Jo Graham - [Numinous World 05]

by The Emperor's Agent (epub)

  "Send out heavy cavalry, I suppose," I said. "To do the work of the other. But that would not work nearly so well."

  "It would not," he said, and I thought there was something of the schoolmaster about him, teaching war and esoterica at once. It occurred to me that he must be a good teacher. "In this situation, a Dove is the equivalent of light cavalry, a seer who can scout ahead for us and who can slip through defenses and bring back a report. We have been trying to do this with the equivalent of heavy cavalry, with little success."

  "With no success," Noirtier said. "The men who have attempted it are not suited by nature to the task. They are simply not natural oracles, and traveling bodiless is a talent that is more often associated with Doves. It's not working."

  "And so you have been looking for a Dove," I said, and was surprised my voice was calm and steady. "But are Doves not usually women? Or at least virgin girls or boys?"

  Noirtier shot Lannes a look, as if to say, she is not as ignorant as she acts.

  "In some older practices this is so," Lannes acknowledged. "The Pléiade, for example, required virgin girls or boys, and in fact preferred fairly young children. More modern disciplines prefer adult women, and not necessarily virgins. But we are all men. And none of us are proving very adept at this."

  "How unfortunate for you," I said. "But surely there are women aplenty, and if you do not want to hire an actress as M. Noirtier did before, don't some of you have wives?"

  "We do," Lannes said, "But not just any woman will do. It must be someone with the right talent, and she must also be entirely trustworthy, someone who can be confided in upon the Emperor's business." His eyes met mine, and I knew what he was not telling Noirtier -- I was the Emperor's agent, and so presumably already had his confidence. "If you are as talented as M. Noirtier says, you are a godsend, Madame St. Elme."

  "I do not want to do this," I said, and my voice was steady.

  Noirtier shook his head and began to say something, but Lannes spoke first. "M. Noirtier, why don't you go ahead to dinner? I will be along shortly."

  He knew a dismissal when he heard one, and got to his feet. "If you think that is the best course, M. le Marechal."

  "I do," Lannes said, and waited until the door had closed behind him. He sighed, and then came around and sat down in the other chair before the desk, turning it toward me.

  "I am not what he says," I said. "I am not."

  His eyes met mine frankly. "Can you honestly tell me you are not an oracle?"

  I looked away. Outside the sun was setting behind the towers of the fortress, golden in an azure sky. He is one too, some part of me whispered. He is like you. He has sworn the same oaths, in one Babylon or another. "No," I said. "No, I can't say that."

  He put his chin on one hand. "If you are the Emperor's agent you are as much a soldier as I. You too are responsible for your service to France, and to these other men we serve beside. Lives rest upon this, Madame. Hundreds of lives, possibly thousands. If it is in your power to serve, you must do so. We are soldiers. We do not choose how we serve and when, at our own pleasure. We must do things that frighten us, things we do not want to do. I ask no more of you than I ask of myself or of any man here. Are you made of steel, Madame?" He caught my rising glance. "Are you what I think you are?"

  I nodded slowly, but did not name it, though the word hung in the air around us: Companion.

  "I am, Marshal," I said. "I will do what you think needful. If you ask me on those oaths I have no choice."

  "Nor I, Madame," he said. "I have no choice but to ask. Do you understand that?"

  "I do," I said. He was in charge of the invasion plans. He must do whatever was necessary to bring it off, and in the end my fear was just a little thing. What was it, compared to what must be done? "I will help you if I can."

  When Corbineau arrived just after nine to meet me I was waiting outside my lodging, coat and hat and boots all Charles.

  "Good evening," Jean-Baptiste said jauntily. "All ready to go set Boulogne on its ear?"

  "I need a drink," I said, standing up with sword cane in hand. "And you need to find me one. Now."

  Strange Travelers

  The house looked like any other, or rather like any other better brothel in an army town. The Army of the Coasts of Ocean had been in and around Boulogne for nearly three years now, and there had been plenty of time for the local economy to adapt. It was a three-story house of the sort one expected to belong to a family of comfortable means, and from the street one might have thought it still did. Windows were open in the warm summer air, and from the downstairs ones came the sounds of a piano and a young woman singing a popular air about lost love.

