The Virgin's Daughter (25 page)

“Asked about your letters, and your studies, and if you ever wrote about any man in particular. He didn’t exactly order me to invite you to France, but he hinted rather strongly.”

Lucette smiled instinctively. “I’m flattered.”

But it wasn’t flattery that sent her mind spinning, but possibilities. It sharpened her observations, and made her wary of his attentions.

She could not deny that there was something restful about Nicolas. He was not challenging, like Julien, she didn’t have to think quickly or guard herself from unwariness. Perhaps restful was not to be underestimated in this world.

But it was not of calm, restful Nicolas she dreamed at night.

The day before the first of Charlotte’s guests arrived, Felix finally begged his way into arranging a training bout between his father and uncle. It had been Julien who spent time with his nephew these last weeks in the practice yard, supervising the child’s training in blades. Cannons might be the backbone of today’s warfare, but there was still a need for men skilled in individual combat.

There was an unusual three-way tension at lunch that day, lines of deepest burgundy running between Renaud and both his sons. Even Charlotte seemed to feel it, for her usual chatter was conducted at a slightly lower level of brightness than normal. Felix, however, could hardly contain himself in his seat. His tutor spoke to him once or twice rather sharply, but Felix could apologize so winningly he managed to make even Laurent sniff and smile.

Julien did not even look at Lucette once, and she was cross to feel guilty. Someone who spent so much time in Paris climbing in and out of women’s beds had no business sulking because she hadn’t followed up their kiss with more liberties. So why, then, did she feel responsible for hurting his feelings?

Julien did, however, address her as they left the table to reconvene at the practice yard. “Do you think my brother and I shall put on as good a show today as we used to do at Wynfield Mote?”

“I think you are both less likely to show off in quite the same
way,” she replied. “At least I hope so, or what is the point of getting older?”

“But showing off is an end in itself, is it not? And not confined to men.”

“Just don’t let showing off get in the way of your fight. I would imagine distraction is a problem when fighting.”

He looked at her with eyes that made her feel liquid and wonder why she had taken such care to stay away from him. “Unfortunately, we cannot always choose our distractions. And if I’m tempted to show off today, you have only yourself to blame.” His smile was one she had never seen from him before—an almost heartbreaking mix of wistfulness and hope.

Words trembled on her lips, pushing her to say things she’d never thought she’d be brave enough to say. “Julien,” she managed to begin…and was interrupted by Felix practically bouncing from excitement.

“May I escort you to the practice yard,
mademoiselle
?” he asked with endearing charm.

Instantly, Julien’s smile twisted into rueful mocking. “Enjoy yourselves,” he told them. “Felix, I expect you to help the lady understand the finer points of what she’s seeing.”

If only there were someone to help her understand the finer points of Julien’s behavior.

The practice yard at Blanclair was surrounded by trees, not dissimilar to the one at Wynfield Mote. Both those houses were manor houses, meant for family living and not defense. The practice yard at Tiverton Castle, by contrast, was far more serious in purpose, meant for exacting military training for the Duke of Exeter’s retainers and liege men. Renaud LeClerc had done most of that sort of training in Paris or at court, so Blanclair retained the homey sense of familiarity.

Lucette had spent many hours watching her brothers and other young men of their household train, and so she expected a certain degree of teasing. Stephen and Kit always threw taunts at one another—Kit more than Stephen—and did not give quarter in their
fights. She was accustomed to Dominic’s eagle eye on his two sons, and could remember occasions when he took the yard himself against them. Having only one hand might change his balance and necessitate a lighter sword, but it had not materially affected Dominic’s skills, and her brothers had always paid the closest attention.

Renaud was present today, but he kept well back and did not shout either encouragement or directions, as she remembered him doing when his adolescent sons fought at Wynfield. Of course, they weren’t adolescents anymore. As Lucette watched Nicolas and Julien finish lacing their padded jerkins, thickly quilted for protection, she was struck anew by the fact that both were far removed from being boys. And how, she wondered, was the unacknowledged tension between these men going to manifest in physical form?

