The Shadows of God (33 page)

“Besides the two of us, you mean? Then blame the malakim, for in the end it was their wish we fulfilled. Quite the opposite of what the legends say—we are
their
djinni, not they ours. As for me, I cannot fool myself. My silly curiosity and girlish game of secrecy ruined the world.”

“Ah, God!” Franklin collapsed into the chair, hands clenching and unclenching. “How can you be so — ” He was going to say “calm” and

“remorseless,” but then he met her gaze again, and her misery struck him like an ocean wave, clogging his throat and stinging his eyes and cold, so cold he shivered. It struck him dumb, and he realized that there was nothing mysterious about this woman at all. He understood her to the core, had since the instant he saw her—and then locked that knowledge away, because to face Adrienne de Mornay de Montchevreuil, he had to face himself, and he had avoided that for many years.

“I hope,” he managed, when he could again form words not too sawn at the edges to be understood, “ that you have some purpose in reminding me of all of this.”

“I do. I want you to share penance with me. I want you to help me make things right.”

THE SHADOWS OF GOD

“That’s what I’m trying to do, with your friend Vasilisa, and Red Shoes, and your students.”

“I do not trust Vasilisa or the Indian. Do you?”

He hesitated. “No, I don’t. There is something in their purpose that feels…

odd. I keep dismissing it.”

“As you dismissed any suspicions that you might be helping the Wrong people, those years ago in Boston?”

“Now that you mention it. But—forgive me—why should I trust you? Or you me?”

“Because we are damned by the same love, the same mistake, the same sin. I trust you because we crave the same redemption.”

He frowned. “What if this is all a lie? You could have learned anything you just told me from Vasilisa.”

“You know it isn’t a lie,” she said.

And, of course, he did.

So he dragged the words out of himself. “Where do we start, then?”

“We start with a story,” Adrienne said. “It’s about my hand…”

12.

THE SHADOWS OF GOD

No Retreat

Oglethorpe listened for a moment to the cannon fire in the distance. The inhabitants of the Taensa village heard it, too, and the women began packing up what few possessions they valued enough to take with them. A small knot of old men sat around the fire chanting—whether merely singing a song or working at some magic, he had no idea.

The cannon boomed again. “That’ll be the German company,” he said. “I had report an hour ago that they were on hand to engage the enemy as they unloaded their ships. I think we shall have a hot breakfast, my friends—powder and ball.”

“Thank God and Benjamin Franklin we have those Swedenborgian airships,”

Nairne said. “At least now we see how the country lies.” He poured each man at the table a glass of Madeira, then raised his own. “To our wizard, Benjamin Franklin!”

They clinked glasses and drank, the five of them —Oglethorpe; Nairne; and their majesties Philippe, Charles, and Peter. The latter two hesitated before touching their glasses, but Charles completed the motion.

I also had word from Unoka,“ Oglethorpe went on. ”He and the Choctaw worked their way north to devil them from the rear. Less than fifty of “em left, but even a gadfly should be help to us now.”

“To them,” Charles said. They drank again.

“I do not ordinarily drink,” the Swedish king explained, “but these are not ordinary times. Moreover, I am getting old, and find myself often doing things I would never have dreamed of in the past.” He glanced conspicuously at the tsar. “To —all of us here. Win or lose this is a fight they shall never forget.”

Peter shook his head. “Not true. If we lose, there shall be no one to remember it.”

“Then we must win. I want them to remember that I finally settled my score with you.”

THE SHADOWS OF GOD

Peter’s face twitched, but to Oglethorpe’s surprise, the remark didn’t seem to anger the tsar. “It may be that our foe will settle it for us.” His face grew longer. “I come here a pauper. I have few men in arms, and those mostly belong to my daughter’s guard. I have no cannon, not even weapons of my own. I wish —I wish one of you would ask me to fight with your company. I will not beg, however.”

That was greeted with silence, for no one could say, really, that they trusted the tsar against troops that were in part Russian. Finally Philippe said, “But of course, sir, it would be my honor if you would ride with the French.”

“No.” They all turned to Charles. His fingers had gone white, gripping his glass. “No. Let him ride with me.”

