Love's First Light

by Jamie Carie

  Christophé slid to the floor, a black haze overtaking him.

  SCARLETT GASPED WITTH the pain. No one had told her. Why had no one told her? No one had warned her of these inside-out twisting spasms that seemed neverending. Her head was pressed back into the pillow and her fingers clawed at the thin sheet beneath her heavy body.

  She shook her head, a sound coming from her throat that she didn’t recognize. Wimpering. For the first time in her life, she was truly afraid.

  Stacia sat at her right side, reaching for her hand, murmuring words Scarlett couldn’t bear to hear. How strong she was. How good she was doing. How the midwife had been sent for. How Robespierre had disappeared and they knew not where he had gone.

  All Scarlett could bear to focus her thoughts on was a face. It rose into her mind’s eye when the pain was too much for her to bear. It took hold of her as strong as the heaving of her womb. Her lifeline. Her hope. She turned toward Stacia during one of her resting moments and spoke quickly, knowing it wouldn’t last long.

  “Christophé. You must find him.”

  Stacia patted her arm like a mother with a two-year-old. “Dearest, Christophé disappeared, remember? We don’t know where he is.”

  Scarlett shook her head against the pillow, her body tensed like a bow string, sweating through her clothes and the bedclothes. “He is here. In Paris.” She just managed the words before another wave of spasms racked her.

  “Ohhh.” She bit down on her lip, feeling the delicate skin split, tasting of her own blood and curling inward as her body demanded her full attention. She clenched her eyes closed and blew air like a stallion tied to a rope and seeing the fencing-in of his future for the first time. She clutched her mound with arms full of strength, wishing she could push on her belly and force this scene to its close.

  The pain ended abruptly, but Scarlett knew it would not be the last. She fell back panting, reaching for Stacia’s hand. “St. Laurent. Find the place where they lived. He will be there.” She sighed out the last, all the strength leaving her. “I know it.”

  Fear tinged Stacia’s features as she stared into Scarlett’s eyes, as though Scarlett was talking out of her mind. Scarlett glared at her sister with an intensity that she never allowed herself to use. She’d always been gentle, loving with the girl that was her best friend. But this wasn’t the time for anything but sure demands. “Go. Christophé St. Laurent. His father was the Count of St. Laurent. Ask questions, quietly, carefully, to only those you think you can trust. You have an intuition like no one I’ve ever known. You can do this. Find him. Or . . .” The pains started again. Scarlett reared up and bellowed, a guttural sound, making Stacia look even more afraid by her ferocity. “Or we are all lost!”

  “Lost? How can we be lost without him? We will be in more danger if we admit knowledge of him.” Stacia smoothed back Scarlett’s sweat-pasted hair.

  There was a noise from outside the door. People were coming. Scarlett lifted up, grasped tight hold of Stacia’s hand. “The serving girl. The one who disappeared.”

  Stacia stared into Scarlett’s eyes, her face an intense picture of concentration.

  “She is Christophé’s sister. I don’t know what Robespierre has planned, but he cannot be trusted. We have to find Christophé and warn him.”

  Their mother rushed into the room, an unknown woman on her heels. The woman looked to be aged beneath a hat that appeared even more ancient. Too old for such work, certainly, but her eyes glowed with intelligence and took in the scene with immediate clarity.

  Stacia squeezed Scarlett’s hand. “I’ll do it.” She leaned in and kissed Scarlett’s cheek. Her words were a whisper in her ear. “I will find him.”

  As another wracking pain bent Scarlett’s body, no one noticed as Stacia slipped silently from the room.

  STACIA GRASPED A long, blue scarf and flung it around her neck and over one shoulder. She dashed to the bureau where she had seen Scarlett hide the coins they hadn’t needed at the market today. Scarlett was a smart one, she marveled, scooping them up into her palm and hearing them clink against her palm. Smarter than she’d realized. The way she’d handled Robespierre today. The way she’d bargained at the stalls to save some of her uncle’s precious money for them. Stacia pulled on elegant walking shoes, hooking the eyes as quickly as she could, and allowed herself a small smile. She was learning much from her sister in how to navigate these treacherous waters, but she also knew that Scarlett had complete faith in her for this task to come. The thought gave her strength as she let herself out of the house and turned toward unknown streets.

