They waited, silent in the deep dusk, Christine praying the Musketeer would not groan and give them away, for the perimeter guards would have to pass on their rounds before they could go any further.

They'd smuggled the young man into the game keeper's cottage for the remainder of daylight, Benoît - after a staged request to take the rest of the day off when they'd returned to the stables with the quickly scrubbed coach - going back to watch over the injured man until they could move him again.

"Now," Christine said urgently, as soon as the crunch of booted feet atop the hard crust of snow faded into the distance.

A low growl stopped them in their tracks.

"Get back, get back!" the duchess hissed, throwing herself forward in a slippery slide across the top of the icy snow. Her cloak billowed out behind her as she set her feet to skate as far as she could from the pair behind her, just managing to snatch the dog's collar as she sailed past. She went down in a graceless heap, Louis throwing his head back to howl once before taking advantage of her prone position to slobber wet kisses all over her face with his massive tongue.

"Your Grace!" The pair of guards were at her side before she could push away the dog and struggle to her feet. "You should not be out here alone, without even a lantern!"

"I know every step of this route, even in the dark," she replied tartly, allowing them to untangle her cloak and help her to her feet. "I do not need a light."

"You're wet now. Arden, escort her back to the house, I'll take Louis and continue with the rounds."

"Both of you be on your way, I will continue to nurse's on my own." She bent to caress the mastiff's huge head. "I will take Louis though, he will keep me upright the rest of the way. It did not occur to me how slippery it would be down here where the sun does not reach."

They knew better than to argue, Christine's command of the staff was equal to her husband's.

"You're sure you're all right, Your Grace?"

"I'm fine. It is not far to Becca's door and Louis is a perfect gentleman." And the perfect guard dog. He'd been named by her husband and assigned as her personal guard dog, trained from a puppy to her scent. In the chaos of the last several hours, she'd forgotten it was his habit to accompany the guards on their nightly rounds.

She grabbed his collar again, adjusted her cloak and stepped out with her duchess persona firmly intact. The men trailed behind at a discreet distance, waited until the door of the cottage opened and then resumed their rounds.

"What now, Wren?" Becca had been waiting for her in the dimly lit entry way, alerted by the commotion. She reached for the cloak Christine swirled from her shoulders. "You did not bring Louis just for a visit."

"No, Nana, Benoît will be along shortly, with a man in need of sanctuary."

"A man?" The old woman's head turned sharply.

Becca, too, was going blind, though she could still distinguish light and darkness and a lamp was kept burning constantly for her. A servant saw to it daily, though for the next few days Christine would make sure she did that herself.

Like Moss, Becca had an uncanny ability to navigate her space; she turned now, expectantly, toward the door, leaning on the stout walking stick she had recently acquired.

"He will wait until the guards are long past. Louis came to investigate, probably a fortunate thing since he will need to know this unfamiliar scent has my approval, else he will give us away. There were Musketeers camped just the other side of the border. Victor's secretary has been spirited away, or so he thinks," Christine relayed quickly, holding nothing back." In retaliation, whether they had anything to do with it or not, my husband and his men massacred the regiment of Musketeers; only two managed to escape. It appeared one went deeper into France, this one came toward Savoy. We found him staggering along the road. He bears a head wound. Benoît says he came around several times during the day - we stashed him in the game keeper's cottage - but cannot seem to hold on to consciousness more than a few moments. I've sent a pigeon already to Tréville, but in the meantime, the Musketeer needs attention and I can't keep going to the game keeper's cottage without rousing suspicion."

"We will contrive," Becca replied, without a trace of concern. "Let me gather -"

The front door swung inward to admit a staggering Benoît, the tall Musketeer draped over his shoulder like a sack of grain, Benoît's shorter stature requiring him to kick the man's feet out of the way with each step forward.

"To the attic, Benoît." Becca did not waste time, she turned toward the stairs and started back up, thumping each stair as she went. Her bones might be slowing her down, but age had stolen none of her mental agility. "Then you must collect a basin and water from the kitchen. Christine, you know where the supplies are, bring them."

"Wait." Benoît had both hands gripped firmly around the Musketeer's hips. "I'll be needing the light," he stated, making sure Becca could 'see' the grin in his voice with her ears. Her keen sense of humor kept the estate retainers on their toes, constantly wary of her legendary pranks.

"Well then, Christine, hand me that lamp, I'll light us up."

Her Grace collected the small oil lamp that burned day and night upon the small cabinet in the entryway, depositing it in the wrinkled hands, and stepped back to watch the pair ascend the stairs.

"Don't be a laggard with those supplies, girl. Bring blankets, too, we'll have to make up a pallet for him."

"Wait a moment, Benoît." Louis was sniffing the boots of the boneless Musketeer. "Let Louis get his fill and I'll take him to the kitchen on my way to the stillroom."

It took several minutes, during which time Benoît's knees began to sag under the extra weight. Louis was finally satisfied and followed willingly after his mistress, anticipation making him slobber, for he had come to associate this place with a juicy bone that kept him gnawing happily for hours.

