Rook(90)

Amber curtsied awkwardly, not looking up from beneath the hanging front curls. She was even younger than she had looked from across the room. Sophia saw émile over to her left, inching just a little closer. Too bad, émile, she thought. The ring is on my finger, and this dress does not have a pocket.

“What a pleasure it is to finally have you in the City of Light, Mademoiselle,” LeBlanc was saying. “Now that you are here, I think that you will never leave it.”

Sophia kept her face pleasant.

“It must be agreeable to your brother,” he added, “to finally take credit for all his deeds. Do you not think that it must be very relieving, to give credit where credit is due?”

Amber raised her head a bit at this, but Sophia just stared back into LeBlanc’s pale eyes. It was true, then. He did know she was the Red Rook. Of course he did. How could he not? She could hear René’s laugh somewhere near. She smiled.

“What a strange thought, Monsieur. But I can honestly say that as long as the goal is met, I do not mind in the slightest if no one knows what I am up to. Or if they do.”

LeBlanc’s slow smile curled, and she matched it. He would be in a million tiny slivers by the dawn, and so would his prison. She glanced past his shoulder and saw René, his arm around a rather lovely young woman in a blond wig. Lies, lies, and lies, served up with more lies. Promises whispered in her ear, arms around her on the roof and just that middlesun, in this very room. I had thought of you living here someday. With me.

René was swaying on his feet a bit now, as if he were drunk. Just as they’d planned. It was almost time to slap him. Just as they’d planned.

“… might injure your health, Mademoiselle?”


She jerked her eyes back to Amber and LeBlanc, who were both watching her curiously. She hadn’t been listening. émile inched closer on her left.

“I …” And then she gasped. A strong burst of laughter from the group around René made several heads around the room turn. René was leaning down to the young blond now, whispering something in her ear while she giggled. “Did you see that, Amber?” Sophia said loudly. “Did you see him?”

émile went still, and both Amber and LeBlanc craned their necks to look behind them. As soon as they had both turned back to her Sophia yelled, “Oh, there! He did it again! Come with me.”

She snatched Amber’s arm with her left hand and marched past, wrenching the girl from LeBlanc’s grip, pulling her at a trot toward René. René saw her coming and got ready.

“My love!” he called, much too loud for politeness, especially with his arm around another woman. émile was sidling along, still on their left, Benoit now with him and speaking into his ear.

“Friends!” René slurred. “This is my fi … my wife … my fiancée! Sophie, my love, have you met …”

“How could you?” she said. “How?”

It was what they’d planned for her to say. Ask him “how could you,” step one, two, three, and slap. But now she meant it. The talk around them fell away, a rippling tide of silent air. She paused, still clutching Amber, then came forward one, two … and slapped René’s face with everything she had. She caught him full force, LeBlanc’s ring still on her finger, the sound of her palm on his cheek reverberating, snapping his head around, making the signed paper with his signature rustle against her chest.

He turned his head slowly back, hand to his cheek. She met his eyes, such a hot fire-blue against the white hair, and for one brief moment was confused by the confusion she could see inside them. His lip was bleeding.

Amber made a feeble attempt to move away, but Sophia didn’t allow it. She was supposed to berate René now, to complete the scene they had created, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t do anything. Everything that had been making her tick was stuttering, all her inner workings grinding to a halt. And when they did, she would detonate. She walked away, forcing Amber along beside her, her high heels clacking on the polished floor.

“Comfort me,” she ordered Amber, in barely a whisper. “Don’t make me drag you. Do it. Now.”

Amber whimpered, but she put an arm around Sophia’s shoulders, walking her to the corridor door, the crowd parting for them like wheat in the wind. Sophia opened the door, shut it behind them, and then grabbed Amber’s hand.

“Run,” she commanded.

They ran around the curving hall, past the noisy kitchen full of people Sophia had never seen, and to the door at the very end. Sophia pushed up the drop bar, opened the door, and shoved Amber through it.

“These are the stairs to the ground. You can go all the way down to the street, or take the air bridge on the eighth floor.” Amber stared at her, goggle-eyed. “Unless you want to stay here with LeBlanc?”

The girl shook her limp curls. Then she shook them harder.

“Do you have somewhere you can go? Can you hide, or get out of the city?”

“Yes, Mademoiselle, I …”

“Then go. And here.” Sophia reached between the edge of her bodice and the top of her skirt and drew out one of her sheathed knives, shoving it into the girl’s hands.

“Thank you,” Amber whispered.

“Go!”

When Amber started moving, Sophia shut the door, dropped the bar back into place, and ran again, down the hall and up the back stairs, pausing before the corridor that led to her room. She darted her head around the corner. What she could see of the hall was empty, so she flitted quickly through the shadows, drew out the knife strapped around her ankle, put an ear to the door of her room, and then opened it cautiously. Except for the table on its side, the room sat ordinary and deserted, as if it hadn’t just experienced the catastrophic collapse of her entire life. Spear and the forged gate passes were gone.