tracking the sun. Not even magic, if magic existed, would be able to move the sun.

That leaves her, and the tree. She has been picked up and put back where she started or she has been followed by this tree. Or the ribbon, perhaps, if it's magically untied itself and made exactly the same knot around a different branch. ...No, there is the bit of blood from where she tripped and scraped her hand against the bark of that tree, and blood and ribbon both following her is more of a stretch than her having been transported or the tree having walked on its very roots to heel like a dog.

Damnation.

Well. Most people who wander into the Witchwood are eventually heard from again. But it's getting dark, and she trips more than enough in daylight; she underestimated the treachery of the ground deep in among the trees.

She goes on. She keeps making her map - it's still possible it will be useful for something, and she has precious little else to do while she walks alone through the dimming woods - keeping an eye out for a place to sleep.

She finds one.

Comments

[deslandes]

From a distance, through the tall trees, it just looks like an unusually well-lit clearing overgrown with thorny plants.

Well, that's true enough, but it is not the complete truth. Because from outside the clearing it's not apparent that in the middle of it there lies a proud old castle, circled by a crumbling outer wall that serves mostly as the framework for a riot of roses. One tall iron door stands out from the gate, listing to the side under the weight of ambitious vines; the other lies flat on the ground, its graceful bars bent and twisted and half-gone to rust, with a sapling oak sprouting out of the middle.

[beheld_beauty]

Belle blinks at this. She's never heard of anyone finding anything like this in the Witchwood, and she's heard her share of Witchwood stories.

It's certainly more worth checking out than another mile of possibly-ambulatory trees.

She sidles around the sapling and past the wall.

[deslandes]

The upper parts of the castle are still lit by the setting sun; the colours it paints on the stone are quite beautiful. And the castle is in surprisingly good repair, considering the condition of the gardens. There is no sign of rust or rot on the main doors, which are made of solid wood banded with elaborately wrought iron.



As she approaches, the doors creak open.

[beheld_beauty]

"Hello?" she calls.

[deslandes]

Silence.

[beheld_beauty]

Okay, weird. Maybe the doors just swing open sometimes, from air pressure - though she didn't feel a breeze. Maybe it's uninhabited and she can sleep in it overnight without having to convince anyone to shelter her. She picks her way through the overrun garden and peers through the door, not stepping in just yet. "Hello?" she calls, louder.

[deslandes]

More silence.

The interior of the castle is richly decorated, lit by a selection of tidy lanterns and a beautiful chandelier, and spotless. Someone obviously lives here - in fact, it should take multiple servants to keep the whole place this clean. But if anyone does, they're not visible from the doorway and they're not making much noise.

[beheld_beauty]

"I'm sorry to barge in like this," she calls into the silence, "but the door was open, and I'm terribly lost - and I'm looking for my father, has he been by this way?"

[deslandes]

No response.

[beheld_beauty]

Maybe there's been some kind of emergency in another part of the castle and everyone's dealing with that. She walks in a bit farther, looking for anything to suggest where the servants and their masters might have gotten to.

[deslandes]

The doors close gently behind her. Across the room, lanterns along the railings of a wide marble stair kindle to life pair by pair from the lowest to the highest. It's as though the castle itself is saying 'come upstairs, please'.

[beheld_beauty]

The doors could be anything.

The lanterns - not.

Lanterns cannot do that.

First the trees and now this.

Belle turns and goes as fast as she dares back to the door and hauls on the handle.

[deslandes]

It sticks on the first pull, then swings open easily.

[beheld_beauty]

Back out into the garden, back out to the wall, she did not come equipped to handle a magic castle.

[deslandes]

The gate is still just as open, but the woods outside have changed. There are no ribbons in sight. The trees look taller, and older.

And it is still getting dark.

[beheld_beauty]

She goes out the gate regardless. She knew this might take more than a day; she came prepared to start a fire and sleep under a tree somewhere.

She uses the remaining light to case the area, looking for an inviting tree.

These trees are less inviting than their predecessors.

[deslandes]

Nothing obviously magical happens...

...except that every time she gets out of sight of the castle, a few more steps take her back in view of its clearing. No matter which direction she goes.

[beheld_beauty]

...

Okay. Something magical is going on, she has no idea how it works, and if it wants it bad enough, she has no powers with which to combat it.

Given the givens -

She may as well cooperate with it to the point of having a roof over her head in the night.

She goes back inside the castle.

[deslandes]

The lanterns going up the stairs are still burning. The doors shut themselves behind her again.

[beheld_beauty]

She tries the door. (Just to make sure it still works.)

[deslandes]

It's terribly cooperative.

[beheld_beauty]

Good.

She lets them close again, and lets the lights lead her up the stairs.

[deslandes]

A continuous line of helpful lanterns leads her directly to a bedroom, as clean and luxurious as the rest of the castle, with warm rugs on the floor and an enormous canopied bed.

[beheld_beauty]

Well, that's nice of it.

She goes in, and closes the door behind her, and waits five seconds, and then attempts to open it.

[deslandes]

It works just fine.