The King's Eye

Chapter 21

"His majesty reinstated Necker," Jacques muttered. "But they have appointed Bailly as mayor." He rolled his eyes, as he leaned against the work table in the kitchen. "They rioted for nothing. All those people are dead for nothing."

"No celebration for Lafayette becoming commander?" Elodie's voice was emotionless as her eyes flicked to him over the rim of her glass.

Jacques gave her a blank stare in response. "It's not time for celebration." His brown eyes were dimmed with exhaustion as he shifted between legs, a wince followed every time he tried to shift into the injured one. Running his fingers through some of his fallen curls, he gave a grim expression. "Because it's not going to stop this war."

It was the claw marks across his face and arms I noticed first when he woke me at first light. The signs he did what I asked of him, and I in turn had murdered my mother.

He was numb to death, though.

I didn't know how many souls he had taken, but I wanted to keep it that way. Thinking only of the slim smile he gave me before I woke Anne, I pretended he didn't fight the last breaths out of the woman who gave me life.

She was a murderer, too, though.

I had not tried to add to the conversation, ignoring half of it as I clung to the pamphlet in my hand. It was odd that a mathematician was made mayor of Paris, but this was a rebellion and it did not take a lot to impress the desperate.

My finger ran over the printed address, leaving ink on my hands. It didn't sit right with me. The address there for everyone to see. The pamphlet Francis handed me at the ball didn't have an address. Did it? Were those involved in the rebellion given a different version? It was so familiar, the street number glaring at me against the street name. I had been there. It was as if...it was the Paris house.

I stood up straight and brought the pamphlet closer to my face, letting my eyes blink to adjust.

"Sophie?" Elodie's voice was a murmur to my ears as I processed what I was reading.

My stomach sank. I looked at Jacques who quickly averted his eyes from me, glancing down at his feet as he shifted uncomfortably. "They print the pamphlets at the wisteria house." I could feel the pamphlet waving through the air, my words coming out tainted with anger.

"I'll look into it," he said. His words came out as a mumble.

"No." I took a step toward him. "I will look into it. It is my duty to his majesty to figure out where my husband is distributing-"

"Sophie, please." Jacques dropped his mask of patience. "You need to handle the affairs in this house before worrying about pamphlets."

Elodie and I shared a confused expression. "I think you need to sleep," she said. Not once had she fed into the emotions of the room, but I knew she was holding back. "Before you make any decisions for the person...the woman who has the power in this room. Because last time I checked you work for her." She pushed off the table. "And I need to look at your leg."

The dried blood on his pants was hued with yellow making me cringe. How much pain had he been dealing with. He walked across the city on that leg. He fought my mother on that leg. "Elodie is right."

Taking a deep breath he shoved past us, swinging his forearm across the table in one clean sweep to knock everything to the floor. Jars of flour and sugar crashed, spreading like sand under his boots. "Well," he said before painfully lifting himself onto the table. "Let's take a look."

He ripped open his breeches exposing himself almost all the way up to the peak of his thigh, making me take a deep breath. I looked down at his leg at the bruising and puss that was once a bullet hole in flesh. It had become red and inflamed as if he had spent too much time in the sun.