Chapter Two: The Form of My Intent
Muttering the alphabet to herself, Jacqueline stared into the swirling coffee, her third cup of the morning. Forced to begin the day at the same unholy hour as the rest of the Musketeers even though she had no assigned duties that day, Jacqueline had dressed by feel and staggered across the rain-soaked street to Café Nouveau. One of a handful of patrons, and the only Musketeer, she had sat at the bar.
Ramon and Siroc had patrol that day. She had not seen d'Artagnan since the night before and assumed he had never returned from his date. Jacqueline grinned, hoping she could manage to be present when Captain Duval caught his prodigy sneaking back into headquarters. In her two weeks with the Musketeers, she'd learned that the Captain tended to conduct his dressings down in public and at a high volume.
After taking another gulp of coffee, Jacqueline reached up to rub her right shoulder, wrenched during fencing practice the other day. The last-ditch lunge had gotten through her adversary's guard, though, and earned her the applause of the assembled trainees. She grinned again at the memory, and looked up into a blast of warm, moist air, redolent with yeast and butter.
The door behind the counter, presumably leading from the kitchen, had ejected a round-faced young man of medium height wearing a floppy toque and white apron. Seeing her at the bar, he grimaced and undid his apron strings. Yanking the floury garment over his head dislodged the hat, so both got tossed under the bar as he slammed back into the kitchen. Frowning, Jacqueline watched him go and return with a tray of squarish, golden pastries.
"Try one of these for me?" Taking one himself, he slid the tray across the bar.
Jacqueline picked a bun up and stared at it for a moment before carefully biting in. The tender, buttery layers of pastry separated easily and the filling, unfamiliar but delicious, tasted of heaven. "It's good," she mumbled, trying to keep the gooey brown stuff from dripping down her chin. "What is it?"
"I haven't decided yet. Either pattissé Etienne or pain au chocolat." He looked critically down at the tray. "I've just created them."
Jacqueline took another bite, gesturing with the bun. "Do you work here?" It was a terribly obvious question, but the fellow had plied her with free pastry, so Jacqueline felt the need to at least keep up her end of the conversation.
"Baker and sous-chef: I do everything except give the orders." He shrugged, picking at the pastry.
"And you're a Musketeer." The non-question cut through the conversation, formerly as light as the pastry they discussed, turning it serious. "I've seen you in here before with the others."
Mouth full of pastry, Jacqueline shrugged. "So?" She took another bite, not sure where he was going. His expression, half fearful and half hoping, puzzled her.
"Noret!" A voice bellowed through the open kitchen door, and the boy's fierce, intense eyes blazed for a moment. "I've got to go," he said, sounding slightly strangled. "I'm glad there's another one." And, retrieving his apron and tugging his hat back over his shock of blond hair, he ducked back into the kitchen.
Jacqueline stared after him, the mouthful of pastry sticking in her throat. What had he meant, 'another one'? She had half a mind to barge into the kitchen and make him explain, but a loud, one-sided argument had begun on the other side of the door, which was still ajar, the shouting directed, Jacqueline thought, at 'Noret' rather than coming from him. She stayed frozen where she was, thinking furiously.
Could he possibly have seen through her disguise? Jacqueline could not imagine adding this boy, who had been quite nice, to the list below Mimou, whose perception and kindness still made her smile, and d'Artagnan, who had only guessed with the evidence before him and Gerard to explain. Unable to completely ignore this possibility, she at least put d'Artagnan out of her head, but even forcibly evicting him made her wonder whether he'd said or done something at the café, with or without her present, that had broadcast his knowledge of her gender to Noret, who might have been watching.
Spitting her sticky mouthful into a napkin, Jacqueline told herself to calm down. She interacted with men every day, and none of them had realized who—'what'—she was. This one, a comparative stranger, couldn't possibly have. 'Not possibly,' she told herself, willing her pounding heart slower. 'He must have meant another "Musketeer". D'Artagnan probably picks on him.'
Booting d'Artagnan a second time, she gathered up her sword and baldric and shouldered her way out of the rapidly filling café. Outside, it had begun to rain again. Pressed back under the eaves, Jacqueline turned her collar up, tucked her sword under her jacket, and prepared to wait it out.
Five minutes later, the downpour had only grown heavier, and a leaky gutter had dropped a stream of icy water down the back of her neck. Deciding she couldn't get any wetter, Jacqueline made a dash across the street, dodging a carriage and a ragged animal of indeterminate specie, to blessed refuge in Musketeer headquarters.
Despite the terrible weather, the building was relatively empty, so Jacqueline managed to avoid encounters and questions as she headed toward her room. On the way, though, she passed the door that lead to Siroc's laboratory and paused.
