The Lost Castle

by Kristy Cambron

  “The Sleeping Beauty . . . ,” Ellie whispered, climbing the steps.

  “That’s you gasping over there, isn’t it, Ellie?”

  “Oui, Titus.” She eased up the last step and accepted his hand. “C’est moi.”

  “Your Français is improving,” he teased. “Soon you’ll be teaching this boy a thing or two about a proper accent.”

  She flipped her gaze to Quinn, who rolled his eyes heavenward.

  Titus raised his eyebrows. “And have you seen the fox yet?”

  “No.” Ellie looked around even then, always hoping to catch a glimpse of rust and a black-tipped tail darting through the trees. “Not yet.”

  “Give it time. They will come to greet you after a while. But they are not why you’ve come. You young ones must have had to walk by the Cathédrale Espoir Sacré, or you would not be here now. Hmm? So tell me—what did you find in Loudun?”

  “That was you?” Quinn leaned back against a ledge of stone and let out a hefty sigh. “You called the police. I might have known my own grandfather would one day be responsible for startin’ up my arrest record. I’m tellin’ your wife, make no mistake.”

  Titus brushed off the threat with a wave of the hand. “Hush. Let the girl answer.”

  “Everything, Titus. We found everything. She was there. In old wartime photos on the wall. I saw Grandma Vi in the dress, the same one from the photo I have. And then in trousers, a vest, and a beret . . . We saw her as I’ve never seen her before. Standing with the rest of the resistance fighters right here at the castle, bold as they were to defend it. Alongside the man from her photo. Was he your brother—this Julien?”

  “It’s been a long time.” He nodded, pausing on the words. “A very long time. I haven’t heard his name in . . . many years.” He turned his face out to the grove, the road, and the chapel, as if he could readily see them all. “Yes. Julien. And my first wife, Mariette. She passed many years ago, when our son was young. And Camille. Brig and Pascal. So many names.”

  “We saw an old camera in a glass case at the church. Was it yours?”

  Titus pressed a finger to his lips. Thinking. Remembering. Some evidence of pride washing down over his countenance. “No. It was not. But I am grateful that your grandmother took ownership of it at the proper time.”

  Ellie walked over to the side of the castle and pressed her palm to the stone façade. Tiny flecks of weathered red still remained; the breath of history beneath her fingertips. “And the V you painted on the front. I can’t believe it—after all this time, the paint is still here.”

  She turned a circle. Looking, taking in the art of the ruins . . . loving the feel of the sun on her shoulders . . . hearing the slight ripples of the water on all sides . . . and seeing the length of the long road she and Quinn had walked together.

  “There is a history where we stand, Ellie, and I would be honored to give you your first tour of this story. In spring, the road is bathed in blossoms overhead, and violets on both sides. They grow wild through the grove. It is said that a mistress of the castle—the first lady to rebuild it anew after the Revolution—she favored them. She came here, fell in love with the land and the people on it. And she is the reason our wine, and our name, and even this very castle survive today.”

  “L’Aveline . . . the Muscadet.” Ellie jumped her gaze over to Quinn, remembering their tour of the night market and the name of the Renard signature label they’d seen at the wine tent. “It’s named for her, isn’t it? Aveline. Was that her name?”

  “There are many names in this place. And Lady Vi made sure to record them all. She spent years writing every name, researching every story, so that one day these ruins could be rebuilt upon them.” Titus lavished her with a smile and took a small leather-bound journal from the inside pocket of his field jacket. “The job of keeping them safe was passed to me. And now, Ellison Carver, these stories belong to you.”

  It felt like a kiss from heaven sweeping in, overwhelming Ellie as she flipped through the journal and saw her grandmother’s writing. Inked pages, years’ worth, filling cover to cover with names . . . and dates . . . and the storied past of the sleeping castle where they stood.

  “I wish I could stay. But Grandma Vi hasn’t been well, and if I have any time left with her”—she paused, hugging the journal to her chest—“I want her to know I found the truth. About her. And Julien. And all the people who have lived here and loved this place. She needed me to find this story, and now that I have, my job is to bring it back to her.”

