Beauty and the Beast (an erotic re-imagining) by Shoshanna Evers

women at Court want to play the games I wish to play. Lady Amelia is almost as old as I, sixteen, and yet she only wants to steal kisses, then giggle with her friends when they see me ride by.
    I finally got Amelia alone in the wine cellar, but she guarded her virginity with more ferocity than Father’s men guard the castle gate. My attempts to woo her resulted in nothing more than me getting a slap across the face with her glove.
    I told her I’d like to use that glove on her, perhaps on her cheeks (I touched her derriere to let her know exactly what I meant), but she gasped as if I’d suggested murdering her, and ran away. I do believe I will cease courting her.
    ~~~
    Belle laughed out loud. She could only imagine the look on the Lady Amelia’s face when the young Prince requested to spank her. It probably looked a bit like the expression on her own when the Beast told Belle to bend over.
    From the looks of it, Prince Frederick had quite a taste for tying girls up and spanking them. But only if they were willing. Belle flipped through pages of entries, each detailing his pursuit and failure to entice dozens of young ladies into his bed.
    ~~~
    Surely it is my Stepmother’s doing, that no girl will have me. A spell of some sort. Heaven knows she has enchanted the King to do her bidding. It is as if no one recognizes that when my father is gone, I will be King, and the woman of my choosing will be Queen. That when I marry (if I marry), the woman I choose will be a Princess until I ascend to the throne.
    None of that is apparent. It can only be black magic to cloud the Court’s minds against the subject. A rumor has gone around that my Stepmother gave birth to a demon that died at birth. My father won’t comment on the matter. Can’t he see she’s using her magic to give him an heir, when God Himself doesn’t want her to spawn a child?
    Why does he need an heir, when he has me? Aren’t I enough?
    ~~~
    Belle had no memory of a King, or a castle, or an Enchantress Queen or a Court or any of the things Prince Frederick wrote of in his journal. Was it all just the imaginative musings of a teenage boy, wishing his life were more interesting than it was?
    Or was it…real?
    Clearly, the castle was real. The portrait of Prince Frederick was real. The castle did have some sort of…something, happening. Fairy infestation.
    Could it be that this evil Queen had “clouded” everyone’s memories, as the journal suggested?
    Either way, Belle could empathize with the young man’s feelings. She too felt like she wasn’t enough, at times. The only daughter to her Papa, a poor consolation when they were forced to move out of town and into the country to work for a living.
    Her stomach grumbled rudely, interrupting her thoughts.
    “Fairies,” she said. “I would like some breakfast, please, and tea.”
    She sat up on the bed, awaiting the tray that would be magically appearing, but none came.
    “Fairies?” she asked. “Are you through granting wishes?”
    A note fell on her lap, settling against the luxurious pale pink fabric of her dress.
    Belle picked it up, eyeing it warily.
    ~~~
    Please do me the honor of joining me in the main dining hall for Breakfast.
    With Devotion,
    The Beast.
    ~~~
    She dropped the note to the bed with a gasp. The handwriting…it was larger, more heavily scrawled, yes, but it was so…similar, somehow. One could almost imagine the Beast studied the handwriting in Prince Frederick’s journal. Or perhaps it was something else?
    Belle picked up the note and used it as a bookmark to mark her place in the journal, and hid it in the folds of her gown. None of this made sense. She’d need to study it further later, when she was alone.
    Right now, it was time to dine with the Beast.
    ***
    Belle took deep, calming breaths as she navigated the immense castle to meet with the Beast. It was only breakfast, after all. The Beast has promised her that she could be the one to let him know if—when—she was