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griseldabanks · 3 months

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Maybelle and the Beast

My contribution to the @inklings-challenge Four Loves Fairy Tale Challenge. This was my back-up idea for last year, so I was excited to have an excuse to finally write it out! Beauty and the Beast is my favorite fairy tale, and I have a feeling I may revisit this particular version again in the future, because I could definitely turn this into a novel ;) I'll admit to taking a lot of inspiration from Robin McKinley's retellings of this fairy tale.

Maybelle stared at the tall, imposing mahogany door. She felt just as reluctant to open it as if it had been the barred portal to a dungeon—like the cold stone chamber she'd explored early on in her stay here, which she expected had been a dungeon once but was now a wine cellar.

More to stall for time than anything else, Maybelle brushed off her rust red skirt and straightened her collar. It was a nervous habit, but in a way it also served to remind her of why she was here, because of who had given her these clothes. Days, weeks, months in this huge, empty mansion, alone except for one companion. The companion who had slammed this very door not half an hour ago.

Taking a deep breath, Maybelle knocked firmly on the door.

“Go 'way,” a muffled voice growled out to her.

Letting out her breath again in an impatient huff, Maybelle crossed her arms. “Are you still sulking, Agnes?”

“I am not sulking,” the voice insisted sulkily.

“Right. You're lying in bed at three in the afternoon, glaring a hole in the ceiling, for your health.”

After a heavy silence, a loud click told her the key had turned in the hole. Taking that as an invitation, Maybelle opened the door and stepped inside.

The heavy drapes had been pulled closed, leaving the bedroom in a stuffy half-light. The only illumination came from the embers of the fire dying in the fireplace. She could barely even make out the silhouette of a large bulk lying in the huge four-poster. It was like stepping into a sickroom.

Rolling her eyes at the drama of it all, Maybelle closed the door with a snap and made a beeline for the window closest to the fireplace. She pulled the curtains aside, letting a band of lazy afternoon sunlight stretch across the carpet, revealing the twisting patterns of vines and roses. After a moment's consideration, Maybelle decided not to open the curtains of the other window nearest the bed. Best not to annoy Agnes any further with a sunbeam in her eyes. She would probably just wave her hand and make the curtains close, then stick together so Maybelle couldn't open them again. Instead, Maybelle contented herself with throwing the window open and letting in the delicious scents of flowers and the buzzing of bees from the gardens.

“There,” she said, drawing in a deep breath of the fresh smell of spring. “Much better.”

With a grunt, the huge lump on the bed rolled over.

Maybelle walked up to the foot of the bed and stood there with her hands on her hips, just waiting. How strange, to remember how frightened she had been the first time she'd ventured into this room. Or how her knees had nearly given out the first time she'd dared to meet the gaze of the terrible Beast who was to be her captor.

It had been months since she'd ceased to be the Beast, and became instead...simply Agnes.

“Well?” Maybelle said, when it became clear Agnes wasn't about to break the silence. “Aren't we going to at least talk about this?”

The long tail lying on top of the blue bedspread flicked irritably, like a huge cat's. “What's to talk about?” Agnes retorted, her voice grumbling like a motorcar in her massive chest. “Clearly, you don't care what happens to me, as long as you get to go have fun without me.”

Closing her eyes for a moment, Maybelle sent up a silent prayer for patience. “Well, for starters,” she said, her voice coming out more sharply than she'd intended, “you called me an awful lot of horrid names, and I thought perhaps you might want to apologize.”

A long, pregnant pause. Finally, with a long-suffering groan from the bed, Agnes rolled over onto her back, her arms tucked up against her chest almost like a dog waiting for a belly rub. The long, black skirt did little to hide her bowed legs ending in sharp claws, and from this angle, her long saber teeth and curled goat-like horns were no longer hidden in her mountain of pillows.

Agnes sighed in resignation. “Sorry for calling you a selfish, bird-brained floozy.”

Maybelle nodded. “Apology accepted. And...I'm sorry too. For calling you a heartless, hairy pig.”

Their eyes met across the room. Agnes let out a snort, followed by a loud guffaw, and suddenly Maybelle found herself laughing as well. The tight coil of anger and bitterness loosened in her chest as she tipped her head back and let her higher-pitched laughter harmonize with Agnes' deep, hefty chuckles.

Still giggling, Maybelle crossed over and flopped onto the huge bed beside Agnes. She felt so tiny in this bed, like a doll. And yet, even though she was sure Agnes could snap her like a twig if she so desired, Maybelle didn't feel a shred of fear to lie a mere foot away from her.

