Chapter Text
Paris, one year ago
It had been Christine’s idea for the costume, the Red Death. It was she who introduced him to the American writer and his short stories and poems, which she loved in their French translation. These were quite different from what Erik knew of American writers, his prior experience being what he had found in the archbishop’s study. These had been nonfiction works, heavily polemic, on matters of human rights and justice. Yet, he had only a vague notion of where this place was, what sort of people they were, or if there was a distinction from the lands of pyramids and Tenochtitlan, and whatever New England meant. The last book he read was of a territory, the writings of the one-armed man, who chronicled his traverse of the Colorado River. He knew now of the river’s rapids, its geology, its canyon chain. He did not, however, know where it was or what country laid claim to it, and now he was not certain of its relationship to the morbid author that Christine loved.
But Christine loved it, as she loved all fantastical and magical things, especially those that tilted into darkness. She often assumed he knew these works himself, and he would always ask her to share them. He did not say that the books he liked best were not stories. He thought she might consider him more romantically inclined than he was. She loved Mary Shelley and Ann Radcliffe, Poe and the sisters Brontë. He loved Nasir al-Din al-Tusi and Ibn Mu'adh al-Jayyani, because it was enjoyable to conduct calculations on curves and spheres, equations that might be mapped onto space, to create an arc or determine the trajectory of flight.
Yet, just as he had loved the adventure stories of Jules Verne because M. Galet loved them, he loved Christine’s stories because she loved them. He found the symbolism, the use of irony, and the way the tales were structured, to be fascinating. He had surprised Christine with the ability to read them untranslated in English, and he liked the process of how the poems changed in translation. Poems, like music, like arcs and parabolas, were maths. Maths were the language of the universe.
And, since by now Christine knew all of his passages and secret rooms, and had become comfortable even in the hidden house across the lake, they had taken up an odd routine. She had left many of her things in the little house, and renamed many of the places. He had already called the lake Avernus, which was due to an idea he had regarding an opera about Don Juan or Giovanni in hell. However, she had said it was more like Styx. Yet, she rejected any underworld names for his home and called the little house, Hvergelmir. She had given him the Eddas to explain this, and when playful had called him, Ratatoskr, the squirrel. These names seemed to come to her easily, and she always named what she saw in the world.
His home was like a squirrel’s nest, she said, so full of strange and wonderful things. He had built or obtained many instruments, his clockwork creations, old stage props he found beautiful or interesting, books, drawings, anything that may create or refract light, and hundreds of half-finished projects. He loved the process of making and creating, though not necessarily finishing or presenting anything. The effect was of being in some kind of hoard, collected as by a dragon in the belly of a mountain, or the objects Alice encountered falling down the rabbit hole. This, too, was an introduction Christine made, though he found he liked these stories because they were also filled with maths.
They had made a little pile of blankets and cushions on the floor, and lay almost back-to-back, though a little separated as he did not yet feel he could trust himself with closeness. The items functioned much as the wall and the mirror had. Yet, as Christine had felt one of her dizzy spells come on earlier that day, she lay with her feet elevated on a bookshelf. He had mirrored this, and the two created an odd, inverted shape, like an asymmetrical W. He was working on the lettering of the Red Death costume and she read aloud from The Works of the Late Edgar Allan Poe, vol. I, somewhere in the middle of “The Fall of the House of Usher”. She had remarked earlier that this arrangement reminded her of girlhood, of staying up with a childhood friend as they created costumes for plays and told one another stories. Only, she had said, she was surprised that he knew needlepoint.
“I just like making things,” he had said.
“Not many men know needlepoint,” she he said. “Though, you’re not very much like a man. You're rather like my old friend, Danara.”
“No, I’m a ghost,” he had said in reply.
Now, she read aloud until her voice gave a little crack. She cleared her throat and reached for the decanter of water beside her. Then, lifting the book, as had been their routine, she cried, “Switch!”
He pinned the needle in its place and handed it backwards to Christine, taking the book from her. “Why don’t you go as Red Death?” he asked.
“Because,” she said, “it’s symbolic when you do it. And anyway, I want to dress simply. So as to not give the wrong impression to Raoul, since I need to explain what’s going on.”
