Disclaimer: All credit and rights go to Gaston Leroux, the author and rightful owner of these characters. I own nothing.
Please read the lengthy author's note at the bottom of the chapter. It will help you understand the story much better.
Scene I
Christine
They came in the night.
My father heard the screaming before I did, and ran out to investigate, unaware of the danger that was closing in on us. By the time the scent of smoke and the sounds of pounding feet roused me from my sleep, I was alone. The distant din grew abruptly deafening, and the glow of fire colored the edges of the doorway. Panic seized me in an instant. I leapt up from my mat, feet bare, and threw aside the woolen quilt that hung down over the doorway.
The scene exploded before my eyes with such violence that I froze in place, chills rushing up and down my arms. It was indescribable. The horror was a blanket over my mind, and I was struck to the very bone. People running, screaming, wailing, the sounds lost in the clatter of hooves. Big, dark shadows of horses pounding in our midst. I saw flashes of steel dart out, eliciting more screams. There were men, large men, clothed in metal armor. They carried torches, tossing them up onto the thatched roofs of homes, which immediately burst into flame. Breaking, crashing, sobbing.
The Rominey had come.
A horse thundered past me, throwing me to the ground. I felt slickness against my fingertips, the ground already wet with blood. The panic finally penetrated my cold shell of shock, and I stumbled forward. The shadow and colors were flying back and forth, blood raining down, fire burning brighter. I dove into one of the only homes that had yet to catch flame.
It was in ruins. The narrow bedframes were broken and overturned, blankets spread about, and ashes from the firepit scattered. I huddled against the stone wall, feeling the cold brick against my back but seeing red behind my eyelids. Adrenaline and fear pounded through my veins. Alone, alone, alone. Where was papa? My breath came faster and harder. On the other side of the wall, a ragged scream choked off abruptly.
Almost afraid of what I would see, I turned up a corner of the entrance quilt and peered through the small gap.
The calm night had turned to a living hell. Already, I could see bodies lying motionless on the ground. I could not force myself to scan them for familiarity. Heart pounding, I crawled forward a few inches, until suddenly a body fell forward into my line of vision with a loud thud. I screamed at the glittering blood covering the young man's face. His expression was frozen in pain and horror, which seemed to seep from his body to mine, steeling me in place.
And then a rough hand, breaking me from my cocoon of fear, fisted around my hair and yanked me up from the ground. The chaos and destruction around me blurred and shrank into the distance. I felt air against my back, and then slammed against a hard surface. I was trapped, trapped by a face that rose up before me, the only clear thing.
Another scream burst from my throat. I was screeching, flailing, kicking, twisting and struggling against the hands that shoved me back into the wall. There was the flash of a knife, reflected in the man's eyes as he moved to kill me. I was going to die, against a crumbling stone wall, surrounded by the hideous sounds of murder and destruction.
My eyes flew open wide, and I grabbed his wrist, trying to stop the rapid advancement of the knife. Atcha, I screamed, atcha! Please, please.
Something indeterminate, something other than the feeble grasp of my fingers, stayed his hand. The knife wavered over my head, as the attacker's eyes opened as wide as mine. For several seconds we hung in suspended animation like that. And then a choked cry broke me out.
"Krsta!" the voice so familiar, so pained, managed to cut through the burning and crashing, straight to my ears.
He was on the ground, blood trickling down from a gash in his forehead and gathering in his beard. Through the haze of horror, I realized that he must have broken his leg. He crawled forward and stretched out an arm in my direction, still so far away. "Krsta, ishen!" Run.
It happened so quickly. A ghastly skull seemed to emerge from the darkness behind him. A hideous, deathly thing of pure white bone. A body materialized below it. My father, his eyes trained on me, begging me to escape, didn't see the blade that rose over his head. As he called out my name one last time the sword dove into his back and burst out of his chest in a shower of red. He burst violently, and his eyes rolled back. It was over in seconds.
