Needs and Questions
I want to cry. I…I should cry. I deserve to cry after the past twenty-four hours. But I cannot. The full blast of the sun finds me changing quickly. My head is pounding. I need more rest. There is the part inside me, however, that forbids crawling back into that bed, and it builds up determination and anger with each second that passes.
Soon, I am in a rage the likes of which I have never felt. I am angrier than I have ever been, and I hasten from the room, swallowing hot tears as I begin to look for the door. Most are open, thrown wide to allow sunlight to bathe the hallway. The door closed, however, looks suspicious, and I push it open.
Most of my resolve drains as a room full of tall men turn to look at me. They are all huddled up around a desk, their quick whispers stopping as I enter. I see Erik sitting in the midst of them, his white mask shining from the sea of flesh. His eyes meet mine coolly. I stare back, determined not to break his gaze.
"What do you need?" he says, his voice unconvincingly polite. "Is the breakfast not to your liking?"
Several of the men laugh, and I feel myself flush angrily. "I need answers," I snap. I am unsure if my voice is as steady as I would like it to be, but I do not quail. "I will not wait any longer."
He is unperturbed by my impatience and says lazily, "You seemed content to wait last night."
Now all them men are laughing, and I am trembling with anger. "Stop!" I say. "I will not be treated like some ignorant child! You will not humiliate me simply to impress your…friends. You do not frighten me – that mask does nothing but irritate me!"
I have crossed a forbidden line when I mention his mask. All mild amusement is erased from his face, and he stands and crosses over to me, so quickly and smoothly that I do not know he is by me until his large hand grasps my upper arm. Instantly, he steers me out of the room and slams the door behind him. I know that I am in very deep trouble, but, somehow, I cannot bring myself to care.
He pushes me into a small room and shuts the door before looking at me, his eyes blazing with anger. When I see them, I suddenly begin to care very much about the situation in which I'm in. His eyes are enough to make me shrink to the undersized couch.
"How dare you!" he hisses. "How dare you come here and expect to be waited on, sympathized with, and comforted!"
"I didn't 'come' here," I say shortly before I can stop myself. "I was abducted. I assure you, I didn't ask for this."
His fists are balled and his knuckles white. "I do not care what you asked for," he says, his voice still sharp. "I will not allow you to parade around this house as if you are the master." He silences me with his hand when I open my mouth. "I will, however, give you thirty minutes after dinner tonight. Until then, stay in your room."
----
I do stay in my room, simply because I did not want to see his eyes flashing like that again. It is a small room, not much to explore, and much, much, much less extravagant than my old one. The bed is not a four-poster or a canopy. It is simply a…bed. The room consists of one window – ugly cotton curtains – a chest of drawers with many unknown bottles on top, a closet, and a couch that is stuffed into the corner, mismatching the rest of the wood and looking very out of place. The closet has only three dresses – a blue one, a green one, and a hideous purple one that I am sure I will never wear, even if I must parade around in my underwear. Quite suddenly, I sigh. The drawers are filled with lace-less chemises, pantaloons, petticoats, and other such commodities. I finger the fabric dully, the coarseness strange against my skin.
A woman enters my room sometime later – one of the women I saw last night. She is carrying a lunch tray and sets it on top of my chest of drawers, pushing aside the bottles. Her black dress is plain. She turns around and smiles at me before saying, "Good afternoon, Madam. I brought your lunch."
It is hard not to stare at her; she speaks to me from her own free will, and this is not expected from someone dressed in black. I can barely stammer a "good afternoon" back before she leaves. After I eat, I fall asleep for a few hours. I blush slightly at the reason of my sleepiness, but it does not prevent me from sleeping well and waking up refreshed. There is no dinner dress to change in to, so I merely readjust my hair and smooth out the wrinkles in my current dress.
But if I expect to impress someone, I am disappointed. I am the only one at the dinner table, which seats four. The kind lady who served my lunch also led me to the dining room, and now she puts a plate before me. For a very long time, I simply look at it, unable to believe what my eyes see. For the first time in my life, I am unable to see the bottom of the plate. It is laden with food – fried potatoes swimming in hot gravy, boiled vegetables, sliced pears, thick, hot buttered bread smeared with bright red jam, and a large slab of pork steaming on the side. Without much ado, I eat it all and soon find a disagreeable and yet peculiarly pleasant feeling: I am completely full for the first time. Now I understand what Clara meant when she said that the infamous "they" starve me. I wonder how I will be able to stand being hungry after eating now that I've experienced this. The kind lady takes my plate away and puts down another, this one a bowl full of creamy white soup. I cannot eat it. The minute I pick up a spoon, my stomach squirms uncomfortably, and I push the bowl away.
"Oh," says the lady, coming and taking it away. "Is chowder not to your liking? Shall I bring something else? Beef, perhaps, or onion soup?"
"No, thank you," I say quickly. "I am quite finished."
As soon as she leaves, someone else enters. It is him – Erik – and he scowls at me for a moment before saying, "Are you finished yet?"
