Hey everyone, H&D here with her newest story. Now, let me tell you, if I ever get a story of mine published, this will be it. I am working horribly hard to make sure this story is completely and totally accurate and I really would like your input. If anyone out there notices a mistake, please let me know so I can take a note of it. This story is a mass of work and although this is just a pilot chapter to see if the idea flies well, I still would love to hear from all of you. Criticisms and Comments are totally welcome.

Now then, the warning. This story's main coupling is two men (yes, I know...but I do love writing slash fics) so if you cannot handle that, then please don't read. Also, if you cannot handle very lurid descriptions of war and death, please do not read (although I will warn you as to which chapters such audacities will occur). This story is angst before romance, so please, PLEASE do not flame me with complaints of the story being too downbeat and all around depressing. Yes, there is romance...fluffy and happy romance but it is often shadowed by the thoughts and images of war.

Now that I have completely depressed you all, shall we get started? Okay, here it is...enjoy.

The Victim's Ball

Chapter One: Le Conte

Five years prior, there had been a massacre. A Queen turned on her people and thus streams of blood flowed from her womb. They committed no crimes other then the complete and total disregard for human existence. They committed no crimes other then absolute selfishness and avarice toward their fellow man. Thus they received their just rewards.

Every year, there is a gathering, known only as the "Victim's Ball" where those who lost loved ones to the blade of the Queen come together. They gather and tell their tales. The ball was held on a dark, Sunday Eve (perfect for such a macabre event) and as each person entered, it was clear it would be a night of tears and remembrance. The attendees would wear their hair up and their collars down, revealing the naked flesh of their necks. The atmosphere in the room was nothing short of gothic, with people dressed in blacks and reds. There was no laughter...only the quiet mumble of storytellers spinning their various tales to whomever would listen.

He walked into the room, removing his cloak to reveal messy, raven black hair. His icy blue gaze scanned the room, looking from face to face, the agony and pain contorted into a false smile that each of them wore. He never really understood why these people gathered like they did. To gather to remember such a horrific and obscene period in his nation's history was not savory. And the fact that the war was still raging made him ill inside.

He pushed his spectacles higher up on his nose and walked into the room, taking an empty seat near a cathedral window. It had been ten years since he set foot in a church, ten years since he denounced God and all of Christianities teachings. A small smirk appeared on his soft and innocent face. God, he thought to himself, such a waste. He gazed out the window, eyes long since clouded by the vision of bloodshed, looking for some kind of happiness in the storm. He pulled a tarnished pocket watch from his jacket and opened it. It had long since stopped ticking. Five years in fact. A single tear ran down his cheek. It read the time that his lover was taken by the blade of his queen.

"May I sit, monsieur?" She asked, a lady with eyes soft as a doe's. He slammed his watch closed and gestured for her to take a seat, "Thank you, Monsieur..."

"Pelletier," He said, looking up at her, not taking the time to wipe his eyes, "Clarion Pelletier."

"What a lovely name..." she said, reclining in the chair, her strawberry hair falling around her peachy face in ringlets, "May I ask Monsieur Pelletier-"

"Clarion will do, my dear," he said, looking back down at his watch, not opening it.

"Clarion," she repeated, "May I inquire as to whose photograph is in your pocket watch?"

"No," he said, head falling to shame, "I beg you not to ask of him...for such a crime I committed, such a devious plot and scheme I committed against my beloved, I will never utter his name..."

She cocked her head, "But sir, you do not look like a malicious creature. How could you have wronged someone so to anger La Guillotine so badly?"

"I never said I angered her, mademoiselle, do not be so quick to judge..." Clarion said, his luscious and enthralling blue eyes meeting hers, "Let us just leave it at I went against God's will and thus I received my punishment." She smiled a warm smile, leaning forward, grabbing his hand.

"Was he a nobleman?" she asked, so simply yet the accuracy of it dumbstruck Clarion to the point of those beautiful sapphire pools to be raging with shock.

"How could you know that?" he said softly and she giggled a girlish giggle before shrugging.

"For some reason, you seem like the type who would go for a nobleman. And if you do not mind my prying, kind sir, may I inquire as to which of the three orders you were from?"

Clarion leaned back in his chair, flicking his pocket watch open again and staring, slamming it shut once more. He shook his head, his messy, midnight shaded hair falling lifelessly in front of his eyes, making his mysterious demeanor more enticing. A stranger joined their table, curious as to what was happening. As people began to see more and more of their kind sitting down at the young man's table, Clarion felt that he had might as well tell answer her questions and thus maybe spark someone else to tell a tale of woe and bloodshed.

"The first order, Mademoiselle, I was a clergyman...heir to my father's grand estate and all of his funds and his title. I was a priest, actually and once my father and mother died, I was forced to raise my sister of which I am five years her younger..." he reached into his robes and pulled out a small, black, leather bound book in which pictures were flooding out of, "here she is..." he said, pointing to a picture of a girl who looked near identical to her brother, yet her eyes were not as vibrant and historical, "Her name was Jacqueline Pelletier...my older and only sibling..." He ran a hand over her face and then closed the book. The lady in which he was speaking to original rubbed one of his hands gingerly.

"Did she pass, Monsieur?" a stranger to Clarion asked and then he realized that he knew none of those people yet, the connection of their individual lost lovers and loved ones alike, made him continue speaking, although he knew what it would bring.

"In my eyes, she is dead," he said, running a finger across the tarnished gold of his pocket watch, "I believe, in reality, she lives in Paris, still, she couldn't leave our home. I suppose she sees me as dead as well, for our hearts were both taken by the same gentleman...did she take his? Or did I? She believes she did because she has a ring to prove it...I believe I did because only once did they make love and it was forced to consummate a false marriage. We made love everyday, more then once if he so desired..." Clarion had no idea why he was speaking and noticing the mortified looks of some of the faces of his listeners, he almost felt it necessary to censor his story.

But he couldn't. He wasn't speaking to them anymore. He was vocalizing his memories of his one true love...to visualize what he once had before his queen stripped him of everything he held dear. Clarion gazed around the room and sighed, opening his pocket watch, looking at it slightly, not noticing or caring if the people sitting behind him gazed upon his lover's face.

"You all came here tonight to hear tales of tragedy, did you not?" Some people nodded, others grunted in agreement and others muttered obscenities of how they should leave him and his tales of debauchery and move on to more wholesome tales of misery, but Clarion did not care. He cleared his throat and stared into the deer eyes of the young woman who approached him in the beginning.

"My name is Clarion Pelletier. I was a member of the Clergy since my birth in 1773. Twenty five years past. My first memories of my childhood come to me in mid 1775, when I was merely an infant of two," he leaned back and looked from face to face, trying to find some spark of captivation and to his surprise, each and every person had their eyes glued to him...waiting for him to continue. He smirked and began his tale. A tale of love and loss. A tale of God and Sodomy. A tale of romance and tragedy...

"My father was a well off member of the First order, and like I said prior...when I was of two years, my father took me to the coronation of King Louis XVI, where the king himself kissed my forehead with his large, fish like lips. And honestly, good people of this ball, I do believe that coronation is where la Revolution begins..."

Okay, woot!! Its finally done! Pilot Chapter, tell me what you think. Ciao!