Promised to the Crown (34 page)

Claudine Deschamps surpassed her sisters in looks, though perhaps not in grace. She was seventeen—almost exactly Manon's age, with dark brown hair and eyes that shone. Emmanuelle was almost sixteen and stouter than her sisters, but her hazel eyes that contrasted with her mahogany hair merited a second look from the young men of her acquaintance.

“You've been well then, my dear?” Nicole asked as she placed a massive loaf of bread in a basket with a jug of soup.

“Yes.” Manon paused to look at the perfectly roasted venison on the plate that Madame Deschamps placed at the table, praying none could hear the rumbling of her stomach. New World foods cooked in the French tradition; foreign and familiar, all at once. “I've been trying to learn the methods my people use for treating illness. That's why I came. I was gathering herbs, for a remedy, for my little brother. I wouldn't have ventured so close to your lands otherwise.”

“You're welcome to gather all the herbs you need here, darling,” Nicole said with a glance toward her husband.

“Of course,” Alexandre acknowledged, “though I would avoid Rocher. He had an unfortunate encounter with an Indian man a year or two back and is a tad leery, as you surely noticed.”

“I'll bear that in mind,” Manon said, keeping her less charitable thoughts to herself. Nicole flitted about the kitchen gathering more things to place in the basket.
I'll be lucky to make it home before daybreak carrying such a burden. Please do hurry
. The images of Tawendeh growing weaker and more feverish plagued her, but she would not shame herself by appearing ungrateful.

“You're sure you can't stay?” Nicole's eyes looked pleading as she scanned the room for anything else she could send along in the overflowing basket.

Claudine took a seat across the table from her brother-in-law and cleared her throat too loudly for it to be anything but a hint to her sister to sit down to the family meal. Nicole could not see that her younger sister was staring intently at the back of her head, seething impatience. Manon's view was unobstructed.

“I wish I could, truly, but I must tend to my brother and the others. And I wouldn't wish to intrude on a family meal.”

“Manon, your visit is not an intrusion. Please promise you'll come see me?” Nicole took Manon's hands in hers, gripping as though to prevent her from slipping away a second time.

The thought of walking through the settlement, dressed in her deerskins, and knocking on the door of one of the finest houses New France could boast caused her empty stomach to churn. “I cannot promise, but our paths may cross again.”

“I hope so, sweet girl.” Nicole's eyes shone as she took Manon in her arms for a long embrace. Manon accepted the overladen basket that Nicole thrust at her and thanked her and Madame Deschamps extravagantly. It was enough food to feed her family for at least two weeks and one fewer worry for her as she nursed Tawendeh back to health.

Darkness had set in, though the waxing moon cast plenty of light to see Manon home. A fine carriage could not pass the rough paths to the Huron settlement; only a rugged wagon could make the journey. Nor would Manon accept the loan of a horse, so she set off toward home on foot. The faces of Nicole's abundant family flashed in her memory one by one. Nicole's darling children, proud husband, loving parents, and lovely sisters.
You've filled my place admirably, Maman. Nicole. I hope, truly, that you've been happy.

 

Mother Onatah looked up from her young son, who was still drenched in sweat and mumbling incoherently despite the cold cloths she applied to his forehead and face.

“No change.” Manon's words were not a question.

Mother Onatah acknowledged them with a grim nod. Though the fever had yet to take a death grip on the boy, they both knew not to treat any fever with frivolity.
Yarrow tea, sooner rather than later.

Manon added the herbs to her mortar to make a thick paste to boil into a pungent tisane. Too weak to protest, Tawendeh swallowed the potent, bitter brew and reclined back into his mother's embrace.

“What can we do now, Skenandoa?” Mother Onatah's black eyes glimmered with the unshed tears of her concern.

“We wait.” The response was cruelly honest, but she would not give her adoptive mother false hope.

Mother Onatah had welcomed the frightened twelve-year-old girl as her own when Manon returned without warning from the French settlement. Onatah had stood before the council, claimed the girl as a daughter, and given her the name Skenandoa—
deer
—owing to her long limbs, graceful gait, and skittish nature. She was thus made an official member of Big Turtle clan, but Manon learned quickly that the Huron distrusted her French ways and her education as much as the French distrusted her brown skin and accented speech.

