by Emerson, Ru
“I think I got that part. The old fat dude’s getting scared just like Lucette said, isn’t he?”
“Sorionne was never the man to take chances, not of any sort. So if he heard already of my grand-père and the letter from France, he would wish to distance himself as far as he could from my father’s disasters. My father—will not like that.”
Chris ate more bread; sniffed his cup and finally drank. “So that was the front door I heard slam.”
“No, that was Lucette. There was someone left in the hall, perhaps Peronne, to watch the door. But I went to listen while you were in the washing; he does not sit with his ear to the door, as Maurice does. He paces and grumbles to himself, and I think he is very bored.” She drew out her watch, glanced at the windows. “There begin to be clouds; it will be very dark in an hour. Peronne or Elonzo, no matter which on the door; they will not be challenge to any who come for us.”
“I hope not. Hour.” Chris pushed to his feet; it was the least bit easier this time. At least the room didn’t fade on him, and he managed to keep his balance on his own. But ten steps were exhausting. As for walking anywhere farther than that bed, or taking out someone guarding the door, Chris thought, Forget it. Hope that aunt of hers brings some muscle. Ariadne went around him, pulled the coverlet back, and pushed the spare pillows out of the way; he sighed faintly as she helped him back flat. “Thanks. Really.”
“Better, I get you from this house, mid from French Jamaica entirely, and then you thank me.”
“Lady,” he murmured, “you got it.” He let his eyes close.
He woke sometime later to utter chaos: it was quiet and dark in the room, but beyond Ariadne’s French windows, he could see the ruddy light of distant fire reflected on the low clouds, hear the shouts and curses of a mob. He levered himself onto his elbows, gasped as the ribs bit hard, and rolled, very cautiously, onto his other side. Ariadne was a dark, still shadow on the narrow balcony, but she must have heard him move; she came back into the room at once.
“It is the dockworkers, they make riot in the streets because of the restriction on the foreign ships, and there is no work for four days. But, perhaps it is my tante Emilie and the brother of Lucette, creating a diversion so, and using the four days for excuse.”
He pressed himself onto hands and knees, groaning. “Jeez. Glad to hear someone’s having fun.” She lifted the hair from his forehead, waited as he eased himself slowly around, sat, and edged his feet to the floor. He sat still for a moment, catching his breath. “Wait. Diversion—you really think so?”
She shrugged. “I think—I hope so. Can you walk, a little?” Before he could even decide, she held up a hand, said, “Hold, and be silent!” urgently and glided toward the door. A moment later, she came running back. “Peronne just left this door to guard the front entry, I heard him run down the steps. So, there is no one—” She caught hold of the door handle, then jumped back. “The bar,” she murmured, and chopped a hand in his direction for him to stay put.
The door opened and an extremely tall man filled the opening—not Maurice, Chris realized after that first heart-stopping moment, but a much thinner man whose skin shone blue-black in the light of the hall chandelier. He wore only pale britches that fell just below his knees, a short bit of vest. Ariadne wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged him, hard. The man hugged her back, then whispered something Chris couldn’t catch; Ariadne caught hold of his arm and pulled him across the room. Ariadne’s aunt Emilie appeared as a bright-edged shadow in the doorway behind them; the door closed.
“Oncle Frère!” Ariadne exclaimed softly. “I did not know you were in Philippe-sur-Mer.” Chris frowned. Uncle—Brother? “Chris,” she added softly, “this is my oncle Frère—my uncle Patrice.”
“Patrice?” Chris held out his hands; the tall man gripped them carefully.
“My brother was also named Patrice, and so I was called Brother, to tell us apart. And so, Uncle Brother.”
Chris managed a faint grin. “Like it. Hey, we’re getting out of here?”
“But yes, and as soon as Emilie makes certain of the hall and the back way,” Patrice assured him. He leaned closer, eyed Chris curiously. Then chuckled. His voice was very low, but held nothing of the gravelly basso threat of Maurice. “But I know this man,” he said, still chuckling. “He gave me good coin not so long ago, to carry one satchel from his ship to the Parrot. So few milk-skinned men do this, one remembers those who do.” The laughter faded. “Dupret does not wish you well, my friend; we get you from here tonight.”
