What Love Is Worth, Ch. 6
Two days passed in agony as preparations were made for Christine to leave the city. She had always intended to return to her estate to assist with the spring harvest – these circumstances just spurred her into earlier action. She had to get out of the city where every brick and paving stone reminded her of him.
Marcello stood in the foyer as she oversaw the final preparations for her journey.
"I must apologize again," he said as he looked at her. "I do not regret my actions or my words, but I regret that they hurt you," he said and she stopped. He took her by the elbow and made her face him.
"Please," he begged. "Don't do this."
She said nothing, but looked at him with dead eyes – eyes that once brimmed with only life and laughter. He had done this to her, had been part of his sister's cruel games. He barely recognized the wraith that stood before him. It was as though her fire had been extinguished.
"Don't do this," he repeated.
She smiled sadly. "I need to leave the city," she said softly.
"So then we'll leave!" he said. "We can go far from this place. We can go to Italy – to Florence! You can listen to opera and we can study the works of the masters," he said desperately. She smiled again and shook her head, her eyes dropping to the floor.
"Marry me!" he said suddenly. "Marry me, and I will take you away from here. Your people will be taken care of and you would never need to hear of him again. France could be a faint memory. He could be a memory."
She stilled at this, another tear sliding down her cheek. Christine was certain this had to be the last one. How many tears could one woman cry?
"I can't," she said, her voice barely discernible. "I love him," she said.
His mouth fell open and his eyes burned with rage. "Still?" he asked incredulously, "After all he's done to you?" He was shouting now. Even the stable boys could hear him as they backed the horses into position in front of the carriage.
"You can't! You just don't know!" he shouted, "Marry me and you should want for nothing," he said as he desperately pressed his lips to hers and he kissed her hard. She stood still, like a corpse, as more tears miraculously continued to fall from her eyes.
He pulled away, his eyes wild.
"I'm sorry," she said and she turned away, leaving him in the hallway.
He spun on his heel and stormed out the door knocking parcels aside as he went.
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"Where is he?!" Marcello shouted as he burst through the garrison gates. "Where is that bastard…that coward?! ARAMIS!" he screamed.
From the shadows Aramis shifted in his chair, a waif, not even resembling the gregarious musketeer he was normally. A bottle of wine lay empty under his seat.
Marcello surged towards him but was stopped suddenly by Athos blocking his way, his outstretched hand pressed against the Duke's chest.
"Out of my way!" he demanded. "I've come here to kill him!"
"Calm down," said Athos. "I suggest you take a breath and leave this place. You don't want to do something you might regret." Porthos and D'Artagnan rose from their seats and flanked Athos. Aramis was still visible from where he lurked in the shadows, his dark eyes, the only sign of life, smoldered with a desire for violence.
"You're a disgrace," he shouted at the marksman. "You all are! You are supposed to be the protectors of the innocent, the defenders of women, and here you keep a murderer among you."
"Nobody is dead," said Porthos coldly.
"She's as good as dead," he hissed back, fury dominating his emotions. "He has nearly killed her. He has stolen her life force and left her broken. You musketeers and all your talk of honour! Where is the honour in that? You're a coward," he shouted again at Aramis. "You truly didn't deserve her if you let the evil cackles of a few courtiers destroy everything you had, and she is EVERYTHING. You never loved her," he finished savagely.
Aramis surged to his feet and flung himself desperately towards the Italian at these words. Porthos and D'Artagnan grabbed him, and desperately tried to retain the marksman.
"Get out of here!" Athos shouted pushing the Duke back towards the gates.
The Duke spat at Athos' feet. "You musketeers have no honour," he snarled and left.
Aramis pulled himself out of the grips of Porthos and D'Artagnan. Grabbing the empty wine bottle from the floor he hurled it so it smashed against the infirmary's exterior wall. He staggered away, grabbing another bottle of wine off the table as he went.
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It had been two weeks since she had left the city. Two weeks of agony as every night his words and her face haunted him. He went about his days in a drunken haze.
Much of what the Italian had said had been true, Porthos thought. With his words, Aramis had killed two people – the Comtesse and himself. This wraith that haunted the infirmary was not the man that Porthos called brother. He did not know the dead eyes that stared back at him.