For a couple minutes, they merely lay there, staring up into the canopy over the four-poster. Maybelle had just realized the stars embroidered there formed constellations and was looking for Orion when Agnes broke the silence.

“You were right, you know.” Her voice was a low, sad rumble like a locomotive rushing past in the night. “I am a pig.”

“Oh, no!” Maybelle raised herself on one elbow, looking over in alarm. “Please, forget those awful things I said. It was very wrong of me to call you that.”

Agnes turned her head aside, but Maybelle thought she caught the sight of a tear glistening in one eye. “You were only speaking the truth. Like you always do. I am heartless. Because I care more about not being alone than I do about you getting a chance to see your family. Even when all you ask is to go to your sister's wedding...I'm too selfish to let you go.”

Slowly, Maybelle lowered herself to her pillow again. She wasn't quite sure what to say, so she spoke slowly, picking her words carefully. “I wasn't thinking of you either. I'm sorry, Agnes. I know...I mean, I can imagine how lonely it must get here, in this huge mansion all alone. But it would only be for the weekend. Just enough to meet Edward and see Adeline off. I'd be back before you could miss me too much.”

“You...would come back?”

Agnes' voice sounded so hesitant and tremulous, Maybelle looked over in surprise, but she couldn't make out her friend's expression past the horn and the unruly mane of hair. “Of course I'll come back. That's part of the deal.”

The silence seemed to congeal between them. Neither of them had mentioned the deal Agnes and Maybelle's father had worked out, not since...Maybelle couldn't even remember. During the past several months, it had become easy to forget how all of this began. When Maybelle had first arrived at the mansion, she'd shut thoughts of home out of her mind as much as possible, to make her dreadful fate a little more bearable. If she weren't constantly thinking of the little cottage or trying to imagine what her father and sisters were up to, perhaps she could carve a small measure of contentment out of her exile. It was a small price to pay for her father's life, after all.

But it had been months since Maybelle had seriously believed that Agnes would have eaten her father. Not after she'd seen the delicate way Agnes handled the gardening tools when she tended to her enchanted rose bushes. Not after the way she'd cradled that finch's body in her enormous hands, huge tears rolling down her hairy face as she muttered spell after spell that fizzled out, unable to bring the tiny animal back to life.

Not after scores upon scores of cozy evenings by the fire, laughing together as Maybelle tried to teach Agnes how to knit with two iron pokers, or taking turns reading from one of the books in the huge library.

For the first time, Maybelle tried to imagine what life must have been like for Agnes in all the years before her father had shown up on the doorstep. Sitting alone in front of a guttering fire. Pacing the dark, dusty hallways, with nothing to hear but the echoes of her own footsteps. Wandering the grounds, able to turn the seasons at a word and the weather at a glance, but with nothing but the birds and bees to listen to her words. A library that magically seemed to provide exactly the book she wanted to read, but all the stories of friendship and adventure only serving to mock her solitude.

“I promise I'll come back,” Maybelle said firmly. “Deal or no deal. I won't leave you alone forever.”

A strange, strangled sound escaped Agnes, quickly disguised in a clearing of her throat. “Well,” she said gruffly, “good. But if you don't come back in three days, I'll die.”

Maybelle rolled her eyes. Always so dramatic.

-----

It was raining when Maybelle returned to the mansion. Since it was midsummer out in the rest of the world, she hadn't thought to pack a coat, so she just ducked her head and hurried up the gravel walk to the great front doors. This wasn't a summer rain, either; the chilly breeze cut right through the thin sleeves of the flower-patterned dress Violette had made for her.

The front doors seemed heavier than usual. Normally, they swung open at the first touch of her hand, but this time Maybelle had to throw her shoulder against one to open it. Perhaps Agnes had left a window open somewhere and there was a draft. Though that seemed strange; surely Agnes would have either closed the window or shifted the weather instead of letting all this cold rain blow in.

Maybelle turned back to glance out the door. It looked like Agnes had fully committed to a dreary late November today. The bare branches of the trees clacked together while the wind howled through them, cold raindrops splashing in puddles that turned the walkways to mud. It made her wonder if the rain had kept up the whole time she'd been away.

Shivering, Maybelle heaved the front door closed again, picked up her bag, and started towards the stairs. “Agnes!” she called, her voice echoing around the huge entryway. “I'm home!”

She was halfway up the stairs, struggling with her free hand to unpin her hair and wring out some of the water, when she realized the lamps were dark. Her feet slowed to a stop in the lush carpeting, and she frowned up at the huge chandelier that hung over the open space. Every time she'd set foot in this hall—or anywhere else in the house, for that matter—candles lit themselves and lamps burst to life. At first, she'd found it frightening, especially when she would walk down a long, straight corridor with the candles flaring up in front of her and winking out behind her, leaving her in a bubble of illumination.

