Thief of Hearts

by Leda Swann

  She opened one of the volumes and started to slowly spell out the words. Her fingers caressed the smooth vellum pages, itching with the desire to steal it. Some of the words were too long and complicated for her to puzzle out, but the story itself was fascinating, about an adventurer who traveled to the Levant and was made a slave of the Sultan. She wondered whether it was true or just a tale. Mayhap is she slipped it into her jacket now, she could even finish reading it before she took it to the fence to sell for her...

  She heard a low, melodious laugh behind her and a woman’s voice broke the silence. “You did not use to be such a bookworm, Jean-Paul, my sweet.”

  She snapped the book shut again and whirled around to face the speaker. A woman in a rich velvet dress of royal purple and embroidered satin slippers was standing by the door to the inner chamber. Her blonde hair hung in ringlets to her bare shoulders, and here and there in the ringlets were scattered what were surely diamonds. Around her neck was a necklace of midnight blue sapphires, and her fingers were so covered with rings of every size and shape with every kind of stone in them that it was a wonder she could lift her hands at all.

  With some effort, Miriame snapped her mouth shut again, swept the hat from her head, and made a low bow. “Your servant, Madame.”

  At the sight of Miriame’s face, the woman gave a squeak of fright and put one beringed hand to her mouth in a gesture of horror. “Who are you?”

  “Jean-Paul Metin at your service, Madame. A Musketeer in the service of the King of France.”

  “You are not the Jean-Paul I used to know. Come now, confess.” Her voice, now that she had gotten over her shock, was cold and severe, a hundred years away from the purr with which Miriame had first been greeted. “You are a spy, I am sure of it. The Cardinal or one of his cohorts has sent you to me to try to search out my secrets.”

  It was Miriame’s turn to be confused. “I do not know any Cardinal.” She didn’t even know so much as a parish priest. She had never been much of a one for churchgoing and the only priests she’d happened across were so abominably stingy when it came to giving alms that she had never bothered to cultivate their acquaintance.

  “Who is your paymaster then? The Comte de Colbert? Simon de Maupassant? It must be one of the three.”

  She shook her head. This woman would clearly be an uncomfortable enemy to have - for all that she wore a gown and carried no obvious weapon. “I am in no one’s pay, save the King’s himself.”

  The woman looked visibly shaken. “The King has sent you to spy on me?” Her voice trembled and she twisted one of the rings on her fingers nervously in her hands. “Is he so tired of me that he must resort to having me spied on by strangers to come up with an excuse to put me aside?”

  “No indeed, Madame. I am a soldier, not a spy.” It was definitely time she removed herself from this whole complicated affair as quickly and smoothly as she could. Something about it smelled decidedly dangerous. Common people could not mix with royalty without getting their fingers burned. She only wished she could snaffle that book before she left. “However, I think I have the answer to your confusion.”

  The woman looked up, unshed tears glinting in her bright blue eyes. Really, she was quite a beauty with her pale skin and her even features, Miriame thought dispassionately, and her rich dress only added to her charms. No doubt her beseeching look would have most men falling at her feet and swearing eternal devotion to her. She smothered a smile. If the woman expected Miriame to be moved by her distress, she would find herself sadly mistaken.

  Miriame bowed. “I am Jean-Paul Metin of the Musketeers, but I am not the only one. Just today a new Jean-Paul Metin joined our guard, a young man of about my age or thereabouts. I didn’t give it a thought until now – Jean-Paul is such a common name, and Metin is hardly a rarity either. A boy gave me a note and I opened it and read it, never considering that it might not have been meant for me. I must apologize most sincerely for my mistake and bid you farewell.”

  At her explanation, feeble as it sounded even to her own ears, the woman’s face gradually cleared. “You are not a spy?”

  “Certainly not, Madame.”

  “You really are a Musketeer?”

  It still amazed her, even after all these weeks, how she had been accepted into the King’s Guard. She spread out her arms to show off her uniform. “I am.”

