The Court of Miracles

by Kester Grant

  “I paid in gold coin, and much more than your usual rate!” I say defensively.

  “If I had known your plans, we would have refused the commission.”

  “Lamarque has been ill for over a year,” I say reasonably. “His suffering is dreadful. Death the Endless will be a mercy to him.”

  “So Lamarque dies—” Corday starts.

  “And as he is a man of the people, his death is the sign the revolutionaries will use to begin their campaign,” I finish. “We control the hour of Lamarque’s death, we control the start of the revolution. People will take to the streets, protesting, fighting, and building barricades. The Flesh Guild will be so distracted, they won’t notice me sneaking in.”

  “Even if you could distract them long enough to get in, you’re only a Thief, in a house full of Fleshers,” Corday points out. “You won’t survive three minutes in their Guild.”

  “I will go with her,” Montparnasse answers from her side.

  And I feel a wave of relief flood through me.

  Corday stiffens; her gaze sears his face. He has no expression, no reaction. He asks no permission, not even from his Lady.

  “And when she fails and you’re found in the Guild? It’ll be outright war,” Corday counters.

  “When have I ever been found?” Montparnasse replies.

  Corday turns back to fix her gaze on me.

  But the atmosphere has changed. If there’s one person capable of entering the Guild, it’s Montparnasse. But there’s still only two of us, and the whole of the Guild of Flesh between us and the Tiger.

  “I might have something else that can help your ascent to the monster’s lair,” the Fisherman says. “It will slow them down, but it will not stop them.”

  I shake inwardly. Gifts mean debts, and debts must be repaid. But what choice do I have?

  “The sons of Flesh at the Guild House number thirty to forty men at most,” Lady Komayd says. “They’re all exceptionally strong and violent; the Tiger keeps their numbers low, culling the weakest among them regularly.”

  “You’re not painting us the most hopeful of pictures, Gayatri, dear,” the Fisherman says gently.

  “They’re well armed, with guns, knives, and bludgeoning tools.”

  “I’ll take care of that,” I say quietly.

  “Nina, there’s one of you, and the Tiger’s Guild is armed to the teeth,” Femi points out.

  “I’ll do what I can,” I say.

  Femi frowns. He knows that fighting and disarming hordes of battle-ready bruisers is not one of my talents. He knows there’s something I’m not telling him.

  “Let us for a minute entertain this wild folly and pretend that you have the luck of Rennart and succeed in removing the Tiger. You then wish us to attack his dens, subdue his men, and free the Sisters?” the Fisherman asks.

  I blink. “Yes.”

  “Komayd?” the Fisherman calls, wanting to know what the Lady of Letters thinks, but Tamar whispers to her that Lady Komayd is already marking spots on the maps to show where the Tiger’s dens lie throughout the city.

  “How will we know the Tiger has fallen?” Komayd asks, looking up at me.

  “The voice of Mor will speak, of course,” the Fisherman answers with a laugh, reading my mind.

  When the Lords have gone, I set off after Orso. He knows I am coming and turns to greet me with a grim look.

  “Cat,” he says.

  “I want to know why you are reneging on your word,” I say, sounding more accusatory than I should.

  “I did not give the students my word. No bone oath was sworn to them.”

  “You found St. Juste, you put the fire in his eyes and his heart, you set him upon this path. Do not tell me that it isn’t so.”

  “He has his uncle’s heart. He would always have—”

  “He was standing in the public places and giving revolutionary speeches under the name of St. Juste! It is a miracle that he managed to survive as long as he did. He would have been hanged his first month in the city if you had not taken him under your wing. How can you abandon him now?”

  Orso steps away from me, trying to deny it.

  “I have been among them, Orso. I know what you did. I know that you showed him how to recruit brethren, how to plan, and what to watch for. There are twenty cells like his across this city. Without our aid they will all be slaughtered.”

  “And what is the slaughter of Those Who Walk by Day to you?” he asks gruffly, his eyebrows raised.

