A Lady Betrayed (Secrets of the Musketeers Book 2) Page 26

  “Don’t do it.”

  She looked up. Pierre was standing in front of her, shaking a little. “What business is it of yours what I do?”

  “Don’t do it.”

  “Why not? I am going to die anyway, at their hands if not at my own. This way at least I can die with dignity and in my own time.”

  He sat down opposite her, his bended knees touching hers. “While there is life there is hope. You have taught me that.”

  She stared at him without saying a word. Hope was one commodity she was all out of herself. How could she have given him any when she had none to give?

  “When you left me here the first time, I would have happily killed myself if I could have. I had nothing on earth to live for if even your forgiveness was denied me. I did not die even in the torture chamber, though I longed for death more than anything. Still I clung to life, my body persisting in life in the face of my mind’s desire to die, though it lived only to suffer more pain.”

  She could not see that his life had gained him anything beyond more pain. “Feel free to use my knife when I have done. I shall not be needing it again.”

  “You do not understand what I am trying to say to you. I am glad now that I lived, so I could see you one more time.”

  She gestured around her at the dank walls of their cell. “I could have wished it was under different circumstances, but I, too, am glad to see you again. My conscience would give me no peace that I had left you here to die. I should not have left a dog here – and humans have souls that dogs do not.”

  “I love you, Courtney.” He gave a short laugh. “I did not think I would ever have the chance to tell you that. Indeed, I wish I never had seen you again and that you had not come to save me. Better by far that you had stayed well away from this fell place and lived happily with our son, forgetting about the man who had hurt you so badly. You risked your life to come for me, little as I deserved such love. I am sorry that I have brought you to this. More sorry than I can say.”

  She shrugged. He had no need to torment himself with guilt for her decisions. “It was my own choice to return. If I had not been betrayed, we would have been safe by now.”

  “If you had not been betrayed...” He rubbed the back of one hand over his eyes. “That is the story of your life, is it not? If you had not been betrayed so many times, how different life would have been for you. If I had not started off the pattern of your life by being the first traitor.”

  She stared at the cold stone walls that surrounded her on all sides. “Do not speak of such things. I have paid you back in far more evil coin by condemning you to die here.”

  He took her chin in his hand, forcing her to look at him. “I took the chance when I chose to become a rebel to my King. I knew if I were caught, then I would die for it.”

  She turned her head away. She could not face him, knowing what she had done to him. “No, you did not so choose of your own free will. I played on your hatred of the King to make you take this choice. I did not think the rebellion would amount to much, but it was worth the chance to me. You were to be the handy scapegoat if things went badly. Like a coward, I rode off and left you to be cut to pieces by the guards sent after us to take us. I thought you had died then. I meant for you to die as vengeance for my father, sent to the Bastille.”

  He stroked her shoulder with one hand, tentatively, as if not sure whether she would turn him away or not. “They were sent to take us alive if they could, so they did not kill me then are there. The only reason I’m still alive at all is their desire to root out traitors. They want to know who my accomplices were. They will not let me die until I have told them what I want to know, or until they have broken me down so far that there is no sense left in me.”

  The softness of his touch on her body melted the last shreds of ice in her heart. How could he forgive her even now, when he was destined so soon to die for her? “I brought you to this. My desire for revenge for the pain and suffering you put me through.” She looked up into his eyes, still the same eyes. “I was in love with you. Desperately in love with you, as only a young girl can be. I trusted you utterly, with every piece of me. When you disappeared, I did not want to believe that you had been untrue to me. I waited for you, but you did not come to me. Justin told me the truth at last, that you had betrayed me, but even then I could not accept it. Not until I sent a messenger to you and you refused to send me even a line of comfort back again, did I understand the truth – that I had given my heart to a scoundrel, who had used me for his own purposes and abandoned me to my fate.”

  “I could not reply to your message. I had no words to write to you that would express my horror and regret at what I had done. I could not come to see you – I had not the courage to face you again. I thought you would forget about me, that you would marry Justin and be happy with him.”

  She took his hand in hers and clasped it tightly. “I loved you too well to wed another. You broke my heart when you left. Besides, I was carrying your child.”

  “My son.” His face took on a softness she had never seen before. “He is well?”

  “He was well when I left him, and growing strong.”

  His face was wistful. “I wish I could have seen him, just once. Tell me about our son, that I may get to know a little of him before I die.”

  Hand in hand they sat together on the floor of the cell, her knife lying forgotten by her side, as she told him about their son. She did not stop until her eyes were wet and her throat too choked with tears to continue.

  He wiped away the tears that were streaming down his cheeks. “What have you told him about his father?”

  “He is too young as yet to know aught about fathers. He does not know yet what he is missing.”

  “If I could get out of this place for long enough to see my son, to plant a kiss on his forehead and give him my blessing, I would die a happy man.”

  They sat in silence for a while, both knowing how hopeless such a wish was.

  Courtney broke the silence at last. “I came here to make my peace with you. If I have done that, I have not died in vain.”

  Pierre took hold of both her hands in his. “Will you forgive me at last?”