Still, Mother Onatah had given her a home, and it was better than no place at all. As the older woman ministered to her son, Manon scanned the house for an occupation. The small longhouse was in disarray. Manon had been gone for hours and Tawendeh commanded all his mother's attention. She began by organizing the pouches of dried herbs she'd strewn about that afternoon when she discovered her stores had run low.
I'll not make that mistake again
.
I'll gather herbs every week during the growing season for the rest of my days. My carelessness could have cost Tawendeh his life.
Chastising herself, she added more kindling to the fire and urged the flame higher in case more yarrow tea was needed.

“He's sleeping,” Mother Onatah whispered to her. “You ought to do the same.”

“I couldn't sleep, Mother. Not while things are unsettled.”

“Then go for a walk and come back ready for rest. I'll have need of you in the morning.”

“Very well.” She didn't bother trying to persuade Mother Onatah to take a turn at sleeping herself. While Tawendeh was in danger, neither would sleep until her body forced her into repose.

Manon stood outside the longhouse, breathing in the midnight air—crisp, but mingled with the woodsy tang of chimney smoke. The light of the waxing moon bathed the village, preventing Heno, the chief's son, from taking her by surprise.

“There you are, my beauty,” Heno said, emerging from the wood. His name meant
thunder
in their language, no doubt the Chief's attempt to inspire confidence in their allies and fear in their enemies. Thus far, the strategy had proven effective, for his son grew strong and tall—the perfect hunter-warrior.

“Good evening, my brave hunter,” she said, offering the handsome young man a kiss as she took him in her arms.

“How is young Tawendeh?” he asked, pulling back slightly from the embrace and tucking a loose strand of her hair behind her ear.

“Improving,” she said. “Mother Onatah ordered me to get some air while she tends him.”

“I'm glad she did,” he said, closing the gap between them and leaving a trail of soft kisses on her face, careful not to disturb the bruise.

“The white man?” he asked, tracing the edge of her puffy cheek with his finger.

She nodded. He growled softly in response. “How are the others?” Manon asked, resting her cheek against his broad chest to hide the injury and change the subject. She wouldn't let the stinking French farmer ruin her time with Heno.

“Fifteen more have fallen ill. No one has died yet, but a few of the elderly and one of the children look close.” He spoke as though reporting back to the council about a scouting expedition or a hunt.
He has to detach himself, or else it would be too painful.

“If only they would let me . . .” Manon began.

“I have spoken to anyone who will listen. They will come around. They'll have to.” Heno ran his fingers down the thick braid of black hair that extended down past her lower back, and gripped her even closer.

I just hope they will accept my help before it's too late.
There was nothing to be done, though. Any attempt to persuade them would only make them more wary.

“I need you,” she breathed between kisses.

“With pleasure, my beauty.” He pulled out of her embrace and led her to their favorite clearing, the place they had met for the past two years when the weather was fine. On colder nights they coupled in whatever warm corner they could find.

Though the night air bit and dew covered the grass, Heno's warm, muscled body drew her mind from the chill.

His mouth was ardent. His hands moved over her body with the confidence of an established lover. The man who taught her the art of love, despite all her misgivings in the early days. Adjusting to the ways of the Huron, where people viewed adolescent exploration as innocent and natural, took a while to accept after three years of Catholic indoctrination.

Manon lay in his arms for minutes—perhaps even hours—sated and impervious to the cold.

“I want to make a child with you,” Heno said, breathing in her ear.

“Please don't start this again. I beg you. Not tonight,” she said. “I can't bear to argue.”

“If you have my child, Father will be forced to let us marry,” Heno reasoned.

“He needn't do any such thing. And if he refuses, I'd be alone, with a child to raise.” Her grip on his arm grew tighter and she had to keep herself from digging her nails into his flesh. Few raised ire in her as much as their chief.

Heno perched up on his elbows, taking her chin with his thumb and forefinger, forcing her to look into the depths of his serious black eyes. “I'd never let that happen, Skenandoa.”

“You're the son of our chief. You'll do exactly as you're bid.” She brushed his hand away. “You're the prince of your people, no freer to do as you please than a prince of France.”

“I can't imagine the prince of a great country not being free to do precisely what he likes.” Heno's jaw grew taut as it often did when she mentioned the French.

“Listen when your father speaks,” she said. “His decisions have nothing to do with his happiness, but rather the welfare of his people.”
And that means seeing you married to a sweet, obedient girl who cares for nothing more than the traditions of our people and securing your lineage.

“That almost sounded like a compliment,” Heno said.