“What is going on?” he said, now sullen, now apprehensive.
“You know what’s going on,” she said, bumping him with her shoulder. “Keep reading. We’re getting to the best part.”
The Island
Christine had seemed to step from the stars when she stood over him, the stars hanging in her hair, around her head, even on her eyelashes. She had kissed him differently than she had before, longer, deeper. It was not, he felt, like she did this in spite of who he was, but somehow because she might actually want this. Yet, even as his heart ached inside him and he felt his whole body burning to reach for her, he could not reciprocate. He could only kneel like in worship, like at the feet of a saint. He felt a dull, throbbing pain through his whole being, and, as he had felt so many times, wished he were anyone but himself. If he were anyone else, not a great man, not even a good or especially interesting man, not even a man at all, he would have reached for her, returned her kisses, swept her in his arms and carried her to the forest. He would have…
But he was not anyone else, and the thought of returning her touch paused whatever fire started in him.
She broke away, walking, it seemed, into the night sky itself, beckoned away by the Lady Clarissa, who had too become stars.
He waited a breath, watching them vanish into the lights, before falling onto the beach, unable to move. He stared up into the darkness, the spiraling stars and the moon that seemed to dance, and his mind rattled off a million words, the never-ending soliloquy that forever plagued him. His own thoughts, jumping from Russian to Persian to assorted Turkic tongues, spoke of a myriad of things, narrating the night, the sky, the past, the future, and, loudest of all, why he should not touch Christine. Nothing as repulsive as himself should be near her, and if he were not a selfish coward, he would have never spoken to her at all. But, he was selfish, immoral, and cowardly, and without any justifiable reason or value to this earth, he still clung to life, to her.
The world seemed to spin and tilt around him, and he thought he would be sick, yet he remained looking at the sky, watching it move, and the lights fade and return again. An intense wave of dizziness, like illness, passed through him, settling not only in his mind but into his bones. Something wasn’t right, beyond mere intoxication.
Someone seemed to stand beside him and then crouch down. It was a young girl, he thought, no older than twelve, and dressed in clothes he did not recognize, something too warm for the island, as if she were talking from a place far away, were fur lined dress was needed. Her hair was tied in two long, dark braids on either side of her shoulders, and she gave him a wide smile. She seemed to be made of moonlight, and he knew she was not there, only some conjuring of the mind-altering drink.
She moved and her long necklace, which hung down her front, clattered lightly, as though she could be real. She pointed a little finger at him, smiling sweetly. “Ay oğul,” she said, laughing. And then, in a language he did not know but somehow understood, “You’re a grown up.”
“I suppose so,” he said.
“I’m dead, so I’m not grown up,” she said. “But you’re alive. That is good.”
“What are you saying?” Winters said, stumbling towards him.
The vision of the girl disappeared, and all that was left were the spiraling stars of the night sky and a vast cosmos. Between each body, and of each body’s rotation in the heavens, were millions of possible calculations, of shapes, distances, densities, and properties, all waiting to be learned in the language of the universe.
Winters stumbled to the ground beside him, also laying on the shore and staring up at the sky. “I’m a little worried about you,” he said.
“Why?”
“Because I think you might be ill,” he said.
“Oh, I am. Very unfortunately, I think Rukn was right after all. I hate that.” He groaned a little, trying to move but finding he had no energy to do so. “God, I actually do think I’m dying. But, I’m not very worried about it.” He looked out at the sky and the stars, seeing the angles and parabolas of their designs. He still tasted Christine’s kiss, felt her hands and mouth on him. His eyes were wet and his vision blurred. “Being stranded here has been the best thing that has ever happened to me,” he whispered.
“You’re not dying,” Winters said. “It’s the drink. It alters your mind, remember?”
“No, I haven’t eaten more than one scallop in days and now consumed the drink and a lot of alcohol. I’ve accidentally poisoned myself,” he said, very factually and dispassionately. He felt a deep calm now, like he would be able to sleep well in the warm sand with the smell of the sea, the sound of the waves and the night birds. The little girl was back, standing at his feet, smiling at him.
“You’re not dying right now,” she said, in the strange language which he was still surprised he understood.
