Igniting Darkness (Courting Darkness Duology #2) - Robin LaFevers Page 0,113

fire. Pressing my advantage, I ask, “Why are you not equally outraged by the lies General Cassel has told you?”

He waves his hand, dismissing them. “It was an indiscretion of his youth. He swore he would never do such a thing now.”

“Such a thing as rape Sir Waroch’s mother?”

“A youthful indiscretion,” the king insists stubbornly.

“He was older than you when it happened. Would you commit such a youthful indiscretion?”

“Never!” I see the moment he remembers laying his hands on me roughly.

“No,” I say softly. “You didn’t. You stopped yourself. Why should General Cassel be held to lesser standards? Besides, who knows how many times Cassel has done such a thing?”

“He was young,” the king repeats mulishly, and I want to reach out and shake his rutting shoulders.

“He was older than the queen is now, when she acted out of true concern for her countrymen. Why are you so willing to forgive him, but not her?” When he says nothing, I step out onto the thinnest of ice and continue. “It cannot be because you think she took something from you, while Cassel’s transgression hurt another.”

It is exactly that, of course, but in so asking, it forces him to see that truth, and he does not like it.

“If General Cassel holds no honor in how he treats women, where else is his honor lacking?” I want so desperately to tell him of Maraud’s brother, Ives, but it is not my story to tell. Instead, “I have heard rumors,” I say.

The king’s head snaps up. “What rumors?”

“Among the men at Cognac, those who served with Angoulême. They said General Cassel did not observe the custom of ransom. That he coldly butchered those who had laid down their swords in surrender.”

The king grows pale. “I have never heard such claims. That goes against all constraints of honor.”

What he means is, it is one thing to show dishonor to a mere woman, and something else entirely to show dishonor to a man of his own rank.

“Everyone knows how you favor General Cassel, Your Majesty. Mayhap they did not have the courage to tell you.

“What will you do?” My voice is soft, hopefully naught but an echo of the very question he is asking himself.

“I don’t know.” He faces me then. No, not me, but the wall behind me. I turn to look, my eyes landing on the painting his father gave him. I did not realize he had it brought with the other household items from Plessis.

Something inside me snaps. “Do not look at that be-damned painting,” I all but shout. “It is as much a chain around your neck as this silver one is around mine.”

His eyes widen, and at first I think it is because he recognizes the truth in my words. But when he raises his gaze to me, it is shuttered and tight. “You go too far. Get out,” he says.

In that moment, all his smallness and narrow-mindedness is as vivid as the painting, and I would happily leave him to the political machinations of his devious sister—if it were not for all the other lives that hang in the balance.

 Chapter 62

Maraud

When Pierre d’Albret and his men had surrounded Maraud on his way to the fletcher’s hut and said, “You are coming with me,” Maraud had laughed.

Until Pierre had said, “We have someone who is very much counting on your cooperation.” Then he was terrified. Terrified that somehow, Pierre d’Albret had seen him and Genevieve together. Terrified that she was the someone d’Albret was so confident he would want to see.

“As I told you back in Angoulême,” Pierre had continued, “I have a proposition that will hold great personal interest for you, and I will not take no for an answer. Unless you do not care if you ever see that person alive again.”

Maraud’s mind kept trying to imagine what d’Albret’s men might be doing to Gen even as he reassured himself Pierre couldn’t have stridden into the palace, past all the king’s guards and men-at-arms, and abducted her.

Except Pierre was also a guest at the palace and likely was not given a second glance. Or, worse, his every whim was seen to.

There was a second option that was less terrifying, but just as bleak. That she would have no choice but to think he’d begged and pleaded with her to come with him, only to abandon her. Knowing her, she’d assume he’d planned that since he first came to her in Paris, set her up for the fall she