  “I need him,” I mumble, flushing for reasons unknown. “I need them to help me overwhelm the Tiger’s Guild. I cannot use any children of the Court to enter the Tiger’s house, for their mere presence might plunge their Guilds into war.” I swallow heavily. “But they will give me their aid only if they survive this uprising—an uprising you and Corday said you would support. That was the bargain we made. You and I both know that without your aid they have very little chance.”

  “It is not the lack of my aid that will damn them,” Orso says stubbornly. “There is a traitor in the Société.”

  “Do you know the identity of the traitor?”

  “No. I have merely overheard conversations. Nonetheless, I will not give my children to a cause that is doomed,” Orso says.

  “St. Juste does not believe it is doomed.”

  “Then he is a fool, just as his uncle was before him.”

  Rage rises in me. “St. Juste’s uncle was a martyr for this city and a brother to you…yet you dare to call him a fool? You, who were one of them, O tailless one, teller of truths, sixth little mouse of six.”

  Orso straightens, his hands flexing. I’ve long suspected that he was the lone rebel who escaped, and his silence tells me I was right.

  “You were not there, child,” he says in a low, dangerous voice. “You do not know of what you speak. You do not know what it is to see your brethren slaughtered like dogs.”

  “Then why are you withdrawing your support from them? Don’t you know it will happen all over again?”

  “You dare question me, child? A Lord of the Miracle Court? Have you considered your own ways? You are sworn to serve Tomasis and the Thieves, yet you plan to enter Kaplan’s home and attack him. Where is your concern for your own Guild if your plan fails? If you draw us all into war?”

  He breaks off, and I feel the sickening truth of his words.

  “Your aims are righteous, little Cat. The Court was broken when Kaplan came, and I hate him with all that is within me. But I have weighed the cost. Have you?”

  I have not. I have been too busy spinning plans, blindly trying to convince others that this is more than just a suicide mission, that there might be a glimmer of hope. But Orso’s words are like my conscience: my own voice now accuses me; my own thoughts now judge me.

  “Kaplan broke the Messenger’s hands for trying to steal from him once, and not a single Lord objected,” Orso continues. “He whipped you like a dog in full view of the entire Court with their sanction. What might he do to your Guild if your attack fails?”

  “Thinking of and fearing what might happen is what gives the Tiger his power. He is a cancer among us, and he must be cut out,” I insist.

  The Dead Lord laughs, and the tension wound so tightly about us eases.

  “Ah, little Cat, you are so fierce. You remind me of my fallen brothers. They, too, dreamt of justice, but for all their dreams they still fell to Madame Guillotine, and all who loved them hanged at Montfaucon.” He reaches out a ruined hand and touches my cheek gently. “You are small, but you are sharp and bright, and the Court loves you. They see in you a fire and a purity. You could be the Lady of Thieves if you choose your battles wisely.”

  “You told me once that if I got you out of the Châtelet, you would give me anything I asked.”

  “That was a long time ago,”
he says gruffly.

  I smile and do my best impression of Thénardier. “Has the word of the Dead Lord changed? There may come a time when you will need angry men with guns and fire in their hearts. It would be a shame if that day comes, only for you to find that they have all died meaninglessly. I’m asking you to help me keep your foot soldiers alive.”

  I hover there with nervous energy, wondering what the Dead Lord will say, readying myself for a crushing blow of disappointment. Orso eyes me; I can see the gears turning in his great mind.

  “If you can convince the Société that their cause is lost, if you can get them to me, then I will help to save them,” he says, and I know there is no more arguing with him.

  For a Guild Lord to agree to save countless numbers of Those Who Walk by Day is no small matter. It is a bad bargain, for I’ve no way of convincing St. Juste to give up the fight—but it’s the only bargain I’m going to get.

  The next evening, I go visiting. The house in the rue Plumet is modest for a genteel neighborhood. It looks perversely cheerful in the fading twilight, with a garden full of greenery and pots brimming with flowers at its every window.

