Thank you to my CP Nine Bright Shiners for all her notes and suggestions for this story. Do go and read her beautiful, yearning Fresme story, Forgive Me, in the book section for The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

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Esmeralda dropped to her knees in the confessional and clasped her hands together. 'Father, is that you?' she whispered, peering through the metal grille. A figure in black was sitting on the other side, two long fingers pressed against his temple, head bent. As she spoke, the figure raised his head, and she saw dark, winged brows. It was the archdeacon.

'My child,' came the quick reply. 'You did as I bid you last night?'

The priest had counselled her for nearly two hours the previous day, drawing shameful confessions from her lips. He'd wanted to know everything: where Phoebus looked at her; if he'd ever touched her; what thoughts she had of him as she bathed; as she lay in bed.

How tight and angry the priest's voice had grown when she told him that just last week Phoebus had plied her with wine and tried to snatch the neckerchief from around her shoulders to expose the top of her breasts.

'Curse him, the devil!' the archdeacon had exclaimed, his head rearing up. 'He did not succeed in this endeavour? He did not touch you or the neckerchief? Speak!'

Esmeralda had assured him that Phoebus had not touched her and she had not touched the wine. She had regarded him for a moment, wondering that a priest should speak in so passionate a manner about a neckerchief. But, then, what did she know about the ways of priests?

'I did, I stayed at home and I thought about the Virgin Mary, just as you told me. At the hour I was to meet Phoebus I prayed even more, and my feet didn't stir over the threshold.'

It had been hard, though, thinking about the gallant captain and how handsome he looked in his armour, mounted on his horse. That he should notice her, a gypsy, in the first place! She was so used to being ignored by anyone of stature that she'd imagined a pretty fantasy: that he loved her, not another. But it was a fantasy. Would a true gallant make her snatch at the crumbs of his affections, and save the feast for another? In the coldness of her empty room she'd faced a hard truth: she was contemptible in his eyes, and unworthy of his love.

The archdeacon breathed out long and slow through his nostrils. 'Good. That is good. You have done well.'

Esmeralda chewed her lip a moment. 'I … did think about him, though.'

The priest's head turned toward her, his black eyes glittering in the darkness. 'Thoughts are just as sinful as deeds in God's eyes. Tell me about these thoughts at once.'

Her heart caught in her throat as he looked at her. 'Please don't be angry with me, Father.'

There seemed to be a great struggle going on behind the archdeacon's eyes, though she could not discern its meaning.

'I am not angry,' the priest said after a moment, only just audible but in words as hard and cold as granite. 'With you,' he added. 'I am not angry with you. Your generous heart has been taken advantage of. Your innocence has been ill-used.'

Esmeralda's eyes filled with tears. He did not think her unworthy! He thought her ill-used. How good he was. But then, it must be easy to be good when one was not plagued by desire. 'I wish I was like you, Father. So holy that I never suffered an impure thought.'

There came the sound of a strangled cough from the other side of the confessional. 'Yes. Just so. Now tell me about these thoughts.'

She could barely speak above a whisper. 'I thought about how he watches me dance. He sometimes lingers in the square outside, and I feel his eyes on me. I am certain that my dance is twice as joyous, three times as graceful, when he is there.'

'You like this man to watch you?'

'Yes, Father.'

'Are his eyes, then, so important to you? Would no one else's eyes make you as joyful?'

Esmeralda considered this. 'They are perhaps not so important,' she admitted. 'It is the admiration, not he, that makes my steps and my heart so light.' She bit her lip. 'I suppose that is very vain.' Vanity was a sin, wasn't it? She couldn't remember. 'Is there a prayer to help with van –'

'What if I were to watch you dance?' he interrupted.

She stared at him. 'You, Father?'

'For your sake. So that you wouldn't crave less worthy eyes.'

He was watching her now, his eyes bright and alert. They were eyes that missed nothing. Esmeralda found that she couldn't speak. Watch her dance? Was that not a little … unseemly for a priest?

Then she scolded herself. He was a man of God. There could be nothing lascivious in his gaze.

'You do not answer,' he said, and he turned his face away. Bitter reproach had entered his voice. 'You do not wish me to watch you, sallow and severe as I am, so unlike the fair-faced, golden Phoebus.' He sneered the name.

She pressed her hands against the grille. 'No, no,' she protested. 'It is not that.'

The priest's temple pulsed as he clenched his jaw. She had gravely upset him, this man who had been so kind to her.

A man, she thought for the first time, for all that he is a priest. He is not carved from stone, but flesh and blood like any other. Despite that black cloth. Despite his vows. For some reason this new consideration made her heart beat a little faster.

'Yes, you are sallow and severe, Father,' she said. 'But you do not gaze upon me with any less attentiveness than Phoebus. If anything, you are more attentive, for your eyes never wander from my face when I speak to you, as if you were thinking of other things.'

'But?' he said, his voice still thick with hurt.

'But, should the Archdeacon of Notre Dame watch a dancing gypsy in the street?'

The heavy brows drew together as he considered her words. 'You are right,' he murmured. 'It would not be seemly to stand always in the square. But I might sometimes,' he said, this last part almost to himself. He looked at her once more. 'I am oftentimes in my study, in the tower high above the square. I spend long hours in mediation at the window, looking at the city. I will watch you from there.'

'You would do this for me?'

'I shall. You may not see me but you can know that I am always watching you.'

She trailed a finger down the grille, looking at him with wonder. His eyes followed the path of that finger, his lower lip softening. 'As God is always watching us,' she asked, 'and knows our secret hearts?'

He looked down at her with an expression more tender than she had ever seen on his face. 'Just so, my child. Now, repeat to me the words of the prayer I taught you yesterday.'

She fixed her eyes on a point above his head, thought for a moment, and began. 'Hail Mary, full of grace. Blessed art thou amongst women …'

...

That afternoon, Esmeralda rolled out the Persian rug that she was wont to dance on, and rattled her tambourine high in the air. A little crowd gathered, and she began to move, turning swiftly, her hips swaying, her steps light and fast. At the crescendo of the dance she lifted her head, elongating her swan-like neck, and gazed up at the dark grey towers of Notre Dame. At a high window she saw the silhouette of a man leaning out, looking down into the square. She could just make out his hands pressed against the stone sill and the priestly square of white at his throat. His eyes were dark smudges in his face, but she could feel them drinking her in, bestowing their blessing, and she, with a heart lighter than it had been in weeks, danced on.

...

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