On My Lady's Honor (All for one, and one for all) (20 page)

Sophie shrugged.
 
“I wore breeches at home and Father Capin did not mind.
 
He only lectured me occasionally about the proper place of a woman, but he eat the ducks I shot for him nevertheless.”

Miriame laughed even harder.
 
“You do not know the priests in Paris,” she said, as soon as she could get the words out between her gales of mirth.
 
“They are a different breed from those in the country.
 
I doubt they could be bought with a brace of freshly-killed ducks – they would demand a fat haunch of venison at the least.”

“So I will pay them whatever it takes for them for their eyes to convince their consciences that I am wearing a perfectly proper and suitable dress.”

Miriame poured herself another glass of wine.
 
“I will have to come and watch this wedding.
 
It will be better than a play.
 
The priests will excommunicate you as an unnatural man-woman, not marry you.”

Sophie dropped her hands into her lap in despair.
 
She had not thought of what she would wear.
 
Miriame was right – she could hardly get married in her breeches, and yet how was she to obtain a dress without giving away her secret a thousand times?
 
She would have to call the wedding off again.
 
Lamotte would simply have to understand that she could not go through with it.

“I have plenty of dresses you can wear,” Courtney offered.
 
She scurried to the corner of her chamber where a large wardrobe stood half hidden by a heavy velvet curtain.
 
Opening it with a flourish, she riffled through the brightly colored silks hanging inside.
 
“I loved them so much that I could not bring myself to part with them all when I came to Paris to be a soldier.
 
It is lucky I did so.
 
You could not possibly be so disrespectful to God and the Church as to get married in breeches.
 
Just imagine what your parents would think if they knew.”

She held up a dress of sparkling emerald green with lace dripping from the sleeves, lovingly stroking with silk with her glance.
 
“Try this one on.
 
It is still quite fashionable and would suit your complexion very well.
 
Besides, the lace is real Brussels lace.
 
That never goes out of style.”

Sophie sent up a quick prayer of thanks to the Lord for her friends.
 
They had saved her twice now.
 
She owed them a debt she would not forget in a hurry.

She kicked off her boots and breeches and unwound the bindings from her breasts.
 
She hadn’t worn a dress in so long that she had forgotten what it felt like to have the feeling of luscious, smooth silk slip over her body.
 

She was shorter than Courtney and several inches of silk pooled at her feet.
 
“It’s a bit too long,” she said doubtfully.
 
“I would ruin the hem in the mud.”
 
Wealthy though they had been, her father had not approved of dressing her too fine.
 
He had spent his savings on fitting out Gerard as a Musketeer and on improving their estate, and had dressed her and her mother in wool and cottons.
 
Silk gowns were reserved for special celebrations – and even then they were plain gowns without a speck of lace or ribbon to be seen.
 
She had never had a dress half so fine before as the one that Courtney was so casually offering her.

“I can shorten it for you in an hour,” Courtney offered.
 
“Musketeer that I am, I haven’t forgotten how to sew.”

“And a little tight in the bodice.”

Courtney inspected the seams.
 
“That can’t be helped.
 
There’s no spare fabric to let out for you.
 
Besides, it makes you look every inch a woman.”

Miriame’s eyes were round and wide at the sight of such finery.
 
She touched the green silk with reverential fingertips.
 
“I’ve never worn a dress this beautiful in my life.”

Courtney went back to the wardrobe and picked out another dress – this one a deep crimson dress with gold trimmings around the neck and sleeves.
 
“This would suit your dark hair,” she said, and she tossed it at Miriame.
 
“Try it on.”

Miriame struggled into it with a few muttered curses.
 
“I feel all trussed up like a goose ready for the oven,” she complained, as she turned this way and that in front of the looking glass.

Sophie could only stare in amazement at her friend.
 
The crimson dress turned her from a striking-looking young man into a woman of quite exotic dark beauty.
 
“You look beautiful.”

Courtney had chosen a yellow dress for herself.
 
“This was used to be my favorite,” she said, as she deftly did up the buttons that ran the length of her back.
 
“I wore it on the happiest day of my life.”
 
She wiped a tear from her eye.
 
“Before I realized what heartless bastards men are.”

Sophie felt like a goose among swans – a plain brown homespun mouse next to a couple of exotic creatures from another world, but the magnificent silk of her dress and the presence of her friends gave her some comfort.
 
“Come to the church with me tomorrow,” she pleaded.
 
“Be my attendants so I will not be quite alone.”

“Oh, to feel like a woman again,” Courtney said, picking up her skirts and doing a little dance in her stockinged feet.
 
“I am so sick of pretending to be a man.
 
I despise filthy men and their even filthier clothes.
 
Soldiers have to wear the most uninspiring clothes in creation.
 
If I could wear my favorite dress into battle, I’m sure I would fight the harder for it.
 
The man who muddied this dress would die a thousand deaths.”

Miriame craned her neck over her shoulder to look at the back of the dress.
 