I was ripped apart, torn from the inside, killed on the spot. All that was left of me was a piercing scream. My legs gave out, and I dove down into myself – broken as I was – wanting to die. Blackness flashed before my eyes, and the only thing that kept me in place was a horrid death's head that peered down emotionlessly as my father, my papa, bled out all over the ground.
The merciless hand yanked me again by my hair and dragged, startling me mid-scream. The kicking and sobbing that erupted from me was purely reactionary. Any sense of self-preservation had been extinguished by my father's blood. I wasn't thinking about living. I wasn't thinking about dying, either. I wasn't thinking at all. I was shrieking.
He didn't kill me. Not immediately, at least. Pebbles, roots and chunks of hard-packed dirt dug into my back as he dragged me further and further from the burning village. Colder and colder and colder the air became against my skin. I wept and clawed at the ground, no longer human.
A large, dappled gray horse that I hadn't seen before was following us silently through the forest, obedient to its master. The crazy thought entered my mind that if I could just break free, I could leap on the horse and escape. Just at that moment, the pressure that seemed to pull my hair out by the roots disappeared. My head thumped painfully against the ground.
My shadowy attacker stood above me and pointed down imperiously. "Stay here, and be silent," he ordered in strange words I didn't understand.
I scrambled to my feet and tried to run. The man caught me in two steps, throwing an arm around my stomach. He dragged me back to the horse and deposited me at the base of a tree. Again, I attempted to regain my feet, but he just shoved me back against the trunk and hissed more words at me.
He turned and reached for the horse, delving into a leather saddle bag and withdrawing a long length of rope. I screamed when I saw it, thinking only that he meant to hang me. Instead, he forced me back against the trunk and threw the rope over my shoulder, wrapping it around me one, twice, three times. I whimpered and wrestled against him, but I was tired and weak and in pain. It was becoming clear that he had no intention of killing me in the near future, and being unsure of his intentions was almost more frightening. As he tied the knot tightly, I began to scream, hoarsely and frantically.
"Be silent," the man snapped. He came around to face me and gripped my chin harshly. "Do you wish for them to find you?" I was so confused, and his foreign words were no help.
He huffed in frustration, and then leaned down and ripped a strip of cloth off of my nightdress. Before I knew what he was doing, he shoved the cloth in my mouth and reached around to tie it behind my head. I was now completely at his mercy.
The man said nothing more. He did nothing. He stared at me for a long moment, then took the reins of his horse and walked away. I kicked and struggled against the bonds, but they were like constricting snakes wrapped around my chest. The tips of my fingers began to go numb. I wept.
The night was not silent. The sky was tinged gray and red from the smoke. I could still hear screams and moans of pain. Hadn't there been enough screaming tonight? I never wanted to hear it again. I wanted to close my eyes and sleep, and wake up in peace.
But there would be no peace tonight. I shuddered in the cold night as the sounds of death echoed through the forest.
Confused? I wouldn't be surprised.
While this story is a complete work of fiction, it is based off of the vague history of the Germanic peoples in Europe around 300-600 AD. They were a large group of various tribes whose descendants eventually became the Danes, Swedes, Norwegians, and other European groups. The Romans knew them as barbarians. Some of the more western tribes eventually adopted latin and became Christianized.
Not much is known about the Germanic tribes, but the fictional tribes in this story are based off of these few facts about them:
1. They were very warlike, and would sometimes wipe out smaller tribes in massive raids, killing men, women, and children
2. They were highly superstitious. Some worshipped pagan gods.
3. They had a very organized system of leadership that was based on rank in their army
I know this is a strange precedent for a Phantom story. I can't really say where it came from. But trust me on this one. It's been boiling in my head for a long time, and I trust it'll be very interesting and original. I will do my best to stay true to the original characters as well.
As for A Little Incentive, my other story (which I've left hanging since December) I fully intend to get a jump on that again once I'm out of school. For anyone who has been reading that, I'm sorry for the long wait. Fortunately, I've just finished my hardest year of high school, and am looking forward to a fairly easy senior year.
Thank you for reading. Please leave a review to let me know what you think.
The Queen's Reprise