The Wolf Esprit: Lykanos Chronicles 3
Chapter Thirty-One

From behind me, a struggling whimper echoed through the salon. I turned to see a sentry bring in a chained prisoner, their hooded face handled cruelly by the throat. It was a woman, and though covered in coarse, loose-fitting cloth, I could see she was very much pregnant.

“You know this human?” Archambault said, and I turned around once I realized he still spoke to me. “They seized her from the camp outside of Saulieu, where our wolves captured you.”

He nodded to the sentry, who lifted off the woman’s burlap hood to show her face. A crude slip of fabric gagged her, but this did not stop her from releasing a wounded cry of terror when she beheld the wolf towering over her. Through the tangle of her brown locks of curls, I saw Thérèse, and my heart fell with disbelief.

With the same look of horror, I turned back to the marquis. I didn’t know if she’d recognized me, terrified by the sight of the monstrous wolf that held her, or the room full of men who gawked with their sinister appraisal. But I knew I had to do everything I could to stop them.

“You know her, then?” Archambault said, no doubt feeling the anguish that flooded me upon seeing my beloved friend in her horrified frenzy. “Who is she to you?”

“Please, my lord, I beg you to release her at once. She’s not one of us and doesn’t deserve your wrath. If you must punish me for giving you offense, I beg you to spare her from it.” The sting of tears blurred my eyes.

“Yes, of course,” he answered. “If you know her and care for her as you so clearly do, I will spare her from the kitchens.”

“Thank you, my lord. I’ll do whatever you ask of me. Only, please release her.”

“You have my word, child. She will go free this very day. I’ll even order her memories erased. They’ll return her to her family unharmed. Both she and her unborn child will live in peace of lycan-kind. All I ask is that you tell me the source of your pack leader’s power.”

I faltered.

“My lord, I don’t understand. The source of it?”

“Yes, child, the source. You heard our debate. The Vicomté believes your pack leader derived her exceptional abilities by some nefarious means—from Lucifer himself. Don Lupofiero posits those powers were handed down or stolen from the Devil of Milan, your grandsire, whom Lupofiero slew in service to God in Heaven.”

I jerked my head toward the man, not comprehending what the marquis claimed of him.

“Both lords agree that such power comes only to the ancient among us. All in this room agree with that belief, which leaves little room for disagreement: she possesses her powers by some ill-gotten means. My question to you is how? What is the source of her powers?”

My legs trembled. I was desperate to tell him the truth but realized he wanted to understand something I knew nothing about.

“My lord, I’ve told you what I know—only what she told me. She was born with exceptional talents, and they grew as she faced her enemies. She told me about a den in the alps that took Father and her captive. They tortured Gabrielle there, and her wolf unleashed its unknown fury as she suffered to rescue them both. She said those powers only came to her when she needed them—something her father once declared was possible for all of us.”

Archambault’s face, once lit with an empathetic concern for my well-being, swallowed now to the edge of anger.

“I can tell plainly that you believe what you say. But still, you keep something from us. Something about how those gifts work for her. Must I make myself better understood to loosen your tongue? Must I have your beloved human’s hands removed and placed at your feet to convey the seriousness of my demand? We don’t consume their hands or feet, so no one from the kitchens will be too cross if she arrives there to be butchered without them.”

Archambault’s eyes shot to the sentry that held Thérèse by her iron collar and nodded.

“Wait, please, my lord!” I fell to my knees before the man and raised my hands to beg mercy. “I’m uncertain of its meaning other than what she claimed. Please allow me to tell you everything I know.”

A scream came from Thérèse as the wolf took hold of her right hand, which he meant to snap and rip off from her wrist.

Hold, the marquis ordered, and the sentry stopped his action at once.

“Speak, then,” he said to me, impatience growing in his voice.

My whole body trembled now, and I struggled to collect my thoughts.

“Gabrielle is afraid, my lord.”

Archambault’s eyes sharpened.

“Go on,” he commanded. “What is she afraid of?”

“Of her powers,” I said. “She cannot control them. She claims they come from her wolf, and only if her wolf feels great hatred toward her enemy. Gabrielle fears an enemy could neutralize that hatred easily by sending someone she cares for to destroy her instead of a blood-thirsty army. She fears her wolf would do nothing to harm someone she loves.”

Archambault glanced at Chastain, who hadn’t taken his eyes from me, and then to Lupofiero. He guarded his thoughts, but I’d seen the look of triumph in his eyes plainly enough. He had what he wanted from me: a secret—something decisively powerful he’d never considered. And at that moment, I understood how I’d betrayed Gabrielle and Father to their graves.

After he ordered Thérèse returned, Archambault sent me with Bishop Toussaint to my cell.

