Chapter XI.

The Sun God Soldier

"I can't believe Esmeralda married that…that weird man!" I ranted to Marcel as the wedding closed and we returned to our sleeping chambers.

"Well, that's exactly what my sister did to your brother," Marcel reminded me, "which by the way, is what saved all your sorry tails."

I sighed. Marcel was right. He was often right. Despite his mischievous character, there was a deep ocean of wisdom lurking in Marcel. It was just really deep down, and many people including myself were often just too lazy to look for it.

"I know why you're mad," Marcel said. "It's because you still love Esmeralda. My advice: get over her and move on. If you think about it, you never had a chance with her anyway. And besides, it's not like she won't be your friend anymore. Just don't expect too much."

I sighed again. "Why do strange things always happen on the Festival of Fools?"

Marcel shrugged. "I guess that's just the way things are."

I shrugged. I didn't want to admit that what Marcel was saying was true, because I didn't want to seem like a weakly little love dove. I would get over it. There was bound to be a girl that I would eventually fall in love with in this city. Then again, Marcel did have more experience in these sort of things than I did, so perhaps he did no something about what he was talking about. Why was life so complicated?

The next day was just like any, and every day after the Festival of Fools always seemed to be that way. It was the rude awakening of what had once been there was no longer. You know, it's like when you have a beautiful dream and wake up to the real world and realize that it was all an illusion. The reality for all of us was that the parties and festivities were over, the good food was gone, and we were back to being gypsies, the drudges of humanity as the Archdeacon Claude Frollo so often referred to us as.

It was an unusually warm day that day however, especially for December in France. All the birds were out singing, and even the alley cats and street dogs came out to bask in the sun. The sun baked a Golden brown glow on Notre Dame, which usually appeared to be a stone gray color on cloudy days. Either way, the cathedral always towered majestically over the city.

Marcel and Henri and I were lazily strumming Spanish guitars and clacking castanets together as Jasmine, Heidi, Esmeralda and several other gypsy girls danced while tapping on tambourines. Normally, Anisa would be there as well, but being pregnant as she was prevented her from that type of physical work.

Everyone so often people would drop a few gold coins in the hat that Esmeralda had set on the cobblestones and Djali would chase off anyone who tried to take it. Wolfen snoozed in the sun by our feet. Everyone just felt tired and lazy, and so did all the other people it seemed.

Suddenly the sound of clopping hooves on cobblestones was heard around the corner of the street. There were often small donkeys and horses pulling carts for farmers, but this sounded like more than one horse, it seemed like quite a lot actually.

"What is it?" Heidi asked sleepily, though I could tell that the horses had caught her attention.

To answer her question, a large group of men carrying swords and shields and heavily clad in armor riding steeds appeared around the corner. Soldiers! Immediately I heard the sighs of Jasmine and all the other gypsy girls as they slowly clopped past us. Even Esmeralda, who was recently married sighed. I just rolled my eyes.

"Good day ladies," one of the soldiers said to them all as he took off his helmit and nodded to Esmeralda and Jasmine. "Bonjour!" he said as he demounted his horse and kissed Esmeralda on the finger. She giggled nervously. Then he turned to us to be polite and said "Greetings to you too," acknowledging Marcel and Henri and I were there with the guitars. Then he turned his attention back to the girls. He had blond hair like straw, and blue eyes. Jasmine and Esmeralda both giggled in a strangely annoyingly flirty way. I exchanged a glance with Marcel and we both rolled our eyes. I didn't understand what was so great about soldiers. Then again, I wasn't a girl.

"So, what may I ask are such lovely ladies as yourselves doing on such a fine day?" he asked.

I couldn't believe the way he was talking to them. It was disgusting. He sounded like an oily eel.

"What is a man of your status doing talking to gypsies such as ourselves," Esmeralda asked. "After all, we are the drudges of society."

"Oh, pish posh," the soldier said smiling. "That Archdeacon of ours has been messing with the people's heads again. I'll have a word with him about that."