The cottage was big enough to be roomy and small enough to be cozy. Becca's one request, when she'd finally agreed to be retired, was an addition to the cottage that had been her bequest on Christine's marriage and removal to Savoy.

Christine made her way through a sitting room, a low fire banked and screened for the night, skirted a diminutive, round table in the breakfast parlor and pointed the mastiff to his assigned spot next to the warm kitchen fireplace as she hurried through into the large, airy room the duke had caused to be added on to the house. A mélange of scents assailed her nose as she reached unerringly for the lamp Becca kept on the end of her work bench.

Christine had learned her organizational skills from Becca - a place for everything and everything in its place. Though it was a habit of long standing, the practice had made it easy for Becca to continue to live alone as she preferred, navigating her home easily by long established sensory memory.

The duchess' fingers closed around the flint and steel cheek by jowl with the lamp. She lowered the wick as soon as it flared to life, hurriedly gathered a basket of potential remedies, collected blankets from the cedar-lined storage cabinet, then took the lamp to the parlor where visitors could be reasonably expected to need light and turned it up, placing it on the table in front of the window.

She was as skilled at traversing the layout of the house in the dark as Becca. She'd spent many, many hours here, often teasing she was far more at home in Becca's snug little sanctuary than she was in her own, though she had fallen instantly in love with the high, soaring towers and broad outdoor walkways of the castle that had become one of her many homes upon her marriage.

Christine ran lightly up the stairs, turning to push the door open with her back. The Musketeer lay sprawled on the floor just beyond the sweep of the door, Benoît was makeshifting curtains from a pile of old moth-eaten blankets to cover the large oriole window at the east end of the space, while Becca pushed and shoved at old trunks and dusty furniture, smothering her sneezes in an elbow.

It was not as cold as the duchess had feared, her breath did not fume like pipe smoke, but neither was it warm enough for an injured man. He'd been slogging through snow for half the night and a good part of the day in just shirt and britches, t'would be miraculous did he not have lung fever already.

"We should put him as close to the chimney as we can, it will provide some warmth."

Christine set her supplies on an ancient escritoire and collected a broom conveniently leaning against the doorjamb. Clouds of dust flew in every direction, accompanied by more sneezes from all but the silent Musketeer. Benoît went to help Becca with the creation of a little nest arranged inside a seemingly haphazard semi-circle of cast-off relics around the fireplace chimney, into the middle of which they dragged an old, hurriedly beaten mattress. Christine mounded cedar-scented blankets over it, and together, she and Benoît eventually managed to rearrange the Musketeer atop them, though he would likely add a scraped back to the list of injuries he had sustained on this benighted mission.

"There is warm water in the kettle over the kitchen fire. Bring a bucket as well as a basin," Becca ordered Benoît, creaking to her knees beside the pallet. "Christine, help me get him out of these foul clothes. You will need to smuggle a nightshirt down from the big house, for the moment he will have to be as he came into this world." Her fingers had found the bandage around his head and shoved it off, then set to exploring the furled edges of the sluggishly bleeding cut across his forehead. "This was made by a club, not a sword. There is more damage beneath than on the surface. It does not appear to need stitches, but there may be bleeding inside the skull."

"I was afraid of that." Christine's worry notched up. The Duchess of Savoy was not unfamiliar with fatal wounds.

Marie de Medici had been quite the opposite of an over-protective mother. Corpses and coups had featured regularly under her regime and she had included all her children in her political maneuverings.

It was after all, how Christine had come to be married to the Duke of Savoy. As a fille de France, she had known herself to be a pawn in her mother's long-term strategy. As an avid chess player, the Daughter of France had been well aware a pawn could be promoted; she had not gone naively to her marriage bed. She considered herself quite fortunate to have fallen head over heels in love with the gruff, rather cold-hearted man whose pivotal geographic location made him a powerful ally or enemy. Especially as it was her job to make certain Victor remained an ally.

Benoît was clomping back up the attic stairs. Christine chased off her lingering thoughts and set her hands to the task of stripping the filthy clothes from the Musketeer. Becca directed Benoît where to set the pail and basin and followed behind with a damp cloth, efficiently whisking away blood and grime as Christine's depredations upon his clothing revealed the long, lean length of Musketeer.

"I expect you can feel the swollen eye," Christine observed as they rearranged the blankets to cover him. "It is the color of dried plums, but there are also multiple bruises about his neck and shoulders."

"He's cold as a skinned March hare. Are there more blankets? Lung fever could take him quicker than the head wound."

Benoît was handing them over before Becca had finished the sentence.

"Take these clothes down to the fireplace in Becca's room and make sure they are completely burnt. What did you do with your own?" Christine gathered up the garments she'd cut off the Musketeer, exchanging them for more blankets.

"Hid 'em til I can sneak 'em to the trash heap on the next burning day."

"Good. I think it would be prudent for you to return to the stables, we'll manage here."

"I should light you back up to the house."

"Louis will see me home. In the meantime -" Christine rose.

Benoît hastily shifted aside the bundle of stinking clothing as she stretched to hug him.

