Maurice never caught the transformation as it happened; it was always done by the time he noticed.
Her powers weren’t limited to roses and fashion and pigs’ snouts, however. When the freshwater spring on the western side of town went sour in late summer, a delegation from the town came to her for a solution.
Just like Maurice spent weeks on end with his kiln and metals and tools, she pored over ancient texts day and night, mumbling to herself and waving her wand in what looked like the same pattern again and again. And in the same way Maurice wrote to great scientists and inventors around the world, she spoke with timid creatures who looked like water themselves, and sought out ancient, powerful crones for advice.
It all culminated with what looked like a simple, quick enchantment that made the water sweet once again. Everyone cheered, but few understood the amount of time and effort that had gone into those few minutes of chanting.
But it wasn’t all work and inventing. Some nights Maurice spent carousing with Alaric and Frédéric, and Rosalind with Adelise and Bernard, when science and magic were forgotten and drinking and laughing were the subjects of the night.
So the two lovers spent long afternoons in each other’s company or tending to their own pursuits, and long evenings in each other’s arms, surrounded by the heady perfume of roses.
And then came the day that Maurice witnessed two young men dragging a teenaged boy into an alley. It was in a quiet part of town and they were trying to do it furtively, but not having much success as he kicked and screamed.
“Stop! Right where you are! Put him down!” the inventor shouted. “What is all this now?”
“None of your business,” one of the men snapped. “Do yourself a favor and pretend you never saw this.”
“He’s one of those charmantes,” the other one said heavily, as if everyone would understand what was going on just by hearing the word.
“So? Since when is that a crime?” Maurice asked, both angry and mystified.
“It has always been a crime against nature, as you should know already if you’re…naturel…uncorrupted by evil.”
Maurice put down the shaft of the cart he was pulling, making it clear he was ready to fight. His clothes, though dirty, did a nice job of highlighting his thick upper arms and solid legs.
Plus there was the long knife he kept on his belt, as all laborers did. He twitched his thumb at it.
The thugs tried to look defiant. It didn’t really work.
“I suggest you run along,” Maurice growled. “NOW! Before I call the guards—or teach you a lesson myself.”
“Friends of those who consort with the devil are as cursed as the devil himself!” one spat. “You will get yours, too!”
They stalked off and Maurice sighed deeply. He turned to the now-freed prisoner. “You all right, boy?”
“I am for now.” He didn’t say it with ingratitude; it was more like wry irony. Maurice could see, as the teen stretched and shook out his bruised body, the high cheekbones, pearly skin, and delicate jaw that made him look different. “They will come after me again, when no one is around to save me. I suppose I will have to…run away…for good.”
The inventor ground his teeth, frustrated. “And the palace guards are just letting this sort of thing happen? To citizens?”
In answer, the boy tossed his chin, pointing across the way. There, lolling in the shadows like they were unemployed, stood a pair of castle guards who had been watching the whole thing. They gave Maurice twin looks of distrust and disgust.
“Something must be done about this,” the inventor began to say, turning back to the boy.
He had disappeared.
But Rosalind was there, suddenly, running forward and throwing her arms around him.
“I saw the whole thing. Marry me,” she said.
“What? Yes. What?” Maurice said.
“You are the best, kindest, bravest, nicest man I have ever met. I want to make sure you can’t ever leave me—by oath.”
“Well, of course. I mean, I was planning to ask you mys—”
But his words were cut off by a passionate kiss.
He only pulled back once, to ask the one thing that bothered him.
“You weren’t the boy there, being beaten up, were you? You weren’t testing me, were you?”
“Don’t be absurd! I came looking for you, using a ‘find friend’ spell. I need you and the cart to haul back some rather big packages for me.”
“Oh.”
“Besides, those two hooligans would have been blind, finless fish if they had tried to attack me. Now shut up and kiss me!” she added, planting her lips firmly on his again.
And so they were married. The wedding might have been hidden, both by its secret location and protective spells. The attendees might have been a trifle strange: tiny men who had advice for Maurice on the workings of metal; long-eared girls with hooves for feet who stamped impatiently for the priest to finish; bespectacled librarians and students; and the heavy-drinking young men Maurice still hung out with. But the party afterwards was as enthusiastic as any the kingdom had ever seen.
Except, perhaps, for Frédéric, who was not enthusiastic and spent the whole night looking uncomfortable and sour about the presence of so many charmantes.
But besides his general grumpiness, there was only one real mishap the whole night: a wild boar, enticed by the smell of the food, managed to work its way in from the woods and root through quite a bit of the magical rose garden before the drunken guests could contain it.
“That’s an odd thing to happen,” Maurice commented.
“Magic,” a tipsy faun said, pushing her finger up on her nose to make a snout, “always comes back on itself.”
Maurice then remembered the man whose nose Rosalind had changed. His new wife was swearing roundly at the pig in her garden now—but not using any magic to shoo it away, he noticed.
“Wait—that’s not him, is it?” Maurice asked, alarmed.
“No!” the girl giggled. “Issa pig! But’s all the same. Everything comes back on itself again. Love, hate, magic, pig noses. S’how it works.”
“That seems reasonable,” said Maurice thoughtfully, who might have also been a little more in his cups than he appeared at first.
What a wonderful place this is, and what an amazing woman I’ve married, he thought. And what a magnificent wedding. Pigs and all.
Belle stomped off over the hill, wanting to run, wanting to maintain her dignity, not managing either. She kept up a strange fast-march in too precise a straight line that neither got her away from everything fast enough nor let her appear to be unaffected by it.
Behind her, on the lawn by the side of the house, was a wedding party.
Her wedding party.
It was beautiful; she had to admit that.
There was a very tasteful canopy woven with sweet-smelling flowers. Paper bells and pink ribbons festooned a high arch. Tables were draped with shining white cloths and pink bunting, and spread with an array of savory delicacies. Silver buckets held bottles of chilled champagne; perfect little beads of moisture covered their gleaming sides like pearls. Like a painting.
There was a band, which was actually kind of terrible but enthusiastic.