Chapter 27- Your Life Matters
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"Marcel, please sit down, you're making me more nervous pacing around like that!" Adelaide sighed as he paced in circles in the sitting room of his mother's home.
"I can't, Adelaide! I wish Maman would just let me have access to her Mirror. Then at least I'd know if they're all right!"
When Agathe and Aloysius took Marcel's flying coach back to France to battle against Le Ministère, Madame Sabine hid her Magic Mirror somewhere in her husband's workshop downstairs, using a locking spell that prevented Marcel from 'accessing' it magically.
"The reason she hid it from you is because if they're not winning this battle, and you see them getting hurt, you'd try to find a way to go back there," Adelaide said to him in a gentle voice.
"I would," Marcel admitted. "Whether it be searching for an old broom, or finding Enchanted people here in London to help me get back. I feel helpless here, Adelaide."
He gave her a pitiable look, but Adelaide- more concerned for her love's safety- shook her head.
"Agathe and Aloysius know what they're doing. And you said you trusted your friend- this Andre fellow- to be your ally. And that he had connections to dragon handlers. And that dragons were the secret weapon they can use against Le Ministère. So just wait!" she argued.
"Do you know how terrifying dragons are, my love? Have you ever seen one?"
Adelaide looked away from him and tried to stifle a giggle. "Of course, Marcel. I lived with dragons all the time! My Maman used little ones to light up our fireplaces and stoves."
"Adelaide, I'm serious!" Marcel shouted.
She covered her face with her hands and burst into laughter. As a Sans-Magie, she'd never believed dragons existed. In fact, she wasn't quite sure she even believed in them yet. When she looked back to her fiance he was storming out the door, a hurt and angry expression on his face.
Feeling a surge of guilt, she followed him.
…
Marcel walked aimlessly down the busy neighborhood with the idea in his mind that he would somehow find fellow Enchanted folk nearby. He scanned the faces of passersby. Amongst strangers he honestly had no idea how to tell a Sans-Magie from a wizard without the use of a wand or Mirror, both of which he lacked.
Realizing he had no clue what he was doing or where he was going, he decided to go back to find his mother and consult with her about his need to search for a wandmaker. After all, he was not in France, and therefore not under Le Ministère persecution for the moment. There was nothing preventing him from finding someone to supply him with a new wand and Magic Mirror. At least the former; the latter he couldn't afford yet.
He was walking back towards his mother's home when he saw Adelaide bustling toward him.
"You're about to do something crazy and I won't let you!" she called out.
"Adelaide…"
She quickened her pace and they collided, Adelaide throwing her arms lovingly around his shoulders.
Just then, Marcel was aware of many eyes upon the both of them. Sans-Magies, strangers. He pulled away from her rather than returning her embrace.
"Sweetheart, what's wrong?" She reached out to grasp his hand.
"Adelaide, don't! They…"
Once more, Marcel remembered the unpleasant fact that whenever he was among Sans-Magies in public, and all of them happened to be pale-skinned, he stood out as different. And just like in France, he was assumed to be a slave.
"How dare you touch her!" a man roared in English.
Adelaide didn't understand much of what the men were saying, but within seconds a gang of three or four men rushed to Marcel and knocked him to the ground. One of them threw back his fist and punched him in the face, drawing blood.
She knew little English, had no way to tell them to stop. She rushed to the man beating up her beloved and tried to pull him away by the shoulders.
Another man grabbed her from behind and pulled her away from the scuffle. "It is alright, dear. He is getting his just punishments. We will protect your honor!"
"Arrêtez! S'il vous plaît!" she cried in French, tears blurring her vision. They didn't let up on their beating. They were about to kill him! Why wasn't he stopping them with magic?
"Ahh, a French lady, are you?" the man still holding her back said with a laugh. "They're taking care of this for you, don't you worry!"
Blood trickled from Marcel's nose as he tried to fend off their blows. Adelaide sobbed. "Utilisez votre magie!" she begged. He was certainly capable of using his magic to fight them off.
She threw back her elbow to strike the man behind her. With a grunt, he loosened his grip on her. She rushed forward and grabbed the arm of the man who was still landing punches on Marcel. He looked powerless now, this warrior wizard who saved her life in a fierce battle in one world- but wouldn't save himself in the other.
