Leopard in Exile (39 page)

'Charenton want de true King, an' he't'ink he can get him. But he wan' him dead, him—he got some crazy

notion he can be king here, an' rule over de lan'. An' dere somet'in' else he won' tell me, eh? Somet'in' he

plannin' fo' All Souls Eve."

"October 31." The eve of All Souls Day was supposed to be one of the two great nights of power in the

year—but did the Old World's rules of magic hold true in the new?

"Somet'in' big. Somet'in' he't'ink even I do'an put up wid, me," Corday said bitterly.

Wessex shot Corday an appraising glance. He'd always known the Acadian as a cool emotionless killer,

technically expert and uninvolved—not a political, but a dependable assassin. For years, Corday had

eliminated the enemies of Imperial France as passionlessly as a skilled gardener pruned his garden,

making his kill and then vanishing like smoke. That he'd been caught at Mooncoign two years ago had

been due to a stroke of unexpected fortune for England, not the result of Corday's lack of skill. Despite

rigorous questioning afterward by the White Tower, Corday had given up none of his secrets, and an

exchange of hostages must have been arranged, for Wessex had next encountered Corday in Denmark.

But in Denmark, Corday had not been working for France's interests, but—Wessex now

realized—Louisianne's.

"This is why you did it, isn't it?" Wessex said quietly. "It was all for this."

Corday shook his head, protesting the necessity even as he confirmed Wessex's guess.

"He knew, de Black Pope. Allus playin' bot' side agains' de middle. He been plannin' t'ings so Louisianne

rise up an' cas' dat tyran' out; so he have de rat-hole to slide into if de Gran' Alliance win. But if he do

dat, what happen to de Aca'juns, eh? Dis our homeland now, an' we doan be movin' again,
cher
, no."

Corday poured himself another glass of whiskey. It was his third, but the Acadian didn't seem in the least

impaired, only now his hand had stopped shaking when he poured.

"So Talleyrand sent you to Louisianne, knowing you would do all you could to topple d'Charenton and

save him the trouble since you wanted Louisianne for your own. But what he didn't know was that you

weren't working alone," Wessex said, as the last piece of the puzzle fell into place in his mind.

"Nevair. From de firs', I work for Acadia. What do we care if I kill Englishmen, hahn? But den, we hear

dat de Los' King is alive."

"And you hoped that he would depose Napoleon, uniting Louisianne and France before the Bourbon

throne once more."

"But he vanish again," Corday said with a sad smile. "An' de Corsican give us 'Charenton."

"A blessing in disguise," Wessex pointed out, "as his presence will unite those who wish a free and

independent Louisianne as nothing else would."

"But we 'ave no leader. Dere is no one anyone can agree on to lead us but de Bourbon heir, an' Triton

'ave him. Bein' united do'an do us any good if 'Charenton kill us all firs'. So now I 'ave said enough. Now

is de time for you to talk, Your Grace. Tell me w'at de W'ite Tower will do for La Belle Louisianne, an'

what she want' in return. If you 'ave brought us a
sorcier
to deal wid 'Charenton, I 'ave not seen him,

me."

So Louis was dead, for Corday's remark about Triton surely meant that the boy had drowned. Wessex

put the thought aside, another thing he would not think about until he reached a less-volatile refuge. For

now, he pondered the other things Corday had told him. That Corday was willing to stand his ally at the

moment was unexpected
lagniappe
, as the Acadians would have it.

"I'm afraid you will have to apply to the good Koscuisko for your particulars, Corday," Wessex lied

suavely. "They are not a part of why I came here. I have urgent business in Nouvelle-Orléans."

There was a long moment while Corday decided whether to accept this. But in the end he did, because

like it or not, Corday courted England precisely because he did
not
want Louisianne to become another

part of New Albion. Corday would do whatever he must to keep his people from being cast out of their

homeland a second time, and Wessex found a grudging sort of respect for the Acadian's devotion, if not

his methods.

