There are secrets only the King knows. The life and trails of young Clopin, the Prince of Knaves, and friends. A tale including but not limited to betrothal, adventure, love, and sorrow.
A/N - Hello there! Well, I can say that this story, and the characters that it will include, have been causing mayhem inside my head for more than a year now. Yes, I think it is high time to post this tale (or numerous tales I should say) of Clopin's youth. It shall take account of all the people that have (in my head) effected him and made him into the king that we get but a brief glimpse of in the Disney movie. So, I don't know why but I thought this author's note was needed just to explain myself for this fic. One final note, I don't plan on making this any sort of mushy Clopin/OC but there will be many OCs.
So yes, an intriguing tale of friendship, gypsy kings, lust, passion, and eventual murder! Mwhahahaha! Why not give it a read, yes? Reviews are always welcome!
And now I give you The Court, our tale begins about 40 years after everything has happened and will be told in a string of flashbacks by our mysterious gypsy outcast.
Hunchback of Notre Dame (c) Disney and Victor Hugo
-JB
"Faith, she hears us
but she doesn't listen very hard.
As she drifts through our lives,
tossing coins into the air.
Watch them twist,
watch them fall,
turning hope into despair.
Watch them twist,
watch them fall,
then she suddenly revives
every dream that we've had
and we find ourselves alive."
-- Fate
Everything looked so different, yet exactly, eerily, the same.
A light dusting of snow covered the nighttime cemetery like a freshly laundered child's blanket. The snow created an luminescent glow as a gentle, chilling, wind brushed by now and again. The frozen ground crunched under my thin shoes as I kept forward, shielded from the weather by only the few rags on my back and a shawl I pulled tightly around my shoulders.
With each step forward, my heart seemed to race faster. For years I had this wicked thought in my mind, and on this winter night, I became desperate enough to follow through with it. Return to the Court of Miracles.
As I came upon the stone tomb, I nearly passed it by. I haven't seen it in almost forty years and I suspected I re-imagined it to be much more majestic in my head.
Its cold visage towered before me with a mocking air. We called it the king's chest, or even the great stone entrance. I knew it very well. From the pain it was to open to the first time I entered it, I remembered it splendidly.
Tonight was much like that first time I had entered decades ago. For one, I had ran out of options. Another, I was a woman with but one wish.
My wish then, as a young girl was to meet the grand and legendary Gypsy King. He went by many names, the King of Thunes or the King of Truands, but I would come to know him as only one; Remus, my hero.
I heaved the heavy granite covering to the side, not the easiest of tasks for a lady of fiftey-five.
I arched my back placing my hands on my hips anticipating an audible crack. I was definitely not the young woman I once was.
No, much has changed. Now as I enter the Court of Miracles I am not a wishful lass with wide eyes but a penniless, spiteful, street beggar yearning for a loaf of bread.
The description I came up for myself nearly makes me smirk. Never did I picture myself in rags and now, on this evening, I would think myself lucky to own a skirt without enough tears at the end to see my skeletal ankles.
Tonight, my only wish would be that the King of the Gypsies, whoever that title may fall upon, is a forgiving man.
You see, I was banished by the Court's last king. I regret to think on him. He was one of the greatest men I've ever known, and still, after all I loved him for, he banished me throwing me to the Parisian streets. I think of him as a great man still because, really, he had no choice I his actions. And if I was to ever find myself in the position he was in, I would do exactly the same.
Being left with no choice can put such impossible ideas into a starving woman's head, but I am desperate.
So desperate that even the fact that I could most definitely hang tonight does not faze me. That rope will far more kind, merciful, and gracious than any person, gadje or no, that has passed me on the streets.
With all these thoughts racing in my head, I dashed down the stairs leaving the nights brisk wind at my back.
I sloshed through vile water that met me at my ankles. Water that was so chilled that it physically hurt to stand in it. Wading through the water in pitch black darkness, tripping here and there, wore quickly on my elderly limbs.
Nevertheless, I kept on, my breathe growing ragged as the air became more thicker and more damp.
It took me a long few minutes before skeletons began to deck the walls and I knew I was close. I could not believe though how far the court seemed to have moved. I suppose the ankle deep water is much more forgiving to younger legs.
Finally, just as I had anticipated, a glow began to reflect off the water ahead of me and voices began to echo off the walls. I glanced behind my shoulder holding my breathe for what I knew was to come.
Standing still for a moment I witnessed light burst into the catacomb as about seven men lit touches and threw me to my knees. Immediately, the gypsies barked questions in my face, holding my hands roughly behind my back.
"Did someone send you here?" asked one.
"Are you a spy of that bastard Purid's?" inquired another.
I said nothing, only moved my face to the side to dodge their integrating suspicions.
"Well then!" came an entirely different voice (one oddly more jovial) from in front of me, "I hardly expected to catch an old woman in my trap!"
I looked up slowly to the man who stood with his hands placed heroically about his hips. I knew in one instant who it had to be.
"Yes your highness, a very apologetic woman," I answered meekly.
He smirked down to me, I noted he was quiet handsome, "Such a grand title! Your highness," he repeated with a dry laugh, "something one could get used to."
"I mean it only with the highest mockery," I quickly spat back gaining momentum in my voice.
At my statement the men held my arms back tighter. I let out a slight gasp but did not take me eyes from the figure who stood before me.
