Page 54

54

A NEW DAWN

T he earliest rays of sunrise were straining beneath the curtains when Henry’s fingers moved again.

Eyes closed, the first sensations he became aware of were cool air ghosting across his skin, and beneath his fingers, something soft.

Gossamer. Barely there at all until his fingers curled, and it became real.

He knew it as Léon’s silken hair.

He wet parched lips, aware of a deep, scraping dryness in his throat.

It hurt to swallow. His eyes opened with a twang of white pain, and a creeping nausea forced them shut again.

He shifted, his arm aching, his body sore all over…

And there was a hot weight on his stomach.

With an effort, his head tilted down, and he searched through bleary vision to see the face of his beloved.

Long eyelashes on beautiful cheeks, asleep, but with deep lines etched into his brow, his pretty fingers scrunching into Henry’s sheets.

He felt hair against his cheek, and discovered Catherine, sound asleep by his shoulder.

Another wave of nausea came for him.

He shut his eyes up against it, his skin crawling all over.

But the touch of Léon’s gorgeous tendrils of hair called to him, and just as soon as he could reel the sick feeling in, he reached deeper into the plentiful golden locks, his hurt arm protesting with a pain sharper than any it had given off before.

He let out an involuntary groan, and Léon’s head snapped up.

He stared at Henry, just as if he’d seen a ghost. As if he couldn’t entirely believe he was there.

He pushed himself to sitting, staring in blank shock.

“Did you wake?”

“Looks like I woke you,” Henry whispered.

“I didn’t mean to.”

“You woke me?” Léon meandered another moment somewhere close to a smile, then promptly burst into tears and threw himself on Henry, crushing his hurt arm in the process, eking a pained cry from him.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered desperately, reeling back.

“Your arm.”

“No, it’s…” He took a hand to it.

The skin burned all the way to his shoulder.

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not, and it almost killed you.” Léon dropped back to his chair, holding Henry’s good hand feverishly, studying every feature.

“How are you feeling?”

“A little rough,” he admitted, finally.

“But I’m really fine. I keep telling you.”

“You are not!” Léon snapped.

He leapt up and took a cup of water from the bedside table.

“Drink it.” Henry leaned forward, but Léon wrenched it away, spilling a little on the sheets.

“But only sip it. The tiniest bit. But sip it until you finish it all.”

Henry gave him a loving, slightly bashful smile.

“All right, Ange.”

Léon settled nervously, watching as Henry took the cup in his good hand.

“You were asleep for… It’s been a whole day and night. Guillotin came. He said…” Léon’s lips turned pale with the hard press of them.

“He said to say goodbye to you.”

Henry looked down at Catherine, then émile and Souveraine next to her, then at the room all about them, broken and smashed to pieces.

“You got sick,” Léon said.

“You got sick because you didn’t fix your stupid arm when I told you to. And then Guillotin said you were going to die. So…” Léon followed Henry’s eyes as he searched over the detritus.

“And then…” Henry looked pointedly at his sister.

“I couldn't not tell her.” The simple statement, the acceptance of Léon’s understanding of his sister, the complete catastrophe of the room, and undoubtedly of the house, touched Henry with a warm and a slightly delirious humour. He raised glowing eyes to Léon, who met them with a blush and a smile, and Léon let out his first laugh in two days in sheer relief, a cathartic release from the vice of stress. He dipped his head against Henry’s waist. “Are you going to be okay?”

“I think so,” he said. “I feel…” He tried to think it over. A day earlier, he had known he was dying. Something late in the piece, before he slipped into the long and uneasy slumber, had alerted him. Some grave fear in his heart. But he hadn't wanted to scare Catherine and endanger everyone, and when he asked for Léon, he wasn’t there. And now he was glad of it.

“It was Catherine’s powers,” Léon said softly, watching her sleeping.

“She woke you?—”

“And then you told me to kill it,” Henry murmured.

Léon’s gaze snapped over to him.

“You remember.”

“Not well. It was like a dream. I could just feel… It was as though I could feel your heart. But it was in my chest. And it hurt. It hurt so much, like it was being torn apart. And then…” His hand reached out absentmindedly, just as it had when he’d stopped Catherine.

“Then…” He looked up at Léon, eyes bright, as if he’d just come back into reality.

“You kissed me. In my dream. You kissed me, and I felt all my energy, this whole world of power come back to me. And I saw this, sort of patchwork of black dots, millions of them, and you told them to die, and they did. They just curled up and slipped away at your word. And I thought…”

Léon, looking deep into his eyes, gave a small nod of encouragement.

Henry squeezed his hand.

“I thought, this is it. Your heart, my heart… Beating as one. It was as though your heart was beating for mine, Léon. And I was alive again.”

Léon came close by Henry’s side, brushing his hair back from his brow, staring down at the man who loved him so deeply.

He felt the connection every bit as much as Henry had.

Henry’s strange and magical control of life and death, and it had wrapped itself around Léon’s heart, saved him at the last, every bit as much as he’d saved Henry.

“It beats for you, now and forever. We cannot part again. I told you I would die without you.”

Henry leaned into the kiss Léon dropped on his cheek, but caught him around the neck before he could pull away.

“I wouldn’t have woken up today without you.”

“You wouldn’t have gotten shot without me.”

“Yes, I would have. I’d have been killed trying to save Catherine. Or boosting a carriage. You have saved my life numerous times. And you did it again last night. And I love you. I wish I could repay you. But there’s nothing I can do. Nothing to make up for everything you’ve been through.”

“You can drink that water.”

Henry laughed, relinquishing his hold on Léon to take another sip.

“And you’ve brought us here. Me and émile. And Souveraine. And Henri… I made you soup.”

Henry smiled wide and adoring.

“Did you?”

“I did. And now I’ve probably ruined it. I should go check.”

“Not yet.” His fingers slid into Léon’s.

“Please stay close to me. For a while.”

That was all too easy for Léon to do, even if he remonstrated, “You need to eat. Something healthy. I got vegetables and mutton. It will do you good.”

Henry’s stomach begged for it after so many small, hard cheese scones.

But he was already dwelling on their finances, awake to the guilt of having let Léon down by getting sick.

“Please don’t spend your money on me.”

Léon smiled with redoubled excitement.

“I didn’t. It was your article, Henri. I didn’t get to tell you. Obviously. But I took it over there, and they loved it. It made the front page. It’s going to be on today’s paper.”

This news was stranger to Henry than everything preceding.

He barely remembered writing it.

Some vision of a quill, swimming in nausea.

“What do you mean?”

But Léon was too exuberant with his reawakening, with being able to tell him the good news, to catch his confusion in full.

“It’s going out to all of Paris this very day. And they want you to write more. You’ll have money, you'll have influence. You’ll have all the things you ever wanted. This is it, Henri. You’ve done it.”

Henry pulled Léon’s hand to his lips. He must have written it, he supposed. And if everything Léon said was true, it must have been good. Even if he didn’t remember a damn word of it. He took in Léon’s expectant, happy face, and, wanting only smiles there, threw away his caution. “I’ll have everything I ever wanted if you stay in Paris.”

“Of course I will,” he assured him. “I can’t ever be without you again. And more than that, I believe in you. I believe in all the beautiful things you say. I believe you’re going to change everything. I believe the goodness in you will seep into the hearts of every person who reads or hears your words, and this revolution… Nothing can stop it. They’ll kill the King. And then we’re going to be so happy.”

“We are, Léon,” Henry whispered, bolstered body and soul by Léon’s love for him. “This is really it. This is our happy ending.”