The Frost of Springtime (2 page)

Perhaps the girl could help him find himself.

Perhaps two orphaned souls could unite as one.

Consumed by his sudden revelation, the dark figure lifted his hand and
attempted to brush a stray curl from her eyes. Jerking free of his touch, she
flinched out of his reach—just as he’d expected she might—behaving like a
mongrel who’d only known beatings. He retreated with a dejected sigh and shook
his face.

“Might I know your name, ma petit?”

“Sofia …” Her voice was little more than a whisper and a true breath of
fresh air.

“Good to know you, my dearest Sofia.” The man inclined his head, gave a
charmingly crooked grin, and clasped a palm to his heart. Aware that everything
had changed, it beat against his ribcage at a rapid pace, the rhythm hard and
strong. “I am Alek.”

Aleksender scooped Sofia into his arms and embraced her bridal style.
Tuned into her pain as if it was his own, he struggled not to inflict further
discomfort upon her injuries. He cradled the child like one might a newborn
babe, instinctively sheltering her from the world.

A strange calm washed over him. It was miraculous. It was beautiful.
Within seconds, she’d melted into his arms.

If a moment of kindness could inspire such contentment, Aleksender
caught himself marveling, what would a lifetime of love bring?

And could he ever bring himself to love another?

The question resolved itself as Sofia nuzzled deeper into his warmth,
stretched her good arm, and curled each limb into a ball.

Soothed like a restless pup, she listened to the melodic drumming of
his heart and surrendered to an adorably large bear yawn. She inhaled his scent
and committed the distinct blend to memory, locking it within the most precious
corner of her soul.

Exotic Persian spices …

A comforting veil descended as peaceful, dreamless sleep claimed her. Aleksender
whispered the eternal vow, his voice beautiful and soothing,
every
word spoken like a lullaby: “You are safe with me, my little Sofia. No harm
shall come of you now.”

CHAPTER
ONE

Spring
of 1871

Coast
of Normandy

Luminous shafts of
orange and red illuminated the limitless morning sky. The horizon was halfway
hidden behind a blanket of swirling clouds and still tucked in for the night.
It was a breathtaking sight to behold. The world was no more than an artistic
canvas, and God had painted a masterpiece. A few stars shined overhead, their
glows absorbed by the imminent sunrise. The North Star was front and center.
And she curtsied in the sky.

A ship’s massive silhouette clashed against the horizon. Cradled by the
ocean’s tide, the vessel approached its port, skimming across Rouen’s leaden
waters in slow and steady movements. Heroes of the Franco-Prussian war lounged
among the clutter of crates, barrels, and weaponry, oblivious to their defeat …
oblivious to the hell in which they were returning. They simply rested in
harmonious silence, lost halfway between dreams and reality.

Aleksender de Lefèvre and Christophe Cleef tapped their beer bottles
and drank in the sunrise. A mild breeze stirred the ship’s billowing sails,
carrying them ever closer to home.

•

Any semblance of peace quickly vanished.

Rouen’s central railway station was packed tight that morning and an
engine of pure chaos. Aleksender and Christophe shoved through the commotion,
tense expressions on their faces and satchels slung over each shoulder.
Mon Dieu
.
There was barely enough space to breathe,
let alone walk.

Thick clouds of smoke ascended into the rafters and flooded
Aleksender’s lungs. Streams of light poured through the above woodwork,
illuminating dust motes that danced about midair. Mourning doves roosted among
those polluted ceiling beams, oblivious to the hustle and bustle, devotedly
preening and nurturing their young squabs. Aleksender squared the wide expanse
of his shoulders and continued his pursuit.

The steam locomotive was hard at work and breathing heavily as it
recovered from a recent round-trip. Aleksender empathized with the thing,
feeling a strange sort of kindred spirit.

Indeed—within seconds, the agony of the past year had struck him in one
fell swoop. Mounting exhaustion claimed every last muscle. A film of sweat
gathered above his brow and blurred his vision. Each step burned more than the
one before it. And the ground below his feet was painful to the touch. It
seemed to be paved with hot coals rather than stones—

“Ah, come now. Look alive, mon ami.” His comrade’s voice sounded surreal,
impossibly distant.

Moments from departure, the locomotive puffed out ribbons of smoke and
blared
its horn in warning. Aleksender and Christophe
muttered a unified curse and picked up their strides.

Anywhere was better than this limbo.

