I do not indulge myself by watching them go but instead turn and take off the distinctive blue habit so d’Albret will not think to punish the Brigantian convent. I stuff it in one of the chests in the room and then peer out into the hall. I can hear approaching footsteps in the distance, but no one is within sight yet, so I step into the corridor and begin running in the opposite direction.
The sounds behind me draw closer, but if I can gain the main floor, I may be able to slip out the doors and lose myself among the servants in the courtyard. I hit the stairs at a full run, but my hope is quickly crushed by the sound of boots rushing toward me.
It is not the guards or soldiers or even Captain de Lur, but Julian. “Sybella!” His voice is full of both hope and caution. “You’re back!”
“I came for our sisters.”
“Sybella.” He reaches out to grab my arms.
I jerk away. “No. No.” And now that I am telling him no, I cannot stop. It is as if there is a great storm of noes that have been building inside me for years. “No, no, no.”
His brow furrows in concern and he tries again to take my arm. “Don’t touch me!” I pull out of his grip, breathing hard.
He stares at me in dismay. “What is wrong?”
“You. Us. The love you think is between us.”
He shakes his head gently, as if something is amiss with his hearing. “You don’t mean that.”
The confusion in his voice reminds me of when he was a young boy, and it pierces my heart. “I do,” I whisper.
“Why did you run away?” Even though he tries to hide it, the pain in his voice is clear.
What do I tell him? Do I speak of the convent, and my work there? Or do I simply say what is in my heart, the reason I went to the convent in the first place? “Because I was dying inside, Julian. I could not bear this life one moment longer.”
“But we had plans. I have been working to gain our father’s trust so he will grant me a holding of my own. Then we will have a life together. The life we have dreamed of since we were children.”
“That you dreamed of Julian, not me.” In spite of the gentleness of my voice, he acts as if he has been struck.
“But we talked of it, planned it together . . .”
“When we were young, Julian, too young to know that sisters and brothers did not marry and have babies together. What was between us was wrong—”
“Why should we care what the world thinks? They do not understand the bond we share. The horrors we have endured together. I wouldn’t have survived if not for you, Sybella.”
I close my eyes. “Nor I without you, but that does not make what you asked of me right. I only did it because I was afraid of losing you, afraid that you would no longer protect me or be my friend.”
He stares at me in silence, as if he has never truly seen me before. “I was always your friend and would never have stopped protecting you.”
“Julian, you betrayed me! You told on the blacksmith’s boy and had him killed!”
His eyes are wild and his breath grows ragged. “I saved you from a life as a blacksmith’s whore—bearing his dirty little brats and living an existence of toil and labor. I saved you from a lifetime of looking over your shoulder wondering when our father would find you, for he would never have stopped searching. Surely you know that.”
“If all that is true, as you say, then how could you ever have used our sisters against me?”
“I was sent to collect them on Father’s orders.”
“And the locks of hair? What were those, Julian, if not a threat?”
“Is that what you think? That I would do such a thing?”
“Yes,” I whisper. “I think you would wrap it up in fine excuses and pretty lies, but only to hide from yourself what you truly intended.”
“I just wanted you to know that I would keep them safe, as I kept you safe all those years. And this is how you thank me.”
But even now, I do not know if he tells the truth or only thinks he does.
In the silence that follows, I hear once more the sound of booted feet fast approaching. I step toward Julian. “When they come, tell them you have found me and stopped me. Here, take out your sword to convince them.”
Julian shakes his head and steps away from me.
I reach out and wrest his sword from his scabbard, then shove the hilt into his hand. “Do it.” Just as I step in front of his sword point, Captain de Lur, Jamette, and half a dozen men-at-arms reach the landing.
“There she is,” Jamette says. “But where are the others?”
“What others?” Julian asks, looking from me to Jamette and back again.
“Tephanie and the girls,” Jamette says. “Sybella said they would all be leaving together.”
“I found only her. Where did you last see them?”
“In the small solar.”
De Lur jerks his head, and half the men retrace their steps to the solar. Then he turns back to Julian. “Were you stopping her? Or aiding her? One can never quite tell with you.”
