Astrid

I find Isabelle first. Then Imogen finds me, with Eli clinging to her torso. There is a cut on her cheek but nothing else. No blood stains the child.

Before I can burst into tears, she does.

“Bayorn,” she sounds nearly hysterical. “Bayorn – outside the dungeon. Astrid, Astrid – he’s...he has…”

“Imogen, Imogen, look at me.” All the choked sobs that were ready to spill from my lips suddenly dissolve at the sight of Imogen’s tear-streaked face. “What has happened?”

Isabelle takes Eli from her with trembling arms, but her voice is steady: “Let’s go.”

We go. The whole castle is a mess: broken furniture, shards of ceramic and glass everywhere – even one of the stone pillars has been cracked. Scratch marks line the heavy front doors – I suspect they refused to let the beast out – but the windows are broken.

It left the castle.

We find Bayorn crumpled on the ground. There is blood everywhere. The white on his clothes are now drenched in scarlet. The smell of it makes me want to gag.

I rip the fabric of my skirt and press the muslin against the source of his bleeding: his side. He coughs and splutters.

“Fine,” his voice is barely audible. “The Master…”

Dawn has not yet broken, but the noise has stopped.

“He is alright,” I lie to him.

Imogen and I heave under his weight and take him to the closest room with a bed. By the time we set him down, Imogen has recovered. She starts to bark orders at Isabelle and me, and we fetch whatever she needs.

Within an hour, the bleeding has stopped. He stirs slightly. Imogen feeds him an unlabeled vial of white liquid.

“Find the Master,” she tells me without looking away from his face.

I do not need to be told twice.

Whatever remnant is left in the aftermath of the beast’s directionless hunt is nearly torn apart by my own hands. I all but ransack the entire building in search of another soul – whether a monster or a man, I do not know. When I am finally satisfied he is not inside, I make my way to the main entrance. The heavy doors make way before I can even voice a request.

Kieran’s naked, broken form is found on the steps leading up to the doors.

His shoulders do not move. A new fear grips my heart.

“Kieran?” I call out. My feet nearly trip over the steps, but I recover quickly and stumble along. The chilly dawn air makes my shins go rigid.

When I reach him, I sink to my knees. “Kieran!”

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I push his torso until he turns over.

He splutters. A bright red gash travels along his midsection, but the colour slowly fades to brown. It starts to disappear.

He bunches his fists and curls up into a fetal position, shivering. I unfasten the strings that bind my cloak over my shoulders and throw it over him for cover.

“Are you alright?” I ask fruitlessly.

Kieran’s lips part but he does not answer. I run a hand over his damp forehead. Then, muttering incoherent assurances, I take one arm and wrap it around my shoulder.

His weight bears down upon me. My knees buckle and we both land painfully on the edges of the steps. He groans in agony.

“Sorry, sorry. I’m sorry.” I repeat myself before heaving him up again.

He is dragged unceremoniously across the cold floor. By some miracle, I manage to get him onto the couch nearby. Sweat starts to pool above my brow and I wipe it with the back of my hand, panting. Yet my work is not quite done.

There is one final thing.

“What have you done?”

Lady Selaena already stands leaning against the edge of the balcony, looking for something beyond the trees. Waiting. She turns around and a hand flies to her chest in feigned innocence.

“Me? Nothing.”

“Before midnight, and the transformation already started,” I snap. As I speak my brain goes over the details of last night, just to confirm the truth behind my weary thoughts. “What. Did. You. Do?”

“I only did what he asked me to do. Every bargain with magic comes with a risk. It is he who chose this path.”

“He didn’t choose anything!”

Something feral awakens inside. Perhaps it is the remainder of the adrenaline from last night. I lunge at her, fingers curled into makeshift claws. My grip somehow finds her collarbone, then her neck in seconds. Enraged screams fill my ears – mine or hers, I do not know.

And then I am thrown back.

My back hits the floor and all the breath I have left is pushed out. Dust erupts from around me like smoke.

Lady Selaena’s slender form emerges from the smoke. She stands over me, eyes a blazing green fire, possibly a mirror of mine. An invisible weight pins down against my chest. I gasp and struggle, but my ribs suddenly weigh like lead.

“You punish him with an eternity of pain when he slighted you once!” I hiss. “Your vengeance has brought upon the death of thousands. The beast is not the killer – you are.”

When the dust clears, half her face is no longer hers.

Torn, melting skin gives way to sinking holes on the left side of her face. One corner of her lips sags into a permanent grimace. The small of smoked meat fills my nostrils, and I gag.

“Do not try to tell me whose wrongs belong to whom, child.”

Her voice has turned into cold steel as she spits out the last word. “Do not presume to know anything about the way he slighted me. About the way he betrayed my love for the lust of other women and threw me to the King to be executed in fire.”

Executed in fire. The vision of the guards reporting to the King that the witch disappeared in the midst of her execution jogs my memory.

“The Prince’s fiancée.”

One corner of her lips curls up bitterly. “So he has told you, then, of his crime. How he uncovered the knowledge of my practice of magic and sought to be rid of me.”

Something cold seizes my gut. The sight of her face, her unyielding glare, makes me turn away.

Betrayal. All this has been about betrayal.

When I look at her again, her face is no longer scathed. Her skin has smoothened once more and a deceptive serenity re-enters her eyes.

“Get up, girl.”

I obey. When I do, the burst of energy that lasted through the night suddenly seeps out of my bones. My legs tremble in exhaustion. Lady Selaena’s attention flickers to the gash in my arm.

“This is not my doing. Our Prince knows there is a price to pay for the end he seeks.”

What end? a small voice echoes from the crevices of my thoughts, but my eyes are trailing towards the blood that trickles down my arm. Now the burn is starting to set in my nerves.

“And soon you will pay it, too.”