The Bat
Eyes opened gently, then fluttered to a close.
He had found her.
Leaning against the wagon, red faced, bathed in sweat and grimier then usual, she seemed in a state of utter exhaustion. Worn out, she didn't notice his presence, her gaze fixed on the few remaining crates on the cart, eyeing them furiously as if doing so would cause them to move themselves. The wooden countenances of the crates did not react.
"You shouldn't stare, it's rude."
Claude blinked. She had moved her furious eyes to glare at him as if it was his fault the crates weren't cowering to her will.
"I was not staring."
"Yes, you was," she muttered, turning back to glare at the crates; it seemed, today, she wasn't in the mood to pester him on the value of mathematics. Dejectedly, she reached out to begin to tug one of the heavy boxes off the cart. The sight – he was still staring – caused something utterly different to twist at Claude's stomach.
Pity.
"Would you like help?"
She paused for a moment.
"You can hold doors."
Regardless, Claude put his book down on the cart and picked up the largest of the crates. She didn't argue, picking up the smaller one. The girl looked at him for a moment, before motioning her head in the direction behind her, "Come on then. And don't let Monsieur Corbin see you."
"… The shop owner?"
"He doesn't want people helpin' me. Old Joe - the sod - told him I was slackin' off and now he says that if I want this weeks wages I've got to make up for it. Make up for it by unloading this bleedin' cart by meself," she said, adding the occasional profanity as if it made her situation any better. Claude didn't respond.
She led the way around to the back door of the shop, up flights of steps and to a rickety ladder leading to a loft and the destination of the boxes. She turned to him, about to speak, when Claude broke his pensive silence to blurt out, "I dislike you."
For a split second she looked as if someone had just slapped her across the face, before descending into laughter, "No, you don't!"
"Intensely. I dislike you intensely, utterly. You are annoying, you are childish, you do not listen, you laugh at me continuously, you cannot speak properly… and you don't understand mathematics! Nor reading, nor science, nor knowledge of any type, or anything else," Claude ranted at her, still holding the crate. His outburst only seemed to amuse her further.
"Do you want me to hold the ladder for you?" she spoke, unfazed.
"No."
Rant interrupted and the steam that he had been storing up against her somewhat dissipated, Claude had no more words. He began to climb, using one hand to balance the crate on his shoulder, the other to grip the wooden rungs. Progressing precariously upwards, halfway he looked down to find that she was once again disobeying him, holding the ladder when he'd told her not to.
Continuing to stiffly climb - ladders are not a simple task when you spend all day seated reading books - he muttered under his breath, "Go away and sweep the floors," but he knew she couldn't hear him.
One final exertion and he had made it to the top rung, off loading the crate from his shoulder to the floorboards with a careless crash.
"Watch it!" the girl called up to him, beginning to climb the ladder herself, and in a manner far nimbler then him. Panting, droplets of sweat upon his brow, Claude sat down on the crate as she emerged on the ladder. After placing her box carefully next to the others, she moved across to where he sat, giving him a push for Claude to move up and make room for her. He quickly shifted to the other side, putting his back to her and leaning his chin on his hand.
After a long moment, she asked, "If you dislike me, then why did you help me?"
He didn't reply.
"If you dislike someone you kick mud in their face and laugh at 'em, you don't help them," she said simply. It was almost an argument based on logic, Claude thought, yet still he kept silent. The urge to start ranting at her again was mixed with other less explicable urges that wanted him to move back, closer to her; this muddle leaving him in a state of inactivity, instincts that had been forced to lay dormant, slowly awakening…
"Y'know, book boy, you're very odd."
Finally, he responded, releasing a sound of semi amused bitterness, "More then half odd?"
"Yep. You ain't like any boy I've ever met. And I've met lots of 'em, I've got seven brothers," she said, pausing for a moment to think, "Although, none of 'em want you to ever hold the ladder either, so maybe you ain't that different."
Claude wasn't consoled by the fact that he was apparently very odd whilst simultaneously being the same as all other boys. While he was gloomily reflecting this, he became aware that the girl had slid herself to sit directly next to him on the crate.
Their shoulders gently nudged together.
