Chapter 35: XXXV:

Estella had been on trains before. Any time she left the village of Saint Tourre with Matthieu they took the train because he didn’t drive. “Don’t trust cars,” he’d said.”Worse than a horse and cart in my opinion.”

The train she was currently on with Oliver was not so different from the regional line that picked them up back home. The basic design is still the same: passenger, lounger, plus the sleepers. Thankfully, Oliver was able to secure them a private room with bench seats for her to lie down on. On another day she’d stare out the window and make conversation. Today, however, she simply wanted to lie out on the bench seat and sleep.

And she did.

“Tickets, please.” A low, gruff voice demanded. The unexpected noise roused Estella but she didn’t move to sit up. Oliver can deal with the man, she thought.

He must have done just that because the next noise over the jostling of the train was the rustling of clothing in the low light of the carriage.

“Yes, of course.” Oliver replied softly.

“Carry on,” the man said and the soft closing of the door followed next.

She could hear Oliver shuffle around. Sit down, perhaps? But he didn’t attempt to speak to her. Estella tried to fall back asleep, to let the sway of the train lull her again but the movement now only served to wake her up more. Huffing, she rolled her head over to look at her companion.

He gave her a wry smile, “No luck, huh?”

“Non,” she grunted.

He clasped his hands together and asked with an amused smile, “How are you feeling now?”

How was she feeling? With her hands, Estella started to gently poke and prod her abdomen. She certainly felt sore and tired but as she probed she noticed that the pain wasn’t quite so searing when encouraged. A sharp wince tore through her when she touched the most delicate part of the wound though. Still definitely painful then, she thought.

“If I can avoid errant elbows I think I shall live.”

In the dim room Estella could still make out some dark emotion flashing across Oliver’s features as his hands clenched. She thought to ask about it but looked to the window instead, afraid the question might lead them down a road she didn’t want to travel.

Outside the night landscape rolled by. She sighed at the passage of hours, aware that she had lost many. Gingerly she sat up, stretching her legs to rest on the bench opposite next to her new—old?—friend.

“Are you going to be up for a while?” he asked.

“I think so.”

He leaned against the backrest. “I’ve been thinking and I have some questions.”

Estella snorted. Of course he has. A half-breed, time traveling vampire practically walked into his life and was mortally wounded too. She’d have questions too if she was him. One doesn’t find themselves with a young woman who you from the future and not have questions.

Squaring her shoulders, she nodded for him to continue.

“Where are you from?” She blinked at him, stunned. “Sometimes when you speak, I think I hear an accent but other times, it’s near flawless.”

“Oh. Well.” That wasn’t what she expected.

“It’s just that, maybe we could get some help where you’re from. If you’re a witch, then maybe someone back in your community could help you.”

“Oh. Well.” Really, she ought to be able to form a more intelligent string of words but his line of thought was so disjointed from her own that she felt totally disconnected from the conversation.

“My guess was that you’re an incredibly well taught European, definitely upper crust I’d think.”

He wasn’t completely off the mark. She cleared her throat. “I was raised in France since I was twelve. Yes, rather privileged.” Okay, maybe very privileged wealth wise. “Before that, I lived in Georgia with my grandparents in a tiny house tucked into the woods.” She definitely wasn’t wealthy then, but comfortable enough.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

“Georgia like the country?...”

She fought a smile. “Like the southern state.”

“So you are American then.”

“Yes, but my accent when speaking English was much more pronounced when I was younger. My grandparents were immigrants and I’d developed a very mixed French-Italian accent. I’ve had to practice it over the years.” Theodora made her.

“I assume you speak French and Italian?”

“Both. Fluently.”

Oliver smiled. “And English. That’s great. I’ve never learned a second language.”

Interesting, she thought, he’d spoken French to her at Saint Tourre. Estella thought about reassuring him that he will one day learn another language but decided against it. If Oliver now wanted to learn French it would be his own choice, not because of who he will be.

“Given the news lately, France, I think, is out of the question. Or least a last resort.”

