And Chantal. Living inside her own enchanted bubble, humming happily to herself, she whirled her frothy umbrella and glided along sunny walks, admiring fountains as if all was right in her world. He would think her an idiot except he’d seen her happiness expand to capture others. She was far more complex than even she was aware.
After meeting her father, Ian was convinced she had Crossbreed powers. He simply must observe her more carefully to understand them.
“Your king does not mind having the public cavort on his lawn?” he asked.
After talking with Pauline this morning, he had begun to form a plan that might accomplish all he needed, while rescuing the besieged royalty behind the moldy walls of their stone prison — walls that concealed the sacred chalice, as he’d seen in his meditations last night. Pauline had warned him not to tell Chantal, and instinct verified her conclusion that Chantal would not approve of their scheming.
“Since the king preferred to isolate himself from his people by living in a vast palace in Versailles until forced to return here, I daresay he’s not thrilled,” Chantal admitted. “Paris is rife with rumors of escape attempts. I would not want to be royalty. Too much is expected of them.”
“Granted, one should not give power to leaders who are incapable of wielding it wisely, but one assumes there is some reason your royalty inherits their power.”
That had been his experience, at least. He was the nominal leader of Aelynn since his father’s death because he possessed the abilities to carry out the duties of that position, abilities inherited from both parents. In Chantal’s world, he assumed those abilities included the power of influential connections as well as vital strengths such as diplomacy and foresight.
“Our royalty claims they were appointed by God and stand second only to the pope. That may have been true a few hundred years ago, but no longer.” She shrugged, and the red, white, and blue ribbons of her hat fluttered in the breeze.
Ian’s family had been appointed as caretakers of the island by their gods on the basis of his family’s powerful attributes. Should his people attempt to imprison him and render him helpless, he’d be appalled and furious, and the gods would surely scorch the land with fire. Such treason went against the natural order of things.
He thought the poor beleaguered French king deserved better than this cold fortress at the mercy of bitter, angry mobs like the one last night. Rescue seemed obligatory, even essential, if he were to retrieve the chalice.
He would never consider interfering in the Other World, except rescuing the king meant rescuing the chalice, and possibly capturing Murdoch by drawing him out, thereby keeping his mate safe. All of which were perfectly legitimate and approved by the gods and laws of Aelynn.
“Your gentlemen dress colorfully here,” he observed, studying the garish blue and gold stripes and red accents of the uniform of a soldier near the palace’s entrance. The bulky breeches were no doubt easier for warfare, but the ruffled collar looked most uncomfortable.
Chantal followed his glance. “You are not familiar with your own Swiss Guards?”
He shrugged. “I do not associate with military men.”
She still looked at him oddly but seemed to accept his explanation. “The Swiss Guards protect the royal family. You will see them only at the palace. The king has hired mercenaries in the field who wear the uniforms of their regiment, but they’re usually led by French nobility. Officers of the nobility favor blue and scarlet.” She nodded in the direction of two soldiers parading in front of the Swiss Guard. “Those blue uniforms over there identify the Assembly’s National Guard.”
“And the ones outside the prison yesterday?” he asked dubiously, uncertain why a country needed so many soldiers. “They wore stripes and trousers and looked nothing like these.”
“Those were local militia. Each sector of Paris and every town and half the aristocrats in France have their own soldiers. The ones here usually wear trousers instead of breeches, and favor patriotic red, white, and blue. Some are loyal to whoever pays them that day.”
In Ian’s last vision, Murdoch had worn the ornate blue and scarlet of a royalist officer. One more piece added to his knowledge.
“How do the National Guard and the king’s officers differ?”
She looked uncomfortable. “The king hires mercenaries to guard the interests of the nobility. The Assembly instituted the National Guard two years ago to protect all the citizens of France. The king shouldn’t doubt the loyalty of his people.”
Ian raised his eyebrows at her naïveté, but she obviously lived in a happy world of her own making. He could see the problem of hiring a mercenary like Murdoch. Hired troops were loyal only to their ambition. And from the anger he was picking up, he suspected the National Guard had no love for their king. The whole situation fermented and simmered unhealthily.
Finally discovering that some small parts of Pauline’s plan were indeed, in place, Ian indicated a tall, blond gentleman in an elegantly tailored frock coat who waited near a bench that his fellow conspirator had described earlier. “I would talk to that gentleman over there.”
“That’s Count von Fersen.” Chantal tilted him a look from beneath her hat. “He’s from Sweden, not Switzerland. How do you know of him?”
“Mutual acquaintances,” Ian replied without breaking stride. Pauline’s explanation had been that the count was the queen’s lover and desperate to save the royal family from their imprisonment.
Chantal hurried to keep up with him. “Except for your coloring, there is some resemblance between you — you are both tall, strong, honest, and willing to do what is right at all costs. The count is truly quite formidable.”
Ian slanted her a look. “I am formidable?”
“How could you not be? Given your skill with weapons…”
Inexplicably pleased that his intended mate found him formidable, Ian continued on to the next curiosity. “You know this man well?”
She waved away the question. “I’ve met him at salons. It is rumored he is a ladies’ man,” she continued, “and enjoys the queen’s favors.”