  She locked eyes with Quinn. There was one question left to answer, and somehow, what he would think about it mattered more to her than having it confirmed.

  “There’s one thing I need to know before I go. You are not the owner of this Sleeping Beauty, are you, Titus?”

  “No. I told you that I am not. But then who is, Ellie? Because I think deep down, you already know the answer.”

  She swept a palm under her eyes, emotion having crept in, and brushed at the wetness beneath her lashes.

  “I am.”

  THIRTY

  JUNE 18, 1944

  LES TROIS-MOUTIERS

  LOIRE VALLEY, FRANCE

  Julien stood along the road to the castle as an eerie morning mist rolled in from the trees.

  Vi recognized his gait, even from far away—the slight hitch of a limp, the tall form and broad shoulders—and lowered her rifle. Relief prompted her to walk faster. To run if she had to, desperate for her legs to pick up and carry her to the safety of his arms. He was alive, and it was all that mattered in the world.

  “Julien!”

  He turned, slowly.

  Too slow for what was normal, without his usual flash of a smile. There were no words. No voice returning the call of her name. And no relieved-to-see-you glimmer in the eyes she knew so well. Instead, agony washed over his face at seeing it was she who was rushing toward him.

  Julien raised a hand to stop her advance.

  His palm was blood-red in the early dawn light, glistening as the drizzle of a cool summer rain fell around them.

  “Julien . . .” She restrained a sob, dulling it to silence upon her lips.

  Vi raised the rifle, keeping her sight sharp for any movement around him.

  She took slow, even steps along the road. Watching. Defying his request to stay because she knew if she could just get to him, surely everything would be alright. They could stay at their castle. Dream together. Rebuild the ruins from the ground up.

  She glanced down, marking her steps as she drew closer.

  The fog began to fade in the rain, and she swallowed hard as crumpled bodies in Nazi uniforms, others in street clothes of the maquisards, began to take form on the road between them. Rifles discarded. Helmets gathering raindrops. Blood mixing with water and mud and pink blossoms that had fallen to the ground.

  “Stop, Lady,” he whispered. Pained, shaking his head. “Please . . . stop.”

  Vi froze, her boot kicking against something as she halted her advance on the road. She dared to look down, hands shaking but sure as she gripped the rifle. She took her gaze off him long enough to see . . . a camera.

  The camera she knew well.

  Her heart sank deeper; the strap was still entwined round the wrist of a girl with chocolate hair who lay facedown on the road, her body entangled with a jumble of others. She resolved that grieving would come later; for now, she’d take charge of the camera’s witness.

  Lifting Camille’s wrist with care, Vi pulled the strap free and swept it over her shoulder, tucking the camera behind her back.

  A shot rang out before she could right herself. Then another, echoing through the trees. Vi fell, facedown in the road, her hand clinging in a white-knuckled grip to her rifle as her cheek ground into stone and mud.

  It took split seconds to realize why Julien had asked her to stop; they were being stalked like prey in an open field. Though fired at, she was unhurt. Limbs were all accounted for and nothing seared with pain, which
meant any shot fired must have missed its mark.

  Unless . . . Julien.

  Vi raised her head enough to see through the mist, though her chin still lay buried in the mud. But he was still crouched and moving in her direction along the trees.

  Breaths rocked in and out, terror cinching her chest as she lay pressed against the ground. She watched as Julien backtracked toward her, his shoulders hunched and a pistol raised in his left hand. Blood trailed down the other, stabbing her heart each time liquid red dripped from the curl of his fingertips.

  He stopped before her, the backs of his military-issue boots within reach of her hand.

  Vi gripped his ankle and squeezed, letting him know she was alive. He eased back and knelt, legs braced in a protective haven, his head and shoulders absorbing the rain over her shoulders.

  “Diables verts,” he whispered down at her, eyes trained on the darkness of the trees on both sides. She closed her eyes and nodded.

  Green devils.