Anger and desperation took over Adelaide. She found herself clutching the man's arm with both her hands. She tugged down the sleeve of his loose blouse. She clawed and pinched the hairy skin of his forearm with her nails.
"Ye bloody crazy woman!" he roared, nudging her in the hip with his overpowering elbow. The layers of fabric from her skirt and petticoats shielded her from any hurt. At least she stopped him from pummeling Marcel. Her efforts were in vain, however, as the other man took over and started to drag Marcel by his arms. A third man took over and yanked him to a kneeling position.
Marcel made no sound. He seemed to be losing consciousness, his face and blouse soaked with blood.
The first man shoved Adelaide aside, paying no heed to her sobbing protests.
"Anybody care to fetch a rope? Let's string 'im up!"
"No!" Adelaide screamed in English. Though she could not understand the language, she knew for a fact that the angry mob was planning to execute the man she loved.
…
Robert Lefebrve and Toulouse Granger were heading up the street, returning from a meeting with London Enchanters inside a secret brewery pub. The small watering hole was known as 'Ye Olde Ale House,' the name carved on the front shingle.
The place was a Sans-Magie pub for the uninformed, yet a secret door to the back opened to an additional chamber room. An English Enchantress named Hortensia Fawley worked there, stirring her cauldrons and selling her stock. Toulouse and Robert had just bought several vials upon Sabine's request.
"This should be plenty enough for a while," said Robert, shouldering the satchel containing the potions.
"Yes," said Toulouse. "It's good that she told us where to find the wandmaker. You and Marcel need to see him straight away. It's imperative that the two of you acquire new wands before you even think of setting foot in France again. Victory or no victory!"
Robert nodded, vocalizing something between a grunt and an affirmative hum.
"You don't seem very enthusiastic today," Toulouse said to his hulking friend.
"I'm no longer a favorite of the ladies," grumbled Robert. "That potion mistress and her pretty daughter both seemed to have eyes for you, while ignoring me."
Toulouse scoffed. "Both of those Enchantresses were exceedingly friendly to me because they fancied making a sale. And furthermore- which one of us is a fluent English speaker?"
"You," Robert replied. He heard shouting and yelling down the street, and noticed what looked like a scuffle or fight. "What the hell's going on over there?"
The two picked up their speed. They couldn't believe their eyes when they saw what, and who, was involved.
"Marcel!" Robert bellowed. He ran to the men holding his friend and hurled his fist directly into the nose of one. The man collapsed with a whimper. Robert grabbed Marcel's semi-conscious and bleeding form.
"Robert! Toulouse! Help him!" Adelaide screamed in French.
"What are you doing to this innocent man?" Toulouse demanded.
"He was touching this fair lady! Nothing innocent about that!" replied a stout man with a tricorne hat pulled low over his angry eyes. "Whoever's slave he is, that fellow's about to be one servant short! This one deserves the noose!"
"No!" Adelaide screamed, rushing to Marcel's side and crying openly.
Toulouse's shocked expression twisted into horror and rage. He took a deep breath and opened his mouth to speak.
"This man is MY servant!" he spat. Toulouse gave Robert and Adelaide a look of warning as if to say, 'Shut up and play along.' He mumbled something out of his breath while his hand dipped into the pocket of his coat.
"Your scoundrel of a slave boy is about to die!" the stout man raged.
That moment, a swarm of bees seemed to appear out of nowhere. With a loud and threatening buzz, they alighted upon each member of the angry mob. Men screamed as they were stung, flailing their arms and falling to the ground, where they rolled in agony.
Robert carefully picked up the severely injured and battered young man, tears welling in his eyes. Not again, he thought. He wasn't sure whether Marcel Clement was a man who either actively went looking for trouble, or if he was a magnet for trouble to find him. It now seemed as if it were the latter.
…
Madame Sabine could not control her emotion as she tried her best to heal the cuts, lacerations and bruises that covered her son. She used the same healing spells with her wand as she'd performed back at the fountain pool at Le Ministère, but they didn't have the same immediate and full effect at healing non-magical injuries.
