The Spymaster's Lady sl-1

by Joanna Bourne

  They went down together. A lamp fell. Dishes crashed to the floor. She could not throw her knife into the tangle of two men wrestling. The guards, idiots, did nothing.

  It was a fight of lightning swiftness, a fight of cats in an alley. Leblanc raised steel that glittered like ice. Struck. Grey caught his arm. The blade sawed back and forth and flipped, end over end, to clatter at Soulier’s feet. Grey’s fist struck. Leblanc collapsed, bloody, on the floor.

  She knelt, gasping, the knife she had not used still in her hand. Grey was not hurt. Not hurt. Not one tiny bit hurt. He was safe.

  The guards ran forward, not sure which man to hold. Soulier’s voice came calmly. “Assist Leblanc to rise, Yves. Just so. Continue to assist him. Monsieur Grey, I am inexpressibly grateful. Annique, my very dear…you are not injured? I see you are not.”

  She got to her feet, shaking so badly she searched for something to support her. The scratch on her cheek…She wiped at it with the back of her hand. A nothing. When she turned to look, behind her on the yellow silk panel of the wall, the bullet made a neat, round puncture, black at the edges.

  Leblanc hung heavily in an implacable hold. He looked…diminished. He was only a thin, ugly man in rumpled clothing, bleeding from his nose. Not the important spy of France. Not the bogeyman of her childhood.

  Her voice came as if from far away. “Vauban is dead. I did not know.”

  Grey came up behind her. “I would have told you. I thought you knew.”

  There was a humming in her ears. So strange. She felt as if she were floating. Because she knew everything. She could see it all. So obvious. “Vauban dies. And it was a week, not more, that Maman’s coach falls unbelievably from a high cliff. I was to ride out with her that day.”

  “My God,” Grey muttered.

  Behind her eyes, fire pulsed. She faced Leblanc. “Was I so hard to kill you must take Maman as well? Or did you think I had shared the secret with her?”

  “I don’t know what you mean.” Leblanc’s gaze slid away. His pupils jerked in tiny twitches. He was guilty. Guilty and afraid.

  He killed Maman. The world went blood red. She dropped her knife and went for him with her bare hands.

  He gagged as her hands closed on his throat. She would tear him apart. Rip his flesh to pieces. She fought the guards who pulled Leblanc away. She fought Grey when he held her arms behind her back and did not let her sink her claws into Leblanc.

  “Arrête, chérie.” Soulier’s voice reached her.

  “I will kill him.” She kicked Grey, who kept her from Leblanc. “I will kill him fifty times. Murderer! Assassin. Animal!” She would shred him to bits.

  “She lies. Do not listen to her. It is all lies.”

  “So far, she merely promises to kill you,” Soulier said. “I am almost inclined to allow it. But we will hear what she has to say first. Calm her, Monsieur Grey. She will hurt herself.”

  She would wipe this piece of filth from the universe. She would grind him to suet. “Son of a maggot. Murderer.”

  “Annique, stop.” Grey’s strength closed around her, and she could not move. “Tell me.”

  The smell of Grey, the steadiness of him, filled her senses. Fury trickled away. She was empty. She slumped against him, chilled and sick, panting for air.

  Vauban was dead. He would never again fold together the pages of her report and nod, all gruff, and say, “Good work,” in front of everyone. He would never pour water in her wine as if she were still a child. Never. Never. Never again for Vauban. For Maman. Everything was gone. Tears burned in her eyes, and the pain choked her. Grey held her to him so she was hidden.

  Soulier said, “Child, there is no time for this. Set it aside.”

  She clung one minute to Grey’s jacket. The rage had passed, leaving her hollow. It was as if her heart and mind had been scooped out of her altogether. She was nothing but a cold wind wrapped in a woman’s skin.

  She tried to push away from Grey and found herself still held—warmly, carefully, firmly. He did not let her go. He turned her within his arms so that she faced Soulier. It seemed she would have the comfort of his body whether she wished for it or not.

  “I am composed,” she said.

  “Good. I must deal with Leblanc,” Soulier said. “Give me the truth of this matter.”

  Truth. How strange that she could tell the simple truth in this company. There was no old man in his stone house in Normandy, depending upon her silence. Vauban was dead. Nothing could hurt him.

