by Mary Balogh
“Men!” she said finally. “God’s gift to the animal kingdom. He made such a number of ghastly errors creating them that he had to create women to set all to rights again. Ah, this is better.”
Someone else was galloping toward her, someone she knew. She set her hands on her hips and lifted her chin while Private Higgins, she could see from the corner of her eye, appeared to be hopping from one foot to the other.
“Jack!” she called in a loud, clear voice.
Major Jack Hanbridge reined in so quickly that his horse reared and he had to fight for a moment to keep his seat. He frowned at the woman who stood her ground on the path, and then peered more closely.
“Joana?” he said at last. “Joana? Is it really you?” His eyes swept over her. “Good Lord. But what in the name of thunder are you doing here? Allow me . . .”
But Joana held up an impatient hand. “Tell me what is going on,” she commanded. “Are we winning?”
“Oh, assuredly,” he said. “You may trust the Beau, Joana. We have sent them back from the center with their tails between their legs. They think to gain the convent here, but Bob Crauford will hold them. And see what awaits them if they do reach the top?” His arm swept a wide arc over his shoulder.
Joana had already seen. Lines of quiet, disciplined infantry had already taken their places behind the skyline. They would send a deadly volley into any Frenchmen unfortunate enough to come charging up over the hill.
“But what on earth are you doing here?” the major asked again. “You must get back, Joana. You should be far from here. Let me—”
“Jack, don’t be tiresome,” she said. “The French are fighting their way up this hill, then? Who is stopping them?”
“Oh, they will be stopped,” he said. “Have no fear. We have the best of our skirmishers down there.”
“The Ninety-fifth,” she said, her stomach performing a somersault.
“And the cacadores,” he said. “The very best. Now, let me—”
“And which French forces are coming up?” she asked. “Do you know, Jack?”
“Ney’s corps,” he said. “But we will—”
“Ney’s?” she said. “Who in particular, Jack?”
“General Loison’s division, I believe,” he said. “Joana, I have to go. Is this private your escort? Soldier . . .”
“Yes, yes,” Joana said. “Be on your way, Jack. I would not keep you. I shall be quite safe.”
He looked at her doubtfully and frowned at Private Higgins. But he had already been delayed longer than a minute. He touched his spurs to his horse’s sides and galloped off to the south.
General Loison. Colonel Leroux was in his division. Perhaps his battalion was among those coming up the hill. Perhaps, oh, perhaps . . . Joana looked hastily about her. All was businesslike organization. And yet it sounded as if all hell had broken loose beyond the hill. Perhaps Colonel Leroux was just beyond the hill. And Robert was there—amidst all the thunder of the guns and all the deadly smoke. Perhaps he was already dead. Perhaps Colonel Leroux was even now in the process of killing him. Perhaps . . .
Perhaps she would go insane if she had to stay inactive one more minute. No, there was no perhaps about it.
“Allan,” she said, turning on the boy who was her guard. She looked wild, afraid. “Give me my musket. Please give it to me.”
“I can’t, ma’am.” He took one step back from her, but she advanced on him.
“You can and you will,” she said. “How would you like to be weaponless at this moment? The French may burst over the hill at any moment, and I am defenseless. And don’t tell me that you will defend me or that you will take me back to safety. I am talking about now—this moment. Give me my gun at least. Do you think I am about to take on the whole of our own army with it? Do you?”
Private Higgins took one more half-step back. “No, ma’am,” he said.
“Give it to me, then,” she said, her voice trembling. “Captain Blake would not want me dead, I do assure you.”
“But, ma’am,” he said, protesting as she reached out and took her musket, checked it quickly with hands that were somewhat out of practice but nevertheless skilled with the weapon. “But, ma’am . . .”
She felt sorry for him—almost. Robert would crucify him at the very least. But there was no time for conscience. She leveled the musket on the boy, whose eyes widened in a kind of hurt astonishment.
“I am going forward,” she said. “I must see for myself what is happening. You may follow me if you wish, Allan. Or you may shoot me in the back—I shall turn it on you in a moment. But you will not stop me. This is my battle too. It is more my battle than anyone else’s, I daresay.”
“But, ma’am . . .” Private Higgins protested, his voice high-pitched and frantic as she turned her back on him and broke into a run. Her back was tense for the first few yards, though she knew that he would not shoot. The noise of the guns was too intense for her to hear whether he shouted anything more at her or whether he was running up behind her. But she would not stop.
She would not stop for anyone or anything. A few of the infantrymen of the Forty-third and Fifty-second, standing in line below the skyline, looked back and saw her. General Crauford saw her and roared something as she passed the mill. And the gunners saw her as she circled past the battery and ran downward into hell.
But no one tried to stop her. No one was going to stop a battle or take any extra risk to prevent a mad peasant woman from hurling herself into certain death.
And strangely, once she was over the brow of the hill and all was noise and smoke, and guns were firing both behind her and in front of her, once she could see the British and Portuguese skirmishers down in the heather and rocks before her, strung out across the hill, firing down on the approaching tirailleurs, the masses of the French columns coming up behind them, she felt no more fear at all. Only a heart-pounding excitement and a sharpened awareness.
