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Being in this room, with these people, made Amélie feel sick.
She kept her hat low on her head, keeping her steps close to Akande as they moved through the Sunset Farm's auction hall. People kept trying to drag the two of them into conversations, and while Akande was polite enough to tolerate a few sentences of dialogue, Amélie outright ignored them and stuck that much closer to her friend. She didn't want to be acknowledged by these people. She wanted to tear them to pieces. She wanted to rid the earth of this lowly of people and wash her hands of this place.
She couldn't, though. Tonight was for observation only. Tonight was only so she and Akande could do recon of the event and farm. They would plan the siege after they got back from the auction, then execute it as soon as possible after that. They would find the books listing the buyer information and get to them too after the farm was crumbled from the inside.
Amélie held on to that thought and took her seat beside Akande, her auction ballet held in her white knuckle grip. They had to pretend to bid, but they weren't actually here to make a purchase. They were here to join these people in their disgusting practices.
"Does Gérard know where you are?" Akande asked in a low voice, so only she could hear him.
She grit her teeth. Akande knew the answer to his question. She was sure he was only trying to get a rise out of her, and she refused to step up to it.
"He does not," she said levely.
"And why, might I ask, does your husband not know where you are?" he asked.
"What is your game here, Ogundimu,” she glared up at him.
"No game at all, I just want the good Mr. Lacroix getting the wrong idea about us,” Akande looked back down at her with a small smirk, and all of the sudden all the building annoyance deflated. He was messing with her to get her mind off their location.
“Well he won’t,” Amélie said, settling back into her seat. “He knows you’re not my type.”
“Not my type? Should I be insulted?” Akande asked.
“If you want to be,” Amélie felt the hint of a smirk try to tug at her lips. She wouldn't let it grow, though. She couldn’t smile in a time like this. A place like this.
“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome welcome,” an auctioneer said into a microphone on the stage. “We are starting our activities for the night, so if you would please take your seats!”
The buzz of the crowd quieted down as they all did as they were asked. Amélie twisted the ballot in her hand, catching carefully for the faces of the people who took their seats. It was pointless, they all wore silk and lace, and intricate masks similar to her own, but still she wanted to get a read on their body language.
Vultures. All of them were nothing but vultures, praying on innocent things they had no right to.
The auction started, and Amélie tried to ignore it. She tried to focus on cataloguing as much objective information as she could, but it was so difficult. She saw the “merchandise” paraded across the stage and her stomach twisted. She raised her ballot for bids she knew she would lose just to fit in, and let Akande handle everything else while she worked to keep her focus objective.
“Our sixth piece for the night was imported to us from a lovely little town in rural Georgia,” the auctioneer announced as the hole in the stage opened again and the platform started to rise. Another ornate cage, with a heavy cloth covering it came into view. “A delicate thing that will require quite a bit of maintenance, but is in the end worth the upkeep. A lovely decoration, or conversation starter for guests, or an accessory if you want to flaunt and brag.”
The heavy cloth was pulled away, revealing yet another piece of “merchandise”.
A woman who had to only be in her mid to late twenties sat in the cage on her legs, wearing a pretty yellow corset dress with black lace. Her hair was up in a loose bun, held together by a thick black velvet band with a yellow rose attached. Waves of snow white hair framed her face. They hadn’t bothered to do her makeup, her lips a natural pretty pink, with the blush of her cheeks seemingly constantly visible through the pale skin.
Her eyes were closed, her head hung low, but still, Amélie recognized her. THe white hair and pale skin, and being from a rural town in Georgia told her everything she needed to know.
“The Ashes’ daughter,” Amélie whispered in horror so only Akande could hear. “I thought she died ten years ago.”
She tore her eyes away from the woman to look at Akande, but flinched at what she found. His expression was visible even behind his mask. The pain and confusion of years written in every line of his body.
She couldn’t look at him for more than a second. She couldn’t bear it, so she looked back to the girl and let her stomach twist. She knew she wouldn’t be able to look away until she was forced out of her view, but it didn’t matter. She couldn’t look away.
Amélie listened to the auction around her, but didn’t really listen to the words. Her sole focus was on the girl. She looked like a doll, the way they had her set up. Nothing like the pictures of the teenage girl the Ashes’ still had around their estate. That girl had wild hair she never put up, and consistent sun burns covered in bandage and ointment because she didn’t have the patience to follow her doctors’ orders and stay out of the sun. The only time she looked put together in those pictures, was when she was in her school uniform. Even then, she rarely wore the thing right.
