The Dark Queen

by Susan Carroll

  Ariane frowned. “Yes, assuming Le Vis is still alive. But what good would the ring do either one of them? They would have no idea what to do with it unless—”

  Ariane froze. Unless they took the ring to Catherine. There was no telling what she might be able to do with such a dangerous weapon.

  But there was no sense terrifying herself by conjuring up some alarming scenario. The important thing was to get word to Renard, warn him at once. Leaving Gabrielle to comfort Miri, Ariane hastened downstairs, preparing to send for Toussaint.

  As she descended to the great hall, she was startled to discover she had a visitor. Marie Claire paced anxiously, looking far from her usual placid self.

  The older woman looked exceedingly grave as she embraced Ariane. Ariane did not even bother with the pretense of greeting. She blurted out, “My God, Marie, what is it?”

  “Word at last. From Paris.” Marie Claire handed Ariane a folded note, her mouth so grim that Ariane did not even need to read her eyes to know that the tidings must be dire.

  She hesitated to take the note, uncertain how much more bad news she could handle. But she steeled her spine, accepting the paper and unfolding it while Marie Claire explained, “That message arrived by carrier pigeon this morning written in our own code, which I fancied so secret. That is my translation of it.”

  Ariane anxiously scanned the ink lines, written in Marie Claire’s elegant hand, but as Ariane read further, it was obvious that the words, icy, arrogant, menacing, emanated from another quarter entirely.

  Greetings to my dear Marie Claire and the Lady of Faire Isle,

  Much as I have enjoyed our recent intrigues, there comes a time when all games must end. I have come into possession of a certain ring, which has enabled me to lure the Comte de Renard to Paris. He will soon be in my grasp, far sooner than you will ever be able to prevent him from walking into my trap. Never fear. At this juncture, all I intend to do is lodge him comfortably in the Bastille.

  I believe you can guess what my price will be for releasing him. I want those gloves, my dear Ariane. You will bring them to me or else your Renard will suffer a far worse fate than the one I meted out to Louise Lavalle and Hermoine Pechard. My good friend Le Vis would be quite astonished. It seems that witches don’t float after all.

  Trusting that we will bring this distressing enmity between us to a satisfactory conclusion.

  The note was signed simply . . . Catherine.

  Ariane let the parchment fall from her hands. She raised her eyes to Marie Claire and saw her own stricken expression mirrored there.

  “Louise and Madame Pechard—”

  “Dead, by this account,” she said hoarsely. “You were right. I should never have sent Louise to spy.” Marie Claire rallied with a wan smile. “But I have many days ahead to don my hair shirt and do penance with my rosary beads. Right now we must decide what is to be done about Renard.”

  “What is there to decide? I must go to Paris.”

  “We should not be hasty. Perhaps this is all a hoax.”

  “I have other reasons to believe it is true.” Ariane swiftly told Marie Claire about the missing ring.

  Marie Claire continued to look dubious. “But could Catherine use the ring to summon him, by pretending she was you? Could Renard be that easily fooled?”

  “I don’t know,” Ariane murmured. “But even if he wasn’t, if someone else used my ring, he would assume that I was in danger.”

  “And go charging to your rescue even if he risked walking into a trap?”

  “Yes, that is exactly what he would do. Trust me, Marie, I know the man so well—” Ariane stumbled to a halt, realizing what she was saying. She did know Renard. His strength, his courage, his willingness to die for her, and yes, how much he loved her.

  What a fool she had been to have ever sent him away. Pray God she would have time enough to mend things with him. But she needed to leave for Paris and at once.

  Marie Claire trailed after her. “And so you will walk into a trap as well.”

  “If I must to save him. Facing Catherine is the only way to end all this, Marie. Perhaps it always has been.”

  “Then I am going with you.”

  “No, Marie. If something does go wrong, you will be needed here on Faire Isle.”

  “But you cannot propose going alone.”

  “She won’t. I am going with her.” Gabrielle’s voice rang out.

  “And me!”