  My heart is skittering behind my ribs as I scale the wall. My breath is short, and I find it hard to swallow. But I press on, ignoring the fact that I’m breaking into church property, ignoring the thought of what lies inside. I enter through an attic window and silently glide into an empty corridor.

  Or so I thought. A shiver starts at the nape of my neck, and my Cat instincts sing. There is another presence here. I freeze. There’s no sound, but it’s here. I narrow my eyes, trying to acclimate them to the deep dark. There’s a whisper of movement behind me. I try to swing around, when something heavy hits the back of my head. I crumple to my knees, seeing only stars, and the darkness grows thick. There is the ominous click of a pistol being cocked.

  A lantern is lit, and I hiss at the brightness. Pain lances my head. A hulking figure of a man stands over me, a giant with a forgettable face. The one I rescued from the Châtelet. Le Maire. For le Maire is the prisoner I freed that day—beloved son of the Guild of Letters, a Merveille of the Miracle Court, lost and found. Orso recognized him that night in the prison and whispered the truth to me sometime later. But a spy of the Guild of Letters is only as good as the mystery that surrounds him, and so his reappearance has been kept quiet from most of the Wretched.

  His eyes take me in, and he sighs heavily and lowers his pistol. “Oh, it’s only you,” he says.

  “Ysengrim be damned, did you have to hit me so hard?” I complain as he helps me to my feet.

  “I have big hands,” he says by way of explanation. He puts his pistol away and stares at me. “You said you weren’t going to come here.”

  Just then a door crashes open behind us with a thwacking crunch. My reflexes kick in and I drop and roll, a dagger in my hand, while le Maire points his pistol at the entrance. There stands Ettie, in a dress that she’s since outgrown, wild-eyed, her hair a tangle of curls, a giant ax in her hands. She is taller than when I last saw her that long-ago night when I paid the bread price. But her face is as lovely as ever, and when she sees me, she throws up her arms, waving the ax around, and gives a triumphant cry.

  “I knew it! I knew you’d rescue me!” She swings around to le Maire, victory etched across her face. “I told you she’d find me. I told you she’d come for me.”

  “Where did you get my ax?”

  “I know how to pick a lock,” she says, rushing toward me, ax still in hand, before stopping abruptly to face le Maire.

  “Now you have to let me go,” she tells him.

  Le Maire sighs and sits down heavily on a petite velvet chair, which creaks under his bulk.

  “Go with her if you want,” he says, his voice dull and tired. “If she no longer needs me to keep you hidden, then my debt is paid and you are no longer my responsibility.”

  Ettie turns slowly and stares at me.

  “Keep me hidden? Nina?”

  “Ettie, why don’t you put down the ax?”

  “I am not putting anything down until someone tells me what is going on,” she retorts, eyes shining and crazed. “Why does he say that you needed to keep me hidden?” She’s glaring at me suspiciously now, as if she’s never seen me before. “You didn’t do this, did you, Nina? You didn’t—”

  “I had no choice, Ettie. The Tiger was going to keep coming for you, and eventually he’d have gotten you. I had to send you away, somewhere you would be safe.”

  Ettie holds the ax before her and points it at me. “Explain,” she commands.

  “He owed me a debt for breaking him out of the Châtelet,” I say, pointing to le Maire. “He’s a spy, a son of the Guild of Letters. If anyone knows how to disappear from the face of the earth, it’s him. So I called in the debt he owed. He went to Thénardier with a price he couldn’t refuse. The diamond tiara we took from the Tuileries, do you remember? Valuable enough to tempt Thénardier to cross even the Tiger and secretly sell you to a stranger.”

  Ettie is staring at me, but she starts to lower the ax, so I press on.

  “The only way I could guarantee you’d be safe from the Tiger was if he believed that someone had taken you from both of us, and that I had no idea where you were. I attacked him in the presence of the entire Court. I swore terrible things. There is no one in any of the nine Guilds who, after witnessing my punishment, would believe I had brought it intentionally upon myself.”

  Blind are the distracted.

