Viridian (The Hundred-Days Series Book 2) (32 page)

“I'm sorry,” he whispered again.

“It was for the best. Papa sent
word a few days later; some very powerful friends had bought his release, but
he felt we were not safe. He wanted us ready to flee for Austria the moment he
arrived.”

Now Ty snapped his face to her, shaking
his head. “Your mother could not have been equal to the journey, not so soon
after…”

She pressed on. “No. She had a
fever, an infection, and was too sick and weak to eat. She improved after a
fortnight, but it was too late. I remember the look on my father's face when he
arrived and nothing was prepared, my mother nearly on her deathbed. I’d never
seen him like that. Anguish, and a terrible resignation on his face. They were
both in such peril, but he refused to leave her behind.”

“Even though it meant his death,”
whispered Ty.

“Even though.” If only mama had
been well, if they had fled Paris that very afternoon. Olivia scrubbed an arm
across tired eyes. “The soldiers came in the middle of the night, so many of
them that it was almost comical. Who would stand against them, the gardener and
the housekeeper? My father? He had been beaten and tortured, and his arm was
nearly broken.”

“Le Emperuer enjoys his shows of
force,” bit Ty.

His words reminded her of the night
Philipe had been taken, and she wondered if he was thinking the same thing. She
had fought the memories of her past for so long, putting them in a little box
in the attic of her mind and pushing it to the corner. Letting in even a little
had been dangerous. They shattered the dam, flooding her.

Drowning her.

*          *          *

Shaking.

Movement pierced the first sleep
she'd had in days. Groaning, she rolled farther over.

It came again.

“Olivie, wake up,” her mother
whispered, a desperate quaver to her voice. “Madame has brought your coat. Put
it on.”

Her eyes burned, refusing to open
fully in the light of even a single candle. Mother's thick brown hair was wild,
unbrushed, her beautiful face red and swollen from crying. “Sit up. You must
put on your coat,” she pleaded.

Olivia didn't want to put on a
coat. Her warm quilt and exhausted limbs begged her to stay put.

“Please, Olivie! I cannot...”
Mother sobbed, dropping her arm as if it weighed a ton. “Madame, please...”

“Move your hands, Charlotte. Let me
do it.” It was Madame Toulon's voice, her firm grip and stern tone, which
finally brought Olivia awake. “You cannot be useless at a time like this,
girl.”

Shouting sounded from somewhere
farther off in the house.

Until now, it hadn't entirely
occurred to her that anything was wrong. Mother cried all the time since she'd
lost the baby. Since she'd fallen ill. But people in the house didn't yell, and
Madame had never stuffed her into her pelisse like a rag doll.

“What's wrong? What has happened?”
Raking hair from her face, she looked from her mother to Madame's stiff
expression, the woman's mouth set in an uncharacteristically grim line.

Madame Toulon shook her head, not a
hair standing out of place from a wiry brown bun. Did she ever sleep, or was
she perpetually waiting to be called on?

“We shan't worry about that. For
now, we shall be expedient, obedient and –”

“And
quiet
,” Olivia
grumbled, finishing Toulon's favorite phrase. Something crashed on the landing,
followed by a scream. She was off the bed, standing, trembling before she knew
it. “What is that?” she whispered.

Lip trembling, Mother only stared
at the door while Madame Toulon grasped her hand.

Pointing to the door, the source of
everyone's attention, Olivia hissed again. “What is out there?” Even as the
words were spoken, she realized that she didn't need an answer. Her parents had
been paralyzed for two days waiting for some fallout since Papa's release.

Mother struggled up from the bed,
her frail body nearly tangled in a brown satin coat that had once fit her
perfectly. Shaking arms circled her, and Olivia rested her head against her
mother's bosom, hardly breathing. Her heart ached, her chest ached. Why would
they not answer her, tell her it would be all right?