Julian’s eyes are colder than frost on stone. “Are you so very certain of that, de Lur? What if my lord father has trusted me above all others and we have but played a deep game to draw her out?”
My gaze snaps to Julian’s face, but even I cannot tell if he is bluffing. Ignoring him, de Lur turns to me. “Your lord father knew just what bait to use to set the trap, and now here you are. Unfortunately, you have chosen an inconvenient time to make your reappearance, as Lord d’Albret has pressing business elsewhere at the moment.”
I arch one eyebrow in disbelief, hoping my scorn will goad him into telling me d’Albret’s business. “More pressing than exacting revenge on his prodigal daughter?”
“More pressing even than that.”
My mind scrambles, trying to find a way to turn this to my advantage. “Take me to Marshal Rieux, then.” For he has at least some small shard of decency and honor. Or at least, he did.
De Lur smiles. “The good marshal is no longer with us. He didn’t have the stomach for what was required.”
I do not know if he means that they have parted ways or that Rieux is dead.
“You will have to avail yourself of the castle dungeon’s hospitality until your father returns.” He turns to his men. “Bring her.”
Two men step forward to grab hold of my arms. Desperate to keep my knives, I jerk my arms out of their reach before they can touch me. “I do not need to be dragged like a sack of wheaten flour.”
De Lur smiles, then fingers the faint white scar on his cheek. “Oh, but you do, my lady.”
I do not like what I see in his eyes, and I shoot Julian a desperate gaze, but he is lost in his own thoughts, painful ones, by the look on his face. The men reach for me again, and this time they grab my arms and feel the knives at my wrists. De Lur orders them removed and then searches me for any other weapons.
Once again I must endure his touch, must feel his hot breath against the back of my neck, must listen as his breathing grows heavier. I say nothing, only watch him. I am not certain that I could best him in a fight, but it would be close, and I would certainly cause him grave injury. At the very least, he or his men would have to kill me in self-defense. But I am not certain I am willing to embrace death just yet. Not while there is still a chance I can get to d’Albret.
As they escort me to the dungeon—the very dungeon Beast once occupied—my heart begins to pound like a drum and I can hear my own blood beating in my ears, for this is the stuff of every nightmare I have ever had—being helpless and at d’Albret’s mercy once more.
Chapter Forty-Nine
IT IS A LONG, DARK night. Panic and terror do their best to stalk me, but I keep them at bay, knowing that if I succumb, I will only be the weaker for it. Terror is as much one of d’Albret’s weapons as his sword or fists, and he wields it with deadly accuracy, using it to sap the will and crush the spirit.
The tower ghosts flutter near me, drawn to my warmth. To distract myself, I force my mind to stillness, curious if these ghosts will tell me their stories.
But there is nothing other than a faint restless rippling in my mind, no cries of anguish, no begging for revenge, no whispered tales of the horror that was inflicted upon them. These ghosts are far older that the others, here long before d’Albret. Maybe they were not wronged in death, but simply died.
Quiet understanding comes, like a soft breeze, and I finally realize why I am able to see not just the souls that depart from their earthly bodies but the restless ghosts who linger. If I am Death’s justice, I must be able to hear their stories.
I turn my attention to the living and what wrongs they might whisper to me. Jamette is naught but a victim, too frightened to see the bars of her own cage. And Madame Dinan? She was innocent once, but no longer. She chose to look away from the truth of d’Albret’s actions once too often, thus crossing the boundary from innocent to guilty.
And Julian? He was not a child of Mortain and did inherit that extra measure of strength, and yet he rejected so much of what d’Albret wanted him to be, fought so hard against the taint that marred him. Unlike Pierre, who embraced it all.
Julian always offered me kindness and love where Pierre and d’Albret offered only cruelty and pain. We had survived so many horrors together, our life was awash in so much wrongness, that the warped love he held out to me felt almost right. Almost. And in his own way, Julian was protecting me—from Pierre.