  Ariane raised her eyes to the musician’s gallery, dismayed to discover that her sisters had been standing there, listening. Gabrielle marched down the stairs with Miri trailing determinedly behind.

  Ariane hastened to the bottom of the steps to head them off. “No, Gabrielle. I know what you would say, but it is utterly out of the question. There is no way I will allow—”

  “This time you have no say in the matter.” Gabrielle cut her off ruthlessly. “Didn’t you promise after what happened with the gloves that you would stop treating both Miri and me like children? We are your sisters, Ariane, and I am sure Maman meant for us all to look out for one another.”

  “And if you don’t let us come, we will just follow you,” Miri chimed in.

  Ariane glanced from one sister to the other, Gabrielle’s lovely patrician features so different from Miri’s ethereal countenance. But never had the resemblance between them been so marked as they stared at Ariane, chins cocked at a stubborn angle, their eyes filled with steely resolve.

  Ariane made another effort to protest, but Gabrielle seized her by the shoulders. “You listen to me, Ariane Cheney. Out of the three of us, you appear to be the only one who has any chance of finding happiness with the man who you love. I am even willing to concede that the comte deserves you.”

  She added with a glimmering smile, “Well, almost. Now are you going to waste time arguing with us or are we going to Paris to rescue your ogre?”

  Ariane’s throat constricted. Moved beyond words, all Ariane could do was nod and envelop first Miri and then Gabrielle in a fierce hug, choking out her gratitude.

  The girl endured it for a few seconds, but as ever was quick to wriggle free.

  “You don’t have to thank me. My motives for wanting to go to Paris are not entirely unselfish.”

  Ariane regarded her sister with a mingling of disappointment and dismay. Surely Gabrielle could not be thinking about her own ambitions at a time like this.

  After some obvious struggle with herself, Gabrielle blurted out, “It’s Remy. We have had not one word about him since he left Faire Isle and I—I—Damn it! I will never be able to rest easy until I know what has happened to the noble fool.”

  Gabrielle cast Ariane a defiant look. It was obvious that she cared for Nicolas Remy far more deeply than she would ever be willing to admit.

  “Of course, I know it is perfectly stupid of me,” she went on gruffly. “Paris is a large city and the man is a fugitive.” Her lower lip trembled. “I daresay we will never be able to find him.”

  Ariane tenderly brushed back a stray lock of Gabrielle’s golden hair.

  “We will find him, dearest,” she promised. “And we will make certain he is safe.”

  Moonlight shimmered over the Louvre, the palace etched against the night sky like a fairy-tale castle, light and music pouring from the windows of the main salon, where the reception for the newly married royal couple was still taking place.

  Outside the gates of the palace, the street was thronged with Parisians celebrating the wedding of the lovely Princess Margot to Henry of Navarre. Most of the common folk were glad of any excuse for revelry, but there was a marked tension about the celebrations. Despite its magnificence the wedding had not been popular, the alliance between Catholics and Huguenots an uneasy one.

  Or perhaps the unease was all inside of him, Remy thought as he stared desperately up at the walls of the palace. He had pushed himself to the brink of collapse to return to Paris, anticipating all manner of disaster. What he had never expected was to arri
ve in time to find himself in the midst of a wedding festival.

  He had been so convinced that the Dark Queen had never meant for this marriage to take place, that she had meant to murder his king. Finding Henry alive and well and a bridegroom had left Remy shaken and confused, but more suspicious and fearful than ever.

  He had marched boldly into the palace, determined to warn Henry, even if it cost him his life. Remy had fully expected to be arrested or slain on the spot, but the Dark Queen had proved too clever for that.

  She had greeted Remy with a warmth that had sickened him, scolding him for being absent for so long. Where had the bold Scourge been? Everyone, including herself, had been so worried about him.

  Where had he been? Fleeing for his life from her soldiers, Remy had bluntly declared before the entire court. But Catherine’s performance had been entirely too much for him.

  She had gasped, paled, insisted that it was all a dreadful mistake, that the men who had attacked him would be severely punished. And what could he do? He could hardly call the Dowager Queen of France a liar, especially when he had no proof.

