An Affair of Poisons(75)
“He doesn’t truly wish to help,” Josse interjects. “You don’t know him like I do.”
“I do wish to help,” Louis insists. “I’ve had time to think, to consider—”
“Yes, I know. I was trapped with you for weeks. I heard plenty of your thoughts on our accommodations and the fare and the company, and none of it was helpful in the least.”
Louis lowers his chin and draws a ragged breath. “I haven’t complained in weeks. I’m trying to change. I want to be a better king. Help me do this, Josse.” He looks up at Josse with the most open and earnest expression. The closest a king could ever come to pleading.
I hold my breath, willing Josse to agree. Marie looks fit to burst with pride from where she sits with the girls off to the side. But Josse pulls his tricorne hat lower and turns his back to Louis. “I’m afraid that’s beyond me.”
Louis makes a pitiful sputtering noise. I press my lips tight and look up at the ceiling. What I really want to do is slap Josse hard across the face. All he had to do was give the tiniest fraction—Louis was willing to bridge the rest—but he couldn’t do it. He wouldn’t do it.
Damn the princeling and his pride.
The Marquis de Cessac glares at Josse, then places a hand on Louis’s shoulder. “Thankfully, we all have a say in this, and I say you lead.”
Josse whirls on the nobleman. “I saved your life!”
“Technically, she saved my life.” He nods to me. “And it sounds as if His Royal Highness assisted in making the antipoison. And Madame Royale delivered it… .”
“I took part in all of those things! And you’re still outnumbered at any rate.”
Ameline whisper-shouts from the bottom of the stairs. “I think the dauphin should lead.”
“As do I,” Marie calls from the corner. Anne and Fran?oise clap their agreement.
“And I.” Desgrez shrugs guiltily when Josse glares at him. “Sorry, mate. It’s for the best.”
Josse turns last to me. “Are you against me as well?”
I look down and finger the cover of Father’s grimoire. “I’m not against you so much as I’m for allowing Louis to do this.”
“Fine.” Josse rips off his hat and wrings it through his fists. “Fine. But when this ends poorly, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
His cryptic words spindle down my neck like spiders, but I brush them off and find a smile for the eager faces around me.
Our ranks are swelling. We have a plan, with a clear end in sight.
There’s no reason to believe this will end poorly.
22
JOSSE
They’ve all rejected me: Desgrez, my sisters, even Mirabelle. I don’t know why I ever thought I could lead this bedamned rebellion.
Perhaps try a different way of leading, my father whispers. Not in the short, clipped tone I came to expect from him, but in a gentle, coaxing manner that makes everything worse.
Because I’m doing it again—lashing out and pushing everyone away and refusing to acknowledge my fault in any of it. The worst part is I know I’m doing it now, but I still can’t stop. I’m like a hedgehog, raising my spines and curling in to protect myself from the truth.
I lean against the counter, close my eyes, and pull several deep breaths through my nose. I can be gracious. I don’t have to let this get to me. But when I look up and see Mirabelle fussing over Louis, sending him off with the Marquis de Cessac to ready for the expedition, my irritation flares again, burning like a pan straight from the oven.
“You need to be seen aiding the rebels, but not necessarily looking like one,” Mirabelle tells Louis. “The people still need to view you as king, so after the crops are saved, remove your disguise to prove you’re alive and well. Let the people see you fighting for them.”
Louis beams, and I can’t stomach another bedamned second of it. I storm out of the shop, not knowing where I’m going. I just have to get away.
I don’t get far.
Mirabelle’s quick footsteps chase me down the street. “Josse, wait.”
“Why? So you can twist your knife deeper? Sell me for thirty pieces of silver?”
She grabs my shirttail and pulls me into an alleyway. “Don’t you think you’re being slightly overdramatic?”
Yes. I know I am. But I growl adamantly, “No.”
“You honestly can’t see the benefit of allowing the people to see Louis defending them?”
“Yes, but—”
“Can’t you see he’s trying? Would it kill you to give him a chance?”
“Why should I when the same courtesy was never extended to me?”
“Wasn’t it?” she says quietly. “Or did you choose not to take it?”
It was bad enough having Louis hurl this accusation at me. Hearing Mirabelle repeat it feels like a punch to the gut. I can’t catch my breath. Tiny stars explode across my vision and form a picture of my father’s face. He looks at me, so warm and sympathetic, and I hear his voice again: You don’t have to sabotage these relationships, too.
But I do. If I don’t protect myself, no one will.
I draw my shoulders back, ready to tell Mirabelle to keep her nose out of my affairs, but she grips my shoulders and says, “You’re enough, Josse. You always have been. You’re the only one who can’t see it.”