L'Ange de la Mort (The Art of Revolution #1)

Chapter Thirty-Two - 14. March. 1789



Lizabeth

Lizabeth doesn’t remember starting to run. 

She remembers tumbling out of Versailles and into the night air, sobbing against Marguerite’s shoulder and refusing to let go. She remembers minutes later, when she lost the strength in her legs and collapsed on the ground. She remembers struggling to breathe. 

But she doesn’t remember how she got just outside the palace doorway—gasping for air while Marguerite shook her shoulders and told her over and over, it will be all right, everything will be all right—to here. The night rushes past her skin and clings to her lungs, filling them with all the breaths she couldn’t take before. Her shoes are off, her stockings landing in a steady thump, thump, thump on the chilled pathway.   

All around her are the gardens she’s come to love so dearly: the rows of towering hedgerow; the bronze fountains; the groves tucked between the trees like a well-kept secret. Her mind makes no conscious decision to run, but her body continues on anyway, past the water parterre with its twin glittering ponds and down the sloping hill leading to the great lawn. When she reaches the end of the hill, she takes a sharp left, dashing through a row of boxwood hedges until she bounds into the Ballroom Grove. And there, she stops. 

The grove is calm and still, silent save for the water bubbling over the tiered stone amphitheater. Moonlight shines against the gilt lead vases and pedestals flanking either side of the grove, and a light breeze blows cool air past her skin. She lowers herself onto the gravel and turns to the sky, trailing her fingers along the surface of a small canal. 

The night is clear, beautiful even, with a bright moon and an expanse of twinkling stars. But the beauty of it all mocks Lizabeth, laughing at her despair and confusion. If only it were stormy or bitterly cold, then she could feel comforted by the weather, and not like God is playing some cruel joke on her for his own sick amusement.

She twirls her dagger in her injured hand, wincing whenever the metal brushes up against her broken skin. If she weren’t so distraught, she might even be embarrassed for the way she conducted herself before in the darkened hallways. In front of— 

She squeezes her dagger, letting the sharp pain clear her mind. She can’t even think of his name without wanting to scream and sob all over again.

For when Lizabeth thinks of him, all she thinks of is the hate putrefying inside her heart. She hates the way she allowed herself to become so distracted by his words and his touch and his kiss, hates that she was stupid enough to think she was beginning to belong, hates that she almost had everything she’s ever hoped for, and it was just as quickly snatched away. 

This is because of her curse—because she dared to try and find happiness when she didn’t deserve it. She should have never come here, or befriended Marguerite and Sophie, or involved herself with him. 

What is there to do now? It’s not as if she can just go back to England without having killed L’Ange de la Mort. This was her one chance to prove to her mother she was worth something, that she could do something right. She can’t fail, even if it means bringing an end to Gabriel de la Marche.

But the thought of killing Gabriel is the most terrible outcome of all. Lizabeth can't fathom sinking her knife into his flesh, or watching blood spill onto his skin. There has to be another way. Some option she hasn’t thought of yet. One that will allow him to live, and will allow her to gain her mother’s love. 

Except there isn’t. 

Because Lizabeth tried to rearrange her stars, forgetting the stars cannot be moved.

It doesn’t matter if she doesn’t want to tread this path, or live this life, or feel this anguish surging straight through her bones. 

There is no use in trying to change fate. 

If the heavens intended for Lizabeth to be a killer, then a killer she’ll be.

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