Chapter Thirty-Three, Revenge and Retribution, by Mordaunt

“Coward! You hide behind the skirts of a murdering whore. Following her around like a dog on a leash. What hold does she have over you?” 

“Where is Alessandra?” 

“I forget that’s her name now. The vile murdering whore who killed your brother!” 

“Not my brother. The brute who attacked her. Where is she?”

“You defend her!” 

“Only too late.” 

“She murdered Thomas!”

“Ah, yes. Your righteous quest, seeking retribution for noble Thomas.” 

“He faced the injustice and ignominy of being passed over for a bastard. A bastard and his whore! Same as I.” 

“This was your plan, Catherine, wasn’t it? Thomas was neither subtle nor cunning. Only vicious and brutal when incensed, which could happen at any moment, for any reason. What a relief it must have been for you, directing Thomas’ blind rage against someone else and ensuring an inheritance. He shared the purpose but the plan was yours.”  

She shrugs. “Why not? I had suffered enough. Rejected by the bastard who was to inherit everything, for a whore he picked up at a brothel. Tethered to the rightful heir who was destitute after his father–a good but weak man, decided to sacrifice everything on a matter of principle. Thomas had a short fuse. For once, I used it to my advantage. This was the weapon I was afforded. I deserved better. I was owed and still am owed for all I have suffered because of you and of her! You took everything from me for your whore. Then you abandoned me to fend for myself without giving me another thought. Without even a crumbling roof over my head. You chose filthy peasants over me! First your whore, then your peasants!”

“Neither you nor Thomas thought she’d strike back; that she’d defend herself and the child.”

“Neither of us thought it would be so easy with you. You did it all, remember? Hapless you!”  Catherine chuckles with contempt. “Your child, the spawn of a bastard and a whore was destined to inherit everything. Thomas would not have the spawn survive and neither would I. The family name, stained. It was all Thomas had: his family name. Not yours. His! You and the whore brought it upon yourselves and your spawn.” 

Raoul catches the end of it, as he approaches the room, drawn to the voice of a woman spouting obscenities, and by the sight of Comminges’ body outside the door, laying in a pool of blood, his throat slit. They are talking about Francesca. The rest Raoul does not care to hear. He remains standing at the threshold, as if to enter would lure him further into that secret which he has chosen not to know.

“Where is she?” Lucien–his loosened shirt soaked in blood and sweat and his sword still drawn– has already walked into the room with Yusuf, ahead of Raoul. 

“Another defender of the murdering whore. Another bastard, this one, even more repugnant. How fitting.” Catherine scorns. “But there are worthy men who will defend me!” 

“I see you that know me, Madame, so we will dispense with polite introductions.” Lucien moves closer to Catherine, adding: “We just stepped over one of you worthy defenders, outside this door. Comminges lies face down drowned in his own blood and piss.” 

“Comminges is a paid cutthroat,” she spits back without losing her nerve, but something in Lucien’s expression, some slight twitch of his lips perhaps, because his eyes are fathomless, makes her voice tremble slightly. “There’s my son. There’s my husband! Henry!” Her eyes dart around the room scanning the stone-faced men who surround her, her defiance overcome by fear. She retreats a step and then another. “Henry! Henry!” she screams, “Where is my husband?”

Athos moves toward her threateningly. “Where is Alessandra?”

“Henry! What have you done to him?” 

“You really want to know what happened to your husband, Madame?” Lucien’s deliberate tone is all the more terrifying because of his appearance: face covered in soot and dried blood; sword drawn. 

“Henry! What have you done to my husband? Fiends! Murderers!” Catherine repeats frantically, in rage and despair. 

Lucien springs toward the woman, and seizing her from the throat pins her against the wall. She gasps, winded, fighting with fists and nails to release herself from his tight grip.  “You really want to know, Madame?” Lucien raises his sword, and for the briefest of moments Raoul feels compelled to intervene. Something about attacking a woman, even this one. He cannot see his father’s face–he stands in front of Raoul–but Raoul has a sense that his father feels equally compelled. 

Lucien is faster. He draws his sword to Catherine’s chest while keeping her pinned against the wall, and with a slow, deliberate twist of his hand, wipes clean the bloodstained blade on her bodice. “There is your husband, Madame. Now that you have my answer, I demand yours. Where is Alessandra?” 

She fixes a contemptuous glare, the revelation of her husband’s death sparking only scorn. “In hell, where she belongs. Dead.” Lucien must have loosened his grip because she snaps back at him, her tone triumphant: “The bitch died yesterday. If only you’d been here a few hours earlier! But for a few hours, you missed her!” She taunts with a grotesque, vindictive giggle. “You know where your whore is now, Athos? Tossed over a cliff. Rotting. Food for the crows and the vultures. Just like her whore of a mother before her! You failed! All you miserable wretches failed!” She is laughing, a frenzied, deranged laughter, that makes Raoul’s skin crawl, while rage throbs in his veins; in his temples. His mother is not dead. 

Catherine has released herself from Lucien’s grip, and sidles to the other side of the room, where the poor nun has been cowering all this time, clutching her prayer beads, eyes firmly closed, praying. “Ask her! Ask the old cow! She was there.” Catherine is screeching. “Henry’s sacrifice was not for naught! You miserable wretches failed! Failed! My son, my beautiful Thomas and I are vindicated! My Thomas!” In vain she calls her son’s name. “Where is Thomas? Where is my son? Thomas!” She no longer sounds brazen and triumphant. She is howling–a long, desperate howl. 