Instinctively, he leant back to keep his distance, then, just as instinctively, he leaned again towards her. Head still slightly turned away, he gazed at her close up, her curves and skin reddened from the heat, the closeness of her turning his stomach not to butterflies, but to a hornets nest. As she seemed to realise that he was looking at her an almost devious smile appeared on her lips – Claude promptly flicked his eyes away to the direction where his turned head should have been looking. Yet out of the corner of his eye, he saw the girl slowly lean her head towards his own…
Claude leapt up. Abruptly he had been struck by a realisation: His hands were empty. The hornets nest dying in his stomach, Claude's eyes scanned the low space of the loft: It wasn't there.
He started to pace across the floorboards, searching but not finding, his movements confusing the girl, "What are you doing?"
The tone in her voice made Claude glance her way; her expression was unmistakably ruffled. Ignoring her, Claude walked a full circle around the crate before spluttering with a note of almost panic, "It's… it's gone!"
"What?"
"My book! It's gone!"
"Oh…" the girl said, her tone had quickly changed to sly amusement. Claude's eyes flicked towards her to find that familiar crafty smile pasted onto her face.
"If you know where it is, you had better tell me right now," he growled, shaking an ordering finger at her. The girl, however, was not to be intimidated.
"Pfft… Or what?"
"Or I'll- I'll-"
She interrupted him, "Admit that you like me."
"What?"
"Say it, and I'll tell you where it is."
Claude glowered down at her, laying upon her his most penetrating stare, teeth grinding together for added effect. Yet the only reaction it extracted was for the girl to stubbornly cross her arms over her chest.
"Go on," she chided.
"I despise you."
"Then why did you help me?"
"Because… because…" it was beyond Claude to express it in words. Finally he managed, "Because you needed help."
"Then you don't despise me," she said, a smile teasing her lips.
Claude scowled, "Yes… no… I-"
"Admit it, bookless boy," she took a moment to grin, "You like me."
Claude glared at her, letting out a deep, almost growled breath as she met his eyes undaunted. Finally he snapped out, "Fine."
"Fine what?"
"Fine, give me my book."
The girl, grinning broadly, wagged a finger at him, "Ah, ah, ah, not 'til you say it proper."
Claude let out an exasperated scoff, running his hand over his dark brow. The girl sat waiting with a mock imperious expression on her face as Claude made a show of rolling his frowning eyes, and muttering something unintelligible.
It did not satisfy her, who indicated he should speak louder by putting a hand to her ear. Claude's scowl deepened, he was sure he hated her more then ever.
"I like you."
He didn't see her triumphant grin; Claude's own words had caused him to lose the ability to look at her, instead staring at the floor ashamed and red faced from something different then exertion. When he spoke, it was little more then a gritted whisper, "Where is my book?"
"Don't know, don't have it," she replied, flippantly.
His eyes flew from the floor to her face, "What!?"
"I reckon," she cut in quickly before he could explode at her, "you should retrace your steps and check the cart for it."
Without another word, Claude dashed back down the ladder to find his book resting in the cart, where he had absent-mindedly left it to carry the crate. Picking it up lovingly, he stroked his thumb down the spine before tucking it safely under his arm.
"Very odd," the girl's voice sounded behind him.
Claude refused to look at her, about to stride away back to the dormitories when her coarsely spoken voice came again, "Book boy, you ever seen a sun rise?"
He stopped. Tongue momentarily blocking his mouth, he replied, "Yes, many times."
"Oh, well…"
Claude slowly turned to face her, something akin to awkward, throat drying panic rising within him as soon as his eyes met her face, the tangled fluttering burning, bricks in the wall loosening, causing him to splutter out, "I have to go."
"You do?" she said glumly. Claude didn't reply, striding away as fast as possible to get back to the dormitories, not even pausing to open his book.
As he walked, the hot, narrow street faded, twisted, altered, contorted to become no longer a street, but a square: The square that was before the cathedral of Notre-Dame.
Save himself and one other, it was empty. Empty as no Paris square, in the middle of the day, could be.
She moved, she spun, she danced, only for him. Her gypsy skin, her neck, her legs were for his eyes only, no other was there to stare or salivate, drool or dream. Her coy smile was directed solely at him; her dark eyes sought only his. For this one fantastical moment, detached from all space and time, she wholly, completely and exclusively belonged to him.
She beckoned him closer with a finger.