  I raised an eyebrow at Jean-Baptiste. "Really?"

  "Really," he said with a smirk, and knocked upon the door.

  The butler looked more like a bouncer than a butler, or perhaps the bouncer had learned to answer the door like a butler, but either way his demeanor was deferential when he saw Corbineau. "Good evening, Major. Pray come in. Madame will be delighted to see you."

  "Good evening, Renaud," Corbineau said, doffing his hat and handing it over. "This gentleman is with me."

  The front hall was spacious, tastefully decorated, and once again gave no hint of anything besides bourgeois respectability. An enormous woman rushed in, her Chinese painted fan not quite matching an ensemble of turquoise silk, black curls bobbing from beneath a huge turban topped with cream-colored feathers and a great many rhinestones. "Major!"

  She advanced to greet him, drapery fluttering, and he bent deeply over her hand. "Madame, it is once again my distinct pleasure. Allow me to present my friend, M. van Aylde. Monsieur, this is Madame Desbrieres, one of the lights of our little town."

  "You flatter me," she preened, allowing me to make my leg before her.

  "The pleasure is mine," I said. She absolutely towered over me. Madame Desbrieres must be six feet tall. Her hands in her evening gloves were wide and long as a man's. Ah, I thought.

  She tossed her head at Corbineau. "The parlor? Or something more private?"

  "Just the parlor to begin, I believe," Jean-Baptiste said, throwing me a wink. He did not precisely need a private room with me.

  A number of banknotes discreetly changed hands as she led us to the right, to the room from which the sound of the piano came. The near end of the parlor held a variety of couches and chairs, all occupied by gentlemen in various uniforms or neat civilian clothes, as respectable a group of callers as one might want to admit, all listening intently to the music or speaking softly over glasses. Instead of the punch, some of them had brandy or whisky, but otherwise nothing separated the listeners from any musical evening in town, save that there were no women except the girl at the piano.

  She was quite pretty, with golden curls caught up in a pink ribbon, wearing a fetching evening gown of rose silk that set off her complexion to perfection. Her playing was reasonably accomplished, but her voice left a bit to be desired, thready and too shrill. If I were her mother, I should tell her to stick to playing, or have some friend with a better voice accompany her. She finished her song, and the gentlemen applauded politely, including Corbineau, who blew a kiss.

  I looked at him sideways. This sort of genteel playacting was not at all what I had expected.

  The young lady stood up and curtsied deeply. "Thank you!" she squeaked in falsetto. "Thank you so much! It gives me so much delight to once again introduce to you my sister, Mademoiselle Camille!"

  The lady in question came through the dining room doors like a Congreve rocket, white silk flying, plumes bobbing in her chestnut curls, a dress as diaphanous as any I had worn as a merveilleuse. It was wondrously low cut in the front, a swell of breasts half exposed and a pale cleavage adorned by false diamonds. The drape of the dress showed off slim limbs and the shape of her body. Or his body. He must have been taped within an inch of his life to look that good, as not a bulge showed beneath his tight stays.

  The room came to their feet
, applauding and whistling, while Mademoiselle Camille made a pretty courtesy and waved. She blew a kiss back to Corbineau, and various men stomped and cheered. It took quite a few minutes to get us all back in our seats.

  As she launched into a sweet love song, I poked Jean-Baptiste. "I must say you did find some nightlife."

  "My dear, I've been here more than a year," he whispered back. "It's less that I found nightlife than that I founded it!"

  We remained two more songs, but I shifted in my seat.

  "Not to your taste?" he asked.

  I shrugged.

  "You like it a bit sharper," Jean-Baptiste observed. "Come on, then." He edged out of the row, excusing us to others, and we made our way to the door.

  "I was hoping for something a bit more…interactive," I said. I put my glass down on a butler's tray nearby. "And somewhere that served stronger drinks."

  He looked at me keenly. "You don't usually drink a lot."

  "I've had a day," I said.

