Chapter 1: Innocence

The sun, the bright, pale thing, filtered through the cloth shades of a small, cramped room.

Amelie’s eyes barely had a second to flutter open as the world, that hazy thing, came into view.

Another day…

She looked around, her room was small, with a straw bed which she lay on, and a small wooden nightstand pressed up against a tall wooden door with a brass handle. On the right of the room, her dress was laid on a small table pressed against a small, brass-lined window covered by curtains which were angled downwards slightly to the left.

She stood up, her bare feet becoming engulfed by the cold of the wooden planks, and her eyes glued to it to avoid getting a splinter.

Or perhaps, for another reason

She approached the table and clutched her dress, changing into it from her nightgown. It was made before the occupation.

Made from the last real cloth

She opened the drawer of the nightstand and peeked inside.

Inside sat a small, new, pristine Bible and a well-used pen.

She grabbed the Bible, slowly closed the drawer, and approached the door, twisting the brass handle.

The door creaked open. Standing in the frame stood a man with sunken, grey eyes, donned in a black robe, and wearing a smile that shook in the still hallway.

Father Benedict.

“Could we have a walk in the garden, Amelie?”

Amelie simply nodded.

Stepping out of the safety of her room, she followed Benedict down a long, wood adorned hallway. After descending a flight of wooden, creaking stairs, they entered the main hall of the church.

A row of pews sat empty in front of a raised platform with a wooden podium on it. Behind it, nailed into the wall, was a statue of the Crucifix.

Amelie remembered back when it still had its golden sheen

Benedict stood, his hand brushing the podium for a mere moment before strolling avoiding a glance. He pulled his hand away quickly, as if the podium were a burning hot pan. He glanced at the pews himself, his posture stiffening, his lungs tightening with a weight which was not his own, his eyes becoming glossy with…

Were they possibly…

No… It couldn’t be.

Benedict looked out the door leading into the garden, his eyes fixed on the horizon. He pulled a brass key from his deep pockets and slid it into the maw of the lock.

He stopped.

His hand shook.

And then he twisted the lock.

He grabbed the brass handle of the door, and pulled, the door swinging open as a blast of cool fall air blasted inwards, momentarily flustering both Amelie and Father Benedict, who was quick to fix his short cropped hair into a more acceptable position. He stepped out, calling Amelie behind him to exit.

Amelie stepped out into the cold, biting wind.

Winter was coming…

But that did not matter– what was Benedict to say today?

The door slammed shut with a click behind Amelie, and Father Benedict was already standing on the cobblestone path a few feet ahead, turned back, eyes locked on Amelie.

Amelie hurried over, quickly slowing as Benedict continued his glacial stroll.

Benedict cleared his throat with a cough devoid of mucus, his hands once again returning to their all-but-familiar posture of a triangle, and his eyes still unfocused.

The fence around the beatiful, green, lush garden was sharp and metallic. Trimmed with barbed wire hastily placed upon its tips.

She did not even glance at the fence.

She only shivered.

Father Benedict smiled.

No… It must just–

“Today, Amelie, is the day you leave. Forever.”

His voice echoed throughout the cathedral.

It was true.

That silence, endless, beckoning, filled the room like water.

Then, Father Benedicts pace increased as he cleared his throat once more, a hoarse tone befalling upon his generally calm, near-professional tone.

“I’m afraid I cannot keep you any longer, Amelie.”

The chirping of the birds only preserved that thin veil of silence which held its grasp on reality for only a second longer as the crickets chirped and the sweet smell of Jasmine flowers overcame Amelie’s senses.

“But why?”

Father Benedict stood still for a moment.

The air around him seemed to freeze.

It was not of temperature.

“You know very well why, Amelie.”

Amelie’s eyes widened only slightly, for a singlular, contained moment in shock.

She did know

“The…”

She froze for a moment.

The birds, the crickets, the sweet smell of Jasmine, it all seemed to vaporize itself into oblivion.

All was left was that singular word left on the tip of her dry, paralysed tongue.

“The Jasmine Killer, Yes.”

Amelie hitched her breath.

Father Benedict’s arm rose.

Pointed at the gate.

Yet his eyes did not approach it.

They remained locked on Amelie.

It… couldn’t–

“Go. Before it is too late.”

Amelie lowered her head. And simply walked towards the gate leading out of the garden.

For all her years living in this… sheltered cage, she had never once thought of the day in which Father Benedict would force her to leave. Or at least, she never wanted to.

For she knew all too well on the day of her acceptance into the cathedral, that one day. She would have to leave.