“Whatever the issues I might take with your father, self-interest is not one of them,” Manon said. “Though I will never care for the man who cast out his sister for taking me in.”

“I wouldn't say Onatah is cast out,” Heno said. “She still lives with her tribe.”

“Marginalized, because she showed me kindness,” Manon said. Heno sighed deeply, whether frustrated by her logic or his father's irrational fear of outside influence, Manon knew not.

“I will have you for my wife, my beauty.” He took her chin again, this time kissing her, claiming her mouth with his.

“Nothing would make me happier, my brave hunter,” Manon said as he pulled away.

For a moment she indulged in her favorite fantasy: a life where the tribe accepted her as Heno's wife. A pillar of her community. A healer. A mother. She allowed herself to consider it only rarely; in her heart she knew it would never happen. But as she lay in Heno's arms, optimism flowed through her veins, nourishing her body like manna.

“I love you, Heno,” she whispered, cupping his face and kissing his lips, savoring his taste like she would her last meal. “For now, just love me and let the future settle itself.”

“Always, my beauty.” He shifted to reclaim his position atop her, but Manon placed her hand on his chest. She gently pushed him to his back and straddled him, claiming her pleasure as the midnight wind stung her skin. For a few moments, she was neither Huron nor French. She was free of everything except her love for the beautiful man beneath her.

C
HAPTER
2

O
ne of Alexandre's stipulations of Claudine and Emmanuelle's staying in town was that they would obey Nicole as readily as they would their own mother. Had it not been for her brother-in-law's decree, Claudine would never have agreed to wake moments after the cock's crow to take supplies to the Huron village with her two sisters and their longtime friend Gabrielle Giroux. She wanted to scoff at the idea of traipsing through the woods with blankets and food to people who had not requested and who would not welcome their interference. But she stilled her tongue. Even if it meant enduring a morning in the woods, it wasn't worth risking Nicole's—or worse, Alexandre's—ire.

“Will one of the servants be driving the carriage?” Emmanuelle asked Nicole, who had come to ensure the girls were up and preparing for the day. Emmanuelle wasn't overly fond of horses since an unfortunate accident when she first came to the colony resulted in a seriously injured leg and the loss of a much-needed horse.

“Pascal Giroux will drive us in the wagon he uses for deliveries. It can maneuver better on the narrow roads than anything we have. Since we're taking supplies, we'll need some room.” The Giroux girl, Gabrielle, was the same age as Emmanuelle, and was included in many of their outings. She was the ward of one of Nicole's dearest friends, Elisabeth Beaumont, who along with her husband ran one of the most successful bakeries in the entire colony. Gabrielle and Emmanuelle were great friends, but Claudine had little interest in her aside from her considerable skills with needle and silk.

“We'll be down for breakfast shortly.” Emmanuelle smiled at Nicole, who backed out of the room with a nod.
Always sister's pet.

“Why in Christendom do we have to go out all that way to haul blankets and broth to people we don't even know? Didn't we send enough along last night? Can't Nicole send someone if she
must
send more?” Claudine asked to no one in particular.

“Because Manon meant a great deal to Nicole, and she wants to help if she can.”

Claudine rolled her eyes and bit her tongue. Emmanuelle always had a response for everything, and it was usually what Nicole and Alexandre wanted to hear. Worse, Emmanuelle offered her explanations as though she were explaining a sum to a befuddled child
. Maddening.

Breakfast was a harried affair, Alexandre eating leisurely while Nicole chided the girls to eat quickly so they could get underway. There was an unspoken censure in Alexandre's eyes, but he rarely contradicted his wife. She was so often the model of propriety and restraint that he must have felt obliged to overlook her few eccentricities. In particular, her affection for the Huron girl that Claudine sensed he never fully understood.

As they left the settlement, the houses and stone buildings gave way to trees and the wide, well-maintained roads gave way to narrow, rocky paths. Emmanuelle and Gabrielle chatted as they often did, but Nicole kept her eyes fixed to the path as though she and not Pascal were driving the wagon. Claudine looked at the endless evergreens and wondered why she had ever thought this would be some magical fairy kingdom where she would never be in want of diversion and handsome suitors. In her years in the settlement, she had yet to reconcile the shattered dreams of her twelve-year-old self, though she was now a woman approaching eighteen.

