Only When the Sun Shone
By Greenlips 24
Summary:
Sometimes, a broken heart cannot be mended.
Based loosely on "The Angel of Death: Chapter LVIII of The Man in the Iron Mask," the last in the Dumas books featuring the Musketeer foursome which is set thirty five years on.
WARNING: Tissue Alert. There may be tears. Choose your moment.
Disclaimer: I do not own any of these characters.
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Dust to dust.
D'Artagnan was familiar with the concept.
In his many years as a soldier, he had seen many men die; some gloriously, some honourably; many needlessly.
It had been with the heaviest of hearts that he had ridden to Athos and Sylvie's home to tell them that their beloved son, Raoul, had died a glorious and honourable death on the battlefield.
He had stayed the night, sharing their grief, before riding back to his regiment the next day.
For the two friends he left behind, the days that followed were grey and lifeless.
A few days later, Sylvie sat in her chair by the window, her fingers pulling the needle through the tapestry without thought or awareness.
She raised her head when she heard Athos enter the room.
He was looking at her with eyes that held a thousand memories. The tenderness she saw there almost overwhelmed her and she laid her tapestry aside and stood to face him.
Her hair still held its thickness, but was now almost silver at the temples. Her face had hardly changed, save for the laughter lines around her eyes; evidence of the joy this man had brought her. Now those eyes were as haunted as his. She took his outstretched hand and went with him, climbing stairs she had run up as a young woman when he had first brought her here from Paris; the same stairs she had walked down carefully, carrying their newborn son.
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Something brought d'Artagnan back that day; pulled by an urgency that he could not still.
He had entered their home through the unlocked door and now stood uneasily on the threshold.
All was quiet.
There was no aroma of breakfast food cooking.
Sylvie's tapestry lay forgotten on her chair.
A pipe on the mantle; a pair of boots on the hearth.
d'Artagnan climbed the stairs slowly; it seemed it was all his legs could manage.
The short corridor seemed endless.
His heels echoed on the polished timbers; alerting no-one.
Finally, he reached their room; his hand not wanting to find the handle.
He did not remember the act of pushing the door open, but he was suddenly aware of the corridor being flooded with light, spilling through the now-open door.
Looking into the room, he was aware of the three figures; Raoul, Athos and Sylvie, embracing in the shaft of sunlight that spilled through the window behind them.
For a moment, he was elated, and took a step into the room.
And then they were gone.
Confused, he stopped, before turning toward the bed.
There, laid peacefully together, lay his dearest friend, Athos, and Sylvie.
They were dressed finely and she lay curled into his side, looking for all the world not the woman, but the girl she had once been. Athos had hardly aged in the years since they were inseparable; his hair still dark and somewhat unruly but now lightly flecked with grey. He held her hand against his still chest, their fingers laced together. His face was turned toward her as if he were gently murmuring tender words of comfort to her; for she looked peaceful. As did he.
As young men, they had never expected to make old bones. Athos would have been the first to scoff derisively if told he would take to his bed, many years ahead, to die. Of all of them, he had been the one they watched, as he hurtled from one scrape to another with no thought for his own safety. It was they who had curbed that tendency and he was a better man for it. Of course, he had repaid them many times over and theirs became a bond that could not be broken.
It seemed, however, that two hearts now so thoroughly broken, could not be mended.
d'Artagnan reached out his hand and placed it over theirs, whispering a benediction taught to him by Aramis a long time ago and uttered many times over the years.
"Nothing that suffers can pass without merit in the sight of God."
Had he been the boy he once was, d'Artagnan would have fallen to his knees and wailed; his own heart thoroughly broken. He would have beseeched a higher power to end this tragedy. As a man, he counted himself immensely honoured to have had this man's love and friendship for so many years and he could not deny him his decision to succumb to the grief of losing their son. He had his dear Sylvie with him, from which d'Artagnan took great comfort. That was not to say his still-boyish heart was not shattered into pieces, but maturity meant that he was more able to rationalise and bear his own loss a little better.
He looked around the room and his eyes lighted on a parchment, propped carefully against a candlestick. How like Athos to know he would come, and leave him his instructions.
d'Artagnan was not overly religious, but he did believe that the soul lived on. He had seen too many deaths to think otherwise. Battle-hardened soldiers at the point of death, suddenly calmed by a sight of something unseen by those around them. A guide perhaps, to help them on their way?
He thought then of the mirage that had greeted him as he first opened their door.
Three golden figures, bathed in morning sunlight ...
Sylvie kept a spotless home; a tradition no doubt borne from her early life in the refugee camp, with only one room to call her own.
But sometimes, despite her best efforts and only when the sun shone, it revealed a thin layer of dust that could not otherwise be seen.
Now, as d'Artagnan crossed to the window, reaching out to retrieve Athos's last instructions – oh, how that thought hurt! – the sun came out again; flooding the same golden light across the floorboards where his mirage had fooled him.
He glanced down and his outstretched hand stopped midway.
His breath caught in his throat.
For there on the floor, in the thinnest layer of dust, were three sets of footprints in a tight circle.
And it was then, that d'Artagnan understood what those soldiers had seen.
And his heart soared.
END
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A/N: My apologies; but the Dumas chapter is infinitely more heart breaking. You have been warned.
Thanks for reading.