Soliloquy

The sound of Alphonse's violin became clearer and clearer as I neared the North Wing. The words of Wren Morgenstern were still fresh in my mind, and I could not shake that strange sense of foreboding that filled me with each step I took. And yet, there was a lightness. There was a way to cure Alphonse of his peculier ailment, curse, whatever it was. Wren had said it herself. I didn't know how she knew, and I didn't quite understand how the Morgensterns fit in with it all. I understood that they were the family that had supposedly cursed the Wainwrights, but other than that - what?

I held a candle in front of me this time, and let it light my way. I kept my footsteps as silent as I could, and quickly down the main staircase. Everything still looked so ominous in the dark. The chandeliers that were lit during the day and a part of the evening had all been blown out and the manor felt as if it were filled with ghosts. I kept my head down. This time when I entered the North Wing, I was not so scared, just anxious. My heart felt sore and I had a strange and unamed feeling as I got closer and closer to the mystery that was Alphonse Wainwright. Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath and rushed foward, realizing what that feeling was. I missed him. Not in the way that I missed my mother; that was different.

This was a strange ache in my heart that I knew would only go away once I had finally laid my eyes on him. Maybe it was just a need to make sure he was still alive, still breathing, but a part of me, and I wasn't quite sure at how large of a part it was, a part of me needed to know he was okay so badly, that it was painful. I opened my eyes and looked at the windows in the North Wing. They were wet from the rain, and I wished I could have seen the moon. It would have made everything so much calmer, so much more...brilliant.

The violin melody, a new song, was louder and louder as I urged on. Finally my hand was at the doorknob. Instead of feeling fear, the way I had the time before this, I felt relief. I pushed open the door with a sense of faraway happiness. Alphonse sat on his bed, his legs tucked underneath him, playing with his eyes closed.

He did not open them until he was finished with the song. I stood against the closed door, much as I had the last time I'd come here. When he was finished, Alphonse set the violin down and looked to me. He gave me a smile that made me feel calm and I breathed out a large, deep sigh. My bare feet ran on the large white rug that adorned his floor. I set the brightly burning candle on his bedside table quickly and turned onto Alphonse. My arms came around his neck and I embraced him close to me. Wren's words echoed in my mind...Your mother was consumed by the frozen wasteland. You would let another die on your hands? No. I would never let Alphonse go. He would not leave me. Not the way Mother had.

Alphonse made a noise of surprise but did not pull away. His head was quite close to mine and I could hear every imperfection in his voice when he spoke. "What is this all about?" he asked and I pulled away. It surprised even me to feel that there were a few tears in the back of my eyes. They would not come forth though, I willed that.

"I just...had to make sure you were okay," I said and then realized what a fool I was being. I took a step back from Alphonse. "I am terribly sorry. That was quite improper of me."

Instead of giving me a rebuke, Alphonse smiled. "I do not see the gossiping ladies of society within these walls. Propriety is nonexistant."

My mouth turned up in the beginnings of a smile. "And what of your etiquette book?" I inquired.

"That was before I knew you," answered Alphonse. "Well, before I knew you were the kind of girl who would care enough about one silly young man to embrace him like a dear friend." He smiled. "No I give myself full leave to corrupt your innocent mind with the plethora of curses I have learned from my father." I could not hold in a giggle and covered my mouth with both my hands. "Ah, Faerie, you need not hide a laugh from me. I am only Alphonse."

Immedietley I stopped, a serious look on my face. "It is quite hard to forget the rules of propriety when I am trying so hard to be improper."

A thoughtful look passed over Alphonse's face. "Ah. I know. Sit down with me and I will read from my copy of the Canterbury Tales. To my knowledge, it is forbidden from young women to read it."

I laughed, and this time, did not cover my face. I did go to sit down with Alphonse on his bed, though. I leaned into him with a conspiratorial smile on my face. "My dear sir, you are going to have to try a lot harder than that. My mother read to me from the Canterbury Tales when I was narry thirteen years of age."

Alphonse pretended to look scandalized. "Thirteen! Did it corrupt your innocent mind, then?" he asked.

Shrugging in a fashion I knew was most unlady-like and therefore completley perfect, I looked to Alphonse's bedside table. The candle I'd brought burned warmly. Beside it lay an ivory handled brush. I looked to the boy sitting directly accross from me. "You have quite the beautiful brush. Why do you not use it?" I asked.