  Stacia made her way quietly down the darkening streets toward the place where they had been shopping. There had been a woman at the market who was selling bread. The Bonham women had struck up a conversation about the business. She was the type of woman who, upon first meeting, would tell her whole life story. She was gleeful, almost, for an audience and a fount of information about the area. She lived only blocks from Porte Berger. She had been kind. And she had invited them to visit her.

  Stacia rapped on the arch-shaped door, hoping she had the right address. She waited, her heart speeding up as the sound of metal clattered against the latch. The door swung wide. An older man, plump and round, with a frown on his face, met her.

  “What do you want?”

  Stacia stuck her chin up and decided to brazen it out. “Your wife. Madame Latrice. I need to speak with her.”

  “At this hour!” The man howled at her and reached for her arm, dragging her into the room. “With the patrols out! Mon Dieu! You will have all our heads!”

  “But she invited me to visit.”

  Then he turned and shouted into the house. “Suri, qu’as tu fais? Foolish woman. Your tongue is like a viper, ready to strike us dead!”

  The man left with heavy-footed steps, still shouting in a tirade of French expletives.

  Stacia pressed her lips together and waited.

  A few moments later, the woman rushed into the room, her cap askew as if she’d just pinned it on. “Citizen Bonham.” She reached for Stacia’s hands and clasped them hard. “Ah. From the market. What are you doing here?”

  Now was the time to come up with a really good story. Stacia squeezed tight the woman’s hands. “Please pardon my unexpected visit. It’s just that I was . . . hopeful today. Remember I told you that my mother and sister and I were bakers in Carcassonne? And then, quite suddenly, the flour gave out. We’ve come to Paris to make a fresh start and I thought”—she smiled up to the woman—“that you might help us find a supply so that we could bake again.” At the woman’s distressed look she quickly continued. “We have some money.” She patted her nearly empty pocket. “I thought, perhaps, we could pay you to supply us and thus increase your profits too.”

  A gleam came into the woman’s brown eyes. “Well, I don’t know. It is so dangerous. Anything we do can be so scrutinized.” She looked to be warming to the subject though. “You shouldn’t be out this time of night, mademoiselle! Oh! I should not even be calling you that. We are all citizens now. No more titles of any kind! I forget!” She raised her arms in the air in distress. “Mon Dieu, these times we live in!”

  Stacia ignored the woman’s distress and continued in an even voice. “Of course. I am so sorry to bring you any distress. We are new to town and it is not so confining in Carcassonne. I am ignorant. But, please, won’t you help us?”

  The woman seemed torn but couldn’t seem to help the occasional glance toward Stacia’s pocket. “I will see what I can do. There is a supply, if one has the coin to pay.”

  “Merci.” Stacia reached into her pocket and brought out a few of the precious coins and then started to turn away. She turned back suddenly with a frown between her eyes. “Might I trouble you with one more question before I leave?”

  The woman looked about the room and then leaned in. “Yes?”

  “Old friends.” Stacia lowered her voice to a whisper, then said the next in quick staccato. “The Count of
St. Laurent. Have you heard what became of him and his family?”

  The woman looked ready to swoon, but eager too. She pulled Stacia close. “All killed. At the guillotine some years ago.” She paused and then grew even quieter so that Stacia had to lean in to hear the next words. “But it is rumored that the youngest son escaped. No one knows what happened to him.”

  Stacia reared back. “Oh. My goodness!” She leaned in herself. “If I wanted to pay my respects, just quietly within myself, with no one to know, where would I find their house?”

  The woman gasped. “You must not go there, dear. Patrols are everywhere, but most especially where the nobility lived.”