  Only he had seen the sly look in Catherine’s eyes that had warned him she was far from done with him, that despite how she smiled upon Navarre and called him her dear son, this marriage was nothing but a farce.

  Remy had had no chance to speak to Henry alone. He had drawn aside Admiral Coligny and several other of the king’s highest-ranking ministers, trying to convince them the king was in grave danger. But it was as Remy had always feared. No one would believe him.

  As he gazed back at the palace, feeling helpless and frustrated, Remy felt one of his brother officers clap him on the shoulders, urging him away from the Louvre and back to their lodgings in the town.

  “But we can’t just leave our king surrounded by his enemies,” Remy said, making one last desperate effort to convince his companions. “We have to get him out of there.”

  “Get him out?” young Tavers exclaimed, his sandy brows lifting in astonishment. “His Majesty has only been wed a day ago. He’s scarcely had time to enjoy the pleasures of his marriage bed.”

  “Marriage bed! It is more likely to be his deathbed and likely the rest of ours as well,” Remy said heatedly.

  “Ah, please lad,” old Admiral Coligny groaned. “No more of that nonsense about Queen Catherine being a witch, plotting to murder us all.”

  “It is not nonsense, sir. If you had seen and learned what I did this summer on Faire Isle—”

  “You should have never set one foot there.” This time it was Remy’s friend, Captain Devereaux who interrupted, the burly man shaking his shaggy brown head. “It is said to be a passing strange place, the Faire Isle.”

  “No doubt our good Remy has been sleeping with the fairies,” Tavers chimed in.

  “Or was bewitched by some blue-eyed Circe,” the old Admiral said, his eyes twinkling.

  Remy was annoyed to feel the red sting his cheeks, the Admiral’s words perilously close to the truth.

  “I tell you what the trouble is,” Tavers said, wagging one finger at Remy. “He cannot bear the thought of a truce with the Catholics. Some men simply aren’t fashioned for peace.”

  “Don’t worry, Remy.” Devereaux clapped one huge hand on Remy’s shoulder. “We’ll find you another war, m’boy.”

  “Damn it, Dev. I am as sick of fighting as you, but—”

  “I think we need to domesticate our Scourge. Find him a wife,” the Admiral declared.

  The two others agreed and soon they were all jocularly putting forth suggestions for a possible bride. Only Devereaux seemed to realize the depth of Remy’s fear and frustration. He said soothingly, “Come along now. You simply need a flagon of wine and a good meal. You hardly ate anything back there at the palace. Anyone would have thought you were afraid of being poisoned.”

  “I wonder why,” Remy muttered.

  “Come back with me to my lodgings. Claire has not clapped eyes on you for an age and you have yet to see our newest offspring, your namesake. Mind you, the lad has such a set of lungs on him, he keeps the entire house awake. We’ve taken to calling him the wee Scourge.”

  Remy attempted to smile. Perhaps they were right and he had let his imagination run wild, conjuring up dangers that had never existed. Perhaps he had been bewitched and everything that had happened on Faire Isle had been nothing more than a strange dream.

  Except that those fleeting hours he had spent with Gabrielle seemed more real to him than the entire rest of his life. His return to Paris, the marriage of his king, his friends’ sanguine belief that this heralded a new age of peace and tolerance for the Huguenots—that was the dream.

  And one from which Remy feared they were destined to be violently awakened.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Ariane gazed wearily out the window of her chamber at the inn, staring at the pale ribbon of road as though she could somehow dissolve the miles remaining to Paris. She would have pressed on farther if Toussaint had not dissuaded her. Night was falling, the old man had argued, and they were all fair dropping from the saddle. The horses had been ridden hard enough for one day and they would never reach Paris if one of the poor brutes pulled up lame.

  All sensible arguments, but Ariane chafed at the further delay. She had prayed that they might overtake Renard before he reached Paris, but there had never been any hope of that. Ariane had always marveled at Renard’s stamina and by what reports they gleaned of him, he was traveling like a man possessed. Barely pausing to eat or sleep, hiring fresh mounts so that he could keep pressing on.

