Twisted Fairy Tales - Beauty and the Beast

Chapter 13: The Sending of a Nursemaid

Aquitaine, France, Le village de la terre verte: Le Château de la bête.

February 25th, 1896.

Before he could finish another drop of ale, the barkeep shakily put anther mug in front of Gaston. His drunken behavior the past month had put everybody on edge. One moment he could be fine and the next he was was shooting off his gun into some guys chest. His death toll, now up at five, had been raised because some poor unlucky souls had crossed his path while Gaston was in these moods. One of his victims had been the sheriff, another the mayor and with those two deaths coming so close together, Gaston had effectively taken over the small village. He shoved his finished mug of beer down the bar until it crashed off the end in a clatter, making the barkeep glad he had kept his old and dented wood and metal models and not bought from the man selling glass mugs.

"Damn that Belle. Does she not know who I am? And what gives her the right to disappear? And now her father is spouting of lunatic stories of monsters? LeFou! Get me D'Arque!" Gaston yelled out in a rage. LeFou had been across the room, trying to gather up the courage to talk to a girl he had liked for a while when he heard Gaston and instead went running to him before he got yet another black eye.

"Right away Gaston, no problem Gaston, you are the best Gaston." LeFou stood next to Gaston for a few moments, waiting for his instructions when he was blindsided by a hand to the side of his head. He hadn't heard Gaston's bellowed demand, otherwise he would have gone straight out into the cold night without a second glance.

"Don't just stand there, go and get me D'Arque!" pounding his fist against the bar he made half the people in the tavern jump with fear, also making LeFou get out the door before a gun could follow him.

"I'm already on my way back Gaston!" he said quickly while slamming the door shut behind him.

"And don't lay the truth on so thickly LeFou! I already know I am the best." Drinking another three mugs of ale before the master of the local insane asylum could make it into the pub, Gaston had become mad with anger, power and an alcohol addled mind.

"You asked for me, Gaston? It is unusual for a patient to ask for me personally, normally they want some-" Gaston threw his half empty mug at the doctor who did not even flinch as it barely brushed past his ear.

"How dare you even 'sinuate that I am a lunatic! I am perfectly sane!" Gaston roared, stomping up to the man who just stared on calmly, clearly used to this kind of behavior. His thin sallow face covered in long wisps of gray hair, both from the top of his head and his chin, leading to his thin skeletal frame, covered by an equally gray suit and tie.

"Clearly." Gaston was confused by his one word answer and the fact that he did not cower before him. Rather then think it through much longer when he was seeing two of everything, he just chose to lead him to a booth in the back of the pub instead.

"I need you to work with me, old man. I need a certain girl to get over her stubbornness and marry me, but she will not do so of her own will. She is however willing to protect her old man at any cost. I need him to go away so that she will say yes to me and then we can bring the old man back."

"This all depends on the man of course. If I take the wrong one I will have the village up in arms against me and my asylum and I will lose all credibility here, an let me assure you that it wouldn't be a good thing for you if that happened."

"I do not think that will be a problem as the whole village knows that this guy is crazy! He has been crazy for years of course staying locked up in his basement most of the day with his science experiments and a daughter who reads for fun and to learn, but lately he has been spouting off stories of how his daughter was kidnapped by a beast and is keeping her held prisoner in his castle's dungeon tower! Nobody has seen the girl either which is unusual but there is no such thing as a beast in a castle any where close to here as I surely would have killed it by now and taken over his castle if there were any around." Gaston had started to ramble on in his drunken stupor, but the Monsieur D'Arque had become used to such ramblings and could understand who he was meant to take.