He had had enough. He needed to put an end to this, to shake his brother back into being and spur him into action before the poison could no longer be extracted from the wound. Porthos turned to face the marksman with a roar that died before it could leave his lips as Athos suddenly burst into the infirmary.
"Finish this!" he said flinging a pistol across the table at Aramis. D'Artagnan slowly entered behind his mentor and stood in the corner. Porthos gripped the edge of the table. Aramis stared dumbstruck at the pistol.
"Finish this!" roared Athos, drawing his rapier. "I swore that I would kill you if you ever hurt her, but it's clear that your actions have sucked the life from you already, so for the love of god, just end this!"
Aramis said nothing as the words of his brother filtered in.
"I have known you to be many things Aramis, but I do not know you as this. Perhaps Marcello was right and you are a coward – that you didn't love her." Aramis' eyes burst into flame at these words. He roared and surged to his feet tossing the table and the pistol aside.
"How dare you," Aramis growled. "You, of all people. You knew how much I loved her, how much I still do!"
"And I know how it killed you to say those things to her! What I don't understand is why!" Athos shouted, blazing blue eyes locking onto burning brown. "I saw you when it happened. I saw you as you turned away. I went to stop you, but it was like looking into the face of a dead man. The face I see before me now! If you love her as I know you still do, then tell me, please brother, why did you do it?"
Aramis stood there shaking, then all at once he let out a sob, the most heartbreaking sound that any of them had ever heard as all the pain and loss that he had kept locked within the gaping hole where his heart once dwelt burst forth in that inarticulate cry. He sank back into the chair and dropped his head. He ran his hands through his hair where they grasped at its ends at the back of his neck.
"I don't know," he stuttered, as Athos knelt in front of him. "I feel as though I was poisoned. I listened to the whispers of that viper that told me I was worthless. She preyed on every fear and doubt I had. She convinced me that if I loved her, I had to let her go. Christine had to marry a nobleman, one who could support her and enrich her lands with those of his own. I grew jealous and felt doubt where before I only felt certainty." His body shook with silent sobs. "She would be throwing her life away with me, Athos. She needs to think of her people. I'm not worthy of her love. I can offer her nothing."
The infirmary echoed in the silence that followed these statements.
Athos' heart broke at hearing the words of his brother.
"Have you lost your mind?" Athos asked. Aramis raised his head, startled. Porthos and D'Artagnan both gasped at the question. Whatever they had been expecting, it was not that.
"Can you hear yourself? Do you not know who you are, what you are, who she is?"
Aramis' eyes widened as Athos gripped his arm.
"I have known Christine since we were both babes. She has never changed. Christine is guided by her heart, Aramis, and in her heart there is only you! By her choosing you, you are deserving of her. Do you think she's a fool?" he asked
"NO!" protested Aramis. "She is the most intelligent and beautiful creature that God has ever created."
"Then do you think she would have pledged her heart to you if you were unworthy of it? So you have no title. You know as well as I do that titles and court life are abhorrent to her. She does not care what the people of the court say and if you asked her to, I know she would relinquish it all for you."
"But Athos, her lands…her people," Aramis said with a desolation and uncertainty which were rarely seen in the marksman.
"She doesn't need you to support her with lands. All she needed from you was your love," Athos said. "She LOVES you Aramis. And through her love, she has marked you as her equal and no courtly opinion has greater value than that. That is what her love is worth."
Silence again reigned.
Slowly Aramis raised his head. "I've been such a fool," he muttered softly.
His eyes shone brightly for the first time in weeks and finally, Porthos once again saw a trace of his brother. The fire had returned to his eyes, strong and determined. Rising, he pulled Athos to his feet and gripped him in a tight embrace. Without a word he strode from the infirmary and into the stables. He was shocked to see his mare tacked and his saddlebags waiting.
"I had a feeling you'd listen to Athos," D'Artagnan said.
"He's quite persuasive with a pistol and a rapier," Aramis said with a slight smirk.
"Thank you brothers," he said with a nod to his brothers as he swung into his stirrups and took off out of the stable doors.
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