Beauty and the Beast (Not Quite the Fairy Tale #3) (13 page)

Epilogue

A man and a cat,

Ben was growing quite tired of the endless chatter.

Sure, his companion had been helpful; he would never have managed to earn the hundred grand he’d offered to the Beast without him, for instance, but did he have to go on and on like that?

“Your sister is a Princess! There’s talk about the King abdicating, too – which means she’ll be Queen, soon. Come on, Benjamin, we
have
to do something about it.”

He sighed, rather than repeating what he’d said, again and again: he didn’t have grand aspirations. Now Lucia was taken care of, he didn’t even need money. He liked his job as the head of
Jereen
an security; why couldn’t that be enough?

The cat jumped on his desk, his little red boots making their annoying, yet familiar little noise with each step.

“What about that girl you met at Belle’s wedding. Didn’t you like her?”

Ben narrowed his eyes. What was Puss up to now?

The girl he referred to was a gorgeous, voluptuous vixen, who’d knocked him on his ass, taken him to bed, before disappearing by dawn.

“Sure. But in case you haven’t noticed, she wasn’t that into me.”

“She can’t be
into
anyone. She’s cursed.”

Here we go; go number twenty-six at trying to get him involved in fay business.

This time, he bit, though.

“Cursed by what?”

“Well, not
personally
cursed, but her kingdom is. Have you ever heard of Carabas?”

The snow queen,

Time was a strange notion to those of her blood. Eira wasn't sure how many seasons she'd seen, but it was a fair few – enough so that every single thing she could do had become a routine.

One day, the prospect of opening her eyes became oppressive, so she’d slept.

And slept.

And slept.

The call wasn't more than a whisper at the back of her mind, but it effortlessly broke through the haze.

Help, the child said.

Eira wasn't sure how that was possible. No creature able to talk to her mind should exist in this world. Not anymore.

She could easily have ignored it, but curiosity – a feeling she wasn’t used to – needled her mind. Opening her lids took a while, sitting up, longer yet: her muscles had lost all of their force during her little nap, which did indicate that the slumber might have lasted a while, this time.

Looking down, she saw that her limbs were practically blue. Frozen. She pushed up to her feet, ignoring the pain; she felt the cold, but the knowledge that it couldn't harm her allowed her to ignore it.

Each step was an effort; she stumbled at first, like a clumsy fawn.

By the time she'd reached the entrance of her cave, she'd regained her balance, her color, and outside, a torrential storm indicated that her powers were just fine, too.

I really do hope you liked this book! If you did, I’d appreciate if you could leave a review, so other readers can find my work, too!

The Snow Queen
is already available on pre-order, and will be released next week, I hope you’ll love it too.

Stay in tune for an extract of Rise,

My sci-fi romance.

1

Duty

Calden

Calden somehow managed to prevent himself from throwing up when he saw the girls. They were little more than children. The agonizing sounds coming from the imperial chamber perfectly illustrated the reason why each and every one of the fourteen females before him was soiled, bruised, and terrified of him.

He looked just like their abuser.

“How many has he called?”

His tone was cold, detached. Such was the way of their race. They never made snap decisions or jumped to conclusions, it went against everything they were taught; Klints measured probable outcomes to every action, using facts, stats and logic.

Calden was a great believer in this process. He needed to remind himself of that, as his fist itched to collide with something solid; anything would do.

“All of them,” Jaycn replied with an uncharacteristic scowl. “Every girl of breeding age in the city.”

The nausea grew worse, yet. This wasn't what their invasion had been about.

The Klints were far superior to the human race in every possible way, which was the reason why they'd left them alone, when they'd first heard of the sentient Earth inhabitants who looked so similar to them; however the most recent researches and experiments had proven that they needed them now.

Or at least, they needed their females.

The Klints had stopped primitively bearing their youth over two millenniums ago; children were engineered, to create the perfect specimens. At the turn of the previous millennium, they'd failed to see the point of developing female reproduction systems – uteruses had become a useless hindrance to women.

However, the reproduction centers had failed to create sane, healthy children for over two generations; they either died before reaching maturity, or worse yet: they turned rogue, insane – whatever they called it. It wasn't pretty.

Then, someone had talked about attempting to inseminate a human, and the rest was history.

Well, not quite; the war following the refusal of the human race to relinquish a hundred breeders a year was too raw in Calden’s mind to be called that, yet.

“He’s managed to impregnate all those girls?”

“Not exactly. From what we can tell of those who aren't resisting medical treatment, he isn't… Impregnating them all.”

