To Serve a King (37 page)

Geneviève ran; the desperation chased her. At first she was unmindful of where her rushing feet took her, until she clattered down the flight of stairs and through the great hall to the rooms on the far side of the castle. As soon as she turned the corner and saw
the heavy wooden door at the end of the dimly lit stone hall, she knew what she needed … whom she needed.

She ran until her body fell against the portal, the flat of one hand rapping upon it.

Sebastien threw open the door, features contorted in confusion, dressed in nothing but the tight breeches and hose of his uniform. In the moment he saw her, his confusion changed to concern and again as quickly to desire. Geneviève fell into the space, fell into his strong arms, which opened without question and caught her.

“Sebastien, I …” she groaned, but she needed to say nothing more. His lips covered hers with his own greedy lust, his hands touched her everywhere, as if he could not believe in her nearness. They rubbed her back, pulled at her arms, held her face captive like a delicate dove in a tender, loving cage.

Geneviève threw her arms around him, felt the smooth, hard nakedness of his back, and latched onto it, her fingers digging into his flesh as she surrendered to his kisses. He led her toward his bed, or perhaps she moved on her own. Her laces came untied in a flurry of motion. Her gown dropped to the floor; her shift loosened as his hands found her breasts and paid homage to them.

Geneviève threw back her head, all painful thought abandoned in the escape found in Sebastien’s touch. The air filled with the musky scent of them and their rasping, harsh breaths.

Sebastien raised his lips to hers and took possession and she groaned like a petted cat. He raised his gaze and stilled, brows furrowing at the tears on her face. The passion raging through him simmered at her sorrow. He kissed her cheeks with small, tender kisses, like the touch of a butterfly’s wings, and laid her gently on the bed.

But she would have none of it. Geneviève grabbed the back of his neck with one hand, the hard curve of his shoulder with the other, and pushed, rolling them over until she lay on top of him, her legs straddling his.

For a fleeting moment, Sebastien’s stunned gaze stared up at
her. His soft smile spread, his dimples came out to play, and a low, husky laugh rumbled in his chest. They came together then, in the frenzy that held her, in the impassioned violence she prayed would hammer away all her fears and sorrows.

She curled herself in a ball and he surrounded her, his warm, moist skin clinging to hers, his body the shield with which he kept the world at bay. He kissed her shoulder, caressing her soft flesh with his warm lips. One hand rose to her face, to push back the gorgeous mess of blond curls draping it, and felt her tears.

“Did I hurt—”

“No, oh no, Sebastien. That … we … it was wonderful,” she said, and rolled onto her back, her violet gaze confirming the truth of her words, pale skin blushing with stunning beauty at the delight she took in their lascivious lovemaking.

Sebastien rose up to brace himself on one elbow. “Then why do you cry,
ma chérie?
”

Geneviève turned her head and looked away from him, looked back at all she had lost and all she had become, looked forward to a future filled with nothing but uncertainty.

“I do not know my path ahead nor my own heart.” Her voice cracked on the words.

“None of us can know the future.” He kissed her full bottom lip and the tip of her nose. “We must do whatever is intended for us, no matter how difficult the challenge may be.”

Geneviève stared up into his penetrating eyes and saw a struggle in them she had never noticed before. With the tip of one finger, she followed the hard frown lines she had never seen around his lips.

He gave her a smile, though it did not seem to come easily. “We can take one step at a time and hope that God will give us a sure footing.”

Geneviève’s worry eased. His doubts echoed her own uncertainty, and she found great succor in his empathy.

Sebastien brushed his lips across hers, moving them down her throat, and she tipped back her head to open herself to him. He took her gently then, with all the peace and tenderness she needed so desperately, loving her until she fell into a deep, restful sleep.

Sebastien jumped as the pounding struck the door, ungraceful with his slumberous movement, sleepy but splendid in his nakedness, grabbing his sword from its sheath hanging on the arm of the chair. Geneviève jolted up, blessed slumber cracked into jagged wakefulness. Smudgy gray dawn light hovered through the open curtains of the window, throwing their faces into shadowy masks of surreal specters.

