Chapter 7:
Her first sight of the Cathedral from the inside took Esmeralda's breath away.
Whenever she'd stood outside it, she had tried to imagine what it would look like, and she was struck by the similarities she saw to the Court of Miracles. Both this Cathedral and the Court were festooned with brilliant colors, and buzzing with life… even if the stained glass windows were in place of the multicolored tents and the cloth which had been hung up to disguise the fact that they were in the catacombs.
Really, for all the similarities she could see, she could also see the stark contrast: namely that Notre Dame was the sanctified version of the safe place her family lived in. It was said that someone could claim sanctuary here… in the Court you had to look a certain way or you were hanged on sight…
Meanwhile, this was the true Court reigned over by God, the king of everything… and it was where real miracles might even be performed… The further she moved into the Cathedral, with her eyes wide open, she began to feel God's presence. Of course, the church had been constructed this way… God would want to have a beautiful house…
If there were a place she could find God, would it not be in a place like this? On that point, why was she allowed in? Possibly because nobody had noticed her, yet…
Her thoughts are interrupted by a footstep behind her in the otherwise empty entrance to the Cathedral, and her eyes slid to their corners to see who it might be.
There stood the Captain, the one she'd thought she could trust, but who had attempted to arrest her, anyway. One of his arms was outstretched towards her, and she snarled at his sickening ability to sneak up on her. It would not go unpunished!
In one smooth motion she turned and gripped the hilt of his sword, and while he was surprised, she gripped his cloak and yanked him off his feet.
"You…" she snarled, angling his sword right at his throat.
"Easy, easy, I-I just shaved this morning…" he said as he crawled backward with his eyes fixed on the blade.
"Oh really?" she tapped the sword against the patch of hair clinging to his chin. "You missed a spot!"
"Just give me a chance to apologize," he said, leaning against a column with his hands up in surrender.
"For what?" she growled.
Before Esmeralda could even guess what he would do next, he had kicked her legs out from under her and reclaimed his sword. "That, for example," he said with a cocky smirk spreading across his face.
From the tiled floor, Esmeralda still gave him a challenging snarl. "You sneaky son of a —"
"Ah, ah, ah! Watch it: you're in a church," he said, his eyes darting from one side to the other as if someone were about to come out of nowhere and scold them… did God do that in churches?
She got to her feet and casually grabbed a candelabrum as she returned his smarmy tone. "Are you always this charming, or am I just lucky?" she asked, and then swung the candelabrum at him before he could see any sign of her continued aggression.
All the man did was laugh at her and block the candelabrum with his sword, dancing back from her as he said, "Candlelight! Music! Couldn't think of a better place for hand-to-hand combat!"
He was so irritating! Esmeralda kept striking at him, but all he did was dance out of her path and continue to mock her.
"You fight almost as well as a man!" he told her with a look that made him appear genuinely impressed.
"Funny!" she slammed the bar of the candelabrum against the sword he raised half-heartedly to deflect her. "I was about to say the same thing about you!" she growled, and since he was only blocking with half his strength, or so she guessed, she pushed with all her might.
"That's hitting a little below the belt, don't you think?" he asked, not having been moved nearly as much off-balance as she'd wanted him to be.
"No," she smirked, angling her makeshift weapon between his legs, "this is!"
Predictably, he was able to block her assault between his legs, but he had been unable to predict that she would also assault his face with the foot of the candelabrum.
He shook himself, and she could see a line of blood trail down his lip where her strike had split it. Still, he smiled in spite of the injury, and his eyes lit up. "Touché!" he grinned, and it was then Djali chose to ram him in the gut. He bent double, and then looked up at her. "I didn't know you had a kid," he told her, unflappably playing the buffoon, even if it were only in the tone of his voice.
"Well, he doesn't take kindly to soldiers," Esmeralda sneered at him, bent over her makeshift weapon as she backed slowly away from him.
"Uh… I noticed!" he still managed to smile somehow. "Permit me, I'm Phoebus. It means… Sun God," he kept smirking, but she could still see that he was being playful and even making fun of himself.
Still, she shared a skeptical glance with Djali, who seemed even more skeptical than she was.
"And… you are…?" he asked the leading question with a friendly tone she didn't trust for a moment.
"Is this an interrogation?" she demanded, raising a brow at his still-drawn sword, waiting for him to strike while she was distracted.
Instead, he sheathed his sword. "It's called an introduction."
"You're not arresting me?" she asked, trying to square that idea with the way he'd nearly arrested her when they were still in the square. Hadn't he come in here to fetch her for Frollo?