"I'm putting him under sleep for the rest...of the day...and into the night," she sobbed. "How could he be so foolish? I've taught him all his life to be careful around all of the European Sans-Magies, to obey them and keep an air of humility and servitude about himself!"
"But that's so unjust! Why?" Adelaide said. "He didn't do anything wrong. I started to hug him, and-"
"You showed your affection and hugged him in public? On the streets of this city?" Sabine turned to her with a bitter and angry expression that made Adelaide wither in shame.
"Yes…"
"How naive and foolish are you? You're a Sans-Magie, and you should know by now that people who look like Marcel, and like me, are in danger of getting killed or beaten on sight!"
"I'm sorry!" she cried in remorse, yet she tearfully tried to defend herself from the woman's accusations that what happened to Marcel was her fault.
"I...I don't notice or care about people's skin color. I never thought about it! I was a servant maid myself. My family was poor. White, but poor. No one we knew owned African servants, and I wasn't even aware that they are enslaved and not paid! Not until that one day when Monique and I were out in Paris, and a man was cruel to her!"
Madame Sabine scowled. "Well now you know! I hope you've learned your lesson about the real world you were raised in!"
She stood up and bustled out of the bedroom, leaving Adelaide alone next to the bed where her beloved fiance slept, his face covered in bandages.
"I'm so, so sorry," she whispered in misery. She leaned down and kissed the dark hair on top of his head. It wasn't fair. During the past year he had been imprisoned, abused, injured, and almost killed more times than she could count. Targeted for death in both societies. Accepted by neither.
"I love you," she whispered. "We'll make it through all this."
…
Sabine went down to the furniture shop downstairs to visit her husband, Hami-Daniel, where he was sanding the edges of a new table. She told him all about Marcel's attack.
"This is why we have to keep up a lie, darling!" she said. "I don't want what almost happened to my son, to happen to you. I know you don't like having outsiders believe you are Edouard's servant, and not the talented man behind this shop that ought to be credited as yours. Not Edouard's business, just because he is a white man. Or that Celeste has to pretend that Edouard is not her own husband when she leaves this building!"
"Sabine, love… we don't have to live in this city. We can all pack up and move on to a small, quiet village," Hami-Daniel said quietly after listening. "Anywhere could be safer than this."
"Nowhere is safe," she replied sadly. "Enchanters. Sans-Magies. Both peoples have their cruel murderers among them. I'm tired, darling. I want to stop running. All my life...ever since Philippe took me away from my homeland when I was eighteen, I've been running away."
"But love, there are also good people among them."
"Perhaps," she said. A tapping came against the window then, and Sabine opened the shutters to greet the fluttering wings of a little owl. The bird let go of a rolled-up piece of paper.
"A message! Perhaps it's from Agathe and Aloysius and the rest of the Resistance in France!"
She started to untie the red ribbon from the scroll and saw that it was addressed not to her, but to her sister Celeste and to Edouard. She immediately went back up into the kitchen and found her sister and brother-in-law relaxing with cups of tea, reading the Enchanted London newspaper.
"An owl brought a letter for the two of you!" she said, giving them the scroll.
Edouard used a flick of his hand to magically cut the ribbon. "It's from Monique!" he said with relief. "She...says she's happy. She was put into the school division she hoped for, and made some new friends already. Her first day of class she transformed a worm into a kitten...she said to make sure we tell Marcel about that."
"We certainly will tell him...as soon as he recovers, the poor dear," said Celeste. "I wish every place could be as beautiful and magical as the Enchanted schools."
The family members' expressions softened as Celeste poured them some more tea, all of them glad to hear a little good news for the day.
Upstairs, Marcel slept under his mother's sedating spell, his cuts and wounds healing. Odd and disturbing dreams entered his consciousness. He revisited Alexis Sauvageon in his old office with the crystal ball. Alexis, with the old arrogant smirk, playing with that crystal ball. In the dream he showed Marcel more scenes of doom and trouble in the world- both worlds. Wars in every nation would continue. More haunting images.
Men firing cannons into a crowd of other men across a field in springtime; the wildflowers and grasses becoming soaked with blood. Flying machines raining explosions upon a city- London, you say? A line of women and children being herded into an ugly building. Why am I being shown a chimney billowing black smoke now, Alexis, mon ami? This makes no sense to me...
