In the Shadow of the Sun

by EM Castellan

  It was only when the carriage rattled on the flagstones and the massive silhouette of the château receded in the distance that I let air expand my lungs. We were leaving Vaux-le-Vicomte behind. We’d survived the party.

  “I’m still waiting for someone to recognize the fact that I saved the day.” Armand’s voice drew me out of my thoughts and I leaned away from the carriage window to nestle against Philippe. Armand, Athénaïs, and Prince Aniaba sat opposite us, their faces gleaming in the moonlight.

  “How so?” Weariness softened Philippe’s tone, but a hint of amusement hid behind it.

  “I’m the one who thought of recruiting the Comte de Saint-Aignan.” He thrust out his finger. “I’m the one who hauled him from some very fetching courtesan’s lap and dragged him all the way across those bloody gardens. If you think that was easy, then you’re mistaken.”

  Philippe chuckled, but Athénaïs rolled her eyes. “What about Jean? Didn’t he save the day, too?”

  The prince waved her praise away. “Lending my magic to perform a spell in a time of crisis hardly counts as heroism. Anyone would have done it.”

  “Exactly,” Armand said. “Whereas getting the count to the grotto? That was heroism.”

  Athénaïs’s voice rose to defend her lover. Armand argued back, and their halfhearted bickering filled the carriage. Grinning, Prince Aniaba gave me a helpless shrug. I extended my hand to him until he gripped it, his expression serious again.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  Words failed me as I tried to convey how grateful I was for his part in the night’s events. He’d used his magic to heal Philippe. He’d done what I had been too weakened to do. He’d saved us both.

  He brought my hand to his lips and kissed it lightly. “There’s no need to thank me, Your Highness.”

  But there was, and despite his gentlemanly denial, he knew it. I squeezed his fingers briefly before releasing him.

  “Still. Do let me know if there’s ever anything I can do for you.”

  He bowed his assent and shifted his attention to Athénaïs and Armand. I relaxed into Philippe’s embrace, utter exhaustion weighing down my limbs. His eyes were closed, and he slept with his head rested against the wall, his handsome profile peaceful at last in the dim light. I kissed his cheek and settled against him. Armand and Athénaïs fell silent, and soon the rumbling of the wheels on the road and the clop of the horses’ hooves mixed with the birdsong in the branches above. Sleep made my eyelids heavy, but I forced them open to lean against the carriage window.

  Gray light tainted the horizon among the trees, announcing the sunrise. The skies paled and turned pink, then orange, until golden light spread across the land, blanketing the countryside in warm hues. A few minutes later the light was too bright for me to keep watching. I sat back on the cushioned bench.

  Armand, Athénaïs, and the prince were all asleep, slumped against each other in the slanted sunshine like the slumbering courtiers of a fairy tale. Their regular breathing filled the carriage, and Armand’s light snoring brought a smile to my lips.

  “The sleep of the innocents.”

  Philippe’s whisper barely reached me over the noise of the carriage. He hadn’t moved, but his eyes were open, and I knew what he meant. Our companions, despite their crucial roles in the night’s incident, hadn’t been in the cave with us. Only Philippe and I knew the full truth of what had happened with Fouquet—the sheer terror and the pain of it all. The blood might be gone from his clothes and the bruises faded from his skin, but the memories of this night would linger for a lifetime, I feared. As if following the same train of thought, Philippe pressed me against him.

  “You need to promise too,” he said, his voice still low in my ear.

  I frowned. “Promise what?”

  “To not try to be heroic and nearly die for me, you daft woman.”

  A laugh built in my chest at his paraphrasing my words. “All right. I promise.”

  It was a lie.

  AUTUMN

  CHAPTER XXIII

  Mist lingered above the cobblestones of the cathedral square in Nantes. Gray clouds hung low in the morning sky, pressing on the slanted roofs and mismatched facades of the city. The church bells tolled eight o’clock, and the wooden chair I sat on creaked under my weight. I leaned toward the dirty panes of the first-floor window, and cast a nervous glance outside for what felt like the thousandth time. Passersby in muted clothes went about their business, and carriages rumbled past as if today were any other day.