"Not as long as you're in here," he gestured to the Cathedral surrounding them, "I can't."
She paused, wondering when the last time she'd heard a soldier say he couldn't arrest someone had been. "You're not at all like the other soldiers," she admitted, setting aside the candelabrum.
"Thank you," he said cordially, still giving her his perpetual smile.
Well, that was another enigma for her: why would he be proud of being different?
She folded her arms defensively, but still took another step closer to him, even if she was still suspicious of him. "So… if you're not going to arrest me… what do you want?" she asked.
"I'd settle for your name," he said.
That was actually it? She didn't even have to get the dagger off her leg again? Slowly, an unstoppable smile took over her lips and stretched them wide. "Esmeralda," she replied.
"Beautiful… well, much better than Phoebus, anyway," he chuckled, and took a step closer to her.
She stared into his eyes, and for the first time saw a man standing there, not a suit of armor. His eyes were full of such kindness, behind the cocky wit. His nose was slightly curved, and his hair… it was like a halo of sunshine… She was moving closer to him, and didn't bother to stop.
She knew this man would not betray her, again. Now they were… friends… or something approaching it…
"Phoebus…" she whispered to him, and could not hide the hint of reverence which crept into how she spoke the name.
She could see the light flicker in his eyes, waiting for the end of a sentence that would never form.
The doors to the church flew open with a bang, and Frollo's voice echoed through the chamber, saying, "Good work, Captain! Now, arrest her!"
Esmeralda's heart froze, and her mind reeled with shame.
"Claim sanctuary…" Phoebus whispered to her. "Say it!"
She swallowed her anger, and thought instead of how he'd given her good advice. "I claim sanctuary!" she snarled, and her balled her hands into fists.
"I'm sorry, Sir," Phoebus said, folding his hands behind his back. "There's nothing I can do."
Frollo stalked closer, pointing at the door. "Then drag her outside, and—"
"Frollo! You will not touch her!" an older man's voice shouted from behind Esmeralda. That same old man's hand was quickly on her shoulder as he said, "Don't worry. Minister Frollo learned years ago to respect the sanctity of the church!" He gave Frollo a glare that made Esmeralda wonder what the subtext behind that comment might be, even as her heart fluttered madly with the knowledge that she was so close to someone who would gladly drag her to the Palace of Justice to be tormented to death.
Frollo's features contorted in a look of such tooth-gnashing rage she thought he might begin to foam at the mouth and charge her. Instead, Frollo sneered down his lengthy nose at the Archdeacon, and motioned for his soldiers to depart from the church. "If you do any more than the bare minimum, you will be aiding and abetting a fugitive," he said, and Esmeralda could hear the edge of smug pleasure in his saying it. "If you are found guilty, you will be stripped of your authority, with the full measure of the law. But of course, you knew that, did you not?"
Esmeralda's eyes darted between Frollo and the Archdeacon, and her knees began to shake. What had she just agreed to? Was she actually safe?
"I know that very well, Frollo, thank you for reminding me," the Archdeacon said. "Now, please allow me to return to my regular duties."
Frollo gritted his teeth, and gestured for his men to leave, after which he also turned to go.
The Archdeacon looped his arm through Phoebus's, and though it was clear the man would have preferred to stay, and his eyes did not leave Esmeralda's face, he did not fight the Archdeacon.
Still, his movements were much too halting for Djali's liking, and the little goat "guided" him along with a few horn strikes to his backside.
As happy as she was to be rid of Frollo, Esmeralda couldn't help but be a little disappointed that the Captain also had to go. They'd just been getting acquainted, after all!
There was little time to reflect on the disappointment, and wonder what may have happened had they gone uninterrupted, for someone seized her arm from behind and twisted it against her back.
That same man pressed himself close to her back, and she knew without a doubt to whom that lean, bony frame belonged, even before he spoke. Ordinary people were warm, up close, but he was colder than stone.
"You think you've outwitted me," he whispered, "but I am a patient man, and gypsies don't do well inside stone walls!" he growled into her ear, and she envisioned what he had done to her people in that stone "palace" of his.
While she attempted to jerk herself free, Frollo began to sniff at her hair.
"What are you doing?" she demanded, as she shivered with disgust.
"I was just imagining a rope around that beautiful neck…" his hand went around her neck and sent a jolt of fresh revulsion through Esmeralda, who jabbed her elbow under his ribs so she could finally escape the filth of his invading presence.
"I know what you were imagining!" she snarled. She had always known he was evil, but this was a new low. "Archdeacon! Help!" she called.
Some of the Parisians who had been praying in other parts of the church ventured to the front to see what was happening.
