Love at Dawn

21.Nightmare of Edith's

Edith found herself walking down alone the empty streets of Paris.

The silence in the dead of night enveloped her like a thick fog, and the only sound she could hear was the echo of her footsteps. The usually fearless young girl clutched her cloak tightly around her shoulders, her nerves on edge - the city was eerily quiet, as if Paris had been deserted and she was the only one left.

Finally, a clamour could be heard from the other end of the street. It grew louder and louder as a horde of lower-class masses approached, carrying torches and singing boisterously to the tune of Carmagnole. At the head of the procession, a man was surrounded by the crowd, holding high a long wooden stake in triumph. At the top of the stake was a noblewoman's head.

Edith had a feeling of déjà vu at this scene. Whose pale and beautiful head was that? Was it the miracle angel from under the bridge by the Seine?

As the crowd drew near, Edith's eyes widened in terror. She recognised her most familiar features: it was Charlene Saint-Clemont's head.

Her bestie's almond eyes looking down at her from the top of the stake had lost their luster, and her mouth was widely open like a black hole. Her face was covered in messy pale-coloured hair that was soaked with dark blood. The expression left on her face at the moment of her death was half-horror, half-sorrow.

As the man leading the charge passed by Edith, he maliciously turned Charlene's face towards her and manipulated the wooden stake like a puppeteer, moving the stake up and down, making the surrounding crowd burst out into a guffaw.

By the light of the torches, Edith recognised the man's face with his messy beard. It was exactly the avenger who had tried to take her life the day before.

Edith's head spun dizzily, and something surged up her throat. Instinctively, she ran in the opposite direction until the taste of rust filled her mouth, until the tears of fear and anger froze on her face from the icy wind, until she thought she had left the city of Paris behind, yet still she couldn't stop.

But why still couldn't she see the end of the street?

She was suddenly tripped by something on the ground. The gravel tore her dress, leaving bloody prints on her palms.

Yet she couldn't care less about the pain - at the moment she turned around, she recognised the body that had tripped her.

Even with messy black hair covering almost her entire face, she could still see the horror in her sister Margot's eyes before she died. Her clothes were in disarray. It was clear she had suffered brutal abuse by the soldiers.

"Margot!" She screamed in despair.

Terrified, the girl did not dare to approach. She staggered to her feet and instinctively turned to continue running, but was once again tripped by a corpse nearby - this time it was Aunt Adele, her short and elderly body lying next to a puddle.

It was until then that she noticed the darkness around her was piled up with dead bodies. There were too many faces she was familiar with: the Desmoulins lying intertwined with their bodies already cold, and Philippe's temple, pierced by a bullet, oozing thick, dark blood profusely...

Edith wanted to scream, but her throat seemed to be strangled and no single sound came out. She wanted to run, but her legs felt rooted to the spot, only able to cover her open mouth with both hands and make fits of despairing gasps.

She smelled a strong smell of blood. Was it from her own throat, or from these unfortunate dead?

Neither. She lifted her head to see a guillotine on the square in front of her. The black and red blood kept dripping from the edge of the raised platform, gathering on the ground to form a scarlet stream, flowing towards her feet rapidly as if it had gained life.