As I followed behind Toussaint, grateful Thérèse was no longer in the room. I didn’t want to see her face again. Surviving my shame would be impossible if she knew the truth, and I allowed myself to believe she’d never recognized me from across the salon as she writhed in horror. Nor did I didn’t want to believe the marquis’ inference he would send her to the kitchens not as a servant but as food. The monstrous idea turned my stomach.

“What will happen to me now?” I asked Toussaint when he’d shut my cell door.

“You did well,” he answered. “I cannot say with certainty that his lordship, the Marquis, will surrender you to my care for absolution, nor what his plans might be for you at all. But I’m confident you did yourself a great service by being so forthcoming about your former master.”

He nodded with a warm smile and left me alone, the light from his single candle flame diminishing as he disappeared back into his chapel.

Former master. I realized that even if I hadn’t doomed Gabrielle by revealing her secret, I would never have returned me to her, to either of them. I was Archambault’s creature now, if not the Vicomté’s. My only hope was to stay with the bishop, the only man here who’d treated me with any modicum of kindness.

His mercy is all I deserve now, I thought. I took to the ground and cried, as I had often done since I was imprisoned here.

Before I could think too long about it, footsteps approached again, bringing with them a blaze of torchlight. In moments, several wolves appeared, accompanying the Marquis du Archambault and Don Lupofiero, followed by the bishop. I scrambled to my feet and bowed my head.

“Boy…” Archambault began. He paused as if he intended to start again. “Esprit, I’ve decided you will live to help me end the evil harbored within these lands. Don Lupofiero has convinced me you are as blameless as one can be for their crimes.”

I looked at Bishop Toussaint for guidance. Upon his demonstrative bow, I returned my eyes to Archambault and dropped my head.

“Thank you, my lord.”

“Very good,” he said. “I am working with my advisors now to decide the best use for your services and expect to realize our plan of action by the end of the week. During that time, I’ve instructed the bishop to help you with your penance and purification. With his love and support, you will become the child of God they have denied you from being.”

I didn’t comprehend what this meant, but I trusted the bishop more than anyone here, and I let my gratitude show as I dropped to my feet and reached for Archambault’s hand to kiss.

“Very good,” he said with a satisfied nod. “While he prepares to begin your ritual, I’ve given Don Lupofiero my consent to speak with you. You may rely upon him to give you sound counsel and assurance that you have made the correct decision here.”

I looked to Lupofiero for only a moment before bowing my head again to Archambault, offering more words of gratitude.

A second later, I stood alone with Lupofiero, the light of a torch left behind by the guards.

I stared at him in silence, remembering what Archambault had said about him, how he had been the one who had killed his father, Sempronio. And I remembered Gabrielle’s struggle when she told me the story—the tears in her eyes when she sighed upon her finished tale—and what this miserable man’s name was to his family.

“Duccio,” I whispered.

Tension took his face, and pain etched through his eyes. He had seen Gabrielle’s face in my mind, her tears of anguish, and he’d felt my sorrow now.

“Are they well?” he asked in his rich baritone.

“Does it matter?” I returned. “Now that I’ve ensured you’ll finish your family’s slaughter, does it matter if they are well?”

He didn’t answer but stared back at me. Were I not exhausted, desperate for comfort and rest, I might have observed him with a contrasting eye. Duccio was handsome to a fault, with his closely shaven jaw and dark hair pulled back from his face. Even in his foreign suit, he was every bit a gentleman. His hawk’s nose flared under his heavy brow in response to my question, but he would not take my bait.

“How are they?”

“They were fine when I left them,” I said.

“They’re survivors,” Duccio added. “But are they happy?”

I couldn’t help but scoff at his words with an unreserved scowl.

“I’ve spent the last year of my life dreaming of being as happy as they are. What should I dream of now? That you and your friends will give them a clean death?”

“You needn’t bother,” Duccio answered. “The Marquis will offer them no such kindness. No, dream now of surviving what awaits you instead.”

My mouth trembled at his meaning. I wanted to spit in his face, but I hadn’t the strength to answer for it, as he no doubt would insist.

From down the hall, I heard the bishop’s footfall, and when he arrived at my cell, Duccio stepped aside for him as if he understood the man’s purpose.

Toussaint nodded to him with deference before unlocking my cell. “If you’re ready, Esprit, I have prepared for the ritual.”

I nodded to the bishop and followed him out.

“I meant what I said, Esprit,” Duccio’s voice called after me when I was a couple of paces away, and I turned to look at him. “Survive this.”

There was nothing but earnestness in the man’s large blue eyes, and he nodded to me as if meaning to lend me strength. But I thought nothing of it at the moment. Knowing his actions and crimes, I felt nothing but spite for the man.

Turning back, I followed the bishop without response.