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'She had given him life, but now he chose to take no more from her. And in the tomb-like silence of this sunlit room, his last, unspoken words rang in her ears like the tolling of a passing bell.
Forget me . . ."'
Madeleine curled her fingers into fists, the nails biting deeply into the flesh of her palm. Last night, for the first time, she had seen herself as she really was. She had seen herself a woman, because at last she had taken the time to see someone other than herself. And in that moment, she also saw what she had been: a selfish, helpless child, poisoned against her own son's love—as he was poisoning her now, all over again.
In the two minutes between waking, discovering him gone, and huddling into a heap on the floor, she was reduced to a child again—a sick, whimpering whining child . . . obeying a more dominate voice. He commanded her, even in his absence. "Forget me. . ."
Obey me.
Suddenly, she was angry. Wasn't she supposed to command him? Well, he was her child, wasn't he? Madeleine almost stamped her foot like a child herself, right then and there. Why did everything about him—his voice, his silence, his presence, his absence—factor in her actions, whether to his advantage or not? And he knew this power he had over her. She had seen that he knew it in his eyes, and she hated that—that look that seemed to say he knew more than she did. It was as if he was subtly shaping her to his will, building her up to his own awesome levels of comprehension, as if to teach her something she could not understand. The idea had frightened her beyond wit's end.
And that, of course, was what he had been trying to teach her. Even now, he taught her: fear would never hold one person to another, not for the times that mattered. In the end, only love could do that. And she had wasted her chance.
For the first time in a long time, Madeleine felt like praying. She was a child, caught in a web of complexity she would never fully grasp. She wanted the Holy Father—she wanted Papa—she wanted Father Mansart—she wanted . . . She wanted her son.
Her son, who was only a child too.
Madeleine's eyes drifted closed as she slowly, resignedly, stood. Erik hadn't changed anything by running away, not really. She had only exchanged one fear for another: a fear of him had become a fear for him. He would never survive this world alone; he had barely been able to survive the selfish passions of a single woman. God forbid he survive and have to deal with another woman like herself; Heaven knew there were too many—women who wouldn't be able to separate their fear of him from their love, their revulsion from their desire . . . women who in the end would let him slip through their fingers, because they were merely young and spoiled little girls, who could never decide exactly what they wanted until it was too late.
Madeleine's eyes snapped open. She would not have him suffer that. Death would be more pleasant to him; her own death was preferable to the thought of him suffering as he had in their own home ever again. She was not about to let it happen. After all, he was only a child—a child with a stomach wound and a necessity for travel by night.
Last night she had stood before the mirror and told herself proudly that she was a grown woman, a real woman who could love another person instead of only herself: a mother. Mothers did not let their children wander off to face the world alone. She was a woman; he was a child. In the end, it all boiled down to the fact that her legs were longer than his.
*
When she at last spotted him, he bolted. He was a quick, stealthy little thing, like a hungry wolf, loping through this briary underbrush as if it was nothing. How did he get to be so fast? He shouldn't be, she reasoned, even as she hastily began to try to follow him. He had spent nine years of his life in the house . . . cooped up in the house, trapped, in prison . . . no wonder he ran from his own mother. Oh Erik . . .
Madeleine almost stopped; despair was exhausting her when hours of travel had not. She had had very little idea of which way Erik might go, but in the end, she had chosen the least likely. Erik was perverse that way. She'd taken the coach past the edges of Boscherville, scanning the country-side, hoping for some sign. France was rocky here, inhospitable, and cold. Autumn was already cool in the air and whipping the leaves into orange eddies and frenzies. That was where he'd be, she told herself—in a forest, under the eyes of trees, who could hide him and not be repulsed by him . . .
When she at last descended from the carriage, she had seen no sign of him. She had had no hope of finding him. It had been sheer luck that the goose boy, thwashing idly at the tall stalks of grass with a stick, had claimed to see a boy just at sun rise, running 'oh, I dunno madam, in that direction?' Then the goose boy had taken her proffered frank, grinned, and got good away before she could decide that he very well could have been lying. It had been fate then, perhaps, that had at last helped her find a little crashing path through the woods. She was no woodsman, but he couldn't have gotten very far—even Erik needed to sleep, and he was wounded . . .
"Erik," she called after him, futilely, in despair. "Erik, please . . . please . . ." Her voice was fading even as she slowed, at last feeling the sharp, winding pain in her side. She was on the verge of collapse, and she would die alone. Without even her monster of a son to know or care . . . without him even knowing how much she loved him.
Even children who love their mothers run away, she told herself, the tears behind her eyes refusing to come and yet blurring her vision into dim smears of bony trees and blood red leaves. If she told herself that Erik was simply a boy, her mischievous, willful boy, who had just run off for the day, only to come back into her arms at twilight, crying, telling her he'd missed her . . . perhaps then she could die in peace . . .
