Prisoner of the Flames (Leisure Historical Romance) (22 page)

“A mission of mercy,” said Robert. “Brother…Andre here has been overcome, I fear, and I myself am on the verge. The stench, sir, it overwhelms us. I’m sure that is all it is.”

“You know these also, Doctor?” the admiral said from behind knit brows.

“Oh, yes, they are old friends, my Lord Admiral. If it please you, stand aside. I shall get them out from underfoot and attend to them.” He took firm hold of Aengus. “Come, Andre,” he said, “let us hope there is no contagion. Fresh air is my first prescription. Then we shall see, eh? Let me help you.” Leading them, the sly old seer turned. “If I am excused, of course,” he said to Coligny. “I have gathered enough evidence to support you in your cause, sir—more than enough.”

“Yes, yes, we are done here,” Coligny growled, waving him off with a hand gesture, “but first I seek Garboneaux. I would have a word with him before we go. He courts another demotion. There’s not a sober guard above this level. Excuse me. I go below.”

Robert stiffened, and the healer responded. “Oh, he is not below,” he said smoothly. “I passed him above just now on my way down, traveling westward in a dreadful snit. Why, he all but threw me down, the clod.” Then over his shoulder to the king, he said, “You had best be away, Your Majesty. That is a foul, unhealthy stench coming from the lower regions. Why, I won’t even chance it. There is much sickness in it, and you are just now recovering. You are courting relapse, and your good mother will never forgive any one of us should you come down here over something so plebeian as reprimanding a common sentry.”

The boy king nodded in agreement, and sealed the decision to leave with a hand gesture. The admiral growled something incoherent, moved aside to let Nostradamus pass, and turned back again in obedience to the king’s command. Charles and his entire entourage followed, and Nostradamus quickened his step, leading Robert and Aengus well out of earshot.

“Is he dead?” the healer whispered, leaning close to Robert’s ear.

The Scot nodded in reply.

“Christ have mercy!”

“So will Uncle Aengus be if we do not tend him quickly. He has been brutalized unmercifully.”

“Take ease, take ease, young ram, all goes well.”

“Too well,” Robert gritted. “The king knows. He recognized me.”

“You are certain?”

“Oh, yes,” Robert muttered.

“And he…did not betray you?”

“No, not yet. But how long is my reprieve?”

“It only need be long enough to get you out of here alive. That, it seems, is done. Thank God for it, and
hurry!
I do believe you’re right. It goes too well, indeed. I like it not.”

D
espite the healer’s apprehensions, no one hindered their departure
from the jail. It was managed so flawlessly, in fact, that all three marveled. They dared not return to the ruins by the same route they had traveled coming. Instead, Nostradamus led them eastward, toward his lodgings, though they did not enter there. Losing themselves amid the crowded streets, they slipped away unnoticed toward the Huguenot village, and doubled back southward through the dense, black forest. It was a lengthier journey to the ruins from that distance, and made even longer because Robert’s horse bore a double weight. Nightfall was upon them before they reached the southern wood that crept up to the foot of the knoll where Nostradamus made a a quick evaluation of Aengus’s condition and imparted a draught for pain after promising Robert that the scourging was not fatal.

With that news to ease him, all Robert thought about was Violette, alone in the secret chamber below the smokehouse. Surely she would be awake by now, and frightened. Once they reached the foot of the knoll and tethered their mounts in the copse, he left his uncle for the doctor to manage, and hurried on ahead, bounding over the rut-scarred incline. The others were still struggling with the steep grade, when he opened the slab and hurried below, calling her name. But he leaped down only to stand frozen in horror. In the glow of the candle that had almost burned down, the room yawned empty before him. Violette was gone.

Screaming her name at the top of his voice, Robert scanned the room, praying that she would materialize before
him, but naught save echoes answered, though his shouts brought the healer, who settled Aengus on the smokehouse floor above and hurried down the coarsely hewn chamber stairs, his velvet robe spread wide.

“She is gone!” Robert cried. “How? How could she be? Where?
She is blind!”

“Take ease, take ease,” Nostradamus snapped, out of breath from his steep descent. “Raving will serve naught.” He glanced around the room, his silver eyes sparkling in the candlelight. “She is not long gone I’m thinking,” he observed, “and there seems to be no sign of a struggle.”