Claudine, having devoured the few letters Nicole had sent home, leaped at the chance to come to the New World, where her sister had married so far above her circle. When Alexandre's agent came to offer them passage to this New France, Claudine nearly screamed at her father's hesitance to leave their barren land. It hadn't taken much persuasion in the end. The voyage provided futures for the girls and their younger brother, Georges. What was more, their elder brothers would absorb the barren land into their own farms, giving them both sizable holdings. The land could rest fallow and it would bear crops again. It would still belong to a Deschamps, and that was as much as their father could have hoped for.

She'd pictured a shining metropolis, and was crestfallen when she learned she'd be living on a farm much like the one where she was born. The house was infinitely better. The land was fertile. But it was still a farm, and one that seemed to be a thousand miles from anywhere interesting. The fledgling town, while nothing to the lively bustle of Rouen, was immeasurably preferable to living out on her parents' homestead. She loved her sister for taking them in and vowed she'd make a good match since she had the gift of connections to some of the best society New France had to offer. If she had any luck, she'd find a man of good sense who wanted to return to France—maybe even the bustle of Paris—and would take her away from the monotony of country life forever. Somewhere there had to be a young man with dark hair and flashing eyes who would whisk her away to a life—if not of luxury and leisure—at least of adventure and varied society. She clutched her wool cloak tight about her shoulders against the damp spring air.
He has to exist somewhere.

In the meantime, Claudine lost herself in poetry. Permanently placed next to her bed was a love-worn copy of ballads by the
trouvères
—the courtly poets of medieval times—that a bookseller had given her when he realized her arresting brown eyes could actually read. It was ragged then, and wouldn't have fetched more than a few
sous
from the small population interested in his wares. Claudine had read it to the point where the corners were indelibly smudged with her fingerprints. While Emmanuelle read widely, Claudine found solace in the one tome. The depictions of gallant knights and maidens took her away from the tedium of farm life and chores even after hundreds of readings.

The Huron village came into view; rows of longhouses dotted the small clearing. A few men stood at the edge of a large fire, scowling like bears awakened midwinter at the small envoy of French who had just descended upon them.

Nicole stepped down from the wagon first. Claudine waited, her breath caught in her throat, as her sister approached the men. Nicole shook visibly, but stood as proud as the Queen herself.

 

Claudine had never seen such a living arrangement in her life. The building was high, even by French standards, and seemed to go on for a solid mile. There were pelts from deer, beaver, bear, and other animals covering nearly every surface of the immense building. It seemed Manon had managed to convince the council to separate the ill into a longhouse by themselves. The sick slept on beds built onto the wall like shelves—not unlike the bunks on the ship they had sailed on from France. The only noises in the longhouse were the wheezing and chattering teeth of the fever-riddled and the crackling of the fire in the pit where Claudine, Nicole, and the others watched Manon tending the contents of her thick cauldron. Nicole stood next to Manon, while the others gathered a step behind her, anxiously awaiting a command from one of them.

“You shouldn't be here.” Manon barely looked away from the vapors slithering up from her pot as she stirred.

“You need help, Manon,” Nicole said, stepping forward. “Please tell us how we can be useful.”

“By going home. I promise.” Manon's eyes were framed by sagging dark circles of exhaustion.

“You heard her, Nicole. She doesn't need our help. I'm sure she's quite capable of managing things on her own.” Claudine stepped forward and put her hand on Nicole's arm to lead her back to the safety of the wagon, but her sister would not move.

“Give us something to do,” Nicole implored. Claudine crossed her arms over her chest and restrained a sigh. Nicole's coolness in public, her composure, was always something Claudine admired; yet in the presence of this common girl, all of that restraint was gone. Nicole was once again the awkward farm girl from Rouen.

“I need more fresh water and yarrow flowers,” Manon said at length, as though speaking a dire confession.

“I'll fetch the water,” Pascal said at once from the dark corner of the longhouse where he had been lingering in silence, exiting before anyone could call him back.
He's a smart young man, probably trying to keep away from the fever. It'll be a miracle if we don't all catch our deaths.

“What does yarrow look like?” Emmanuelle asked. Manon produced a stem with clusters of dainty white flowers like a riot of miniature daisies.

“As much as you can find. It's the only thing that seems to be helping.”