  She said, “Vauban stole the Albion plans,” and she watched the words stab to the heart of Soulier.

  “That is impossible.”

  Behind her, Grey stiffened, deep in his muscles.

  “He stole them to pass to the British. Not for the money. It was never for the money.” She could not clear the lump from her throat. “It was…With gold as payment, even a small amount of gold, no one would suspect Vauban.”

  “No one would believe that of him.” Soulier sank heavily into the chair. “He conceived a faultless operation. As always.”

  “He planned for months, alone, in secret.” Her feelings were chaotic, even after so many months. “I think…I think Vauban went a little mad when his sons died in Egypt.”

  Soulier looked away, his lips tight. “Other men have lost sons.”

  “His sons died for nothing. Napoleon sailed home to hold parades and put sphinxes upon the feet of his tables. Émile and Philippe died in the fever and stink of Cairo, deserted by the man who led them there. They died for a Corsican’s vanity, Vauban said.”

  How could Soulier not understand? He had been Vauban’s friend. How could he look like that, shocked and condemning? “He was old and tired and sick. He lived his whole life in the service of France. He lost everything in the Terror—his home, his family, his wife.”

  “My child, I was there. I know.”

  “Only his boys were left. Then Napoleon threw their lives away on a grandiose whim to rule the East.”

  She shook herself free of Grey and began to pace the room. She could not stay still. The Frenchmen, Soulier’s agents, followed her with their eyes, waiting for what she would say. Soulier’s pain whipped at her with silent lashes.

  She steadied her voice. “And now Napoleon planned another vast expedition. To England. That is why Vauban stole the plans. He said Napoleon had betrayed the Revolution.”

  Soulier passed his hand over his forehead. “Always, he was the dreamer among us. The idealist. But this…”

  “There would be no more pointless battles overseas, Vauban said. No more French armies abandoned. He would prevent it.”

  Soulier lifted his eyes to her. “You were under his orders, Annique. If he told you to help him in this…”

  Did he think Vauban would lay that upon her? “But no. He told me nothing. He brought me to Bruges to run the small errands, as always. To watch for the British. But Leblanc…”

  Leblanc fought the men who held him, knowing what she would say next. Hatred washed over her in tides. She took shaking, hot breaths before she could speak. “Leblanc’s small worm in the Military Intelligence of England, Tillman, told Leblanc where the British would deliver the gold. The Englishmen were betrayed, first, by an English.”

  She turned to Grey. He remained expressionless, his eyes level and cold. It was to him she spoke. “Leblanc lay in wait. And killed. And took the gold. He has done endless murder for that gold.”

  When she said that, he nodded, just a fraction. Leblanc was dead from this moment. He might still walk and talk for an hour or a week, but he was dead. Soulier saw this. She did not think Leblanc yet realized.

  “She lies. I swear, Soulier, this is lies.” Leblanc writhed in fury and fear. Long scratches showed red on his face. “It was Vauban. Only Vauban. I know nothing of this.”

  She did not bother to look upon Leblanc. “I was with Vauban. Leblanc came to the inn with the blood of those murdered men still upon his clothing.” She remembered the shock and the sickness
. Vauban’s incredulous anger. “Leblanc knew Vauban must have the plans. He demanded them, as the price of his silence.”

  “The bitch lies. She lies in her teeth. I was in Paris that day. I can bring a dozen men to swear this.”

  “He was there. He hid in the farmhouse of Paul Drouet that night, in Brésanne. No.” She snapped, “Be silent, maggot. Your men, Plaçais and Vachelard, are dead by your secret order. The family Drouet burned in their beds. It has been unhealthy to know this thing about you, Leblanc. But one daughter escaped and lives. There is a witness.”

  The willingness of Yves and the other guards to keep violent hands upon Leblanc increased by the minute.

  “You will not listen to this whore, this bitch in heat, who sweats and grunts under an English dog.”

  “You killed Maman when I was blinded and useless. And three Englishmen in Bruges. And two of your own men. And the family Drouet at their farm,” she stared into Leblanc’s eyes, and her voice cracked, “even the children. The good God alone knows how many others. All for gold…” She could no longer speak.

