Rosalind - Beauty and the Beast meets Dracula retelling

21- Upon A White Wolf's Hide

"You will never run out of sins to commit, will you, father?" In the dark of night, Troy stood by the stables watching Caspian saddle one of the steeds. Though the animals no longer required hay or water to survive, the persistent scent of their feed-boxes and manure lingered in the air around them.

The sound of the leather saddle landing on the horse's back twined with the metallic jingle of the stirrups swaying by the animal's flesh-less belly. Caspian turned roughly to his only child, his lips rising in a snarl. "We are damned to continue living together, boy, but I will not put up with you chastising me."

"Chastising?" Troy tried to keep his gaze away from the horse's horrific appearance. Now, a century later, he still avoided the stables as much as possible but he would not stand in silence while his father took a prisoner. "I am condemning you, father, not chastising. I saw the woman in the house, or rather she is barely a woman. How old is she, father...sixteen, seventeen?"

Caspian ran his hand firmly over the horse's side, over smooth ribs which had turned yellowish with age. Though the cold blossomed outside, inside the marrow of him, the lord felt his anger boil.

Barely tolerating one another, father and son kept away from each other as much as possible. Troy had unwillingly turned a blind eye to his father's decades of slaughter, but he could not stay silent to this. "What are you going to do with her? Keep her here until you bore of her?  Steal her innocence then murder her? She is a girl, father. My age. Or what age I would have been had you not had this wretchedness tossed upon us."

When Caspian dropped his hand from the horse, the animal shuddered and stepped back. The lord's long legs took him to his son. He raised his hand and slapped Troy across the face in the same manner he had struck old Serabeth so long ago. "Go back to the forest or to your chamber before I hurt you," Caspian hissed. His eyes narrowed at his son.

It should have been Calla spared, Caspian thought, not you.

Troy's lip throbbed. When he touched his fingers to his mouth, it stung from a cut. "This is all you know," he whispered. "Pain and death." Troy lowered his hand, his fingertips stained with blood.

Caspian looked at Troy with disgust. He could barely tolerate the young man but he would never kill the last piece of Calla left alive. As long as her blood ran through Troy, he was safe from his father's blood-lust. "Though you resemble a wolf most days, wolf you are not. You would have been better suited as a rabbit. You are meek and always have been. I wanted a son who would grow up to be a man like I am, not remain a frail child."

Troy shook his head. "I will never be the man you are, father, and that suits me fine." Backing away from the stables and rotting mess of both father and steeds, Troy turned towards the woods. He shed his human skin and transformed into a white wolf before dashing into the arms of darkness.

A new day came. The morning sun seemed to reach every part of Transylvania except for the manor. Splattered rays of light tried in desperation to slice though the low hanging murkiness. Still in her nightdress, Rosalind watched the fog rolling lazily before her. Back home the sun would be shining and the day would be bright. There would be no ominous gloom or eternal iciness. Though fireplaces burned day and night in the lord's house, there was a constant chill in the air.

At this time back home, Rosalind would be making her way to the kitchen to have her breakfast. Clairie, the maid would have made her a cup of tea, and together the two young women would share a few words. Rosalind's brothers and father would be getting ready for work. The sounds of family and house-staff would dance merrily in the air.

A sting of tears threatened to turn into weeping but Rosalind would not allow such nonsense.

Quickly rising, Rosalind took in a deep breath. "From a certain point on there is no turning back. This is the part I have reached. If I must endure this torment for a month so be it." Her father's face came into her mind. His loving face. His kind eyes. "Some people are worth suffering for."