Free Beauty and the Fleet (Intergalactic Fairy Tales Book 2) by Robert McKay Page B

here?" she asked, once she was certain Hands was fully unconscious. Despite her best effort the question still came out loaded with more emotion than the simple words could convey. The question meant so much more than that. It begged him to explain why he had come to their house, and why he had killed her father. Why did he give her back A Dark Beauty , and why had he taken it in the first place? One final question stole through her head, but she refused to give it words.
    "You asked me to come talk to you," he said simply. He reached up and rubbed the puckered, circular scar above his left eye. His black fur rippled over the muscles of his forearm. Most of the rest of his body was covered with the standard issue Colarian grey uniform.
    Beatrix growled in frustration. He was just standing there, looking at her, calmly, almost meekly. Despite being three times her weight and towering over her, with the bars between them, he looked more like a tamed circus lion than a murderer. The potential for violence was written in every rippling muscle, but it was hard to see past the way he yawned and stretched in the patch of dim light like a house cat in the sun. She brushed aside those thoughts and dredged up the memory of her father lying on the kitchen table with that knife sticking out of his back. "I mean why are you coming to talk to me? I didn't even know you things could talk until I heard you outside."
    "We have mouths and tongues, of course we can talk." He completely ignored her question. He spoke softly and with a slight accent, his consonants a bit too soft and his R's rolling off his tongue.
    "That's flawed logic," she sniped back at him.
    "It is, but not for the reason you think," he responded, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.
    "What's that supposed to mean? Most creatures have tongues and mouths and most of them can't talk." She stepped closer to the bars and crossed her arms over her aching chest before she could think better of it.
    "False. Every creature can talk, even the ones without mouths and tongues. That was the flaw in our logic. We know that even your Nedran science has proved that many insects can speak through scent."
    Beatrix scowled, realizing that he was probably closer to being correct than she was, if not entirely. His smile spread the rest of the way across his face, showing his white teeth, even the too long ones that more closely resembled fangs. Somehow it wasn't terrifying and that made her scowl even deeper. "This is all beside the point."
    "Yes, what is the point?" he asked, his left brow quirking up.
    "Why do you have us here? Why haven't you killed us?"
    "I-I don't want you to die."
    "Why didn't you kill me when you killed my father?" she asked, finally giving voice to the question that had been plaguing her for years. Had he left her alive just to torment her? Is that why he was keeping her locked up now?
    "I need you—" he started, and his words cut off with a strangled sound. The smile drained from his face and his eyes dimmed. He suddenly looked just like one of the lifeless guards. His back stiffened and he reached into his jacket. Keys jangled from his clawed hand. Without a word, the two guards entered and walked over to Hands' cell.
    "What are you doing?" shouted Beatrix.
    The beast unlocked the cell and in a manner of moments they were dragging Hands down the hallway, kicking and screaming.
    "I take it back! Don't hurt him! I'm the one that screwed up; take me instead!"
    The door slammed closed behind them. Hands was gone.
     
     

 
     
     
    CHAPTER FIFTEEN
     
     
    When Hands returned to his cell he walked calmly between his two captors. The beast was nowhere to be seen. Beatrix had been lying on her bed for hours, staring at the wall outside her cell, waiting for Hands to return. She had to know that he was well and that her conversation with the beast hadn't caused him any harm. Her heart fluttered with relief at seeing him walking under his own power. Gadget was still