She pressed her hand against the cold, metallic structure of the gate. A sollem smile fell across her face.

A single tear running down her cheek.

She glanced back.

Father Benedict was sitting on a bench in the garden, back turned, hunched over. His face covered by his palms. But they were not drenched in sweat, but rather something else.

Amelie could not bear it.

She turned towards the gate, taking a deep, final breath in the safety of the cathedral, and stepped through with such great reluctance it was as if she were being told to leave the country and never return.

That is how it felt at least

And then, as she stepped through the looking glass of this sanctuary into this new, horribly wonderfully free world, she did not bear to turn back. To steal a glance at what could have been.

To steal a glance at what had been stolen from her.

_The gates shut with a crack of metal_

Amelie glanced around. Houses were jammed up against eachother, people walking down the cobblestone streets. A red flag with a black, horribly familiar, horribly terrible emblem on it glanced back at her, pinned high on the wall of a nearby cottage.

It was crooked at an angle, not blending in, as if it had been hastily placed there.

As if it were there not by choice, but by force

Violent force, no doubt

Amelie shivered, not from the cold, but from this…

New world.

A world she could barely recognize despite seeing it every day through that stained glass window in her… old bedroom.

Yet she felt so… isolated.

Despite being in the midst of so many people.

She walked towards the nearest cottage, one with a sign of a florist on it.

Mrs. Dubois might be able to help her…

She twisted the handle on the door, and pushed it inward before stepping inside.

Sitting behind a counter was Mrs. Dubois, in a simple patchwork dress, spectacles perched on her wrinkled nose. Her eyes were quite small, but sharp, and her posture was straight, unburdened, unlike Benedict’s.

The wall was covered in shelves holding all sorts of jarred herbs, flowers, and medicines, the floor planks that were uprooted in some places and covered in fallen leaves and flowers, and the ceiling had a single, dying bulb hanging from it.

Dubois looked up. Her eyes widened slightly, her glare sharpening with curiousity. She coughed, not to clear her throat, but for another purpose, and inquired.

“Amelie– Does Father Benedict know you… are… out of the church?”

Amelie simply nodded.

Dubois’ skeptical glare ceased instantly.

If only Amelie had such a pleasure as to be able to simple accept words as truth

“Then, what brings you here? Donations? An illness among you at the church?”

Amelie lay her hands on the table, smiling not with joy, but with a look said in her glossy eyes, pale skin, and shuddering figure before looking up at Dubois.

“He– He… kicked me out.”

Another tear fell down Amelie’s cheek. Her voice cracking ever so slightly as she said those words which she never wanted to hear in her life, yet knew so very well she would hear them for the rest of it.

Dubois stopped for a moment, her hands momentairly resting on the table, her face leaving the embrace of the unfinsihed jars.

“I understand.”

Amelie slowly nodded.

Dubois coughed once more. Amelie heard footsteps from above the shop. Heavy boots no doubt.

Dubois stopped looking at the jars.

“I will give you what you need.”

Amelie looked down at the counter. A small smile appearing on her face. One possibly constructed of some form of happiness.

Dubois did not smile. She simply bent down, grabbed a jar from under the counter, and laid it on the table. It was filled with red and orange leaves, with a slight sheen coming from inside, possibly from a metallic object.

She glanced around, shaking ever so slightly, her eyes locked onto that jar. On its contents.

She unscrewed the lid quickly and without a word, and poured the contents onto the table.

Spilling from its depths came a small, colored paper of the leaves, and a flow of numerous coins. Francs.

Hundreds of them.

They clinked as they hit the wooden counter, some falling into slight chips in the wood.

Dubois did not seem suprised.

“Take these.”

Amelie froze.

She placed her hands for a moment into her pockets.

“How’d– you…”

Dubois cut her off with a glare.

Amelie stared at the coins.

What was their origin?

In the middle of their flow, a single, colored paper. A french flag.

She knew now.

Amelie shuddered, then cupped the coins in her hand and shoved them deep into her pockets.

“Now go.”

Amelie turned around, opened the door, and left without a second word.

She could not risk it

She glanced around. The sun had reached its zenith. Within a few hours, she’d need a place to sleep.

She couldn’t risk being on the streets

The market stood as a beacon in the midday sun-baked Virtue.

She began strolling towards it, not sprinting, her hands stuffed in her pockets, her head avoiding the gaze of a grey-uniformed man holding a rifle with that same horrible flag stiched on his arm.

A throng of people were flooding the streets at this time, shouting prices, demanding housing, beseeching for something or the other. Amelie could hardly slide through it all.

