by Leda Swann
What had he done? Miriame thought of the sight of Jean-Paul lying on the cobbles, bleeding to death on the street for the sake of a few pieces of paper he carried. She had no pity for such scum as this man, who killed innocents on their master’s orders, and no patience, either. She gave him a swift kick in the backside to hurry him along.
He gave an anguished yelp as her boot made contact with his naked buttocks and shuffled out quite tame again for the moment.
Nicole handed over the other two they had captured. “We’re quits then, Dan?” she asked with a shrewd look in her eye. “You won’t be wanting to kidnap any more of my customers will you? These three will do for Andre?”
Miriame spat in her hand and held it out to Nicole. “We’re quits.”
Nicole gave a broad grin, spat in her hand, and they sealed the bargain with a shake. “It’s not that I mind about these three, but if word gets out of what happened, it’ll be bad for business.”
“I won’t say a word. And I doubt that these three,” and she gave the ropes in her hand a quick jerk so that her captives stumbled, “will be in the mood for boasting, either.”
The wind outside was cold for early spring and the cobbles wet from a light rain. Miriame turned her collar up against the cold and hunched her shoulders in her jacket, feeling a certain amount of vicious satisfaction from the ill weather. Naked as they were, a night in the stocks would be no walk in the park for these three.
They deserved death, for sure. After the punishment they were about to undergo, no doubt they would wish for death, but killing them was too easy. They deserved to suffer a little first.
The marketplace was only a few minutes walk from the brothel. Their unwilling captives grew more and more truculent at every step that brought them closer to the shame of the stocks. Twice Miriame had to stop and tickle her man along with a knife in his privates. The second time she grew impatient and drew a trickle of blood. Her captive’s face went green and he soiled the cobbles in his fear. She had no trouble with him after that.
The stocks were set right in the middle of the market square. They loomed up out of the night, black menacing shapes in the darkness.
Their subjects needed some not so gentle coaxing to put their heads and arms through the indentations in the stocks that would keep them there, immobilized, until they were set free again. Jean-Paul held them there by the sheer force of his will, and the point of his dagger, while Miriame slowly lowered the heavy block of wood that would imprison them until the morning came. Eventually some petty official would want the stocks for some other malefactor, notice their plight, and set these three free.
The harness with the indecent protuberances had fallen to the ground, shaken off by its owner as soon as he bent his head to put it into the stocks. Jean-Paul picked it up and shook the water off it. “Tut, tut, this will never do.” He strode around to the back off the stocks and fastened the harness around the man’s waist, the protuberance nestled between his buttocks. “The whole of Paris may as well see what your favorite game is.”
The man shook his body from side to side, but in vain. His motions only caused the harness to bob up and down even more indecently than ever. Miriame had to cover her mouth to stifle a scandalized laugh. The early morning crowds in the marketplace would be merciless. He would never dare show his face again – not in the whole of Paris.
Jean-Paul looped the whip he had taken from the girl around the neck of the second man. “The good people of Paris may as well see what your favorite pastime is, as well, my friend. That way your fellow will not be the only one held up to mockery.”
Despite the cold air, the first man was sweating when Jean-Paul came to stand in front of him. Droplets of moisture fell in rivulets from his face and into the wood of the stocks, stained dark from the sweat and blood of countless others. “You’re in luck today, my good man,” Jean-Paul said in a conversational tone. “I don’t have anything to hang around your neck today so the morning crowds can jeer at you. Of course if you are foolish enough for there to be a next time, you may not be so lucky...”
He tucked his dagger back into his belt and stepped back to admire his handiwork. “We should be safe enough now, wouldn’t you say?”
Miriame shrugged. “I doubt they’ll bother us again. And if they do,” she deliberately raised her voice so the three men could hear her, “I’ll cut their manhood off before I put them in the stocks next time.” With that parting shot, she turned on her heel and began to walk away.
A chorus of protests greeted her departure. “You can’t mean to leave me here all night.”
“The crowds will crucify me.”
“I’ll freeze to death before morning.”
“I’ll kill you for this, you stinking bastard.”
“I’ll give you anything you want for you to let me out. Anything at all.”
“Name your price. I’ll double it.”
“Just you wait until I’m out of here, you poxy son of a whore. You’ll regret this, I swear you will.”
“Just don’t leave me here.”
They sounded as though they meant every word. Their voices bullied, threatened, cajoled, and whined in equal measure.
Miriame looked up at the sky, whose edges were even now tinged with the pale pinky gray of dawn. “Yes, we do mean to leave you here. Nothing on earth would induce me to let you out. Unfortunately for me, though fortunately for you, I suppose, I doubt that any of you will be crucified.”
Jean-Paul got into the game with her as they walked away from the square. “So, what do you think will happen to them, then? Rotten cabbages biffed at their heads?”
“Probably. Of course, they’ll be luckier than they deserve if it’s only rotten cabbages aimed at them, and not stones.”
He creased his forehead in thought. “A slap on their naked buttocks with a dead fish?”
She laughed. “Highly likely. Fish wives aren’t known for their subtlety.”
