The Courtesan (35 page)

Gabrielle tried to think of a way to refuse without insulting Cass or hurting her feelings. “Er—thank you. I appreciate the gesture, but Maman taught all of us girls not to set much store by such things as charms and amulets.”

“She also taught you to leave black magic alone, but you’ve seen for yourself what a powerful tool necromancy can be in my hands. That is no gypsy’s trinket I have fashioned. Examine it more closely and tell me if you have ever seen its like before.”

Gabrielle carried the medallion over to the torch and studied the charm in the flickering light. It was molded from no metal she could identify, neither copper, nor iron, nor silver. The amulet’s dull surface was etched with strange runic markings.

Gabrielle’s brow creased into a faint frown. Actually she had seen something similar to this charm before. It looked very much like the metal and the markings that comprised the strange ring that her brother-in-law, Renard, had given her sister, linking their thoughts no matter how far they were separated. Gabrielle would never have believed that to be possible either if she herself had not witnessed the proof of it.

She dangled the medallion before her eyes, still a little skeptical. “Exactly what does this charm of yours do? You claim it could protect Remy?”

“Not exactly. But if he wore it, he would be able to feel malice directed toward him, sense impending danger. Forewarned is forearmed.”

“Incredible,” Gabrielle murmured.

“Believe in the charm’s power or not, just as you choose. But what harm could it do your captain to try it?”

“None, I suppose. But what would you want for something like this?” Gabrielle asked uneasily, remembering the last bargain she had made with Cass.

Cass felt her way forward until her fingers curled around Gabrielle’s arm. “Consider it a gift, a token of our friendship. You remind me of a part of myself I have lost. My sisters . . .” She trailed off, her face pensive and sad.

Cass could be a strange, intense woman at times, but Gabrielle felt a tug of kinship with her. Perhaps because she too knew what it was to lose her sisters. But she at least had the hope, however slim, of someday seeing Ariane and Miri again.

Cass trailed her hand up Gabrielle’s arm and shoulder, until she rested her fingers against Gabrielle’s cheek. “Perhaps you will be my sister now. We have already made an unbreakable pact between us. You pledged to do a favor for me. You do remember that, don’t you?”

Gabrielle caught Cass’s hand and squeezed it gently. “Let me redeem my pledge now by getting you out of this dismal place. No wonder you are seized by these bouts of melancholy, living alone with just your dog and that wretched servant girl for company. There is no need for you to keep hiding here in this horrid house. The pack of witch-hunters who attacked your family has long been destroyed.”

“Ah, there will always be more witch-hunters, my dear Gabrielle. They are as certain as death and taxes.” Cass eased her hand away. “I do not stay hiding at the Maison d’Esprit out of fear, but by my own choice. I am waiting.”

“Waiting? For what?”

“For my own destiny to take shape. I will know when the time has come for me to emerge, to make my presence known to the world,” Cass said softly. Her mouth curved in an odd smile that sent an inexplicable shiver through Gabrielle.

She wondered if all this seclusion or the amount of drink Cass consumed was starting to drive the woman a bit mad. But Gabrielle’s unease was forgotten in the wake of a disturbance from upstairs, an outbreak of fierce barking from Cerberus.

“An intruder,” Cass muttered, tensing. “Gabrielle, you were careful that you were not followed when you came here?”

“Of course,” Gabrielle said. After the incident with Catherine’s spy, Gabrielle had been doubly cautious wherever she went. Yet despite her assertion, her stomach knotted with alarm as the commotion above them increased. Cerberus’s barking waxed even louder, interspersed with the sound of footsteps.

“Never mind,” Cass said tersely. “No one can find the entrance to my secret room and Cerberus will soon make whoever it is regret—”

Her brave words choked to a halt as Cerberus went still. Not a bark, not even a low growl. The silence was far more frightening than the disturbance had been.

Cass’s face washed white. “My dog. Something has happened to my dog.”

