Page 101 of Dragons of the Great Wyves: Fire and Song
Rebecca grabbed my wrist with the strength of shock. My medical training, that bloody gauntlet of surgical amputations and childbirths, slammed into place, suspending my bodily reflexes—do not vomit; do not faint—even while mourning and panic overwhelmed my thoughts.
The perfumer had not broken stride. She stopped four steps away. Cloying citrus and musk spilled through the air. She frowned at the colonel’s body. “Quel dommage. I do not like to lose the flying ones, but your soldier was quick, and a sting is…” She waved a satin-gloved finger, hunting for words, then settled for, “not quick.”
“Salope,” I enunciated carefully, an obscenity I had never heard, only read in one of Georgiana’s cheaply printed French novels.
The perfumer tapped her palms together, an ironic clap muted by cloth. “Bon français!But we are told always how English ladies are polite.” She looked past me at the museum doors. “The Great Wyfe visits the great museum. Why?”
I did not answer. Wild thoughts raced. Run—but Rebecca was petrified. Fight—but I had no concept how one fought. The pistol lay a few steps away. The hammer had closed, but it had not fired. I did not understand the mechanism well enough to know if it could be reset.
And the perfumer had killed a skilled soldier. Effortlessly. In a heartbeat.
“What is in your hand?” she asked, and pointed to the flute’s mouthpiece, clutched and forgotten. Childishly, I moved it behind my back. She arched an eyebrow. “I think we visit for the same reason.”
French soldiers were entering the courtyard, running single file in the concealing shadow of the west wing. More. Twenty. Thirty. An officer marched to the perfumer, stopping uneasily some distance away as if afraid of her scent.
“Cherchez à l’intérieur,” she told him.
“Do not harm the curator,” I said. “He knows nothing.”
The perfumer watched as the officer selected four men. They propped the museum doors wide and ran inside. The officer shouted flamboyant commands after them, a performance that allowed him to put several more steps between himself and the perfumer.
Be literal. Be accurate. The flute is worthless. I held it out to her. “I found the flute. You may have it.”
Strangely, that made her suspicious. She angled her chin toward Rebecca. “Qui est-elle?” Who is she?
“A friend,” I said. “I am helping her leave the city.”
Rebecca released my arm. I hazarded a look, and our gazes met. Her eyes narrowed as if to convey some message, but I had no idea what.
The perfumer took two steps closer, toes in line like a dancer. At the limit of our combined reach, she stretched out her hand. I passed the mouthpiece to her. She retreated and examined it, nose wrinkling when charcoal marked her glove.
She shook her head. “Non.”
“It is the flute,” I said. “All that remains.Il n’y en a plus.” There is no more.
She displayed the split end, the charring. “The Emperor will not accept this.” She shrugged and slipped the mouthpiece into a pocket of her gown. “That is sad. I need a proper gift. A gift that ensures victory. A great gift.”
She sank her hand in another pocket and tossed something on the ground—a handful of wriggling, finger-length crawlers. They scurried aimlessly. After so many monsters, common crawlers seemed a trifle, but that was foolish. The smallest crawler was lethal.
“The Emperor learned much from your Lydia’s books,” she continued. “He orders that the great wyves never unite. So, I see my great gift. The death of a Great Wyfe.”
The crawlers skittered forward.
The artificial calm of my medical training had held. My fine muscles were relaxed, what Dr. Davenport called surgeon’s focus. I pursed my lips and whistled the summoning song. Beside me, Rebecca was desperately scraping the sealing wax from her syringe of draca essence—she must have had it ready in her hand—but faster yet, the song draca arrived, streaming between us and the perfumer like a sparkling brook, singing harmony to my melody while their blue fire snapped, burning the crawlers to smoldering crisps.
The song draca spiraled up, an airborne flock of shimmering aquamarine and sapphire. The loyal one assumed his perch on my shoulder.
The perfumer watched with professional interest and a certain grudging respect. “Les presages. Vous êtes devenue une grande sorcière.”
“I am no sorceress.”
“Then your songbirds will not save you.”
Rebecca shouted a grating, female battle cry and raised her syringe like a warrior’s crossbow. Draca essence squirted twelve feet, dousing the perfumer’s face and soaking the bodice of her gown.
The perfumer made a disgusted grimace. She wiped her face, smearing inky kohl and red lip paint, then looked at her luridly discolored gloves. “Merde.”
A discordant whine began around the courtyard. The French officer, who had sidled even farther away, turned and ran. His men followed.