"Thank you for your assistance, but more than that, your loyalty. I could not have done this without you."

He bore the hug without flinching, though not without trepidation. She was a princess and a duchess; he was a lowly stable hand, even if his position as her personal guard gave him some extra status among the servants. She was his savior in a very real sense, having taken him off the streets of Paris when he'd been no more than five or six. And then she'd fought practically tooth and nail to keep him when her screeching witch of a mother had found him waiting in her personal suite of rooms one afternoon, amusing himself before the mirror on her dressing table by decking himself out in her jewels. That memory was a precious relic he kept locked away tight in a space in his mind reserved for his infatuation with his Madonna. He had grown to manhood without betraying himself, but these incidental hugs were torture.

"And I think you are insane to keep him here on the estate under the duke's nose, but you will do as you please," he said with that air of weary resignation her madder schemes engendered. "I owe you my life, Your Grace, you may do with it as you please. I pray only that you will not let the duke put me on the rack when he finally loses patience with you," he added mournfully.

Christine's low laugh had a slight edge to it. "This could be it, but I will send Moss to warn you so you may take flight if need be. Thank you," she repeated, imbuing her voice with all the genuine gratitude she felt. "The two of you are the best conspirators any patriot of France could ask for."

The old woman harrumphed, Benoît, an odd darkness suffusing his swarthy features even in the dim light of the single oil lamp, fled - sedately - to the shelter of the stairs.

Savoy was tolerant of the odd trio of retainers she'd brought to the marriage; her aging nurse, a blind man, and a youthful page barely ten years younger than the duchess. Christine made sure he never had reason to doubt they were as loyal to Victor as they were to her.

"Wait, Benoît!" Becca called after him. "Before you go, bring up a mug of the chocolate, the pot is in the inglenook."

"Let me get these clothes on the fire and I'll be right back," the young man responded, clattering down the steps.

Christine collected the smelling salts from the basket of supplies she'd brought up; uselessly, since they did not even produce a twitch from their unconscious patient. "Should we try to get a little water into him?"

"No, if the salts won't reach him, he is deeply unconscious. It would be kinder to let him drift away than to choke him to death."

"What do we do then?"

Becca was pulling the edges of the head wound together. "Hold this while I apply the bandage." She had cleaned it thoroughly and patted it dry before applying a bit of arnica. Christine leaned across to pucker the flesh around the wound as Becca expertly placed the gauze, then it smoothed honey around the edge. "He has young flesh, musculature that is firm and well-contoured. Is he as handsome as your husband, my little Wren?" It was her one regret, losing her eyesight; she could no longer ogle the young men.

An inelegant snort met this query. "You know I have eyes only for my husband, dearest one, but yes, he is quite handsome. Dark-haired, with a luxuriant mustache and what must have been a well-groomed beard not too long ago. He's a bit scraggly, but they have been camping on our border for the past ten days. Likely amenities were scarce; I cannot hold his unkemptness against him."

"Christine."

The duchess looked up, meeting the blind gaze directed at her with a rueful smile. "I know, Nana, but what was I to do? I could not just leave him for Victor to find and finish the job, or to die alone in the snow. I do not believe the Musketeers had anything to do with Cluzet'sdisappearance, though perhaps they were sent here as a decoy. If that's the case, it was without their knowledge, for they were as unprepared as raw recruits for the savagery perpetrated upon them. There were twenty dead in the camp, a handful only had drawn weapons."

The milky eyes closed briefly. "Twenty comrades," she breathed as if over her prayer beads. "No wonder the spirit has fled the body's shell."

Christine watched as the old woman reached with absolute accuracy to collect a cold hand, chafing it between her worn, callused palms.

"Turn down the light as low as it will go, we don't want it showing through up here, and collect some hot bricks, then you must go, Wren."

She was back to Wren, the old childhood nickname comforting as a warm blanket. She was only Christine when the subject was a of a serious nature, or prefacing a scold. "Why do you call me Wren?"

"In all these years you have never asked, child. Why not?"

Christine tilted her head consideringly. "I don't know. I suppose because it became such a beloved pet name it never occurred to me to ask its origin."

"Well I will tell you, for it will make you laugh." Becca continued to chafe the warming fingers. "When you were just a wee thing, you were plain as a wren, without even a hint of the beauty that was to be your legacy. You were my little wren from the moment I laid eyes on you, bouncing on your tiny derriere without a stitch of clothing on. You chirped like a baby bird too, whenever someone came into the room, until they picked you up for a cuddle. Plain as a little brown wren, but with such confidence that you would be the center of attention where ever you went. And because of it, you were. It took an age to grow into your father's eyes and your mother's cheekbones, but your unassailable self-assurance was enough until you grew into the traits you inherited from your parents. The combination has turned you into a breathtakingly beautiful woman."

As predicted, it did make Christine laugh. "Oh Nana, you are such a lark!" She laughed merrily. "As if I could ever be breathtakingly beautiful!"

Between them, the blanket-covered Musketeer stirred.

TBC