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#15
JUL 09 |
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“Final Conflict”
Remy LeBeau shot up in his bed. Bella Donna Boudreaux, the unbalanced woman who was also his wife, stood in the doorway of the infirmary. "Belle?" he asked cautiously.
Bella Donna smiled. "Yes," she said. "I've come for you, Remy LeBeau."
"Where's de nurse?" Remy asked.
Bella Donna's eyes flicked behind the doorway and down. "She's occupied."
Remy's eyes widened as he saw the small pool of crimson spreading outward. "You killed her," he said.
"Of course I did," Bella Donna said as she stepped into the room. "She was in my way."
Remy tensed as he tried to think of a defense. "Why're you doin' dis, Belle?"
Bella Donna smiled again. "You don't know," she said with surprise in her voice. "Incredible. How could you not know?" She took a step forward. "I'll just have to show you."
Jean-Luc LeBeau paced in his inner office. Souris stood before him. "Are you sure?" LeBeau asked.
"Y-y-yes," Souris replied.
"De Antiquary," LeBeau muttered. He turned back to Souris. "You've got yo' money. Go on."
Souris bowed slightly and hurried out.
LeBeau sat down behind an ornate desk and put his head in his hands. "Not again," he whispered. "Not de Antiquary."
"Belle, t'ink about dis," Remy warned as Bella Donna continued to advance toward him. "De war's over."
"And we lost. Is that what you want to say?" Bella Donna asked.
"Nobody won," Remy said. "Dat's what dose dead T'ieves would say."
"Why do you sound so sure?" Bella Donna asked. "You haven't gotten to ask them yet. Allow me to send you to meet them!" With a scream, she leaped at him, dagger held upright and ready to tear into his flesh.
Nice place, Fontanelle thought. She stood on the porch of an old Southern plantation house. She heard birds singing softly in the trees. A slight breeze rustled through the green leaves. She turned the knob and the front door opened easily. She stepped inside and closed the door behind her. She looked around the large foyer and smiled. "Very nice place," she murmured. She heard ice clinking in a glass and turned to follow the sound. Jacques LeBeau sat in the library, sipping a drink. He turned as she entered.
"So this is your dream," Fontanelle said as she entered. "A life of peace. Free from the eternal struggle between the Guilds. Be careful. It is a noble wish, but it can be easily manipulated."
"Who are you?" Jacques asked as he stood.
"Someone who needs information," Fontanelle said. "Show me what you know of the Antiquary and his relation to your brother."
The scene changed and Fontanelle stood in a darkened nursery. Her nose crinkled as she was surrounded by the hospital smells. She instinctively took a step back into shadows as the door opened and a nurse stepped inside carrying a newborn.
"This poor child," the nurse whispered. "His eyes." She laid him down in a bassinet, and then pushed the bassinet out of view of the window. "May God protect you," she said to the child, "because I doubt that anyone else will, poor thing." She gently kissed his forehead and then left the room. Fontanelle walked to the bassinet and looked down at the infant. He opened his eyes for a moment and she saw the telltale black eyes with red irises. Sensing an opportunity, she glanced at the baby's chart to read his parents' names. The writing on the chart was blurred and illegible.
"Interesting," Fontanelle murmured to herself. "So not even Jacques LeBeau knows who his brother's true parents are." She turned as a window in the back of the room silently creaked open. A glance at a clock showed that four hours had passed. Jean-Luc LeBeau, remarkably unchanged over the last twenty-plus years, dropped soundlessly to the floor. He made a straight line for the child. He reached down, and the infant grabbed his finger. An unfamiliar emotion showed on Jean-Luc's face as he gently scooped the baby up and left the same way he had entered.
Remy was ready. As Bella Donna dove at him, he threw the pillow he'd been charging at her. It exploded, throwing her back into the wall. He jumped to the floor and started toward her. A wild slice from Bella Donna encountered only air, but still kept him back.
"Belle, stop dis before you hurt yourself," Remy said.
Bella Donna smiled a mad smile as she climbed to her feet. She still held the dagger out. "The last time we fought I won. You're only alive because Gris Gris interfered where he shouldn't have."
Remy took another step back, keeping an eye on the knife. Mental note, he thought. Never fight in just boxers again. Not a lot of protection. "Belle, he did it after you stabbed me in de back. You'd already lost de duel."
Bella Donna laughed. "He's not here now," she said. "And after I finish with you, he's next."
Fontanelle looked around as the scene changed. Jacques LeBeau now stood beside her. "Where are we?" she asked, taking in the lush scene.
"The Antiquary's," Jacques spat.
"Is that him?" Fontanelle asked, pointing at a man sitting on a throne. He resembled a Caesar in his looks and haircut.
"The same," Jacques admitted.
"Who is he?" Fontanelle asked. "I have heard his name and it provoked an… unusual response." Unusual wasn't the word for it. She'd never seen New Son almost… well… panic.
"A former thief," Jacques said, emphasizing the word former. "He believes in vague prophecies and magics."
