An Affair of Poisons(54)
I know that walk.
I crawl to the edge of the wine casks to watch him pass. Through the sumptuous folds of his hood, I spy an intricate black mask framed by strings of long, greasy hair.
Fernand.
My body stiffens and the cobbles beneath me feel suddenly colder. Harder.
When he reaches the intersection, he quickly checks over his shoulder, then continues down the adjacent street walking much faster than he had been moments before—all vestiges of drunkenness gone.
“Hurry!” I nudge Josse. “Follow him.”
“Why would we follow a drunkard home from the tavern?”
“Because that drunkard is my sister’s fiancé, and I suspect he isn’t drunk at all. He’s up to something.” I scurry out from behind the casks and Josse follows without complaint. Miracle of miracles!
The streets are winding and narrow, and by the time we reach the intersection, Fernand is vanishing down another. I clench my fists and break into a jog. We turn and turn again, leaving the crowded city center behind and entering the bourgeois neighborhoods. Lemon yellow and sage green villas line the road, each with a walled garden, dainty cast-iron balcony, and hanging plants.
Josse shoots me a meaningful look and we quicken our pace.
A dark, streaking shadow vaults over the wall surrounding the largest chateau at the end of the road. Fernand’s so light-footed, I would have thought him a stray cat or a cloud passing in front of the moon if I didn’t know to look for a man.
Josse and I hurry to the chateau and flatten ourselves against the wall. “Give me a leg up,” I whisper. Josse cups his hands and hefts me up so I can peer into the garden and the house beyond. It’s a towering stone behemoth with turrets on either end and a sharp, spired roof. The iron gate is festooned with flourishes in the shape of a family crest—a red cross surrounded by blue eagles. I recognize it at once. Those banners flew from many a carriage in front of our house on the rue Beauregard: the esteemed Duc de Luxembourg—maréchal of France and perhaps Mother’s most notable client, besides Madame de Montespan. Though their high status did them little good in the end.
The sound of crashing glass comes from somewhere within, and a moment later a bloodcurdling cry that’s swiftly muffled.
I grip the top of the wall and hoist myself over, landing with a thump in the swampy ground. “Hurry!” I hiss to Josse. While he heaves himself over the wall with considerably more difficulty than Fernand, I fumble with my skirts and rip free the phial of antipoison I sewed into the hem of my maid’s dress. If Fernand used Viper’s Venom, we haven’t long to administer the antidote.
We creep along the outside of the chateau and wait beside the servants’ entrance. The tiny phial trembles in my fist. My pulse roars in my ears, so loud I lose track of the minutes. We cannot venture in before Fernand leaves. Neither of us could best the mercenary in a fight.
I never see Fernand, but I hear the slightest disturbance of pebbles in the road and nod at Josse. He throws his shoulder against the door and we race inside. My boots slide across the polished parquet as if it’s ice.
“Monsier le Duc!” The hall is wide and soaring, and my voice rebounds off the wood paneling, shouting back at me. I pause to listen for an answer. When it doesn’t come, I charge up the nearest staircase.
Abovestairs, the walls are adorned with heavy silk tapestries that billow and flap as we barrel into the great hall. It too is empty. Or has the appearance of being empty. I can feel dozens of eyes watching us from behind pillars and spying around corners. The house is crawling with servants but not a single one answers our call. Not a single one comes to their master’s aid. I don’t blame them. They’ve no way of knowing if the danger has passed.
I call out again, and this time, there comes the tiniest croak, hardly more than a wheeze.
“There!” Josse points to what looks to be a pile of soiled rushes in the corner, but now I see the man. The duc lies prostrate on his back. His hands jerk and flap at his sides, but his gimlet eyes are fixed and opened, so wide that they look to be protruding from his head.
I drop to my knees beside him and bite the cork from my phial of antipoison. “Drink.” I tip the phial to his lips. He looks up at me and a low, guttural scream rattles from his lips. He thrashes violently, and Josse crouches down to hold his shoulders—as he did when I healed Fran?oise. “I am not my mother,” I roar. “Drink if you want to live.”
The fight goes out of him, and he stills long enough to allow the antipoison to dribble across his lips.
The hammering of my pulse counts the seconds.
I haven’t a clue how long it will take.
When I reach six, the duc’s jaw falls open and a virulent mixture of blood and phlegm spills over his chin. I try to turn him on his side, but he wails and arches back, his spine twisting at a sickening angle.
“Why isn’t it working?” Josse stammers. His face is as pallid as the swath of moonlight pooling beneath the window. He looks like he’s going to be sick.
“It will.” I fumble again for the phial. According to my calculations, the man should have needed only half, but I pull him onto my lap, jam the bottle between his lips, and tip every last drop into his mouth.
You will not die.
I don’t know if I think it, or whisper it, or scream it. But it booms like thunder in my mind. I barely knew the duc, and what I did know I didn’t particularly like, but now I need him to live as surely as I need to breathe. I need my antipoison to be effective.