Charlotte seemed to wonder the same. She leaned against the fence, with Felix bouncing on the balls of his feet on Lucette’s other side, and said pensively, “It has been a long time since I have seen my brothers spar openly. I think perhaps they have much between them that will arise when fighting.”

“Did they disagree often when they were young?”

“No more than most brothers, I should think. But these last years…I wish I knew what was keeping Julien from home. And not just since Mother died. He has kept himself in Paris since…” She hesitated.

“Since when?” Lucette expected to hear about St. Bartholomew’s Day, wondering if Charlotte had guessed about Julien’s love for a Huguenot girl.

But though Charlotte’s timing was right, her conclusion was wildly different. “Since Nicolas was injured in Paris and then lost his wife. Julien seemed so stricken with guilt. I have never dared ask, and I can’t say that I saw any signs during her life, but I have since wondered if Julien was in love with Nicolas’s wife.”

Oh, dear. Another possible woman in the mix! Why did Julien attract troublesome women like flies? Although she supposed grudgingly
that it wasn’t fair of her to assume they were troublesome simply because they were dead.

And yet, wasn’t guilt something she could well understand? Although how guilt over loving his brother’s wife might have prompted Julien to work for Walsingham…no, she couldn’t quite make that piece fit. She could, however, turn it around. If Julien had been in love with Célie—and Nicolas had known it—then the older brother might well be targeting Lucette simply to upset Julien. Though that did not answer why Nicolas had apparently been interested in her months before her arrival.

Did that make it more or less likely that Nicolas was involved in Nightingale? That was the piece she was still missing—his motivation. Whatever injury had been done to him in Paris had been committed by the Catholics. Wouldn’t that make Nicolas unlikely to aid their cause?

She shook her head, forcing the tumble of overlapping thoughts into the background. Puzzles were solved out of the corner of the eye, when the mind was focused elsewhere. So she focused on Nicolas and Julien and their fight.

Lucette supposed that training bouts had not changed substantively in several hundred years. Using either wooden replicas or rapiers with their deadly edges blunted, men had a way to practice the skills that might mean the difference between life and death. The LeClerc brothers used rebated steel today, and the flash of sunlight on swords looked deadly enough.

“I’m only allowed to use wood,” Felix informed her regretfully. “Uncle Julien says if I work very hard, I can try rebated steel when I’m ten. That’s how old he was.”

“And your father?”

“Father doesn’t often like to fight. Not with me. The master tells me he and Uncle Julien were well matched when younger, but they have not fought against each other since I was born.”

Another link to the year of 1572. The threads surrounding that
date in Lucette’s ledgers were beginning to vibrate with suppressed meaning.

The match was little different from the ones Lucette had seen, not only between her brothers, but at court. She was accustomed to the dance of men and weapons, but she quickly realized that there was more behind this bout. Nicolas might be out of practice—she could see that his early movements were half a beat slower than Julien’s—but his instincts had been so well honed that it didn’t take long for his body to remember what it had once done without thought. As Lucette remembered from watching them when she was a child, Julien was the gambler and Nicolas the thinker. But they had both grown, and not just physically, since those days. She had no doubt that Julien had killed men with the moves he used now, and it sent shivers down her back.

Nicolas, more precise than Julien, had once been more focused as well. But Julien had a ferocious concentration today that fixed itself on his older brother as though he were fighting his own demons incarnate. It was Charlotte who murmured in her ear, “There is always ferocity when a woman is involved.”

Plainly, Charlotte thought she was that woman. It was an…intriguing thought. Lucette had never imagined herself a femme fatale, leading brothers to duel one another for her favour. Not that she intended to bestow her favour on either of them—at least, not as a result of a practice yard fight.

True to his uncle’s command, Felix kept up a running commentary on the match. “See how Uncle Julien moves his feet? If it were an opponent who did not know him, the surprise would be very useful. But father knows him too well. He can always anticipate where Uncle Julien will be.”