  There was no way Ariane or her sisters could match that killing pace. Of the three of them, only Miri was a skilled rider. But even she was showing signs of extreme exhaustion. This evening, she and Gabrielle had scarcely remained awake long enough to take some supper before collapsing upon the bed.

  Sleep eluded Ariane, bone tired as she was, and Toussaint was equally restless. She could see the old man moving about in the stableyard below, long after there was any need for him to do so.

  Toussaint had insisted that he and several of the comte’s retainers accompany the Cheneys on the journey to Paris and Ariane had put up little argument. The road could be a dangerous place. She was glad of Toussaint’s escort, although for much of the journey she had been obliged to listen to his grumbling about Renard’s pigheadedness, the lad’s reckless folly in always charging off on his own this way.

  All this fierce bluster barely concealed the old man’s very real fear for the fate of his cousin. If the Dark Queen had succeeded in luring him into her trap, Toussaint drew comfort from the fact that Justice was no longer a humble peasant, but a comte, a powerful nobleman. The queen would not dare to simply dispose of him as though he was someone of no importance.

  Ariane had said nothing when Toussaint advanced this opinion. She wished she could have derived consolation from such a belief. But if Catherine had had no compunction about murdering a queen, she was unlikely to have any qualms about destroying Renard. In some of her darker moments of this endless journey, Ariane despaired that Catherine might already have done so.

  “Uhhh.”

  Ariane turned away from the window at the sound and crossed anxiously over to the large four-poster bed. Gabrielle was fast asleep, but Miri was stirring restively.

  Ariane drew the coverlet more snugly over her. Miri appeared so worn out and her nightmares had been getting worse ever since they’d left home. She smoothed back her sister’s fall of white-blond hair. Her sister still seemed so much the child. It was hard to remember that Miri would be thirteen in five days’ time, Ariane reckoned up on her fingers. Because this was August 23, St. Bartholomew’s Eve.

  The royal apartment was heavy with mist rolling in from the Seine, the stars and moon blotted out by a blanket of cloud. St. Bartholomew’s Eve . . . a good night for creating a few more martyrs, Catherine thought with a cynical twist of her lips.

  She had always found it strange to honor a man simply
because he’d been fool enough to get himself skinned alive for the sake of his God. Not very clever of old Bartholomew, but Catherine had little patience for saints and martyrs.

  The fools never seemed to have the wit to realize that religion was more a matter of politics than anything else. Personally she didn’t give a damn that the Huguenots refused to hear mass and preferred the Book of Common Prayer. She only cared that they had become a threat to her power.

  Catherine placed the small iron burner on the window ledge. Using a candle, she lit the incense, the sweet, acrid scent mingling with the dank smell coming in off the river.

  “What are you doing, Maman?” her son Charles called out anxiously.

  “There are noxious odors drifting in from the Seine tonight. I am merely perfuming the air.”

  Smiling, she turned to face the cluster of men gathered in the king’s private apartment for this secret council meeting. His Majesty’s most high-ranking advisors, at least those of the Catholic persuasion.

  Many of them were Catherine’s political enemies and deeply mistrusted her, especially the handsome duc de Guise. But tonight she and the arrogant young nobleman were temporarily united in a common cause. De Guise’s father had been killed by the Huguenots and he had long thirsted for revenge.

  Then there was her younger son, the duc d’Anjou. Despite his effeminate appearance, a pearl earring dangling from one ear, he fancied himself a soldier. He was eager for any action that might bring him fame, capable of any cruelty.

  The only hitch to her plans was the king himself, as Catherine had known he would be. As Charles listened to his advisors’ arguments, he plucked nervously at the thin beard that did little to conceal the weakness of his chin. His receding hairline made him appear older than his years. His bloodshot eyes spoke of a man with a tenuous grip on his sanity.

  The courtiers fell back as Catherine rustled forward to grasp Charles by the hand, making it seem like an affectionate motherly gesture. It stopped him from biting his knuckles, an irritating habit of his when he grew agitated.