  We slipped out while the men were applauding and gained the street. It was a balmy summer night and the stars were bright, though there was no moon.

  Corbineau dusted off his bicorn. "Not your taste?"

  "Not really," I said. I didn't want to say I thought it was awfully dull.

  "The real attraction's not the music," he said. "They serve a half decent if overpriced meal to eat with friends, and the rooms are clean, well-appointed and private. There's not really anywhere else to take someone, if you share a billet with three or four other men. If both of you do…." He shrugged. "It's much nicer than a sand dune or a back alley, and much more discreet. If one's tastes run more to assignations than orgies."

  "As yours do," I said. I supposed I had thought that before, that he would prefer a lover to anonymous hands and mouths.

  Corbineau shrugged again, still examining his hat for an imaginary speck of dust. "Generally speaking. I would rather a lover. But that gets complicated. It's been some time since I was comfortably settled."

  I put my head to the side. He had never talked about this with me before. "What happened?" I asked.

  "He died." Corbineau looked at me, his eyes bright in the dim light of the street. "Nothing baroque or tragic, I assure you. He was a naval officer. He went down with the Orpheé twenty months ago. These things happen. Fortunes of war, and it could as easily have been me as him."

  "I'm so sorry," I said. I had not known about it. "You did not even write and tell me."

  Corbineau put his hat on and tilted it to the correct angle. "It's not the sort of thing one puts in letters, is it? Besides, I have little to complain of. We had a good run, and that's all one really gets." He shrugged again, and if there was a catch in his voice it was only for a moment. "Now I will need that drink as much as you. Let's go find it."

  "Indeed, my friend," I said, and we set off. "A drink is exactly what we need."

  Nearer the port than the castle, it was a much rougher place. The music was raucous and came out into the street. A couple of working girls lounged outside, bodices artfully disarranged and reeking of cheap cologne. Only of course they weren't girls. Unlike their sisters in the first establishment, they had not waxed their arms.

  One of them plucked at my sleeve. "Looking for a good time, handsome boy?"

  The other rolled her eyes. "Wrong one, connard. That one's a pussy like you."

  Corbineau put his arm around me. "Sorry, ladies."

  It was a bit odd to walk in with his arm around me, and also to meet the kind of appraising looks Charles rarely got from men in public places. The tables were just board tables, the seats a motley collection of benches and mismatched chairs, and the room was filled with smoke from hanging lanterns which must burn the cheapest oil. In a near chair a man in a seaman's coat lounged, a boy with a painted face across his lap, a faint expression of boredom on his face beneath his rouged cheeks. I nearly gagged at the smell of opium, and dragged Jean-Baptiste to sit as far across the room as possible from the men with the pipe.

  We settled down on a bench against the wall, his arm still around me behind the table. "Just staking my claim, my dear," he said, then raised his voice to the barmaid. "Brandy for me and my friend, and don't be all night about it."

  She slunk back toward the bar with an unimpressed sneer. The seaman had his hand under the boy's untucked shirt, and as he moved I saw his hand on the boy, possessive and hard. At the bar, two ladies in dresses held court for five or six sailors, their hair piled up and their lips painted carmine. One of them seemed to be directing the sailor to kiss her shoe if he wanted further favors. He knelt and planted one on her ankle instead, one hand on the back of her calf. She wasn't taped in the least. I could see her erection through the thin dress.

  "Oh, much better," I said, taking my cravat off and opening the buttons of my shirt, biting my lip all the while. I opened the shirt just enough to show the top of my stays, white lace and little pink ribbons beneath man's waistcoat and coat.

  "You are going to get me into so much trouble," Jean-Baptiste observed, handing over a few coins as the barmaid dumped glasses in front of us. "You look like public indecency on two feet."

  "Do I now?" I took a long drink of the brandy, feeling it burn its way down my throat. "I feel like trouble." My eyes met those of a heavyset man across the room with the five o'clock shadow of a man whose five o'clock was yesterday. I smiled.

  "Oh God," Jean-Baptiste said.

  He came right over. "I haven't seen you around here before," he said.

