Chapter 1
A man in a crisp, gray uniform stood before me, squinting down at a sheet of paper. “Are you Lieutenant…Eve Masters?” His face contorted into a perplexed look, and he shrugged to punctuate it. I forced myself to picture things from his point of view, seeing a young woman in military uniform. My long, auburn hair was in a heavy braid, and I knew that my heart-shaped face and rounded cheeks wouldn’t inspire confidence in a veteran soldier. The top of my head barely came to the man’s chin, and I had to look up to meet him in the eye. My uniform had required intensive tailoring to fit, but I was thankful for a slim frame and modest curves that dulled the femininity of it. The incessant clacking of typewriters buzzed in the background, but was muted by curtains hung along the stone walls. I straightened my back, stuck my chin out, and gave a quick nod.
“Yes sir, Lieutenant of the Special Courier Service, as of last week.” I suppressed a smile, still feeling a bit of pride at my promotion to officer. Only a scant month ago, I’d been a field nurse with no rank at all. “Do you have my orders?”
“They’re sending a fresh mug out on this one?” The man snorted, pulled an envelope from his pocket and passed it across to me, while not answering my question. “Good luck, darling.”
The pet name caused me to bristle, and I clenched my free hand into a tight fist. The calfskin of my glove creaked in protest, but I managed to swallow once, heavily, and regain my composure.
“Same to you, sweetheart.” I snapped, instantly regretting it. The man gave no notice, but I was trying to set a good impression during my first mission. As he trundled away and back into his office, I flipped the envelope over in my hands, peering at the wax seal that held it shut. The sound of several code breaking personnel on their typewriters was slowly driving me insane, so I left the room before opening my orders. Inside was a slip of parchment, simply worded and to the point.
Lt. Masters,
You are to reconnoiter the Devil’s Bridge warehouse and report back on any Apache Gang activity in the area. You are acting of your own recognizance, and should take such actions as are necessary to prevent harm to the civilian populace of the city.
-Major
I still hadn’t learned the major’s actual name. He seemed to use it rarely. An enigmatic figure, he had arrived in the hospital while I was recovering from a disastrous misadventure. I had been stationed at Fort Vaux, a hardened military fort at what had been the front lines. When the Germans made their push to Verdun, it was surrounded and besieged. Another major, Raynal, had crammed a courier bag full of intelligence and sent me through a secret tunnel to escape.
That’s a story for another time, but I made it back to Entente lines and was promptly shot by friendly fire. The major had heard of my escape, and came to offer me my current job. The Special Courier Service wasn’t strictly a military outfit, but we had the authority to deal with the military on even terms. Our job was far more clandestine; we handled various traitors and enemy agents, and dealt with the sort of thing that other groups didn’t particularly care to admit existed. The Courier in our name was a red herring; we weren’t involved with delivering messages in the slightest. Rather, it kept attention off of us while giving us an excuse to crop up in strange locations.
This was more of the former, as the Apaches were a violent street gang in Paris. They had a tendency to show up behind weapon sales and illicit materials. If they were using this particular warehouse near Notre Dame as a waypoint, we might be able to deal a serious blow to their supply lines. The sun was blazing as I stepped outside of the municipal building and onto the streets of Paris, and I longed to be wearing light civilian clothes, rather than the heavy wool that seemed so prevalent in the military these days. I tucked the envelope into my satchel and mounted my new motorbike.
It was only a matter of finding a spot to watch, and I had already formulated a plan. A single kick was all it took to roll the engine over, and I gunned out toward the Seine.
*****
Sickly yellow and barely illuminating, the shielded light of an electric lantern stretched feebly into the warehouse rafters. It was enough for me to see the path ahead, but only scarcely. I stayed low to the support beam, my legs wrapped around it, pulling myself forward with my arms. The chattering of a pair of voices wafted up, but the distance was sufficient to steal any meaning from them.
When I arrived, it had been instantly obvious that there were no Apaches here. The interior of the warehouse was plastered with communist propaganda and a severe scent of sulfur. It was for these reasons that I had chosen to get a closer look. The only way to do so was to head to the roof, but even from here, I couldn’t see anything of value. There were a couple of men dressed in simple civilian clothing, loading unlabeled crates into the back of a truck. If I wanted to know the contents of those crates, I’d have to get closer.
When I reached the far end of my beam, I found myself only a few feet above a support strut for the wall of the warehouse. After dropping quietly onto the horizontal surface, I made my way across and onto a set of ancient metal stairs that groaned painfully beneath my weight. The sound made me freeze in place, waiting for the shout of alarm that would signal my discovery, but none came. I scurried down the stairs as fast as I dared and crouched low to the ground. The voices were clear now, from such a close proximity.
“And why do you think Notre Dame would make a better target?” This came from a taller man, who was seated on one of the multitudes of crates. He had a half-full bottle of wine in his hand and took a swig while waiting for a response.
“Religion is a greater enemy than the ghost of an emperor,” the other man, a mousey fellow with a scraggly beard, said with exuberance bordering on zeal. “We’d do better to invoke Napoleon as our own.”
