The Wolves of Paris (32 page)

“But who opened the lock?” he asked in a low voice.

Even his whisper carried along the tunnel.

“Never mind,” Simon said. “Hurry. He’s getting away.”

As the two friars continued ahead, Marco grabbed Lorenzo’s arm and shot him another look.

Don’t take your eyes off him.

Lorenzo nodded his understanding.

There had been a traitor. Courtaud may carry some dark magic—the ability to hide himself in shadow—but they’d spotted the wolves jumping out of Nemours’s chatelet into the moat. They couldn’t fly. So how had they penetrated the fortress in the first place? How had they crossed the raised drawbridge over the moat, passed between the pair of towers at the gate, and slipped through the lowered portcullis to attack the castle interior?

Someone must have helped them. Lorenzo had suspected as much for some time, but he couldn’t figure out who or why. It didn’t make sense. Giuseppe had been chained in the dungeon, and everyone else was either a guard or servant, untouched at that point by the wolves, or from the party that had fled in terror along the road while packs of wolves leaped at their sleigh to drag them off and eat them.

When Lorenzo saw Simon standing there uninjured, untouched by the battle, everything came together. Simon hadn’t faced attack on the sleigh, either. Hadn’t fought the wolves at any time. Why?

Lucrezia’s letter to the Dominicans was the key—Lorenzo should have guessed it before. To complete her plan and turn her husband into a wolf, unable to change back to human form, she’d needed a correct translation of the Slavonic. A doctor at the university had pointed her to the Dominican monastery of Saint-Jacques.

Who had done the translation? Lorenzo had assumed it was one of the young monks he’d seen copying manuscripts—perhaps one of them was from the Slavic east, where they spoke the tongue. He had a better idea now.

Lucrezia’s note had alerted Montguillon to the witchcraft afoot in Paris. It had also given a young friar even more sinister ideas. Simon had the incantation. He searched Saint-Jacques’s own library, perhaps far beyond, and found another copy of the manuscript on sorcery possessed by Lucrezia’s husband. And there was more, wasn’t there? Additional information from the Moravian manuscript, the notes by the monk pursued by wolf men.

Intrigued by the forbidden knowledge, it seemed that Simon had found a way to contact the wolves. Had put himself in league with their evil schemes. He let them into the chatelet, and opened a passage for them from the catacombs beneath the Cité to the crypts and from there into the heart of the cathedral. In return, they left him alone. Perhaps they had exchanged promises.

Lorenzo didn’t know how much of this Marco had figured out. Enough.

“You know your way through these catacombs,” Montguillon said to Simon. “How is that?”

“The blood, look.”

Simon lowered his torch. Splatters of red marked the ground.

“You have a good eye,” the prior said.

“And I can smell it. The scent is hanging in the air. The red wolf—all of them. They passed this way. It stinks of them. Don’t you smell it too?”

“It’s dank, but I don’t smell any wolf. Not even bones anymore, but maybe your nose is stronger than mine.”

Montguillon held up his torch and a strange expression came over his face.

Not now,
Lorenzo thought.

Why couldn’t the older Dominican keep his doubts to himself for a few more minutes, until they came to the end of this passageway and figured out where Courtaud had escaped?

“What are you saying?” Simon said.

“I’m saying I’m curious,” Montguillon answered. “You’re so sure down here in the dark. As if you have been here before.”

“We don’t have time for this,” Lorenzo said. “Hurry on.”

“No,” the prior said. He gripped his staff tightly in his hands. “Don’t you wonder, both of you? How does this young brother know? There are branches, it leads us deeper. Where are we going and how is Simon so sure of foot if he hasn’t been down here before?”

“Leave it alone,” Marco said. “Go on, Simon. Find us this beast so we can destroy it.”

If Simon recognized he’d been caught out, not only by his spiritual father, but by the two Italians, he didn’t show it. Instead, he led them on, moving at a swifter pace. The friar certainly seemed eager to help. And maybe he was regretting his actions now. He’d let the wolves into the cathedral and maybe he was anxious to see them dead so as to hide his crime.

Lorenzo was inclined to follow. The young man wasn’t armed, except with a torch. Marco and Lorenzo had swords, and even the prior carried his staff. A bigger risk was that Simon would lead them into a trap, but Lorenzo didn’t think so. Courtaud was alone now, and wounded. What kind of trap could it be?