The gesture made his heart skip three beats, then pound wildly in order to catch up, all breath leaving him in a single gasp, brain unable to process any thought but mad desire… unseeing the black shadow that squatted high above him.
He took – or rather staggered – one step forward for her hand to instantly retract, and become again one with the dance. She turned from him, skirts sweeping the wooden platform, as her body took at once to a new rhythm, different then before, slower, no less elaborate, yet more so elegant. Erotic, curving, luring; her limbs caressed elongated movements that seemed to exude feminine grace, her figure taking all intricacies of the dance to flow them together, as water, to form one singular, continuous wave of untamed female sensuality.
It maddened him beyond all control: No longer could he bare to simply watch her, the pleasure of the voyeur had soured long ago, he must - he needed - to touch her. Almost hypnotised, he walked to reach the edge of the stage, eyes burning thirty six years of repressed passion, to be closer to her then he had ever dared before. She danced closer, her emerald skirt twirling just before his face as she turned away from him, then flexed her back into an impossible arch, her whole body taking on a deep curve. Neck following the arc, she leant back over the stage, her head lowering towards his own until their eyes were level, shining jewelled light into his smouldering coals, her full lips hovering agonizingly close to his. As he felt the heat of her breath upon his face; as her slightly parted lips crept ever closer, his eyes, on instinct, fluttered dreamily to a close…
He felt light fingertips skim his cheek.
Eyes flying open at the touch, his hand reached out to her to find the gypsy once more apart from him, twirling in the centre of the stage. Without thinking, he placed both hands on the wooden platform to pull himself upon it, no longer willing to be separated from her by any force, least of all a podium.
The face of the bat shadow turned a livid green.
As he stood up upon the podium, she continued to dance, ignoring his intrusion and flaming eyes, spinning swift footed circles around him, refusing to meet his gaze. Patience was no longer a virtue he owned. He lunged out to grab her by the arm, yet she pulled out of his grasp: The force of her dance seemed unstoppable, sensuality succumbing to animal ferocity with every step. Growling through gritted teeth, he tried to seize her arm again, yet once more she escaped him to the other side of the podium. He tried again and again and again, but every time she slipped his grasp; her skin soft as silk, yet, to him, each limb as slippery as an ocean eel. Throughout the rapidity of her dance, not once did she ever meet his desperate, desiring eyes: The tenderness and connection of a few moments ago would seem never to have existed.
Endless frustration mixed with denied passion brought the blood within his temples to boiling point. Her waist once more escaping his grasp, teeth grounding together, he barked out, "Witch!"
That grabbed her attention.
Her dance ceased immediately, in one swift movement crossing the stage to press her body up against him, dark breasts pressed against his torso, the top of her head reaching only to his chin. The sudden contact – though what he so desperately wanted - made him blanch white, a strangled half growl leaving his throat as she hooked two fingers over his priests collar, placing her other hand around his neck. Her eyes, no longer tender, but flashing a fire to match his own; her face, holding not warmth and kindness, instead contorted into an impish countenance of pure spite.
She moved up on her toes to place her lips to his ear, whispering in a tone oozing malice, "Do you love me?"
Her words, the caressing fingers at his throat, all prevented him from forming an answer that had possessed his soul for what seemed like centuries. His tongue was no longer able to grasp language, his mind, stupefied by sensation, no longer able to think in words, his hands acting as the only communicator as they moved to grip and squeeze the flesh that had been his tormentor day and night.
The moment his fingertips touched her body, the moment he stroked but an inch of that dark female flesh, experienced just a second of pleasure, the wings of the bat shadow descended upon him.
Blackness surrounded him, female screams filling his ears, himself yelling out in pain as his right shoulder suddenly seared with an agony that cut through to his spine . His back contorted, hands reaching out for something to support himself, finding nothing. The pain plunged deep beneath his skin, the female screaming growing louder and louder as his shoulder blade became bathed in a hot, sticky wetness, pain intensifying with a twist. His knees gave way. He collapsed to the ground, bones cracking on wood. The thick, sticky substance kept flowing, pooling beneath him, round him, over him, taking away consciousness as the female screams reduced to whimpers, then ceased.
As his eyelids drooped to a close, before he descended completely into the abyss, one image seared through the darkness: A face of a man contorted by green fury.
It swooped down and stuck his heart the final blow.