She heard worried voices, people shouting something about “The Jasmine Killer!” and the clinking of franks changing hands under the veil of the flooded marketplace.

She finally made it to the market, and her head rose.

Her eyes fell upon a tall, plump man.

A tight belt was fastened across his waist.

His eyes looked down at Amelie.

How she wished she could vanish into the crowd…

He wore a grey uniform, with the same, familiar flag stiched onto the arm.

Another Occupier…

He looked down at her, his blue eyes familiar, yet so horribly unforgettable.

“Why do you enter the market, girl? You know there is a lockdown on it! Our Fuhrer has declared Virtue to have no more concessional trading! It is blaphemously horrible.”

Amelie froze up.

She had never spoken to The Occupiers before

“I– Need… a place to stay for the night…”

The man seemed suprised.

He stared for a moment.

He seemed to soften for a moment.

Then. He glanced around.

He mouthed the word “no”.

“Find it elsewhere! Scram!”

Amelie scrambled away, her pockets jingling with francs.

The man’s eyes slowly widened with realization. His hands uncurled from fists, his hand instinctively going to his own pocket to brush over an empty void which lay there.

He stepped forward as Amelie glanced back at the man, slowly coming towards her, staring out at the distance, his other hand over his face, as if trying to remember.

Nobody ever kept francs in their pockets, they never had enough to spare

He grabbed Amelie by the shoulder.

“Wait.”

Amelie turned around, the man only inches from her face now, studying it.

“I know you.”

Amelie stared.

“You are Father Benedict’s orphan.”

This was Otto, the police commisionar, no doubt. Every sabbath he’d come. He always sat in the back. Alone.

Otto stared out at the crowd. His hand still resting on Amelie’s shoulder, his eyes still sharp.

He clearly was not focused on them

“Come along.”

Amelie didn’t hesitate. She knew better than that. Otto began walking down the path, walking down a flight of stairs leading to the less dense part of Virtue.

“Otto– might i ask… why am I–“

“You may not.”

She might as well not ask again…

Amelie kept her mouth sealed for the rest of the stroll until they reached the gate leading into a green courtyard, the density of the market giving way to a thinning village as the sun began to set as the glacial walk stretched on.

As Otto approached the gate, he wrapped his hand around one of its poles.

“So, I heard that Father Benedict kicked you out.”

“How–“

A moment of silence broke the speech, but only for so long could silence room.

“I’m the police commisionar.”

Otto pulled out a large keyring, sifting through its metallic depths before grasping onto a well-worn iron key and ripping it off the keychain and sliding it into the maw of the lock. He twisted it, the click of the lock ringing throughout the now-silent streets of this town in a soon-to-end sunset.

He opened the gate with a sharp snap of metal and a long, agonizing creak.

Then he stepped through, Amelie following close behind.

Otto slammed the gate shut behind him, and guided Amelie towards a single wooden table in the middle of the barren green courtyard surrounded by a cobblestone estate. Otto sat down opposite to Amelie.

On the table sat a chess board, the pieces in perfect place.

“Do you know how to play, Amelie?”

That was the first time he had ever said her name.

She’d never told him her name…

Amelie nodded.

“Very well, I shall play first.”

Otto grasped a pawn and shifted it a tile forward. The sun’s gilden rays filtered through the courtyard like spots in an unmixed tea. The air seemed to freeze. Not with temperature, for it was only cool, but with something else.

“Your turn.”

Amelie grasped a pawn herself and moved it two tiles forward.

Otto simply smirked. His eyes not focused on the game.

He grabbed another piece and moved it.

Amelie did the same.

“Chess is a complicated game. Just as war.”

He slid a piece across the board.

Amelie stared, in partial shock, but mostly in curiosity.

Her curiosity was not focused on the game…

Then, the silence broke. The serene peace suddenly shattered as glass when it hits a hard floor.

Otto’s right hand, gloved in black, found rest on the table. His blue eyes momentarily scanning the horizon before laying his other hand on the table.

“You realize, that this is not about the game, Amelie?”

For simply a moment, silence’s tranquil embrace returned.

Amelie’s hands found purchase on the beams beneath the table, grasping them until her knuckles turned white. Doing this caused that same clink in her pockets.

“Your– Turn…”

Amelie could not help but croak it out.

What would Benedict think? Her being killed off the second she left the safety–

She couldn’t let it happen…

Otto did not pick up a piece this time.

He simply sat there. His pale face eminating no light as the sun lowered even further.

For a moment, his hand hovered over a piece.

Amelie’s gaze wandered to a balcony. For a moment, she saw a flash of red, and possibly blond hair ruffled in the wind.