  Leblanc was a cornered rat, teeth bared. “You will regret this, Soulier. Fouché will crush you like an ant when I tell him this.”

  Soulier had become like ancient ice in the mountains, frigid and blue and glittering. “You are a greedy man, Jacques. Greedy enough that I believe this atrocity of you. It is the answer to some questions that have occurred to me this last year. And why else would you try to kill Annique?

  “She lies,” Leblanc hissed.

  “You are stupid beyond belief to think you can attack in my own house someone I have given sanctuary. To do this to a woman Grey chooses to protect…Do you not realize, you idiot, that he has a dozen men outside? That this is his trap for you? That he has come for you tonight to hang you?”

  Grey was at her back, and she could not see his expression. Leblanc did. He paled to the color of a fish belly. He did not like to look upon his own death, for all the death he had meted out to others.

  Soulier threaded the thin sword cane into its concealing scabbard and secured it with a quick, vicious twist. “I will spare Grey his trouble, if he agrees. I will deliver you to Fouché, to make an example of. He will relieve his spleen by separating you from your head. You permit, Monsieur Grey?”

  Grey’s voice was quiet into her ear. “Annique, Leblanc is yours. Shall I hang him for you? Or you can kill him with your own hands, if that’s what you need. Anything you want.”

  The thought of laying hands upon Leblanc to kill him made her sick. She shook her head quickly.

  Grey said to Soulier, “Take him. Get him out of here. We need to talk. Alone.”

  Soulier waved impatiently. “Yves, put him…I do not know. I do not keep a cage for such rats in my house. Put him somewhere and watch him. The pantry. All of you go. Yes, all. Do not let him escape.”

  Leblanc was dragged from the room, leaving threats behind him like the trail of a snail, departing.

  Thirty-eight

  WITH LEBLANC GONE, THE ROOM WAS ODDLY quiet. She rested within Grey’s arms, her cheek pressed against his sleeve. Truly, love plucked away all one’s common sense. She was tempted to cling to him and feed off the strength of him and feel safe. She had not known such temptations existed until she met him.

  When she pushed herself free, Grey let her go with one instant of hesitation that said he did not want to.

  “Soulier must be told the truth of what I have done,” she said, which was warning enough, for an astute man like Grey, that she was about to lie in a serious fashion.

  This was the last throw of her game. This was what she had planned through her days at Meeks Street, lying by Grey’s side, playing chess with Galba, teaching Hawker to juggle knives. If she lied well enough, she would end the threat of invasion, yet lay no advantage into the hands of the British.

  Soulier sat, urbane and well-tailored, framed by the chair with its high tapestry back. He might have been a courtier of the old king, receiving an ambassador at Versailles.

  She must make him look upon her, not Grey. Grey was unprepared and might make some small revelations upon his face. “I did not speak of the Albion plans in front of the others. I knew you would not wish me to.”

  “Then do not speak of them now.” Soulier was testy with her.

  “I must.” She stood square in front of him. She had stood thus many times, reporting or receiving orders. “You have guessed most of it. The Albion plans are ashes. Vauban burned them in the fireplace of the inn that night, rather than give them to Leblanc.”

  “You have said enough.”

  “He gave them to me first, to memorize.”

  Soulier conveyed the need for discretion with an angry, emphatic shake of his head.

  “The British know about my memory. I have spent days at Meeks Street copying out the plans, page by page.” She made a picture of that in her mind, so vivid and exact it did not even feel like a lie. “They have them now.”

  It was done. France would not invade. England was safe. Now she must face what would come to her.

  Soulier stared at his hands that rested, one upon the other, on the pommel of his cane. “You did this for Vauban.”

  “He asked it of me. In Bruges.”

  “Then he has condemned you to death.” Soulier leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. “Even I cannot save you.”

  The hairs on the back of her neck stood up. There is a difference between knowing one will die and hearing the sentence pronounced. “I have accepted the consequences of my actions. I delayed leaving for England for a long time, hoping Napoleon would turn aside from this invasion, and the plans would come to nothing, but it did not happen. I did not wish to die, you understand. And I was injured and made blind.” Her mouth felt dry. “Which complicated matters. Leblanc has been a complexity, as well.”