Indeed, after a bit it did seem as though Nicolas were fighting with all the foreknowledge of a seer. Julien seemed to realize it as well, if the narrowness of his eyes and tightness of his jaw were any indication. His wheat-coloured hair tumbled about his face as he whirled suddenly away and back, out of his brother’s reach, and they
stood facing each other with an intensity that suggested they had momentarily forgotten there were spectators.

“Quitting?” Nicolas asked, with an ugly edge to his voice that seemed to hint at an unknown number of grudges. So might a man sound who hated his brother, perhaps for loving his wife or perhaps for something else. Even if Nicolas had not greatly loved Célie for herself, the possessiveness of a husband could easily make a man territorial and unwilling to share.

Like Dominic and William.

Julien just laughed. “When, dear brother, have I ever walked away from a fight?”

“No, you don’t walk away so much as send someone else to finish the fight for you. Who will it be today, Julien? Going to send Felix in your place next time?”

All the irritation previously alive in Julien’s expression flattened into blankness. “That is unfair.”

“So’s war. And also, I believe, love.”

Julien dropped his sword. “Well, then, in the interests of brotherly love, let us call it a draw.”

There seemed to be a wealth of unspoken communication between them, and Lucette chanced a sideways glance at Renaud. His hands were knotted together until his knuckles were white. Suddenly she knew that something terrible stood between these brothers. Something only they and their father knew.

Something—she was sure of it—that had happened in 1572.

Nicolas held his position as though contemplating striking the unprepared Julien, but at last he shrugged and dropped his own sword point. “We shall call it a draw for now. But brothers cannot ever leave matters entirely alone. We shall finish the fight one day.”

Julien jerked his head in acknowledgment and strode out of the yard without a glance for Felix or Lucette or anyone else watching. After only a moment’s hesitation, Lucette followed him.

As she went, she heard Felix say, “
Mademoiselle
…” and then Nicolas reprove his son.

“Let her go, Felix.” Lucette fancied she could feel the force of Nicolas’s gaze at her retreat. “There’s no need to chase the lady down. She’ll come back of her own accord quick enough.”

He sounded absolutely sure of himself.

—

When Julien heard Lucette following him (who else would be foolish enough to come after him when he was clearly in a temper?), he wanted to turn his eyes to heaven and ask piteously,
Why now?
She had asked him to kiss her, appeared to enjoy the experience, and then taken every effort to keep out of his way since.

Not, he admitted to himself, that he had made any great efforts otherwise. He hadn’t been lying—he did only kiss women who asked it of him—but the asking had always been a game, the words a mere formality considering that those women had given every indication of wanting far more than just a kiss. There had been times when he wished he hadn’t told Lucette that, having been so sure that she would never ask. Whether from pride or disinterest…

But then she did. In the most honest, winsome manner that had the effect of a spear blow to his chest. No woman had ever looked at him like that—except Léonore. And see how badly that turned out, he reminded himself blackly.

He was not used to jealousy, at least not on his own account. But as Lucette had taken to spending much of her time with Nicolas this last week, he’d at times been so jealous he couldn’t see straight. He’d rather have the Paris strumpets, he told himself. At least the whores never pretended.

All in all, he’d been glad enough to fight Nicolas today. Until his brother took the single worst moment of Julien’s life and openly threw it in his face.

This was why he never came home. Forget pleasing Charlotte—he would leave tonight. He did not want to be here while Paris descended and Lucette paired herself with Nicolas.

Except she can’t
, his selfish side whispered.
No matter how much Nic may want her, he can never give her what I can
.

So he wasn’t pleased when she caught him up. “I thought you said you didn’t run away,” she noted shrewdly.

“I would think you’d be pleased with my restraint,” he said, halting because he could not go on without rudeness and because, finally, she was speaking to him, and damn it all if it didn’t make him dizzy. “I assure you, I could have finished my brother with a few carefully chosen strokes. I have always been the more violent one.”

“Julien, what happened in Paris in 1572?”

He shook his head, startled by her change of topic—and unnerved by her insight. How did she know that all of this traced back to Paris? Only a guess, of course, for she couldn’t know the truth. And she would never hear it from him. As furious as Nicolas made him, he owed his brother that and much, much more.