“The man didn’t have a communist bone in his body,” the first replied with a slight slur. I circled about the clear area at the base of the stairs and came up behind the truck. I could still hear them talking as I slowly pulled a tarpaulin from over the crates, but their voices were muffled by the distance.
“Not true! He was a great supporter of the common man, you’ll recall,” Mousey argued vehemently as I pulled my stiletto free from the side of my boot. His voice had grown louder as a result of his increased emotion. I began to pry at the nails on the nearest crate, working slowly to avoid any noise.
“Be that as it may, we don’t decide who to hit. The boss does,” Wino grumbled, and the conversation fell silent, just in time to make the sudden crack of a board deafeningly loud. I had misjudged my leverage and snapped one of the slats on the lid of the crate.
While it exposed the interior, and the deadly red cylinders of dynamite within, it also brought a challenging shout from Wino. “Who’s there?” I couldn’t see the two from my place behind the truck, but their investigating footsteps rang loudly on the warehouse’s cement floor.
“Don’t move!” Mousey added. He came into view in the space between the truck’s cab and bed, still unaware of my exact location. A heavy caliber revolver had materialized in the span of time I hadn’t been looking directly at him. “I have a gun!”
“So do I!” My impulses got the better of me, as they had a tendency to do, and I shouted before the thought had fully run through my head. My hand responded in kind, pulling the awkward weight of a Colt 1911 from the holster under my left arm.
“O-oh yeah?” Mousey squeaked, his voice raising an octave. He had turned to peer through the truck’s interior as best he could. “Well, I don’t believe you! You sound like a woman.”
“What difference does that make?” I growled, keeping the truck between me and the two men. The light of the electric lantern lit the only path to the door, cutting off a stealthy escape. If I tried to run, they’d have a clear shot the entire time. Coupled with the fact I’d be leaving a pair of terrorists with enough dynamite to wipe out a small army, I decided to try a distraction, searching my immediate area for an object I could pitch into the distance to create a sound. I found a heavy wrench, and just as I let the tool fly, I felt a pair of strong arms encircling my waist.
I was lifted right as the wrench clattered to the ground behind the truck. I could see Mousey jump into view in front of the truck. There was a roar as his pistol fired into the ground, which seemed to startle everyone involved. Judging by the stench of old grapes, Wino was the one who had grabbed me, but he paused to shout at the other communist.
“Don’t shoot near the truck! You’ll blow us all to hell!” I yelled, flailing my legs ineffectually, wrestling with the man’s grip, until I remembered the pistol. I didn’t really want to shoot him, if I could avoid it, but the gun was weighty enough to give some damage potential to my fist. I squirmed around until I could get a good arc and slammed the butt of the thing into the man’s cheek. Wino fell over with a grunt, and I had the opportunity to scramble away and hide beneath the truck. I could see the electric lantern’s bulb now, and took careful aim with the pistol. Shooting came naturally to me, or at least I’d been doing it for so long that it felt natural. I fired two shots, shattering the bulb, and an electric spark lit the nearby pile of tarps on fire.
“I told you to stop firing! We’ve got to get out of here, or we’re going to be obliterated,” Wino cried, and I could hear the truck’s passenger door opening above me.
“It wasn’t me! She must really have a gun!” shouted Mousey.
The driver’s door opened as well, and both doors slammed shut at nearly the same time. The engine grumbled painfully before rolling over, spitting out exhaust smoke. I flattened myself tightly against the ground as it began to pass over. As soon as the air space above me was clear, I leapt to my feet and made a beeline for the exit. I didn’t know if there was any dynamite left in the warehouse, but I sure as hell didn’t want to find out.
I heard them squeal out of the warehouse, and it seemed the driver was having trouble navigating the truck. The flames had spread quickly and were now lapping at the walls of the old building. I rushed out and around to an alleyway tucked in between the warehouse and an old harbor building, retrieving the motorbike I had left there on my way in. Just as I kicked it into gear, the two men had managed to force their way through the tight street and blazed past in the direction of central Paris.
I revved the motorbike’s small but powerful engine and streaked off in pursuit, noticing with alarm that a small lick of flame had caught on the truck bed’s cloth covering. This would turn it into a rolling bomb that was heading directly into a heavily populated area of the city. Gunning the engine once more, I managed to come up even with the passenger’s side door. I gestured wildly toward the truck’s bed, but Wino wanted nothing to do with me and disappeared from view. I was forced to turn my focus back to the road, swerving around a kiosk. When I narrowed the gap between us once again, Wino had returned to view in the truck’s window, now armed with Mousey’s pistol. It roared for a second time that night, and the shot went wide. Still, it had what I assumed was the desired effect, as I braked and distanced myself from the man’s line of fire.
Despite the population, the late hour had mercifully sapped the roads of any stray traffic, and our high speed dance continued as we passed further from the river. The Arc de Triomphe itself was lit up festively that night, and my eyes widened as I realized the two still intended to hit their mark. My hand left the grip and reached once more for the Colt. I may have been a natural shot, but I certainly wasn’t a natural driver. The motor bike was still new to me, and in the process of trying to drive it one handed, I nearly slammed into the side of the truck. I managed to steady up, just as the truck, and myself, jumped the edge of the plaza. The impact as I came back down was jarring, and I braked reflexively. The truck shot off into the distance, headed directly for the Arc.