“Good,” Ariadne said. She sounded calm once more, but she was plaiting her fingers together. Patrice freed a hand, patted her shoulder, and held up a cord from which depended a wire cage enclosing a pale stone. “Hold this; you know how it works. Stay by the door.” And as she hesitated, he flapped the hand at her. “Go, go, child, I watch over your man, get him to his feet. Emilie said the so-nice Maurice—”
“Yeah,” Chris said. “So nice. Really. I’m all right, Ari, go watch the door.” She gave him a doubtful look, wrapped the cord around her fingers, and crossed the room.
Patrice eyed Chris for a long moment, and when he spoke, his voice was a non-carrying near whisper. “How badly you are hurt?”
“I can walk—I think,” Chris added honestly. “Mostly I think it’s just bruises, except maybe my ribs.”
“Yes. Well.” The roar of the mob outside the French windows increased dramatically all of a sudden. “We can manage, I think.” Ariadne hissed at him, held out the wire-and-stone charm; it was glowing faintly. “We go now.” He hauled Chris to his feet, half carried him to the door.
Just short of it, he stopped suddenly; Ariadne caught her breath and bit down on the side of her hand. Mob noises came from the front of the house all at once, but the echoing slam of the lower hall door muffled them once more. Heavy footsteps, men running up the staircase. Patrice held up a hand, wrapped one of Chris’s hands around a bit of twigs and cord, closed his own enormous paws over the younger man’s. Chris could all at once hear very well.
“Was that utterly necessary?” Dupret’s voice, icy with barely contained fury.
“M’sieu, I did what I had to.” Maurice sounded nearly as angry. “I brought us safely from your club, on foot, through the streets—and we both still breathe. What more would you?” Momentary silence. “Was it utterly of necessity that you create as you did?”
Another silence, broken by a loud, cracking blow. “That,” Dupret snapped, “for anyone-—including yourself, Maurice!—who would dare question what I do, and why!” Another silence. Chris was vaguely aware of Ariadne, a still form outlined against the door by the reflection of flames from the far street, via the open French doors. Dupret’s suddenly, unnervingly warm voice followed a nasty silence. “Ah, my friend, forgive, I beg you! That so many matters demand my attention! My brother, my daughter, my wretched brother! And now Sorionne!”
Another silence. When the man next spoke, Chris would have sworn he heard tears in Maurice’s voice: “My good sir, no. There is nothing to forgive. That—that you—non. N’importe pas. But what you did this night—I did all I could to protect you, my good sir. Know that.”
“But—of course,” Dupret murmured. “And I know that no one else in all French Jamaica could protect me so well as you. Still. Sorionne.”
“May he rot,” Maurice said flatly.
Dupret giggled—the most unnerving thing Chris had heard thus far; he shivered, and Patrice’s arm tightened around his shoulders “He assuredly does already, my friend, consider the climate! But—non. We must consider the damage caused tonight.”
“You struck Sorionne,” Maurice said flatly, “and he fell from the window. Dead as he landed.”
“I know this!” The wall shook as one of them slammed a fist into it. “Still—what was needed is done, now we need decide what to do about his sons, who may well take outrage and demand satisfaction of honor. Come, the study, you and I; bring Peronne from the door, ther
e is no need for him here.”
“The front door, sir—”
“What mob would dare come here to make damage?” Dupret giggled again. “We drink, you and I, to greater profit without Sorionne, and we decide how best to settle this—and to settle the matter of my brother Philippe, now that neither Sorionne nor my daughter can tell him anything.”
How come they didn’t see the door unbarred? Chris wondered dazedly as the nobleman and his servant clomped down the main stairs. But the answer came right away: the bar slid quietly from its place, and Ariadne’s aunt opened the door to beckon urgently. “The way is clear, but there are men everywhere, his men, watching. Frere, you make all the changes of cart and horse we planned, swear it!”
“Of course, Emilie.”
“Of course, Emilie,” she mocked him sharply. “Don’t you sound so cool to me, this is a bad time, we need to hurry!”
“We hurry. Boy, you able to walk, or should I carry you?”
“I—yeah,” Chris said breathily. “I can walk.”