The King bent over to meet my gaze, "From what name are you come from, woman?" the laugh now gone from his voice.
"I have none," I answered stubbornly.
"Not a single name? Fine then. Been charged with any crimes lately?" he asked as if we were old friends discussing the weather.
"Only if one counts being abandoned by her people, bastard!"
At that one of the men holding me back jerked my arm harshly, "Answer to the King with respect, madam!"
The King raised a silencing hand to the man without taking his keen eye off of me.
"I see no king!" I continued, "his father may have been a great king, but he is not the man I look to with respect."
My words seemed to make the young man curious. As I looked to him now I noted his dark skin, black eyes, and reddish hair that fell in thick tendrils to his chest. I sneered to him as he only stared to me. I noticed how his eye lingered to my right ear where a single gold hope with a glass red bead hung.
He stepped forward to me and reached out a hand to touch it. I lurched back but allowed him to look upon the ring without too much defiance. He seemed to weigh it in his hand for a long moment before looking back to my face with sudden realization.
"Mon dieu, you've returned."
With those hushed words the King took me by my arm and briskly lead me back to the Court of Miracles.
All in one instant, the colors, light, sounds, and smells hit me and I was a child again. A thin hand went to cover my mouth as I saw my younger self dancing through the Court. I saw my friends, my sisters, running after me.
I was home.
I couldn't stop from sobbing leaning my frail body against the young King's.
"Come quickly," he said in a hushed tone taking me off to the side. I was unaware where he was leading me but I put my trust completely in him. Partly because I had no other choice and there was something about him that I instantly found reliable. I suppose it's a trait that comes naturally for all Trouillefou men.
The sounds from the center of the Court quieted as we found our way behind a wall of barrels, a rather isolated section of the Court used for storage. I continued following the young man until I was certain I would collapse.
We came to a set up of comfortable looking chairs surrounded by a wooden table. It looked as if the small chamber was used for this man's personal company. The vision of standing before a dangling rope became further back in my mind.
"Mon dieu," he repeated under his breathe. "Does this world hold no more surprises?" He asked as he pulled out a chair for me which I collapsed into.
I lazily looked back up to him. He had a large smile as he peeled off his leather gloves and tossed his brown worn in hat on the table before taking the seat across from me.
"You are a Trouillefou no doubt." I stated
He looked amused, "What makes you say that?"
"You men have such interesting taste... In hats."
He laughed looking to his wide brimmed ostrich feathered hat beside him before glancing back to me.
"You knew my father then?"
"I knew your King-your true King," I said causing him to raise a brow. "I also knew his father. Such great men."
The man nodded, "You know, I've heard legends of him and you. Clopin and you that is."
"Is that why you brought me here? To hear of times of lore, the mischievous antics of young and rebellious gypsies?"
"Are you really she?" he asked seeming to ignore my rant. "You said you had no name and she was stripped of hers."
"My name does not matter now," I answered feeling the roar of my empty stomach.
"But, if you are who I know you to be-"
"Then why would it matter? My true name, the name these gypsies gave to me, it has not been spoken aloud in thirty years. Not to me, any matter," his smile widened as a sudden question struck me. "If you think I'm all that then why did you not hang me yet?"
"My father told me once that if ever a sorry looking woman baring one golden earring with a red glass bead ever entered our Court, I should ask no questions and hang her." He leaned in closer to me lowering his voice here, "Clopin refused to ever tell me the true tale. You must know everything! Everything papa refused to tell me because I was too young."
"You'd be wise to listen to your father," I retorted.
"Yes, but now papa is dead and I am no longer young," he added with a smirk. I saw, for an instant, his father captured in that slow smile he shot to me. I leaned forward clutching my stomach.
"Yes, I heard he had died. What was it again, the stake or the noose?"
"Neither," began the man nonchalantly, "he was beaten to death by one of those morose guards. But that does not matter today, so tell me the story, please!"
"I am very weak Marious."
"A drink! You would perhaps like a drink, non?"
"A drink will do, yes. But it must be accompanied by a loaf of bread."
He nodded to me and in an instant I was met with a cup of wine and a day old loaf of wheat. I devoured the bread in a manner that the young man had probably never seen from a lady. He waited patiently though, his dirty, rouged hands folded neatly in front of him.
Finishing off the loaf, I leaned back into my chair, my thoughts wandering. For some reason, I let them wander aloud.
"I once loved, and hated, and lived for this hidden place. I danced around the tents and caravans, the homes of the people of the Court. I laughed along with other gypsy girls, I called them my sisters. I lived by the lawless freedom of a petty thief, with the all pride of the Romany. With all the hate I could muster."
"The Court of Miracles with Clopin as King," said the young man with wonder, "what a great time to be of the Rom!"
"You would think young Marious. A certain story comes to me now… one that makes me smile." I shook my head, "But that was so long past."
"You must remember something."
I looked to him blankly. Honestly, I remembered everything. I recall the long, heartening story kneeling in the muddy waters of the catacombs. Still the taste of cheap tavern brew lingers on my tongue. The sounds of a cheering crowd as he sang, the girls danced, and the other boy played the lute.
Now, I thought to myself, I remember why I returned.
"Well?" asked the King quietly, hope filling his dark eyes.
I was brought back to the present and looked up to Marious slowly.
"Yes, it began in the spring. Young Clopin was missing for days, his sister was pacing in her tent. She was so worried…"