Alaric Longward - Cantiniére Tales) Read online

  REIGN OF FEAR

  Story of French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars

  Cantiniére Tales: Book 1

  By: Alaric Longward

  Text and story copyright © 2014

  Alaric Longward

  (www.alariclongward.com)

  All Rights Reserved

  Cover art and design by Laura Gordon

  (www.thebookcovermachine.com)

  ISBN 978-952-7101-01-8

  To Lumia and Arn, my sweetest darlings, the bright light of our lives. You make me smile like a child, happy beyond understanding and occasionally, curse softly when there is finally some peace in the late evening for us adults. I’d have it no other way, kids. I thank you for inspiring me in so many ways, day and night.

  Table of Contents

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  PEOPLE

  PROLOGUE: 1840 – CHERBOURG – THE GUARD’S COCK

  PART I: BOOKSISH GHOULS

  PART II: KING OF THE RABBLE

  PART III: PULLING ON THE BOOT

  PART IV: HAMMERS AND NAILS

  PART V: THE REVENANT

  1840 – CHERBOURG – THE GUARD’S COCK

  AFTERWORD

  PEOPLE

  Adam Baxa: younger brother of Guillemin Baxa, a hard working man, the schemer in the family, hoping to supplant Guillemin as the future master of the guild due to his industriousness. Father of Gilbert.

  Adéle d’Estoi: a prisoner at the Temple, friend to Jeanette.

  Agnés Carrabin: wife to Pierre Carrabin, a cook and cleaner at the Temple.

  Andre Carrabin: a jailer, works for Georges Danton in secret, brother of Pierre, husband to Mathilde.

  Antoine Saliceti: a diplomat and a leading figure in the French revolution.

  Augustin Robespierre: brother to Maximillien Robespierre, a revolutionary leader.

  Breadcrumbs: a sergeant with a huge brush of a moustache.

  Camille Desmoulins: a Cordelier’s Club member, a journalist, a politician.

  Chambon: colonel of the 4th Chasseur Battalion, a Jacobin and a weak-spirited tool for Gilbert and the Jacobins.

  Charles: a corporal in Jeanette’s company.

  Claude Antin: father of Florian Antin, a chocolate maker.

  Cleft: a chasseur in Jeanette’s company. Religious and bordering on fanatical Jacobinism, he is attracted to Jeanette.

  Colbert Baxa: a master in the Paris Book Guild, fat, religious and rich, he has secret ambitions and vices Henriette and Jeanette will discover to their dismay.

  Didier: captain Voclain’s man, a former Jacobin.

  Florian Antin: Henriette’s and Gilbert’s growing partner, their friend.

  Georges Danton: a leading member of the revolution, one of the head figures of the radical Cordelier’s Club and the first president of the Committee of Public Safety.

  Gilbert Baxa (the Revenant): son of Adam, cousin to Jeanette, he was to follow Adam to the book printing business, but will in the end become a feared man of the revolution, a spy, assassin and a schemer who knows much. He is known as the Revenant, for he came back from the dead, and he hates Jeanette and Henriette for many reasons.

  Guillemin Baxa: father of Jeanette, Julie and Jean Baxa. A journeyman to Colbert Baxa, a master in Paris Book Guild. Guillemin is a desperate man, with many weaknesses and is the cause to the downfall of Jeanette and her family.

  Henri d’Montepello: captain of the 5th company of the 4th Chasseur’s battalion. Later colonel of the battalion. Impossible former noble, a true soldier with many scars.

  Henriette Baxa: Mother of Jeanette, Julie and Jean Baxa, and of Jacques Lefebvre. A cantiniére with Jeanette, she fights with her to keep alive and to find her lost children.

  Humps: a musician sergeant in love with Jeanette.

  Jacques Lefebvre: born during the Italian campaign, he is Jeanette’s half brother.

  Jean Baxa: son of Henriette and Guillemin, a baby and twin to Julie Baxa, brother of Jeanette.