Estella nodded. She’d seen the date in the newspaper: August 28th, 1939. Today was August 29th and it would soon turn over to August 30th. She didn’t know the exact timeline of the war. She knew it broke out in 1939. That Poland fell first. She knew France would declare war in September 1939. And she knew France was invaded in May 1940. Of course, she also knew it wouldn’t end until 1945. Of course, if you asked those who survived, like Matthieu, they might tell you they kept fighting that war for years after Hitler died. “Just because the enemy was gone doesn't mean the shadow of them went away,” Matthieu had told her about the war.

When her country is invaded, her family will scatter. Jacques will go to Paris and pass messages and secure passage. “Never was a fighter,” he’d told her with a shrug. Theodora will “take no prisoners,” which she always said with a secretive smile that Estella knew meant certain death. And Matthieu…Matthieu didn’t really talk about the war. He had provided aid on the Western Front and that was all he would say about it. What “aid” meant she wasn’t certain but she hadn’t wanted to push him.

Hadn’t wanted to bother him, really. That was always the thing with Matthieu, no matter how good their relationship was, she had felt a bit like her existence was a bit of a nightmare for him, a constant haunting reminder that his daughter had lived but chose to do so without him. That fact haunted her too and was why she knew she wouldn’t stop trying to get home until she either did just that or died trying.

Despite the invasion, Saint Tourre will still stand. Perhaps…

“I could send a letter. Maybe someone will go home or be at Jacques’s law office and read it and send advice. That’s what my family does, you know. Advise people.”

“It is? Who is your family?”

“We’re—” She hadn’t told him this earlier, she realized. She hadn’t lied, no really. She didn’t know who she was here. “Or, I will be a part of the Saint Tourre family. The keepers, you know, of knowledge and whatnot.”

Oliver’s upper lip curled slightly. “I don’t know what that means.”

She said nothing. There was nothing to say. The idea that someone didn’t know her family was so surprising that it literally took her breath away. In a quiet voice, she asked “You don’t know what Saint Tourre is?”

Jacques had told her once that the Americas were like the Wild West they see in the movie. Hardly any oversight and remote enough from the Commission that unless someone intentionally brought a violation to their attention the creature there lived in relative obscurity.

“No.”

“Do you know what the Commission is?”

That made him straighten up. “What does the Commission have to do with Saint Tourre and your family?”

“My family can serve as a sort of middleman or counselor between people and the Commission. Represent them even to try to get the Commission to see reason. Like their position on humans knowing about vampires. There are historical examples of peaceful co-existence between the two groups and even romantic relationships. Plus it endangers the social network of witch communities. The black and white picture they paint now…it wasn’t always like that.”

“Why did it change?”

She shrugged, “It depends but most people—or most supernatural creatures who bother to study history, which isn’t many—point to the age of persecution as the shift. It changed the balance. Sure, there were parts of our lives better in the dark, like blood drinking. But the magique, the speed, and strength. These were things that we didn’t need to hide. They were a benefit even.”

“That doesn’t sound real, Estella.”

She laughed, “Tell that to the people who lived it.”

He fell silent after that and stayed that way so long she thought he’d given up on the conversation. Turning back to the window, Estella let her thoughts naturally wander from her studies to her family. They had been the focal point of her entire life. When it wasn’t Jacques, Matthieu, and Theodora, it had been Marguerite and Timoteo who had formed her.

“You think they’d respond to a letter?” His voice was so low Estella almost missed it over the sound of the train.

“It is what they do: help people. But still, they are probably not home.” She smiled wryly, thinking of Theodora. “They were busy during this time.”

“And if they don’t respond?”

“Saint Tourre still has resources that I can use. I suppose I will have to find my way there—should I need to.”

Oliver quickly shook his head to indicate that her thought was was a bad idea. “You know better than I do what is to come but I don’t think it looks safe, Estella.”

She didn’t respond, he was right, of course. He took her silence as confirmation of that fact. “What about Georgia? You said your grandparents live there.”

It was a good question. What about Georgia? Her grandparents wouldn’t be there yet. But maybe…

“I can think of some people I could reach out to who might be able to help me.”

“A letter writing campaign then?”

“Do you have any other ideas?”

“Not a one.”