His mother's voice, soft in his ear, singing an old Swedish lullaby she sang him when he was very small, when he was ill, when he had nightmares. Her soft voice, her fingers lightly brushing his cheek. She has always been so pretty, his mother. So pretty and so gentle and her voice is the prettiest of all.
He is too tired to open his eyes to see her, his eyes too sore and scratchy, but he turns his head just a little, for to hear her better, and her lips are gentle on his forehead.
"Just sleep, darling," she whispers. "Just sleep."
Shaking, shaking, the whole world shaking beneath him. An earthquake? They don't get earthquakes here, not usually. There was one in Rome, once, and all the buildings shook, and he lay on the floor with Antoine's pale face over him, Antoine shielding him from falling trinkets and books. And if he were able to move, if he were able to move he would roll over and shield Antoine because he could not have it if Antoine got injured protecting him, but the weight of Antoine's body was too heavy and his breaths were coming in short little gasps, those brown eyes boring into his, and all he could do was stare, stare until the shaking stopped.
Antoine's lips were soft when they met his, and he slipped his tongue between them without a moment's hesitation.
"Tell us a story, Waoul!" Guillaume claps his hands, his dark curls bouncing, and Antoine chimes in with "Yeah!". No! Raoul tells terrible stories. It's Nadir that tells the best stories, don't the twins know that by now? Nadir has all the stories about his homeland and Papa and travelling and the opera, and sometimes they're a little bit scary but he always makes them funny. Raoul's stories are boring, and he always looks like he's trying to figure out what to say but he can't tell him that because Raoul might get upset, and he doesn't want to upset Raoul because Raoul is always nice and brings him little sweet things that Mamma would not let him have.
Raoul laughs and leans forward in his chair, his fingers pressed together so that they look like a church steeple, or a tower. It was Darius that told him the story about the princess in a tower, but it wasn't as exciting as Nadir would tell it, or as boring as Raoul would.
"What sort of story?" Raoul asks, a faint smile twitching at the corners of his lips.
"A story when you were little!"
Raoul's eyes sparkle, the same glow that Mamma gets sometimes when she tells him the stories her Papa told her, about trolls and goblins and ghosts. He's always wanted to see a ghost. Sometimes he thinks his Papa might be one, creeping around the opera and watching Mamma sing, but when he asked Mamma if Papa is a ghost now she got that sad look and said a soft, "No" and he never asked her again but that doesn't keep him from wondering.
It might be nice if Papa were a ghost.
Fingers, fumbling at his throat. Gentle fingers that he knows. Those fingers have been wrapped around his own, have carded through his hair. He would know the touch of them anywhere, their softness beneath the calluses.
Fingers, and a sigh.
"Konstin." Pain throbbing through him as a hand shakes his shoulder, jarring his ribs. He gasps, his heart pounding with the grinding of his ribs. "Konstin." His very name sounds urgent, sounds like an emergency.
A whimper is all he can muster, too weak to open his eyes, but he knows that voice, he knows it. He would recognise it anywhere, underwater or in the desert or in the mountains or anywhere. (He has recognised it, in each place and more.)
Antoine. Antoine is here. Antoine has found him. Dear, sweet, beautiful Antoine. Tears sting his eyes just at knowing he is here.
"Oh, Konstin."
Oh, Antoine, he longs to reply, lips tingling to kiss him, arms aching to hold him close. And he would kiss him, he would, but he can't because they'll see. Those others will see and they'll know, and he and Antoine will be locked up and never able to see each other again, and he'll die, he'll die if he can't see Antoine, he'll die.
"An.." he gasps, the closest he can get to his name, and Antoine's fingers curl around his own, a hand smoothing back his hair.
"I'm here, Konstin." The voice is a hoarse whisper, Antoine's but not Antoine's when it's beautiful. Antoine's when it's stressed, when he's worried. Surely Antoine isn't worried over Konstin. It would be foolish of him to worry…so much else to worry about… "I'm here and I'm going to…I promise, and…to be fine."
It's all just a jumble of words, more than he has the strength to work out. Words and words but none of them matter, not really. Not when Antoine is here beside him. You've found me. I knew you would find me. The thought clings to him, begs to be spoken, but his lips are too stiff and numb.
"An…toine." The broken name is all he can manage, as if it were a prayer, as if it will keep Antoine from disappearing from him.
"Ssshhh." A hand stroking his hair, so gentle. "…don't say a word…You're safe now."
I know I'm safe. I just want you to know. And it hurts so terribly.
The pain is coming back now, creeping in, eating at his arm, at his chest, at his leg. The pain will eat him and he'll die and Antoine won't be able to bring him back. The pain will eat Antoine too, destroy him, and Antoine can't know pain, he can't, he isn't allowed to, it's not right, he's supposed to be free of all that, supposed to—
He needs to warn him.
"Hu…urts." His lips are too stiff, too stiff damn them.
"I know it does…I promise…they'll fix you up."
If you're not careful they'll need to fix you up too.
But before he can say it, before he can gasp a single warning, Antoine is lifting him and the pain is burning through his chest and he can't breathe he can't breathe he can't breathe, tears prickling his eyes and lungs gasping can't breathe can't—
"…sorry, Konstin…"
And before he can attempt to draw breath to cry out, he's gone.