  “Annique,” Soulier said gently.

  “Yes?”

  “Be silent. I am thinking.” He opened his eyes to frown at her. “And do not stand there like a loaf of bread. This room is disordered beyond belief by the men you brought here to fight over you. Do something useful.” He closed his eyes again.

  That was comforting. Perhaps Soulier would think of a way to save her from Fouché. It was not impossible.

  Grey was saying nothing, for which she was grateful. He knew, better than anyone else, that the Albion plans were not in British hands. For the moment, he played her game.

  She set the small table upright and put the silver tray upon it and knelt to gather shattered glass from the lamp chimney into the palm of her hand. Such mundane activities. Spying is a life of boring, ordinary tasks, performed while death scratches at the window. She had been seven when Soulier told her that.

  Matters did not go so badly. Leblanc had not shot her, after all. The oil lamp that fell from this table had not set itself afire to burn her to death. She had told a convincing lie to Soulier, who was a master in detecting lies. Soulier had not yet been compelled to kill her. And she had, perhaps, prevented the invasion of England. Altogether, she had much to congratulate herself upon.

  Soulier opened his eyes. “You did not give the Albion plans to the British Service.”

  Her stomach dropped like a stone. She had not been believed, after all. Diable. “Soulier, I have—”

  “Do not chatter. It is Leblanc who just sold the plans to the British.”

  “Leblanc?”

  “Exact. I am in a state of shock. Monsieur Grey is even now informing me of Leblanc’s guilt. He does this in a pique of revenge, for Leblanc’s culpability in the matter of gold and murder at Bruges, which he has just discovered.”

  She did not glance at Grey, who was doubtless being impenetrable. “I see.”

  “You, my child, were never in Bruges. You were somewhere else entirely. Dijon perhaps.”

  “That is a dull town. I am delighted to have been there.” She put broken crockery upon the silver tray. “It is convenient of Leblanc to be so guilty.” />
  “Is it not? He will deny everything and tangle himself in a dozen lies and not be believed. Fouché delights in simplicities. We shall fasten one more crime upon this salaud, who has committed so many. He can only die once, unfortunately. And you, child, will not pay for Vauban’s folly.”

  “It is not—”

  “You have sufficient folly of your own to pay for,” Soulier said sharply. “Which I must now deal with.”

  Grey’s footfalls as he stepped forward had become the tread of a fighter, balanced and light. Tension, fierce and invisible, twisted in the air. “Then you deal with me.”

  “You saved her life tonight, Monsieur Grey, when my men failed me. I am in your debt. But she is safe now, with her own people. You must leave her to us.”

  Grey said, “This isn’t negotiable.”

  “She is mine, monsieur. And I will not give her up.” Soulier hesitated, then laid his cane aside, slanted against the arm of his chair. “But I am wise enough not to challenge you directly. Come. Sit. Let us discuss this like civilized men.”

  Grey picked an overturned gilt chair and set it upright so it confronted Soulier. He sat, and he pulled her to stand next to him, his arm around her. “Talk.”

  “Eh bien. We shall be blunt, as you English prefer.” Soulier leaned toward him. “You have achieved the Albion plans. That must content you. As you care for my little one, I ask you to leave her with me and go. Make your farewell as tender as you wish, but part from her quickly. It is the kindest way.”

  “I’m not letting you have her.”

  “Do you know so little of me? Do you fear I will do revenge upon her? We French take into account the human frailties. For a woman such as Annique, we will forgive a great many frailties.”

  “I don’t give a damn what you forgive.”

  The silence lengthened. She heard the gilt clock on the mantelpiece very distinctly, ticking. She had not made plans that stretched beyond this room and facing Soulier. She had not expected Grey to come. Whatever happened, she would remember that Grey came for her.

  Soulier sighed. “I had thought Annique’s…unwisdom…was one-sided. She is young, and infatuated, and believes, just a little, in fairy tales. She does not understand that a relationship between the two of you is out of the question. You and I, Grey, we know this. If you take her with you in this selfish fashion, you will destroy her life. Quite literally. Fouché will see her dead within the month. Leave the Cub with me. I will arrange that no harm comes to her.”