Chapter 2
The silence between them stretched longer than the span of a breath. Julian did not look away, nor did he invite the boy to sit. The white linen table remained a physical boundary between two entirely different centuries, separated only by the width of a mahogany tray.
Leo didn't flinch at the rejection. He had heard variations of those three words in every doorway from the Gare du Nord to the steps of the Palais de Chaillot. He shifted his weight, his worn-out canvas shoes crunching slightly against the gravel border of the terrace. With deliberate slowness, he raised the carved wooden flute to his lips. There was no hesitation in his posture, no performative flourish meant to beg for sympathy. He simply breathed in, closing his eyes against the cold glare of the electric candles flickering in their glass cylinders.
The first note was low, reedy, and slightly flat, cutting sharply through the murmur of polite conversation two tables away. It sounded like wind whistling through a narrow attic window during a winter gale. Julian’s hand, hovering inches from his water glass, stopped. The silver tines of his fork vibrated faintly against the edge of the porcelain plate as the second note joined the first, winding into a mournful, forgotten melody that smelled faintly of woodsmoke and damp earth. It was a tune from the eastern provinces, the kind old men played on benches while watching the hay burn down to ash.
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A few patrons turned their heads, their irritation softening into curiosity, then fading back into their wine glasses as they realized the music was coming from a child who looked like he had crawled out from under a bridge. But Julian remained motionless. His eyes narrowed, the heavy skin beneath them tightening as the small wooden instrument sang in the damp night air. The tune wasn't complex—just six notes, repeated and bent like wire—yet it hit a nerve deep inside the chest, beneath the wool and silk, where things had been buried for a very long time.
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