“No,” Robert agreed, “but she could not have moved that stone herself. She would have barely had the strength for such a feat in good health, let alone drained weak from plague.”

“She was probably still unconscious when they took her,” the healer opined. His sharp gaze scrutinized the room. Something shiny caught his eye near the pallet in the straw, and he stooped and snatched it up, studying it beside the candle flame.

“What have you got there?” Robert said, coming closer. “What is it?”

“A silver crucifix,” said Nostradamus, exhibiting it. “This is not one that I issued you with your disguise.”

“No,” Robert responded. “What does it mean?”

“A calling card,” the healer answered, “left here deliberately, no doubt. You are invited to retrieve her. They wanted you to find this. That’s why they left the candle burning.”

“The cardinal?”

Nostradamus nodded. “I would expect so,” he said. “You must have been seen coming here with the girl. No doubt we were seen leaving today as well.”

“She told me she heard something outside Montaigne’s château. I should have trusted her hearing. Then here…I told you I thought I saw someone by the edge of the wood
below.” He awarded his forehead a scathing blow with the heel of his open palm. “Of course! They were the cardinal’s spies. That is why they didn’t take us into custody.”

“The rest is fairly obvious.”

“Not to me,” Robert blurted. “Where has he got her? The Bastille?”

Nostradamus shook his head. “No,” he said. “I thought it odd that he did not put in an appearance there today, even though he was not scheduled to do so. That sanctimonious old fox would scarcely let so juicy an opportunity escape him…unless it served his purpose somehow. He has a talent for intercepting the king whenever Coligny is involved. There is a jealous animosity between those two.”

“Where, then? Where has he taken her?”

“To Notre Dame, I have no doubt, and you are expected.”

“I will not disappoint him,” Robert snarled. Stripping off the monk’s robe, he darted toward the stairs.

“Hold there!” the healer thundered, stopping him mid-step. “That is not the way. You cannot march on Notre Dame. You will be caught, and sent to the Bastille before you even reach the threshold. Have you forgotten what we have just left behind? By now, it is a safe assumption that Garboneaux’s body has been found. It is also a safe assumption that the gendarmes will be here directly. We must get away from here—and quickly—to the forest. I will tend your uncle, and we will form a strategy for this misadventure. It needs careful planning.”

“But Violette! She will be terrified. She is not yet recovered. They will kill her!”

“No,” Nostradamus refuted. “She will come to no harm. He will not even breathe a word to the authorities that he has her—not yet. The cardinal wants
you
, young ram. It is you who have bested and offended him. She is his insurance that you will come. He waits, expecting you to do exactly
what you are set to do here—fall right into his trap. You must not. You
cannot
, else you will both be lost.”

“We are already,” Robert groaned.

“No, this can be managed, but I can no longer help you now, save to give counsel. After our little farce today, my usefulness is ended here. I am old. I have foreseen my death, and it is not far off. I would spend what few scant years remain in my family’s company at home in Salon. God has much yet for me to do before I join him. He would not have given me the sight if I were not to pass on what I have seen to others. There is a grave lesson in it. It is best now that we part, for your own sake as well as mine.”

“Then I am alone here,” Robert realized.

“No,” said Nostradamus. “You are not alone, Robert of Paxton. One who I have counseled has not heeded my advice…not totally at any rate, and that, if you have paid close attention to my counsel now, might just save you.”

They reached the copse below not a minute too soon. They had scarcely taken cover amid the trees, when the summit above was lit as bright as midday from the storm of torch-bearing troops that flooded the castle ruins. Like so many ants, they scurried helter-skelter, leaving no crevice unscrutinized, igniting that which would burn as if, not having found their quarry, they would punish the refuse itself for spite.

The parched straw that carpeted the secret chamber was dry tinder, and great shafts of flame shot up through the smokehouse. Writhing columns of blood-red flames climbed up the castle’s wounded walls. Tall clouds of spark-embroidered smoke belched from the castle’s bowels and drifted low over the forest, where the three crouched watching. But the troops were long gone then. They had disappeared into the darkness behind the holocaust.

