Page 80 of The Spy’s Song

A.M.

Antoine de Montmorency, comte de Châtillon.

Rodrick should leave. He had the confirmation. He had the name, the stall, the regiment. Everything Talleyrand had withheld for fifteen years was now his. All he had to do now was bribe the groom for Antoine's billet location.

Rodrick's fingers closed around the latch, and he stepped inside. The horse shifted, making space. It trusted him. That, of all things, nearly made him laugh.

Pamplemousse.

Rodrick had forgotten it. How could he have forgotten?

His hand rose and found the animal's neck. The muscle shifted beneath his palm. "My sister adored the tragic tale of Paul et Virginie. Two children raised together on the Île de France, in a place called Pamplemousses, convinced love alone could defy the world. It ends badly, of course. It always does."

His sister… Rodrick tried to remember her face and damned his brain for blurring the lines. She had read the famous French novel seven times. The romantic fool, he had called her, reading the same sad story over again and weeping at the same pages as though her tears could change the ending.

She had told him that Paul and Virginie loved each other with the kind of love that didn't require the world to be sensible, and that was the whole point, and he clearly had no heart.

She had been right about his heart. He hadn't had much of one.

He put his forehead against the horse's neck.

She had always been a frail girl. Whimsical. As if he had taken all her strength when they were born and left her only the smile. But what a smile. No one could watch the little dimple in her rosy cheek and stay unaffected. Louise would've liked her. She would've taken the romantic girl under her wing, just as she had with Hélène and Celeste.

The bay breathed, lifting plumes of sawdust.

From his coat pocket he took the flask. He uncorked it without looking and drank deeply.

"Your master, Antoine de Montmorency, used to call her the petite Princesse de Pamplemousse. I wonder if he called her that when he helped Gaunt rape her."

Rodrick could see the wooden walls but could not determine their distance. He was standing—he believed he was standing—but the floor had opened beneath his boots. His hands were somewhere. He could not have said where.

Pamplemousse. Antoine the rapist remembered her nickname, and he—her brother, the one who was supposed to protect her—had forgotten it.

He looked at the ground. Considered lying down on the straw. At least the fucking Royalists had good straw.

He was taking another swallow of the brandy when a pistol hammer clicked back behind him.

Louise touched the pillow beside her. The bed here, in this rented house in Brussels, was too large. Too much space. Perhaps she was one of those night creatures who could only sleep in caves. She required—she removed her hand from the pillow and looked at the ceiling—she required nothing. She required sleep. She required the six hours of rest tomorrow demanded of her and that her body refused to provide.

The house was too quiet.

Where had he gone? During the march she had always known, within fifty yards, where he was… His shako ahead of her in the column. His voice at the officers' fire. His boots outside the tent flap.

But Lord Vane had his own business. The city strove to tempt a husband from home. Gambling in every corner. Aristocrats competing to throw the most brilliant balls and dinner parties. At the opera, the singer Catalani was delighting all hearers.

Since when had she turned into a jealous wife?

Groaning, she turned. Thin lamplight slipped through the shutters. Brussels still glowed at two in the morning. English soldiers had no reason to seek early beds when wine flowed freely, and battle waited.

Rodrick could have come to say goodnight… Or goodbye. He could have—she pressed her face into the pillow's wrong smell.

No. She could not afford distractions. Tomorrow at the ball she needed—she would not think about tomorrow. She would sleep. She would close her eyes and breathe slowly—bootsteps carried through the street.

She held herself still, every sense drawn toward the sound. Whatever character he was playing tonight, Lord Vane, warm and slightly patronizing, Captain de Montreval, crisp and operational… The spy, with his careful eyes. She wanted any of them.

The boots moved on and dissolved.

She exhaled and stared at the ceiling. Only a fool lay in a foreign city, with the enemy in red coats prowling the street, and she was sad that the boots didn't stop.