Esmeralda giggled at that. I had never seen her so giddy. I was used to her being calm and composed, but now she was acting like a jellyfish washed up on the beach. So was Jasmine.

"What may I ask is your name, soldier?" Esmeralda asked the man.

The soldier paused, as if he wasn't accustomed to being asked such a question, by a gypsy or not. Then he answered, "my name is Phoebus. It means…uh…you're going to get a kick out of this, it means…Sun God."

Esmeralda burst out laughing. "Sun God? I love it!"

Phoebus smiled. "And who may ask, are you?"

"Esmeralda," Esmeralda replied, smiling.

"Esmeralda?" Phoebus repeated. "It's beautiful. What language is it?"

Esmeralda shrugged. "I've been told it's Egyptian, but I'm from Spain, so who knows."

"Well, Esmeralda, I have a feeling that we'll be seeing each other very soon," Phoebus said. "Good to meet you, and goodbye for now." With that, he gathered up his men, and they galloped away down the street.

"Phoebus," Esmeralda said sighing. "Phoebus, Phoebus, Phoebus," she repeated the name to herself. "What I would do for a man like that."

I couldn't believe it! I was rolling my eyes even harder now.

"Esmeralda, you can't possibly fall in love with that slob, you're already married," I reminded her.

Esmeralda just glanced over in my direction and gave me a strange look I'd never seen before. It was a mix of a withering glare, and a look that I was hopeless.

"The man I'm married to is a slob," she retorted. "And Phoebus is a gentleman."

"Oh yes he is," all the other girls including Jasmine and Heidi agreed.

"Ok, whatever, I guess I know nothing," I mumbled to myself as we gathered up the guitars and tambourines and headed back to the Court of Miracles.

"Don't take it too hard," Marcel told me as we walked past. "Esmeralda has far too much class to ever cheat on her husband, even if she doesn't particularly love him all that much. And think of what Claude Frollo would do if he caught Esmeralda committing adultery. It wouldn't be pretty."

"Speak of the devil," I whispered as we were walking. Sure enough, the archdeacon of Paris was walking towards us right now. He made it evident that he didn't want to touch us, by the way he took a long path to walk around us. He gave his little signature sniff of contempt as he walked past, but I noticed that there was an unusual gleam in his cold beady eyes.

"Marcel, look," I whispered, nudging him in the ribs.

"What?"

"Look!"

Frollo's eyes were glued to Esmeralda.

"Oh, no, you're not thinking," Marcel began.

"That's exactly what I'm thinking," I replied. "Look at him!"

It was obvious that the archdeacon was lusting over Esmeralda.

"But that can't even be possible!" Marcel objected. "Clergy members are forbidden to have any sort of romantic ties with anybody. They give an oath of chastity when they are sworn in."

"Damn chastity!" I almost shouted. "It's completely obvious! Didn't you see the way he was looking at her!?"

"All I'm saying," Marcel replied, "is that we shouldn't jump to any sort of conclusions."

"You say that now," I muttered.

"Do you even think for a minute that Esmeralda would ever have anything to do with that creepy man?" Marcel asked.

"I'm not worried about that," I assured him. "I'm worried about what Frollo might do to get what he wants. He has unbelievable power. Just think about what he can do! It's rather scary if you think about it."

"Forget it," Marcel interrupted me. "It's impossible. There's no way that what you think is going to happen is going to happen. Ok, it just won't"

I sighed. But I couldn't force Frollo's creepy look out of my mind. I knew that Esmeralda was a strong individual and that I probably had no business worrying about these things, but I just couldn't help the horrible feeling I had in my mind. Something bad was just waiting to happen and Frollo and Phoebus were part of it.

I hope you enjoyed. If you are confused about why Phoebus seems so out of check, it's because I'm basing this story more off the book than the movie and in the book, Phoebus isn't such a great dude. Most of the interactions from here out between Esmeralda, Phoebus and Frollo are actually in the book, but trust me that this story is going somewhere and it will eventually tie in with the prologue. Once again thanks to Opaque Opal and disneyqueen and please review!