Dinner was an adequate but awkward affair at Château Abois that evening. Alexandre du Chêne was entertaining two unwelcome guests: the minister of the interior and the undersecretary of the treasury. Du Chêne adjourned the dinner party to the library at the earliest opportunity. A minimum of lamps were lit and he walked the clean, albeit bare, path between the rooms briskly; but it was plain that the castle was fast approaching the tipping point between picturesque and uninhabitable.
The library was one of few rooms retaining its splendor and complete furnishings; it was one of fewer that was structurally sound and had been wired for electricity. The unnatural light caught the many birds of paradise adorning the room. Du Chêne poured three digestifs and distributed them before the minister and undersecretary were even fully settled in their seats.
“Now, messieurs,” he said, making them flinch with the unabashedly antidemocratic form of address, “what is your business here?”
The minister cleared his throat, shifted uncomfortably, took a sip from his glass- paused to savor the unexpectedly good quality of his drink, giving it an appreciative glance- and addressed his words more or less to his host’s knees. “Not to speak indelicately-“
Du Chêne interrupted him with a laugh. “Please, minister. Your presence here is already indelicate enough. Come to the point.”
He pursed his lips before continuing. “Very well, Citoyen du Chêne. I have been sent to obtain the Bird of Paradise on behalf of the Republic.”
Du Chêne thrust out his jaw and glared frostily at the man. “I suspected as much,” he muttered. “How dare you demand my family’s most precious heirloom?”
“On the contrary, Citoyen, this is an offer, not a demand. The diamond is intimately connected to your family, it is true- however, like anything else of our heritage in the Republic, it ought to not merely belong to one man, but to all. We will, of course, compensate you for your, shall we say, guardianship of the Bird of Paradise.”
“I see no reason why it shouldn’t continue in my- guardianship, to use your euphemism for personal property,” du Chêne bit out, normally warm brown eyes growing hard. “It is priceless. Even if I wished to sell it- which I emphatically do not– the Republic is incapable of fairly compensating me.”
“I don’t see that you hold a strong position to bargain from,” the undersecretary sneered, with a significant wave of his fingers that indicated the dilapidated castle. “And your family has an unfortunate habit of mislaying this diamond every few generations. It would be safer with the Republic.”
Du Chêne glowered at him. “The Bird of Paradise has been in my family for centuries, ever since it was given to Queen Amélie- given to my direct ancestor.
“This Republic disgusts me. You chase my family to this old ruin. You declare us citizens- but we can never be citizens, because we were kings! I cannot earn a living like my fellow citizens, for no one will employ me out of fear of being branded a royalist. I know the government buys up the property we sell. You think you can take the Bird of Paradise next? You’re outrageously mistaken. George will see to your needs if you’ll be remaining the night. Bonne nuit, messieurs.”
Du Chêne did not wait to see if the men rose before he strode from the room, although he suspected they democratically kept their seats. He hoped that, left to their own devices, they would pile into their smart black car and drive away. Face white and set, he took a torch in hand, pulled on a pair of wellingtons, and navigated across unused swathes of the castle, sometimes climbing over the rubble of collapsed walls.
Medieval engineers had strategically built Château Abois on the highest accessible foothill of impassable mountains, commanding an excellent view of the broad plain to the south. Du Chêne exited through one of its back doors. With the ease that comes of much practice, he scaled the cliff-like face of the overshadowing mountain until he reached a small ledge. The rock behind it had a small aperture, low enough so as to be invisible from below.
He crouched down and scuttled sideways into the cave’s narrow mouth, like a crab- the easiest movement when one’s neck is brushing one’s knees. His left hand grasped the torch while his right balanced his awkward weight. Not three feet into the cave, the need for wellingtons became apparent: the floor consisted of shallow pools and particularly adhesive mud.
Proceeding in this fashion, the faint outline of the entrance was soon lost behind him. The utter darkness and the weight of the mountain seemed to take on physical force; the chilly, wet air moved unwillingly into his lungs. The enclosed space produced weird echoes of his movements, punctuated by intermittent drips of water. Every so often du Chêne forgot himself, unbent his knees a trifle too much, and scraped his back unpleasantly against the damp ceiling. After some minutes, he arrived in a broader, but not higher, chamber; splashing to a small boulder that had split nearly down the middle, he reached into its crevice. With a squelch, he tugged out a dripping, mud-encrusted sack, about the right size to hold a workman’s lunch.
