JOSSE
I force myself to look up.
Watching the girls march to their death is the last thing I want to witness, but I can hold my chin high, muster a smile, and pretend to have a plan if it will make them even a little less afraid. If it will make their last few moments slightly more bearable.
Fernand and Gris push through the mob like tunneling ants, vanishing and reappearing in the turbulent sea of masks and cloaks. Each step feels like a league, each second a lifetime. I can’t recall the last time I breathed. It isn’t until they’re halfway across the square and La Voisin gasps that I realize the prisoners are a wearing dirty tunics and breeches rather than skirts. Instead of Marie and Louis’s blond and Anne and Françoise’s rich mahogany, one has hair as black as charcoal and another is white blond. The foremost prisoner has hair like straw and flashes a wide, toothy grin at me when they reach the base of the platform.
“You look surprised to see us,” Gavril says. “Though not as surprised as her.” He laughs at La Voisin, and Fernand yanks the rope, sending Gavril crashing to the scaffold steps.
I blink and my mouth falls open. A thousand questions rattle around my head, but my tongue has forgotten how to form words.
“The royals never returned to the sewer,” Gavril says with an innocent shrug. “Haven’t a clue where they could be.”
I don’t mean to be callous—I would never wish to see our little allies shackled here beside me—but I’m so relieved the girls are safe, I fall to my knees.
I’ll die knowing they’re alive—that they still have a chance.
I immediately look to Mirabelle. I don’t mean to, but my eyes are drawn to hers. She tilts her head back and lets out an exultant whoop.
I clutch my stomach, half laughing, half crying.
“Stop that!” Marguerite shouts at us.
“Get up!” One of the guards slams his boot into my thigh. But the pain doesn’t register. I am out of my body with joy.
Mirabelle and I continue celebrating while La Voisin and Lesage stitch strained smiles across their lips and try to act as if this development was expected. But sparks jump between Lesage’s clenched fingers, and La Voisin is practically vibrating with fury. She fists Fernand’s cloak and drags him into what may resemble an embrace to the people down below. A very forceful embrace.
“Where are they?” she demands.
Fernand mumbles something unintelligible.
“Where. Are. They?” La Voisin’s voice is a deadly whisper.
Gris elbows Fernand aside with an exaggerated swing of his arm and smiles at the crowd, as if jostling for his share of favor. While they cheer, he lowers his head and mutters, “If we knew their location, they would be here. We were ambushed by these little miscreants.”
“The dauphin said the sewer was sure to be filled with Society roaches,” Gavril pipes in, “so he placed us in the tunnels to exterminate them. Which, I’d say, we did rather well.” He smiles wickedly at Gris and Fernand, and that’s when I notice the blood smeared down the length of Gris’s face and the gruesome spray across his cloak. Fernand is equally covered in gore, but it’s difficult to see beneath his mask and raven-black ensemble.
“It took those two plus half a dozen less fortunate guards to apprehend just the four of us,” the black-haired orphan boasts.
My brows rise so high and quick, they practically leap off my face. Not because the orphans slayed so many guards—I’ve seen them take down far worse—but becauseLouisorganized the ambush. He spirited our sisters away and arranged to have the orphans waiting in their place.
Mirabelle shoots me a goading look, and I can’t even pretend to be annoyed. I would willingly throw myself at my brother’s slippered feet and kiss his ringed fingers and even powder his bedamned wig.
He saved my girls.
“Unbelievable!” La Voisin’s voice rises.
Lesage rushes forward and places a firm hand on her shoulder. “There are many watching eyes, my love,” he says through his teeth. “The royals can’t get far, but I suggest we take care of the rebels already in our possession or we’re like to have a riot on our hands.”
As if on cue, someone tosses a turnip at the stage. The shouts redouble. The people came for blood, and unlike La Voisin, they don’t care whose is spilled, so long as someone pays for the decimated crops.
“Act as if everything has gone to plan; the people will have no reason to think otherwise,” Lesage continues. Gris and Fernand drag Gavril and his three comrades into position beside us. The orphans balk and bray like stubborn donkeys until Lesage holds up a crackling hand in warning. All four of them flinch and one accidentally whimpers—reminding me how young they are. My heart squirms inside my chest; they shouldn’t have to make such a sacrifice. I may be prepared to die for my siblings, but I would never ask them to do the same.
Once we’re all lined up before the cauldron of Viper’s Venom, La Voisin takes a deep breath and returns to the front of the platform to address the crowd. “Do you wish to see them punished?” she bellows.
The roar of approval is thunderous. I wonder if Anne and Françoise can hear from wherever they hide.
Don’t worry about me,I want to tell them.Just live. Live and be well.