But after all these months, she'd grown used to such things. Doors opening at a touch, lamps lighting on their own, plates of food and cups of tea appearing on tables right when she wanted them, a bath drawn and waiting for her without even the hint of a servant in sight. It was all part of the magic of this place. Agnes' magic.

In the cold darkness and silence, Maybelle suddenly remembered what Agnes had said before her trip. If you don't come back in three days, I'll die.

A chill ran down her spine that had nothing to do with her soaked dress. Surely Agnes had just been exaggerating, the way she so often did. Like that time she'd said she felt like she'd been alone in this mansion for a hundred years. Or when she said she lived under a curse.

But still...where was she? After all the fuss she'd made when Maybelle had first asked to leave, why wasn't she waiting for her? Was she sulking in her room again?

“Agnes!” Maybelle called again, slowly climbing the rest of the stairs. “I'm back! Where are you?”

Nothing but silence to welcome her.

Her footsteps slowed as she reached the top of the stairs and turned to the right, heading for her room. The corridor was wide enough that there wasn't much danger of bumping into things, but it was all so eerie without candles lighting her way. She paused at the corner, where a tall window offered a bit of cold illumination.

Shivering, Maybelle looked out at the darkening grounds, still lashed by the driving rain. The rosebushes looked like they were taking a beating, magic or no magic. Even as she watched, the wind stripped leaves off the branches, and most of the brightly-colored petals were already gone. What on earth was Agnes thinking? Even in her most fickle moods, she would usually relent if she realized it would endanger her precious roses....

Maybelle frowned. What was that dark lump in the middle of the path? She hadn't noticed it as she rushed up the front drive, but from this higher vantage point, she could see it clearly. Was it a tarp caught under a wheelbarrow, knocked onto its side in all this wind?

No. Those weren't the handles of a wheelbarrow. They were horns. Two horns, curled like a goat's, rising from a big hairy head lying in the mud....

Dropping everything, Maybelle grabbed her dripping skirts and raced back down the corridor. She hopped up onto the banister as she'd done so many times before and slid expertly to the bottom. Laughing as Agnes tried to imitate her and toppled over the side in a heap.

She ran to the front door and heaved it open, letting go as the howling wind gusted in and slammed it back against the wall. “Last one inside's a rotten egg!”

The rain almost seemed to be falling horizontally, the wind was so strong. Holding up an arm to shield her face, Maybelle splashed along the muddy path as fast as she could. Walking along the path, crunching through the snow, leaving behind a neat row of shoe prints and paw prints side-by-side.

“Agnes!” Maybelle screamed, the wind stealing her voice, as she turned down an aisle between the rosebushes. “You were wrong when you said there was nothing beautiful about you, Agnes. Just look at your roses!”

There she lay, like a mound of dirt, one arm flung around a rosebush as if to protect it, the other curled tight against her chest. She wasn't moving.

“Agnes?” Maybelle dropped to her knees in a puddle by Agnes' side. Throwing her weight against Agnes' huge shoulder, she managed to roll her onto her back. But how would she ever drag her up into the house?

A weak groan escaped Agnes' lips, and her eyelids fluttered, then slid open. “May...belle?”

Hot tears stung Maybelle's eyes. “Thank goodness!” she cried, grasping Agnes' hand in both of hers. “I thought you were....”

Agnes slowly opened her hand, and Maybelle saw that it was cupped around a small, bedraggled red rose. Most of the petals were gone, and those that remained looked wilted.

“Last one,” Agnes grunted. “Not much...time now.”

“It's all right,” Maybelle said, trying to give her an encouraging smile. “We can replant. Once you're feeling a little stronger, maybe you can turn the weather back to spring and—“

“No.” A shudder ran through Agnes' whole body, and her face twisted in a horrible grimace of pain. “No starting over. No...No use.”

“What are you talking about?” Maybelle patted her friend's hand. “Of course we can start over. We can always start over.”

“But...we sh-shouldn't.” Agnes' voice grew fainter by the minute, and Maybelle had to lean closer to hear. “Just...go back home...Maybelle.”

Icy fingers of dread closed around Maybelle's heart. “What? No! I made a promise, remember? I'm to stay here in my father's place—“

“I release you.” Her big amber eyes rolled to meet Maybelle's, bloodshot and exhausted, but crystal clear. “It was...wrong. I...was wrong. To make you stay...against your will. So...I...re...lease...you....”

