Rook(8)

“Who, Mrs. Rathbone?”

“Him! Well, not ‘him,’ of course, not the ‘him’ of the first time …”

Sophia fanned her face. Just how much wine had Mrs. Rathbone consumed?

“I mean him! In the blue coat, chatting with your partner to be.”

Sophia followed the woman’s gaze, through trousers and skirts and false hair, dragging her eyes to where the gold jacket now stood beside a Sunken City blue. She had been avoiding looking at René’s part of the room, a weakness she now paid for with shock. Just beyond her fiancé’s shoulder was a face she had never expected to see in her home, on her land, or even on her side of the Channel Sea. A face she associated with misery and blood, so incongruent in the celebratory surroundings that its presence left her stunned.

The face belonged to LeBlanc.





“Allemande’s Ministre of Security, is he not?” Mrs. Rathbone was saying while Sophia stared. “Now there’s a man what’s seen a head or two roll.”

“Yes, he has,” Sophia replied, not bothering to sugar her revulsion. She studied LeBlanc in his plain coat as he listened to René talking about she knew not what. LeBlanc was much shorter than her fiancé, an odd streak of white running through the sleek, dark hair. Spear Hammond stood with them, towering over both men like a tall blond statue, an empty plate in one hand, his furrowed brow the only betrayal of what had to be a considerable amount of alarm. LeBlanc was in Bellamy House.

“What does he think he’s doing here?” Sophia said, more to herself than the lady beside her.

Mrs. Rathbone turned on the window seat. “You’re not sporting with my intelligence after all, I see. You seem to have lost all your own! Your young man’s grandmother …”

“He is not my young man.”

“I apologize,” said Mrs. Rathbone. “I thought I was attending your Banns. Your … person, his grandmother was a LeBlanc. They are second cousins once removed, or some such. Haven’t you even looked at the pedigree of the family? What are you thinking of?”

Sophia shook her head, watching Spear’s blue eyes widen slightly at whatever René was saying.

“But the question is, of course,” Mrs. Rathbone continued in a confidential whisper, “why has Allemande’s right-hand man come to his father’s aunt’s grandson’s engagement party?” When Sophia did not give the required answer, Mrs. Rathbone supplied it. “I mean the Bonnards, of course! The coast! LeBlanc must believe they’ve landed nearby. He must think that he is nearby.”

Sophia turned to Mrs. Rathbone. “Who do you mean?” she asked innocently.

“I mean the Red Rook, of course! He could be here right now, even as we speak. Wouldn’t that be delicious?”

Sophia looked away, just lifting one bare shoulder, causing Mrs. Rathbone to huff once as she got to her feet. “I think you need a long moon’s sleep, Miss Bellamy. Being engaged seems to have addled your wits. Good night.”

“You, too, Mrs. Rathbone. Do come to dinner,” Sophia replied absently. As soon as the lady had flounced away she stood and adjusted her bodice, pulled so tight that anything extra was in danger of being squeezed out, her forehead drawn to almost the same degree of tension. Then the fan snapped back open and she was gliding across the Ancient tiles of the ballroom. By the time she reached the three men her face was serene.

“René, there you are!” Sophia said, gazing at the second button. She held out a cheek for him to kiss. He obliged, but not before she’d caught a hint of a smile in one corner of his mouth. He seemed to think he had scored a point. He was wrong. Spear looked away, because of the kiss or because she was voluntarily approaching the snake that had slithered into her home, Sophia did not know. She stepped away from the hand René had left on her bare back and stood a little closer to Spear. Then she turned to LeBlanc.

“Monsieur LeBlanc, isn’t it? I understand you are a Hasard relation.”

“I have been remiss!” René said. “Please accept my apologies, my love. This is my father’s second cousin, Albert LeBlanc. And this, Cousin, is my fiancée, Miss Bellamy.”

“Enchantée,” said LeBlanc, his long smile curling. She watched two pale, almost colorless eyes look her up and down as her hand was kissed, noting the man’s meticulously manicured nails. She had half expected to see them bloodstained.

“And you have both been introduced to Mr. Hammond?” Sophia asked. She gave Spear’s empty plate a significant glance. “You’ve forgotten to save me some cake, I see.” Spear’s face vacillated somewhere between amusement and anxiety as she turned to smile at the others. “Mr. Hammond is a very old and dear friend of the Bellamys.”

“By which Miss Sophia means that her brother and I have been taking care of her since her days of tree climbing and scraped knees,” Spear said.

“Scraped knees, you say?” said René, examining the contents of his glass. “How interesting. And tell me, when was the last time you had to bind her up, Monsieur?”

Sophia said quickly, “I understand you live in the Sunken City, Monsieur LeBlanc.”

“I am the Ministre of Security in the Cité de Lumière. The City of Light. That is its new name, Miss Bellamy.”