Kushiel's Chosen - Jacqueline Carey [285]
Forgotten, the Illyrians lowered weapons on the stairs, catching their breath. Those rioters, the true sons of the Scholae with work-stained hands and bewildered faces, began to retreat or flee, sensing their cause abandoned.
Not so with the mercenaries, who continued to fight. I do not think they were skilled or numerous enough to have taken Ysandre's guard. They didn't have to be. It wasn't the point. They were enough to press the D'Angelines, engaging them—even the Cassilines, who had not yet drawn to kill. They wouldn't, in a Serenissiman temple, not without the Queen's order, unless her life was truly threatened. It was enough to maintain a cordon of safety around her.
Ysandre's face was taut with fear and anger; mostly anger. Across the Temple, I stared at her, at her Cassilines. One by one I stared at them all, my gaze returning again and again to one in particular, in the forward left position, as I remembered an afternoon in the Hall of Portraits, where there hung the image of Isabel L'Envers de la Courcel, my lord Delaunay's enemy, the mother Ysandre so resembled.
And there hung too a portrait of Edmée de Rocaille, Rolande's betrothed, the woman he would have wed if Isabel had not arranged an accident.
My mother was responsible for her death, you know.
I knew; oh, how I knew! That death had shaped my life in ways I could scarce encompass, forging Anafiel Delaunay, a Prince's beloved, into the man his enemies would name the Whoremaster of Spies; turning me, an anguissette raised to serve pleasure in the Court of Night-Blooming Flowers, into one of his most subtle weapons.
One death; so many repercussions.
I stared at Edmée de Rocaille's brother.
If I had not been watching him so hard, I might not have seen it, the beginning of that fateful turn in the clear space that surrounded him, graceful and flowing, tossing his right-hand dagger in the air and catching it by the blade to make ready for the throw.
"Joscelin!" I grabbed his arm with one hand, pointing with the other. "There!"
Joscelin had spoken truly; a Cassiline Brother planning to assassinate his sovereign would indeed be prepared to die.
David de Rocaille was performing the terminus.
SEVENTY-FIVE
David de Rocaille!" Given from the balcony, Joscelin's shout echoed from the vaulted dome as he hurtled into motion, wrenching out of my grip and whipping past Kazan's startled Illyrians on the stair. At the far end of the Temple, the grey-clad figure faltered ... and continued onward with the terminus, setting the blade of the left-hand dagger at his own throat while his right arm cocked for the throw.
Directly at Ysandre de la Courcel, the Queen of Terre d'Ange.
She hadn't even seen the danger, gazing instead at the balcony with the frown of an embattled monarch, wondering what new threat the outcry betokened.
At the sharp curve in the staircase, Joscelin leapt onto the railing, catching himself to balance above the fray, flipping the dagger in his right hand to hold it blade-first. David deRocaille did pause then, and I think for an instant their eyes met across the crowded space. With a death's-head smile, the brother of Edmée de Rocaille looked at the Queen and made to cast his dagger.
And with a prayer that was half-curse, Joscelin threw first.
I do not think it is stretching the truth to say that Cassiel himself guided Joscelin's hand that day, for it was an impossible throw under impossible conditions. I cannot think how else he made it. End over end, the blade flashed over the heads of skirmishing guardsmen.
Ready to die or no, David de Rocaille reacted on instinct, blocking the strike with one vambraced arm. Joscelin's dagger clattered against it and fell harmlessly to the floor. Slow to react, those nearest turned, uncertain what had happened. Closing his eyes briefly, David de Rocaille bowed and sheathed his daggers, reaching over his shoulder to draw his sword.
With a wordless cry, Joscelin launched himself from the railing, scattering members