In the distance, the dark figure suddenly stopped stock still. Madeleine blinked, swaying where she stood. "Erik?" she called tremulously, suddenly hopeful.
The figure turned away, for a moment looking in the direction it had been running with what seemed, from this distance, to be longing. Then slowly, reluctantly, Erik turned toward her and took wary, reluctant steps back, until he stood at the edge of the tiny pool of leaves where she had at last faltered. He stared at her for a moment, blinking calmly. He didn't seem the least out of breath from his flight. "Mother?" he said at last, and she couldn't hear the tremor in his voice, the sob at the rim of his trachea.
He didn't know it was me, she was thinking. It made everything in her swell, stand straighter. The voluminous, lacy dress she hadn't bothered to change out of when she made her mad decision earlier this morning was dirty, torn and ripped, and there was a desperation about her that was a far cry different from the soft, sensual Madeleine everyone in Boscherville had once known, even when she was condemned as crazed by those closest to her. No wonder he hadn't recognized her. She looked more like herself, now, her shoulders thrown back as she looked at him with shining eyes. He hadn't purposely run away from her; he hadn't known it was her; she still had a chance with him . . . She said the only thing she could in answer to his question, because her heart was in her throat. "Yes."
Erik didn't move. He was filthy, she noted idly, and his wound had reopened. His hands were at his sides as if he hadn't even notice it. It chilled her to think that perhaps he hadn't. "What do you want?" he said at last, when neither of them said anything.
He spoke casually, just as if she was anyone at all, someone who had happened to disturb him while he was tinkering in his room with those toys of his. It made her lift her head and put her maternal authority in her voice—the voice that she always used when she was about to hit him, the voice that was her everyday, casual voice, as if nothing had happened at all. "I want you to come home, of course. Look at you—you're filthy, and you . . ." she faltered. "You didn't eat your breakfast," she finished lamely, hoping somehow that he could understand the weakness in her tone.
He regarded her warily. "I don't have a home," he said finally, his words measured.
"Nonsense," she found herself saying. "What utter nonsense, Erik. We live on Rue d'Elbeuf. We're number eight, the one with the ivy." She didn't know why she was talking like this, in this patronizing voice. What she really wanted to do was get on her knees, open her arms, and have him run into them, and never let him go. Why did he make her feel so defensive? Why did he have to make everything so difficult? "Let's put this childishness behind us. You need a bath. Come home."
"What do you want?" Erik demanded abruptly, and Madeleine was suddenly terrified he was going to fly into another one of his rages.
The whiplash in his voice elicited the reaction he wanted. All unwilling, the truth was tumbling from her lips, and her voice was pleading with him, pleading and broken, revealing all the weakness she had always feared to show him: "I want you to come home," she said again, but this time it was different. "Oh Erik, I want . . . I want us to be a family, don't you see how it would be? We could start over. I planned on burning all the masks this very morning, Erik, and then I found that you were gone . . . oh, my son—"
He flinched at that, because that she never called him: her son. Hers. "Did you?" he said suddenly. When she only stared at him, a single tear rolling over her splendid cheek, he put his hands on his hips and petulantly repeated, "Well, did you burn them all?"
"No—but because I came looking for you, Erik! I had to find you; I had to have you home." She was choking on her own words, but suddenly she knew what she had to say. Come home, Erik. I—I love you."
"No!" he suddenly cried out passionately, stepping back. His reaction was stronger than it had ever been when she raised her hand against him, and her eyes widened in horror. Somehow, she had thought that if she could just get the words out, just expose herself to him, everything would be alright. He would become a normal little boy, despite his face, and rush into her arms, crying, telling her how much he loved her back and how the only reason he had run away was for love of her. And she would take him home and take care of him and he would happily stay with her until she died, just the two of them, a family of themselves. Apparently, Erik was being his predictable self: unpredictable.
"No! I don't want to come home with you!" He stamped his foot then, and the gesture was so childish that she blinked. "How come nothing I ever do is good enough for you? How come whenever I try and please you, it's not the right thing?"
He was advancing on her now, and Madeleine instinctively backed away. "Erik, I'm your mother," she said timorously. "I just want to take care of you; I want what's best for you—"
"You never cared what's best for me!" he shrieked at her, and strangely, the sound was something lovely. The very leaves at his feet seemed to stir in a lazy melody of his anger. "You still don't! You decided you're ashamed of yourself and now you want to fix it. Well, do you know what, mother? You can't! I won't let you!"