They all stared at him, as he turned with deliberation to the tsar. “If you fear it, I swear to you this is no ruse to put you
yn
front of my gun. I need not resort to that—I know, as do you, that if we duel with swords I will win. I am far the better swordsman, and God is also on my side. No contest of arms between us can be fair. So this is my challenge to you, sir. We shall face the guns of the enemy-side by side and—as you say—we shall let the enemy settle our differences. In the meantime, it will give me great pleasure that y”ou see my soldiers— who have undergone such misery on your account—for the incomparable warriors that they are, and that you should ride with, them against the same men who once fought for you. One of us must live, and one of us must die—that seems certain. I am content to let God choose.“

The tsar looked down at his wineglass, and a slow smile spread across his face.

“That is a challenge worthy of a tsar,” he said’t “And it is to my liking.”

And so they all drank to that, and Oglethorpe knew for a fact that the world would never see such a thing again. They belonged to another age, these men: an age of titans. Whatever happened, their epoch was past, and they knew it.

As Oglethorpe predicted, by morning the lines were more or less drawn. The German company and other Indian-style fighters had done what they could to slow the advancing troops, but sooner or later—as they once said in Holland—the water reaches the dike.

THE SHADOWS OF GOD

The dike around New Paris was the series of redoubts, protected by devil guns, a zone of unbreathable air created by yet more Franklin devices, some new inventions that were supposed to halt the worst of the diabolic weapons if they ever came to bear—and themselves, the army of the continent.

It was a dike that would not hold for long. It was too long and thin, with too many holes in it. Once it was breached, there would be nothing for it but to fall back to New Paris itself.

Oglethorpe had no intention of letting that happen. He met with the other commanders the next morning.

“ Twill take them a few days, at best, to cut through our line somewhere. When they have us all forced back to New Paris, they’ll emplace their long-range guns and pound the city to bits. They may even grow bold enough to put their airships high over the city and drop grenados.”

“I doubt it,” Peter said. “The lesson of Venice is still remembered in Russia.”

“Granted, but they seem in a desperate hurry in this matter, so they may try it.

Even foundered, a fully laden airship crashing into New Paris would wreak plenty of havoc.”

“Still I doubt it. Mademoiselle de Montchevreuil and her companions tell me the devil’s army lost the bulk of their airships battling her and the Choctaw.

They will protect those that remain.”

“You may be right,” Oglethorpe conceded. “Indeed, though I raised the question, I am counting on that being the case. After Unloading artillery, the airships withdrew some two leagues from here, where they are grounded, presumably from fear that we might Manage—as we have in the past—to slip close with a devil gun.

“Ah.”

“Yes. He refused my favor—me—for that thick-waisted Emilie.”

“And that kept you up until morning?”

THE SHADOWS OF GOD

Elizavet settled on a tabouret. “Where are you going?” she repeated. “You are still injured.” ,

“That in a moment.”

Elizavet sighed and examined her right palm, tracing the index finger of her left along the delicate lines there. “They say our fate is written here. I never thought I had much of a fate. I never thought I needed one. I’m the daughter of the tsar, after all. Yes, Linne refused me. A very rare thing, especially when the other woman is so far from me in beauty.”

“But he is in love, Elizavet, and that makes a difference.”

“I know,” the tsarevna said. “I did not believe that before, not in my heart. But the more I thought on it, the more I wondered why I ever wanted him. And it was because of
her,
Mademoiselle.” She knit her fingers in her lap.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, Emilie is like you. Oh, not so beautiful, of course. But her mind, her thoughts —I cannot imagine them, as
I
cannot imagine yours. They are too far beyond me. And I — envy that. Desire it. It makes her better than me, and I tried to take Linne from her to prove that she was not. But I failed.”

“Elizavet, there is nothing wrong with you.”

“I’m just stupid —is that it? Naturally, like a beast?”

“No. No, you are very bright. You’ve just never been interested in proving it.

Why are you now?”

