Leopard in Exile (47 page)

their journey would be even more terrible than it was.

The light toward which they walked was a different thing altogether. It was as red as burning blood,

silhouetting the spires of the Cathedral against the sky. They could hear the roaring of a crowd as they

came closer to the Cathedral de Saint Louis—an unpleasant sound that was more like the haying of dogs

than the cheering of crowds, and Sarah flinched away from it instinctively. For some reason, she was

very, very sure she did not want to see the inhabitants of the Square.

"Meriel!" she whispered urgently. "We can't go there. It's right by the fires—there are people there, and if

they are anything like the soldiers, I don't know what they may try to do." She thought of asking Meriel to

conceal the glowing cup, and hesitated to do so for the same reason. She did not think she wished to be

here without the protection of that Light.

Meriel stopped, and for the first time in many minutes looked at Sarah as if she saw her.

"We have to.
I
have to," she. said simply.

"But does it have to be through the front door?" Sarah asked plaintively. Though she had never seen even

a drawing of the great Cathedral that dominated the center of Nouvelle-Orléans, it surely must be of a

similar construction to the English churches Sarah was familiar with. There was usually a side door by the

altar through which the congregation could enter, as well as a back door that led through the vestry. If

they could gain either of the alternate entrances, they could get into the church without seeing—or being

seen by—what lay in the square beyond.

"I have to put the Cup on the altar," Meriel answered, as if she were only now wondering why this might

be so. She smiled, and it was as if Meriel's old self peeked out for a moment from behind a mask of

worry and determination and too much knowledge for the human spirit to bear. "But I do not think that

God cares
how
I get into the church."

Sarah smiled, but she did not have long to luxuriate in her relief. Over the oceanic sound of the roaring

mob, she heard the sound of many booted feet approaching at a run.

"Come on!" Sarah grabbed Meriel and ran.

Away from the Cathedral.

The
Theatre d'Orléans
was deserted, though it showed signs of opportunistic vandalism. Inside its walls

the shouting and the drums were muted, and that made it easier for Wessex to think.

Too late now to consider questioning d'Charenton for information about Sarah. Too late for so many

things, perhaps even to rescue Corday. Even if Wessex killed d'Charenton now, who knew what orders

the army had been given, or when the bombs that Robie had seen laid in the houses would be detonated?

Louis might once more find himself crowned King of Nothing, even if d'Charenton died tonight.

The two men reached the back of the theater. The door to the outside was chained shut, but a few blows

from a discarded maul broke the lock. Koscuisko eased the door open a bare inch, then closed it again,

shaking his head.

"We can't get out that way," he said. He looked around. There were windows high along the walls that

could be opened for ventilation, reachable from the iron stairs that led to the catwalks above the stage.

The theater, so hastily abandoned, was filled with paraphernalia suitable to Koscuisko's purpose.

"Look around. Poles—ropes—sandbags—if we can get to this roof, we can get to the next. And

nobody ever looks up," Koscuisko added.

Armed with their plunder, the two men climbed the long spiral stairs to the window that opened sixty feet

above the ground. It was a tight squeeze. Koscuisko went first, and Wessex stopped to remove his coat

before going on, cursing the fact that the shirt beneath it was white, but there was no help for it. Without

the coat's fashionable constriction, Wessex had the freedom of movement to follow his partner but the

window and up the side of the building. Just as he had prophesied, the plans he had made—and for

which he had dressed so elegantly—had not survived their first encounter with events, and he must make

do with what Fortune had sent him.

They gained the roof, but their view of the Square was still blocked by the looming bulk of the Arsenal

that stretched before them. The building stood beside the Cabildo—the city had grown outward from the

government buildings at its heart—and across the square from the Cathedral, whose spires gleamed

brightly in the wash of light from the torches below. The space between the theater and the Arsenal was

narrow—perhaps twenty feet—but too wide to jump, even though the roof of the Arsenal was slightly

below them.

Wessex walked to the edge of the roof and looked down. There were at least two thousand people

gathered in the square below, if what he could see were any indication. While the two of them could

blend into such a mob virtually unnoticed, the crowd made it impossible for either of them to reach

d'Charenton.

"And now? We fly?" Wessex asked. He began knotting a weight into the end of a light coil of rope,

knowing it was useless. He could toss the weighted line to the other roof, and even, if he were lucky,

snag one of the gargoyles that ornamented the roof of the Arsenal, but it was unlikely the line would hold

or the friable stone bear his weight.

"After a fashion," Koscuisko replied enigmatically. "I saw this done once in a circus in Venice. I've

always wanted to try it."

He was testing the pole he'd carried up from below—a length of ash twelve feet long, with a hook at one

end. It was used by the stagehands of the
Théâtre d'Orléans
to pull down the counterweights that raised

and lowered scenery.

"Don't tell me," Wessex suggested. Koscuisko grinned and retreated to the far corner of the building,

carrying the carefully balanced staff upon his shoulder. Wessex stood back, ready to take what came.

Koscuisko began to run forward, with an odd loping sideways gait, the rod balanced at his shoulder. He

reached the edge of the building and Wessex tensed to pull him back from certain death. At the last

possible moment, Koscuisko dropped the end of the pole. It hit the low brick edge of the roof and stuck.

The far end whipped into the air, carrying Koscuisko with it. For a moment the pole stood nearly upright,

and Wessex watched as Koscuisko swung his body around it and soared outward into space, then let

go. Released, the rod sprang back. Wessex dived and caught it before it fell to the ground below.

When he looked up, for a moment he did not see his partner anywhere. Where was Koscuisko? He

scanned the opposite roof, and at last a flash of movement caught his eye. Koscuisko was getting to his

feet, waving to show he was safe. The pole had enabled him to vault the gap between the two buildings.