“Good,” Emilie said, then hissed, “Go, go, go!” Before anyone could move, heavy boots came up the main staircase. “Maurice,” Emilie breathed. Patrice swore breathily, hauled Chris behind the door. Emilie simply vanished from his line of sight as the door quietly eased shut. It creaked open almost at once; Maurice shoved it open and cursed angrily.
“Alio! Peronne, what are you doing in here? The master wants you!” Silence. “Where are you?”
“Peronne.” An alto voice sent shivers up Chris’s back. Ariadne stepped into the light. “There is no Peronne here. Bâtarde.” Maurice smiled; his teeth gleamed as he brought up an enormous fist. Ariadne’s knife was a shining blur that came underhand in a full arc and vanished. Maurice swore faintly, coughed, and sagged into the doorframe, then slid to the floor. Ariadne stood over him, her face grim.
“Guard of my beloved father,” she whispered. “Meet him in Hell, and tell him how sorry Ariadne was that she could not cause you more pain at the end.” She stooped, tugged hard; brought the knife up with her as she stood. Chris closed his eyes, bit his lip; the blade was dark, sticky. He gasped as Patrice hauled him off his feet once again, hurried him out the door and down the hall. The light was bright against his eyelids, gone; they plunged down a steep flight of stairs.
“Sorry, my friend,” Patrice said softly against his ear as they reached ground level. “I see this hurts but there is no time to waste.” Chris forced his eyes open as warm, scented air blew past him. Ariadne vanished through an open door into darkness. Patrice followed, paused on the threshold.
“Whatever are you doing still here, go, go, go!” Emilie materialized at his elbow, snapping her fingers softly; she sounded very nervous all at once.
“The men on guard outside.”
“Three—no more,” Emilie said, and drew her hand meaningfully across her throat. “Remember, every change! If any of his men see you, Patrice—”
“Hush, woman, we make it so they don’t see us.” He hauled Chris through the door, across the brick courtyard, and into total darkness. “Stable,” Patrice whispered.
“Mmmm,” Chris replied. He couldn’t have managed real words at the moment. The smell of horse and polished leather was all around him. They were through the stable, then out the far side and into a narrow alley between high, solid walls. Merchants’ entry, Chris remembered. A covered cart waited for them, and Ariadne, her face anxious, stood by the canvas flap at the back.
“Go, shoo, in,” Patrice murmured. Ariadne scrambled into the cart, turned to hold out her hands. Chris fell onto a pile of rough, dusty sacks as the flap came down. He used his elbows to drag himself a little farther in, and collapsed again. The sacks smelled like grain; the cart itself had a fusty odor he couldn’t place. The pain in his side was grindingly sharp, nearly unbearable; he gasped as the cart jolted forward. Ariadne eased down next to him, felt for his hand. Her fingers were cool and damp, her pulse very fast.
Say something, he told himself. She just killed—she’ll think—“Good job,” he managed. Her fingers tightened on his briefly.
The cart jostled down the alleyway, turned onto the street, and began to move more quickly. Chris held his breath, listened; he couldn’t hear anything but the clink of harness, hooves against brick or stone, and the very distant sound of that mob. From the front of the cart, then, Patrice’s low, non-carrying voice: “Two hours, perhaps three. The English Hawk will send a boat for you, we meet it this side of Point-Azur. But we cannot go straight there. Dupret’s men are everywhere these days, and they watch for anything—”
“Two, three hours,” Chris said hastily. He didn’t want to think about Dupret’s men standing in shadows, watching and waiting… “Still be dark in three hours, good.”
“Boat will not come until sunrise,” Patrice corrected him. “The tide and the reef; the ships are not permitted to leave port anyway before then—so no one can sneak from Philippe-sur-Mer, as you and your man did the one time, Ariadne. Your aunt Emilie says good-bye.”
It was quiet for some time. Chris had no idea where they might be, except by the occasional lights they were still inside the city. He lost track of the times Patrice helped him from one cart in a darkened alley or stableyard, and into another. He itched from straw; one cart had no sides or roof, so Patrice had thrown straw over them both, and a filthy, fishy blanket over that.
