Chapter XXV
XXV
Eastern Tournel, France
Jacques forced another dripping chunk of deer heart into his mouth, gagging.
He knelt over the animal’s carcass where it had fallen among the pine needles, its head blasted almost clean away by my musket. In the chill of the autumnal forest, he belched steam like a dragon, screwing up his face against the urge to vomit.
“Quickly now, sir—don’t stop.” I knelt beside him, my hunting knife still wet with the deer’s blood.
“I need. Just a moment,” he gasped, glancing back through the trees to where the horse and wagon waited, perhaps a hundred yards away.
Over the past week—had it only been a week?
—this had become our habit; I would make a kill and then bring him to it, to do what must be done.
Thankfully, the road cut through deep forest and I seldom had to go far to find him a beating heart.
“Very well, but only a moment. I have told you; it must be alive or it will do you no good.”
“The thing is still moving, Professor—I assure you it is still alive.”
I looked appraisingly at the heart in his hands; as he said, it was still twitching weakly, and there were glimmers of golden anima swimming within it.
I turned away quickly; Sarmodel’s obscene appetite was bringing me very close to devouring it myself.
“Excellent. Eat. If you do not, I will have no choice but to chain you again, as we discussed.”
And what about me? Sarmodel asked. Are we going to give every drop of anima to the young lord while we starve? I’m hungry, Sebastian, and I know that means you’re hungry too.
I am. But Jacques comes first, I’m afraid.
I watched hungrily, making sure Jacques finished the heart, down to the last arterial scrap. He swallowed, heaving, and then bolted down water from his flask.
“Well done, sir,” I said. “The voice?”
“Quiet again. For now.”
“I am pleased.” I handed him a rag. “Clean your face and your vest before we head back—you are a horror.”
Jacques complied and then threw the rag back at me. “Professor, how much longer until we reach Gévaudan? I cannot take much more of this.”
“We will be there very soon, sir,” I said. “Now please, try to calm yourself. Breathe deeply and slowly, as we have practiced. You must avoid becoming agitated.”
“And you are certain I can be cured?”
“I am.”
Sebastian, is it wise to lie to the young lord?
I think he has enough to worry about. Let him believe it for now.
Or—let me finish—you could kill him and be done.
“Come, sir,” I said to Jacques. “I apologize that we must keep moving, but neither of us will survive long should the snows catch us. Do you need a moment to rest?”
“No . . . no. It gets easier each time.” Jacques shook his head, defeated, and I assisted him back through the trees to the wagon.
We were—finally—out of the Alps, and the memory of Aherin’s brutal demise was no longer so fresh. Winter was following us out of the mountains, however, and we woke each morning to a bitter white frost; it was set to be a very cold return to Ocerne.
“Will you continue your story, Professor?” Jacques asked as we resumed our journey. “Though it is an ungodly tale, I cannot bear the silence.”
“It was an ungodly business, I’m afraid—as you well know, sir,” I told him.
Jacques was quiet for a moment, his eyes thoughtful as the wagon wheels creaked beneath him. “I don’t understand. My father—how could he keep all this from us?”
“I cannot answer for him. We parted on bad terms, as I’m sure you have deduced. But he has his reasons,” I said. “Just as the other survivors do.”
“It is strange to hear you speak so of the Gévaudanais. Père Arnaud and the others—these are people I have known since I was a child. It is as though they lived other lives, to have seen these things and never once spoken of them to me.” He shook his head.
“How is it possible? The good père held mass at the chateau only weeks ago. Comtois the cheesemaker’s wagon is still first to the market every month.
And Mademoiselle Cecile still makes her tisanes and poultices, of course. ”
Oh her, said Sarmodel, with sudden bile. I was sure she’d be warming the bowels of her familiar by now.
“Truly?” I said. “And how fares the sage-femme of Saint-Julien?”
“Cecile? Well, she is still our midwife—she was there at my birth, and I have no doubt she will be there for my firstborn as well.”
Jacques looked as though he would go on, but then stopped talking abruptly, his lips pressed firmly together. My suspicion was roused immediately.
“I should very much like to pay the midwife a visit—I believe she can help us.” Apart from Antoine or perhaps the Bishop of Mende, Cecile the sage-femme was the only person in Gévaudan with any knowledge of the Beast’s true nature.
She might be very helpful with a number of questions I had, if I could get her to speak to me.
“We will pass through Saint-Julien on the way to the chateau. Perhaps Mademoiselle Cecile will be more amenable to guests this time—unless you object, sir?”
Jacques looked as though he did indeed want to object, but he simply nodded.
“Very well. Now—where was I?”
“You destroyed the bridge—which took us years to rebuild, incidentally—and crushed the Beast with one of your unholy tricks. But that is not how it died.”
“No, of course not,” I said. “That happened later, at the Bow and Brace, as you know.”
“So tell me, then—how did you allow the Beast to escape from beneath a thousand tons of stone?” I noted with unease that, in spite of his revulsion, he absently licked his lips, picking up the last traces of blood from his beard.
“Very well, sir. Take another measure of your tonic and I will continue—I fear you will need it.”