  It’s what they called the Nazi paratroopers—the savage fighters uniformed in forest green. No doubt that’s what they’d heard the night before, planes dropping more than bombs over the estate house. The Nazis were desperate to hold France from the Allies and dropped reinforcements in known areas of resistance or strategic points of defense.

  Turned out, the castle and the bridge to Loudun were both.

  “We were ambushed at the bridge. Brig pulled the trigger before they could come over, but the green devils were already here.” It was a short summary for the evidence of the fight all around them. In the next breath his voice softened with, “Are you hurt, love?”

  “No,” she whispered, rain splattering mud sprays against her lips. Vi feared she knew the answer but begged, “Are you?”

  He ignored the question, keeping his gaze moving along the trees. “See the Matford on the side of the road, to our left?”

  It was a skeleton of metal riddled with bullets, but still there.

  Gertie was mangled, her cart flipped and torn into a pile of scrap metal. Vi could only imagine the fighting that had gone on to defend the estate house. Hold the bridge. Fend off an attack on the castle ruins, and protect the ridge that led to the cottage and the underground bunker, and she who’d been inside it.

  “Yes. I see it.”

  “Rise up. Just enough to crawl, but stay behind me. We’re going for cover. Over to the car.” He reached his hand down, palm open to her. Vi obeyed and took it, feeling relief at the strength of life still in his grip but worried that it would cause pain if she were to hold too tight.

  “Together, oui?”

  There wasn’t time.

  Not to crawl an inch or even nod her answer to him.

  A Nazi uniform emerged from the cover of trees, with a pair of devilish eyes and a rifle trained on them. A lone paratrooper, ready to claim his prey.

  Julien raised his pistol but still braced in front of her and absorbed a bullet that tore through the air, spinning him at the shoulder. Vi screamed and caught him as he fell, trying to cover him so another bullet couldn’t tear into his flesh.

  Two shots, one piercing echo after another, blasted the air. The paratrooper fell forward and then . . . only deafening silence.

  And the sound of rain.

  Vi pulled Julien back with her, realizing the final shots had found their target, and it wasn’t them. She lay Julien across her lap and raised the rifle, training her sight on the form of a man cutting a path from the castle steps, trekking down the center of the road with weapon raised.

  With hands shaking, she gripped the rifle, index finger hugging the trigger.

  “Ne tirez pas!” he called out, telling her not to shoot. “I’m Elder, and that was the last one.”

  “Elder . . .” The name sparked something familiar, the code for their general in the woods, though he’d been a ghost until that very moment. Tall, broad shouldered, with a thick coal beard covering his chin, he stalked forward, moving in their direction while shifting his shoulders to scan the tree line on both sides.

  “Stay down!”

  Vi obeyed, dropping the rifle at her side.

  She slid her fingers under Julien’s neck, supporting his head. His eyes followed her, thank God. He was awake and she could have smacked him—for he’d chosen that very moment to lavish a boyish smile up at her.

  “Lady . . .” He reached up, twirling a lock of her hair in bloodied fingertips.

  “This is my fault,” she sobbed, sliding him onto the ground to make a rain shield over top of him. Vi tore the buttons on her vest and shrugged out of it, wadding the fabric to press against the wound in his shoulder. “If I’d listened to you . . . gone straight to the chapel . . .”

  “No, Lady. It’s not your fault. I wouldn’t have been there. This way, I get to see you,” Julien whispered, dotting a finger to the dimple in her cheek to get her attention. “You have dirt on your face. Remember? Just like the first time I saw you.”

  “And I am delighted to see you too.” Vi lowered her head and pressed a kiss to his lips, tasting the salt of her own tears upon them. “But shh . . . let me see to this now. Teasing later.”

  Elder appeared, swung the strap of his rifle over his shoulder, and knelt at her side.

  “Help me,” she cried, looking to the man. She shuddered at the blood covering her hands—Julien’s—as she pressed the vest to his shoulder. “Please, I don’t know what to do.”

  “Didn’t I tell you?” Julien cut in, looking up to Elder. “She’s beautiful, isn’t she?”