  “If you will forgive me.”

  “There is nothing to forgive – you did nothing to me that I did not deserve.”

  “I thought I wanted justice – I wanted only revenge.” She gave a bitter smile. “Little did I know that true justice is more akin to mercy than to vengeance. God has punished for my lack of forgiveness. I would not dare not to forgive you now.”

  “No more enmity between us then? Friends, now, at last?”

  “Friends to the death.”

  Courtney did not know how long the two of them sat there, holding hands and talking with each other, sharing the thoughts and feelings that they had kept hidden from each other and from the rest of the world for so long. Though she was under sentence of death, she felt more at peace than she had for a long time. For the very first time in her heart of hearts she had truly forgiven Pierre for his betrayal of her. She knew that he had forgiven her as well for her betrayal of him that had led them both to his place.

  The guards pushed a loaf of black bread and a jug of stale water in through a slot in the door of their cell. They shared the bread and took turns drinking out of the jug until their meager rations were gone. She could not have been happier if they had been dining on nectar and ambrosia instead of the moldy leavings of the guards’ own food.

  How many weeks and months of loving Pierre she had missed out on. Now that she had so little time left, days at the most, maybe only hours, she would make the most of every second.

  She did not even want to close her eyes, but eventually weariness overcame them both. They stretched out together side by side on the cold, hard, stone floor. His hand clasped firmly in hers, their bodies pressed up against each other for warmth and the love of companionship, they drifted off to sleep.

  They awoke some time later to sounds of
muffled chaos outside the door of their cell. She sat up and rubbed her eyes, still heavy with sleep. She hoped that the noises did not presage ill tidings for them both. She could bear her imprisonment well enough in Pierre’s company, but if he was taken away from her, or taken off to be tortured again...She wasn’t sure she could live with that.

  At least she still had her knife. She would do her best to hide it from the guards for as long as she could. While she kept it in her possession, they both still had a choice whether to live or die.

  Beside her, Pierre clambered to his feet with a groan and stretched out his stiff limbs one by one. “Sleeping on the stone floor after a session on the rack,” he said with a rueful smile, “and I feel like an old man of three score and more. I can barely move.”

  The noise outside the cell door was growing louder. She could hear much shouting and yelling, and sounds of furiously running feet. It sounded as though a full scale riot had broken out.

  They sat and listened for some moments, but the riot did not quiet. If anything, it became louder and more demanding. “No breakfast for us this morning,” Pierre said with a casual shrug. “Whatever is happening out there sounds like it will take all the guards attention for some time.”

  Courtney groaned. Her mouth was as dry as all the sands of Araby. She would give a lot for another jug of water – even the stale, brackish water they had drunk so reluctantly the day before. She hoped that the guards were simply too busy to think of their prisoners needs, and that depriving them of food and water was not a new form of torture that they would have to endure. Food she could do without, but not water...

  Her mouth was too dry to talk. She sat in silence with Pierre, enduring.

  A noise right outside the door of their cell made her jump. With a feeling of dread about her heart, she heard the ominous sound of a key turning in the lock.

  Pierre’s face grew gray with alarm and he clasped her hands tighter than ever in his own. “I love you, Courtney,” he said, desperation in his voice. “Do not forget that. Whatever they do to you, whatever they do to me, they cannot take that away from us.”

  Courtney squeezed his hands back again as she looked deeply into his eyes. For all she knew, this would be the last time she ever saw him. She wanted to remember the love in his face until the moment of her death. “I love you, too, Pierre.”

  “Cut out the mushy stuff,” broke in an amused voice. “There’ll be time enough for that later on.”

  Courtney dragged her eyes away from Pierre’s face to where a booted figure with a fistful of keys stood at the door. “Miriame?”

  “In the flesh.”

  Courtney clambered to her feet, with Pierre only a second behind her.

  “Great, you’re not shackled. That’ll save us a bit of time.” Miriame waved them out the door. “Things are a little crazy around here. Find your way to the front gate. I’ll just round up the others and be right behind you.”

  Surely she could not just wander out the front gate of France’s most secure prison. “What about the guards?”

  Miriame laughed uproariously. “They’ll be in no state to give you any trouble. But just in case,” she drew a dagger out of each boot and tossed one at each of them. “This should be all you’ll need.”

  They were in the corridor by now. Miriame pushed them in one direction, “The gate’s that way,” and took off running in the other.

  Around the first corner was a guard. “Stop right there,” he said, holding up his sword.

  They drew their daggers, determined to fight their way out now that they had a chance to escape.

  They didn’t even need to strike a single blow. All of a sudden a queer look came over the guard’s face. He dropped his sword, his face turned green, he started to gasp, and he dashed off with his hands clutching wildly at his stomach.

  She looked at the departing guard with delight. Just what had Miriame done to disable a whole garrison?

  Pierre picked up the sword that lay forgotten on the ground and tested the edge. “Crude workmanship, but the edge is sharp enough. I feel better armed now.”