  “Then I must beg your pardon for my rudeness to you earlier.” The woman’s voice was all honey and warmth now, nothing like the ice and fury it had been just moments before. “I had thought you were sent by my enemies at court to ruin me. A woman in my position, you know,” and she fluttered her fan weakly in front of her face as she peeped over the top of it, “I can never be too careful. My enemies are all around me, waiting for their chance to tear me down.”

  God in Heaven above, now the woman was trying to flirt with her. This was an unexpected – and rather unwelcome - development. Why in Heaven’s name had she not ripped up that note and thrown in into the gutter while she’d had the chance? “Your enemies, Madame?” she said forcing a gallantry she was far from feeling. She supposed that while she was dressed like a Musketeer, she had best act like one, too, so that none would see through her disguise. Never had she found it so difficult to act like a man. “Who could possibly wish you harm?”

  She trilled a laugh that set Miriame’s teeth on edge. “How foolish of me. If you are really who you say you are, you do not even know who I am.”

  “I must confess I do not, Madame. You have the advantage over me there.”

  Her smile was sweet enough to give Miriame’s teeth the rot just looking at it. “My name is Francoise Athenais de Montespan, the Marquise de Montespan, but you may call me Francine.”

  Francine de Montespan? The mistress of the King of France? The man whose identity she had stolen, the real Jean-Paul Metin, was the secret lover of the King’s mistress? If his identity had been discovered by the King’s men, it was no wonder he had been attacked in the street and left for dead. Things were starting to make a horrible kind of sense to her now. “I am honored to make your acquaintance, Madame Francine.”

  “I am pleased to have met you, Monsieur Metin, though you were not the Monsieur Metin I had been expecting.” She heaved a sigh and touched her fingertips gently to Miriame’s arm. “I must not keep you from your duties any longer, I suppose. Are they so very arduous then, the duties of a Musketeer?”

  If Jean-Paul’s identity was known to the King already, or to the Cardinal or whoever this Francine woman was so afraid of, then she herself was in danger, too. She had inherited the danger along with the name she had stolen. “They keep me well occupied.”

  The fingertips pressed a little harder against her arm. “So well occupied that you have no leisure to visit your friends?”

  Blast and botheration. Why could she not have stolen the identity of some nobody who had no enemies and had never cuckolded the King? Of course, if the real Metin had not been such a fool, he would not have been wounded and she would never have been able to steal his identity. She supposed it served her fair and square for not looking into the matter more carefully before acting. “I know few people in Paris, Madame, so my duties do not seem so onerous to me. I have little call for leisure, so I do not miss it.”

  “But you must count me as one of your friends now, Monsieur Metin,” she said. “Now that we have been introduced, I will take it quite amiss if you do not come to visit me again.”

  Of course, even if she had fully realized the danger Metin was in before she took over his identity, she would have done so anyway. He had been her chance to break out of the slums. She would risk death a thousand times for the chance of a decent life. Now, at least, she knew with what she was dealing and would be on her guard. “You are too kind to a poor soldier, and a stranger.”

  The Marquise rapped Miriame’s knuckles gently with the fan. “You are not a stranger now, Monsieur Metin. Or may I call you Jean-Paul?” She heaved a sigh, more with her bosom t
han with anything else.

  Miriame admired her artistry. With such a gift as she had for manipulating her audience, the Marquise would never be in danger of starvation. “You do me a great honor, Marquise. I would be delighted if you would allow me to call on you,” she lied. The stuffy atmosphere, laded with perfume and spices, was starting to give her a headache. The Marquise really ought to open her casement more often to let in some fresh air. “But will your husband not object if you were to receive a male caller, all alone?”

  At the mention of her husband, the Marquise’s eyes darkened. “The Marquis is too busy with his own position at Court to keep an over careful eye on his wife’s friends,” she said tartly. “You are not afraid of a mere courtier, are you? A brave Musketeer that you are?”