  Vi wished she could ignore the comment as Elder did; it blistered her heart. But Elder was calm, going to work on the compression at Julien’s shoulder. He inspected the wound only briefly, then, brow furrowed deep, he turned his attention down, instead looking over Julien’s torso.

  Vi studied him, not understanding. “What’s the matter?”

  “The shoulder’s just a flesh wound. A nick shouldn’t be bleeding like this.” He tore at the black vest buttoned down Julien’s middle, revealing a deep wound to his right side, his shirt soaked in crimson.

  “Julien . . .” She covered her mouth, her chin trembling beneath her palm. “Oh no . . .”

  “I knew you took a bullet in the side before you ran down the castle steps, but you wouldn’t stop. Brave fool.” Elder looked to her. “He went after the team.”

  Vi turned around, seeing Camille . . . probably Brig, and countless other maquisards from the woods, their bodies strewn along the road.

  Elder wasted no time, pulling Julien’s vest tight. “Deep breath, my brother. We’re going for a walk.” Then he raised Julien, lifting him over his shoulders.

  Julien cried out, a moan tendered with each running step to the car.

  “Brother?” Vi grabbed up the rifle and her vest, following behind.

  He nodded. “I’m Titus.” He eased Julien in the front of the car to lay him out on the seat. “If we were going to put up a fight, it was safer for everyone if the Boches thought I was already gone. Or dead.”

  “You’re Julien’s brother . . . All this time, you’ve been leading the Maquis in the grove.”

  Suddenly, thoughts hit in a barrage.

  Marie and the baby flew back to her mind, realization that the short time she’d promised to be gone from the bunker had turned into a nightmare of moments she’d lost track of. That in the very moment they stood beside her love, bleeding and moaning in a front seat, Titus’s love could be in just as much danger.

  “Titus.” Vi reached out, grabbing his lapels. “Your wife is in labor. I came to get Julien, never expecting to find you instead. But she’s calling out for you. She won’t calm for anyone else. I would have delivered the baby myself, but it’s been hours and I’m worried that something is wrong.”

  His eyes, so similar to his brother’s, deep and gold, and pained beyond anything, looked to his brother’s boots sticking out of the car. “Where is she?”

  “The bunker. With Criquet and the rest of
the children. I swore I’d only be gone long enough to bring help back. But you have to go to her. I can handle this.” Vi looked down in the car, relieved that Julien’s chest was still rising and falling at a steady pace. She turned back, pulled the cellar door key from her vest, and pressed it into his hand. “Now, tell me what to do, and I’ll do it.”

  Titus shocked her. A man of strength, a shade taller and thicker than his brother, with a steely resolve to lead an army in the woods, couldn’t keep tenderness at bay enough to keep his bottom lip still.

  “I think you should make him comfortable.” He swallowed, a long pause of emotion. “Just stay with him. Please.”

  Vi shot back a denial, shaking her head with the force of everything inside her. “No. I said tell me what to do. You go back to the bunker and I will look after your brother.” She swept the strap of the rifle over her shoulder, determined to move. “Look at me, Titus. What do I do?”

  Titus glanced at the car, then sighed deep. “Take the road leading out from here, past the estate house. The bridge is bombed flat so it’s the only way out. Left at the big fork, all the way into Loudun. That’s ten kilometers, Lady. Through countryside that could be overrun, so don’t you dare stop for anything or anyone. I can’t promise you’ll make it—”

  “We’ll make it.” She notched her chin. “What then?”

  “Look for the Porte du Martray—a medieval gate at Rue du Martray. There is a chapel beyond it, buried in the street on the hill. It’s Cathédrale Espoir Sacré—Cathedral of Sacred Hope. Medics were dropped in France weeks ago, in preparation for the invasion we didn’t know was coming. They’re already taking wounded. If Loudun is not under siege, it’ll be the best chance for him.”

  “Then I’ll get word to you when we’re safe.”

  Vi ran to the driver’s side and climbed in, settling Julien’s head in her lap. She braced the rifle on the floorboard, leaning it against his shoulder for quick access, and steadied her hands on the wheel.