It was almost as if time were slowed, as if she had all the leisure time in the world to observe details. The British and the Portuguese were on the hillside, quite close. The French had already pushed them back through the village of Sula and were themselves on the slope. They were moving inexorably upward. Her mind took in the larger picture almost immediately.
She went down onto her stomach behind a boulder. She could shoot only once with her musket. She had no ammunition with which to reload it. She must choose her shot with great care. Not that she had any interest in killing Frenchmen—only one Frenchman. And surely, oh, surely she would not be fortunate enough to see him.
But she saw Robert suddenly below her and was glad that she was down on her stomach. He was crouched down aiming his rifle at the enemy and firing it. His face was black with the smoke of his gun, and there was a smear of blood down one temple. But he was still alive. Oh, God, he was still alive.
He flung his rifle behind him for a sergeant to reload and picked up his sword from the ground beside him. As a captain he was not expected to use a gun at all, but only to lead and guide his men with his sword. But Robert was doing both. He was both leading and fighting. The sergeant reloaded the rifle and set it back on the ground.
Captain Blake and his company were stubbornly holding one rise of ground, she could see, refusing to give ground until they were forced to do so despite the fact that companies around them were already edging back up the hill. But the columns were coming closer and closer behind their own tirailleurs. Soon the riflemen and the cacadores would have no choice but to retreat or die needlessly.
Joana saw everything in just a few seconds. She saw Robert’s danger and his stubbornness. And she looked beyond him to the advancing blue columns, scarcely visible as more than a dense mass through the smoke. And yet one sharp detail burned its way through her eyes and she stared, unbelieving, convinced for a moment that she saw only what she wished to see.
; Colonel Leroux was at the head of one of the columns, urging it forward, his sword raised. Her hands suddenly felt cold and clammy against her musket. They shook. But they would not shake. By God, they would not. He had killed Maria. Worse. He had done those unspeakable things to her before ordering her death, and she, Joana, had seen it all. For that he would die. For that she would keep her hands steady or die herself in the attempt.
He was too far away. She knew it even as she sighted along the gun. Not beyond range of the musket, but beyond sure range. For the musket was notoriously poor at hitting any definite target at any distance. And yet she could not wait. Her heart was pounding up into her throat and against her eardrums, more powerful even than the noise of the French drums. She would be helped. Some power above would help her. She could not miss. Not now, when fate had given her this one last unbelievably coincidental chance. She could not miss.
She fired the gun and watched Colonel Leroux march onward, still urging his men on, still waving his sword in the air. He was quite unaware that she was there and that she had just fired on him. She dropped her face to the ground and gave in to momentary despair while hell continued to rage about her.
And then her head snapped up and her eyes focused and widened on the loaded rifle still on the ground behind Captain Blake below her. At any moment he would pick it up. At any moment he would signal his men to move back—all about them had done so. At any moment her very last chance would be gone and Miguel and Maria would be unavenged for all eternity.
The battle was nearing and intensifying. But all Joana saw was the rifle on the ground below her. All she thought of was reaching it before it was too late. She abandoned her musket, pushed herself into a crouching position, and launched herself downhill.
It all happened in seconds. And if a higher power had not guided her aim a few moments before, certainly one was looking after her now. The only wounds she could count after it was all over were the scratches and bruises she had acquired from the ground.
She hurtled down the steep hillside somehow without stumbling, and the rifle was in her hand before Captain Blake whirled around and regarded her from astonished eyes that looked remarkably blue against his bloodied and blackened face.
“Jesus Christ!” he said.
But she did not even hear the blasphemy. She was on her feet and hoisting the unfamiliar rifle to her shoulder and sighting along it and screaming out against the thunder of sound around her.
“Marcel!” she shrieked.
Whether he heard her, or whether his attention was caught by the unusual sight of someone—a woman—standing up straight despite all the shells and bullets whizzing about her, she did not know. But he saw her. And he recognized her, she knew. And he saw that she had the gun pointed at him. It was all the matter of a split second, but she knew that he had seen her and that he knew, and she knew that this time she could not miss.
She fired the rifle.
And watched him stop midstride, an expression of surprise on his face, and twist sideways before going down.
She laughed in triumph.
And then the strange feeling she had had since coming over the top of the hill, that time had been suspended, left her as she came crashing down onto the ground, two powerful arms about her waist.
“Jesus, woman!” he said. “Jesus!”
She lay panting on her face beneath the full weight of his body. And she felt a chilling terror at the steady beating of the French drums and the heavy thunder of the British guns and the harsh cracking of the skirmishers’ firearms.
“I killed him,” she said, her voice a gasp of triumph. “I killed him.”
But he was not listening to her. He was on one knee beside her, his sword sweeping the air, his voice a great roar. “Back,” he yelled. “Back, you bastards.”