Amélie had never met her, but she had heard stories from the grieving parents. At social events people tried to tiptoe around the subject, but it was always an elephant in the room. When it would come up, Mr. Ashe’s eyes would get watery and expression tense, and he would have to excuse himself. Mrs. Ashe would stay there, and talk sorrowfully of their lost daughter who loved life so much.
The girl from those pictures and stories did not belong here. And yet, Amélie knew for a fact it was her.
“Going once! Goin twice!”
Amélie didn’t think. She just raised up her ballot and shouted, “One billion!”
The price had only been in the ten millions when she spoke, and the room was stunned into silence by the sudden increase. When he seemed to get over his shock, the auctioneer’s expression turned to delight.
“Going once! Going Twice! Sold to the woman in purple!”
Amélie’s hand shook around her ballot, the adrenaline and fear in her veins chilling when the woman in the cage’s eyes opened, and she was met by the deepest crimson red.
“Dear god,” Akande whispered beside her, his voice filled with the horror she felt.
What had she done?
~~~
They approached the private jet, Akande’s presence beside her no longer comforting, but instead harsh and cold.
A few of the farm managers were maneuvering the crate into the cargo load that had “Fragile” loudly written in red on every side. Amélie heard no movement from inside, but she knew she was there. She knew she would have to stay there for the entire plane ride back to Paris, and she wanted so badly to cry.
Her powers failed her. She couldn’t put that comforting wall between herself and her emotions. She couldn’t seem to even dull them. Her powers were being counteracted by something, but she didn’t have the energy to figure out what. She was too tired, too sick with herself.
Akande wouldn’t look at her when they sat in their seats across from each other, and Amélie wondered if he would ever speak to her again when the plane landed and he was free from her presence. Did he hate her as much as she hated herself right then? Did she really want to know?
It was three hours into their flight that Akande finally spoke.
“I’m not angry with you.”
“How?” Amélie asked. “I’m angry with myself.”
“Because I know you did what you did out of panic,” Akande said. “And out of a need to help an old friend.”
“But I didn't,” Amélie said, desperate. “I didn’t do it for the Ashes. Akande there is no way they don’t know she’s alive.”
“I know,” Akande cast his gaze down. “They’re probably the ones who put her there, that’s not what I meant.”
She knew it wasn’t. She knew, but she was so afraid she might really cry if she even thought the truth. Akande wouldn’t let her escape it, though. He wouldn’t let her feign ignorance to his pain.
“When we get to Paris she can go with you,” Amélie said. “I will provide the funds if you need them to help her reintegrate into society. I’ll help in any way I can-”
“Amélie, please, stop,” Akande said, and she had never quite heard his voice like that. Maybe close to it, when the girl was first declared missing, but this was so much worse. With his mask off she could see his face, and she knew so deeply the pain written there.
“I thought she was dead,” Akande said.
“We all did,” Amélie said.
They stayed silent the rest of the flight. What could she possibly say to a man grieving as deeply as he was? She didn’t know back then, and she certainly didn’t know now.
The night they received the letter had been the first time Amélie ever saw him cry.
He had cried one name over and over again, and that name left a scar on all of their hearts, even if he was the only one who knew the face to it. It was a name linked to snow white hair, and crimson red eyes, and bright mischievous smiles. A name linked to Akande’s past, and what his future should have had.
Caledonia.
The plane landed near the Lacroix estate, and outside the window Amélie watched the crew start to unload the crate. Before she could stand, Akande’s voice caught her.
“I can’t bring her with me.”
Amélie looked back at him, mouth open to protest. To protest how he had said himself for years what he would give to have her back. That if the universe would grant him one wish, it would be to hold her one last time.
Akande shook his hair before she spoke, “I can’t care for her. Not in the way she deserves, not right now. Please, take care of her.”
“I can’t,” Amélie quickly said.
“You can. I wouldn’t trust anyone else to,” Akande said. “Please Amélie, I can’t subject her to my life. At least with you and Gérard she will know some kind of normalcy.
They stared at each other for a long time. Finally, Amélie relented and nodded, though she didn’t know why. By all reason, she should have kept fighting and gotten Akande to take her home. But he wouldn’t, and she could see it in his eyes that it was true he couldn’t. As his friend and as the one who had gotten them into this mess, she had to care for her.
They left the plane together, and Amélie’s heart sank when she saw her husband standing in the doorway to the chateau, his eyes wide and horrified as he took in the sight of the white haired woman kneeling patiently, waiting.
His eyes met her, and he spoke the same question she couldn’t stop asking herself.
“What have you done?”