“Why?” Her eyes grew large. “Because of you, of course. You have shown me what a woman might be. I love you, Mademoiselle, as 1 have never loved another woman, not even my mother. I —I do not wish to disappoint you. But there is nothing to do! Everyone else has something to give to this fight, everyone but me!”

THE SHADOWS OF GOD

“That isn’t true. Elizavet, your men love you. What we’ve of your old guard is utterly devoted to you. Look to them.”

“What do you mean?”

“Have you noticed them lately? They are in a strange place, they do not speak the language, they hardly understand anything of what goes on around them, and yet soon they must lay down their lives for a cause they scarcely understand.”

“My father—”

“Is not you. They did not leave Moscow for him—they left for you.”

“But what can I do?”

“Not ride into battle, of course. But be their tsarevna. Give them hope and heart.”

“Is that all?”

“It’s a great gift, Elizavet. You exerted it in Saint Petersburg without even knowing it. Think how much you can accomplish if you put your mind to it.”

Elizavet smiled, but then her smile shrank away. “Is this merely some ploy to improve my mood and rid you of my complaints?”

“No. Partly. But what I say is true: the few Russians here are in the wilderness, and you can help to guide them. You
are
a tsarevna, a force to be reckoned with if you only choose to be.”

“As
you
chose to be.”

“I suppose.”

Elizavet laughed, wiped the tears beaded on her lashes. “Very well, then. And will you now tell me where you are going?”

THE SHADOWS OF GOD

“I’m going to battle.”

“Not like that!”

“This will be a different sort of battle, the sort that only I can wage.”

“Let me come with you, then!”

“There is no space for anyone else. None of my students is going. They are needed here, as you are.”

Elizavet stood, noticeably trembling, and then she came and knelt and laid her head in Adrienne’s lap.

“Do not die,” she whispered. “Come back to us, and I promise to do my lessons, all to the end.”

You must do that whether I return or not,“ Adrienne said.

As they readied the
Lightning,
Franklin reflected that he would rather a bit more strategy was involved in the coming battle than a race by three generals to reach the ships. Still, they
were
generals, and presumably knew what they were doing.

“I notice you did not mention our
real
goal,” Euler said, testing one of the brass valves for tightness.

“What point in that? It would only have added a confusing element—and they might have even forbidden us. If we fail, the dark engines come alive, and most or all of us perish. To succeed, we need the army to capture the ships, or at least distract them from us. If we had time to build a real navy, things might be different, and we might be able to take them on better-than-even terms. After all, from what you and the others say, they were never able to build their own aeges, and that gives us an advantage.”

“But they have made weapons that seek them.”

“I’ve planned for that,” Franklin said, stepping back to survey his ship.

THE SHADOWS OF GOD

The
Lightning
was a barge thirty feet long and ten wide, enclosed by a square cabin. She was framed with adamantium, but most of her was plain steel and iron, set with alchemical glass panes in the deck and bulkheads. She had more hatches than a thief has pockets—two in the bottom, for dropping grenades, two in the bulkheads for getting in and out on the ground, one in the roof. The roof was the oddest thing about the whole structure. A box on a box, it was five feet deep, because the cargo holds were there. As they would be hovering over the enemy, Franklin wanted the cargo as far from upward-flying shells as possible. So there was one more hatch—from the“ hold into the cabin.

He watched as four burly soldiers loaded the holds, grunting with the weight of heavy casks full of grenades and other weapons.

“We ought to have called her the
Turtle
,” Robert noted.

“Well, we can sure tuck in our head,” Franklin allowed. “It has an aegis and some other scientific protections. But those below us will know we are a storm, never fear.”

Vasilisa stuck her head out of the top hatch.

“It’s prepared, Benjamin, and we are all here. Shouldn’t we get started?”

“Not quite. We’re waiting for two more. But see, there they are.” He gestured at the sedan chair, born across the muddy plaza in front of the palace by two stout Lorraine guards.

“Adrienne? You’ve made peace with her, then? I knew nothing
oi
this.”

Red Shoes seemed pleased with their new passenger. “It is good,” Franklin heard him murmur, from where he sat on an empty rum cask, smoking a pipe and watching the philosophers at their tasks.