Prejudice and oppression would continue, it seemed. Three dark-skinned men, hanging by their necks together on a lamp post in a city street while crowds jeered all around them. Alexis- why are they dark-skinned like me and my family, while the crowd is made of all light-skinned people? Is it just because they are dark that this is happening? Monsieur Sauvageon, this crystal ball makes no sense!
Angry crowds breaking windows of shops. People dressed in armored suits, firing clouds of gas at other, unarmed people.
He started to wake; his head and nose throbbed from the pain of the beating. It was still pitch dark in the room. Relief came when he fell back to sleep.
Towards morning, Marcel dreamed he was flying a broom, playing Boule de Plume. The little golden ball glistened in the moonlight as it sped away, rising higher. He forced the broom to soar higher, reaching and stretching to touch the magical object, but he could not catch it.
…
The late morning sun finally brought him to full consciousness. He felt someone touch his hand and slip something into it. A smooth, cool metallic ball, with delicate feathers attached. The feathers began to flutter, tickling his palm and fingers. He squeezed it; a familiar feeling of triumph and victory came over him. He opened his eyes and saw Adelaide, her sweet face framed by soft tousled waves of brown hair.
"Adelaide..." Despite his cracking voice and the dull throbs of pain, he couldn't help a smile pulling at his lips. Her hazel green eyes were bloodshot from a night of crying, but a smile of her own had broken through.
"Marcel- we won!"
"What?"
"Agathe and Aloysius are back! The dragon attack on Le Ministère succeeded! Bertrand is dead! Andre Rosier is taking control of Enchanted France, he's demanding peace between all wizards!"
"Yes…" he whispered, closing his eyes. "Thank you for telling me. I had a rough day yesterday."
"Rough day? That's an understatement. It was terrible what they did to you! They deserved Toulouse's bee curse. Are you feeling better?"
Marcel paused to collect his thoughts. The battle for Enchanted France was won. He ought to be ecstatic about his friends being victorious. But he was not.
"Perhaps a little better."
Her smile faded; she bent down to kiss the part of his cheek not covered by a linen bandage. "What can I do to help you feel better?"
"Marry me as soon as I get my energy back. And let me take you back home."
"I will. I love you."
He glanced at the Boule de Plume which she'd slipped into his hand. "Was this one that Maman kept from my old games? What made you think of giving it to me?"
"I just...I had the urge to give it to you when I saw it on a hutch cabinet. After Agathe and Aloysius returned. Would you like them to come speak to you? Do you want me to get you a cup of tea or something?"
He nodded. "Sure...Adelaide?"
"Yes, sweetheart?" She turned back around just as she began to walk out of his room. Her dress today was red and white striped, like sweet peppermint candy.
"Remember that day when I told Sauvageon I wanted to leave the Enchanted world and live among Sans-Magies instead? I think I changed my mind."
"I don't blame you after yesterday."
"I can't live in either, it seems," he said sadly.
"Well, you must chose one to live in. Or, just like me, live a little in both." Adelaide tried to coax a smile with her tone of humor, but it feel flat. He looked morose, his brow knit in hurt and anger, and pain.
"I want to be happy about the defeat of the Minister's regime, but I know that things will never get better. And I mean the whole world. For ages."
"Things will never get better completely. Cruel people will always exist. I'm sorry."
"In both worlds...it seems like my life doesn't matter."
"Don't say that!" Adelaide replied. "Of course it matters. You were a great warrior. You did so many things to fight for the freedom of Magical folk! You were brave, clever, strong, and-"
"I'm not talking about what I did or what I will do. I'm talking about who I am." His eyes began to sting with the threat of tears.
Adelaide knelt down and embraced him, resting her head on his chest.
"Who you are...is the love of my life! And because of that, your life matters. And it will matter to our children someday. And their lives will matter."
"I want to meet those children of ours, starting next year," said Marcel. Joy and peace began to rise anew in his heart. Adelaide raised her head to place her lips upon his. He took her in his arms, vowing to never let her go for the rest of his living days.
...