Beauty And The Salty Beast 《TsukiYama》

6

Tadashi was walking his horse around the castle since he didn't have much to do, the weather was to nice to not go for a walk. The snow has started to pile up and it was an amazing sight to see.

Beast was watching Tadashi on his balcony, enjoying the sight of him playing in the snow. He looked at his now bandaged arm, a sudden spark feeling in his chest.

"I've.. never felt this way about anyone before.." Beast said, realizing his newly developed feelings for the boy.
"I wanna do something for him.. but what?" He asked his pendulum clock servant.

"Well there's the usual things flowers, chocolates, insults that you throw at us" His pendulum servant replied bitterly. The candle servant quickly went towards them as he heard the other servants reply.
"Ah Noya, it has to be something special, something that sparks his interest" The candle servant said, as he thinks about it.

"Something special..." The beast looked towards Tadashi, trying to think of a suitable present to give to the boy.

"Hmm, Wait a minute!" The candle servant suddenly said, as if an idea had already formed in his head.

...

Beast was leading Tadashi to a room, one that Tadashi has never seen before, he hasn't really been exploring the castle that much due to him being a bit tired by the incident a few days ago.

"Tadashi there's something I want to show you" Beast said, slowly opening the door before suddenly closing it again.
"But first you have to close your eyes" Tadashi gave him a weird look. A bit suspicious about the beast' sudden behavior.

"It's a surprise" Tadashi gave him one last look before closing his eyes shut.
Beast waved his hand Infront of Tadashi to check before opening the doors, gently grabbing his hands and slowly pulling him inside.

"Can I open them?" Tadashi asked.
"Not yet, wait here" Beast replied, putting Tadashi to a stop.
He then let go off Tadashi's hands to open a bunch of curtains. Tadashi turned towards the sudden noice, not knowing what beast was up to.
"Now can I open them?" Tadashi asked, feeling sunlight on his skin.
"Alright..now" The beast said before Tadashi opened his eyes, gasping at the sight of a big library.

"I can't believe it, I've never so many books in all my life!" Tadashi looked around the room, feeling excited by seeing all the different types of books.
"You like it?" The beast asked.
"It's wonderful" Tadashi replied, checking the place out.
"Then it's yours" Tadashi looked at the beast, surprised, was he really aloud to have it?

"Oh, Thank you so much!" Tadashi went to hug the beast, making beast a bit taken a back by the sudden gesture but after a few seconds he decided to hug back. Tadashi realized what he was doing and quickly pulled away.
"Ah sorry.." Tadashi looked away, embarrassed. Beast just smiled at him.

"If you want I can recommend you some" The beast said, making Tadashi look at him in delight.
"Oh please do! There's so many to choose from I don't know where to start" Beast then lead him the way to the other section of the library.

The two boys were to busy talking about various books to not notice people watching them.

"Would you look at that" The teapot servant said, most of the servants were watching the two near the entrance, enjoying the new sweet atmosphere.
"I knew it would work!" The candle servant said, proud that his suggestion worked.

"This is gonna be great!" The pendulum clock servant said, feeling happy that the two have finally gotten along.
"Suga-san look at how sweet they are, now I miss Kags" The little teacup looked up towards Suga.
"Why don't we give those two a bit of privacy" The Teapot said before making it's way downstairs with the others following closely behind.

"Oh isn't this exciting!" The feather duster commented before going to follow the others downstairs.

...

Tadashi was slowly getting to know the beast, he wasn't really that frightening once you get to know, he was actually kind of sweet Tadashi thought. Beast was showing him around the library and was recommending him different types of books, the books beast usually recommends were the ones that involves either dinosaurs and stars, it seems like beast' really liked those kinds of things.

Tadashi's glad to know that they both have something in common like reading and liking stars. Tadashi might like adventurous stories but what he finds interesting the most are the stars and constilations that they form as.

Beast was babbling about different types of dinosaurs, and how scientist gave them some weird, hard to pronounce names. Tadashi found that quite cute.

Tadashi was to in his thoughts that he didn't realized that beast had stopped talking.

"Hey, I know this seems sudden but I've been wondering, that brother of yours, you guys don't seem to be related by blood" The beast suddenly said, making Tadashi snap out of his thoughts.
"Oh, yea.. We actually aren't, my brother was a run away orphan at the age of 13 and found me under a tree, unconscious" Tadashi paused for a bit, fiddling with his hands.

"Innoshita took pity on me and decided to take me in, living was tough due to us being minors and because of that my brother resulted to gambling just for us to make a living.. I couldn't do anything because I was only 10 at the time.." Tadashi looked down, he hasn't seen his brother for a week now and with him stuck in this castle he wasn't sure if he'll ever see him again.

Beast felt more guilty on separating the two, maybe he shouldn't have been so rough on the boy, maybe he should have controlled his temper.. Beast thought as he watch Tadashi getting a bit gloomy.

"Can I ask you something too?" Tadashi asked, beast stared at him before nodding.
"What was the reason of you guys getting cursed?.." Beast was a bit taken aback by the question but decided to answer.
"That was.. because of something I did a long time ago, I was a selfish kid, a person with a big ego.. and because of that we ended up in this situation" Beast looked like he was ashamed, looking away from Tadashi to hide his guilt-ridden face.

"But that was a long time ago, I've learned my lesson now and I've changed.. well I think I did" Tadashi just chuckled at Beast' unsure response.
"I'm sure you've changed" Tadashi gave beast a smile, one that made beast' already falling heart fall for him even more, if that was possible.

"Is there.. a way to break the curse? Maybe I can help" Tadashi suggested, he felt bad for the people in the castle and wanted to find a way to be able to help. Beast looked at him speechless.
"Uh, there is but.. it's quite difficult to do so.." Beast looked away as he said the last part. Tadashi raised a brow at him.

Was it really that hard for beast to do? Tadashi thought. Tadashi decided to drop the subject since it seemed like beast didn't want to say anything more.

"I-I need to go now, ahem uh, I forgot I got other things to do so I'll see you later" With that beast hurriedly went out the library. Tadashi just stared at him as he went out the room before deciding to just explore the library more.