It was apparently possible for Frollo to turn even paler, since that was what happened when he realized there were witnesses. He collected himself quickly, however. "This is a clever witch," he told the others. "She twists words to cloud weak minds with unholy thoughts, but I am invulnerable to her trickery!"
"If you aren't having ugly thoughts, then how would you know a thing like that?" Esmeralda asked.
Though she'd hoped that the Parisians would back her up, they appeared too afraid to confront the judge for her.
"Well, no matter," Frollo had now collected himself and folded his hands. "You've chosen a prison, but it is a prison, nonetheless. Step one foot outside and you're mine!" he said, before slamming the door behind himself.
"None of us are trapped in here with you, are we?" an old woman in a velvet gown asked, and others ran to check all the other doors.
The lamentations of those who had realized that it was true, and every door was guarded rose up and filled the church with a din of panic.
That was until the Archdeacon reentered with his hands raised. "Gentle parishioners!" he called over the din, "You are all free to come and go as you please! Frollo and his men are only here to ensure our dancing friend here stays out of trouble! None of you will be accosted if you wish to leave now, but I shall be performing a special mass to help us all recover from today's trying events."
Now the Parisians were appeased, and so they filed back into the pews, though the Archdeacon spared a moment to give Esmeralda a sympathetic look, and say, "Don't act rashly, dear child. You created quite a stir at the festival… it would be unwise to arouse Frollo's anger further."
She pursed her lips, "You saw what happened out there, didn't you? You saw how the crowd was torturing that poor boy?" with her eyes widening she looked to the Archdeacon for support. "I thought if just one person would stand up to him, then, well—" he sighed, seeing that the Archdeacon was giving her a kind-eyed look, but he still wore a smile. He understood, but it wasn't enough… "What do they have against people who are different, anyway?" she asked him.
"You cannot right all the wrongs in this world by yourself," he told her, placing a gentle hand on her back and guiding her further into the church.
"Nobody out there's going to help, that's for sure," she grumbled.
"Well," he said gently before he left to conduct the service, "perhaps there's someone in here who can."
Esmeralda stood frozen when he was gone, her muscles tense as she worried that with him gone, Frollo would sneak up on her once more. Instead, she proceeded further into the church, thinking that perhaps she would find someone to help her… but that was not what the Archdeacon had meant.
In a nearby chapel off the nave, Esmeralda found a statue of Mary holding the baby Jesus. She'd never seen one so close before. She tried to remember the details of the story as she gazed upon their serene faces.
Mary had been born a poor girl far away in the Holy Land, and one day God told her that he'd picked her to be the mother of Jesus. Esmeralda knew well enough what an unmarried woman with a baby would go through in France, let alone among her own people. The Holy Land would probably not be any different. She couldn't help but smile at the thought that God hadn't chosen a princess to bring his son into the world, but an ordinary peasant girl.
Even though now Mary and her son, God himself, were in Heaven, surely they had to remember what it had been like to live on Earth. Both Mary and her son had been poor and mistreated.
Thus, with the hope that they would understand her need for help, she offered God and any of his family members who may be listening in a hesitant prayer. Assuming they had time for someone like her.
She moved on from that statue after a short while as she heard the mass continue. As comforting as the very human image of a mother and child was, it undermined the image she had in her mind of the powerful father of all humanity.
She could not understand the words she heard, but everything still sounded beautiful.
As long as God wasn't distracted by the mass and still had time to listen to her, this was her one chance to petition Him on behalf of her people.
Thus she looked into the eyes of a stained glass portrayal of Jesus, hoping to see a sign of kindness there. It was in so doing that she finally felt the presence of God all around her. She'd known she'd find Him if she just kept searching! At last, she did make one request on her own behalf.
Silently, she stood in the light of the rose window, and asked if she could be called the child of God, and if one day Jesus would take her to Heaven, whether or not she deserved that gift.
In the wake of her prayer, she was overwhelmed with a sense of peace. Even though she knew the world would not change and become more pleasant and accommodating, she still knew that there was something brighter filling her heart that could defeat any shadow that threatened to consume her.
The moment of peace was utterly shattered by a man shouting at the bell ringer, demanding to know why he dared to be in the presence of those attending the church service after the trouble he'd caused.
As Esmeralda turned she saw how frightened the young man was, how he fumbled around after he'd been caught in everyone's midst.
"Wait!" she called after him as he began to hurry up the stairs. "I want to talk to you!"
Her voice echoed back at her as she called up the staircase after him. However, he gave her no response.
She'd just have to catch him.