Alas, Aleksender had half-expected to be greeted by Charon, Hades’
personal ferryman—the infamous seaman who escorted the souls of the dead into
the Underworld. And instead of paying passage with coins of gold, they’d offer
two clammy pieces of parchment.

Aleksender blinked away the beads of sweat. Upside-down words,
Chermin de Fer
de Rouen—Voiture,
were slightly smudged and damp with perspiration
marks. He and Christophe beelined through the maze of swishing skirts and worn
helmets, hearts madly pounding, those one-way tickets balanced between their
fingertips.

Overhead the silhouette of an eagle emerged from a black haze of smoke.
Mindless of his friend’s glower, Aleksender stopped dead in his tracks, brushed
away his forelock, and marveled at the vision. Colossal wings were curved into
two elegant arches as if preparing to take flight. But the creature remained
unnaturally still. It was a shadow kissed by coils of smoke, a sinister force
that had come with the tenth plague of Egypt, hovering high above the station
like the Angel of Death.

Wearing a scowl that could only be described as weary, Christophe
socked Aleksender’s shoulder and urged him into motion. A set of dog tags
dangled from his neck and clashed against the uniform’s navy hue. The tags
tinkled with the delicacy of tin cymbals, manipulated by each shift in his body
weight. The sound irritated Aleksender. It reminded him of nails on a
chalkboard. Or, more appropriately, like nails raking against the inside of a
coffin—

“Stand there like that and I reckon we’ll never see Paris again.” The
train whistled another warning and pumped out furls of smoke. Christophe
scoffed, massaging the arch of his chin in a nervous gesture. “What in the
devil has gotten into you? Would you—”

Aleksender silently shoved past Christophe and claimed the lead. He
half-expected the eagle to descend from the rafters at any given moment. But
the illusion faded away with each of his steps—unveiling that bird of prey for
what it truly was.
“The Imperial War flag.”

Or rather, the symbol of the Imperial War flag.

Christophe rotated in the direction of Aleksender’s voice with a grin
and arched brow. Murmuring a pained grunt, he adjusted the satchel’s strap. The
leather was pliable and soft with age, though fully capable of leaving a solid
welt in its wake. “Ah. So it is …” A chuckle rumbled low in Christophe’s
throat. “Bit of an ugly thing, eh?”

Aleksender said nothing. Firmly rooted in place, he held his breath and
surveyed the station in its entirety. For the first time, he really drank in
his surroundings.

And the truth was a knife to his throat.

An overall sense of discontentment tainted the air. Hordes of Prussian soldiers
infested nearly every square foot, outnumbering members of the French military
three-to-one. Aleksender felt strangely out of his element—as if he was
intruding upon his own home. He cursed and blotted away beads of sweat with the
side of his cufflink. “What horror have we returned to?”

His words were lost to the surrounding din. From wall to wall, a wave
of excitement had flooded the station. Men, women and children eagerly huddled
about as they contended for a proper viewing spot of the building action. A
little boy was lifted onto his father’s shoulders, granting him a bird’s-eye
view as the scene unfolded. The competition was ruthless. In a single instant,
Aleksender had returned to the damn battlefield.

Laying down the rifle and satchel, he extended each limb and inhaled a
deep groan. He was more than a bit grateful for the delay. As he’d expected,
his comrade flocked to the drama, behaving like some petty spinster rather than
a veteran of war.

And what spectacular drama it was. Within moments, the surrounding
madness escalated to a full-blown riot. A handsome, young couple was hustled
from the train in order to make room for two Prussians. A tangle of protests
and empty threats filled the station as France’s citizens flocked to the
couple’s defense.

“My sincerest apologies, madame, monsieur,” the guard mumbled without
an inkling of sympathy in his voice. He led them down the three wooden steps
and onto the platform.

The lady twisted on her fine heels. Her fair complexion flushed deeply,
gloved hands strangling the parasol like twin manacles. “You dare turn us out
for those savages!?
Those … those common Visigoths!”

“Don’t fret, darling,” crooned the husband as he caressed her arm with
calculated strokes. “We shall catch the next one without delay.”

She jerked free of his touch, lips hooked into a fierce scowl and
pretty eyes blazing. An arm was propped on either side of her hip as she hotly
spoke. “Why, I never took you for a coward till this moment! I suppose Father
was right about you, after all.”

