Darling Beast

IT WAS VERY late—well past midnight—before Lily retired to bed. There had been the reunion with Indio, made even more chaotic by the duke’s four dogs—two greyhounds, a silly spaniel, and an elderly white lapdog—all of whom Daffodil seemed to regard as very large play toys. There had been the rather nerve-racking introduction to Apollo’s sister, who, no matter how nice she seemed, was after all a duchess. There had been a positively decadent bath followed by a very good late-night supper of roast duck and baby carrots.

So it was understandable that Lily didn’t at first notice the very large man in her bed when she entered the room assigned to her.

When she did, she stopped dead and hissed, “You can’t be in here!”

The covers were pulled to his waist, but he appeared to be quite naked underneath.

“Why not?” Apollo asked, apparently having forgotten all the social niceties that someone must’ve taught him as a small child.

“Because this is your sister’s house.”

He cocked his head. “Actually it’s His Grace the Ass’s house, but I do see your meaning. You know she’s a floor above us?”

“Why do you even call him that?” she asked as she began removing her bodice. “He seems a perfectly nice man, if a bit stiff, and as I understand it, he actually rescued you from Bedlam.”

Apollo frowned ferociously. “He seduced my sister before they were married.”

She looked at him, eyebrow raised.

“And he’s an ass. But mostly it’s my sister.”

“So if Edwin chose to call you out over your very thorough debauchment of me…?”

“He’d be well within his rights,” he assured her. “In fact, he really ought to.”

She couldn’t tell if he was joking or not, and honestly she rather thought he wasn’t.

“Gentlemen have very odd minds,” she commented as she slipped out of her skirt.

“We do,” he replied lazily. “For instance, I’d rather like you to become my wife.”

She was silent, frowning as she unlaced her stays.

After a moment he cleared his throat. “This is where many a gentleman might think that it’s ladies who have odd minds.”

“Richard—”

“Please don’t do me the insult of comparing me to that worm,” he said, quietly and seriously.

“I’m sorry,” she said at once, because she was. Apollo was nothing like Richard and she more than anyone else knew that. “But you must understand: even without his violence, I don’t think their marriage would’ve been a happy one.”

He rolled to his side and propped himself up on his arm. “You’re still comparing,” he said gently. “I don’t give a damn about bloodlines. I think today’s events more than prove that only madmen do, really.”

She swallowed, pulling off her stays gingerly. “Your family won’t like an actress for your wife.”

“My family consists of Artemis and, I suppose by default, His Grace the Ass. Did you find either of them unwelcoming?”

“No, but—”

“And they won’t be.” He rose, gloriously nude, and walked to her, taking her hands. “Lily, my light, my love. What are you afraid of?”

“I…” she began and then couldn’t answer because she didn’t know what it was she feared. She looked up at him helplessly.

He smiled his gentle smile and brought her hand to his lips, tenderly kissing each fingertip. “I love you and you love me. I might’ve been in a little doubt before this afternoon, but when you flung yourself in front of a pistol, it did rather clarify things. And, since you love me and I love you, it is right and meet and wonderful that you and I become man and wife and spend the rest of our lives sleeping together and rising together and having masses of children together and living joyfully.”

“Masses?” she muttered a bit doubtfully, but fortunately he ignored her.

Apollo sank onto one knee there before her, with her only in her chemise and him in… nothing at all.

“Lily Stump,” he said, his voice rasping a little as it always would, “will you take me as husband and be my wife? Will you be my sun and light all the days of my life and never make me regret bathing in a muddy pond?”

And she laughed as she drew him up to kiss.

“Yes,” she said against his lips. “Yes.”

Epilogue

A cry broke from Ariadne’s lips at the gruesome sight. The monster shook his head and Theseus’s body fell to the ground, bloodied. She ran to kneel by the man, but saw at once that the wound was too deep and too terrible. Theseus looked up at her, his eyes wide in surprise, and gasped with his last breath, “I am the hero. It is the monster who should die, not me.”

And then his spirit left his body.

Ariadne bowed her head and said a prayer. When she raised it she saw the monster wading in the pool, washing the gore from his chest and head. She stood, but he did not look at her. In fact, he turned his back.

“Monster!” she called, but the moment the word left her lips, she knew it was wrong. “I’m sorry,” she said, softer. “You aren’t a monster, no matter what others say.”

At that he raised his bull head and finally turned to look at her.

There were tears in his beautiful brown eyes.

“I do not know your name,” she said. “Perhaps you’ve never had one—not a proper one, at least. So I’ll call you Asterion—ruler of the stars—if that meets with your approval?”

Gravely, Asterion bowed his head.

Ariadne held out her hand. “Will you come with me out of the labyrinth? It is beautiful here in your garden, but no birds sing and I think it rather lonely.”

So Asterion took Ariadne’s hand and she, following the red thread from the spindle the queen had given her, retraced her steps out of the labyrinth. Of course it took many days, for even with the thread to follow, the labyrinth’s corridors were long and winding. But Ariadne passed the time telling Asterion about the island outside the labyrinth, and the people who lived there.