Du Chêne pressed ahead, and the cave narrowed for many yards; then, he emerged into the biggest chamber yet- by no means of generous proportions, but large enough for him to stiffly stand upright and clamber atop the slippery bank of mud to his right. Fumbling slightly, he thrust his free hand into the sack and withdrew in his fist a blue diamond of breathtaking clarity and size, a dazzling, glittering globe that was inexplicably unstained by any smear of mud, despite how the substance permeated the sack and coated his hand.
He turned off his torch and stood waiting in the pitch darkness. As if it had held the light in reserve, the diamond sparked to life, little specks like falling stars chasing each other inside it. From his outstretched hand, the Bird of Paradise slowly rose into the air, the light intensifying, leaving the diamond and extending like feathers from wings unfurled. It coalesced into a woman with raven locks and a gown strongly reminiscent of her namesake’s plumage. The Apus was lit from within, and her aura gently washed the chamber in the cool tones of the night sky. At her every motion, her dress rustled and moved in the manner of a bird’s feathers, like an integral part of her, flashing as though it were embedded with living stars.
The transformation took no more than a minute. Her feet were not visible, and she left no footprints in the mud, even though she appeared to stand on the cave floor. Her beauty was cool and flawless, like the diamond from which she had emerged; du Chêne shuddered slightly, to think that at her heart was nothing but that diamond. Her eyes were its color exactly, pale and crystalline blue, shining as the stars out of which the diamond was rumored to have fallen.
“Bonsoir, Alexandre.”
Her voice rang in perfectly pure tones. It was all he could do to resist the urge to fall on his knees and grovel before her in the mud. Instead, he replied, “Madame Apus.”
“You look troubled, mon chèr,” she observed, shifting and moving her neck to look at him in a way that was indescribably avian, favoring one eye.
“The Republic has realized I’m destitute, save for you. They’ve offered me the carrot. When they tire of that, they’ll employ the stick. I’ll be the last whimper of a royal bloodline. The Bird of Paradise has been the symbol of my family’s magnificence for four hundred years.” His breath hung in the air as trailing wisps, warm moisture caught in cold, lit by the brilliance of the Apus.
“This would grieve me, as I see it does you. Have you reconsidered my offer?”
Alexandre du Chêne gave a short laugh and looked to the side, eyes fastening on the water droplets that clung to a stalactite, sparkling in the light of this ethereal creature. He licked his lips. “You promise me wealth and power and success?”
“Yes. These things will cling to your hand like the mud of this cave clings at this moment. I have grown surpassingly strong, resting in the mountain.”
He flexed his right hand- the mud was indeed strangely viscous. “My grandfather went to the guillotine,” he said accusingly.
She seemed to rustle faintly; her dress fluffed and her eyes flashed. “They could not even sense me. Not everyone in your line has been blue-blooded.” She nodded towards his hands, and he extended them, rotating them so that his upturned wrists escaped from his cuffs. His veins shone in their own right, brimming with a light that answered hers. “You have the strength to carry me, if that is your wish. You will never again be alone or helpless.”
“And then, when I die, the Bird of Paradise will be found on my chest, after going missing for a lifetime,” he murmured, recalling the strange legends of his family. He breathed deeply and drew himself up straight. “My only other recourse is to capitulate to a government that hunted and murdered my family.” He made a small, tight jerk of his head. “I prefer your offer. I’m ready.”
She bowed from the waist and burned brighter, relinquishing her human form to once again become a floating diamond, lit by its own internal flecks of starlight. Slowly, the blue diamond began to transform- a bit of pink here, a little dark red there, and a strip of glistening ivory across the two. Du Chêne groaned, torch falling to the mud as his hands clutched his chest. He tore open his shirt and looked down, transfixed by fascinated horror as the blue light grew stronger in his chest and weaker in the diamond- a diamond no longer, for it was rapidly taking on the qualities of a mass of heart, and lung, and bone. He gave a final, stuttering gasp.
The cave was filled by the blaze of blinding light that enveloped his body. The blaze receded; the ball of tissues so lately residing in Alexandre du Chêne’s chest fell to the mud with a wet thlop. Two eyes flashed starlight blue in the darkness, and where once a man had stood, a bird of paradise took to wing, an ethereal voice whispering in his mind:
“Bonsoir, Alexandre. Let me make you a king.”