The faintest blush singed the gentleman’s cheekbones. Leaning on his
walking stick like an old man, he cleared his throat and shrunk two full sizes.
“Now, see here, darling, I simply—”

“How can you be so shameless? Why, I’ve half a mind to board the first
ship out of this wretched place and never look back!”

Suspended above this melodrama was Prussia’s black and white flag.
Fluttering amongst a smoky sea of ashes, it hung in the midst of France’s
greatest railway station without a trace of honor.

A true angel of death,
Aleksender
inwardly mused.

And that blackened eagle had confirmed his deepest, darkest
premonition: the war was far from over.

The bloodshed had only just begun.

•

Dawn was almost fully broken an hour later. Flittering street lamps
cast rings of light that were lost to sunrays. The long streams oozed through
Paris’s ancient buildings and monuments, awarding the city with an unworldly
quality.

Aleksender and Christophe wandered the cobblestone walkways in
uniformed silence. All around them society was waking for the day. The town
baker rolled his cart, whistling a merry tune, the bread rolls still warm and
steaming. Men and women opened up shop and greeted awaiting clientele. This
spectacular show of normalcy was contradicted by countless barricades—a handful
of which clogged alleyways and blocked store entrances.

Together, Aleksender and Christophe observed Paris like it was a
foreign land. And in a most strange way, it was.

Indeed, a black plague had consumed every inch of Paris since she’d
been under siege only months before. The war had left the city isolated from
the rest of France and in a state of purgatory. Monarchy was dead, the
government virtually useless, and citizens overcome with poverty and despair.
Cries of revolution had spawned as the National Guard took charge, enlisting
persons of all ages and social classes to stand at Paris’s defense. It was a
militia created and sustained by the people—and a force that opposed France’s
formal army.

Early stirrings of civil war had broken out between Parisians and the
military of Versailles. And this so-called peace, a sentiment that comes with
the ending of war, was nothing less than a mockery of Paris’s former elegance.

Blaring signs of chaos were everywhere—the beggars, abandoned
buildings, rundown whores, starving children, filthy sidewalks.

Christophe’s voice finally broke the pressing quiet. “My shop better be
alive and well. I got no chit awaitin’ my return. Only a couple knives, saws,
an’ clamps to keep me warm at night. Be a damn pity to lose the one thing I can
rightfully call my own.”

A tight and poignant chuckle inflated Aleksender’s lungs. “I doubt such
a thing matters with the whole of Paris good and dead.”

Aleksender drew toward one of the wrecked shops and studied its
emaciated and skeletal frame. The windows had been shattered, exposing
lightless and gutted insides. Out-of-doors, the red freedom flag hung from the
structure’s aged planks like a bloody omen. Christophe fondled the scarlet
linen, scanning the various nooks and crannies that lay beyond the battered
walls.

Observing his friend’s silent awe, Aleksender stepped back and adjusted
his satchel. Christophe Cleef was thirty-five years old, though a bit of a
child himself. Blessed with boyish good looks and the devil’s charm, he did not
see France’s swift surrender as defeat; he rather saw it as an opportunity to
inspire much-needed change within his beloved home. Like so many before him, he
was blinded by idealistic thoughts and would stop at nothing to see them carried
out.

Aleksender certainly did not see eye-to-eye with his comrade’s
whimsical perspective of the world. He rather thought Christophe’s grand ideas
were downright ridiculous—the ambitious musings of a deluded idiot. Such
passion was both a blessing and curse.

“What a pity,” Aleksender
mumbled,
his voice
icy and void of remorse. “The people insist on bringing about their own
destruction.”

•

Christophe shot Aleksender a look and hastened his steps. As usual, he remained
mute and turned a deaf ear to his friend’s cynicism. He shook his face and
rounded the maimed structure, an all-too-familiar resentment thrumming through
his veins. He desperately needed space—a breath of fresh air. The temptation to
lash out at his comrade was just too great. And that was one territory he
didn’t wish to revisit any time soon.

As Christophe continued his investigation of Paris, the street
narrowed, enclosing his body between wood and stone. Steam from a nearby
workshop fogged his vision and curled around his limbs, urging him forward. His
hair grew heavy with condensation as he waded through the dense cloud.

All around him, sunrays speared through splintered planks and
illuminated the ornaments that decorated his military coat. The assortment of
bronze and silver shone in the early morning light and contrasted against the
uniform’s deep hue. Lost within a strain of thought, Christophe paused in his
tracks and inclined his chin. A burst of pride instantly overcame him.