“Crucifixion?” he asked hopefully.
She shook her head. “Too much effort for the crowd, I would wager.”
“Freezing to death?”
“Nah – it’s not cold enough. Frostbite maybe, but nothing worse than that.”
The voices of the men still shouting out their protests carried through the still night air as the two of them walked away.
Miriame felt little triumph in their victory. The men were nothing but the hirelings of a greater man, who used his brain and their brawn to bludgeon his opponents to death. Her quarrel was not so much with the simple hirelings, but with their master. The Cardinal would find other tools for his purpose – though maybe not as easily as might have before after words of tonight’s events filtered through the underclass of Paris.
She felt a savage satisfaction that the square would not remain empty for long. As the first trickle of dawn came sneaking into the night, so would the early risers of the town, the fish sellers, fruit sellers, flower sellers, rag-pickers, make their way through the lightening streets to the market square.
Let the three of them reap a taste of the misery they had sown in the jeers and catcalls of the crowd that would soon gather there. They would think twice before they next waylaid strangers in the street and tried to murder them in return for a handful of gold pieces.
Suddenly she felt weary unto death. She yawned and stumbled over an uneven cobblestone.
Jean-Paul caught her arm before she could fall. “Are you all right?”
She nodded. “Just tired, that’s all.” Now that she thought about it, she was so tired she could hardly walk another step. She concentrated on plodding along, one foot after another, not thinking about how far she had to go. God in Heaven knew how she was going to make it home. She wanted to fall to the ground and curl up where she lay.
Just as she felt she could not go on and was about to stop for a rest, she felt herself being lifted up by a pair of strong arms. “Put me down,” she protested weakly.
Jean-Paul took no notice of her p
rotests. “No.”
“Where are you taking me?” She was almost too tired to care.
“Home to my bed.”
She shook her head, even though she knew she did not have the strength to fight him. Her weeks of restless energy and her nights without sleep had finally caught up with her. “I don’t want to go to bed with you.”
“I don’t recall giving you a choice in the matter.” His voice was dry. She realized with a start that he was repeating word for word his earlier threats to the men they had just locked in the stocks.
“I won’t fornicate with you,” she warned. At least she hoped she wouldn’t. She doubted that she had the strength to resist him if he really pushed the point.
“The thought hadn’t even crossed my mind. Besides which, fornicating with you tonight would be about as exciting as fornicating with a corpse.”
“I’m offended,” she said, but his words had calmed her fears. She relaxed into his arms, no longer even trying to fight him.
By the time he reached his apartments, lugged her up the stairs and placed her gently on the bed, she was fast asleep.
Jean-Paul pulled off her boots and breeches, carefully averting his eyes from her stockinged legs. There was no point in getting all steamed up about nothing – Miriame was dead to the world for hours yet. She’d probably sleep until doomsday if she could.
She muttered sleepily as he pulled off her jacket and rolled her in between the blankets to keep her warm.
The fire had died down and the room was chilly in the light of early dawn. He eyed the sleeping form on his bed enviously and yawned. Chairs were not made for sleeping in, and his bed was plenty wide enough for two if they huddled close together.
He shrugged off his own outer clothes and crept in next to her, eagerly sharing the warmth of her body. God, but he’d grown colder than he knew, sitting there in the icy room, as the warmth seeped out of him.
She had brought warmth to his soul as well as to his body. He hated to admit as much, even to himself. He had been lost and alone without her. With her, he felt as though he could conquer the world.
She was his friend, his companion, even his comrade. He desired her body as he had never desired another woman before. Not even Francine, with all her paint and perfume and whore’s tricks could hope to match the fire that he felt for Miriame.
Heaven help him, but he had fallen in love with the wench all over again. He lay there in the growing light, the thought running through his brain over and over again. He had fallen in love with Miriame.
She was a beggar and a thief – with one hand she had robbed him of all that he owned, while with the other she had saved his life - twice. Without question she was a beggar and a scoundrel, but she was more honest and loyal than Francine, for all her airs and graces, had proven. She had killed a man in a fight – the man who had tried to kill him.
She was not the woman in the velvet dress he had first thought she was – she was far, far more than that. She was more beautiful than an angel, and as deadly as a viper. She was sweet and gentle and loving, and swift and brutal in her defense of the innocent. She would trade passionate blows with him one moment, and kiss him just as passionately the moment after. Through it all, she was the woman of his heart.
He did not want to love her. He did not want to love where he could not trust, but he had no choice. Fate had played an ill trick on him.
Her body was warm and soft. His arms crept around her almost of their own volition to keep her close to him. He did not want to love her, but he could at least find a measure of warmth and happiness in her embrace.
Miriame awoke to a luxurious feeling of warmth. Her bed felt softer than usual, and the blankets smelled different to hers. Not bad or wrong, just different. Nice different.
She reached out an arm and touched a body, a warm body. She knew without even opening her eyes who it belonged to. The planes of his back, even through the rough linen of his shirt, were implanted on her memory. She knew every ridge and hollow of his shoulder blades. Her hands stroked up and down his back, reminding her of all that she had once possessed, that she had had to give away.