It was likely just another soldier.

Then, unexpectedly, Otto picked up a piece, and slid it with glacial slowness.

He stopped.

“Mrs. Dubois. Approxamitely 654 Francs. I know their origin, Amelie. I have two officers outside her shop right now. With a flick of my wrist I could tell them to snuff out the rebellion’s major supplier. I could end you right here in this courtyard. In this lush, secluded paradise. But I don’t.”

Amelie opened her mouth to speak, although she knew the question was meaninglessly redundant.

“Why not?”

“Because, Amelie, I know something you want to know.”

Amelie, this time, did not respond.

“And you happen to know something I want to know.”

Otto overtook Amelie’s piece and rapidly stood up.

“And I know something for certain. You are a sympathetic woman.”

He brushed his hair back before placing his tall cap back on it.

“Stay right here. I will be back very soon.”

He tightened his belt a notch and turned, walking away towards a door leading into the estate.

Without even turning his head, he spoke, his hand tight on the handle to the door.

“If you attempt to run, I will have Mrs. Dubois shot. For I, unlike you, am not a sympathetic man.”

The door clicked shut behind Otto.

The silence began its tranqiul recooperation at once.

The chirping of the birds, the scent of jasmine, and the sharp rays of sun became more prevelant forces pressing on the senses of Amelie as the time seemed to slow to a glaical, agonizing slowness.

Then it was broken once again, as it so often was, by soft footsteps. Made by shoes, not boots. And certainly not ones which would be usually found on a soldiers feet.

“Hello–?”

A… Boy, or perhaps a young adolecents voice cut through the silence once more.

Amelie turned her head slowly. Standing a few feet away, hands folded behind his back, was a young adolecent wearing a brown waistcoat, simple garments, and a stark, red blindfold.

Was this the flash she had seen on the balcony? Perhaps.

His skin was rather pale, much like Otto’s, and his hair nearly the same shade.

“I heard you were in… the courtyard. I thought you might enjoy company while fa– Otto was in the house preparing his affairs.”

“I was simply seeing Otto for–“

Her breath hitched.

Perhaps it was not the best choice to be talking of confidental affairs around– whoever this was… a servant perhaps? If the occupiers even had those…

He smiled lightly. It flinched for a moment, his hands still tight behind his back, yet trembling ever so slightly.

“No worries– I don’t need to know the purpose of your affiars…”

“But– do you need anything?”

Amelie couldn’t speak.

She was at a loss for words. If she said one thing wrong, it could be the end of her and Mrs. Dubois.

The moment Dubois gave her those francs, Amelie knew that she trusted her.

“Do you mind if I sit? My legs are quite a bit weary from my– I– meant that I just need to rest for a moment…”

“Not at all…”

He took a seat across from Amelie, still with that slightly twitching smile.

“My name’s Ethan, by the way.”

He outstretched a hand.

The Occupiers truly were not that different from the French people… They spoke near-perfect french too…

Amelie took it.

“I am Amelie…”

It was ever-so-slightly damp.

She pushed aside the thought.

As she retracted her hand, a jingle rang out.

Those blasted Francs…

Ethan quickly retracted his hand.

“I– shouldn’t…”

He stuffed his hands into his pockets as his face went ever so slightly red, a sharp contrast to his paleness.

Amelie cleared her throat, in hopes of…

Doing something?

“Your f– As I was saying– Otto had called me because— He under–“

Ethan chuckled dryly.

“No– worries…”

Then the door creaked open.

Otto stood in the doorway, his face still that flat, pale, lifeless thing. His boots clicked against the cobblestone. Then he stopped.

His eyes only microscopicaly dialated.

Then, he placed his hand on his face.

“Ethan. Leave at once.”

Ethan scrambled to his feet, fumbling with the chair as it crashed to the ground.

He leaned down, grabbing the chair and pulling it upright.

With such… ease.

As he strolled towards the door, Amelie overheard him mumbling.

Counting up from 1…

“1…”

“2…”

“3…”

Then he simply approached towards the door which Otto had came through and grasped the handle tightly. On his first try.

Without even feeling for it…

The door clicked behind Ethan.

Such a strange boy. He must have lived here quite some time to know how to navigate so well without his sight…

Otto sat onto the chair with a creak of metal under his weight.

“I see you’ve met Ethan.”

“He was– nice…”

She hitched in the middle of saying it. As if she wanted to say a word stronger than “nice”, or possibly simply retract what she had said

“I assume, as I know Ethan’s– unique persona quite well– You likely know his relation to me.”

Amelie froze.

She certainly did not.