When at last they reached the entrance of the labyrinth and Ariadne heard birds singing in the trees, she turned to Asterion with a joyful smile upon her face.

But what a surprise met her when she gazed upon her companion! For while Asterion still retained his coal-black hue, his massive shoulders, the horns of a bull, and the tail as well, his visage had changed to that of a man.

And with a man’s lips and tongue came the power of speech. Asterion fell to his knees before Ariadne. “Gentle maiden, I owe you my life,” he said, his voice hoarse and halting. “For years others have entered into my labyrinth bent on killing me. Only you saw me as a thinking being. A man with a soul. In this way you have broken my curse.”

“And I am glad of it,” she said.

Ariadne and Asterion went to the golden castle. But how it had changed since she’d last seen it! The great halls were empty, the courtiers and soldiers disappeared. Together Ariadne and Asterion wandered for many hours before they at last found the mad queen.

What tears the queen wept when she saw her son! For the first time in years she put down her spinning, and she opened wide her arms to receive him. As for the king? Why, he was quite dead. One morning he’d grown irritated at the singing of sparrows on his balcony, and when in a fit of ire he’d chased them, the balcony wall had given way, and the king had fallen to his death.

But the island was in chaos with no one to rule. The people crowded the streets, confused and fearful. So Asterion went to the king’s balcony and raised his hands.

“My people,” he shouted, and immediately all turned their heads to stare in wonder. “My people, I was born a beast, but by the kindness of Ariadne, I have become a man. I know violence, but I prefer peace. If you will accept me as your leader, I will try to rule more justly than my father and I will keep Ariadne by my side as my wife so that I never forget the importance of kindness.”

And as the people cheered, Asterion turned to Ariadne and smiled with his new-formed human lips. “Will you, my sweet maid? Will you be my wife and queen and tutor me in gentleness? Will you be my love forevermore?”

Ariadne placed her palms on his dark cheeks and smiled up at him. “I think you have no need of my tutoring, my lord, but if you will have me as wife, I will gladly wed you and be your love forevermore.”

And so she did.

—From The Minotaur

THREE MONTHS LATER…

Apollo stood with his adopted son and looked with pride at the newly planted oak. The tree stood beside the pond, gently waving dark-green leaves reflected in the clear water’s surface. A sublime sight indeed.

Indio had slightly more down-to-earth thoughts about the new planting. “Can I climb it?”

“No,” Apollo said firmly, for he’d found that simple, blunt statements were least likely to be wriggled out of by a crafty seven-year-old boy. “And Daff can’t, either.”

The little dog barked and spun in a circle at her name, nearly landing in the pond.

“Awww!” Indio moaned in disappointment and then almost immediately perked up at another thought. “Can I start our picnic now?

“Yes.”

“And eat the leftover wedding cake first?”

“If you can get Maude’s permission,” Apollo replied, because he was certainly no fool.

“Huzzah!” Indio whooped. “Come on, Daff!”

And he and the dog raced off in the direction of the ruined theater. Apollo followed more slowly, inspecting the progress of his garden as he went. He and his gardeners had successfully planted more than a score of trees as well as flowering shrubs. Many of the trees and shrubs would take years to mature, so to fill in he’d planted faster-growing vegetation such as evergreens, both to provide background and to give shelter to the tender hardwoods. Along the paths he’d also planted annual flowers, which made bright pools of color.

“There you are.”

He turned at the sound of his wife’s voice. Lily was wearing scarlet, his favorite color on her, and she stood out like a bright poppy in his garden.

He smiled into her green eyes and held out his hand. “I’m afraid Indio has rushed off to ravage the rest of the wedding cake.”

“Well, someone has to eat it,” she replied, taking his hand. “Maude baked far too much. There’s plenty more at home.”

They’d married only three days ago, in a small private ceremony marked mostly by the abundance of Maude’s seed cake. They’d been eating it ever since, often on the picnics Lily, Indio, and Maude brought for his luncheon at the garden.

“And how have you spent your morning?” he teased Lily, for he knew very well what she’d been doing.

Artemis had given them a small town house not far from the garden. She had insisted it was a wedding present, but Apollo expected to repay her the cost of the house when he came into his inheritance. From the reports, it wouldn’t be too long.

“Have you any idea how hard it is to paint a room?” Lily asked. “I thought peach for my writing room, but then it turned the most ghastly shade of orange on the wall. The painters are going over it now in yellow, although with my luck it’ll turn some terrible shade of brown.”

“Mmm,” he murmured, listening more to the sound of her voice than to her words.

“Next I’m considering painting your study lavender,” she continued, “perhaps with pink stripes.”

He looked at her. “I am paying attention.”

“Good.” She took a deep breath, suddenly serious. “I’ve something for you.”

He stopped, turning to face her. “What is it?”

She fumbled in the pocket of her dress. “I found it this morning while I was unpacking the chest I had at the theater, and I thought…”