The watch is heavy in his hand. His father's watch. Mamma gave to him, before he and Antoine started their journey, and he weighs it now in his hand. A gold watch, and a thick chain. Nadir told him once that he took it off Er—off Pap—off his father in a moment of impulse before they buried him, thinking that Mamma might like to have it to hold onto, for the memories. Something of his father's to always have. It was a lovely thought, he must admit. And it is a lovely watch. But though it's been weeks since Mamma pressed it into his hand he still can't get used to carrying it.
His own watch is much lighter, not that the weight of this watch is the problem. It's more that he keeps taking it out to look at it, to hold it and wonder. How often did his father do the same? Take the watch out and flick the case open to check the time? There is a miniature little sketch of Mamma tucked inside, and she does not look much older than he is now, her face uncreased and hair wavy long.
His fingers hover over the sketch, almost of their own accord. His father touched this paper once, held the lead that made the sketch. He's always known that his father was something of an artist. Mamma has always said that that's where he got it from, all his sketchbooks full of drawings. But it's strange to see one of his sketches tucked carefully into the watch case, to really know that he touched this once, too.
A tear trickles down his cheek and lands on the watch face, but his throat is too tight to cry.
Carried. Someone is carrying him, someone whose back is warm beneath his aching chest, whose neck is soft beneath his lips. Someone…his mother, is it? Carrying him beneath the opera to visit his father? She used to do that all the time, and small boy that he was he would sit and talk for hours to a grave never realising that his father couldn't hear him, and then he got too old for such fantasies and would go alone to sit in silence, as if the darkness down there might soothe the pain twisting in his heart.
Carrying him… Is it Darius? After scooping him out of somewhere he shouldn't have been? Poor old Darius. Darius would make him tea and tuck him into bed and there would be no aching in his chest, and Darius would pretend not to be worried, pretend not to hover, always finding something to tug at and fix, but Darius always worried.
Konstin's eye flickers open, his right one, the left sealed shut with blood. It is not his mother carrying him. Not Darius, either, but someone in uniform, with a helmet. Uniform. A helmet. Blonde hair creeping out beneath…Antoine. Antoine? Antoine shouldn't be carrying him, he's too tall. He should be carrying Antoine. That's the way it always is, always… The way it's supposed to be.
His vision is hazy, and the fog is pressing in like it was so long ago as he lay beneath it, and there is someone walking in front of them, leading them, someone tall and dressed in black but he is too tired to focus and too numb to wonder who it is, and his eye slips shut again, the gentle rhythm of Antoine walking easing him back to sleep.
His cousin. But he isn't his cousin, not really. He is his step-cousin, more technically, just like Raoul is not his father but his stepfather. But people never really refer to their step-cousins, so he doesn't bother and settles for calling him his cousin. He gave up qualifying it for them years ago.
But though Guillaume and Marguerite are his step-cousins-slash-cousins too, Antoine is so much more than that. Antoine has always been so much more than that.
Voices. Flustered voices. "Commandant de Chagny!" and "Commandant Daaé!" gasped. Arms taking him, lowering him down, fingers fumbling at the buttons of his uniform, whispers of "careful with him" and "shrapnel…gravely wounded."
He hears the shot before the cry goes up. A distant crack and a soft pfft as the bullet finds flesh and he is being lowered to the ground, the hands leaving him, disappearing.
And faintly, faintly in a voice hoarse and strained he hears "Look to Daaé." Look to Daaé—but that voice never calls him Daaé, always Konstin. Only, only Konstin.
The world is swimming back into view, blackened pale faces that he doesn't recognise stark against the fog, one of them whispering, "bullet entered just beneath the ribs" and gasped whimpers from, from somewhere, from his left, from the voice that called him Daaé that never calls him Daaé.
His eyes roll, and through the press of gathered bodies he sees Antoine's pale face, staring at him, scarlet blood trailing from the corner of his mouth and chest heaving to gasp each breath.
Not Antoine! It can't be Antoine! It's not allowed to be Antoine it's not he won't let it he won't he can't not Antoine. Not—
Tears burn Konstin's eyes and his vision dims, but this time he fights it. Damn the darkness! Damn the pain! Damn his leg and damn his ribs and damn his eye and damn the tears! He has to stay awake, he has to. Antoine is wounded and he needs to go to him, needs to—needs to be there—needs to hold his hand and promise him he'll be all right and—and swear he loves him and damn all those fools listening damn them! He needs to get to Antoine needs to—
"Easy, sir, easy." The hands pin him down, stronger than he is able for, the world greying. They don't understand, they don't—
His heart stutters, falters, pain blooming deep inside and he gasps, chokes. And when the darkness takes him, the streak of blood from Antoine's mouth follows him.
"Promise me you'll be safe." His voice is hoarse, his throat aching tight, but the tears on his cheeks are not his own. They are Antoine's, brushed against him. "Promise me." He is aware that he sounds desperate, but he needs to hear it, needs to know.
"You know I can't, Konstin." Antoine's voice is hoarse, too, hoarser than his own. "You know that." He presses closer, so that his lips are right against Konstin's ear and the warmth of his breath stirs the hairs on the back of his neck. "If—if I could promise you that, I would make you promise me the same."
Konstin gasps, one of his own hot tears rolling to join Antoine's on his cheek. "I'll try," he whispers. "I promise I'll try to be."
"And I promise the same. I promise."
A/N: This week's bonus chapter ended up longer than expected, but please do let me know what you think! And thank you for all your lovely reviews so far!
Up next week: Marguerite at the hospital