  Jeanette Baxa: daughter of Guillemin and Henriette Baxa. The main character, a girl in the revolutionary Paris and as a woman, a cantiniére of the French army.

  Julie Baxa: daughter of Henriette and Guillemin, a baby and twin to Jean Baxa, sister of Jeanette.

  Lafayette: the Hero of the Two Worlds, an aristocrat that embraced the revolution in America, leading the French forces there, he was part of the French revolution as well. Creator of the National Guard, he had a hand in the creation of the Rights of Men and Citizens, but ultimately failed to help create a kingdom with constitutional restraints.

  Laroche: a chasseur, a poacher and a thief, Jeanette’s friend and helper.

  Madame Fourier: Colbert’s old lover and business associate.

  Manuel Voclain: captain of the 4th company, a former Jacobin and supporter of Gilbert.

  Marcel Lefebvre: Sergeant major of the 5th company, Henriette’s new husband, father to Jacques Lefebvre.

  Marie-Louise: a beggar and street-dweller in Paris, friend of Jeanette.

  Mathilde Carrabin: wife to Andre Carrabin, a cook and a cleaner at the Temple.

  Maximillien Robespierre: lawyer, politician, strong man of the French Revolution, a Jacobin and the face of Terror.

  Mirabeau: an early revolutionary leader, he was a noble that betrayed his creed and started to preach for a constitutional monarchy. Hated by the queen and the king, he was a balancing force between the monarchy and the radicals, swaying people by his powerful oratory.

  Paul Barras: a French Revolutionary leader, and one of the main leaders of the Directory period beyond 1795.

  Pierre Carrabin: a jailer, works for Georges Danton in secret, brother of Andre, husband to Agnes.

  Poxy Fox: captain Voclain’s man, a former Jacobin.

  Robert de Dreux: a prisoner at the Temple, lover to Henriette.

  Skins: a chasseur and old soldier in Jeanette’s company.

  Stanislas-Marie Maillard: a captain of Bastille Volunteers, a leader to the march to Versailles, Maillard was a figure that seemed to take part in many of the main events of the Revolution.

  Syphilis: a sergeant who has suffered from a suspicious disease previously.

  Thierry: captain Voclain’s man, a former Jacobin, husband of Vivien.

  Vivien: a cantiniére, married to Thierry, enemy to Henriette and Jeanette.

  PROLOGUE: 1840 – Cherbourg – The Guard’s Cock

  Dear Marie.

  When you read these lines, years from now, you might understand the storm of conflicting emotions one must endure, when one’s love and trust has been shaken by unexpected news of betrayal. Naturally, anger is one of these emotions, and yes, Marie, I was angry yesterday. I was angry beyond words, hardly able to breathe for it. You see, a customer of our tavern, the Guard’s Cock, a young man called Damon, deep in his cups spoke of his past life. You know this fine young man, I know. He told us of his recent employment and how he adored a young girl of eight, eight, mind you, the beautiful scion of the noble family of de Courcillions.

  De Courcillions. Ah, but I knew that name.

  I knew your father was the last of his illustrious line, so it was not hard for us to deduct it was my daughter’s husband drunken Damon was discussing. Yet, we did not know there was a small lady called Marie in this world, and that meant the count was no longer the last of his line, had not been for eight bloody years, and it meant your grandfather and I, we have a grandchild.

  Imagine that, Marie, if you can. For eight years, we have been blissfully unaware of you. So yes, rage and anger followed bewilderment like a corpse follows a cannon shot.

  As
we accosted him, trying to fathom if this was indeed so, wondering if it was even possible, Damon was proved honest. He knew your mother; our wayward daughter and we believed him. In the following, harrowing discussions, he confessed he knew of a distant family on the girl’s mother’s side, but had never met them, for there was a whiff of a scandal, the servants had gossiped, and some thought the countess was not of noble stock by birth.

  Well, these servants were right in that, Marie. God, I snorted at his words. He was drunk, yes, but keen enough and found the reason for our interest and many questions while exploring our enraged faces. We are that very distant family, and the dreadful scandal as well. That damned countess, your mother is our daughter. Damon enjoyed the rest of his night, trust me, and we did not hurt your friend, no matter our anger.