  They soon realized they weren’t alone in the corridors. Most of the doors to the cells were swinging open, and the chambers were empty. Miriame had evidently decided to give the guards a few diversions in addition to their stomach cramps.

  A few prisoners were milling around aimlessly not knowing what to do with their unexpected freedom. “Follow me,” Courtney cried. “To freedom.”

  They followed: walking, running, hobbling and limping along, a sad and sorry bunch of half-humans in filthy rags who had never thought such good luck would be upon them.

  From the hubbub in the prison came another, different noise – the harsh cry of a man barking orders in a sharp voice. Evidently not all of the guards had been disabled. Some lucky souls must have escaped the effects of Miriame’s poisonous brew.

  They rounded another corner and at the juncture of a couple of corridors, they came face to face with D’Artagnan, the Captain of the Musketeers, under whom they both had served. He was standing alone, barking orders still at a group of soldiers who were fast disappearing down the other corridor.

  His eyes grew wide when he turned and saw them both in rags with a following of prisoners behind them. “What’s going on here?” he demanded in his most imperious voice.

  Courtney stopped and saluted him smartly. She had no wish to fight him if she did not have to. “Prison break, Captain.”

  He gave a harrumph. “Who do you think you breaking out of prison?”

  She pointed to Pierre, who was leaning against the wall catching his breath. She respected her former Captain. She had no choice but to trust D’Artagnan’s sense of justice and his unwillingness to shed unnecessary blood. “Each other.”

  “I could kill you all, you know,” D’Artagnan said, conversationally, “and the King would thank me for it.”

  If he had wanted to kill them, he would have started on it already, Courtney knew. “Do we deserve death for rescuing a comrade in arms?”

  He looked at Pierre’s tattered clothes and limp. “Seems to me you had a spell in prison coming to you for your foolishness, my lad,” he said slowly, “but you were a brave soldier and I hate to see you fall victim to the vengeance of a King. Go on, be off with the pair of you before I change my mind and take you both up again.”

  Courtney saluted him again and they ran on. Behind them they could hear D’Artagnan barking out more orders, but no one came after them. He had been as good as his word and had set his troops off in a different direction to give them a chance to escape. It was up to them to make the most of it. If he came up on them again when he was not alone, he would not be able to let them off so easily.

  The front gate to the prison was standing wide open. The two guards who should have been on duty were otherwise occupied – trousers around their ankles, they were huddled in a corner, agonized groans coming from them as they emptied their bodies from every orifice. They looked up as the escaping prisoners came into view. One of the guards tried to rise and give chase, but after a couple of steps another spasm of pain overtook him and he collapsed back to a squat again with a miserable moan.

  The prisoners greeted the light of the outdoors with a cry of gladness. Even those who had limped along barely able to walk got another renewal of life as they dispersed out of the gate.

  Courtney stopped just short of freedom. “Miriame is still inside. She risked her life to save mine. I cannot leave without her.”

  Just then three figures came flying out towards them as if on wings. After them were a group of D’Artagnan’s troops, swords flailing wildly in the air.

  “Here they come,” Courtney shouted. “Let’s go.”

  A group of horses were tethered in front of the prison gate – the horses of the Musketeers called in to quell the riot in the prison no doubt. Pierre and Courtney leaped on the backs of the nearest pair and he cut their tethers with a sweep of his sword. Miriame, Sophie and Sophi
e’s husband were right behind them on stolen horses of their own.

  The Musketeers let out a howl of anguish as they saw their quarry disappearing on five of their best mounts and several of them leaped on their own mounts to give chase.

  D’Artagnan’s voice was clearly heard right behind them. “Come back, you fools, and leave a couple of horse thieves be for now. Our job is to quell the riot in the Bastille, and that is what we shall do.”

  There was a chorus of protests from the Musketeers. “But they’re escaping.”

  “What’s a handful of prisoners when we have a whole prison full to deal with. Will you go off chasing them, and let the rest go free? Not while I am your Captain, you will not. Any damn fool who runs off now will be courtmartialed as disobedient and as a coward.”

  With muttered groans, the soldiers dismounted and went back into the Bastille to herd the few remaining prisoners back into their cells.

  Courtney and Pierre turned to each other with a huge smile of joy and happiness as they rode hell for leather through the streets of Paris. They had made it. They were free.

  “To Burgundy?” Courtney asked, as they stopped for breath once they were safely away from Paris.

  “To Burgundy,” Sophie said. “Your father awaits your return anxiously, and the Duke will welcome you there for as long as you wish to stay.”

  Pierre’s face was suffused with a glow of utter joy. “To Burgundy. To our son.”

  Epilogue

  Pierre looked down at the sleeping face of his son for the very first time. “He is beautiful,” he whispered in a low voice, not wanting to disturb the boy’s slumber.

  Courtney stood by him, her arm around his waist. After all they had been through together, she found to hard to believe that they had reached the safety of Burgundy at last. She was safe here, with all those she loved: her father, her lover, and her precious little son. She looked at her son’s face. He was smiling a little in his sleep, almost as if he knew that his mother and father were united again and looking on him with love. “He takes after his father.”