Fingers tangled in her hair. “I
love you, Olivie. So much. I –”

Splintering wood half deafened her,
and she swallowed a scream. Their chamber door swung open, rattling off of the
wall. A soldier filled the opening, dressed in black and red from head to toe.
His leather hat and boots and wide bandolier cast a dull reflection like snake
skin. He was terror incarnate.

She would be sick. Olivia felt it.
Her stomach constricted once, then again, harder. Desperate, she sucked breaths
in through her nose until her head swam.

The specter multiplied. Two
appeared behind him, and another behind them. There were more footsteps out of
sight, boots hammering a staircase or a hallway.

“Out,” he barked in clipped French.
“Move. Get out.”

She looked to Madame Toulon, who
nodded and slipped an arm around mother's waist.

“Let go of her!” another soldier
demanded, this one with more plumes in his helmet. An officer, she guessed.
“She can manage on her own.”

“She cannot!” Madame shot back.
“She’s in a delicate state and –”

His advance was swift, cutting off
the rest of her plea. He crossed the room and buried a rifle butt in her belly
before she could move, before mother even had a chance to cry out.

To her credit, Madame stumbled and
groaned, but kept her footing. The officer grasped her bun, pulling. Olivia
dodged clear when he tried to jab her with the muzzle. “Out,” he demanded
again, even though she was moving for the door.

“Mama?” She craned her neck, trying
to see past Madame's captor. “Mama!”

Another black-clad demon rushed
past on some unspoken command and tried to stand Mama up. When her legs
wouldn't steady, he clutched a fistful of her coat and pulled, dragging her
along the ground like garbage.

Their descent was dark and silent
except for vulgar swearing from the soldiers and her mother's cries as they
dragged her over each stair. Cold air rushed over her face, its dampness
piercing the wool of her pelisse and mingling with her sweat.

Papa. He would know what to do. No
one would hurt them in his presence.

When she reached the last step before
the main hall, a fist jabbed at her back, forcing her toward the formal parlor.
That filled her with a strange sort of hope. It was her parents’ favorite room,
filled with happy memories. Mother had decorated it with velvet drapes in her
father's favorite shade of blue, and he had hung a beautiful portrait of her
over the mantle.

She could hardly see any of it now.
A lamp burned on a stand in the corner, its wick sputtering from a lack of oil.
Her mother's maid, a cook's boy, and the valet huddled close as though its glow
would protect them. A shadow farther back hovering near a silhouette couch took
a hesitant step forward, revealing her father.

“Papa!” she gasped, covering the
room in two long-legged strides. When she grabbed his waist, he cried out,
flinching. “What's the matter? What's happening?”

Thin light caught his face. Blood
clung sticky and half dried to a crescent shaped wound beneath his eye. His lip
was split, his cheek swollen, and fresh bruises mingled with his older ones.

Something behind her ribs gave, and
Olivia swore her heart tore. No one could help them. Mama was too sick. Madame
Toulon could not intimidate the men. And her last hope, her father, had been
beaten along with the rest of them.

His handsome face drooped. He bent
and pressed a kiss to her forehead, wrapping her hand in his larger one. “Do
you remember,” he managed, trembling, breaking apart his words, “When I took
you to Bordeaux to get your pony?”

She could only nod, tears filling
her eyes, her throat closed like a vice. They'd had to give the pony up when
the estate had been confiscated, but she remembered the trip like it was
yesterday.

“You delighted me the whole way.
You didn't sleep a wink, and I don't believe you stopped chatting long enough
to take a breath.”

“We had a picnic on the green,” she
whispered, feeling the grass on her stockinged legs, the warm sun of that day
burning through closed eyes.

“You wanted to feed him
everything.” He let out the ghost of a laugh. “I was certain you would make him
too sick to travel.” A heavy edge to his words crushed her, making it hard to
breathe. Why was he recalling this now? Olivia shook her head, trying to shut
up the voice in her mind whispering that she knew why.

He pressed a kiss to her forehead.
“I love you, Olivie. So much.”