  Except today was Monday, September fifth—the date chosen for Fouquet’s arrest.

  I wrung my hands together, my body stiff from sitting in tense anxiety for so long. Waiting in this nondescript inn, with its uneven floorboards and whitewashed walls, the memories of the luxurious gathering at Vaux appeared impossibly distant and almost surreal. Two and a half weeks had gone by, yet the party’s magnificence could have happened half a lifetime ago and half a world away.

  After that day, the king had made a gambit. He had followed his mother’s advice and let Fouquet go free. He’d granted him a long private audience, during which peace had been made and past sins had been forgiven. The Crown Magicien had left the room with a satisfied grin on his face—strengthened in his belief that the king feared him and that his position was secure. Then we’d all waited for that precise moment when Fouquet could be arrested without endangering the king. We’d bided our time until his power weakened. Until he lowered his guard. Until the right opportunity arose.

  And this morning at last, the pieces were ready to fall into place on the chessboard. Ten days after the events at Vaux, Louis and part of the court had left Fontainebleau for Nantes. To the outside world, the Sun King was bestowing the honor of his presence to a provincial town, touring convents and meeting city officials. But to a handful of trusted close relations, this visit was much more than that: It was Louis’s way of luring Fouquet out of his safe haven and away from his Parisian supporters. Rumored to be plagued by headaches, fever, and even depression, the Crown Magicien had delayed his arrival in Nantes, then lain sequestered in his private lodgings once here. Growing impatient, Louis had decided to hold a council at his château this morning to force his most important minister to attend. Fouquet had complied. The council had started an hour ago.

  I stood up, my nerves getting the better of me. The château where Louis resided stood a couple of streets away from the cathedral. Louis wanted to avoid scandal there, in front of the court and his hosts, so he’d ordered the arrest to be made outside, as soon as Fouquet left after the council. The Crown Magicien would then be brought to this privatized inn, where Louis and I would ensure his magic wouldn’t hurt anyone else ever again before his transfer into a royal prison. Our plan was simple, with a very narrow location. The town crawled with the crown’s finest musketeers, making it impossible for Fouquet to escape.

  Yet the clock above the watchmaker’s shop indicated ten past eight. The council should have been over by now, and Louis and Fouquet before me.

  I paced the short distance before the window, my heavy cloak trailing around my ankles. The two musketeers in blue-and-red uniforms by the door exchanged a worried glance. They didn’t know what the day held, except that they were supposed to guard me with their lives. I forced a reassuring smile onto my lips, and turned my attention outside again, my mind racing once more.

  The Comte de Saint-Aignan and Prince Aniaba were at the château with the king, in case a magical intervention was needed there. Should anything have happened during or after the council, they could protect the king. But what if, sensing danger, Fouquet had simply chosen flight over fight? Louis had trusted the leader of the musketeers, a man in his forties named D’Artagnan, with the task of stopping him. He was a magicien, but not a powerful one as far as rumor went. And there was no knowing how tired Fouquet truly was—and how much his weakened state was feigned. What if he had already fled?

  The crowd outside grew thicker as the minutes went by
, people weaving in and out of the shops around the square, pausing to greet each other in front of the cathedral and avoiding the mud splashed by rolling carriages. All of a sudden a small group stood out amid the mingling pedestrians: seven men who stuck to the outskirts of the square and the shadows, and marched with a purpose the other passersby lacked. Six of them wore the musketeers’ uniform. One was wrapped in a long black cloak, his face hidden under a wide-brimmed hat. They ducked under the inn’s awning and disappeared inside below my window.

  My heartbeat quickened, and I turned to face the door. Knocking rattled the wooden panel, which prompted the two soldiers inside to shoot me expectant looks. I gave them a quick nod, so they opened the door.

  Louis took off his hat and let his gaze sweep the room as he walked in. Then his face blanched and he looked at me. “He’s not here?”

  The controlled anger in his voice made the musketeers behind him take a cautious step back. My throat tight, I shook my head. Louis let out a curse and threw his hat onto the bed.

  “He left the château before me,” he said, his voice rising. “I had time to alter my appearance, slip away from court, go out through the back way, and walk here like a penniless peasant, and he’s still not here?”

