‘The docteur.’
She thought about this docteur sitting on a chair as he carefully stitched the girl into a fabric cage with his curved surgical needles. Lip curling in a silent snarl, she pulled a knife from her boot and made short work of the seam holding the glove and sleeve together. The stitches were stiff and brown with dried blood and tugged through the girl’s skin like a wound. They pulled away to leave a bracelet of blood blooming around her wrist. Camille thought for a moment she might be sick.
As she snipped through the final threads, Olympe stilled and drew in a sudden breath. The hairs on the back of Camille’s neck stood up. She spun on her heel, grasping her pistol.
A soldier had appeared in the doorway.
‘Who the hell are you?’
He strode forwards, lifting his baton.
Everything happened in a heartbeat. The pistol snagged in her belt as she tried to pull it out. The guard closed the gap, ruddy face twisted in fury. Olympe’s glove drifted to the floor.
The guard’s eyes widened – not at the pistol, but at Olympe’s bare hand.
Camille started to raise the gun, but Olympe was there first. She reached out and touched the skin at the guard’s neck. Blue sparks covered her hand, jumping along her fingers, lighting up the cell and the guard’s startled face. He shook, vibrating like a tuning fork as Olympe pressed her palm flat against his skin. Her nails were long and ragged, like claws. The sparks crackled from Olympe’s mottled skin to the guard. A smell of meat burning filled the room.
Camille stilled in fascination and horror. She’d seen something like this before. Once, as a young girl, her parents had taken her to a scientific display. On the stage, a man had strung up a boy over the boards. He was swaddled in cloths and hung from pink silk cords. The scientist had applied a large sulphur globe to his feet, cranking it round so it spun against his bare soles. The boy had reached out his hand and she’d watched in amazement as first feathers, then pages of a book had risen to his fingertips. A volunteer from the audience had been called for, and her mother had nudged her up to the front. The scientist had her stand on a stool and then all the lights had been dimmed. Camille had stretched her hand towards the boy’s nose as instructed. A loud crack made the crowd gasp, and a spark flew towards her outstretched hand.
Just like the sparks now burning dark spots into the guard’s skin.
‘That’s enough.’ Camille’s voice was a whisper.
Olympe shuddered and snatched back her hand. The guard collapsed. Slowly, Camille hooked her gun into her belt. Then she picked up the glove and gave it back to Olympe.
She ran a hand through her hair to hide her shaking fingers. For the first time in a very long while, Camille felt out of her depth. The world that she knew was gone. Extinguished in a flash, just like the life had died in the guard’s eyes. This was so much more than the duc lying to her about the details. A yawning, unknown expanse opened beneath her, and she felt as though she was on a narrow beam attempting to cross the chasm.
5
Underneath the Prison
‘What? Where are all the people?’ yelped Al.
Ada pushed him into the room. ‘Quick!’
The soldiers were close behind them. The boys flung themselves against the door and Ada kneeled, sliding her pins into the lock again. It was easier this time, only a few seconds’ work to lock the door as the soldiers hammered into it.
She slumped to the floor, heart racing.
Al had walked further into the room, stopping next to a stack of barrels.
‘Where are we?’
Ada looked round in confusion. They should still be in the part of the cellars where the prisoners were kept. Had she taken a wrong turn? She ran over the prison plans in her head. They’d gone left at the bottom of the stairs, to go north. Only, the stairs had twisted as they’d gone down. Left had taken them south, away from the chapel and further under the prison.
‘It’s the arsenal.’ Guil was examining the array of barrels, running his thumb along the seals and sniffing it.
Suddenly, the strong smell of gunpowder made sense.
There had to be more than twenty barrels stacked around the cramped room. It was divided by the remains of a wall that had once split off an inner room, a break where the door had once been. The only light came from a series of wells bored into the ceiling. The soldiers had stopped hammering on the door – someone must have gone for a key. It was only a matter of time before they returned.
They were trapped.
She’d made another mistake. First the balloon, now this. Camille trusted her and she kept letting her down.
‘Well, this plan has gone arse-backwards.’ Al pushed his ash-blond hair behind his ear. ‘I don’t know why Camille lets us out of the house.’
‘Pity, in your case,’ replied Guil. He had set down the useless musket on top of a barrel and started picking through the contents of the room. ‘If I can find some bullets, we might be able to fight our way out.’