Madame Toulon, acting as a crutch,
was struggling to settle mother onto the sofa. Charlotte wasn't crying anymore.
She wasn't really doing anything, her eyes closed, her breathing slow enough
that Olivia almost believed she was sleeping.

She was dying. Father was going to
be killed. And madame. Something inside her softened, weakened, and began to
pool. Olivia felt her will run like melted wax. They couldn't protect her. No
one could protect her. They couldn't even protect themselves.

There was a rumble from outside,
then the clatter of hooves along the drive out front. It laced the room with
new tension, cutting even whispered conversation to nothing.

“Bring them out.” The voice from
outside was square-edged and efficient, issuing an instruction without concern
for its result. It terrified her more than if he had been enraged.

A sentry at the parlor door snapped
a salute, then turned and stomped in, followed by his partner. Everyone
received a blow, a crack from the rifle. Even her mother took several blows to
the ribs before father lunged to intervene. He earned a swing to the face that
spattered blood across his shirt.

Mother moaned, then was silent.

I’m dying
. Olivia's knees
shook. Her fingers tingled. They weren't getting enough blood because her heart
was stopping. She could feel it, seizing up. Why hadn't she said 'I love you'?
Why hadn't she answered her mother?

It was too late, now.

It was too far into spring for the
nights to feel so much like winter. Rain mocked her as they passed out into the
door yard, insult on top of injury that stung her cheeks and dampened her
clothes. Three wagons lined the drive. She had seen them before, in the city.
She had peered curiously at the dirty, leering men who gripped the iron bars
from inside them as they yelled and swore.
Prison wagons.

“Line them up!” The officer shouted
again, on horseback now and more frightening, if that were possible.

Soldiers prodded them into a row,
manipulating by force as though her family were no more than chess pieces.
Mother stumbled up at her right, not looking any more well than she had inside,
braced by the frigid air. She closed her eyes, head rolling back like she was near
fainting.

Olivia swallowed, determined not to
miss her chance. “I love you, Mama,” she whispered. In her heart, it felt like
saying goodbye.

Fingers squeezed her left hand.
Papa
.

“Captain,” called the mounted
officer, “take names!”

Once that was over, she expected
they would be herded into wagons. The torture was only beginning. She
understood this, on some level, even if everything beyond the wagon was a
mystery. There was no way of knowing if her imaginings were worse than the
truth.

While rain soaked deeper into their
clothes, the slit-eyed captain rolled his moustache, stopping at random
intervals. He yelled for their first names, their surnames, and then the other
way around. Sometimes he asked for the same one again and again, striking them
with a fist if they stumbled.

By the time he moved left down the
line for what she thought must be his twentieth parade, Olivia counted two
throbbing cheeks and a swollen lip. At the first blow, she had stood in mute
shock, too surprised even to cry. No one had ever struck her; it would be
unthinkable. The second blow was not so terrible, almost as though it had been
visited upon someone else. She wondered if that should frighten her.

Fingers tugging at her shoulder cut
off the thought. She glanced up at her father. He faced straight ahead, but his
eyes were on her. His lips formed something she couldn't make out in the
semi-darkness.

Giving her head the barest shake,
she watched him carefully as his mouth worked again.

Run
.

The idea shocked her, snapped her
terrified mind into motion. She glanced from the commander, to the captain's
back. The bluff above the road was not far, just beyond a wall of trees off of
her right shoulder. On foot, with a head start, she could outpace them, and
even though they would catch up, by then she could hide herself in places only
a thirteen-year-old girl could reach. And then she could go for help. The
villagers would not allow the soldiers to treat Mama and Papa so roughly.

“Olivie!” her father rasped. “Now!
Run!”

She sucked in a breath, tensed her
knees and drew back ready to spring. Before she could move, she became aware of
her mother's fingers gripping her shoulder, leaning on her, and Olivia realized
she bore all of her mother's weight in that moment. She was fading, and Olivia
was her bulwark.

If she ran, her mother would be
alone, and Olivia had no doubt that she would die that way.

Knees relaxed, and she exhaled. The
captain spun around.

