Free Before Beauty by Brittany Fichter

Her voice nearly
squeaked with excitement. “Have you heard about young Master
Raoul?”
    Though she managed to keep her
eyes on the ground, Isa’s heart beat unevenly. Out of the corner of
her eye, she saw her mother give her an uneasy look.
    “ Isa, why don’t you go inside and
prepare some tea? I could use a warm drink, and I believe our guest
could use one, also.”
    But Margot shook her head, her
words tumbling out faster than Isa could walk. “No, I believe Miss
Isa should hear this, and she’ll know just how fortunate she is not
to have married that horrible young man.”
    “ Margot, I–” her mother tried to
interject, but the older woman just kept talking.
    “ I was just down to the butcher’s
shop this morning, when Harriet Bissette skipped into the town
square to show off her ring. Can you believe it, Isa? He gave her
exactly the same ring that he gave you!”
    His grandmother’s ring. Isa’s
thumb instinctively moved to rub the spot that, for two months, had
been occupied by the silver band. Not so long ago, he’d placed that
ring on her own finger. Suddenly, it was hard to
breathe.
    “… less than a year, and he’s
already proposed to a second girl!”
    “ Really, Margot!” Deline
protested, but their neighbor babbled on.
    “ Isa, you should count it a
blessing that you two were not wed! You have a lovely face, my
dear, but with your lame leg and hand and all, you wouldn’t have
been able to hold him. Better to be alone and keep your dignity
than to know your man is off chasing other women because you can’t
satisfy him!” And with that, she spotted another neighbor, and was
gone before Isa or Deline could say anything else.
    Isa bolted for the door before any
other well-intentioned friend or relative could find her, and ran
upstairs as quickly as her ankle would allow. Deline was faster,
however, and she followed her daughter into the attic before Isa
could get the door closed.
    “ I don’t want to talk about it!”
Isa threw her things down on the bed and went to stare out the
window.
    “ Isa, you knew it was bound to
happen.”
    “ That doesn’t mean I want to hear
about it. This is why I don’t leave the house!”
    “ You can’t stay locked up in this
attic forever,” Deline said. “We have tried to be kind to you, to
be sensitive to things that remind you of him. But you can’t live
the rest of your life hiding from the world!”
    “ What if I don’t want to be part
of the world?” Isa finally turned and faced her mother. “Thanks to
our hero prince, the world thinks I’m good for nothing anyway!
There is a reason all the women my age are expecting babies, and
their little sisters are getting married, and I’m not. Is it so
much to ask that my nose not be rubbed in my loss? That I get to
simply remain where at least I know I’m wanted?”
    “ But you can’t do that!” Deline
was now just as loud as Isa, her voice quivering.
    “ And why not?”
    “ Because you were born for more
than that!”
    Before Isa could reply, however,
Launce burst into the room, out of breath.
    “ Mum, Isa, Father’s home.
Something is wrong.”
    In a flash, Deline was downstairs.
It took Isa longer to make her way down the wooden steps, but when
she finally did, she could see that something was indeed wrong.
Ansel’s face was pale, and no matter how many blankets Megane and
Launce piled on him, he shivered. What frightened Isa the most,
however, was the wild feverish look in his eyes. He looked like a
dog cornered in an alley.
    It was ten minutes before his
teeth stopped chattering enough for him to speak a single sentence,
which was directed at Megane, asking her to take care of his
horse.
    “ Let Launce do it,” Deline told
him as the girl bounded off. “She’s been dying to see you, and the
horse will take at least half an hour.”
    “ I know.” Ansel finally looked up
from the tea they’d placed in his hands. “But I have something I
must tell you all, and I am afraid it