She lurched forward, banging into the table in her haste to reach the stairs. Gabrielle intercepted her, catching hold of Cass’s shoulders. “No, stay here. Let me go.”

If Gabrielle had brought any sort of danger down upon the house, she was determined to shield Cass at any cost. But Cass was so frantic for the safety of her dog, it was all Gabrielle could do to persuade her to remain below.

Gabrielle looked about her for anything that might serve as a weapon. She glanced down at the charm she clutched in her hand. So much for Cass’s protective amulet, she thought wryly. She had not felt so much as a tingle of approaching danger.

She shoved the charm in the pocket of her gown and seized upon Cass’s stout walking stick. Gripping the gnarled wood in her hands, she crept up the narrow stair.

Cass hovered below her, whispering anxiously, “Be careful.”

Gabrielle did not reply, her concentration focused on making her way through the darkness that enveloped her, finding the lever that controlled the door to the hidden chamber. Following Cass’s instructions, Gabrielle twisted the handle a few degrees to the left, just enough to barely shift the cupboard.

The creaking of the mechanism sounded infernally loud to Gabrielle’s ears, enough to alert any intruder. She waited a few seconds before cautiously poking her head out the opening. The great hall was shrouded in the gloom of evening, the dust thickening on the floor appearing undisturbed. But the sound of a ferocious hiss caused the hairs on the back of Gabrielle’s neck to rise.

She muffled her startled cry and tracked the sound to its source. A black cat with snowy paws had taken refuge atop the high table. Back arched, it spat furiously. Gabrielle released a tremulous breath. Was it possible the dread intruder was no more than this cat? But then where was Cerberus? Why wasn’t he baying his head off and threatening to make a meal of the feline?

As the cat hissed again, Gabrielle realized its venom was not directed at her. Those golden feline eyes glared at something out of her range of sight. Tightening her grip on the walking stick, Gabrielle inched from behind the aumbry until she spotted Cerberus. The dog flopped over on his back, but not because he had taken any harm.

Cass’s hellhound groveled shamelessly at the feet of a slender youth obscured beneath a long gray cloak, a hood pulled forward over his face. All Gabrielle could make out of the lad were his dusty boots and shapely legs encased in a pair of dark trunk hose. He crouched down, scratching Cerebus’s stomach, subduing the fierce animal with no more than a touch and a few soft words. Gabrielle had only ever known one person in her life who had such a magical way with animals. But no. It could not possibly be.

She stepped forward and the floor creaked beneath her feet. The lad glanced up at her and then calmly rose to meet her. He thrust back his hood and revealed—not a lad at all, but a tall young woman with straight moon-gold hair and eyes of silvery blue.

“Hello, Gabby,” she said with an impish smile.

“Miri?”

At least now Gabrielle knew why Cass’s amulet had failed to signal danger. Recovering from her shock, she gave a glad cry and gathered her sister into her arms.

Gabrielle rummaged through her wardrobe, inspecting gown after gown only to discard them, the chair in her bedchamber disappearing beneath a rainbow array of silks. As she considered each garment in turn, her gaze traveled to the figure curled up on her bed, fearing that Miri might vanish just like the fairy child she had always been.

Perhaps she only imagined the girl lying propped on one elbow, teasing her cat with a bit of ribbon, conjured her up out of her lonely ache for her home and family. Except this was not the Miri of Gabrielle’s memory. This was a girl on the verge of womanhood, her figure blossoming with soft curves that her boyish garb could not quite conceal. Her high cheekbones and winged brows combined with her moon-gold hair and unusual silvery-blue eyes to give her a dreamy, ethereal appearance.

When had this happened? At what point during the past two years had her scapegrace little sister been transformed into this serene young beauty? The changes in Miri brought a bittersweet ache to Gabrielle’s heart and filled her eyes with tears. When Miri lifted her head and regarded her gravely, Gabrielle was swift to turn away. Blinking hard, she dove back into her wardrobe and hauled out one of her simpler gowns with a modest square neckline and tiered sleeves.