He kept a bruising grip on her arm as they retreated up the hillside, his men shooting as they went. The sergeant had grabbed his gun and was reloading it, Joana saw. And she prepared her mind for death. There was no way of avoiding it, she decided, caught as they were between two vast armies in all the chaos of a living hell.
“Give me the rifle,” she said, reaching for it. “I’ll help.”
But he pushed her roughly behind him so that she stumbled. He spoke with a snarl. “You are not going to escape,” he said. “You will remain my prisoner or die with me. Get down and stay down.”
She did as she was bidden. Their very lives depended upon her being meek for once in her life, she knew, even though she could have helped if only he had allowed her to use his rifle. But it was no time to argue.
Every inch of ground was hard-fought, and on every inch of ground Joana prepared herself to die. She would not mind dying, she told herself, now that she had avenged the deaths of her half-brother and half-sister—if only Duarte could know. And she would not mind dying with Robert beside her. She felt strangely calm after the first bone-weakening terror.
But if she was to die, it was not to be just yet, after all. As the skirmishers neared the top of the hill, the French columns hard upon them, the great guns were withdrawn to avoid capture and General Crauford sat quietly on his horse outside the mill assessing the moment. Joana caught a glimpse of him as he was in the act of sweeping off his hat. And then she heard his high-pitched bellow, quite audible above all the noise.
“Now, Fifty-second! Avenge the death of Sir John Moore!” he roared.
“Company!” The bellow was Robert’s, in her ear. He had a grip on her arm that cut the circulation from her hand. “Join the line!”
“Charge! Charge!” the general roared. “Huzza!”
The British lines that had been waiting behind the skyline were stepping forward to make their presence known to the unsuspecting French, their muskets leveled, their bayonets fixed. The skirmishers fell in at the end of the line and joined the charge.
Captain Blake flung Joana back behind the lines. “Go back!” he yelled at her. “Get yourself to safety. I shall find you later and beat the living daylights out of you.”
And he was gone to join his men in their charge back down the hill. Joana heard the murderous volley of musketry and knew that the French advance had been halted, that hundreds had died in that first moment. She got wearily to her feet and retired to the far side of the lateral track.
She felt mortally weak, mortally tired. If she could just sink down to the ground and close her eyes, she thought, she would surely sleep for a week. But she would not do that. Not yet. Not until she knew that he was safe. Not until she had given him the chance to beat her black-and-blue. There was a thin thread of amusement in her smile.
Until she remembered that she had just killed a man.
And then she began to shake.
* * *
It was all over. The French had been routed, and there would be no more attacks that day. As usually happened after a battle, or sometimes even in the midst of a battle when a temporary truce had been sounded, the French and the English mingled on the hill, all hostility gone, gathering together their dead and wounded. Some men even exchanged greetings and drinks of precious water with men they had been shooting at just minutes before.
It was perhaps the strangest part of war to those who were not accustomed to it.
Captain Blake toiled uphill with his men. He could drink two brooks dry if they would just present themselves, he thought. But his main duty was to find his own dead and arrange for their burial—always the most painful part of a day of fighting—and to see that his wounded were tended if their wounds were slight or carried away to the hospital tents if they were in need of amputation.
And yet he made one detour from the path that he had taken with his company earlier in their retreat uphill. He walked over to where a larger-than-usual group of Frenchmen was gathered, a sure sign that an officer of high rank was about to be carried away. And he found that he had not been mistaken. H
e had wondered—though he had not had a great deal of leisure in which to wonder. But that strange out-of-time, slower-than-time experience had seemed unreal. He had doubted the evidence of his own senses.
But he had not been mistaken. The French officer, who had died from a bullet wound just above the level of his heart—roughly in the same spot as his own wound had been the year before, Captain Blake thought—was Colonel Marcel Leroux. And Joana had killed him.
Hadn’t she?
Had he imagined it? She had stood up, quite recklessly exposing herself to harm, yelled out his name, quite deliberately taken aim, and killed him.
Captain Blake frowned and made his way off to join his men again and to direct the burials and the removal of their wounded.
Almost at the top of the hill he knelt down beside a sobbing boy and touched him reassuringly on the shoulder before recognizing him. Private Allan Higgins turned his face away as Captain Blake’s jaw tightened.
“You will live,” he said as another private cut the trousers away from the boy’s leg to reveal the bullet hole. “We will have to have the bullet removed, but you will keep your leg. It is hurting badly?”
The boy made an effort to control his sobs. “No, sir,” he said, obviously lying. “But I could not shoot her in the back, sir. She ran, but I could not shoot her.”
“No.” Captain Blake squeezed his shoulder. “A man does not shoot a woman in the back even if she is the devil’s dam. Well, lad, you have had your first taste of battle and you have acquitted yourself well. You came forward when you might have stayed back.”
“But I let you down, sir.” The sobs resumed.
“Get ahold of yourself, soldier,” Captain Blake said, straightening up and nodding to the two privates who had come to carry the boy up the hill. “We will discuss that matter later. It is sufficient now that you have survived.”
The boy did not seem in any way consoled.