“Thomas will not be witnessing your triumph, Madame,” Raoul says coldly and from the startled looks, he realizes that no one in the room, including his father and Lucien, noticed him before.  He steps inside, next to his father, whose expression is unfathomable, and, once again, in this infernal house, Raoul is grateful for the darkness he once dreaded. It helps him see beyond rage and despair. It gives him absolute clarity. “Your son is where he belongs, Madame,” Raoul says with perfect equanimity. “Thomas is in hell. We tossed his body over a cliff. Rotting. Food for the crows and the vultures.” 

Catherine lets out a low, guttural wail and drops to her knees with a loud thumping sound. “Thomas!” 

Lucien slants Raoul a quick glance, at equal measure probing and satisfied and seizes Catherine by the arm, dragging her to her feet. He pushes her into the hands of Yusuf who grips a firm hand over her mouth, muffling her screams. “Give her to Loup. Tell him to warn the Dog’s Head that she barks and bites. He knows what to do,” and walking up to the cowering nun, Licien offers her his hand, helping her to her feet. “You are safe now, Sister,” he assures her gently. 

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His father’s demeanor worries him. His father’s silence alarms him. The story about his mother’s death from the mouth of an embittered, vengeful fiend, and the account of how they disposed of his mother’s body, makes little sense. The darkness that has enveloped Raoul, that darkness which Rochefort has been teaching him to master, affords him the clarity to detect the logical flaws. You cannot dispose of a body without being seen at an estate that has been surrounded and observed by their spies for days. Why not bury her in the premises in the dark of night? Who rode in and out carrying something as heavy and visible as a dead body? On a horse? In a carriage? Using a cart? Where is that cliff? There are no cliffs and promontories anywhere around Saintonge, only marshlands and estuaries. What did the nun witness? Until Raoul has answers he will not accept an account that only reeks of revenge. Until he finds his mother’s body, he will not accept her death, and even then he’ll doubt and push further. Did he not see, with his own eyes, the remains interred in Rochefort’s grave? Raoul has a sense that Lucien is making the same calculations. His uncle is a practical man but perhaps there’s more in their shared proclivity, perhaps the darkness which Rochefort saw in Raoul since childhood is their inheritance from Richelieu. And it is because of Rochefort’s game that he and his uncle are secret adversaries: the Company of the Orient, whose men Comminges has wasted, and Lucien Grimaud. Such a perfect, vicious circle. 

Raoul is marching out of the sordid room and down the corridor, with Lucien and his father. Yusuf carried out Catherine de Renard, biting and kicking, and then Gasparo was in the room, helping the nun who could barely walk. Raoul is marching down the corridor, with Lucien and his father in silence, and it is his father’s silence that alarms him. His father is a reticent man, level-headed and poised, always in control, always composed. This silence is different. It is muted despair, agony suppressed. It is pure rage.  His father suffers, and Raoul will not allow it. His sister, his mother, his father, their suffering must stop. 

Raoul is not sure if he is leading them or if they know where they are headed, but he has in mind to return to that old library, which is the closest, most logical place to recoup and find their bearings. All around them are the remnants of a battle, fierce and futile. The corridors and stairs are strewn with dead bodies, and the air is still thick with powder and the acrid smell of blood. Raoul’s eyes are tearing from the smoke. They push aside broken furniture and charred furnishings still smoldering, and avoid crumbling walls and half-fallen ceilings. 

In the old library, they find Captain d’ Artagnan and General du Vallon seated around the desk. The duc d’ Herblay has just stood up, it seems, and is unearthing bottles of wine from a wooden crate that someone hid between the empty bookshelves. Perhaps it was de Winter who ordered the wine, Raoul thinks, de Winter liked living in luxury. De Winter’s fine hat is no longer on the desk. Someone, Captain d’ Artagnan most likely, who sits now with his booted feet on the desk, has kicked it onto the floor. Catherine de Renard’s cloak is no longer hanging over the back of the chair where General du Vallon sits, legs sprawled out. Olivain and Raoul used it to cover up Thomas de Renard as they dragged him out of the room, through the narrow service door, and out the back of the house. 

The duc d’ Herblay says nothing when he sees them entering, only waves them inside with a hand holding a corked bottle. There is something in the eyes of his father’s friends that Raoul recognizes for he feels the same. A distant look, that weariness which descends after a battle when doublets are unbuttoned and buffcoats loosened, when the mind becomes sluggish and the limbs grow numb. With his eyes Captain d’ Artagnan points to de Winter’s hat on the muddied, trampled floor. “I gather de Winter will not be needing it,” he tells Lucien who nods. He hands Lucien a tankard full of wine which the duc d’ Herblay has filled. 

“He’s fine. Not a scratch,” Raoul answers General du Vallon’s silent question about Olivain. 

There’s another question in their eyes, however, and no one is willing to ask it. “We heard the screaming,” Captain d’ Artagnan finally admits. 

Raoul has been alarmed by his father’s silence and knows that his fear is justified. It is the way that his father has turned his back to everyone and stares at the fire that now burns in the fireplace. General du Vallon stands up slowly, and carefully places his hand on Athos’ shoulder, barely touching him. “Why don’t you sit with us, Athos?” he proposes gently. He slants a concerned look toward Lucien. The others too fix their eyes on Lucien, as if expecting an answer from him, but Lucien only shakes his head, his hooded eyes offering them nothing. 

“Athos, my friend…” the duc d’ Herblay begins tentatively.  

“No!” Raoul hears his father’s voice thundering in the room. Such rage Raoul never expected from his father. Not despair, not anguish, just pure rage: “She is not dead!”