“Olivie,” her father whispered,
anguish and disappointment creasing his face. “No.”

She hung her head, glad for the
warmth of tears on her frozen cheeks.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Olivia wished she could summon up
those tears now. Anything to relieve the throbbing in her chest. Instead, the
memory was a horrible wound, and she was too frightened to lift the bandage and
look. Frightened of herself, of the girl who shrugged at being hit, and of the
woman who shrugged at nearly decapitating her foe. Ashamed that she hadn’t had
the guts to run when her father had begged any more than she had when it was
Ty. Perhaps the worst was yet to come, and she braced for what Ty would think
of her when her tale was done.

They came into a series of wider
caves, the floor worn smooth and the arrangements more elaborate. This part of
the crypt was obviously more frequented, and she guessed they were nearing the
exit. She pressed on, feeling the need to finish her story before they reached
the world above.

“I was packed into one of those
shabby wagons with my mother and Madame Toulon. We were not permitted…” She
swallowed. “We never saw my father again, not before –” She stopped and tried
to summon up his face with its broad forehead and long, regal nose crisscrossed
by cuts, the tears running over the blue bruise painting his cheek bone. “That
was the last time I saw him, until the day he and my mother were massacred.”

Ty’s sigh was ragged, a ghostly
echo off the rough walls. “I have no idea how much you know about your father,
during the time you were all imprisoned. He never stopped fighting for France,
Olivia. He did a lot of good, even from a cell. He was a great man, a hero.”

There was a note of pride in Ty's
voice that was strange and deeply touching. “My uncle, though he disapproved of
my mother's affair, has never withheld anecdotes or information about my
parents. If he were not needed so desperately now in England, I know he would
come and help me try to find them.”

They were quiet together. She lost
herself in the memories, but after a moment Ty cleared his throat, reminding
her that she had left her story unfinished. “That night, the road into the city
was pitted, muddy, and I swear the journey took three times as long as it ever
had before. Mama winced and groaned; her body was still swollen and tender.
Madame Toulon wriggled her bony body in between us, wrapped us both with her
arms and pulled our heads to her shoulders. I slept a little then, not waking until
Madame jostled me and a soldier jabbed my arm. When I climbed down and saw the
high stone arch, the heavy iron gate… I panicked for the first time. I only
remember begging, and it all came out as blubbering nonsense.”

“I know the building well. And how nearly
impossible it is to get
in
, to say nothing of getting
out
.”

Ty had been in and out of
La
Force
. Why did that not surprise her? If anyone could escape from that
cursed place, it was him.

After a moment, she nodded at his
words. “Something about walking inside made it feel final in a way it hadn’t
before that. Once we were actually
taken
inside, my first thought was
that my baby brother's death had been a blessing. He would have suffered in
that place, and died anyhow. Until then, the most disgusting thing I'd ever
seen were the Paris gutters.
La Force
was so much worse. I was horrified
by the absolute filth, the stench of old urine, rotting food, the mud and dead
rats.” She shuddered, unconsciously breathing faster to clear her nose of the
memory.

“My mother was hardly pampered or
spoiled, but she’d never had to live that way.
La Force
was used mostly
for prostitutes and other women of ill repute, so I think Fouche put her there
intentionally, for added torment. The vulgarity and coarseness unnerved her,
not to mention the unending filth. Toulon was doubly offended, I think, being
of an older generation.”

“A child, an invalid, and a
spinster at the mercy of La Force.” He shuddered. “I can imagine few things
more cruel.” Ty’s words were quiet, measured, completely lacking the cheerful
irreverence she so associated with him. In that moment, she loved him for it.

“Nearly as cruel as the way the
women treated one another. There was no sisterhood, no mutual support. In the
common area at midday, we had our hair pulled, our faces slapped. Some of the
larger, meaner women pinched at my breasts or tried to get a hand up my skirts.
Their misery, it was made very clear, would be shared by all of us. Eventually,
my mother refused to leave our cell. She was sick enough that the guards
stopped trying to force her. And Madame Toulon stayed with her, claiming
advanced years and protesting that my mother needed a caretaker. But me...”