"A magician?" Fontanelle asked.
"He has done battle with Dr. Strange," Jacques said. They watched in silence as Jean-Luc entered and handed the infant to the Antiquary.
"So what was so horrible about this?" Fontanelle asked. "Your father stole your brother from a hospital and gave him to this old man."
"For use in the Velvet Ministry," Jacques said.
"What is that?" Fontanelle prompted.
"We do not speak of it," Jacques said and was gone, leaving Fontanelle to study a frozen scene of the Antiquary looking into the infant's eyes.
Remy gasped as Bella Donna's blade sliced into his left forearm. He gripped the wound, trying to stop the bleeding as his insane wife continued forward. In desperation, he grabbed a blanket off the bed, charged it, and threw it onto her. Bella Donna screamed as the blanket burned her, fighting to get it off.
Remy ran backwards into the next room. His feet hit the puddle of blood and went out from under him. As he fell, he saw that Bella Donna had freed herself from the blanket and was charging. He hit the floor and rolled. The knife struck the floor where his head had been only a moment before. Remy flipped onto his knees and grabbed a large ceramic bowl from a counter. He threw it. It struck Bella Donna in the head and she fell to the ground. Remy picked up the knife and threw it away. It skittered under a bed. He turned back to Bella Donna, who had picked up a large shard of porcelain.
"So you think you've won again," Bella Donna said.
"Don't do dis, Belle," Remy pleaded as he started forward.
With a final defiant smile, Bella Donna took her porcelain shard and slit her own throat from ear to ear.
"NO!" Remy yelled as he dove forward, trying to hold the wound closed with his hands. Her blood flowed out under them without slowing.
Bella Donna's eyes fluttered open one more time and she looked up. "Why, Belle?" Remy asked with tears flowing down his cheeks. "Why did you do dis?"
Bella Donna's only response was to spit a gob of blood in his face before her eyes closed again. Remy could sense that her chest had stopped rising.
"No," Remy said. "No. Somebody help me!" he screamed as he knelt beside his dead wife.
Two days later, Jean-Luc LeBeau stood in the infirmary. Another Thief, their doctor, stood beside an empty bed that, until recently, had held the covered body of Bella Donna Boudreaux. Gris Gris (the acting leader of the Assassins' Guild) and an assembly of Assassins had come to retrieve her and to take her to her burial. Remy still hadn't emerged from his room. Meals that Jean-Luc had ordered sent to him were returned untouched. He was unaware of Gris Gris's message to the Thieves - there would be no reprisals because Bella Donna had been acting alone, but no Thieves, including Remy, were to be at the funeral.
The doctor turned to Jean-Luc. "What can you tell me?" Jean-Luc asked.
The doctor picked up a folder from his desk. Although he had once had a formal title, much like Tome, Hoard, or Elixir, it had long since been forgotten. Now he was only referred to as the doctor. "No real surprises on the autopsy," he said. Due to his medical schooling in Connecticut, he had no accent. "Cause of death was the wound to her throat."
"And you told dat to de Assassins?" Jean-Luc asked.
"Yes," the doctor replied. "I was also able to prove that the positioning of the body proved that your son had told them the truth."
"My t'anks, Doctor," Jean-Luc said. "That bit o' evidence may have just saved a lot mo' lives." He paused a moment. "What did you ask to see me for?"
The doctor paused a moment before retrieving another sheet of paper from the file. He handed it to Jean-Luc. "I felt you should know about this before I destroyed this evidence."
Jean-Luc looked up, his eyes wide. "She was pregnant?" he asked.
"Was," the doctor said. "At the time of her death, the fetus was no longer in her body."
"Did she miscarry?" Jean-Luc asked. "When she fought Remy in dat duel, she wasn't showing, so she couldn't have had it."
"No," the doctor said. "I found traces of a chemical agent in her bloodstream. Elixir confirmed it. It was an old Assassin formula designed for one purpose - to terminate an unborn child."
Jean-Luc fell to the floor. The doctor dropped his folder and ran to help the leader of the Thieves' Guild into a nearby chair. "She murdered my grandchild," he said.
"Yes," the doctor said. "Apparently she and your son had intercourse after he went to rescue her from that rogue Assassin. I would estimate that was the point of conception."
"Why? Why did she do dis to us?" Jean-Luc asked in a daze. "Did she hate us dis much?"
"I don't believe she had a choice," the doctor said. "As you recall, she received a dose of the Elixir of Life some time ago.*"
"Oui. Dat was when our pact wit' Candra was broken."
The doctor nodded once. "Her brother Julien was driven mad by the Elixir. From the accounts I have read, she did not receive a full dose. I believe that the madness simply took longer to manifest because of this."
"Den she got her wish," Jean-Luc said as he slowly stood. He handed the paper back to the doctor. "Destroy dat, and never mention it to anyone."
"Understood," the doctor said.
"She got her wish," Jean-Luc quietly repeated as she left the room. "She won."
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The End...
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