  The ax clatters to the ground, and Ettie stands before me, shaking.

  “I’ve dreamt of this moment for two years, Nina. I’ve hoped and prayed and waited and prepared. I thought you’d come and save me from him,” she says, looking at le Maire. “I never suspected. I can’t believe that it was you who did this to me.” Tears fill her eyes, and she buries her face in her hands. My heart twists. Ettie, who has been left by everybody she loved. I was the one she trusted, the one who swore to look after her.

  “I’m sorry, Ettie….The less you knew, the safer you would be.”

  “S-sorry is not close to enough to make up for leaving me with him,” she says, raising her head and pointing at le Maire. “Do you know how awful he is? How boring?”

  I stare at her. The tears in her eyes are just tears of frustration.

  Le Maire sighs loudly.

  “He says nothing, he tells me nothing, he confines me to three rooms. I’m not allowed to ask questions, or sing, or breathe, or talk to him.”

  “It’s never stopped you from talking,” says le Maire.

  “No, but you never answer me, which is pretty much the same thing!” Her eyes are wild. “Nina, I’ve been talking to myself for two years! Two years! And I know how long it was because I kept track of the days by carving marks into the walls….I’d never have known how much time was passing because I was never allowed to open the shutters!

  “He keeps telling me his name is Monsieur Madeleine, but it isn’t! He has a tattoo, a prison tattoo, and I know the mark of the Guild of Letters when I see it.”

  “See? She doesn’t stop talking,” le Maire says with weariness.

  “And he doesn’t know any stories.”

  “You told yourself enough for the both of us,” le Maire offers drily.

  I know the signs of two people who have been too long cooped up together.

  “And the nuns think he is a saint! The gardener thinks he’s the Holy Lord incarnate. He’s got them all wrapped around his little finger, and if I ever dare try to get news of the outside world or, Ysengrim forbid, seek out any company aside from his, they all cluck at me that Monsieur Madeleine wouldn’t like it!”

  “At times,” le Maire says to me, “at times I have thought that you should have left me to rot in the Châtelet.”

  Ettie shoots him a reproachful look before she carrie
s on with her tirade. “At first I thought he was one of the Tiger’s men, but after a few weeks—”

  “During which she tried to escape on twenty-three separate occasions—”

  “I realized he couldn’t be working for the Tiger. But still he refused to tell me who he was and what he wanted with me.” She shivers. “I used to think he had sinister intentions, but after a while I came to understand that he only meant me to die of boredom.

  “And all the while, I couldn’t know what was happening, to Gavroche, and Orso, and Loup, and Montparnasse…and you.” She looks up at me, the fury slowly draining out of her. “I could barely sleep each night, wondering what might have happened to you.”

  My eyes burn at her mournful words. I’ve missed the sound of her voice, her nonsensical reactions. I’ve missed her so much it was like a physical ache.

  “I tried to be ready because I knew you’d come for me.” The blaze of belief in her eyes puts me to shame. “But he took my weapons, so I couldn’t practice with them.”

  “You tried to stab me with your knife,” le Maire reminds her.

  “He wouldn’t even let me eat with a knife and fork,” she says, “which is fine in the Halls of the Dead. But when the nuns are watching you eat with your fingers like you’re some kind of animal—”

  “You tried to stab me with your fork, too.”

  She ignores him. “I tried to keep up the things you taught me. And I didn’t eat too much, so I’d not get slow if we had to escape suddenly. I fed half my food to the birds, and every time I did that I thought about whether you had enough food, whether there was sickness, whether little Gavroche had recovered…whether you and St. Juste had declared your feelings for one another.”

  “Why is everyone convinced I am in love with St. Juste?” I ask, disgruntled.

  “I hear he is very handsome,” le Maire says gravely. “That he has the face of an angel.”

  “Oh, Nina!” Ettie says with a sob, and she throws herself into my arms, almost bowling me over. “I’ve been so miserable without you.” Over her head, le Maire gives me look that says she has been far more trouble than she is worth.