I saw the two men leap from the vehicle and brought my own to a stop. The unmanned truck barreled forward at breakneck speed, veering to the left towards one of the Arc’s support struts. Stilled, I was able to aim slowly down my gun and let off a single .45 caliber shot that pierced the rear left tire of the truck. The sudden change in grip and balance caused it to turn violently to the side and roll, coming to a stop a few dozen yards from the edge of the Arc. The cloth was now fully aflame, and it didn’t take long for the first crate of dynamite to catch. The sticks began to detonate to no rhyme nor reason, a series of deafening pops that lit the night air with shrapnel and sound.
Bloody, broken, and barely mobile, Wino and Mousey put up little resistance when the police arrived. Luckily for me, the major arrived with them and ushered them quickly away before I aroused suspicion.
“So, I trust that these weren’t Apaches you were dealing with, then?” The major asked, a bushy white eyebrow rising.
“Communists, sir. I didn’t think I should let them blow up a monument like this,” I answered sheepishly, averting my eyes from the superior officer. The Arc itself caught my gaze, stretching high into the night sky above us. I had the distinct impression of a mausoleum or cemetery monument, as a result of the blocky, irregular façade. The arch itself was cut from the center, offering a pathway through to the opposite side. My gaze lighted on the exterior structure of the Arc, where the explosions had managed to do some superficial damage.
“I applaud your initiative, Lieutenant, but I think you may want to reconsider your tactics for the next time.” The major rifled through his uniform pocket, his hand emerging with a pipe. As he set about preparing it, he continued to speak. “You remember that it’s best to call in reinforcements, rather than try to tackle everything alone.”
“Well, ” I started to argue, but bit my lower lip to silence it. There was no need to antagonize so early in my courier career. The major packed a bit of tobacco into his pipe and lit it with a trench lighter, drawing air through before puffing it out in a cloud of vanilla-scented smoke.
“Now, let’s investigate the damage, hmm?” He began to walk at a steady pace toward the corner of the monument structure, and I fell into step behind and to his left. As we drew closer, it became obvious that the damage had punched through the exterior layer of stonework and into an interior room of some sort. Dust was still billowing out, but the major wasted no time in clambering up and into the chamber, so I followed suit.
The diffuse street lights outside could barely penetrate inside the monument so I flipped on my electric torch. The harsh light revealed an immaculately decorated room, with two dusty portraits set into the far wall. The first showed a stout man with black hair, dressed in an early 19th century military uniform and instantly recognizable as Napoleon Bonaparte. The other was a stately woman in contemporary fashion to the emperor, seated prim and proper before a parasol.
“Well, now, isn’t that interesting,” The major mused, stepping across a dust-covered rug to stand beside the portraits. Between the two was a classical-style pedestal, and an interesting, if utterly empty, stand. “Seems there was something here, once, but I’d say it’s long gone.” He expelled another haze of tobacco smoke, and turned to survey the remainder of the hidden room.
I took a moment to lean in closer to the paintings, squinting to see the finer details, before turning to another wall. There was a doorway set into it, but it had been bricked up and likely couldn’t be seen from the opposite side. Next to the entry stood a pedestal topped by a leather-bound journal. After stepping in closer, I cautiously lifted the cover.
I leafed through the first few pages, seeing nothing of glaring interest, before flipping to the last filled page. “Major, I think this might give us more information.” The page was dated near the middle of the previous century, and I could vaguely hear the major make a sound of approval from behind my shoulder. I slid my fingertip along the page, beneath the line I was reading.
They’re building barricades across the city; we won’t have much time. I’ve hired a coach to spirit us from the city, but I must make certain that there is no way for them to discover the rose. I leave this, in the hopes that once this revolution is over and crushed, someone may find the rose and preserve it as it so deserves.
-Jacques Chevalier, Servant of the French Empire
“I can’t say I’ve ever heard of this rose,” the major said, fitting his pipe into the corner of his mouth. “Sounds like just the sort of thing we should investigate, wouldn’t you say?”
“Yessir!” My words formed together from excitement as I realized just how quickly this had turned from an anti-partisan campaign into a treasure hunt. It was the latter that had attracted me to the job offer in the S.C.S., but I hadn’t expected to be involved in a hunt so soon. The major reached across to pluck the journal from the podium, carefully closing the cover, before tucking it under his arm.
“What do you say we head back to the office and see what we can dig up about Monsieur Chevalier?” He offered a rogueish smile and turned to scale back out through the hole left by the explosion. “This is always the best part of the hunt.”
“Chasing down a treasure?” I asked readily.
“Oh my, no. We have several long days of research ahead of us first!” he said cheerfully, tapping his pipe out against his thigh as my spirits fell. “I’m getting far too old for field work. I much prefer my books.”