  “I can be careful, just to pass by and say . . . adieu. Please. There are no churches to visit. I can hardly believe how they’ve been looted and turned into storage houses. I am sure there are no graves to visit. I do not know how else to pay my respects.”

  “If you are caught paying your respects to the nobility you will be thought a traitor and turned over to the Convention. No one shows respect for anything except the beliefs of the Révolution.”

  “I will be careful. No one will know anything except that I passed by. I will not even pause in my steps.”

  The woman sighed in mock resignation. “The chateau is on Rue St. Honoré.” She waved her arm in a direction. “Close to here. Go that way, then left on Rue de Louvre, toward the river, you will see Rue St. Honoré. Take that road a little ways. A grand chateau. You will know it.”

  “Merci.” Stacia gripped her hand, the rush of accomplishment soaring through her. “You are a good friend.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  There were few people on the street now. Dusk was turning into night, the time when the patrols were out looking for anyone breaking the strictly enforced curfew. Stacia’s heart beat within her but she was only a little afraid.

  Mostly she was filled with the excitement of a secret mission.

  Her skirts swished around her ankles as she broke into a near run. Only three blocks more. The city passed by in a blur. And then, there it was. She looked up and up at the huge stone edifice, with its sharply slanted roof and spires on each corner giving it the look of a cathedral. It was nothing short of palatial. She ran up the wide steps and reached for the ornate door handle. She pressed her shoulder and her weight into the door. It wouldn’t open. It was, of course, securely bolted. She heard a noise behind her, a jangling of reins and the heavy beat of horses’ hoofs. Two mounts with stern-looking men riding them were coming up the street just a few feet away. She dove for cover behind some shrubbery near the door. Sure enough, the men wore upon their uniformed lapels the cockade of the Republic—red then white then blue then white again. For purity, they said.

  Stacia held her breath as they passed by, saw them looking to the left and the right and then laughing at some comment she couldn’t quite make out.

  She waited for several long minutes after they had gone and then, hugging the walls of the building, skirted around to the back, looking for windows that might open. She even climbed up onto a raised terrace to push against two double doors. Everything was locked.

  Of course the chateau would be secured! Scarlett! Why did you send me on such a fool’s errand?

  At the back of the building was the servant’s entrance. Stacia crept to what seemed a small door. Actually it was normal size, just small compared with the other. She tried it, expecting nothing. The latch clicked and gave way! She eased the door open, peered into the dark stairway—then slipped inside.

  The air was close and dank as she crept up the shadowy stairs. Fear assailed her—along with the sense that everything was not as it appeared.

  She smelled something pungent . . . unpleasant. She mounted the next level of stone steps. They were wide and grand, strictly for a servant’s use, signifying the wealth of the family. As she climbed, she realized what the terrible smell was.

  Blood.

  Her footsteps soundless, she glanced about for some sort of weapon. Reaching the main landing, she groped around until her fingers closed on a familiar item. A poker near a fireplace. She grasped it firmly in hand, and then headed up to the second story, the stairs now very grand and curving. She pictured the balls and soireés, the social events they might have had here. Lovely women in ornate dresses. Men in tailcoats and intricately knotted cravats, enchanted by the St. Laurents and what must have been a picture-perfect family. Stacia felt a stab of sadness imagining the place in all its glory. Now it seemed little more than a huge, echoing tomb.

  She reached the second story and crept across the grand foyer, then down a wide hall. Rounding a corner she saw a flickering light. Someone was inside that room.

  There was no sound, just the pale light and the feeling that whoever was in that room, it was not Christophé. Her mind screamed at her to turn and run or wilt to the floor in fear, but she had to know. What if it was Christophé? She took a tentative step forward. And then another and another, until she was at the open door. She pressed herself against the wall, craned her neck, and peered in. A noise sounded from the room, and she reared back against the wall, her heart pounding so loud she was sure she would be discovered. She heard a voice that sounded recent and familiar.