  "I just arrived from Paris," I said. "My friend here was showing me the sights." I gave him a little smile. "Friend, not friend."

  "Too bad," his eyes flicked to Corbineau, and then back to me. "I've got a few nice sights I could show you."

  "Maybe later," I said.

  He slid onto the bench on the other side of me from Corbineau, one hand on my thigh. "I bet you're a sight too."

  "I try to be," I said, taking up the brandy glass again and flipping it back.

  "I give as good as I get," he said, squeezing my knee. I scooted back before his hand reached for something that wasn't there. "Fair's fair."

  I thought he had nice brown eyes, and there was something I liked about him, a starving kind of hunger but no malice. He probably had a wife who had no idea where he went drinking. "Out in the back, then, if there's a storeroom or such, but I'm back in ten minutes. Otherwise my friend here will come looking for me with his sharp, pointy sword."

  Jean-Baptiste looked vaguely appalled. "Charles, what am I going to do with you?"

  "I'll be back in ten minutes," I said.

  "Jesus, Charles," Jean-Baptiste said. "I will come looking if you're not."

  "See that you do," I said, and followed him behind the rough curtain that blocked off the storeroom from the tavern. "Popular place," I said. It reeked of men.

  "Pretty much," he said, and pushed me up against the wall. I got my hand in the band of his breeches, undoing buttons one handed.

  He tasted like brandy and salt, garlic from dinner and some kind of soup, exactly what I wanted, hard and raw and nothing except that. It took about three minutes to get him off in my hand, pumping and grinding against him, his face buried in my cleavage, in the top of Charles' stays. He swore and stepped back, stopping as I had him still, running my nail down the top of his drained member. "God Almighty!" Sweat was running down his face.

  "More like Aphrodite," I said, and smiled a feral smile. The power of having him that way was intoxicating. I wanted to squeeze, to see how far I could push him, but he was only a stranger, not someone I could play those games with. I let go.

  "Aye, Aphrodite," he said, beginning to do up his buttons. "I'll have you off. Turn about and all."

  "No need," I said, leaning in and kissing him tenderly. "I've had my fun."

  "If you say."

  I nodded, the pressure unbearable. "I do. Go on now."

  He took a breath, gave me one inscrutable look, pulled the curtain aside
and went out. It had barely fallen back into place before I had my buttons open, stroking downward, one finger unerringly finding my wet quim, my pearl throbbing like a tiny knob. On the other side of the curtain fifty men were at their games. On the other side of the very thin curtain. That anyone might move any minute. I gasped and nearly screamed out my pleasure, shaking, my shoulders against the wall, my boot heels grinding on the boards. Light, dark, light and dark again.

  I closed my eyes for a moment, catching my breath.

  Then I wiped my hands on my shirttail, tucked it in neatly, did up my buttons and fastened my shirt almost to the collar. It was less than ten minutes before I came out.

  Corbineau nearly jumped out of his seat. I slid in beside him, taking up the brandy and having a long drink. I really felt much, much better.

  "I was about to come after you," he said in a low voice. "Damnation, Elza. You're crazy."

  "Yes," I said levelly. "I know."

  He snorted and refilled his glass from the bottle. "You think so, don't you?"

  "I don't have any other word for it," I said. "But it works well enough for me. And that's all anyone gets, isn't it?"

  "That it is," he said, and touched his glass to mine. "Strange travelers."

  "Absent friends," I said, touching my glass to his.

  We drank. He spread his hands around the glass as though examining each finger. "What happened?" he asked. "With you and the Marshal, I mean. You seemed so happy in Munich. And now he's…."

  "Miserable?" I asked, cocking an eyebrow.

  Corbineau shook his head. "Frustrated. Explosive. I don't mean that he does anything he shouldn't, but he feels like it's all coiled there, just beneath the surface, and if something touches the powder off it will all explode. Mind you, I love working with him. Always have. I think the world of him, don't mistake me. But he's tinder waiting for the flame, all the time now."

  "I don't know," I said, and was surprised to hear the sadness in my voice. "I have no idea what he's thinking anymore. We haven't talked in nearly three years, Jean-Baptiste, not once."