It came again: explosive hammering that shook the wooden door in its frame, hinges and latch jangling in protest. The lovers stared at each other, confounded in their apprehension.

“Geneviève? Are you in there?” The fretful voice found its way through the cracks, and they jumped at its familiarity.

“Arabelle?” Geneviève leaped out of bed and wrapped the rumpled linens around her naked body.

Sebastien dropped his sword and grabbed his breeches, tumbling as he tried to walk to the door while pushing his legs through the slim openings. He made it to the door, threw up the latch, and yanked it open.

Arabelle stood on the threshold, face grubby with tears, lovely features decimated by exhaustion and turmoil. Geneviève rushed to her, grabbing her by the arm and pulling her into the tiny chamber before any inquisitive courtiers wandering the halls found them.

“You are here?” Geneviève thought of nothing more to say. When she had fallen asleep, when emotional and physical exhaustion had overtaken her, Arabelle had been in Paris.

Arabelle nodded, throat bulging with a hard swallow. “We rode through the night. We did not want anyone else telling the duchesse.”

Geneviève’s chin dropped to her chest and her jaw hardened as she looked up at her friend. “Tell the duchesse what?”

In that wretched moment, she knew what was coming, but she would deny it to the last minute.

Arabelle reached out and grabbed Geneviève’s forearms as her knees began to give way.

“They’ve found her guilty,” she sobbed. “Lisette. They are going to hang her. They are going to hang Lisette in two days.”

Geneviève shook her head back and forth and back again, refusing Arabelle’s words, but such anguish was undeniable. The friends slipped to the ground and fell together in their sorrow.

26

The smile is a weapon as well as the sword—

And just as dangerous.

—François I (1494–1547)

E
very one of Anne’s ladies came to her chamber that morning, creeping in long before dawn’s first light. As the day faithfully came, undeterred by their deepest hopes and fervent prayers, Je-celyn and Geneviève sat beside each other on the settee, pretending to sew, yet doing nothing more than holding the wood frame and linens in their hands without taking a stitch. Their senseless feud was forgotten, abandoned in the face of life’s bleak cruelty. There was no place else to be but here, no other people to be with.

Arabelle sat alone in the window embrasure; no words consoled her, no embrace called her away, but neither could she face the moment in solitude. Huddled in a ball, skirts wrapped around her knees as she rocked, Arabelle stared out at the bright sunny morning as if unable to comprehend its cheerfulness.

Sybille and Béatrice sat at the table with Anne. Not one of them had touched a single bite of the morning’s fare, not even Béatrice, for whom a good meal was of sacred esteem. The large corner clock in its walnut cabinet beat out the minutes left in Lisette’s life and the women listened to each tick, willing it to stop.

The door opened without a knock and the women jumped,
fearful the Grim Reaper himself had come calling; the ravaged apparition standing in its frame could well have been.

The king hovered on the threshold, an elderly man beaten by a life that had piled hardship and loss upon suffering and grief. Geneviève stared at him, at the deep crags upon his once handsome face, at the inward slump of his once broad shoulders. She had come to his court to destroy him and, in a manner, she had succeeded; but at what cost?

His presence here, now, meant one thing; the time for a pardon had passed. Lisette’s fate was sealed.

Anne stood and for a long moment made no move toward her lover, her life’s mate. Temper clouded her features; they all saw it, the king most of all. He curled further inward, as if struck in the gut by a powerful fist, and began to turn away.

“Wait!” Anne cried, rushing to his side, a choked sob rising above the rustling of her skirts. She threw her arms around him, clutched him near, her cheek flat and tight against his chest.

Relief flooded François, his wide mouth trembling as he lowered his lips to the top of her head, closing his eyes as he leaned upon her. Their silent, intimate embrace, one offered to each other as freely as if they had been alone, healed any fissure daring to insinuate itself between them. Anne lifted her face, offering him a tender smile, an expression infused with love but tinctured with their shared grief. The large man returned it in kind. Taking his hand, Anne led him silently into the room.

