Belle: A Retelling of “Beauty and the Beast” By Cameron Dokey (20 page)
Gaspard and I parted from my family, and rode to the great stone house in silence, with me seated before him on Corbeau. The iron gates stood open, as if welcoming us home. Every tree in the orchard was in bloom, though the days were shortening now. We left Corbeau in his stable. Then, hand in hand, we walked to where the Heartwood stood by the shore of the lake.
“Look,” I said when I saw it. “Oh, look, Gaspard.”
The blossoms of the Heartwood tree lay scattered on the ground. But in their
place, its boughs were filled with fruit as ripe and golden as the sun. slowly, almost reverently, I moved to lay a hand against the bark.
“Someday,” I said softly, “this tree will die. But what it carried in its heart will never be extinguished. Its roots go too deep, the fruit it bears it too nourishing, and the promise carried on the scent of its blossoms travels too far.
“True love may not always be easy to see, but once it has been discovered it can
never be lost.”
“You are as honest at the end as you were at the beginning,” my true love said.
And I put my arms around him and kissed him beneath the branches of the
Heartwood Tree, feeling my heart ache at the pure joy.
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