Free Unfallen by Lilith Saintcrow Page B

blood. I could, however, see the edge of Lisele’s dress. If I tried hard enough, I could imagine she simply slumbered, perhaps given a draught of night’s-ease and valeriol to quiet her dreaming.
    I sought to calm my heaving sides. My own harsh gasps sounded loud as a trumpet in the quiet.
    They thundered into the receiving-room. I saw plumes and blue sashes.
    The Duc’s Guard. The Duc Timrothe d’Orlaans, the king’s brother, perhaps the finest Court sorcerer in Arquitaine. He dueled regularly, and rumor said he allowed his opponent to survive only if there were official witnesses present. For all that, he was blood royal, and had he killed a few, noble or common, nothing could be done. Still, his Guard was perhaps here to protect the Princesse.
    I let out a relieved sigh and was about to rise and make myself known when yet another voice I recognized sounded deep and harsh.
    “Check the bodies. Make absolutely certain none live.” Garonne di Narborre, the Duc’s servant, otherwise known as the Black Captain for the coal of his hair and eyes. I had danced with him several times, had even taken a rose from his hand at the last Fête of Flowers. He cut a fine figure, yet somehow few of the women cared for him. I had found his fingers too hard on my waist and my hand, but twas not politic to refuse him a dance.
    Not politic at all, and while he was occupied with me he did not watch Lisele so closely. I simply did not like the way he gazed at her. He could not hope to win her hand, and there was no tenderness in his watching, and since the Duc was just after Lisele in the Line of Succession and she was just barely of age…well. I danced with him, and Lisele told me afterward she did not like him overmuch.
    “Aye, sieur .” A lieutenant—I think it may have been Gregoire di Champforte.
    “Have they found the di Rocancheil girl yet?”
    I started violently, tasted bitterness on the back of my tongue. Bit my lower lip, hard , to stop any betraying noise from my treacherous, dry throat.
    “No, sieur . She was in the gardens this morn, has not been sighted since.”
    “Well, perhaps Simieri caught her; he was waiting in the passage. And d’Arcenne?”
    Simieri was part of this, and meant to catch me in the passage? Why? My heart pounded in my ears, and I swayed.
    Do not dare faint now, Vianne. Do not dare!
    “Taken to the donjons, sieur . Executed come morning, the orders are being drawn up now.” The men were stepping among the bodies. I heard a crunch, and a wet stabbing sound.
    They were making certain no woman survived.
    My gorge rose again, and I trembled. Whatever Lisele had closed in my nerveless hand was still there, pulsing.
    “Look, sieur . On the Princesse.”
    “Hedgewitchery,” someone breathed. “The di Rocancheil girl has been here.”
    A tense, indrawn breath. “Find her. Search the Palais and the gardens. She wanders about in the gardens and the kitchens. Find her! Bring her to the Duc. He needs her.”
    What? I am of no account, and I have not done anything!
    Yet I knew even an innocent could be caught in a net at Court. I hesitated. Should I announce myself, and be taken to the Duc? But they were making certain the women were dead .
    They had not said aught of “rescue.”
    The Duc is next in line to the throne, with Lisele…gone. It was the only answer that made any sense at all. And yet…
    My wit, weak and weary as it was under these successive shocks, began to work again. I must hide. But where would they not find me? I cast about frantically, taking care not to lean on the door—varnished wood, and suddenly thin as an eggshell. Such a fragile, flimsy shield.
    The North Tower. Tis locked, and none have used it for a hundred years or more. My wits began to work, racing inside my head with little pattering feet, rather like a collection of cats chasing about in my skull. Stunned and witless, with my Princesse’s blood on my fingers and something in my hand she had entrusted to me, I