The place 'did' need a good cleaning, and doing so would be more useful than sulking in her room or doing drills in the gymnasium, her usual cure for boredom. Without Siroc there, she'd be able to get a lot done, and give him a nice surprise when he returned from patrol. After checking the corridor, she opened the door and paused again, hand hovering over the gas switch, vision of fireballs dancing through her head. She decided to make do with the overcast sunlight streaming through the windows and light some candles.
They did little more than define the shadows cast by towering piles of books and shifting paper landslides. Elaborately haphazard constructions of glassware barely glinted, but here and there metal gleamed off models and instruments. A fine layer of chalk dust covered everything, especially thick beneath the blackboards, while soot filled the forge, heavy with old coal. Jacqueline took a deep breath and rolled up her sleeves.
It was just like home, where she'd cleaned when she didn't want to think or was tired of crying, when Gerard wouldn't duel with her or another boy had made his intentions known to her father. She began on a bookshelf near the door, removing beakers, tubes, and the odd teacup, knocking dust onto the floor and standing books upright. The space got filled with books from workbench piles, and Jacqueline shifted the equipment to the now-empty benches, piling the crockery by the door.
She moved around the room this way until the proper things stood in what she hoped were their proper places, and then set to work on the snowdrifts of paper, arranging the stacks, as they might have been originally, into piles that looked more or less related. This was more miss than hit, as Jacqueline couldn't read the contents, and, she thought, probably wouldn't have understood them if she had been able to.
Even though she'd left the chalkboards alone and hadn't touched the loft, Jacqueline was nearly wading through the dust by the time she'd worked her way over to the forge. It, at least, she could deal with competently. New coal replaced the spent, as well as most of the soot, and though she itched to light it into life, she resisted.
After searching for and finding an Erlenmeyer flask full of what was probably water, she sprinkled it around to settle the dust and set about driving it into a pile with a broom she'd unearthed behind the forge. Retrieving what might once have been a wastebasket, she set about shoveling the debris inside. Back to the door, she heard it open, and craned her neck to see d'Artagnan stick his head inside.
"Well, I like what you've done with the place," he said, checking the corridor behind him. "Mind if I come in?"
"Yes." Jacqueline continued sweeping.
"Jacques, please!" he hissed, desperation contorting face and voice. "Captain Duval is after my blood!" And indeed, the sound of a limp and the tap of a cane echoed down the hall.
Jacqueline grinned and picked up the overflowing bin. "Serves you right." Opening the door, she shoved it into his arms. "Take care of that for me, would you?" And, with an angelic smile, she closed the door in his face, holding the knob and pushing against his frantic rattling. The thumping drew nearer, and then stopped.
She heard d'Artagnan clear his throat. "Hello, sir. You're looking well."
"I can't say the same for you, d'Artagnan. Perhaps that's why you couldn't be bothered to appear at muster this morning: you were sick?"
Again the throat clearing and a thud as d'Artagnan set the bin down. "I feel fine, sir."
"Good, because I hear the dungeons need another thorough cleaning. I think you're well enough to start on that bright and early tomorrow morning."
Jacqueline laughed so hard she nearly missed d'Artagnan's mumbled, "Yes, sir."
When she could stand upright again, she looked around with satisfaction at the laboratory, as organized as she could get it without Siroc's input. It was certainly clean. Grinning, she pulled a stool over to last night's chalkboard and began to study the alphabet.
She was just thinking of taking a lunch break when the door opened again and Siroc came in. Three steps into the room his expression went from preoccupied to horrified. "Jacques? What—"
She levered herself up and gestured at the room, smiling encouragingly. "Place needed a good cleaning. Thought I'd help."
"You- you-" he closed his eyes in incredulity for a moment, and then looked around again, his expression growing more pained by the minute. "You put all the books back on the shelves! My experiments! And my papers!"
Jacqueline's smile evaporated as he moved around the room, touching things compulsively. "I didn't break anything or throw anything away."
Brows drawn, Siroc frowned at the carefully arranged models, lips pressed tightly together, and then at Jacqueline. She shrugged helplessly, sheepish without knowing why, and tried to hang onto the fact that she hadn't done anything wrong.
"I had a system going here, and now I won't be able to find anything!" He slammed a fist down on a workbench, making the glassware jump.
"Siroc, I-" She stopped, unsure whether to apologize or argue, not really wanting to do either.
"Jacques, when I said I needed an assistant, this wasn't what I meant," he explained, now more exasperated than angry.
Opening her mouth to explain that that wasn't why she'd done it, that she'd only meant to help and be nice and say thank you, Jacqueline stopped, wondering at the masculinity of such statements. She could only look at Siroc and hope, as she had the night before, that her eyes would convey the meaning.
It didn't work. He tossed a lock of hair out of his eyes and stared around once more, expression as blank as glass. "Go. Just go."
Jacqueline fled, on the verge of tears, and did not look back.