Beauty and the Bookworm

Chapter 4: A Wrong Turn

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Somewhere out in the woods, Maurice and his horse Philippe had become hopelessly lost. To make matters worse, a storm had started to form.

"These woods are lovely. I only wish I recognized them. Do you know where we are Philippe? Because I don't." Maurice asked, knowing full well the horse wouldn't respond.

Suddenly, a blast of lightening struck a tree in front of them, knocking it over and scaring Philippe.

"It's alright, it's alright Philippe." Maurice soothed. He noticed another path to the right of them.

"Hmm...yes, we can go this way." Maurice decided. "Go on, to the right. That's it, steady. Walk on!" He encouraged the horse. "One path closes, another one opens.

As the were walking down the path, Maurice noticed that it was snowing!

"It's alright boy, it's just a bit of snow. In June. Mind your step. It's slippery." He told the horse.

Unbeknownst to them, white wolves had spotted them and were trying to sneak up on them. Philippe noticed something was wrong and started neighing. Maurice looked to the left and saw a white wolf with a scar over his left eye growling at him. He quickly became scared and encouraged Philippe to move faster.

"Go! Go, Philippe! Come on! Come on!" He yelled.

Philippe started racing through the forest with the wolves in hot pursuit.

"Come on!" He encouraged. "Go! Philippe, go! Go, go!"

The wolves were still hunting them down, and Philippe went over a tree root, causing the cart to separate and be knocked over. The force of the impact launched Maurice off of Philippe and he landed on a snow ledge.

Maurice climbed further up the ledge trying to get further away from the wolves, only to look up and be face to face with the one with the scar on its face. On top of that, there were wolves waiting below him. Maurice slid back down the ledge to get away from the scarred one and was about to slide down to the ones waiting below.

Luckily, Philippe was able to catch him and they rode away. They came across an icy gate that opened. The wolves that were following him stopped at the entrance.

...

Maurice and Philippe found themselves in a beautiful garden in front of a magnificent castle.

"Well done boy. They'll have to get their dinner somewhere else won't they." Maurice chuckled. He saw they had a barn and left Philippe there for food and water.

"I'll go pay our respects to our unwitting host...Whoever that maybe." Maurice climbed up the stairs and opened the door to the magnificent castle.

"Hello?" he called out, only to receive no answer. "Hello? Sorry to intrude. I'm just a traveler...seeking shelter from the storm." Still no answer.

"Sorry to disturb you." Maurice said, hanging his coat on a coat rack, not noticing that the coat rack was trying to shake his coat off. "Anyone home?"

On a table on the foyer, Lumière and Cogsworth were watching him.

"He must of lost his way in the woods." Lumière whispered.

"Shut up, you idiot!" Cogsworth replied.

Maurice heard whispers and turned around. "Excuse me?" He said walking up to the table where they both were.

"Hmm." Maurice said, admiring the two pieces. "Beautiful." He complimented Cogsworth, then tuned to Lumière and picked him up. "Extraordinary."

Out of nowhere, music started playing. Maurice put Lumière down and went to investigate.