  “And the King? Would he not be even more careful with your virtue than your husband?”

  She laughed gaily. “As long as you are discrete in your visits, how would he ever know aught of them? I certainly shall not court his anger by telling him of them. What the King does not know, will never hurt him. Besides,” she added coyly. “There is no harm in a simple visit. I am just so lonely sometimes in the long, cold winter evenings when the court is dull and tiresome. I thought mayhap we could play a game of cards together, or you could read to me. Why should the King mind if we are engaged in such innocent pursuits, even were he to discover your visits?”

  Miriame held back a sigh. She could see no escape. The Marquise was quite determined. “I would be pleased to play cards with you, Madame, whenever you are pleased to call for me.”

  “Tomorrow night?” the Marquise suggested, twisting a small diamond ring from off her middle finger and pressing it into Miriame’s hand. “At the same time? I will have Berthe wait for you by the door as she did tonight to escort you here.”

  Miriame closed her fingers over the ring in her hand, her head swimming with astonishment. She had just been given a king’s ransom for a mere promise to visit the Marquise and play her at cards. Her disguise held some unexpected advantages. For such a pretty bauble she would come visit in her Musketeer’s uniform and bow and scrape and mouth foolish words that she didn’t mean for a month altogether. “I will treasure this for your sake,” she said, as she raised the jewel to her mouth and kissed it.

  Just as long as the Marquise did not try to kiss her, she thought all of a sudden, an uncomfortable feeling in the pit of her stomach. Bleuch – she didn’t care for the thought at all. Playing cards was tolerable enough, but kissing the woman was quite out of the question, even for another diamond ring.

  She backed quickly towards the door of the chamber with her loot, kissing her fingertips and waving them at the Marquise as she turned to leave.

  The Marquise fluttered her fan in front of her face. “Until tomorrow.”

  Miriame gave a smart salute in reply. “I shall count the moments until then.”

  The same maidservant led her through the maze of corridors back to the western gate. Miriame heard the door being shut and the bolts drawn home behind her as she strode off into the snow. She’d had an exhausting day that had tired her in both body and spirit, and she was looking forward to the peace and privacy that her tiny chamber afforded her. Her own space, where she was safe from the rest of the world. How she treasured it. How glad she was that she had made the decision to stay and fight it out – not to run.

  She had barely gone five steps when a threatening figure in a long swirling cloak, his face shadowed by a heavy hood, materialized out of the darkness in front of her. It pointed its sword at her, forcing her to stop dead in the street.

  “What do you want?” she demanded. She was annoyed, but hardly scared, by such an open challenge. If her assailant had seriously wished to harm her, he would never have given her such a clear warning of his intentions, but would have jumped her without a word and tried to slit her throat before she had a chance to fight back. She had no fear of those who fought her openly, but a healthy fear of those who crept in the shadows, stalking their prey like an alley cat on the prowl.

  “Draw your sword, you scoundrel,” the figure demanded in a voice filled with fury. “Draw your sword and fight me like a man.”

  Chapter 4

  She pushed the flat edge of the blade away with one gloved hand. “I am in no mood for jesting with strangers. Be off with you and let me be.”

  “Draw your sword and fight me like a man,” the figure repeated, “or I will carve out the heart from your very body and spit it on the tip of my blade.”

  He sounded terribly determined. She sighed in annoyance. “Who are you that I should fight with you?”

  The figure threw back the hood of his cloak with a flourish. The moonlight glinted off the planes of his cheeks and shone silver on his shoulder-length hair.

  She groaned. “You.” Damn it all. She was in no mood for a confrontation with her namesake right now. She was carrying a jewel worth a small fortune in her pocket, and did not want to lose it in the fray. Besides she had a headache. She was not even in the mood for admiring his spectacular beauty, with its unique marriage of masculinity and grace. He was far better-looking now that he was on his feet than he had been lying wounded in his bed. His face, even in the moonlight, no longer had the pallor of death. “Go away and call on me in the morning, if you must. I’m tired and hungry and in no mood for a confrontation.”