“I want to,” he said. “It’s as it should be, before I can ruin everything again.”
“No, don’t be morbid like that,” Winters said. “I’m having quite altered perception myself. But, it isn’t so bad if you remind yourself, it’s only the drink. You’ll weather it. Though you should be eating. That's not good, my friend.”
“It feels shameful. I don’t like to be watched,” he said, in barely a whisper. “I don’t like being me.”
The little girl frowned at this, shaking her head, the beads around her head and in her ears shaking as she did. “Munu aytpa,” she whispered, putting her finger to her lips. She seemed to dissolve now, into the moonlight, light into light.
“Well, I like you,” Winters said, in the same half-silly, drunken tone as before.
“That’s stupid.”
“Maybe.”
“I really do think I’m going to die now,” Erik said. “But, I don’t mind it. Actually, the day has been nice.” He wasn’t sure if he said the last words. He felt like he was sinking into the sand, but it was warm and he felt heavy in it. The last thing he remembered was feeling a heavy weight over his chest, and realizing Winters had cast an arm over him. The ground rose around him, dark meeting dark, and one by one every one of the stars blinked out.
Morning cast a painful, silver light, like he was being struck with something sharp in the center of his head. When he tried to open his eyes, the world shook and spun, and it took him some time to focus his vision. The pain was like broken glass and he thought he would be sick.
For a moment, he was not sure why he felt a warm, heaviness against him. Then, he realized the Englishman must have fallen asleep beside him, and had nearly rolled over onto him, an arm around his shoulders like he was holding his wife. He jerked himself from this embrace, scrambling over the sand and shaking himself awake. The glare of the sun off the sand was blinding and the world once again swam before his eyes, as if it were made of water. That was what he needed, water. But, he remembered they had used the last of the fresh water to brew the chocolate the night before. He would have to find the stream again, somehow, if the world would stop moving for a moment.
He could not fix his eyes, which kept blurring and clouding painfully, his vision darting from one object to the next, bursts of light and shadow flashing into his vision. He could taste something metallic and felt a chill that he knew did not comport with the island’s heat. His mind was already rambling at him, explaining that he was still poisoned, that the events the night before had not subsided.
He tried to stand, only to fall nearly flat into the ground. Then, he dragged himself up again, this time much slower, looking over the scene at the shore. Rukn was nowhere to be seen, and neither was Christine nor Lady Clarissa and her son. Winters remained curled up on his side, snoring peacefully. A few paces away, the stupid, idiot vicomte was on his back, asleep but with an expression of misery. Erik thought he remembered kicking him, and would have smiled if he felt less ill and if the sun were less painful and noisy. Instead, he staggered toward the trees, falling against one and gripping its sharp branches for support. The branch nicking his skin was comforting, grounding. It seemed to draw him back into himself, as though his spirit kept trying to escape its vessel.
Slowly, half-falling, he made his way through the forest in this manner, feeling trunks and branches, seeing the flashes of scarlet from the tree’s blooms, amidst the silvery foliage, and startling the butterflies and bees. He could taste blood more clearly now, not just from cracked lips but a burning in his mouth, a sweet and metallic taste that he desperately wished to wash away. He wondered why he did not die in the night, though he often wondered at himself for not dying, many times, when he often had the chance. The unnatural cold chill ran through him again, and he felt his clothes stick to his body through an icy sweat. He could hear the water, splashing merrily on its way. It must be very close, perhaps even two paces ahead. He tried to orientate himself to it, but the world swam in colors and the sounds of the sea birds and the smell of the brine in the air. He was sure, only one or two paces away. If he could see it. But, the light was growing very narrow, as though he looked through a pinhole in a card. And now, he found himself again on the ground, laying in the sharp, volcanic cinders. He reached one hand, as far as he could go, and felt the lightest touch of the cold water. It was there, if he could move to it. Yet, though the cinders were jagged, even their piercing could not revive him as the tree branches had done before. He closed his eyes, waiting for the spinning feeling to stop and the taste of metal to dissipate. Then, he would get to the water. Only, the wind was cold now, and the air smelled like honey and sea foam, and the rocks were not too sharp after all. He could sleep.