  I, on the other hand, saddled my surprised horse, loaded my old pistols, fetched my battered sword and got ready to ride my nag like the devil itself was intent on devouring us, but your grandfather resolutely stopped me. He pulled me from the relieved horse, took away my pistols and sat on me in a pool of cold mud until I gave up. It took some time, love. After that, while pouting at the corner table of the tavern, I gazed at your grandfather with sibilant, vengeful eyes, but he ignored me and expected me to calm down.

  So I tried.

  Little by little, I succeeded, fortified by stiff cognac. The rage was and still is there, love, lurking at the edge of my mind and it is natural, I know. I cursed your mother foully, often and loudly, and had I made it where you live, I would have switched her rear, and it would have been a sight to remember as a crude, old tavern keeper gives a countess a trashing on her silk covered ass. God knows I trashed her rear often when she was a child, so I know how to do that.

  Yet, one of these conflicting emotions I feel is love, and so I am grateful to your grandfather for having given me a mud bath, for that feeling is strong, stronger than rage, and more sensible in some ways. One needs a heaven full of love to cope with desires impossible to fulfill, especially when one suddenly learns of a granddaughter of eight years old, one we did not previously know about, one whose life is a total mystery to us. But here I am, today, barely coping, and I use love to ward off the ill feelings I have towards your mother as I write my thoughts down, slave to love and not rage, not like it was yesterday. Perhaps tomorrow it will be different, for I am irascible and change my mind often. My old war wounds do not help my temper, nor do my aching joints. I am old, love.

  God, I still love her. I love you too, even if I have never seen you.

  I smile at love. It is such a mystery. To know love, one has to be omniscient. Few are, but what I know about it is that true love has nothing to do with reason. Not everyone understands this is so. If you ever hear a person listing the ingredients of love in the finest, most excruciatingly detailed way, casually naming them as if they were dearest friends, then you know the love they know is based on an agreement or compromise, likely picked from simpering books full of supposedly prudent advice. Love like this is but a mask. Grant them this masquerade, Marie, but know; they are missing out on a great, fantastic adventure. I doubt these people could love their wayward daughter like I still love your mother, even after what she has done to us. No, these people know nothing.

  Rather look at the people who shrug, when asked. They smile politely, half dreaming, their memories overwhelming them and they have little to say to those who accost them about love, but observe, Marie, that only fools think these silent dreamers have not loved.

  Love, an all-encompassing love is a seed in one’s soul. A true love like this is hard as Spanish steel, enduring as a rugged, storm whipped mountain. Love like this is not unlike the brilliant morning sun over the desert, the splendid colors of red, yellow and ochre spreading across sky that was once dark and cold, void of pure light and meaning. After that, if your love endures, it burns less but instead settles into the warmth and peace of a midday sun. When the night comes, as it will for all us mortals, the pale colors of fading light remind you of a life lived well.

  Like this, I also loved my children; I still do, though only two remain alive, but the seed is strong. The seed of wondrous love that was planted inside me at their painful birth remains, love. It makes me smile, often mysteriously, as I contemplate on the affairs of my children and I know I love and sometimes hate them, for I am a mother.

  And so I smile now, even if I feel deeply betrayed.

  It has not been an easy life between your mother and I. First and foremost, Marie, we are both stubborn as scarred mules. Second, we are both women. In Egypt, it is said it is safer to kiss an irritated monkey than try to settle a dispute between two quarrelsome women. Most women possess little patience for nonsense, and nonsense, Marie, is what fool men and rebellious daughters are all about. She would replace “daughters” with “oppressive mothers,” but that is moot and your mother has no saying in what I write.