Out in the courtyard the drums began to beat, echoes of those in the courtyard of the Louvre, informing the king of what took place at the city’s judicial center. François and Anne fell onto the couch opposite the settee—listless, shocked victims of a ruthless trauma. For an instant, the king’s gaze caught Geneviève’s and her heart thudded against her chest. Did he know of her hand in this catastrophe? She did not believe it would serve Constable Mont-morency to tell him, but she feared his censure nonetheless. His empty stare passed over her, and she knew he was ignorant.

Yet the hammering in her chest would not yield. As the beat of the drums grew faster and faster, so did her palpitating heart. She stared at the defeated king, but there was no joy in a battle won. It should have been a moment of triumph, at the very least one of enormous relief, but it was neither.

The drum beats became a furious roll, a never-ending roar.

The king threw himself into Anne’s arms.

Arabelle sobbed.

Sybille and Béatrice began to pray, beseeching God for intervention.

Geneviève gasped for air, unable to breathe.

But she must.

She had to tell the king to stop it.

He had to save Lisette.

The drums thundered.

She jumped to her feet.

The words formed on the tip of her tongue.

The drums crashed.

And then … they stopped.

“God be with her,” Sybille sobbed.

Geneviève crumbled, unconscious, to the ground.

Her gowns hung upon her, so much weight had she lost in the last fortnight. Carine had no choice but to hastily ply needle and thread to make Geneviève presentable before she returned to the duchesse’s chambers and resumed her duties.

The duchesse had insisted Geneviève take time to recover. The king’s physician, the same who had scooped her off Anne’s floor and rushed her to bed, had told them she suffered a physical malady, one whose symptoms included weakness, lack of appetite, and an inability to keep food in her gullet. In truth, the symptoms had been extreme, the nausea debilitating, but no one knew her illness bore the name of heartbreak and confusion.

Carine’s hands brushed her mistress’s skirts. “It is not the best I
have seen you looking, but it is far better than some.” She offered the backhanded compliment as she looked up at Geneviève’s pale face with a smile. “All shall be much pleased to see you, mam’selle.”

Geneviève gave a small nod. Day after day, Arabelle had been to visit her; Sebastien came as often as his duties would allow. The duchesse had sent her tokens, as had the king, both his sons, and Diane de Poitiers as well. Yes, she was a well-liked courtier, for all that she was a murderer.

She looked at herself in the cloudy looking glass, or was it her essence that was cloudy and not the glass? How much of herself had she lost? The blond ringlets flowing from the jeweled crescent hood, the waiflike body encased in beaded lilac: It was her, but it wasn’t.

The knocking upon her door did little to rouse her from her self-examination, and Carine jumped up to answer it.

“Oh look, mademoiselle, another posy to cheer you,” Carine trilled as she retrieved the delivery from the page and dismissed him with a
denier
to his palm and a polite
merci
. “And English ivy, no less. It must be a deep pocket to afford such a token.”

Geneviève jerked round, eyes wide at the sight of the two small pink rosebuds surrounded by the trailing, three-pointed green leaves.

“Who sends it, Carine?”

Her maid used her fingers to hunt among the leaves and petals, but found no note or card. “It doesn’t say,” she said dubiously. “How very odd.”

Geneviève rushed to retrieve the small bouquet from Carine’s hand. “Very odd, indeed, but beautiful all the same. I will treasure it in the spirit it was given.”

“Will you take it with you to the duchesse?” Carine asked casually, clearing her sewing notions from the floor where she’d left them, and missing the vexation sweeping across Geneviève’s face.

“No. I believe I will keep it to myself,” Geneviève replied.
“You may leave me now, Carine. I think I will take a few minutes’ more rest before I go.”

Carine looked hard at her mistress. “Are you all right? Do you feel a return of the illness?”

“No no, have no fear,” Geneviève assured her, deciding again to use truth to perpetuate deception. “I’m a little nervous, if truth be told. I would gather myself before seeing the duchesse.”

Carine tilted her head and smiled at Geneviève with the sympathetic indulgence of a mother. “Of course, mam’selle, I understand.” She took up her sewing basket and made for the door. “I will not be far, should you need me.”