Realization of her danger struck almost at once. Her sleep-befuddled brain was awake and alert on the instant, and she threw off the blankets that covered her, grabbed her clothes from the floor and dressed herself in a matter of seconds.
Thank Heaven she had woken up in time. She was still clothed in all her linen so they could not have been fornicating. Heaven save her from fornication. She could not afford to bear a child. She could not bring up a child to live on the streets, cold and hungry as she had been – such a life was no life at all. She would sooner throw herself in the river and be done with life right away.
Jean-Paul would have to go. As long as she was in his company, she would be tempted with fornication. The devil would tempt her and tempt her and tempt her until sooner or later she would give in to his blandishments. She knew herself well enough to know the limits of her own strength. She laced her breeches and pulled on her boots as fast as her fingers could fumble. Better that she remove herself from temptation right away before the devil got the better of her.
“There’s no need to look quite so panic-stricken, my dear.”
Miriame peeked at Jean-Paul out of the corner of her eye as he lifted his head on to one elbow and gazed at her frenzied dressing. She resented the description. “I am not panic-stricken. Just in a hurry.”
“In a hurry for what?”
She could not confess to being in a hurry to get out of his company. She could not confess to her weakness for him, or he would use it to torment her, to weaken her. “To break my fast,” she improvised. “I’m starving.”
“Wait with me. We’ll go together.”
She couldn’t think up any excuse not to wait so she waited, tapping her feet impatiently on the wooden floor as he drew his breeches over his firm thighs. She tried not to look at his half-naked body, but her eyes were drawn almost irresistibly to the sight of him.
He looked up from lacing his breeches and smirked at her when he caught her peeking at him.
She dropped her eyes to the ground and made sure they stayed there from then on.
They’d slept away a good part of the day. It was well past noon already and the evening shadows were starting to lengthen. The cook shop at the end of the street was filled with shopkeepers and their apprentices with shirt sleeves rolled up and aprons tied around their waists, tradesmen and journeymen lugging the tools of their trade around with them, and peddlers with their heavy packs, and was doing a roaring trade.
Jean-Paul handed over a handful of coins in exchange for a couple of meat pasties and tankards of small beer and they squeezed into a corner to eat them.
A burly blacksmith with arms the size of a normal person’s legs and hands as thick and wide as trenchers elbowed her in the crush.
She glared at him as threateningly as she could. He took one look at her uniform and the long sword by her side, mumbled an apology and moved away.
Miriame bit into her meat pasty with satisfaction. She liked being a man and a soldier. No one looked down on her or treated her as dirt beneath their feet. As a soldier, she was the equal of anyone in France.
The meat pasty was good. She wolfed it down in no time at all and licked her fingers. Only when every crumb of pastry and every drop of gravy had disappeared did she sit back and wash it down with a mouthful of ale.
Jean-Paul was staring at her in amazement. She noticed with some embarrassment that he’d hardly touched his pasty. He raised an eyebrow. “Do you always eat like that?”
She crossed her arms across her chest to ward off his criticism. “I told you I was hungry.” She didn’t know why she cared what he thought of her. Growing up on the street wasn’t calculated to give her gentlemanly manners, far less ladylike ones. “Besides, where I came from, if you didn’t swallow your food down quick enough, it would be stolen from out of your mouth as you were chewing it.”
She screwed her nose up and made a rude gesture at him. “I wouldn’t touch your leavings. I earn my own bread now.”
“You could have earned your own bread on the streets, too, doing what Nicole and her girls do. Instead, you were a virgin when we first met. You were a virgin until I took you to my bed.”
She lifted her chin. “I am not ashamed of what I have done.”
He shook his head slowly from side to side as he looked at her. “Why did you not take that path instead of turning soldier as you did?”
Miriame’s defiance turned to disbelief. “You are suggesting I should have made my living on my back,” she hissed, “whoring for whatever scum of the streets had two coppers in his pockets to rub together?” She banged her fist on the table, heedless of the eyes that turned her way at the ruckus. “Damn you, I should slit you from end to end for that insult.”
He raised his hands in front of him. “I did not mean the question that way, believe me.”
She stared at him, her fury still bubbling over in her soul. How could he think that whoring was more suitable for a woman than soldiering was? Could he not imagine the desperation, the utter despair, a woman would have to feel before she opened her legs to a stranger and catered to his every filthy whim?
“Most women would have taken the easy way out – earned money in their sleep. You, alone out of so many, chose not to take that path.”
No, she had never chosen the path of a whore. She could never chose that path. As feared as she was of the hangman’s noose, she had rather risk death every time she picked a pocket or lifted a measure of cloth to sell. Anything, anything but whoring. Her soul would never have survived that.
She stood up and began to shoulder her way to the door through the crowds. The secret was not hers alone, but Rebecca would readily forgive her, she knew, for what she was about to divulge. “You ask me why I did not choose the life of a whore to fill my belly with bread? Come with me and I’ll show you.”