I know that love is required to defeat the monster before me, but I am at a loss as to how to manifest that love. I face him secure in Mortain’s love, and Beast’s love, and love for my sisters, but I do not know how to turn that into a weapon that I can use against him.
I must trust now in the god whose blood flows in my veins and in my own true nature. And while it is not as dark and twisted as d’Albret’s, it is dark. And strong. And will hopefully offer some small chance of victory. I must have faith, but having faith is hard, so very much harder than despair.
The sound of a key in the lock wakes me with a jolt, and it is all I can do to keep from leaping to my feet and rushing over to peer through the bars. Slowly, I stand.
When the door is flung open, two soldiers stride in, then drag me into the outer chamber. De Lur is there. “It is time to face your father’s justice.”
I am escorted to a chamber where Madame Dinan herself is waiting for me, along with Jamette. Two servants are filling a tub with water. Dinan does not even bother to look at me, just stares out the window. “Get her out of those rags,” she orders.
The two servants step forward, eyeing me warily, but I do not make their job difficult, for none of this is their fault. I watch Jamette the whole time, hoping to unnerve her, for it is her duplicity that has brought me here. “All you had to do was turn the other way,” I tell her under my breath, “and I would have been out of your life forever. Julian might even have come to hate me eventually, leaving the way clear for you. But now—now I will be a martyr in his eyes, and my memory much more difficult to compete with.”
Her eyes widen and she glances at Madame Dinan to see if she has heard, but the older woman is still staring out the window.
She has aged much since I last saw her. The skin is sagging off her delicate bones. Her eyes are no longer merely nervous but haunted-looking. As if feeling my gaze on her, she turns, but even then she will not meet my eyes. “Burn the rags she was wearing,” she tells the maid. “And get her into the tub.”
“There is no need. I will do it myself,” I say, stepping into the warm water and taking up the soap.
Once the servants have left, Dinan turns to me. “You foolish girl! You have ruined everything!”
“What do you mean?”
“Since d’Albret wasn’t able to take Rennes as he’d planned, he had to resort to other options.”
“Options that have driven Marshal Rieux from his side?”
She ignores my question. “With the duchess’s marriage to the Holy Roman emperor, he has been left with no choice but to . . .” She trails off with a glance in Jamette’s direction. “Go fetch her gown,” she orders. Jamette curtsies then hurries to do as she is told.
Remembering the abbess of Saint Brigantia’s words, I stare at her, the soap in my hand forgotten. “Is this option why my father has been communicating with the French regent?”
She stops twisting the linen handkerchief she holds and I see that her nails are bitten to the quick. “What do you know of that?”
I shrug. “Simply that there are rumors.”
She smiles thinly. “You must realize there are other ways he can gain control of the kingdom if the duchess will not honor her promises.”
I look away so she will not see how much her words disturb me, for if d’Albret is conspiring with the French regent, it can only mean disaster for the duchess. And why is Dinan telling me this? Is it because she knows I will die and take this knowledge with me? Or is there some small spark of loyalty left in her that abhors the choice d’Albret has made?
But there is no opportunity to ask further questions because Jamette returns carrying one of my gowns. It is of crimson velvet trimmed with gold braid, and I wonder if she has chosen it because the blood will not show.
Chapter Fifty
DE LUR TAKES GREAT PLEASURE in binding my hands behind my back and prodding me forward into the great hall. As I am ushered in, I hold my head high. The chamber is stuffed full of d’Albret’s retainers and vassals. Looking among them, I see that there are none of the Nantes lords who were recent allies of d’Albret’s. Have they left? Has he killed them all out of suspicion? Or perhaps any of his soldiers with a scrap of decency left with Marshal Rieux. I know not, but the soldiers and vassals here are wholly his and have been for years. They are the ones who stood silently by as he murdered each of his six wives, who eagerly carried out his order to terrorize the town into submission by raping their women and burning their homes. They are the ones who chased down and slayed any servants who remained loyal to the duchess, hunting them with as much feeling as if they were hunting rats. Whatever d’Albret plans for me, there will be no help from them.