“Let's go,” Gabrielle chimed in, gesturing to the door with the basket she held firmly in her right hand. “I think I saw a patch not more than a mile from here along the road when we came in.” Claudine followed Emmanuelle and Gabrielle, both of whom walked briskly to the main road that connected the Huron village to the French settlement.
Anything to be out of there and away from those people. Who knows when they'll decide they've had enough of us and choose to send us on our way by force? Or worse. I doubt her concoction even works. It'll probably do no more than give them a bitter taste in their mouths and a sour stomach.

As Gabrielle promised, the abundant yarrow patch was a ten-minute walk from Manon's longhouse. The gentle spring rains and nurturing sun had yielded wildflower patches thicker than Claudine had ever seen.

“Let's use knives and cut the stems higher up, rather than pulling,” Emmanuelle suggested.

“That will take longer and I don't want to have to come back for more.” Claudine knelt and began yanking the stems from the ground, roots and all, ignoring Gabrielle's glare.

“The plants won't grow back if you aren't gentle with them,” Gabrielle warned.

“I'm not wasting more time gathering weeds than I absolutely have to.” Claudine gripped another yarrow stem and yanked it from the earth.

“Claudine, the Huron depend on these herbs for their medicine. Treat them carefully.” Emmanuelle sounded so very much like Nicole that Claudine raised her head to see if their older sister had followed the three of them to the clearing. Claudine gritted her teeth at the rebuke.
Don't forget I'm the older sister. Learn your place.
But her censure went unvoiced. The world seemed to side with Emmanuelle and there was no winning.

“Fine. You two can sit here rolling in the weeds. I'm going back.”

Claudine thought about walking back to the settlement on her own. Perhaps she could entertain Alexandre with tales of how his wife was carrying on with a pack of savages with no regard for his respectability and position, but town was miles away on a path she didn't know.

She sat down on a boulder just out of view of Emmanuelle and Gabrielle and let the tears flow down her cheeks. Nicole had told her countless times that she was supposed to be a pillar of the community and the first to volunteer her services to those in need. It was supposed to feel noble and self-sacrificing, not tiresome and aggravating.
This isn't how things were meant to be. I am going to disappoint them both and they'll send me back to the farm for the rest of my days.

It was another quarter of an hour before Emmanuelle and Gabrielle met Claudine at the boulder where she had been sitting, having gathered enough of the yarrow to satisfy the demand, or so they hoped. To Claudine the overflowing basket looked like a pile of weeds big enough to treat several fever-ridden villages, but she didn't presume to know what went into the brewing of a tisane to cure fever.

Knowing long walks in cold weather irritated Emmanuelle's lungs and worsened her limp, Claudine took the overfilled basket and strode ahead. She was almost a hundred yards ahead of her sister and Gabrielle when the longhouse came into view.
Thank the Lord we didn't get lost. I'll learn to knit blankets for the poor after this so perhaps I might at least be able to be of service to the less fortunate from the comfort of the settee.

Manon sat beside an older woman who lay very ill with the fever. Manon held her hand and muttered words in her native tongue. The woman was petite to begin with, but the glow from sweat and the quaking of her shivering body made her look like a child. A weak child.

“I have your flowers for you,” Claudine announced, trying to call Manon's attention back to her. Manon simply held up one hand to command silence. Claudine wanted to fling the weeds at Manon's head in exasperation, but stood frozen to the floor. Nicole stood a few yards away, as transfixed by the scene as she was. Though Nicole was always the center of activity . . . always the one to organize everything . . . she stood immobile and useless. At seeing her sister in such a state, Claudine felt an ache in her stomach as though she were witnessing something unnatural—something wrong—like the dust flying off her father's barren field when she was a girl.

The fragile woman took a rasping breath, exhaled, and did not take another. Grim faced, Manon closed the woman's eyes. She stood, took the basket from Claudine, and returned to her cauldron over the fire where she added new flowers to the mixture.

Emmanuelle and Gabrielle now stood next to Claudine, and their eyes followed Manon as well. Claudine found the nerve to look at Nicole and raise a questioning brow. Nicole looked up from the deceased woman and crossed to her and the other girls.

“That woman was Manon's adoptive mother,” Nicole whispered in explanation. Claudine looked at Manon, kneeling transfixed in front of the simmering cauldron.
Poor girl. No one deserves to lose a mother so young.
There were no words or gestures that Claudine could conjure up that didn't sound ridiculous, so she stood in place and waited for someone to offer up an order. It was perhaps the first time in her life she would have been glad of a useful occupation, and consequently, the first time one wasn't eagerly waiting on the tip of her mother's or sister's tongue.