“Which way will the flames turn you this time?” Nostradamus mused.

Robert’s eyes flashed toward him. “They didn’t even seek us here,” he marveled. “Why?”

“They would not search a weald so vast as this in darkness. They are but a handful, not nearly enough in number to comb the forest by night. There are too many places for you to elude them, and they are a lazy, self-serving lot. No doubt the cardinal has told them where to find you. Unwittingly, they have underscored his message, and at the same time made it impossible for you to return here. That is all this is about.”

“They will return,” Robert said. This was definitely not the type of warfare waged in Scotland. He did not understand this devious French battle mentality. Things were much simpler at home, where battle was joined in the open, and fought to the death hand-to-hand in plain sight.

“Anything is possible,” Nostradamus replied, “and we must, of course, be prepared for all possibilities. I have tended your uncle. He sleeps now, and will for some time.”

“How serious is it?”

“He will recover. The beatings were severe, and he is not a young man, but with rest and care—”

“How can I provide rest and care for him here now?” Robert interrupted.

“You cannot,” the healer said succinctly.

“He must leave France!” the laird ranted.

“I know, young ram, but first he must be fit to leave France.”

“You have a plan,” Robert said, answering his own question.

The old healer nodded. “I will see him safely to Montaigne’s château, and—”

“That is no use,” Robert cut in. “His servant turned us away. He will not admit him. Even if he did, he wouldn’t be safe there. Who is to say that the steward wasn’t the one who betrayed us?”

“You are too impetuous,” the healer scolded. “You do not let me finish. Not here in Paris. In Bordeaux.”

“Bordeaux?”

Again the healer nodded. “I told you I will go south to home now. On my way, I shall deliver your uncle to the magistrate myself.”

“I am not familiar with your land, ‘tis true,” said Robert, “but I have seen maps and Bordeaux is quite a distance from Salon, I think.”

“I know,” the healer replied. “Aside from plotting this new escapade of yours, it is the last service I can render you.”

“I am in your debt for life, sir—”

“—which will not be a lengthy span of time if you do not step cautiously here now, and heed me,” Nostradamus added.

“I will do as you say,” Robert conceded.

“Good. These ruins are no longer safe. The forest must shelter you now, until this is accomplished.”

“That is the least of my worries. How do I liberate Violette?”

The crafty old seer smiled and cocked his head. “You must first find her,” he said. “I must return now to the city. I will go to the king, for I need his sanction to depart. I will discern how closely he is aligned in your…situation. I must render my findings at the Bastille in any case. If I can learn her whereabouts, it will be all the easier. If I cannot…well, we will deal with that if it comes to pass.”

“You cannot go to the king! They will arrest you for complicity.”

“No, no, I am quite beyond reproach, young ram. I can easily profess that you duped me as you did the rest.”

“No one will believe that, especially if our comings and goings have been monitored.”

Again, the old healer smiled. “You do not understand,” he said. “I am needed here—France needs me. The Queen
Mother knows it, and champions me because of it. I have her favor. Given that, they know it will be expedient for them to believe me, should I say black is white, and white is purple. Besides, the king himself recognized you. If he holds
his
position, how dare they question me?”

“No man is indispensable here now,” Robert said. “The king said that to me once, also.”

“Do you trust me, Robert of Paxton?”

“Yes, I trust you, but I do not trust them—any of them.”

“That, of course, is wise. But you can trust this—no harm will come to me unless God wills it. I shall glean what news I can of the girl, and conclude my business. Remain here in the forest. When the sun sets on the morrow, I will return with my carriage. It is not my preferred mode of travel, that awkward, rickety old wooden box on wheels. Such conveyances will not always be so inhospitable. Alas, I shall not live to see that come to pass. I much prefer my mule for travel. My servant will have to tie him on behind. Then I will counsel you toward your course, and see your uncle safely to Montaigne.”

“And…if you do not return?”

“But I must, mustn’t I?” the seer replied. “And I shall, else all this has been for naught.” He laughed, and said, “Don’t look so wretched. Your course is far from run. Sleep, and tend to Aengus. Only one thing in all this muddle is certain—you will need all the strength you can muster for what now lies before you.”