"The things you learn at circuses," Wessex muttered. He took up the coil of rope and made sure it would

run free, then stepped up and flung the weight tied at its end as hard as he could.

It took two casts, but then Koscuisko had it secure in his hands and was tying it off to one of the stone

gargoyles that ornamented the Arsenal's roof, coiling the slack in his hands to take the strain.

Now it was Wessex's turn. He gathered the end of the rope in his hands—glad he was wearing

gloves—and stepped off the edge of the roof into space.

For a moment he fell straight down, then the rope began to pull him forward. Like a pendulum, Wessex

swung toward the other building feet first, as above, Koscuisko shortened the line to keep him as high

above the crowd below as possible. The moment his feet hit the wall Wessex began scrambling up the

rope as fast as he could, the soles of his feet smarting from their impact against the brick.

Koscuisko dragged him the last few feet and coiled the rope in after him.

"You'll be delighted to know that there's a trap door that leads down," he said, as Wessex struggled to

catch his breath. "But I think you'd better look at the Square first."

Koscuisko's voice was tight with shock, for all the airy banter of his words, and Wessex steeled himself

against the sight of something terrible. But even his worst imaginings fell fearfully short of the sight that

greeted him.

In the uncertain light of the torches, he could see across the square to the porch of the Cathedral beyond.

Bodies hung from a gibbet erected over the steps of the church, and beneath the corpses sat three men

with their drums, their sable skin glistening with the sweat of their exertions. In the center of the square

stood three iron stakes. Chained to the center one was Charles Corday. His body was a map of welts

and bruises, and half his face was a bloody ruin, but he still lived.

In front of Corday stood d'Charenton in his scarlet Devil's robes, and around d'Charenton lay the bodies

of half a dozen young women, their throats slit as if they were pigs. Save for a small area around the

bodies and the stakes, Cabildo Square was filled with armed soldiers restraining a mixed mob of

Orléannais
. As Wessex watched, the soldiers brought d'Charenton another victim. The sound of her

screams was swallowed up in the hungry roaring of the crowd as the soldiers forced her to her knees, as

though her death fed their appetite as well as d'Charenton's.

For a moment Wessex's mind reeled, and he wanted nothing more than to turn his back on this

monstrous horror. Then his will asserted itself. He reached for his pistol, then hesitated. It was long range

for a shot, especially by torchlight. With unfamiliar weapons, he did not think he could make it.

"I have to get closer," Wessex said reluctantly. He looked at his partner. Another roar rose up from the

crowd lining the square. Koscuisko turned away, his face pale but expressionless.

"Let's go down."

The trap door was chained from below, but there was enough play in the chain for Wessex to wedge the

muzzle of one of his pistols through the gap and fire. The chain parted with a ringing sound and he raised

the iron door. He did not worry about being heard—not with the inferno going on in the Square below.

The stairway below was empty, and when they reached the foot of the steps they could see—in the

flickering torchlight that shone through the barred windows—that the store of powder and weapons that

should have been here was gone. The two men looked down the stairs that led to the front door and the

square beyond.

"Give me five minutes," Koscuisko said. "I'll find a window to shoot from. It will draw their attention."

"Hurry," Wessex said. Each moment they waited meant another life.

Koscuisko turned away. Wessex stood a moment longer in the firelit darkness, then drew his remaining

pistol. He would have liked to have both, but it was too dark to reload. With his pistol in his left hand and

his sabre in his right, he continued down the stair.

The Arsenal was an impressive building, built at the height of the power of the Dons. From the foot of the

staircase the foyer stretched thirty feet to the enormous ironbound doors. Wessex crossed the expanse

warily, straining to hear any sound above the drums and the crowd, but there was none. D'Charenton

had concentrated all his forces outside in the Square.

Carefully, Wessex pulled open one of the double doors. This close to the carnage, the smell of blood

was a thick fog in the air, and Wessex steeled himself against it.

D'Charenton was to his right, directly between the Cabildo and the Cathedral. The sorcerer was

surrounded by soldiers. Blood gloved him, staining the once-white linen at his wrists, and even spotted

his incarnadine robes, drying to an ugly russet color upon the red silk. Wessex raised his pistol, but was

unable to get a clear shot through d'Charenton's guards. He had only one shot, and they would give him

no time to reload—but as soon as Koscuisko fired, the soldiers would scatter, and then Wessex could

fire with reasonable certainty of striking his prey. But the seconds stretched, and there was no sound of

gunfire from the window above.

Why didn't Koscuisko shoot?

A moment later Wessex understood.

The drums fell silent in a ragged skirl, and Annie Christmas came walking through the crowd. The

townspeople scrambled to get out of the black giantess's way, and even the soldiers drew back from her.

She wore a white calico dress and a white tignon upon her hair. Her arms and neck were wreathed with

live snakes, and she wore a necklace of skulls and alligator teeth. Upon her ample hips was tied a red

fabric belt covered with scalps and barely identifiable scraps of dried flesh. Between her teeth she

clenched an enormous black cigar, and blue smoke wreathed her features as she puffed on it.

"Wheah de scrawny w'ite mans whut gots mah Charlie?" she roared in her deep bass voice. "I be Annie

Chris'mas, de na'chural dautah o' de typhoon an de lightnin'-quake. I gots blessin' in my righ' nan' an

cursin' in my lef. I can raise up de daid an' cas' down de livin', an' I doan feah no mans o' woman born.

Ah comes ter sets de hoodoo on de mans whut took mah boy!"

Amazingly, the crowd let her through—but if Wessex had learned one thing in his sojourn here, it was

that the
Orléannais
feared the
Voudous
more than the powers of either Church or State. He understood

why Koscuisko had held his fire. Annie Christmas just might have a chance to destroy d'Charenton, and