  There are many things burning me, despite the love I still hold for your mother, despite the stubborn seed. One is the new seed that took root yesterday. The one for you. I am aching to know you, of you, what you do, what you are like. I missed being there when you were born, bloody and loud to the world, pissing on the grinning midwife. I heard it was so, from Damon, though I doubt he was there, the lying bastard. He told us how you grew up, being a little brave monster, climbing like a stubborn monkey, falling over the fancy furniture and giggling at brilliant pranks that you tended to overuse. He spoke of your many toys, plentitude of fine books and how deeply inquisitive you are, with a good head for languages and mathematics.

  Well, I thank your father for that. Your mother is not a learned woman, other than what she learned for herself, but she knows to run a business, loot the fallen and sell at a profit. She was a child of war, Marie. It runs in the family. Yet, while I thank your father for your upbringing, the many opportunities, I sit and muse what your mother will teach you. She might, or might not, expect you to be tough as nails; able to face the world’s many hazards. She might prepare you for the world, or she might think to make you a porcelain doll, fanciful and fragile, in hopes to forget her own tougher past. I’ll not have that.

  Nothing threatens you, Damon claims, but one day, something will.

  It is certain; as certain as rain in October, and then love will not help you, love. Only determination, ruthlessness and rage will, and these are the things I know about, and your mother as well, under the silken trappings of nobility, for it was not always so that she ate from silver plates. No, Marie, it was not. Our family, your blood is tough and stubborn, and while not noble, it has all the qualities that made men and women nobles to begin with. You are blessed in many ways. Some ways you do not know of yet. But you will.

  I will tell you my story.

  If I will never meet you, God help it is not so, I will leave you a legacy. I will tell you the story of your family, not the story of a soft silk and silvered plates, the mundane ways of a modern noble family, but the rough, bleeding handed story of a Parisian refugees of the Revolution, and what that did to us. It is not a pretty story, Marie, no. Not always, at least, and I realize you are too young to read it now, but one day you will not be and it will hold, until then. I will devise a way, should I not be allowed to know you, to deliver these pages to you. I will fight savagely, Marie, so that I will meet you, but should I lose, this is my backup plan. Soldiers plan for many eventualities.

  Oh, I was a soldier, Marie. Yes, I was. So were your grandfather and my mother. Even your mother was one, though she was but a child then. We fought for our France. No, that is not right. We fought for each other, to be exact and to us, the army was France. Today, Marie, in fair Cherbourg, at the end of the fine peninsula resembling an erect penis, forever ready to fuck the Brits, as the sailors claim, our emperor came home. It was a sad affair, despite the old cripples in mottled bear skins, tough old veteran guardsmen and scarred, silent former officers with missing feet, arms, even an odd nose from the terrible Russian mistake
. He came home, our Napoleon, the shit looking ship mooring forlornly, the dusty, crude cask getting lifted from the hold, swinging unceremoniously and he no longer could see us saluting him or the faded flags full of names of the terrible places we made him and France proud and it was drizzling. He went on for Paris, but we looked at each other, knowing it was the last time most of the splendid men and women would meet. They came, mostly, to our tavern and today, they are gone. God, I will miss them. They are family, for I was a cantiniére. A cantiniére is part of a military company, a strong and skillful woman who sells the men looted victuals and much needed clothing, precious medicines, interesting books and crude tobacco and gives them a place and an ear to speak of other matters than the army. She shares in on the plentiful misery and sweetest of victories, and sometimes she too falls dead with them, her family. There are graveyards, Marie, which my family fills.

  At this point, love, I must warn you.

  Please note, love, that I am a woman, but not one of the simpering fool of women you see in your fancy salons, giggling and silly, prudent and soaked in good manners, but cut from a different tree. I was pretty as the sun, still am in my old age, I dare say, but I speak roughly and forthrightly, sparing no words and have little use for niceties. After I lost our father, mother and I spent our time with the crude, scheming revolutionaries, in a crowded prison during the time of the Terror and then, for much of my past, as a cantiniére of a military company, with the rude army, and such women are forever different from the wives and ladies of this society of ours. Indeed, I’d have it no other way. So, excuse me, Marie, for my words, should they be offensive, and excuse me, if you find my way of hiding little offensive as well. Mea culpa, love.