Which was why the handsome count was willing to aid the beautiful queen, Pauline had said, and from Ian’s glimpse of the count’s anxiety now, he concurred.
He cast Chantal another sideways look to see how she expected him to take her comparison of him to a ladies’ man. “I shall have to challenge him if he should look on you as I do,” he said solemnly.
He fully meant that. He would challenge any man who came between him and his amacara, but Chantal did not quite understand his intent. Ian hid his smile when she darted him a look but couldn’t ask her question because they’d reached their destination.
“Madame Deveau,” the count said as they arrived. “It is a pleasure to see you again. Madame Racine said you were entertaining a friend of mine.”
Count von Fersen, the queen’s lover, held out his hand, and Ian knew his plan to rescue the royal couple was already in place. He stiffened, assessing any challenge the other man might present, but the count exuded only concern for the queen and her children.
As he shook the other man’s hand, Ian had the feeling that Chantal and her father would heartily disapprove of his intentions, which would certainly complicate his already complicated courtship.
Ten
Chantal had always recognized and admired the courage in the count’s voice, only now, comparing him to Ian, she realized the shallowness of his character. Von Fersen might be golden, handsome, and smiling, but his gallantry was that of the court. Beneath the pleasantries he bestowed upon her, he was assessing her loyalty to the royal couple, testing her intelligence, and clearly dismissing her as useless for his purposes, whatever they might be. She felt no attraction to the man at all, although she was aware he had several mistresses and that every other lady in Paris swooned over his beauty.
Ian, on the other hand, was dark, mysterious, and unsmiling. She could almost swear he was a Spartan warrior poised for battle as he disc
ussed the king’s health and plans for the summer. Still, despite his enigmatic expression, Ian did not hide behind charm and subterfuge. He openly revealed himself as a friend to the court, even though he had to know that she disapproved.
Ian blatantly ignored her opinions when he did not agree with them, but he at least respected her knowledge enough to listen. That he chose to dismiss her view on the king’s imprisonment was not relevant. All Paris argued over it. She preferred Ian’s honest rejection to the count’s artificial pretense that all was well.
Despite her acknowledgment of her lover’s superiority, Chantal was not inclined to be diplomatic after von Fersen made his bows and departed.
“Do you have any idea how much Marie Antoinette spent on refurbishing the Tuileries when they moved in here?” she asked. “And now you and the count discuss returning her to Versailles for the summer where she can quadruple her staff and build more useless follies while people starve? While no doubt plotting to let her brothers’ armies invade to march on Paris and overthrow the Assembly.”
“I merely inquired into their health.” Idly swinging his long staff as a gentleman would his walking stick, Ian eyed the long, low building housing the Swiss Guard. “It is up to your Assembly to take charge of finances and prevent royal overspending.”
“It’s not that simple,” she argued, but rather than launch into a political tirade, she switched to a more pleasant subject. “I hadn’t thought, but if you are Swiss, then do you know anyone in the king’s guards?” The king’s Swiss Guards possessed an unusual loyalty to Louis and his queen. That might explain a great deal of Ian’s interest in the king — except that he hadn’t recognized the guards’ uniforms.
Ian shrugged. “I have an… acquaintance …in the royal army, yes, but I don’t believe he’s here. Did you say your father keeps a stable?”
She cast him a curious glance as he stumbled over the word acquaintance. “North of Paris, yes. We once raced horses, but the upkeep has become prohibitive. Why?”
“Once I’ve recovered the chalice, I wish to find my fellow countryman. I thought it might be easier if I acquire transportation.” He strode purposefully along the gravel path near the barracks, examining the grimy windows and doors rather than the garden.
“Unless you ride, you will have to ask my father about our carriage horses. The stable contains brood mares and a stallion, but they are thoroughbreds from England and not broken to the traces.”
“Nevertheless, I would like to see your stable. We do not have horses at home. The count mentioned that yours possess great speed, and I have discovered an affinity for these animals.”
Occasionally, Ian was more than passing strange. Chantal frowned, trying to remember the count saying any such thing, but she’d quit listening once she realized von Fersen wasn’t interested in her opinions. “Perhaps tomorrow we could visit them,” she suggested as they turned toward the river. She could not imagine any country that lacked horses, so perhaps she’d misunderstood. “I suppose Switzerland is too mountainous for racing horses?”
“Something like that,” he agreed, studying the river and its environs. “Could we reach your stable by riverboat?”
“No, and it’s best if we wait for news of your chalice before leaving the city. Then, if my father agrees, we could provide a horse for Pierre once he is released, so that he may quit this country quickly.”
As Jean and Pauline’s youngest brother, Pierre had been Chantal’s childhood friend, too though not a close one. She hated to see him go into exile, if only for Pauline’s sake, but his departure seemed inevitable.
Ian considered her suggestion. “You are fond of these people, yes?”
“Yes, of course. Pauline is like a sister to me. We have our differences, but I am godmother to her children, as she would have been to mine, had I been so blessed.”
Swinging his stick, he frowned at a punt drifting on the river. As if refraining from asking the question on his mind, he turned away from the water. “I shall see what I can do then.”