Ty's smile was no more than a grim
line. “I know you well enough to know that you did not make it easy on them.”

She squeezed his hand absently. “I
was a wiry thing at fourteen. A little fit from riding and walking, but I had
no more muscle than a pond reed. Observing some of the tougher women when we
were herded through the corridors, I watched how they beat fists into the stone
for toughness, or used the window lip high overhead to raise and lower
themselves. Against
Madame's
protests, I followed their example. So when
the guards came to take me out at midday, I fought. I fought them for sometimes
half an hour, until the women were being filed back and there was no point in
their taking me out. They made me suffer for my stubbornness, but it was worth
it.”

He glanced her way, and Olivia
caught his eye moving head to toe. “I wonder you survived. You weren't exactly
incarcerated in the Temple, with all the courtesies of a state detention.”

“I suffered more than one snapped
rib. An infected lip from being struck again and again. My jaw swelled up after
one particularly vicious blow, and I couldn't eat for the rest of the week. But
I learned to duck, to dodge, where to hit with a small fist in order to do the
most harm. After a few months, some of the younger guards refused to tend my
cell. And every bruise was a victory, every cut a medal.”

“By God, Olivia! It's a wonder
you're not dead.” He gestured so forcefully that the torch sputtered, and for a
moment she was afraid they would be left in the dark. Ty caught himself, and
shook his head. “The wardens have no patience for anarchy.”

That was an absolute fact. Her
block captain had written letters more than once begging to send her to the
guillotine just to have peace, to quell the rebellion in some of the other
women that her protests incited, or at least to be allowed to make a bit of
coin off of her flesh. But by some strange design, mysterious to all not privy
to the inner workings of his festering mind, Fouche himself had declined the
request. She had no idea why, not even a decade later.

La Force
had given her a
thorough education, though, enough to know that what happened away from
Fouche's gaze could be covered up, explained away, or blamed on easy
scapegoats. She had learned when to bite and when to smile.

“By turns I was sweet and obliging,
charming the warden so mama could have extra rations or Madame a little
something for her headaches. He got me a branch, under the impression I longed
for something of the outside. I used the few hours of moonlight at night to
scrub it against the stones in my cell, until I had a makeshift awl.”

He chuckled. “That is referred to
as a
shiv
.”

“Call it what you like. There were
rumors that my mother and even Madame would be taken any day before the court,
and on to the guillotine after. As much as it broke my heart, I knew if I were
left behind, I would have to be ready to survive on my own.”

Waving the torch left and right
ahead of them, Ty debated a fork in the passage, then nodded to the right. “It
never came to that, did it? As I understand it, your uncle arrived shortly
thereafter.”

“It never
would
have come to
that; I wouldn’t allow it. About a week after I got the branch, we were taken
out for our forced exercise. I spied out the largest woman in the courtyard,
La Stump
, and spit in her face. I called her names I'd overheard in the
bawdy songs at night. At first I didn't think she'd bite. I'd never uttered a
word to her before, and for a moment she hunched over me, looking dumbstruck.”

“Very clever,” praised Ty. “Making
a target of the meanest one.”

“I had a hidden motive. The woman
was quite literally a stump. Short and wide, meaty limbs. She could hit with
the force of a ship at ramming speed, but was not a bit agile. I made a show of
dodging her, but it hardly winded me. Unfortunately, she had a little band of
followers that bought protection for themselves by giving her food or smuggled
goods. Needless to say, they took my provocation amiss and were determined to
gang up on me.”

Ty let out a low, airy whistle.

“I hung myself from her thick neck,
like the monkeys you see in those drawings from the South Islands. The first
time one of her cadre disobeyed my warning to stand back, I skewered
La
Stump
like a Christmas roast.” The confession tasted bland and
matter-of-fact, and she summoned the same determination she’d had to that day
in the yard. The act was rendered no less horrible by its necessity.