Strangely, Calden was relieved, rather than irritated. At least, not all of them would be likely to carry his half-siblings.

He lifted his left hand and wordlessly, Jaycn thrust his sword into his grasp.

It hadn't been his plan; he would have preferred to spend a century or two perfecting his knowledge of the world, before taking on the responsibility.

But it seemed that there was going to be a new Emperor by nightfall.

•

Five years later.

Lena

Lena wasn't stupid, so when the officials came for her, she did what any smart, sensible girl would have: she ran for it.

She was quite good at that; while she perhaps lacked practice now, no one raised by Michael Ashford would ever enter a building without considering the potential emergency exits.

Besides, she’d survived two years at the Imperial Academy. Such a feat wouldn’t have been accomplished without daydreaming about every possible way of breaking out on a daily basis. The professors were that boring. Hot, like most Klints, but then, they opened their mouths.

When the three officials in their immaculate imperial uniforms entered the classroom and announced they – and their various weapons – wished to speak to her, she went for the window. It was that or the back door, and she suspected the three large Suckers might have more issues dangling down drainage pipes than running through corridors.

She skillfully glided down and jumped when she reached the first floor; the fall hurt her knees and joints, but as the adrenaline had kicked in, she managed to ignore it and force her limbs to move, fast.

From there, it was a walk in the park.

Well, not technically; San Francisco was anything but a park, these days. Lena passed the quiet, clean streets of the privileged A Zone – in other words, the homes of various high-ranking Klints – as quickly as possible, taking every shortcut to get to the busy, messy, foggy market. 

There. She was safe now. There was no way they'd ever find one lone girl in this mess. Well, as long as she managed to blend in.

The market had taken over what she'd called the city center, in her teens. To say that things had changed was a
slight
understatement.

While fashion was still available to those who could afford it, behind the closed, guarded doors of the Imperial Malls, there were no high end boutiques in these streets; things had gone back to the basics for the common populace.

On her left, there were the butchers, milkmen and fishermen, the artisans were on her right and the produce, higher up the street, closer to the Mall – they'd been allowed that place of choice because while they displayed their goods in front of their doors like anyone else, fruit and veggies didn't stink as much as raw meat, and weren't as noisy as shoemakers; the Suckers wouldn't want their sensitive senses to be accosted by such unpleasantness when they came down to restock their wardrobes, after all. Assholes.

Lena was on a tight budget, but she headed straight to her right, towards Donny’s.

The shop mostly sold second hand and handmade items, but amongst the many cast-offs, she'd spotted something a while back. It was in the sparse “new” section, and still had tags which revealed it used to be seventy-five dollars – practically twice her monthly food allowance. Now, it was fifteen dollars.

“I'm taking that.”

Lena pressed her finger against the digital cash register, which flashed blue, indicating that the credit had been approved.

She couldn't afford it, but she needed to change, she was too recognizable right now. As a purchase had to be made, she didn't see the point in going for a cheaper outfit she would have no use for after today. In for a penny, in for a pound, as the Brits said.

“I need to get changed. Is the back free?”

The old shop-owner took her in, and she must have read her accurately, because she looked out the window, towards the street.

She took a step back, mouth open. No need to ask what she'd seen.

The old woman silently pointed towards a door, before thrusting a bundle of fabric in Lena’s hand, squeezing her fingers in show of support.  

Lena didn’t waste an instant, shedding her beige student uniform, replacing it by a pair of skintight exercise trousers and a running jacket.

It was the good stuff, no doubt about that. Despite the cool air, she felt perfectly comfortable – not warm, nor cold.

The bundle of cloth turned out to be a hat. Good call. She gathered her red hair and stuffed it under the black wool, before leaving through the staff entrance behind the shop.

Twenty minutes later, she was five miles away from the place where her financial transaction could be recorded; she might have been quicker, if she could have afforded some running shoes, but in her flat ballerinas, it was as far as she could go without giving herself blisters.

Lena winced. Scratch that. More blisters. She already had a couple, at least
.

She knew she couldn't hide forever; she had exams in two weeks, and she couldn't miss them. Not after everything she'd given up to get an education.

But surrendering now, while being on low ground, unaware of what the Klints were after, wasn't in her nature; she'd figure out what they wanted with her before deciding on the best course of action.

Lena knew she wasn't really in trouble; whatever it was, anyway, she hadn't done it. Her life was that uneventful, these days.

But they could have wanted her because of her father.

After considering her options, she headed towards the closest Dissenter outpost she knew of, and sent a simple message to their leadership.

Help.