As I drift out of sleep, I hear giggles, and smile. For once, we are relaxing. Laurent and I are laughing at a joke Michel has told, and he and Mirielle are playing together for a change. Usually, they bicker and fight, as all siblings are prone to do. She wants to go get her doll, and I let her leave, watching as she leaves the room and smile fondly after her.
Just after she leaves a motion at the door catches my eye. A small Japanese girl, no more than seven at the most, younger than my Mirielle, is standing there. Before I can even wonder what she is doing in our house, a gunshot goes off and my husband's body slides to the floor, blood splattering onto the wall and floor. Another, and my son, my precious twelve year old boy follows.
I am numb, almost unable to process what has happened. My first thought is that Soldats must have sent this girl, punishment for not handing Mirielle to them as requested. My second is that this little girl in front of me must be one of them, one of the 'saplings', the candidates to become Noir. So this is what Mirielle would have become had we handed her over…inconceivable.
The girl stands in front of me, eyes emotionless, with her gun pointed right at me. She has killed my husband, and my son, and yet, I cannot find it in myself to hate this child. For some reason, she is hesitating to kill me, but still, I sense that movement, reasoning on my part will be useless. My fate is sealed, I am to die today.
Altena will not, however, want Mirielle dead, not until she has played out her twisted chess game, with these girls as pawns. Desperately, I want to protect her, to protect all the children who have been given a burden that none should bear.
Who, however, can help her? Soldats will not, only harm her; Claude can not, bound to them as he is. Her Maman and Papa will no longer be alive, nor will her older brother. So who…?
The most unlikely person comes to mind, and that is the little girl standing so still in front of me, with her eyes so blank. So I speak the words that I hope, someday, will break through Altena's teachings, through her battered, torn psyche. The psyche no child should have.
'Love can kill, but hate can never save.'
These, along with a plea to protect Mirielle are my last words. I have done all I can do, I have protected my daughter. For my own sanity now, I must hope that this girl will protect my daughter. Her fingers tighten around the trigger, and think of Mirielle, the way she might have been, and the way she is. I have no regrets.
I am prepared to die.