  He spat the last words, his accusatory golden gaze settling on the soldiers, who shuffled their feet and kept their heads down. I held my gloved hand up in an appeasing gesture to save the poor men from his wrath. They hadn’t been tasked with arresting Fouquet, after all.

  “It’s quite crowded outside,” I said. “Fouquet is traveling by litter. He might just be stuck in traffic.”

  “Or he might have escaped!” Louis exploded. He ran his fingers through his hair, which he’d tied at the nape of his neck with a black velvet ribbon, and freed a few blond strands.

  “Let’s just wait another few minutes,” I replied, my voice far more controlled than my emotions.

  Trusting a weak magicien with arresting Fouquet had been a mistake; it was obvious now. Even cornered, our enemy still had power, and now that he knew what we’d planned, there would be no stopping him again. My chest deflated, and I turned my attention back outside to hide the distress in my expression. We’d lost our only chance.

  A commotion in the square caught my eye. A carriage had stopped in front of a shop at the most inconvenient location, creating a traffic jam. Pedestrians and drivers alike shouted their discontent, while a litter for hire struggled to overtake the blockade. The wigged gentleman in the sedan chair poked out his head to survey the tumult. My heart jolted.

  “He’s here!”

  Louis rushed to my side and spotted Fouquet’s dark wig in a heartbeat. “Why isn’t he riding his own litter?”

  “Maybe that’s how he escaped D’Artagnan’s attention?”

  Louis hit the windowsill with his fist, and bits of plaster fell down. Frustration all over his features, he gritted his teeth. “He can’t get away.” He moved to make his way back out, and fear at his recklessness turned my blood cold. He was the king: He couldn’t stroll out into a public square to attempt to arrest his own Crown Magicien.

  I closed my fingers around his forearm. “Wait—”

  He spun around to release his arm, but his gaze landed on something outside and he froze. I let him go to take a look myself: Fifteen of his musketeers surrounded Fouquet’s sedan chair, D’Artagnan’s tall silhouette in the lead. The two men exchanged a few words. Even from a distance, Fouquet’s body language denoted surprise. He recoiled, then stepped out of the litter, while D’Artagnan produced a piece of paper: the lettre de cachet signed by Louis that ordered the Crown Magicien’s arrest and sealed his fate. Fouquet took more time than I expected to read the letter, or maybe he read it more than once, as if the words had trouble sinking in. His shoulders sagged.

  Next to me, Louis held his breath, his tight grasp on the windowsill turning his knuckles white. His tension was contagious. As traffic resumed in the square, carriages and passersby moved on. They avoided the litter at a standstill in front of the watchmaker, unaware of the identity of its occupant, oblivious to the tremendous event that shook his world.

  Time slowed and I could almost see the cogs turning in Fouquet’s mind as he weighed his decision: attempt escape, or give in. On the windowsill, Louis’s knuckles cracked. The tension in my chest vanished as a certainty struck me, and I wrapped my hand over his.

  “He’s going to let D’Artagnan arrest him,” I said. This time, my voice was as self-assured as I felt. Since the beginning of the summer, Fouquet had been guided—and blinded by—his endless pride and confidence. Even after the disaster at Vaux, he’d kept on thinking he was untouchable. He’d met with the king and walked out of the interview with a smile on his face. He’d come to Nantes, although ill and weakened, as if his presence at the king’s side was indispensable.

  And now, with the king’s order of arrest in his hand and musketeers surrounding him, he still pondered his options. He still thought himself superior. He still believed he could win, his arrest just a temporary setback.

  He spoke to D’Artagnan, who gave a curt reply. Fouquet held out his arms to allow him access to his pockets, but the musketeer came up only with papers. The Crown Magicien didn’t need weapons—he had power at his fingertips. He handed his cane to D’Artagnan, who snapped a command at his men. They surrounded Fouquet and led him to the inn door.

  “Yes,” Louis hissed between his teeth.

  He took off his cloak with a flourish and dropped it onto the bed. Then he crossed his arms, waiting for his Crown Magicien to be brought into the room.