He spoke to them, now and again, a word or two—mostly warning. “There is a man—three doors down, stay still. A man on horse, coming from behind us. Two men with pistols—” He had broken into a ragged cough at that point, using cough as an excuse to avert his face, Chris thought. His own stomach was painfully tight, his mouth dry. Ariadne clung to his hand. The sounds of the rampaging mob faded, dwindled, was gone entirely. The air was cooler, dryer—less wharf-scented.
The current cart was pulled by an aging donkey and had carried chickens; there were feathers, chicken fluff, and the odor of chickens everywhere. Ariadne had fortunately retained enough wit to pull an armful of clean straw from the previous cart before she and Patrice got him in; even so, he continually fought not to sneeze as down floated across his upper lip or tried to go up his nose.
“Quiet here,” Patrice said very softly. “And no one in sight.”
“Do not trust to that,” Ariadne warned as quietly.
“I do not.”
Silence then; the donkey’s hooves were muffled by the dirt road. Chris eased down a little flatter; Ariadne’s fingers tightened on his and she leaned close to him. “I’m all right,” he whispered. “Just—really tired.”
“Sleep, if you can,” she whispered back.
“Can’t.” But the slow-moving cart creaked rhythmically back and forth; somehow, he lost track of time and even movement. When he next opened his eyes, the cart wasn’t moving and he could smell sea.
It wasn’t entirely dark anymore; he could see Ariadne kneeling down by his feet, the canvas flap in her hand. She let it fall as he moved slightly. “Shhh. Everything is all right. Patrice goes to wait for the ship.”
“Oh. Good.”
Her hand pressed damp hair from his brow, rested there a moment. He let his eyes close. “You feel warm.” She sounded worried.
“‘S all right. I always sleep warm.” He didn’t. No point in both of them worrying. Hawk was English, some of them carried healers or at least someone to dispense powders. New Lisbon wasn’t that far, either. Once they got off this island. If.
The wagon springs creaked. Chris’s skin prickled but it was only Patrice. “I see it,” he said. “We go now, reach the water as the boat arrives, get you both gone.”
“I like it,” Chris said. Getting him out of the cart wasn’t any fun at all; he was sweating freely by the time Patrice had hold of his shoulders and his feet on dry sand.
“We two manage from here,” Ariadne said. “You go; all those men of my beloved papa’s last night, if one of them worked it out, somehow—”
Patrice shrugg
ed. “Perhaps; still, no one followed us from the city, and there has been no traffic on that road since we stopped here.”
“There may be no need to follow,” Ariadne said flatly. “At the wharfs, if someone there overheard—” She glanced over her shoulder. “Please, go. If he suspects you—”
“He suspects any who are his servants or the kin of your mother; we give him no cause to suspect us of helping you.”
“He needs no cause.” Patrice merely shook his head. Ariadne sighed. “At least hide the cart better.”
He glanced back toward the road. “Well—yes, all right, there is time, and to make you happy. Wait here.”
Chris leaned against a tree and ran a cautious hand across his eyes; they felt gritty. It wouldn’t be a bright morning; too many clouds. Beyond the narrow belt of trees and scrub lay sand, a litter of branches and logs, and steel gray water past that.
Ariadne kept one hand on his arm; she pointed suddenly. “Look, there—a ship.”
“Ours?”
“I—I think yes,” she added suddenly. “Look, to this side of it.”
A long wooden boat had separated from the ship and was moving steadily toward the shore. Patrice was suddenly and very quietly back with them, his hand under Chris’s elbow once more, but they waited where they were, still in shadow, just beyond the sand. The boat slid down the front of a low wave; someone jumped into hip-deep water and dragged the bow onto shore.
Patrice gave Ariadne a nudge. “Go, girl, we follow.” She caught her lip between her teeth, broke cover, and ran, skirts wrapped high around one hand. Her feet made deep holes, squeaking in the coarse, dry sand. Chris eyed it with misgivings, but Patrice lifted him with ease and started forward. “You don’t want to walk this, my friend.” He covered the distance to the boat in half a dozen long-legged strides, delivered Chris into the hands of two seamen standing on shore.
Ariadne was already in the boat, waiting, the knife in her hands. “Please, Oncle Frère, you’ve done all you dare, go at once!” Patrice blew her a kiss, then turned and walked quickly away; a moment later he vanished between the trees. Ariadne let her breath out in a gusty sigh, then held out a hand for Chris.