“What you can do about what?” she asked in puzzlement, hurrying to keep up with his now rapid stride in a different direction.
“I have a friend in this country, one who married here and lives on the coast. He tells me that your families are very important to you, and that we should not disregard your ties to them.”
“You have to be told that? What do you do in your country — throw your relations down the mountain when you tire of them?”
Ian snorted. “If you knew my sister, you would understand.” Before she could comment, he redirected the topic. “Tell me, what is the name of that animal on the leash over there?”
Chantal glanced in the direction he indicated and saw only a lovingly groomed spaniel being walked by a fashionably garbed woman at a distance farther down the path. “The dog? You do not have dogs either? Are you sure you do not live on the moon?”
“Not precisely,” he admitted. “Do you know the lady? I must speak with her.”
“She is not someone I may publicly accost.” Chantal tugged his arm to keep him in place when he seemed determined to ignore her opinion once again. “You can’t go up to strangers and ask about their dogs.” She had to set aside her questions about a land with no dogs or horses in favor of preventing his faux pas.
“I fail to see why not. There is no barrier preventing it.” He continued determinedly on his course, forcing her to hurry to keep up with him.
“I am very liberal in my beliefs, monsieur, but my father would have an apoplexy if he heard I was publicly acknowledging a courtesan. It is bad enough that you ruin my reputation in the privacy of my home, but I cannot allow you to shame me like this!”
He halted and stared at her with perplexity. “Explain courtesan, please.”
Chantal rubbed the place between her eyes that had begun to ache. “Does your country consist only of yourself? No men who pay for the favors of women? Or perhaps you have no women in Switzerland?”
He snorted in apparent amusement. “We have men and women in plenty, and many ways of courting and enjoying each other’s favors. There is only pleasure and no shame in it. It is your customs that are odd. Explain, please.”
“You do not have women who exchange their favors for jewels and gowns and other forms of wealth?”
He was watching the beautiful courtesan stroll toward them, a vision in fluttering ribbons and flimsy muslin and exposed bosom. Chantal wanted to elbow him for his interest, but she had no right to act on her newly acknowledged jealousy.
“Our men might compete for the hand of a woman, and women often compete for the attention of men they favor, but that is not the same, is it? You are saying if I offer her coins or a pretty pearl, she will share her… favors.”
“She is not a prostitute,” Chantal replied crossly, wishing she could drag him away. “She is an expensive courtesan. I was surprised that she did not follow the court to Austria, but she has apparently found a new lover in the Assembly. The lady trades in state secrets as well as jewels.”
He stared at her in astonishment. “Surely that is a crime.”
Chantal deliberately dropped his arm and took a side path so she needn’t acknowledge the other woman’s presence. She wasn’t an innocent. This was Paris, after all, the city of equality. She was sophisticated enough to attend fashionable salons that such creatures also attended, but she was sufficiently well-bred to know how to avert the nuisance of meeting when they needn’t.
She’d hoped Ian would follow, but instead, he laid in wait for the object of his interest, twirling his stick, a breeze rippling his robes over his boots, his dark visage a study in curiosity. Chantal considered walking straight home and leaving the annoying man alone, but she couldn’t resist eavesdropping from behind the lilacs.
He intrigued her far more than was wise. Sometimes, he seemed so oblivious to reality that he may as well have sprung full blown from the earth just yesterday.
“Excuse me, madame,” she heard him
say. “I could not help but notice that your …dog …has an infected ear that pains him greatly. You might wish to take him to a healer.”
A healer? Ian’s understanding of her language must be more limited than she had noticed. And how the devil did he know the spaniel was hurting? Or was this a novel excuse to introduce himself to a beautiful courtesan?
The lady expressed no curiosity as to how Ian knew about dog ears, but merely conveyed appropriate feminine horror over her “poor, dear poopsie-whoopsie.” In exasperation, Chantal imagined the woman bending over the pretty spaniel, exposing her generous assets for Ian’s benefit while she petted and hugged the dog in a manner that would allow a gentleman to envision himself as beneficiary to such cosseting. Would Ian recognize the wiles of a courtesan?
Chantal would have walked away if Ian were any other man, but for him, she lingered. She simply could not resist hearing his thoughts on spaniels and courtesans and whatever else came to mind. He seemed to view her ordinary world through an unusual lens.
Or maybe it was just basic sexual attraction that held her hostage.
He strolled around the shrubbery a few minutes later, this time actually offering his arm rather than forcing Chantal to appropriate it.
“She is a desperate woman who keeps a young child sheltered outside the city. I feel sorry for her, but she spies on the king. You must warn Madame Pauline.”
“I’m sure Pauline already knows,” Chantal said brightly, attempting to disguise her shock at his knowledge after just one meeting. “Did she whisper all those sweet nothings in your ear?”
He didn’t immediately reply. “I am unsure of how much I can tell you,” he finally said, as if that answered her question. “You and I have no formal arrangement between us. And even once that matter is resolved, it will take time for us to know each other. Perhaps it is best to concentrate on our tasks for now.”
Mystic Rider Page 9