  Jean-Paul Metin glowered at her. Even in the dim moonlight the obvious fury on his beautiful face would have made many a soldier quail. “I see you know who I am.”

  “Of course. You’re the soldier with a face as pretty as any girl’s,” she said with a wry grin. “You’re quite famous in the barracks already. Why, one of the lieutenants was practically salivating as he described you to the other men. One can only wonder,” she said in a curious voice, “exactly how he came by such detailed and graphic information he was sharing with such glee.”

  Just as she had hoped, her taunting set him off into a furious rampage. Without another word, he attacked. His anger gave him more force, but less care. He swung his sword wildly around his head and charged at her. If just one of his powerful blows had connected with her, she would have been seriously hurt, if not dead on the instant.

  She sidestepped him easily. “I see you fight like a girl, too. What do you do of an evening when you have finished with your soldiering? Do you sew your own shirts? Or maybe you sit over your embroidery gossiping with the other women, or stir the cooking pots, or bend over for your lord and master to do his pleasure...”

  She’d not thought he could get any madder than he was before, but it seemed he could. She parried his blows with some difficulty. Luckily for her they were less than accurate, but so strong that the force from each strike that she deflected traveled up her sword arm in a thousand shivers.

  Back and forward they danced, he attacking, she defending, until she began to tire. Her long day was beginning to tell on her strength.

  She’d given him enough of a game. He must have worked out the worst of his anger on her by now. She wanted to go home to bed.

  His attack showed no sign of letting up. Time to play dirty. With a quick fumble at her buckle, she loosened her scabbard.

  He charged her, his sword up high. Instead of parrying his blow with her sword as he was expecting, Miriame ducked out of the way and swung her long scabbard along the ground at the level of his knees.

  He tripped over it and fell with a thud to the cobbles, gave a groan, and lay still.

  Miriame hesitated. She had saved his life once, after all. There was no sense in her undoing all her good work and killing him now. Besides, her greatest enemy wanted him dead. That was reason enough for her to keep him safe.

  In a moment, he stirred and raised his head to glare at her. He’d only had the breath knocked out of him, nothing more. She sheathed her sword and took to her heels, sprinting away through the dark streets towards her home.

  His angry curses followed her down the street. She looked back before she
turned the corner. He had stumbled to his feet, but did not look very steady. His steps were faltering, and he leaned heavily against a wall to hold himself upright.

  For just a moment she thought of going back to help him, but decided against it. She would only make things worse. In the temper he was in, he could easily do her a damage before she could explain that she was there to help him. She doubted he would accept her help anyway.

  Still, she didn’t like to live him incapacitated in the street, easy prey for any one who might be lurking in the shadows. Knowing what she did now about his enemies, he was lucky to still be alive. Half of Paris would be baying for his blood.

  She doubled back quietly, going the long way around so she could creep up behind him without being noticed.

  He had ceased shouting abuse at her and was retracing her steps of earlier that evening, right up to the wall of the palace and knocked on the western door, just as she had done.

  There was no answer.

  He knocked again, louder.

  Still no answer.

  He hammered furiously against the door with the hilt of his sword, the thuds reverberating through the night like thunder.

  Just as she thought the door was going to cave in under the force of his blows, the Marquise’s maidservant finally came to the door and opened it just a crack. “What do you want?” She was clearly not pleased to be disturbed at such a late hour.

  “I want to see Francine.”

  She was not impressed. “I am afraid that my mistress has already retired for the night. It is too late for her to receive visitors.”

  The Musketeer was not to be dismissed that easily. He slipped his foot into the door so it could not be shut in his face. “Tell her that Jean-Paul Metin, the man who loves her more than life itself, is here to see her. Tell her that every moment of my life spent away from her is like a lifetime. Tell her that my existence has no meaning without her. Tell her that I love her more than ever before and would cross mountains to be by her side.”