I frown, saying, "Yes," and I stand quickly. He leaves, and I follow him, all the questions coming back to my mind, crowding out the rest of my thoughts. We go to a new room; it is a study of some kind. The ten books of the Oligarchy sit, gathering dust, on a small table. A magnificent piano crowds most of the room. Erik leans against it and points to a chair, on which I sit. We sit in an awkward silence. I look at his hands and grow warm as I remember where they were last night.
"Well?" he says. "You have questions. I have answers. Ask."
"I – " Nothing comes out for a minute, and I struggle with my questions before saying feebly, "Who are you?"
His eyebrow rises. "I am Erik."
"I know your name," I explain quickly. "But…I don't know who you are."
"And why should you want to?"
I say nothing, instead choosing to raise my eyebrows and glare at him. He sighs. "I am a man, such as they are. I breathe. I think. Is that good enough for you?"
Deciding to ignore his last question, I ask him my next one. "Why are you doing this?"
"Doing what?"
"This – all of this. Why have you destroyed the Oligarchy? What purpose is there? Do you wish for the power that they have?"
His lips thin at my last question, and he says, very coldly, "No. I do not want their corrupt power." After a minute, he takes a seat, tense and irritated, in the chair that faces me. "Christine," he says, "I am not doing this for myself. I am not doing it for the men that are in the next room. I am not doing it for you, or for the Oligarchy. I am doing this for the people. Yes – the people, Christine! You, who have grown up with everything…you simply cannot comprehend. Have you seen the laborers' village?"
"I could see their houses from my window at the mansion. Sometimes," I add hastily.
Those long, bony fingers press together, and he is quiet for a minute. "Then you will not understand why I am doing this. Those people have nothing, save the clothes on their back. They hardly have enough to feed themselves, let alone their families. The Oligarchy presses them for every bit of food and goods they produce. They starve and do nothing about it because they do not know what to do! There is no education, no progress, and their children grow up twice as ignorant. The ideals of the Oligarchy have crumbled."
Trying to process this all and still have room for more answers, I ask, "And you will set up a new government? A better one?"
He gives something like a shrug. "I would be doing this if it was any government. It would not matter if this was a parliament, a dictatorship, a monarchy, a republic – I would have destroyed it nonetheless. But, seeing the government had true intentions, I see no reason to completely reform. We will put in men who are true and watch them closely. Those kind of men still exist, no matter what anyone thinks."
Neither of us say anything for a few minutes. His fingers reach for the piano and skim over its smooth, black surface, and I watch them.
"This morning," I say finally, and his golden eyes snap back to me, "you said something about a…a situation. What happened last night?"
"We have put ourselves into a delicate condition," he says evenly, though his exposed features harden, looking as rigid as the mask that rests on his face. "Philippe was killed, but by the time my men had gotten to his brother's room, someone had seen Philippe and raised the alarm, and he was nowhere to be found."
I raise an eyebrow. Even to me the plan sounds rough and unsteady, and I wonder why he hadn't developed a better plan.
"We weren't counting on it, I assure you," he says, stretching back in his chair, similar to a long, sleek cat. "There wasn't enough time to count on it. With no wife, we thought his bedroom would be empty. But evidently someone had entered it while my men searched for the brother."
"So – so Raoul is alive?" My stomach churns as he nods.
"You can see how fragile this is. Seeing as we were married yesterday and – ah – carried out the vows, we are wed by law. But you are still wed to your former husband by law, and he is now head of the Oligarchy. The rest of them have been eliminated. He will quickly set up a new group."
My head is aching, and I stare at him, unable to believe what he has told me. He stands and heads to the door, saying, "The time is up. Good evening." And he leaves.
I sit on the chair for a very long time, thinking, staring, waiting…Raoul is alive. Philippe is dead. Clara is dead. I am alive. I am married. The sun casts long shadows as it disappears. I stare at the piano longingly, wishing for the comforting sounds of music to soothe me.
When the stars are twinkling and everything is still, I continue to sit on the chair. I cannot find determination to move. Bright moonlight illuminates the room. It is very comforting, and I feel myself slump onto the armrest, my entire frame weary. Sighing, I curl into a comfortable position and give myself up to sleep.
----
The night is still present when I am woken. Something hard is pressing onto my shoulder, and I pull myself awake, moaning slightly as my restricted muscles ache. I soon realize it is Erik's hand. He is standing beside me, his fingers touching me. For a minute, we stare at each other. He has come to take me back up to the bedroom. I wonder if I should tell him that I am unable to fulfill my one purpose.
His appearance is much less harsh than it was hours ago. He has shed his dark, strict coat and vest, trading it in for a loose-fitting white shirt. The dark hair is rumpled and hangs about his ears. And there is something in his face, too, that suggests he is not as harsh and commanding as he was.
"You are sleeping here?" he asks. His voice is soft, like it was the night before. I shake my head and rub my neck as it cricks.
"I'm sorry," I say, my voice a whisper. "I fell asleep. I'll return to the bedroom."
When I stand, I sway slightly, my legs asleep from their confined position on the chair. They buzz angrily, and I stumble toward the door, my eyes and head still swimming with sleep. Something touches my back lightly, and a presence tells me it is Erik's hand. He guides me down the hall. I am too tired…I don't want him to come to my bedroom…
But as soon as I am in the room, he leaves and shuts the door quietly behind him. With a sigh, I sink into the bed and think no more.