"I mus' be back dere by noon tomorrow," Corday said, and the lines of pain about his mouth deepened

at the thought. "I tak' you den, so you do'an catch Annie's eye again, neh? 'Charenton't'inks I 'ave a

cher-amie
on one of de plantations here."

"The Clouds, I presume?" Wessex asked.

Corday nodded. A mythical sweetheart was a good cover for Corday's frequent journeys into the bayou,

and the enigmatic Rhettler Baronner could undoubtedly be called upon to endorse any alibis that might be

needed.

"But for now, Your Grace, we got to get you prettied up, hahn?" Corday said, with a ghost of his past

gay recklessness. "You frighten de ladies,
cher
, you go into Town lookin' like dat."

Corday was as good as his word, providing Wessex with dinner, a bed, and fresh clothes. He had even

managed to recover a few of Wessex's personal effects from the others in the camp, so the Duke

rejoiced in the possession of his own boots—their secret freight of gold doubloons still concealed—and

his rapier.

But the rest—his knives and pistols, his compass, his garotte, and his incidental jewelry, were gone. Such

losses happened in the field, and Wessex held them to be of little account. It was enough for the moment

that he was shaved and dressed and out of the hands of the homicidal giantess Annie Christmas.

Good manners dictated that he not try to see more of his hosts than absolutely necessary, so Wessex

remained inside the tent. Corday brought him dinner—a spicy local stew he called
jambalaya
, which

seemed to Wessex to consist mainly of sausage and fire—but did not eat himself. He had finished the first

bottle of whiskey earlier and was halfway through the second, still without its seeming to have any

particular effect upon him.

"Is it so bad?" Wessex asked at last. If it was compassion that motivated him, it was the detached

compassion of a craftsman for his tools. Corday was his passport out of here, as well as a vital link in the

Rebellion's plans. He could not be allowed to destroy himself now.

"I 'ave seen evil." Corday spoke in the local French patois he must have learned as a child, his voice so

low that Wessex had to strain to hear him. Corday did not meet the Duke's eyes as he spoke, but gazed

off into nothingness as if he saw visions there. "I 'ave seen monsters—an' done dere work, too. I 'ave

killed innocent men. I 'ave killed women, me. But I did not
play
wit' dem!" The last words came out in a

strained whisper, as if Corday had finally mustered up the courage to speak of unspeakable things.

"Charenton, he is
un amateur
—an amateur. It is all for fun, what he does, for sport. Dey die, cher, to

amuse him, an' he try… he try to make ot'ers like himself. Children. De Mam'selle Delphine…" Corday

stopped speaking abruptly, his voice catching on something suspiciously like a sob. After a long pause,

he spoke again. "If I could, I would kill him myself, me. But I canno' risk de lives of de ones who follow

me. I will no' give anyone to him in dis life or de nex."

It was the ultimate dilemma of the deep cover agent. How did one keep his soul safe while presenting an

acquiescent face and a studied mask to all manner of horrors? Wessex knew of, and had known, men

and women who had been forced by the highest sort of altruism to do things against which they rebelled

as much as Corday did against being made d'Charenton's
intime
. The effort destroyed them all if they left

escape from their double role too late.

"No," Wessex said. "You won't have to." A decision he couldn't remember having made presented itself

to him with the inevitability of the only clear choice. D'Charenton would have the answers that Wessex

sought, and so Wessex must seek him out to discover where Meriel and Sarah were. Killing him would

be act of virtue. "Don't worry, Gambit. This death's on me."

And more than ever before, Wessex was determined that it would be his farewell performance on the

chessboard of the Shadow Game.

The Shortest Way to Hades

(Nouvelle-Orléans ana Vicinity, October 1807)

T
he deliberations at Chandeleur went on for another couple of hours, but they were now between

Lafitte and his pirate captains. Illya and Louis were left to their own devices elsewhere in the house, with

Robie in attendance.