“This one might do.” She held up the green silk folds. “Come here and let me see.”

The cat had draped itself over Miri’s lap. When she shifted him off her, Necromancer let out a yowl of protest. Miri approached Gabrielle reluctantly. “There is no need for you to be going to so much bother, Gabby.”

“No need? It is bad enough you have been running all over the countryside garbed as a boy. You cannot possibly continue to do so here in Paris. Now stand still.”

Miri fetched a heavy sigh, but obeyed. Gabrielle bit back a smile. At least one thing about her little sister had not changed. Miri still preferred the freedom of doublets and trunk hose to feminine lace and frills. But as Gabrielle held up the gown to Miri’s shoulders, she made another startling discovery.

“Great heavens. You—you are taller than me.”

“So I am.” Miri lifted her chin proudly. “I am a bit taller than Ariane too.”

The mention of their other sister caused Gabrielle to stiffen. It was as though a shadow fell between them. Miri must have felt it too because she said softly, “Ariane misses you very much, Gabrielle.”

“Does she?” Gabrielle’s heart lifted with sudden hope. “Is that why you have come to Paris? Did Ariane send you here to act as peacemaker?”

“No, she didn’t even know I was coming.”

“Oh.” Gabrielle concealed the depth of her disappointment, berating herself for a fool. She should have known her older sister better than that. If Ariane had the least interest in mending their quarrel, she would have come herself.

Lifting the lid of the trunk at the foot of her bed, Gabrielle hunted for petticoats and chemise to go with the gown. “So then how the devil did you get all the way here to Paris?” she demanded of her younger sister.

“I, er, borrowed one of Renard’s horses and outfitted the saddle with a basket for Necromancer. Neither Brindel—that’s the horse—nor Necromancer were fond of the arrangement. But we managed by taking the journey in easy stages.”

Gabrielle paused in the act of unearthing a shift to gaze at her sister in consternation. “Miribelle Cheney! You—you traveled all this way alone?”

“I wasn’t alone. I just
told
you. I was with Brindel and Necromancer.”

“A horse and a stupid cat!”

Necromancer perched on the end of Gabrielle’s bed, haughtily licking his snow-dipped paws. As though he understood her, he paused to shoot Gabrielle a baleful look.

Slamming the lid to the trunk closed, Gabrielle straightened and scolded. “Damnation, Miri. I would have thought you would have acquired more sense by now. That is a journey most men would have feared to make alone.”

“Ah, but I am not a man. Nor some ordinary woman.” Miri’s air of unruffled serenity only added fuel to Gabrielle’s outrage.

“Do you even realize what could have happened to you? You could have been set upon by brigands, robbed, attacked, even worse.” Gabrielle’s blood ran cold as she imagined the horrors that could have been visited upon her innocent young sister, injuries that might have made death welcome by comparison.

But Miri replied with infuriating calm, “Nothing could have harmed me. Necromancer would have warned me if there was peril nearby and I have my own sixth sense for danger. It is not as though I stayed overnight at public places like inns. Thanks to Ariane’s council meetings, I know where other wise women reside. I merely traveled from one safe house to another.”

“I don’t care!” Gabrielle fumed. “It was still a reckless and irresponsible thing to do. Ariane must be frantic. You do realize that she will blame me for you running away and hate me more than ever.”

“Ariane doesn’t hate you. And she knows that I make my own decisions. She understands that I am no longer a child.”

“Then she must be a great deal different from the Ariane I remember. I never thought she’d willingly allow either one of us to grow up.”

“Ariane has changed.” Miri’s remarkable eyes darkened, clouding to a hue of gray. “She has not been the same since the babe—”

“Babe? Ariane has had a child?” Gabrielle’s anger faded in the face of this new staggering information. “I—I am somebody’s aunt?

“Well, what is it?” she asked eagerly. “A boy or a girl?”

“Ariane lost the child before we could tell. She has had other miscarriages as well and seems unable to conceive again. It grieves her deeply. I think it is tearing her all to pieces inside.”