  “I have you now. The last of the St. Laurents.” The man grunted, and the sound of a body being dragged across a rug sent chills down Stacia’s arms. Booted feet swung into her line of vision and she gasped, then clamped her hand over her mouth, terrified that she might have been heard. She held her shaking body very still as the man continued. “You thought I killed her, didn’t you?” Dark laughter sent tremors through Stacia’s spine. “She was too sweet. Too innocent. I couldn’t do it. I could not send that child to the guillotine.” Another laugh, but this time it sounded hollow, like it was coming from a man whose mind was broken. “So I made her my servant. And a fine servant she is.”

  The man’s words . . . the sound of his voice . . . suddenly all the pieces came together, and Stacia bit down on her lip to keep another gasp from escaping. The servant—Émilie. The voice . . .

  Robespierre. He was here.

  Oh, gracious Father in heaven! Christophé. It had to be.

  What was she to do? Everything within her wanted to charge the room and demand something . . . some justice. But she had only a poker and little strength to use it. Instead she crept to the door’s very edge and waited.

  She heard a deep sigh of utter exhaustion. She heard the bed creak and covers being pulled up. Within minutes, she heard the snores of someone who must be certain that the man on the floor was dead.

  She waited a long while, her head leaning against the ornate paneling of the hall. She lectured herself silently. You must go in. You must discover the identities of these men. You must find Christophé.

  As soon as the snores grew more even, Stacia crept into the room. There was a small fire lit in the fireplace which, thankfully, gave a little light. And there was the man on the floor, his face turned away from her . . . and blood. Blood on the floor next to his head.

  Her stomach turned as she averted her gaze.

  Then she remembered her mission—Scarlett’s sure words echoed across her mind: If we don’t find Christophé, we will all be lost. She looked back at the man on the floor, then crept closer to his still form.

  It was he. Stacia’s hand went to her mouth to keep herself quiet. He looked to be dead. Before she could think, she reached out and took firm grasp of his wrists, then—as quickly and quietly as possible—drug the body from the room.

  She refused to look at him, but knew in some deep part of her that a bloody swath was following them from the room and down the hall. She pulled the body to the stairs and then paused to catch her breath. At the top of the stairs, she took a firmer hold on his wrists and pulled him down, step by slow step. Praise be to God that Robespierre’s snoring still sounded in the distance.

  Finally she reached the back door. Now what? She couldn’t drag his body all the way to Sc
arlett’s side. Never mind the patrols. She didn’t have the strength. She looked down and gasped. His skin was very pale.

  “Christophé,” she whispered. “Wake up.” She reached out and touched his cheek. It was cold.

  There was no hope. He was dead. Her sister’s second chance. Stacia felt anger fill her. It was unfair!

  “No. No.” She knelt down beside him and placed her ear on his chest. Yes, there it was—a heartbeat. She shook him harder, hissing in a loud whisper. “Christophé, you have to wake up!”

  Christophé swallowed.

  Stacia sat back a little, relief flooding through her. He was coming around. She shook him harder and whisper-screamed into his ear. “Christophé, Scarlett needs you. Remember Scarlett? Wake up for her.”

  He roused and turned his head toward her, eyes still closed. She grasped tight hold of his arms. “Scarlett needs you and we have to get out of here . . . now!”

  Christophé blinked and gasped. So much so that Stacia shushed him. “We must escape. Robespierre sleeps upstairs. He thinks you are dead. We have to get out of here, now.”

  He nodded and sat up, his hand going to his head.

  Stacia took off her scarf and wrapped its length around and around his head, tying it in the back. The bleeding didn’t seem so bad now. “Do you understand what I’m telling you?”

  “Yes. Yes.” He sat against the bottom stair blinking and looking more and more himself.

  “Come then.” She stood and helped him up, then led him, stumbling and half-supporting him, from the chateau. They tottered together down the empty, windswept street. Whenever Stacia heard a noise, she led them into the cover of a bush or around the corner of a house where they would cower for long minutes. Christophé leaned heavily against her, silent, determination etched on his set features.

  After what seemed hours later, they inched into the street where Robespierre lived. “Come. Just a little further.”