Joanna Bourne: The Forbidden Rose

“But they’re looking for a man with a scar.” He took another step closer. “Like this fellow on the floor. Not me.”

“You’ll see. You will discover who they listen to. A hulking bandit or—Keep away from me.” Victor sprinted sideways. Grabbed Maggie from behind. Wrapped his arm around her throat. A little blade appeared suddenly in his hand. He brought it up under her breast, sticking it in so the cloth parted. Pointed it to her heart.

“Don’t.” Doyle snapped the order before Hawker could throw. “Leave him to me.”

I’m going to get his blood on Maggie. Damn. I didn’t want her to see this. He drew his knife .

Maggie twisted inside the arm that held her. She reached up and behind and found Victor’s face and raked at his eye.

Victor screamed. She jerked free and swirled back, out of danger.

“Nice work.” That was beautifully done. Smooth as silk. He’d taught her exactly that move, and she did him proud.

“Thank you. I am not a cat one grabs by the scruff of the neck,” she said.

Victor was sobbing. “Took my eye out. She took my eye out. She’s killed me. My eye. I’m bleeding. I’m—”

“Your eye is fine. The rest of you, though . . .” He punched, short and fast, into Victor’s belly. Victor’s words cut off in a shriek.

He said, softly, so only Victor heard him, “That’s for taking a club to me when I was tied up.” He knocked Victor’s elegant little dagger out of reach on the floor.

At the street door, men demanded Citoyen Victor de Fleurignac. “He is one of the followers of the tyrant Robespierre. He is to be arrested.” When Janvier protested, he was answered, “It is the order of the Convention.”

Plenty of time to finish this. He hit Victor with his left, into the ribs. Holding back, because this was a flimsy small fellow. “That’s for sending assassins after an old man.”

Victor gurgled.

“I don’t think anyone’s in the mood to listen to you today. But just to make sure . . .” Precisely, scientifically, he struck upward and broke the man’s jaw.

Victor swayed against the wall.

“That one was for sending soldiers to arrest a woman with a baby.” He set one hand in the other and rubbed his knuckles. “But this one . . . This is for Maggie.”

He snapped his knee up fast, hard into the bastard’s crotch. Then he turned away and let the pig fall where he would.

At the front door Janvier said, “Victor de Fleurignac is in the salon. I will take you to him.”

MARGUERITE LEFT THE HÔTEL DE FLEURIGNAC, walking beside Guillaume in the Paris dawn, trailed by a pair of donkeys and Adrian. It was a familiar feeling.

Much had changed. Guillaume did not wear his scar today, continuing to disguise himself as himself. The lack of a scar made him look dull and honest, which was misleading, to say the least.

The Garde Nationale would take no interest in missing prisoners today, not when the great Robespierre himself was so newly dead and no one sure who would be ruling France next week. Still, it was unwise to match too closely the description of an escaped prisoner. One does not thumb one’s nose at Fate.

Of Victor, she had no news whatsoever. The prisons had swallowed him and all was in confusion there. As far as she was concerned, he could continue to live.

Guillaume traveled as a Breton merchant, she as his wife, returning home from settling some business in Rheims. They had packed to portray a dull and solid respectability. Guillaume told her to bring only her most plain and ordinary shifts and stockings and stays. He would buy her new, indecent ones in England, he said.

Her name was Martine, this time, for this trip. She preferred that to Suzette.

Hawker checked the straps on Dulce, who was eating a carrot and pretending to be the most docile creature in creation. “You’ll clean up the mess in England.” He didn’t look at Guillaume. “You have the names now.”

“Just a matter of time,” Guillaume said. “We’ll find our assassins. I’ll pass along your regards to Lazarus. If he hasn’t killed anybody, he’s of no interest to us.”

“I don’t think he’s killed anybody on that list.” There were more straps for him to go over, pulling on each one and tucking it tight. The donkeys carried a pair of valises, one on each side, and a complicated set of bags tied on top of that. Lots of straps. “I wouldn’t go so far as to promise he hasn’t killed anybody at all.”

“He won’t come looking for you in France. You don’t belong to him anymore.”

“Right.” Hawker sounded skeptical. The last adjustments to the packs were firm and brisk. “Bread and wine, cheese. You can buy more when you’re out in the countryside and the food gets better.” He turned and grinned suddenly. “I don’t have to tell you that.”

“No,” Guillaume said calmly. “But I don’t mind. You coming with us partway?”

“As far as the barrière. Just seeing you off. Then it’s back to tell Citoyenne Cachard you’re safe on your way.” His voice was a shade too casual as he added, “She has work for me.”

Hawker clucked the donkeys into motion. It could not be said he strutted, but he was very pleased with himself. He wore knee breeches and a striped vest and a shirt of smooth, close-woven linen. Better clothing than Guillaume. When someone saw them on the street, Hawker would look like the son of some rich merchant house, walking with the family steward.

The fine clothes, oddly, made Hawker look younger. Close to his true age. They did not succeed in making him look like a schoolboy, though. A magic cloak gifted to him by the Queen of the Fairies would not make Hawker look like a schoolboy.

“Let’s hope they don’t change governments again before I get you out of the city.” Guillaume studied the street behind them, looked down the Rue de Laval, ahead. To a suspicious mind, the quiet itself must seem vaguely ominous.

The city waited. Violent men woke to the promise of a hot day and tried to decide whether it was worth rioting in such heat. Delegates to the Convention poured their morning chocolate and gave thanks they had not yet perished on the guillotine. Officers of the Garde Nationale pondered the difficulty of keeping order in the city without inadvertently arresting the men who might be in power tomorrow.

And Robespierre was dead.

No tumbrels rolled to the guillotine. The nuns and priest at the Convent of Saint-Barthélémy were safe. Even Victor would escape death if nobody noticed him.

It was a good day to leave Paris. The barrières would be lightly manned and the guards uncertain and distracted.

Guillaume tilted his new hat back on his head. It was very much in the style of his old one but less decrepit. Hawker paused at the corner to metaphorically sniff the air. He was the first to see Justine. She sat on the steps of a house, the child, Séverine, in her arms. She lifted her chin as they approached.

“Good day to you, citoyens . It is a pleasant day to be walking free under the sun, is it not?”

“Very,” Guillaume said amiably. “You’re waiting for us?”

“For Marguerite, though this is a matter of interest to you as well.”

It would be a matter of some importance. When the city might explode into riot at any minute, Justine would not stroll about in the dawn to wave good-bye. She would not bring the child.

Séverine lay, sleepy-eyed, in Justine’s lap, wrapped tight in her arms. She wore a dress of printed cotton. Justine, in dark serge, could have been a nursemaid looking after her mistress’s daughter.

Séverine stood up on her sister’s lap. “Justine said you would tell me stories.”