We both looked at the brush for a moment before Alphonse brought it up and looked at it in his broad hands. "I don't enjoy brushing my hair. Mother says I should but Father sees it as a waste of time. Mother brushes my hair sometimes. She says Father thinks it is effeminate."

I took it from him and inspected it. "Well, it looks as if it cost a fortune. I'm not about to let it go to waste." With that, I put the brush to my own hair and started to pull it through. Alphonse smiled.

"It is more natural, I suppose, when one brushes their own hair."

I brushed in silence, letting Alphonse watch me carefully. My mind wandered to my childhood, when I would let my own mother brush my hair. She would pull the brush through and we would count the strokes together. She would brush my hair until it shone and then would curtsy to me and call me 'Princess.' Then she would laugh and take me on a carriage ride through Hyde Park, and would tell me that all the other people in the carriages were all looking at my beautiful hair. I never noticed anyone, and she always used to tell me I just had missed them. I truly believed her and felt like the most beautiful little girl in the whole of England. I wished with my entire heart that I could feel that feeling once more. Finally, I set the brush down and smiled. "It is times like these...when I do miss my mother."

"That is understandable," Alphonse replied.

I smiled. "I wonder if I will ever stop missing her?" I asked him.

"No, of course not. But she will always be a part of you, just like my mother is a part of me." His reply was very unguarded.

Over and over, I turned the brush in my hand. "Sometimes, when she doesn't know it, I look at your mother's eyes. They are so very far away. She looks always as if she is another time." Alphonse did not respond to that. I smiled. "She loves you very much, that much is obvious."

The dark eyes of the boy opposite of me lit up. "Yes. I know, and I am thankful for that," he answered. "Father too. He is very smart. He taught me how to read Latin a few years ago, so now I can read some of the ancient Greek and Roman writers. The plays and poems are very fascinating. Latin is difficult, but my father is a wonderful teacher." A shy look passed over Alphonse's features. "My father told me that your father is not...well not exactly the nicest man he knows."

A sigh passed through me. "No, he is not. He constantly ridiculed my mother for the way she taught me and liked to find fault in the things I did. I know he loves me...it's just I don't really think he understands me. When it was decided I would come up here with your father, I said that I would be happy to leave. My father laughed and said it was amusing that I thought I'd actually had a choice." Alphonse frowned. "I do believe sometimes that my father wishes I was born a boy. My mother had a son, however, he died shortly after birth. She never conceieved again after me. I knew that made her very sad. Not because she didn't love me, but because my father was always mad that she never produced an heir."

We were quiet. Finally Alphonse spoke. "Well, you turned out exceptional, even if your father was..." he couldn't find a polite word for my father and I didn't care. There were more than a hundred words I could think of to put in for that pause. I let it go, however and cocked my head.

"I have a question for you, that I have been thinking of most of tonight," I said to him. Alphonse nodded. "In all of your readings, have you ever come across something that refers to death as a frozen wasteland?" I asked.

Alphonse looked surprised. "What an odd question!" he exclaimed. He sat, thinking, for a moment and then a smile spread to his face. "Yes, yes, I have, actually. You told me, last time you saw me, that you learned a Norse spell to banish evil spirits. Well, in the same book, I believe there is a history of Norse legends. It even has some of the poems in there." Alphonse looked excited now. "Yes, the Norse referred to a place called Niflheim as the frozen land of the dead."

I considered this. "Well, that is fairly strange."

"I wondered if I'll go to Niflheim," Alphonse considered. I looked at him, anger and fear rising to my throat. Our eyes met for the longest time. Alphonse looked unguarded yet sad and I knew I looked angry and quite upset. "I'm sorry. I do not wish to make you upset."

My eyes did not leave his. "I heard..." I took a deep breath, "Wren Morgenstern told me that there is a way to break the curse."

A look of great shock passed over Alphonse's eyes, but then they returned to normal. "How could she possibly know?" he questioned. I wanted to laugh. That was what I'd been wondering. But she wouldn't - she couldn't - have lied to me. How could she know about Alphonse's existence and not of anything else? I supposed that if she was rich enough, she could bribe the doctor or even one of the Wainwrights into telling her about Alphonse. But why would she? "I doubt anything she could have said to be truthful. My father has told me much of the Morgensterns. They are not to be trusted."