The sudden silence was appalling, and Madeleine realized that she was crying. "Please, Erik; it's not that. Please, just come home, just let me show you how it could be with us . . . Come home, Erik, I'll do anything. I'll—" She looked around half wildly for a second, then: "I'll kiss you. I'll kiss you, Erik; I'll kiss you everyday. I'll—"
The look in his eyes cut her off. The hot, hurt anger was gone from his eyes, replaced with a steel cold. She was losing him, she realized. His anger she had always understood, as wild and violent as it could get sometimes. This cold withdrawal was beyond her comprehension. "It's too late for that," he said, his teeth grinding. "You made me ask. You made me ask, mother, and then you wouldn't do it." He paused, and then, almost thoughtfully, "I did love you, once. I loved you and you hated me. And now we're switched, and I don't care."
If Fate had actually helped her find him, this had been Her master plan all along. Fate, who wanted to force her to watch her one and only son, the only person left to her in the world, reject her, sealing the punishment she so well deserved for every moment she could have shown her love for him and hadn't. Fate wanted her to know for certain that she was at last very much alone in the world, that all vestiges of hope for redemption were lost completely.
Dully, Madeleine saw this. Hopelessly, she was resigned to it. She did deserve it; she had not brought any monstrosity into this world except her own monstrous cruelty, and with that she had perhaps ruined a beautiful, innocent child for good. She hung her head in defeat, and several feet away, Erik's eyes widened. He'd never seen his mother look so beaten; he had been able to drive her to insanity, but never to complete defenselessness. Slowly, with a sort of longing, she lifted her eyes to him. "Let me anyway," she said at last. "Let me at least kiss you good bye. Let me kiss my son good-bye."
He could condemn her now. He could deny her, refusing to let her take the action that would prove to herself that she had at least loved him, she had at least done all she could there, at the very end. Madeleine took the several steps toward him peacefully, without aggression, but also without beseechment, accepting that he could choose to turn away, that he had that right.
Erik did not turn away. He stood completely still, the sudden stillness of his heart too abrupt to even cause him to tremble. Madeleine looked down at her son, who already came to her shoulder, though she was tall. He only watched her, not swallowing, not even blinking, looking very much like an animal who is very certain it is about to be slaughtered, and is too helpless with fear to even attempt escape. In her weary, fluid grace, she untied his mask and let it fall from her finger-tips, not between them, but beside them. The simple, beautiful movement of her neck as she lowered her head toward his was the last thing he saw before he shut his eyes tightly, and she kissed him gently on the forehead.
His teeth were tightly clenched and he was suddenly shuddering when her lips lightly lifted from his face. Erik took one, deep breath belabored by a sob, and then another, and at last one sudden other before he let loose. "I hate you," he screamed. "I hate you!" He was beating at her blindly with his hands, struggling wildly as if that frightened animal that had been waiting in him had suddenly been let loose and given leave to fight for its life. "I hate you; I hate you; I—" he panted, "—hate—" and hit her squarely in the jaw—"you!"
"Erik," she murmured. "Erik." And suddenly he was in the folds of her arms, his disgusting horrendous face against her soft breast, his wracking, raging sobs colliding with her collar bone. His hands clutched her waist as he embraced her for the first time.
"I hate you," he confided sullenly to her sternum, through tears. She was soothing back his hair, trying to comfort him, realizing she didn't know how, realizing how very little experience she had with children.
And yet, only seconds after falling into her arms he tore himself away, stepping back, refusing to even wipe his face of tears with that stubborn, steadfast pride. He regarded her warily as she gazed back at him with her lovely, full eyes and open arms. "Come home," she said once again, and this time she didn't even need to say that she loved him, that she wanted him; he could hear it in her voice.
Erik looked away sharply and turned his gaze to the leaves at her feet. "No," he said suddenly, unexpectedly. Madeleine blinked, the realization of his denial slow to set in. "You always make me eat boiled eggs for breakfast." He paused reflectively. "I hate eggs."
Slowly, she began to smile. "You can have anything you like this morning, Erik. Anything," she added simply, and held out her hand to him. Suspiciously, he took it, and for a moment, they stood there in the silent forest, him holding someone's hand for the first time in his short life. After a moment, she turned his wrist and kissed him on the palm. She only smiled to herself when his fingers curled and he jerked his fist away, as if she had just burned him there.
She turned a little, and waited for him to follow her in the direction of the way out of the forest. She noticed that his right hand was still in a fist, held close to his chest with his other hand as if to protect something he held there, but she said only: "Take advantage of it, dear. Tomorrow, you're back to boiled eggs." He scowled up at her and she shrugged. "They're healthy for a growing boy," she said, and began to walk away. After a moment, after a single leaf seem to fall in a sigh of the collective forest at her exquisite beauty passing, he followed, his one hand still clutched to his chest.
On the leaves behind them, covered already by a brown leaf, as if thrown away and forgotten, lay the mask. They turned their backs and walked into the sunlight.