Beside her, Ty ground to a halt so
fast that his boots skidded over wet grit. He stared unblinking, and Olivia had
the sense that they were strangers for a moment. She met his stare, looking for
any sign that he was judging her. His throat worked, and he swallowed hard but
kept silent.

She had gone this far. She might as
well finish the tale. “I
meant
to do it. I provoked her with every
intention of doing violence. I had to be able to survive alone, and it was repayment
for all the times she had hurt or menaced me. When her blood ran out over my
hand… I realized I hadn't been prepared for what that meant.” She stopped,
swallowing down some bile that had risen in her throat. La Stump, d'Oettlinger,
and herself; she wondered who was truly the monster. “Girls transform from
children to women when their monthly courses come, or they get with child.
That
was the moment I grew up.”

Ty grabbed her with his free arm
and dragged her against him. He was warm and solid, and his touch chased back
some of the darkness. Olivia buried her face in his shirt. She couldn't cry;
that well had dried up years before. Instead she drank in the comfort of his
simple but meaningful gesture.

“How do I say it, Olivia, without
sounding like one of those damned Romantics?” He smeared a trickle of blood
across his shirt, escaped from a cut he’d aggravated while they walked. “Every
person has dark places inside. If you believe the good book, they can never all
be gotten rid of. Goodness isn’t the absence of that darkness. I think perhaps
it’s the struggle of not giving in to it.”

She considered how profound his
words were, and ignored disappointment that his philosophical side had gone
untapped until now. After a long, silent moment, she squeezed his waist and let
go. “I wish I could have taken the painting. My uncle has two or three, but
they don't look the way I remember her, and my memories...” For a moment, it
seemed she'd been wrong and that tears would come. Olivia caught herself with a
deep breath. “My recollection of my parents was so sharp, for so long. Lately
though, I have trouble drawing up their faces. I'm afraid that someday, soon,
I'll have forgotten them entirely.”

“You won't ever forget them
completely, Olivia. I know you well enough to appreciate that once something is
stamped on your heart, you never forget it.”

Philipe. Her parents. Ty.

Ty wrapped an arm around her waist,
guiding them toward a spiral of steps cut into the rock, while she wondered if
he had any notion just how right he was.

*          *          *

They gained the last stone step and
reached a gatehouse where Ty paused and pressed his back against the planks,
catching his breath. Olivia looked him over, wide-eyed. “Are you all right?”

He nodded, not entirely certain. “I
don't do well in the passages. Too far from an exit, too far below daylight.
Historically, that has not always gone well for me.” He’d tried not to show
signs of it in the tunnels, but without Olivia, Ty wasn't certain he could have
traversed the crypts and kept his sanity.

Resting against the opposite wall,
Olivia closed her eyes. “I prefer to stay out of the dark.”

He studied her, slender nose, full
lips, and a riot of blonde waves barely contained by a scrap of fabric. Under
the dirt and dust, the chunks of moss and damp strands of hair, she was
undeniably Olivia. Still, he could not help feeling at least one of them had
emerged from the crypts a different person. He just wasn't certain
which
of them it was.

He'd volunteered to do a lot of
things, commit acts in the name of patriotism he would hesitate to share even
with Olivia. But he had signed on for each one and done it for the greater
good. Olivia's bravery had been thrust upon her as a child. She had survived,
even thrived, in spite of the terror all around her.

Admiration was too weak a word to
describe the emotion that squeezed his chest. He had witnessed her ruthlessness
and her sweetly acerbic side. He was in no doubt of knowing her completely.
Where his love for Kate had been innocent and untested, what he felt now for
Olivia seemed unbreakable, forged by fire.

It occurred to him that even if
Olivia had not asked to be reassigned, their work together would very soon be
over. He would return to the army; she would return to searching for her
parents. What then?

That question plagued him as he
sorted through his haversack. He took out a red, woolen liberty cap and put his
coat inside. Olivia was watching him now, and he stood, waving her closer.
“Turn around.”