Without my permission, or even my acknowledgment, my hands went to Alphonse's wrists. I pulled them towards me and clutched his hands. It pulled him forward, so he was not more than a finger's distance away from me. "You would not believe me? You would not try to live?" I asked.

Sadness, a sadness I almost could not bear, passed through Alphonse's eyes. "I do not wish to get my hopes up, only to leave a world behind that I have fallen in love with." We were so quiet, I swore I could hear our hearts beating. Alphonse finally tugged his hands out of mine and averted his eyes. "I think you should go," he said, "and I don't think you should come back."

The tears from before, those unshed tears that I had worked so hard to keep away, suddenly sprang to my eyes. I wiped them away hastily and stood up. "If you did not want me here, why did you play your blasted violin?" My voice was thick and full of hurt. Alphonse still did not look at me, he did not say anything. "Fine then, give up, die! I don't care about you!" I turned away and stormed out of the room, but not before one wrenching sob left me. I wished I could have stifled it, but it came anyway. I did not want to look weak in his eyes, but it would not wait. I slammed Alphonse's door behind me and ran all the way through the North Wing, not even caring that I couldn't see a thing.

My room would bring no comfort to me, so I didn't go to it. Instead I left the manor entirely. I did not know what possesed me to leave the safety of Deathcreeke and walk into the out of doors, but I did. It was not raining anymore, but the ground was wet. My feet would not take me very far, either. I continuously stepped on small rocks that tore into the tender flesh of my rarely bare feet. I stopped walking and leaned down over the dirt. The tears flowed freely. I felt hurt, used, angry and rejected. I'd never felt this way before. Even when I consciouslly knew that my father had rejected me and sent me far away because he could not stand me any further, I did not feel as upset as I did now. I cared about my father, I swore I did, but not in the piercing, blinding way I'd suddenly cared about Alphonse. And at that moment, I realized why. Alphonse was the only part of this place that felt like home. In him, I could find peace and happiness. In a communities of darkness, he was a light. He would not lie, he would not betray, he had no secrets. He was just him. And now I didn't have that.

I felt more alone than I had when Mother had died. When she died, at least everything was familiar. London would always be gray and rainy, my father would always be careless and chauvanistic. Rupert would always be nice but slightly obnoxious. My friends would stay the same. My mother was close to me, and I still had all the memories of her. Here, I had nothing. Nothing was familiar.

Homesick and still crying, I made my way back to Deathcreeke. It wasn't safe for me to be out here all alone. I reentered Deathcreeke and knew that my feet were bleeding. Sighing, I ran up the main stairs and lightly as I could and went to my room. When I closed the door, I felt a little more at peace. Here maybe I was alone, but at least this room was mine. Or...as mine as it could be. I lit another candle and put it into another holder. It lit up the room and I brought it over to the basin and poured more water in. I took a towel and soaked it and brought it over to my bed.

My feet weren't as bloody as I thought, or at least, the blood wasn't flowing down my feet. I wiped away the scratches from each of my feet and put the towel into the basin. My eyes went to my large window. Through the glass, I noticed that the moon was shining through the thinning clouds. My face felt swollen, and I took a deep breath that was ragged through my chest. Taking a breath made me feel a little better and a little calmer. I got into my bed and tried not to think about Alphonse. It was inevitable.

How could he just tell me not to come anymore? How could he just make me go away? I was only trying to help. I didn't mean to get his hopes up, but Wren had sounded so earnest! Oh, I did not want to face her wrath when I told her that Alphonse would not be persuaded and had locked me out of his life. I would delay the information as long as possible. Maybe I'd just send her a nice note. Alphonse told me to go away when I suggested he could live. Faerie. Ah yes. That would go over so well. I didn't wish to tell her. Maybe next time I saw her, I would lie. Just a little lie. I would tell her I was working on Alphonse, but he didn't seem to believe me. I did not have to mention that he hated me now. I could just skim that part.

Or maybe...

Or maybe I could escape. I thought of Rupert's letter. His less than romantic proposal. I always had a home in the Townshends, that was what he said. Could I really go back to London, go back to familiarity, and marry Rupert? Could I let my life go back to the dulling monotony that I had so dreaded before?

I made up my mind quickly. It would be easier to be alone in London than be alone here. I would leave.