  The stomping of feet echoed on the staircase outside, and my pulse thumped against my rib cage again. In the past two and a half weeks, I had made a point of avoiding Fouquet. Nightmares of the events in the cave still woke Philippe at night, and although I tried to put it all behind me, my anger still stirred every time memories of Moreau’s death and Philippe’s ordeal flashed through my mind. I couldn’t shut the door on the past, and I couldn’t move on.

  Which was why I had agreed to Louis’s plan—and the spell he wanted to perform today.

  After what seemed a long time, the door sprang open and D’Artagnan pushed the Crown Magicien inside. Fouquet took in the simple room, my presence, and the king’s with a stunned expression. Exhaustion and illness carved deep lines into his face. Shadows haunted his emaciated features and sunken eyes. D’Artagnan held him by his arm, and he leaned his weight against him, out of breath after the climb up the stairs. I frowned. From up close, he looked worse than I had imagined. Nothing like a powerful magicien. More like a sick old man at death’s door. Maybe our spell wouldn’t be necessary after all.

  Striving to play his part until the end, Fouquet bowed, the gesture rendered pathetic by the frailness of his body. “Your Majesty. Your Highness. I’m confused—”

  “Oh, spare us, Fouquet,” Louis snapped. He’d dropped the Monsieur before his Crown Magicien’s name, unable to hide his contempt any longer even in the presence of his musketeers. “You know why you’re here. Don’t pretend you don’t know why you’re going to spend the rest of your days in a cell—however many days that is. You played, and you lost.” A sneer pulled at his lips, for a moment casting his handsome features in darkness.

  Uneasiness tugged at my heart. Louis’s cruel trait was no news to me, yet I found it hard to witness firsthand. I liked to always think of him as the blond Apollo who performed beautiful magic, dreamed of a safer world, and laughed in sunbathed clearings. But he was the king, and a traitor had nearly killed him, and it brought out all the shadows in his soul.

  Fouquet straightened his back, the ghost of his former defiance crossing his gaunt features. “That’s your plan, Sire? Bury me in a dark pit and throw away the key?”

  Louis clasped his hands together. “It is. But have no fear: You’ll have a trial, where the extent of your treachery will be exposed. By the time I’m done with you, your name will be disgraced, your family ruined, all th
at you ever built seized or destroyed, and your part in my life erased from history.”

  Fouquet’s expression darkened. “How the mighty fall,” he said, his voice dangerously low. “Careful you’re not next, Your Majesty.”

  Louis’s grin widened. “Your threats don’t scare me anymore. You’re finished. You’ve been finished for weeks, as a matter of fact. I haven’t needed you in months, and if you’d rid yourself of this deluded notion that you could take me on and win, you might have enjoyed a peaceful retirement in one of your châteaux.” He leaned in to stare his former Crown Magicien in the eye. “But then … Vaux-le-Vicomte. How the mighty fall, indeed.”

  Fouquet didn’t flinch. “What makes you think I can’t derail my trial? Or escape from prison? I’m the most powerful magicien this country has ever known.”

  Louis nodded, his smile turning condescending. “I’ve thought about this too. I can’t have you persuading witnesses to give false testimony or worming your way out of jail. However pitiful your magic is, you still have too much of it to my liking. Thankfully, I found a solution.”

  Uncertainty, then fear, flashed in the former Crown Magicien’s eyes. “What?”

  “You’re wrong in thinking you’re still the most powerful magicien in this country,” Louis said. “I am, now.”

  He held out his hand to me, and hesitation stopped me in my tracks. Louis’s tone was so cold. So harsh. He wanted to be powerful enough to rule without relying on a Crown Magicien. Yet he was beginning to sound like his former minister. Doubt crept into my mind. Lending him my magic for this spell would ensure we were rid of Fouquet forever. But I had no wish to destroy one threat while creating another.

  I paused too long, for Louis snapped his fingers. “Henriette?”

  I took a cautious step toward him, my thoughts still churning. Then Louis closed his fingers around mine, and realization dawned on Fouquet’s thin face. In that moment, he and I saw the same thing: a king in full control of his power, filled with the confidence gained from the knowledge of complex spells, and self-assured in his capacity to control a Source’s magic. A magicien capable of ending him and taking over the world afterward.