As they continued, water dripped from the ceiling and ran in rivulets down the wall. A thick, humid miasma coated his throat and nostrils, carrying a muddy, rotten smell like a freshly opened coffin dug up from a church graveyard.

He was getting ready to order Simon to stop and explain himself when they came around the corner and there he was. Courtaud, the red wolf. Injured and cornered.

Chapter Thirty-two

Lucrezia and Martin braced themselves while Rigord attacked the door to the tower roof. It shuddered. The hinges groaned where the bolts secured them to the stone. For blow after blow it held. But for how much longer?

“I lost my dagger,” she said. Her shaking voice betrayed her fear. “Do you have another weapon?”

“No, my lady.”

Martin didn’t take his eyes from the shaking door. His sword trembled in his hand.

“A dagger, a knife? Anything?”

“No, I am sorry.”

Boom.
The shock echoed through the door. The hinges moved visibly this time. Behind, snarling, clawing.
Boom.

The chill air continued to swirl and bluster. It carried her hair up around her face and flapped her cloak like the frantic beating of a swallow’s wings. If only it were. If only they could leap from the tower and fly away to safety. Instead, only the cold, hard ice of the river on one side and on the other the frozen dirt of the street.

I’ll do it,
she thought.
If he breaks through, I’ll hurl myself from the tower. He won’t get me.

No, that was wrong. Martin had a sword and he would die protecting her. Like Fournier had died, defending the sleigh. And Demetrius in the corridor at the bottom of the tower. And her dear, sweet dogs: Cicero, driving wolves from her house, and Tullia, who threw herself at Rigord in a final, desperate attempt to stop him. Martin may die, but she wouldn’t stand by while it happened. If only she hadn’t lost her dagger, she might give an accounting of herself.

The pounding stopped. For a moment she dared to hope, then a low, throaty growl came from the other side.

“I smell your fear.” Rigord’s voice was rusty metal on stone. “The scent of your blood fills my nostrils. The others dead, every one of them. Their flesh fills my belly. They died in terror and pain. Screaming. It sweetens their meat.”

Rage, red and hot, filled her head.

“And where’s your pack?” Lucrezia answered. “The wolves you cultivated, your followers—all gone. Swords through their throats, heads chopped off like vermin. Run through with spears. Dead, every filthy one of them.”

“I’ll raise a new pack,” he said. “You won’t be so fortunate.”

“Idiot. You forgot Courtaud. He’s still growing. You’ll be even weaker. He’ll kill you.” She laughed. “No, you’re going to die in this tower. Look! There are men with torches running toward the house. Armed men. Only a few streets away. Up here!” she shouted. “Help!”

Her words enraged Rigord. He attacked the door with renewed ferocity. Again and again he beat against the solid wood. His snarl turned to a howl.

It was a lie anyway. There were no men running, no city watch in breastplates and carrying pikes and swords. The streets remained as dark and silent as ever. She only hoped that she’d been wrong about Courtaud as well, that Lorenzo and the others had trapped them like rats within the walls of Notre Dame, to hunt and kill until the pack was utterly destroyed.

“I shouldn’t have said that,” she murmured. “Shouldn’t have angered him.”

“He’s coming anyway,” Martin said. “Nothing will change that.”

No, nothing. When men came, and they certainly would, as these wolves couldn’t destroy the entire city in a single night, they might catch Rigord feasting on all these bodies. The blood lust had consumed him, devoured all reason.

The door must hold. It must.

“I smell you!” Rigord shouted. Frustration and anger sounded in his voice. His breath panted on the other side. He let out a low moan that climbed and dropped in pitch until it became a howl that raised the hairs on her neck.

Lucrezia felt her clothing and body for brooches or even a ring with a scratching surface. A pin, anything with a sharp point. No, there was nothing. She groped along the crenelated wall encircling the top of the tower. Searching for a loose stone to use as a club. She found one that wiggled in place and she clawed at the mortar to free it.

Boom.
The door cracked with a terrific groan. It shuddered and split down the center. Rigord roared and redoubled his efforts. The door shook. A clawed hand broke through the split with a shower of splinters. Martin cursed and lunged forward with his sword. It drew blood and the arm withdrew. The beast on the other side howled in rage and pain. Then he attacked the door again.

