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Not much happens at the castle. It's the two of them and the magic. She studies. He wanders around. He's not very careful about standing behind things - he does when he remembers and there is something nearby, but it's plain that nothing about being visible in the less-than-fluffy nude bothers Beast except on her behalf.
Finally she excises an hour of study time to spend on being able to look at him without intervening furniture or flinching. She finds it's possible to do this in her mindscape, without having to use a notebook. She can zoom in deep into a rose petal, find a level of detail beyond which there are no patterns, and write, directly there. This isn't an ideal memory aid - if she looks later the words aren't exactly the same - but it's much faster for sheer processing, and the chosen modifications morph into the structure of the rose without special effort as soon as she's sure she wants them.
She behaves with more equanimity about his nudity after that. "You can stop trying to remember to hide behind things," she tells him.
beheld_beauty
deslandes
The dosage isn't the issue; the amount of power generated by how he feels about her would, it seems, be more than enough all by itself. The problem is structure: the spell is set up to accept a very specific thing, and without the two-way connection, there's just no budging it.
There are no books that talk about how to accomplish the kind of delicate surgery that would be needed to change the structure of the curse in the relevant way.
There are no books that talk about how to accomplish the kind of delicate surgery that would be needed to change the structure of the curse in the relevant way.
beheld_beauty
Dangit.
Well. She has many notes about the curse. She shaves off everything she can from the curriculum she's designed - disenchantments relating to anything not powered by Heart, disenchantments that are aimed at short-term curses, disenchantments that simply hasten programmed timed expiration.
She cuts down her estimate by about four weeks. This is not nothing, but it is not enough to be quite comfortable. Study study study. The next time the Beast wanders in she'll ask him when he was planning to tell her.
Well. She has many notes about the curse. She shaves off everything she can from the curriculum she's designed - disenchantments relating to anything not powered by Heart, disenchantments that are aimed at short-term curses, disenchantments that simply hasten programmed timed expiration.
She cuts down her estimate by about four weeks. This is not nothing, but it is not enough to be quite comfortable. Study study study. The next time the Beast wanders in she'll ask him when he was planning to tell her.
deslandes
The Beast wanders in about an hour later, preceded by the lunch tray, and flomps into his chair as the tray sidles up to Belle.
beheld_beauty
"Were you going to tell me at some point that you fell in love with me?" Belle inquires.
beheld_beauty
"Assuming you're relatively constant about it, anyway. It is necessary for both halves to be at the same time."
beheld_beauty
"Well, I would have a good idea, in my case, but I make a particular study of my own mind, and I still wouldn't be as confident as that. So I want to know why you think so."
deslandes
He laughs.
"I'm sorry, I just can't think of another way to say it. It's not in me to give someone up like that, not for as long as I remember who you are."
"I'm sorry, I just can't think of another way to say it. It's not in me to give someone up like that, not for as long as I remember who you are."
beheld_beauty
"All right." She sighs. "I really don't know how to fall in love with someone. There are not - instructions, anywhere."
beheld_beauty
"You're my friend," she offers after a moment. "You - you've been treated with appalling unfairness, and there's a sort of openness to you that I half-admire, and you have quite a smile. If unbeknownst to me that added up to love on my part I believe the curse would have noticed, though."
beheld_beauty
"Well," Belle says. "When I fully admire something like that, I copy it for myself. I'm disinclined to do that. It wouldn't suit me. But it seems to work for you."
beheld_beauty
"Like what?"
She really ought to be getting to know him more diligently than she has. She suspects that's a prerequisite for falling in love. For her, at least.
She really ought to be getting to know him more diligently than she has. She suspects that's a prerequisite for falling in love. For her, at least.