With that final whisper, her eyes slid closed, and her head lolled back onto the ground. A shiver, like a tiny electric pulse, ran through Maybelle's whole body, and she knew that some sort of spell had just ended.

“No, Agnes!” Frantically, Maybelle chafed Agnes' hands, patted her cheeks, loosened her collar. “Agnes, you don't understand! I'm not here against my will! We're friends, Agnes! I want to be here!”

The huge beast didn't move. This wasn't like the times Agnes sulked and refused to talk to Maybelle. She couldn't even tell if Agnes was breathing anymore.

Desperate to do something, Maybelle tried to heave Agnes into her arms, but the most she could manage was to cradle Agnes' head in her lap. Tears mingled with rainwater on her furry cheeks.

What if she were dead already? What would Maybelle do then? Go back to her family? But there would be no more strolling through the gardens in the evening, no more reading by firelight, no more long conversations or teaching each other games or trying to braid each other's hair or teaching Agnes how to dance or listening to her wonderful singing voice or laughing at each other's silly jokes or....

“Don't be stupid, Agnes!” Maybelle sobbed. “You're my best friend. The best friend I've ever had. No one knows me like you do. No one cares like you do. If I knew this would happen to you, I never would have gone away.”

Maybelle rested her cheek against Agnes' forehead, in between the horns, and rocked back and forth, holding her best friend close. “I'm sorry, Agnes...I'm sorry.... I never wanted to lose you. I just...I just wanted to keep being your friend. Always. Forever.” A painful sob ripped out of her chest as her best friend's body lay cold and still in her arms. “I love you, Agnes.”

Faintly, Maybelle was aware that the wind had died down, and raindrops no longer pounded down on her head and shoulders. The realization of what that meant only made her cry harder. Her fingers tangled in Agnes' mane of hair as she mumbled over and over again, “I love you, Agnes...I love you....”

“Love you too.”

Maybelle looked up at those gruff words, then gave a great start as she realized she held a complete stranger in her arms.

The woman she held was large, with broad shoulders and a squarish jaw. She was no great beauty, especially not with disheveled brown hair straggling all over the place or her body swimming in Agnes' oversized dress, but there was something comfortable and familiar about....

Wait. “Ag...nes?”

Moving stiffly, the woman held her own hands up in front of her face and turned them around, as if she'd never seen them before. Slowly, a wondering smile crossed her face, and Maybelle noticed this woman's front teeth protruded slightly.

Not too unlike the huge fangs that had curved from Agnes' lips.

Then she raised her eyes to meet Maybelle's, and there was no doubt. Those were the amber-brown eyes of her best friend.

“Agnes!”

They threw their arms around each other, and they were crying, but they were also laughing, and Agnes was trying to tell her something about a fairy and a flower and a curse, but Maybelle was too distracted by how small Agnes was in her arms. How high Agnes' voice was.

“How?” she gulped, pulling back and holding Agnes at arms' length. “How did this happen?”

“It's all you, silly!” Agnes laughed, swiping her sleeve over Maybelle's cheeks to dry her tears. She still moved carefully, as if afraid of accidentally swiping Maybelle with nonexistent claws. “True love breaks any curse, don't you know that?”

“True love?” Maybelle sniffled.

Tears spilled out of Agnes' beautiful amber eyes and rolled down her round, rosy cheeks. “What love could be truer than this?” she said with a shaky laugh. “That you'd still want to be friends with someone as beastly as me?”

“Oh, you're not as bad as all that.”

Agnes raised her eyebrows. “Really? Even after all those nasty things I said to scare you on your first night here? Or when I threw a chair at you and screamed when you went exploring in the west wing?”

“Well....” Maybelle didn't know how to deny it without completely lying, so she hastily changed the subject. “I don't regret anything, though. I don't regret coming here. I don't regret deciding to be your friend.”

With a watery chuckle, Agnes rested their foreheads together. “I don't regret it either.”

#inklingschallenge #four loves fairy tale challenge #theme: philia #story: complete #beauty and the beast #fairy tales #set in vaguely-victorian era #maybelle #agnes

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magnoliabloomfield · 1 year

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It Happened in the Kitchen

Slivko x Maybelle from my fanfic Under Normal Circumstances.

Summary: it’s their anniversary and Slivko tries to make a cake. Emphasis on “tries”.

Requested by @whourfeyrac

Warnings: SFW but implied love making, fade to black. No cursing. Just domestic fluff.

🍰🎂🍰🎂

“What… happened?” Maybelle asked in a controlled tone as she stood at the threshold of the kitchen and surveyed the state it was in.