One of Lucrezia’s fingernails broke, but she was scraping away the old, flaking mortar, little by little, trying to shake the stone free. It loosened. A moment longer, just a moment. One of the hinges broke loose with a scream of tortured metal and popping bolts. The door shivered and then the split broke it in two. Rigord shoved his snout through the gap.

Martin shouted a battle cry and leaped forward with his sword whistling through the air. But this time his enemy was ready. He jerked backward and the sword bit into the broken wood. Martin pried it loose as the door rocked back and forth. A second hinge popped loose. Then the third.

Rigord burst through, holding the shattered remains of the door. It was in three flapping pieces, held together by a few stubborn fibers. He hurled it over the edge of the tower. It spun as it fell, then smashed onto the frozen river with a boom.

Lucrezia gave the stone a final heave. It didn’t come loose. Still too much mortar. If only she had another few minutes. She fell back with a cry of frustration.

Rigord stood panting and snarling. He reared to his full height—seven, eight feet tall. The muscles on his fur-covered, stretched arms bulged as large as a man’s thigh. His clawed hands clenched and unclenched. Blood and gore caked his muzzle. It was a monster that stood before them.

He had torn through the men in the chamber below as if they were children armed with sharpened sticks. The wounds that bloodied his shoulders and haunches seemed nothing to him. Martin stood before him, trembling and small, his sword pitiful in the face of those claws.

Martin charged with a cry. The wolf man slapped away the thrusting sword. His claw raked Martin’s arm as it came across and the man flew backward. His sword fell to the ground and Rigord stomped his paw down to pin it in place. Martin lay against the wall, bleeding heavily from his arm, stunned and moaning. Rigord lifted his head and howled.

He turned his ravenous gaze on Lucrezia. His mouth opened, a deep gaping hole, rimmed with teeth, each as long as her little finger and as sharp as a blade. Teeth for tearing, not chewing. Backed by jaws strong enough that they’d crunched off Demetrius’s face in a single bite. And the hunger in those eyes . . .

Now! Jump. Cheat him of his victory.

Lucrezia backed against the battlement and wrapped her fingers around the outer lip of the wall, ready to fall back through one of the lower embrasures and let herself fall. It would have to be quick. All Rigord needed to do was stretch his claws and grab her throat. Her other hand went to her neck, where she felt the clasp of her cloak. And even then, her fingers groped desperately at the little jeweled nub, as if willing it to have a chunk of metal or something sharp to defend herself with. The cloak came loose.

Her eyes shot to Martin’s sword. Rigord had stepped clear and it lay on the stone, gleaming in the moonlight. Martin was on his knees, trying to regain his feet.

“Martin!” she cried.

Without waiting to see if he would act, or if he were even capable, Lucrezia swept off her cloak. She jumped toward Rigord with her arms swinging high, the edges of the cloak clenched in her fists. The cloak encircled the beast’s head. He roared and swiped with his claws. It was a blind grope, but his claws tore through the edge of her gown and nearly ripped it clean from her body. The wind flapped the cloak in the air and he struggled to get it off his head. It came off in pieces, shredded, while he howled in rage.

Martin regained his feet and lurched forward.

“The sword!” she screamed.

His right arm dangled uselessly. He’d have to use his left. Only a moment and Rigord would be free.
Hurry!

Martin lowered his head and charged. He didn’t go for the sword, but wrapped his arms around the wolf man and drove him backward with a cry. Rigord got the cloak free and turned his head to bite. But Martin already had him against the edge of the wall. For a moment they hung there, one driving to the edge, the other with claws screeching against the stone as he tried to gain purchase. They teetered for an instant, balanced. Rigord lifted his head, eyes wild. He turned back to Lucrezia, just long enough that she could tell he recognized the look of mixed triumph, fear, and worry in her eyes.

Then the balance shifted. They fell, still flailing. She was alone on top of the tower.

“Martin!” she cried. “No!”

A terrific crack split the air—the sound of breaking ice.

Lucrezia ran to the edge in horror. Martin and the beast lay motionless atop the frozen surface of the river, still locked in each other’s embrace. A web of cracks spread from the impact, but they hadn’t broken through to the water below. She stared down in horror, willing Martin to rise. He would climb shakily to his feet, kick the dead wolf man in disgust, then limp for the shore. Even though it had been a hundred feet or more, somehow Rigord’s body had cushioned the fall.