Beast
So I had this wonderful dream about Beauty and the Beast. Alternate universe? Retelling? Something in there.
Anyway the story we all know never happened. The Beast sadly lived out the time of the rose's blooming, and when it finally dropped all the petals, Beauty had never come at all. Due to the confines of the spell, he was now pretty much immortal unless something killed him, so he had some time. Also, now that all hope of a human form was gone, he had time and was liberated from thinking only of his own trouble.
When my viewpoint got there, he'd been running an orphanage of sorts. Babies would be left for dead in the woods, or children would get lost, or have nowhere to go, and he'd gently approach them and bring them to the Summer Garden. A bump of his massive flank on a couple of the fruit trees, and enough fruit would pour down to satisfy anyone. He went hunting from time to time too, when there was someone around who knew how to build a fire. He might have been able if he tried long enough, he just didn't have thumbs.
A note on all this beastliness. Yes, he was massive and had no thumbs, mostly like a wolf but with a lion's mane, like a Tibetan mastiff, long underbite tusks like a boar. For reference, think the white wolf creature in "Princess Mononoke," so we're talking a wolf the size of a kodiak bear. He had lion front paws too, which came in useful when dealing with the kids, as he could retract the claws and they were nice velvety pads. The kids gave him some ridiculous name that changed as the namer did: Taily (because he had a tail) or Big Dog (kids, yo) or something along that line. He let them crawl all over him, and loved it.
Sometimes the kids' families would go searching for them in the woods, and when that happened, the Beast always gave them back. But they didn't always; sometimes he raised the kids completely into self-sufficiency, and they left of their own accord, but nobody ever told about him or the Summer Garden. They made up some story if asked ("Kidnapped by fairies" was popular) but never said anything about the Beast, and slapped down any rumors about him as stupid fancy. He would never be hunted, while there were those kids-turned-adults in the country nearby.
Beauty came into the picture the first time he had a young baby to take care of, and nobody with thumbs around (usually there were older children who could help with nappies). So he waited until someone was alone in the woods, and nabbed her. Because he couldn't speak human language, there was quite a lot of miscommunication, and he had to gradually earn the trust from her that the kids gave so freely. So tedious. Occasionally he would write words in the dirt with one claw, so she quickly understood that this was no weird animal, but something else. She took care of the kid, but this was his first adult. He had no idea what to do with her.
(Dream skips reel annoyingly.)
At some point she made it back to town, and was in the tavern staring into her ale when she overheard one of the older men say something like "there's always fruit in the Summer garden," and she pounced on him. It turns out this old man was one of the Beast's kids, and in secret, he told her all about it, answering her questions as best he could, but he didn't know much more than she did. Eventually she decides that if magic is at hand, she ought to be able to figure it out.
Library time! She discovers that there used to be a young lord that lived in the castle that was the ruins behind the Summer Garden, and all record of him stopped at some point a hundred years ago. She returns to the Beast, and reminds him of his name, which he had almost forgotten. It hits him like a cannonball, and the peace he had found suddenly vanishes. But the fact of Beauty going all this extra mile for him apparently counts as an act of love enough to half-break the curse, the old day/night transformation, and he melts into a human.
They talk all night, and a bit of snuggling. In the morning he returns to Beast form, and gives a huge howl of anguish before running off into the woods in confusion and rage. He wrecks a lot of trees.
(dream ends here, but I truly believe there's a happy ending waiting for us. Beauty is a good person, by now the Beast is too, so there's no way he can stay cursed for long :) )
Anyway the story we all know never happened. The Beast sadly lived out the time of the rose's blooming, and when it finally dropped all the petals, Beauty had never come at all. Due to the confines of the spell, he was now pretty much immortal unless something killed him, so he had some time. Also, now that all hope of a human form was gone, he had time and was liberated from thinking only of his own trouble.
When my viewpoint got there, he'd been running an orphanage of sorts. Babies would be left for dead in the woods, or children would get lost, or have nowhere to go, and he'd gently approach them and bring them to the Summer Garden. A bump of his massive flank on a couple of the fruit trees, and enough fruit would pour down to satisfy anyone. He went hunting from time to time too, when there was someone around who knew how to build a fire. He might have been able if he tried long enough, he just didn't have thumbs.
A note on all this beastliness. Yes, he was massive and had no thumbs, mostly like a wolf but with a lion's mane, like a Tibetan mastiff, long underbite tusks like a boar. For reference, think the white wolf creature in "Princess Mononoke," so we're talking a wolf the size of a kodiak bear. He had lion front paws too, which came in useful when dealing with the kids, as he could retract the claws and they were nice velvety pads. The kids gave him some ridiculous name that changed as the namer did: Taily (because he had a tail) or Big Dog (kids, yo) or something along that line. He let them crawl all over him, and loved it.
Sometimes the kids' families would go searching for them in the woods, and when that happened, the Beast always gave them back. But they didn't always; sometimes he raised the kids completely into self-sufficiency, and they left of their own accord, but nobody ever told about him or the Summer Garden. They made up some story if asked ("Kidnapped by fairies" was popular) but never said anything about the Beast, and slapped down any rumors about him as stupid fancy. He would never be hunted, while there were those kids-turned-adults in the country nearby.
Beauty came into the picture the first time he had a young baby to take care of, and nobody with thumbs around (usually there were older children who could help with nappies). So he waited until someone was alone in the woods, and nabbed her. Because he couldn't speak human language, there was quite a lot of miscommunication, and he had to gradually earn the trust from her that the kids gave so freely. So tedious. Occasionally he would write words in the dirt with one claw, so she quickly understood that this was no weird animal, but something else. She took care of the kid, but this was his first adult. He had no idea what to do with her.
(Dream skips reel annoyingly.)
At some point she made it back to town, and was in the tavern staring into her ale when she overheard one of the older men say something like "there's always fruit in the Summer garden," and she pounced on him. It turns out this old man was one of the Beast's kids, and in secret, he told her all about it, answering her questions as best he could, but he didn't know much more than she did. Eventually she decides that if magic is at hand, she ought to be able to figure it out.
Library time! She discovers that there used to be a young lord that lived in the castle that was the ruins behind the Summer Garden, and all record of him stopped at some point a hundred years ago. She returns to the Beast, and reminds him of his name, which he had almost forgotten. It hits him like a cannonball, and the peace he had found suddenly vanishes. But the fact of Beauty going all this extra mile for him apparently counts as an act of love enough to half-break the curse, the old day/night transformation, and he melts into a human.
They talk all night, and a bit of snuggling. In the morning he returns to Beast form, and gives a huge howl of anguish before running off into the woods in confusion and rage. He wrecks a lot of trees.
(dream ends here, but I truly believe there's a happy ending waiting for us. Beauty is a good person, by now the Beast is too, so there's no way he can stay cursed for long :) )