"So, you will make a king of me yet," Louis said. He was striving for a light tone, but he could not

conceal the bitterness in his voice. Lafitte might try to make it all seem like an exciting social experiment,

but his flattery could not disguise the fact that these were the same gilded shackles that Louis had fought

against all his life.

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry," Illya said. "This seems to be my month for persuading people to do

things against their better judgment But I don't see any other way out. Do you? You are the one thing all

the factions can unite behind—the True King."

"A king must be trained in kingship. He must… know the land, and all its people. I know nothing of those

things," Louis pointed out He could remember no other life than that of a pawn in hiding—a poor

beginning, he thought, for kingship.

"I don't think they will matter for the sort of thing Lafitte has in mind," Koscuisko said absently. "The

important thing is—can you kill a man?"

Louis stared at Koscuisko in astonishment. Behind him, he heard Robie snort derisively.

"I… you want me to kill Lafitte?"

Koscuisko shook his head quickly. "Not him. Someone has to kill the Imperial Governor, you see, and

the fellow who was supposed to do it has turned up missing. Very awkward, but what would you? And

d'Charenton is a sorcerer, so…"

"So only an aristocrat or a prince of the Church can slay him without harm," Louis finished. "Ah, well. At

one point I was to have taken Holy Orders, so I suppose…"

"Killing a man isn't hard," Robie said contemptuously. "Half the men and two-thirds of the women in

Barataria would do it for a dixie and a bottle of rum, and they wouldn't much care if they died of it."

"If it were that alone, it would be a simple matter," Koscuisko said. "But there is a power in
l'art magie
,

and especially in diabolism, which does not die with its wielder. It strikes back at the slayer of an adept,

but unfortunately, that is not all it does. It… well, it takes on a separate life."

"A
duppy
," Robie breathed, and for the first time Louis saw actual fear in his eyes. Sailors were a

notoriously superstitious lot, and feared the spirit world far more than their land-dwelling counterparts

did.

"Yes, if you like. It has much the aspect of a ghost, a sort of artificial elemental. And I should not wish to

free that which has been bred in d'Charenton's soul to walk free of the bonds of flesh, not even if I were

to put an ocean between us. So he must be killed by a man who is more than a man; one of royal blood."

Louis swallowed. He had assisted at more than one exorcism while living beneath his uncle's roof, and

knew the truth in Koscuisko's words. But though he had been a hunted prize all his life, he had never

killed a man—certainly he had not executed one in cold blood. He wasn't sure he could.

His face must have showed his thoughts, for Robie turned away from him in disgust.

"What about you? You could do it yourself—or is that business of you being a count just another

taradiddle?" Robie asked contemptuously, turning to Koscuisko.

"In Poland we elect our kings. Our relationship to the land-spirits which confer royalty is not…

sufficiently similar to what is done in the West for me to be certain that I could kill him effectively,"

Koscuisko said, unembarrassed by the admission. "And I think the stakes are too high in this case to risk

the experiment."

"I will do what you ask of me," Louis said. "If I can." He thought—not for the first time—of Meriel, and

wondered if Koscuisko had any news of her. Not knowing what had become of his wife was a constant

dull grief—and one he would not parade before Robie or any of the other pirates. His questions could

wait until he had some privacy in which to ask them.

As the sky began to lighten, a servant came to bid them come to breakfast. They followed her into the

dining room. The sideboard was lavishly laden with covered silver chafing dishes—the sight of them, if

not the hour at which they were presented, was familiar to Louis. The three of them were the only diners,

apparently.

"The condemned man?" Koscuisko offered, gesturing toward the table.

"I suppose we should eat while we can," Louis answered. Robie was already filling a plate, ignoring them

both.

Lafitte entered as they were finishing breakfast.

"And now, the preliminaries being accomplished, it is time for M'sieur le Comte
et moi
to pay a social

call upon my brothers in this great adventure. I am desolate not to be able to include you,
mon pauvre

petit
, but it is much better for us all if you remain safe and well here in my little snuggery."

"So I am to go back to my kennel?" Louis asked, with an acid punctilio Illya had not heard from him