“Nevermind, Amelie.”

Otto didn’t give her even a second to think.

He grabbed a piece, the queen to be precise, and shifted it across the board, cornering Amelie’s king.

“I have my reasons for calling you here. But for today, your presence is no longer needed, for the Reich has its plans, and the sun is setting. Now, go to your–“

He stopped suddenly, becoming slightly more pale.

He rubbed his chin for a moment.

“I have forgotten– You do not have a home. But perhaps, you could stay here? I have a guest room.”

Amelie did not reply.

However, she was certainly not frozen.

“N–“

“I will give you the pleasure of choice, however, I know not whether you will want to indulge in it, for the sun has finally left the sky.”

Amelie did not resist.

She stood up, the sun finally faded from the sky, and sighed.

There was never a “choice”.

Otto seemed to vanish beyond the door.

Amelie followed him, detached from her movements. Focused solely on her situation.

On its… unique state

And as the world bathed itself in the embrace of shadow, Amelie entered the house, filled with a dimming, orange, warm light.

A small wooden table sat in the middle, sitting at it was Ethan, shuffling through a deck of cards, feeling on their brailed surfaces, mumbling something about “Queens”, “Jacks” and “Kings”.

Amelie averted her gaze, Otto’s sharp glare in her peripheral vision slicing through what little curiosity remained in her soul.

Now there only remained one, singular purpose.

“The affairs shall be attended to the coming morning. Get some rest. The Reich has no time for burning moonlight or risking our lives in the field with that… predatorial monster on the horizon.”

Predatorial… perhaps The Occupiers did not speak perfect French after all…

The thumping of boots filled Amelie’s ears. Otto opened the window and shouted something in German.

The boots suddenly stopped.

Another shout, from outside.

Otto replied in german.

Then the boots started again, faster than before.

Much faster…

Amelie looked at Otto, bent over the sink, filling a shaking glass with water from the tap.

She caught a glance of a luger pistol snug in his holster.

An image which shattered her moment of trust in this all-but-entirely hostile world

As Amelie took a seat, Otto leaned his head back and drank the glass in one gulp.

He rubbed his gloved hand over his stubble, wiping away the excess water, and groaned.

Amelie heard Otto grunt under his breath.

“I can’t keep doing this… Not anymore Le–“

Then he stopped.

His head turned with a glacial slowness.

He caught a glance of Amelie, sitting there, staring at him with an aqkward gaze while eavesdropping.

“Get upstairs, Amelie. Your blasted ears will get no more pleasurable sustinence tonight.”

Amelie crawled to her feet at a glacial pace, reaching down to grab her Bible, which she had been carrying in her pocket this entire time since her… expulsion.

Otto glared at her. She fumbled with the Bible, it slipping from her sweat-soaked grasp.

Ethan laid his hands on the table, focused away from his game now.

Amelie heard him mumbling something.

But it was inaudiable.

“GO!”

Otto’s face was slightly red now, his fingers curled into fists.

Ethan looked up from the cards which he had locked his face to moment earlier. His face now angled directly at Otto.

He lay a hand on the table.

“F– Otto. Please. Give her a moment.”

Amelie sighed in relief before quickly dropping her Bible.

It clunked to the floor with a loud crack as it hit the tiled floor. Amelie looked at it.

She could not risk it.

She rushed for the stairs, her hand tight around the handle.

“First door on the left! Don’t come back down until the sun has risen!”

Amelie quickly rose the stairs, placing her hand on the first door to the left.

As she pushed open the door, a thought came to mind.

For how long would she be trapped here? As long as in the Cathedral?

A tear slowly fell down her face as she saw the cramped room.

Not of her present situation.

Not that she was trapped again.

But that it only brought her a wave of nostalga

She felt the cloth bedding engulf her as she fell onto it.

Despite its comfort, despite the clutching of her eyes sealed, despite the serene silence, despite the sweet, comforting scent of jasmine, she could not fall asleep.

Her eyes peeled open slowly, tears welling in their depths.

Then she covered her face, as she heard those same shoes from the courtyard clicking on the floor. Ascending the stairs.

Probably going to the room on the right…

So many years she had been entrapped in that prison.

That safe cage.

Only to enter another?

She had, for all her many years in the Cathedral, dreamed of this outside world.

The occupation was more brutal than she had thought.

The war still raged outside France.

The horrible flag still reigned high over Virtue.

The Occupiers had no Innocence.

They could not.

They were monsters.

Killers.

And no matter how much she hoped they did.

She knew the truth.

Nor did she dream of the outside world any longer.

She only dreamed of a life inside the cage.