“If this is what feeling like a woman feels like, I’d rather stay a soldier, thanks very much.
 
It’s much more practical.”
 
All the same, she didn’t move away from the glass.

“Forget that you’re soldiers for the morrow,” Sophie begged, “and come to my wedding.
 
I shall need some friendly faces to get me through.
 
Lamotte would not like me to have an escort of Musketeers, but he could not quibble over an escort of women.
 
Besides, nobody will recognize you in a silk dress.”

Courtney’s face creased in indecision.
 
“As a woman, I knew more than a few people in Paris.
 
I would not like to be recognized by anyone.
 
Besides, I have business that ought to take me out of Paris tomorrow.”

“I suppose I can be a woman for one day,” Miriame said, smoothing the silk over her hips with covetous hands.
 
“It might be the only chance I ever get to wear a dress worth this much.”

“We shall be three women, not three soldiers.
 
None of our comrades will know us.”

“Ah, damn it,” Courtney said, and she banged her hand on the wardrobe door with the finality of decision.
 
“I shall be there for you.
 
Every woman deserves a proper wedding day.”

Lamotte stood at the door of the church, waiting for his bride.
 
He felt little other than a decided impatience to get it all over and done with.
 
His honor demanded that he marry the wench.
 
He was sure he could like her well enough, did she but douse a little of her martial spirit.
 
He certainly lusted after her body as a man should lust after his wife.
 
He had no doubt but that once she had accepted him as her lord and master, they would eventually find a measure of sexual satisfaction with each other.
 
He might never find true love and happiness in her arms, but he must needs be content with what he had and forbear from pining for what he could never realize.

A hackney coach stopped a little way down the lane and three female figures alighted, stepping carefully through the mud of the street in their high patterns.
 
He glanced at them briefly before turning his head away again.
 
Where the devil was Sophie?
 
Did she think to keep him waiting all day?

“Monsieur le Comte?”

He turned his head back again with a snap.

His mouth fell open in shock to see Sophie, with her soft brown hair in ringlets about her face and looking like a dream in a dress of a rich green, holding out her hand to him.
 
“You are rather lacking in gallantry, Monsieur le Comte, to ignore us so pointedly.”

He blinked his eyes once or twice to make sure that he was not seeing visions that were not really there.
 
“I did not know it was you.
 
You look… different.”

“I am the same Sophie Delamanse I always was – only in a dress.”

He could not get over how feminine and fragile she looked – how unlike a soldier.
 
He had an overpowering urge to take her in his arms and hold her close, to protect her from the world outside.
 
“It suits you.”

She gestured first to one and then to the other of the women accompanying her.
 
“My friends, Mademoiselle Ruthgard and Mademoiselle Dardagny.
 
They have come to see me wed.”

One of them dropped into a graceful curtsey and the other nodded her head awkwardly at the introduction.

He bowed perfunctorily to them both, but his eyes were captivated by Sophie.
 
His wife-to-be was beautiful – truly beautiful.
 
He had not though that a dress could make so much difference.
 
In her gown of emerald green, her blue eyes shining, she was the woman he had dreamed of marrying.
 
She was the Sophie he had always imagined her to be.

He held out his arm to her, still in a daze.
 
“I cannot imagine anything I would rather do than marry you.”

He nodded to the priest, who stood waiting on the steps at the door of the church.
 
“Here is my bride.”

The priest cleared his throat and started to read.
 
Lamotte stood facing his soon-to-be wife, her cold hands clasped in his own.
 
He waited impatiently for the priest to reach the crucial part of the ceremony.
 
He didn’t trust Sophie not to run off before the words that could tie them together as man and wife were finally spoken.

Finally the priest asked the question he had been waiting to hear.

“I do.”
 
He spoke the words loudly and clear, surprised to find that he meant them with all his heart.
 
He wanted to proclaim his marriage to the whole world.
 
Sophie was his wife now and he was glad of it.

“I do.”
 
Her voice was soft and clear but her eyes were troubled.
 
He smiled at her to put her at ease but she did not smile back.

He bent his head in the symbolic kiss that would seal their union.
 
Her breath was as sweet and fresh and smelled faintly of mint.
 
He wished he were not on the steps of the church and could kiss her thoroughly instead of merely pecking her chastely on her closed lips.

She gave no outward reaction to his kiss, but there was a telltale flush on her cheeks when he lifted his head again.
 
Maybe his wife was not as immune to him as she made herself out to be.
 

She was his wife and he had promised to seduce her into his bed.
 
He was looking forward to this night – their wedding night.
 
He would tempt her palate with sweet dainties and her body with sweet caresses until she melted into his arms.
 
If kind words and gentle kisses could woo her, she would be his wife in earnest by the morrow.

Sophie stood outside the King’s apartments, her legs apart and her arms crossed over her chest.
 
Her emerald green wedding dress was safely packed away in Courtney’s wardrobe with all the others, as if it had never taken part in such a momentous occasion.
 
She was back to boots and breeches as if she had never left off wearing them.