Slivko stood there with as much flour on him as was on the counters, much more than was in the mixing bowl at this point.

He sighed and ran a hand down his face, feeling dry and gritty.

“Happy anniversary?” He said as his hand fell to his side and sent up a little white cloud.

Maybelle’s face took on that look, the one where he could hear the “awe!” she was holding in. She left foot prints across the kitchen tile when she came up to him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. She tried to give him a kiss but quickly pulled back, wiping flour off her lips with the back of her hand before she wiped his mouth off too and tried again.

“So… what were you going for?” She asked after she broke the kiss, still holding onto him.

“Chocolate cake- devil’s food because I know it’s your favorite,” he answered and watched her bite her bottom lip adorably. “But apparently I’m an idiot who-“

“You are not an idiot,” she said firmly, squeezing him a little tighter. “You, sir, learned how to fly a helicopter. There is no way you can be an idiot.”

All his frustration melted away at that and he wondered if she could see how pink he was blushing under the layers of flour. He couldn’t deny how happy being with Maybelle made him, she was always on his side and never allowed him to be too hard on himself. Even when she was correcting him she was on his side because her goal was always to draw them closer together and keep them together, rather than her ever just wanting to be “right”.

He grinned down at her and wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her flush against him. She gave him a smile before tucking her head under his chin and hugging him back. She took a deep breath, like she usually did during hugs like these, and was thrown into a sneezing fit by all the flour she inhaled.

“What seems to be giving you trouble?” She asked when she was finished sneezing.

He showed her the instructions, a little recipe card he’d gotten from Penny, and explained what he’d done. Maybelle didn’t tell him anything outright, but rather she asked him some leading questions. He liked that she just leaned on the counter, chin resting cutely on her hands as she watched him. He wanted to do this for her on his own, but it was still much more fun having her around.

After he put the cake in the oven they cleaned up the kitchen together. With a few minutes left on the timer, she turned on the radio and tuned it till she found something to dance to. Slivko smiled as her hand found his and pulled him closer in the middle of the kitchen. She loved to dance with him in the kitchen and he loved that about her.

It seemed like more than the oven was getting heated in there. Slivko almost forgot the cake entirely in favor of something else sweet as his hands strayed farther from normal dance positions. She watched him with a knowing look in her eye but didn’t stop him or say anything. He knew how to get an answer from her.

He spun her out and pulled her back in, her back to his chest with her arms wrapped around herself. Trapped in this gentle prison he leaned down and buried his face in her neck. It was her most ticklish spot and he found that if she allowed kisses there it meant she was up for more, but if she just giggled and turned into a turtle it wasn’t the time.

She leaned her head back against his shoulder so he went for it. He made little pink marks on her skin from her ear to her collar bone before he was interrupted by the timer.

She tried to step away but he held her fast.

“Slivie,” she giggled. “Let’s take the cake out and turn the oven off so we don’t burn the house down.”

He let her hands go but clung to her waist as she moved to get the oven mitts and then over to the stove to take out the cake. His body followed her motions even as she bent over to get the cake and he kissed her back through her shirt.

The cake was left in the pan, oven hastily turned off before she turned in his arms and started kissing him now. The first kiss she ever gave him, the first kiss she’d ever given anyone, had been simple and innocent. She’d learned a lot since then.

He pulled back from her eager lips to look into her eyes. Her pupils were large and he could swear he saw little hearts in them as she peered up at him.

“That’s one year down, Mrs. Slivko. Do you want to sign on for another?” He asked her, feeling her hands find the hem of his t-shirt.

“Aye aye captain,” she breathed as she tiptoed to reach his lips again.

He laughed. “That’s the navy,” he corrected.

“Would you complain if I told you you had permission to come aboard?” She asked.

“Aye aye captain,” he repeated as he scooped her up and carried her off for their personal anniversary celebration.

And afterwards there would be cake. Slivko didn’t think it could get any better than that.

“Remember your dream car?” She asked out of the blue when they were halfway to the bedroom.

“Uh huh,” he said though he could barely remember anything that wasn’t what he wanted to be doing right then.

“When we’re done,” she kissed him once more. “Look in the driveway.” She whisper the last bit in his ear before kissing his neck.

Yes, the fact that she had bought him a car, his dream car, and it was sitting in the driveway that very moment was exciting. But he didn’t need to see it just then. There could be a fleet of cars waiting out there for him, but all he wanted and all he cared about was already there in his arms and all he wanted to do was prove that to her.

#Slivko #reg Slivko #Kong skull island #under normal circumstances #Maybelle

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