La Pute

4

"There are no allies, Florence."

"The faces you see here are nothing but masks of those that are afraid, those that prowl, or those that are full of despair."

Lying on the bed, Florence returned to the moment when Vauquelin had said those words. She knew well enough the meaning behind them, but not what he wanted to tell her. There had never been a time when she looked at others with longing or trust, not even the ones that looked at her and called her 'sister'. Her existence alone was invisible, all the while in plain sight. Eyes that saw through the mist.

She flipped around the photograph in her hands and ran her finger over the image of a woman.

"Claire Fontaine. 31 years old. Graduated from a police academy in Paris."

Florence raised an eyebrow. She had never seen the woman in Marseille before.

"She's new in town. Nosy." From the brief explanation Florence could tell right away what Vauquelin wanted. He wanted the woman wiped from the face of the earth. She looked at the picture of the brown-haired woman again, taking in the simplicity of her features; earthly tones with nothing that stood out about them. What a pitiful woman, she thought to herself, not because of her fate but for her semblence. It reminded Florence of herself.

Publicly the leader of Le Cœur was Jean-Baptiste Maxence, an orphan born and raised in Marseille and the face of the lower class. Florence had never met him, but once saw him on TV during one of the protests he organized. As if to draw attention to his peasently background, he wore ragged, brown-colored clothing with large holes here and there, worn-out boots and a grey hat. His face was no different; wrinkled like that of a man twenty years his senior. The crowds screamed his name into the camera, followed by chants that Florence had never heard of.

Because none of it really had anything to do with Le Cœur.

Behind the backs on the protesters, in the dark, was Vauquelin de Chiel, the one that really held the Heart on his palm. Seven years ago he appeared in Marseille on a containership and brought death into the city. Not just any death, but the violent kind. He bought a small office on the business district and from there on his activities remained a mystery.

If Florence were to guess, Vauquelin had never met Maxence either. This contradiction was what initially confused Florence as well, and even today she would remain oblivious to the truth, had Vauquelin not shed light on the matter.

"Maxence? Isn't he entertaining?" Vauquelin tapped the side of the television and smiled faintly. As it turned out, Maxence did represent Le Cœur, but even he didn't know about the true scale at which it operated. He didn't know anything. He simply decided that he was the right man to claim the title and take to the streets - and so he did. Lucky for him, people accepted him and thus, Maxence's lie became reality.

"He already sleeps with one eye open, waiting for the man he is posing as to come claim his glory. It would be a pity to end it now", Vauquelin sighed. His reasoning was unusually impulsive, yet so like him.